Page 6 of Acolyte (Tempris #2)

And Taly… well, she didn’t particularly care about the blowfish or just how it had found itself inside the bottle.

She was still trying to figure out just what a “ bachelorette party” was and why this was something her mother had wanted when she found herself being pushed to sit on a gnarled wooden bench.

Azura took a seat across from her, arranging her skirts beneath a matching table before she began picking at a tower of brightly colored pastries.

There were cookies laced with frosting, cakes stuffed with cream, candied fruits, pocket pies, and little dots of chocolate and caramel everywhere.

“And that’s when I said” —Azura paused to take a bite from a frothy cream puff— “Venny—he always hated it when I called him Venny. So I said, Venny , Breena is a quality woman. You’re never going to win her over with things like flowers or jewelry.

If you want to woo her, get her the thing she really wants, the thing that all women really want.

A dagger—sharp but still small enough to be worn to a ball. ”

Azura took another bite. “The gowns were so dreadfully tight back when your parents were courting. It was almost impossible to wear more than a few throwing knives beneath your skirts, never mind a decent short sword. Although, Breena... well, she was a creative one. I once saw her hide a rapier in a place where a rapier had no business being.” The Queen laughed, then paused, her expression sobering.

“Is there something wrong?” She eyed Taly like there was, indeed, something wrong.

“Why aren’t you eating? I’ve never known you to turn down sugarberry tart before. ”

“I… um…” Taly reached for the piece of pink quartz around her neck, glad that Leto had let her keep it.

Her mother’s necklace. She felt the familiar divot in the center as she rasped, “Sugarberries are fine.” More than fine.

She loved sugarberries—had, on more than one occasion, forced Skye to escort her through the Seren Gate to the nearby town of Marin for the First Harvest Festival just so she could gorge on sugarberry confections.

But that begged the question: how did the Queen know that?

How did the Queen know her at all? Taly had never been inside the palace before, much less met the woman that used to sit on its throne.

“I’m confused,” Taly said, even though it felt like an understatement. She was more than confused. She had lost the thread of the conversation a long time ago—alongside her grip on reality. “Who is Venny? And how did you know my mother? How do you know Vaughn?”

Azura’s lips pursed, and she carefully set the half-eaten pastry in her hands on a delicate golden plate.

“Oh, dear,” she murmured. “Oh, dear, dear, dear, dear, dear... You said you would know next to nothing when you got here, but I didn’t think it would be this bad.

” Azura fixed her with a look. “Am I to understand that you don’t know who your parents are? ”

Taly shook her head.

“Or why you’re here?”

Another shake of her head.

“Or who’s invading your island?”

That was also a good question—one Taly also didn’t know the answer to.

She shook her head.

“I can only assume then,” Azura said, “that you know nothing about our arrangement.”

“Why would I have an arrangement with a terrorist?” The words were out of her mouth before she could stop them, and Taly’s stomach gave a sickening lurch when the Queen raised a brow.

“I see that mouth of yours has always been a problem.” Azura leaned back in her chair, smiling. “If I’m being perfectly honest, my dear, I was hoping that was one aspect of your personality that developed later in life. Shards only know how many problems it’s caused.”

Taly chewed on her lip. Azura wasn’t wrong. Sarina was always telling her to think before she spoke.

Azura sighed and pinched the bridge of her nose.

“I suppose we’ll start with the basics,” she said as if it pained her to do so.

“You, my dear, are a time mage. Not the first to be born since the Sanctorum started hunting our kind, but thanks to your mother’s ingenuity and a little intervention on my part, the first to survive to adulthood. ”

Taly stared at her palm, the place where that little moon-shaped scar used to be. The skin was smooth, unmarked. The runes, what little had remained of her mother’s enchantments, had been wiped away. “My mother made me look human.”

Azura shook her head. “Your mother didn’t just make you look human.

She made you bleed like a human, grow like a human, move like a human.

She had your body so convinced it was mortal, your blood used iron instead of aether.

Or at least it used to, until the spells began to break down.

” Azura reached into her pocket, producing a small shadow crystal that she placed in the center of the table.

“The anchor for your mother’s spells. I thought you might like to keep it.

The enchantment matrix was so old that once I removed it, what little magic was left crumbled. ”

Taly reached out a trembling hand, carefully picking up the crystal. She had carried this with her for fifteen years without knowing it. It felt strange to be holding it now—one of the few items of her mother’s she had left.

Azura went on, “You’ve been here before—many times, along with your entourage. However, due to the unusual nature of this place, we’re a bit out-of-sync—chronologically speaking, that is. You never show up in the right order.”

“What does that mean?”

“It means that while I’ve known you for a very long time, you do not know me. Not yet, at least. Time mages experience the world differently, especially in places like this where the normal rules of time and space don’t apply.”

Taly clenched her hand around the crystal.

An anchor—this had been an anchor, and that’s exactly what she needed now.

“We know each other,” she said. Not a question, though she still couldn’t quite wrap her head around the concept.

She grasped at a flicker of memory, something Azura had said at the gates. “Are we friends?”

“Of course.”

“But you committed genocide. How could I ever be friends with you, knowing what you did?”

Bold words—far bolder than she felt.

But the Queen just chuckled, looking at her with the fondness one might hold for a pet. “And there’s that mouth again,” she said. “And that frown. You know, I’m always telling you—it doesn’t matter if you’re immortal, you’re going to get wrinkles if you keep frowning like that.”

Taly’s brows nudged together even further, deepening said frown. “You’re insane.”

“Yes,” Azura replied easily. “And if you ask me, that’s better than…

” She waved a hand in the direction of Taly’s face.

“Whatever that is. You’re always so serious.

Always need to know every little thing. You’re always saying ‘Azura, this isn’t the time’ or ‘Azura, that’s inappropriate’ or ‘Azura, please stop rambling; you’re giving me a headache.

’ You’re always so predictable, and I’m not saying that just because I can see the future.

” She pointed an accusing finger. “You, my dear, are a fun-killer.”

“I am not,” Taly snapped back. Shards, how had they gotten here ?

“Yes, you are,” Azura countered childishly.

“In fact, by the authority vested in me as the High Lady of Time, I dub thee ‘Lady Caro, Killer of Fun.’ There—now it’s official.

” She pouted, reaching for another cookie.

“No wonder Skye always looks so bored when he’s here.

Poor boy probably never gets to go out and play—not with Lady Fun-Killer attached to his hip. ”

Taly shook her head. She wasn’t going to ask.

Didn’t care about this madwoman’s ramblings.

“Look,” she said, placing a hand flat on the table, “I don’t know how I got here, or even where here is.

And to be perfectly honest, I don’t give a shit.

About any of it—you, the Schism, this future version of me that apparently has no problem with the fact that you killed millions. I just want you to send me home.”

“Don’t be ridiculous. You can’t leave.”

“So, I’m a prisoner then?” Taly arched a brow, amazed that her voice remained so even.

“A prisoner?” Azura barked out a laugh. “What makes you think you’re my prisoner?”

“I was brought here against my will, and now you won’t let me go. Even by the loosest definition, I’m pretty sure that makes me your captive.”

“You know,” Azura said, tapping a finger to her lips, “you said that you were going to say that. Well, not you you. The other you—the one that grows into someone worth knowing. And granted, I didn’t believe you— her?

—at the time. After all, our visits are always so pleasant, and she made a special trip just to make sure your rooms were prepared.

Brought along the loveliest bottle of brandy.

Actually, now that I think about it, that’s probably how she talked me into loaning you so many of my jewels. ”

Taly eyed the ring on her finger—an obscenely large emerald surrounded by a nest of gold. She hated wearing rings, but she’d been drawn to it immediately. It was the same color as Skye’s eyes. “Are you insinuating that I’m complicit in my own captivity?”

“Well, you did ask me to train you, so… yes—it seems that your current state of captivity is entirely your fault, and that makes me feel quite a lot better, so thank you. Given your age and unusual set of circumstances, your education will be unorthodox, to say the least. I was starting to feel marginally guilty, and it was a very unpleasant emotion.”

Taly leaned back. “I asked you to train me,” she murmured to herself.

Though it didn’t stop Azura from muttering, “Have we really not established that yet?”

“And if I said I no longer wanted your help?”

“Oh, I gave my word, dear. I never go back on my word.”