She opened her eyes and faced him, revealing a vivid ache in her gaze. “I think … I used up my heart completely this afternoon. There is no space for any new feeling to take hold, Ban. Only for what already lived there, and rooted long ago.”
“I was there.”
Elia nodded. “As he has always been. And you are here now, and that is … it is such a balm to see you.”
“Just in time for you to leave, to trade places with me in Aremoria,” he said angrily, wanting to remind her sharply that Morimaros of Aremoria was not rooted in her heart. But he said no more, shocked at his conflicted loyalty. Morimaros deserved much better from him.
She shook her head sadly, disapproving of his anger. Then she asked, “Why did you come out here, to this place you dislike?”
“To escape our fathers,” he muttered.
“There are many ways to do that. Are you looking for a prophecy? It is what this place is for.”
“You should know better. I came to invite myself back to the roots of Innis Lear. To the voices of the trees and stones. Since there is no well from which to drink.” He stalked to the eastern stone, where the moon hung a handspan above it now, and the Star of First Birds sparkled just to the side. As he approached, the stone grew and grew against the darkening sky until it swallowed the moon whole. Ban put his hands flat against it and pushed. It did not budge, of course, but he ground his teeth and shoved, straining with all his strength. His boots slid roughly.
Elia appeared beside him. “Ban?”
Suddenly he stopped. He flopped against the cool face of the monolith, sweat seeping off his skin and into the porous granite like the stone drank up his sacrifice. “I want to tear it all down,” he whispered, panting. He would destroy Lear and ruin his father for their relentless devotion to uncaring, unflinching stars.
She leaned beside him, flat against the rock. For a disorienting moment, he remembered lying with her on the ground like this as children, facing each other to watch the slow progress of a snail.
They stared at each other as the night deepened and the stars lifted themselves to cast hazy light over the frazzled edges of Elia’s curls. Ban thought again of kissing her, touching her mouth, her neck, the ringlets of her hair. He tried to think of nothing else, just her. To calm himself with her image, her breath near his breath. She was Innis Lear to him, all the goodness and potential of this forsaken land, and now the king was sending her away. If he accomplished his goals here, might he follow her home to Aremoria, and find welcome and peace where she was, both of them with Morimaros?
Then Elia said, “These stones have always been here. They can’t be destroyed.”
“Someone made this place.”
“The earth saints, long ago. They’re grown into the ground now. Indestructible.” Elia sounded defeated, but sure.
“Like a father’s love?” He could not help the mockery.
She broke in half, bending at the waist. “I don’t understand it, Ban. I don’t understand how he let this happen. What did I do?”
Rage cut through him, turning the starlight to sparks and fire.
“Nothing,” Ban whispered. “You did nothing wrong. I will prove it to you, somehow, how easy it is to ruin a father’s heart. To turn them against a beloved child.”
The idea blazed in him: he would show her.
He would use Morimaros’s game to his own advantage. If he could convince Elia, draw her over to his side, the world would be right, for the first time, no matter how terrible the truth might seem. Elia of the Stars and Ban of the Earth, bridging that terrible chasm. “You’ll see, Elia, that it’s not a flaw in you making this happen, but in Lear himself. A flaw your father embedded into the heart of this island. Fear and absolutism. When you understand he has no power over you, then you can be home. I will make you a home with this proof.”
Elia pulled hard away from him
“Don’t be afraid. Be bold, like you were today.” He slapped his hand on his chest. “All I have is what I was born with, no star promise, and it’s made me bold, won me what little I have. It’s what will push me further, allow me to take what is mine. That is what I want. What do you want? What is yours? What is it that makes you bold, Elia? Bold enough to look your father in the eye and be honest?”
She shook her head. “I don’t know.”
“Find it.”
“Help me.”
“I can’t, Elia. You have to do it yourself. I went to Aremoria and found who I am. And now you could do the same. You aren’t your father or your sisters or your mother. Who are you?”
Elia touched the back of his hand. “Who am I?” she asked softly.
In the language of trees, he said it again: Who are you?
And she replied the first words he’d taught her, twelve years ago: Thank you.
Elia Lear, the island whispered, but she stared at him as if she did not hear its voice at all.
Ban left her at the stone and went to the edge of the cliff. Before him yawned a black, churning chasm of rocky teeth and hungry waves. Eating away at the island. Someday it would eat through enough that the earth where he stood would fall on its own, cleave apart because of that hungry sea. The stone circle would fall, destroyed and invisible to those cold stars.
Part
TWO
FIVE YEARS AGO, EASTERN BORDER OF AREMORIA
THE ONLY THING the king of Aremoria disliked about himself was this weakness he had of avoiding the hospital tents for hours or even days after battle.
It was not that he was bothered by injury, violence, or gore;
