Elia stared. She touched her lips. “Maybe it’s me,” the princess whispered. “I’m broken somewhere inside, in a place that used to be—that I thought always had been—solid and strong. This is what he’s feeling too, my father. Even if everyone hates it, he and I were there together. I was his star, the beacon leading through the storm of his loss. Now I am gone, and he has lost his way again. He lost me.”
“He threw you away!” Aefa tugged on a free strand of Elia’s hair, fierce and hissing. “You did nothing!”
“I never do anything, it’s as you said. I’m always the buffer, the balm and comfort! A bridge, perhaps. But the bridge doesn’t soar or even move; it never even sees the end of the river. I thought the stars were enough, that choosing them for him was enough, but I’ve spent my entire life doing nothing. Studying what others do, what the stars say we should do. Reacting. Being what I’m supposed to be. I held the course, tried to be kind and listen, but did you know? Even the trees do not speak to me now. I spent myself with the silent stars and forgot the language of trees.”
“You can relearn,” Aefa murmured, stunned.
Elia shook her head. “I should have refused my father’s decree. I could have stayed, and gone with Gaela or Regan to hold my place against him until he saw me again. I should not have let his mad dismissal push me away or their disdain and exclusion intimidate me. I should have done something. But I don’t know how to act, Aefa. I only … am still.” She paused, then whispered, “I should have run away with Ban.”
Aefa pulled away and lowered her chin to stare suspiciously. “You should have done what with whom? The bastard of Errigal? The Fox of Aremoria?”
Elia fluttered her lashes and glanced down. “There was a fifth note,” she confessed. “From Ban Errigal, yes.”
Aefa made a strangled gasp.
“The king has it now. It said, I keep my promises, marked in the language of trees. At least I can still read it.” Elia added the latter quickly, as if it might cover up the first part.
“What promise?!” Aefa shrieked.
“He promised to show me how easily changed a father’s love can be. To prove somehow this was not my fault, but a fault of weakness in our fathers.”
Aefa narrowed her eyes and mouth. “I can’t decide if that sounds brilliant or dangerous. Very likely both, then.”
“That describes him, Aefa. Brilliant and dangerous.”
“Oh? Oh?” It excited Aefa: she’d been hunting for signs of attraction or desire in Elia for over a year. Why wait for such things to be decided for you? She’d always asked. Elia always replied, I will be what I am.
Aefa touched her princess’s back.
Shaking her head that she was all right, Elia took a deep breath.
“We can fix this,” Aefa said. “What do you want to do?”
“Be bold.” Elia lifted her face and gripped Aefa’s hand. “Aefa,” she whispered, holding tight to her friend, “I don’t know how.”
“Elia,” Aefa said back, strong and firm. “Choose.”
“Act. Yes. I’m going to—to do what Regan says.”
The Fool’s daughter laughed, once, loudly and with disbelief. “You are.”
Elia roused herself to her feet. “Come with me.”
They went quickly down from the kennel loft, then swept across the courtyard and back into the palace proper. Without allowing Aefa a moment to pick the straw out of her hair, Elia marched them into the castle proper. She asked a guard where the king was, twice. Aefa hurried behind, until they reached the wide polished doors leading into Morimaros’s grand throne room where the king was holding a hastily assembled council session.
Aefa bit her inner cheek, knowing that meant some news had come, or something disrupted the usual calm order of the Aremore court. She hoped it was nothing to grieve Elia further, and Aefa wished she could go inside with her princess, a living shield or at least support.
In their path was a small boy, his ear pressed to the throne room doors, his eyes squeezed closed in concentration. Isarnos, the king’s nephew and current heir. At seven, Isarnos was already a magnanimous charmer who spread his attention to every living creature in Aremoria, based on the menagerie often trailing behind him. Today two bright green-and-yellow birds with hooked beaks perched on the sconces over his head, and a trio of cats stalked them in circles like slender, furred vultures. A harried-looking nurse and an animal handler with thick leather gloves and a pail of waste waited several paces from the doors. There was no sign of Aefa’s friendly tutor.
Aefa wondered what they’d find inside, to compete with the spectacle facing them out here.
“Isarnos?” Elia said gently.
His eyes flashed open. “Elia! That is, my lady. Princess. Have you come for the council? They began without you, but, oh! Your cousin is inside.”
“My cousin?”
Isarnos said, “The man from Innis Lear but who looks like he’s from the Third Kingdom.”
“Kayo,” Elia said, frowning.
Isarnos’s eyes widened at both of them, as if worried now he’d misbehaved. The boy was slender and pale, paler than Morimaros or the Elder Queen, paler than his own mother, Ianta. His father had been from the north, a warrior prince from the winter countries, and had died in battle three years ago. A terrible year that had been for Aremoria, perhaps like this one was shaping into for Innis Lear.
Aefa glanced at the palace guards standing on either side of the door, studiously ignoring the interaction of peculiar royalty. One stared straight ahead; the other flicked his eyes to Elia and away.
“It’s all right, Isarnos,” Elia said to the young prince.
Then she gently nudged him aside and threw open the door.
MORIMAROS
MARS PREFERRED THE throne room empty. Cavernous and quiet, lacking all these lords and ladies and soldiers who comprised his council, those now arguing loudly their concerns.
As a
