Page 10

Ten

Duja

Duja heard her husband’s laughter all the way from the entrance hall of the eastern wing.

It echoed across the gilded nooks in the coffered ceiling.

She took a right down the narrow servants’ passageway and followed it to the open door at the end.

The king brightened when she stepped inside.

The Orfelian, garbed in what Duja recognized as the king’s old clothes, dropped to a nervous bow beside him.

“There you are, my love,” Hari Aki said, holding out his hand to her.

“Come see what we’ve done with the place.”

Duja scanned the room.

Pineapple silk drapes did not cascade from the ceilings.

Gilded ornaments did not adorn the paneled wood.

The walls were plain even for the eastern wing, which stood barren most of the year.

The air inside was stale.

Light shone dully through the opaque panels of the window shades.

All were sealed shut, and Duja wondered how long it had been since they were last opened.

Before the eastern wing collapsed, the room had once served as a break area for the servants of their guests’ private households.

Hara Duja had not dared house anyone there after the second accident.

Part of her agreed with the rumors: the eastern wing was cursed.

When it came to the Orfelian, however, she didn’t have a choice.

During the feast days, nobles with keen ears and prying eyes crawled like fire ants across the palace grounds.

The Orfelian, with his peculiar features and foreign accent, was sure to provoke questions.

If one of Duja’s subjects caught sight of him, vicious rumors would spread across the island like her brother’s wildfire.

How long before they found out who he was and about his precioso?

No, Duja needed to keep him out of sight until Mariit quieted.

The eastern wing was her only option?—no one would search for trouble there.

Duja turned to the Orfelian.

“I hope your new workshop is to your liking.”

“Yes, Your Majesty,” he said, nodding enthusiastically.

“I think this workshop will suit my needs perfectly.”

A long, narrow table of unfinished rosewood stood at the center of the room.

Duja ran a finger over its rough, dusty surface.

The table had been there for years.

As for the cupboards at the back of the room opposite the paneled windows?—that morning, the Orfelian and Aki had hauled them down from the upper floors.

Duja balked at the idea of her husband doing this sort of labor, but he had insisted.

The fewer servants milling about the eastern wing, the better.

Through the cupboards’ glass doors, Duja spied several canisters of varying sizes, some as stout as teakettles and others as slender as bamboo flutes.

Many were unlabeled, but the Orfelian had given her the names of the ingredients he needed.

Duja didn’t recognize most of them?—chemicals with strange, multisyllabic names?—but she had passed this list on to General Ojas, who’d sent one of his most trusted guards to the city proper to acquire them.

“I see you’ve already received the materials,” Duja said with a small, approving grin.

“Unfortunately, my people were not able to find the quantities you requested, but we’ve put in an order?—”

“Oh, no, these will be more than enough for a sample batch,” the Orfelian said, then turned pink in the cheeks when he realized he had interrupted her.

He bowed his head and added a brief Your Majesty in one breath.

Hari Aki’s eyes twinkled when he glanced between Duja and the Orfelian.

Unlike Duja, he was amused by the young man’s occasional breaches of formality.

“If you’ll allow us, Duja,” the king said, “I was just about to give Dr. Sauros here the lay of the land.”

That was his name?—Dr.

Ariel Sauros.

The Orfelian had told Duja this when they’d spoken during the dawn feast, but she still had trouble thinking of him as anything more than an outsider.

“Allow me to accompany you,” she said, leading the way out of the workshop.

Her muscles screamed in protest when she reached the staircase.

Ariel’s precioso couldn’t come soon enough.

Even when the tremors did not plague her, their effects lingered?—an ache that seeped deeper into her bones with each passing day.

Precioso would slow the tremors’ progression, but the Orfelian had told her how it had poisoned the people in his homeland.

The sickest ones craved the drug with a feverish desperation, consuming it before water, before food, until their bodies wasted away.

Even her husband had shared the warnings from his research; precioso addiction would creep in slowly, then all at once.

However, there were ways to mitigate the risks.

Once Ariel started producing it for her, she’d have to limit herself to small, sparing doses.

Duja prayed that the Orfelian’s guidance?—and the discipline she’d built over the past twenty-two years of her reign?—would save her from such a fate.

On their way upstairs, Aki remarked over his shoulder, “As happy as we are that you’ve come to stay with us, Ariel, we do hope you understand the delicacy of your presence here.”

Duja bit her lip to conceal her smile.

Her husband was not a man for straight talk.

Every other sentence hid a riddle of a sort.

In a number of words, the king had made one thing clear.

No one was to know about how Ariel Sauros truly came to Maynara, nor the fact that the queen commissioned him to produce precioso.

She glanced at the Orfelian.

Behind his thin wire-framed spectacles, understanding flickered in his eyes.

“Yes, Your Majesty,” he said, this time in a careful, obsequious tone.

“I understand.”

The king would never outright threaten him, but Duja could not deny the guilt simmering in her stomach.

They had asked people to lie for them before, but the Orfelian was a different case.

The previous day, Ariel had briefly spoken of the horrors awaiting him back home.

The westerners slaughtered his friends and robbed him of everything he had.

She sensed the sadness in Ariel because the same sadness lived at the core of Duja’s being.

An unbearable hollowness swelled in her chest as she ascended to the upper apartments of the eastern wing.

When Duja’s mother was alive, she would flood these halls with heady banana-flower perfume.

If Duja closed her eyes, she could still smell it, and her heart lurched at the memory.

Her kind, unsuspecting mother.

Duja wanted to lean over Ariel’s shoulder and whisper: I, too, know what it’s like to lose.

They stopped on the second story.

The king had assigned Ariel a set of apartments in a dark corner of the eastern wing.

They stood in front of the modest sitting room adjoining Ariel’s bedchamber.

The sitting room offered a small writing desk, an antique divan with a lattice cane back, and, if they rolled back the window screens, an unobstructed view of the central courtyard.

“As we discussed earlier, you’ll have one servant to attend to your chambers. Otherwise, you will not be disturbed,” the king said.

Ariel shook his head and tried to protest.

“That’s kind of you, but a servant really won’t be necessary.”

“Nonsense,” Hari Aki said.

“I don’t think you realize how valuable your services are, Dr. Sauros. One servant is the least we can offer in return.”

The other man remained silent.

Duja saw from his conflicted expression that Ariel was not accustomed to such luxuries.

How different he was from the horde of highborns who’d bombarded Duja during the dawn feast.

She knew not to be too critical of her own subjects, but they were the reason she dreaded the feast days year after year.

The constant cavorting, the endless stream of requests?—it was Duja’s duty as queen to entertain them, but to her, the feast days felt more like a military campaign than a celebration.

Compared to that spectacle, Ariel’s humble presence, despite the risk it posed in Mariit, was a welcome relief.

Beyond the window screens, angry shouts rang out from the courtyard below.

Duja’s ears perked up?—her daughters’ voices.

She sighed and turned to her husband.

“I’ll see to it,” Hari Aki murmured as he backed out of the sitting room.

Ariel watched the king head downstairs, confused.

“Is something the matter?”

“Nothing out of the ordinary,” Duja said with a shake of her head.

“It seems Laya and Bulan are fighting again.”

Duja had long struggled to mitigate the tensions between her eldest daughters.

If not for their shared Gatdula traits?—murky, green-flecked eyes and deep-brown skin?—one would never guess they’d come from the same womb.

Their weekly clashes, though trivial and short-lived, reflected a deep-seated fracture between the sisters, which Duja often blamed herself for.

She crossed the sitting room and struggled to pry open the window screen.

Her fingers had gone rigid, a warning of coming tremors.

Ariel rushed to her side and helped her slide the screen open a few inches.

Duja offered him a small smile of thanks, then glanced through the window.

She half expected to find her daughters at each other’s throats.

What she saw was even more surprising.

Laya and Bulan weren’t fighting, nor were they in the courtyard alone.

Eti was scampering across the tiles to stand between them.

“Are you ready?” Eti’s voice, small and childlike, floated up to Ariel’s sitting room.

The girl raised her right palm.

A pellet of pure gold rose about a foot above her head, its rounded surface glinting in the sunlight.

Duja let out a delighted laugh.

“I don’t believe it. They’re playing a game,” she said, amazed, and waved Ariel over to watch.

He stood behind her shoulder, the window screen concealing most of his profile.

Down in the courtyard, Eti made the first move.

Her eyes darted between her sisters, deciding upon her target.

After a few seconds’ deliberation, she drew her hand back and hurled the pellet at Bulan.

The pellet zoomed across the courtyard in a yellow streak.

Bulan was ready.

She lunged to the side, catching the pellet with the flat edge of her sword.

It soared back to Eti, who jumped to catch it with a satisfied cheer.

“Your turn, Laya!” she cried, casting the pellet in her other sister’s direction.

But neither Bulan nor Eti could match Laya’s winds, which cut through the air like a dagger.

Laya needed only to thrust out her hands, and a blast erupted across the courtyard, rattling the windows in their metal frames.

The blast whisked the pellet high above the girls’ heads.

It sailed over fifty feet away to the opposite end of the courtyard, before crashing to a stop a few inches in front of the entrance to the palace gardens.

“Whoa,” Ariel whispered, astonished.

In the courtyard, Bulan groaned.

“Laya! We agreed to keep it within bounds,” she yelled.

Eti crossed her arms and pouted.

“I don’t care what you said. I’m not fetching it.”

“Well, I’m not fetching it,” Laya yelled back.

“What’s going on here?” the king called.

Duja caught sight of the top of his head as he stepped out of the eastern wing.

He joined his daughters in the courtyard, his hands clasped behind his back.

Eti pointed at Laya.

“She’s cheating.”

Duja could see Laya roll her eyes all the way from the sitting room.

“Please. There are no winners or losers in this game,” Laya said.

“So?” Bulan asked.

Laya shrugged.

“If you can’t win, you can’t cheat. Everyone knows that.”

“Oh, I don’t know if that’s true,” Aki said in a good-natured tone.

“Of course it’s true,” Laya said.

Eti stuck her tongue out at her, and Laya stuck out her tongue back.

With Laya’s attention on her younger sister, Aki barreled toward her, catching her off guard.

He hauled Laya over his shoulder like a sack of rice.

“Does this count as cheating, my dear?” he asked.

Laya pounded his back while her sisters howled.

“Let me down, Father! That’s not fair!” she cried.

But Laya could never be angry with her father.

Even as she protested, tears of laughter streamed down her cheeks.

“I thought you couldn’t cheat!” Aki teased.

“I’ll save you, Laya!” Eti ran for them, tackling their father at the knees.

With a dramatic cry, he tumbled to the ground and Laya with him.

Before they could get up, Bulan threw herself atop the pile.

All four of them collapsed on the tiled ground, their shoulders shaking as they laughed.

Warmth burst inside Duja’s chest as she watched the scene unfold.

She leaned against the glass, her joy numbing the stabs of pain shooting down her fingertips.

“They’re happy,” she said, more to herself than to Ariel.

He gave her a shy smile.

“A happy family indeed.”

Duja looked back at her children.

It was so rare to see them like this, especially Laya.

A broad, unguarded grin stretched across Laya’s face.

She looked as young as Eti when she smiled like that.

Duja saw bits of herself and Aki in Laya’s face; but, with her sharp gaze and delicate features, Laya looked most like her uncle.

Oh, Pangil.

Lately, she saw her brother everywhere.

Duja still pictured Pangil as a young man, lithe and handsome with skin the shade of narra wood.

She remembered when they played in the courtyard as children.

As she watched her daughters, another rare and tender memory struck her, of another sunny day, the day Imeria Kulaw challenged Duja to a race.

“First to the garden gate wins the loser’s yam cakes,” Imeria had said.

She was smaller than Duja, and she ran on much shorter legs.

That did not deter the Kulaw girl.

She set her jaw as she tucked her hair into a neat plait that wound over Imeria’s shoulder like an eel.

Imeria had thick, straight hair the shade of ink.

For weeks, Duja had itched to touch those strands.

Surely, they weren’t as silky as they looked.

Duja’s cheeks had heated at the mere thought.

She tightened the straps of her sandals to distract herself from Imeria’s troublesome beauty.

When Duja reached down, a shadow stretched across the tiles at her feet.

She looked up.

Pangil stood before them, coconut flakes dusting the corners of his lips.

He had been raiding the palace kitchen for sweets again.

It was the first time in days she saw no contempt in his expression.

He stared down at her and placed his hands on his hips.

“A race, you say?” Pangil said.

To Duja’s right, Imeria gave him a challenging grin.

In the end, Ojas gave the signal.

He was a junior guard then, with a young man’s gait and a trim, dark beard.

Though he always wore the same stoic expression, he doted on Duja and would do whatever she asked.

“Ready... Set... Go!” Ojas called, his voice booming across the courtyard like thunder.

But Pangil had taken off a split second before Ojas had given the go-ahead.

“No fair!” Imeria cried out.

As Duja opened her mouth to protest, Imeria took off after Pangil.

She dashed across the courtyard, her plait shooting from the back of her head like a dart.

Though she was a full head shorter than Pangil, she caught up close enough to lunge at his knees.

Pangil toppled to the ground under the younger girl’s weight.

“Hey!” he cried.

“Pangil, wait!” Duja sprinted for them, fear rising in her throat.

She had seen the little tyrant her brother became when angered.

But Pangil didn’t strike Imeria.

He didn’t even yell at her.

Instead, he threw his head back and laughed.

To Duja’s shock, Imeria joined him.

They laughed until their bellies ached and they ran out of breath.

So rarely had they been that happy, the three of them.

That moment was a small, lonely island.

If it didn’t glow so brightly amidst Duja’s ocean of memories, she’d have been convinced it was nothing but some faraway dream.

Duja thought of that moment as she stared at her family.

At Laya, who kept her softest angles hidden, even though she was lovelier for them.

Laya, whose dark eyes burned with unharnessed potential.

Fearless, passionate Laya, who might one day build things far greater than the walls her younger self tore down.

“So much like Pangil,” Duja murmured.

For the first time, the thought didn’t fill her with dread.

“Pangil,” Ariel echoed, jolting Duja from her thoughts.

“Yes?” she said, embarrassed.

She didn’t realize she had uttered her brother’s name out loud.

“Will he also come to the palace?” Ariel asked, hesitant.

Duja faltered.

Would she allow Pangil to return to Maynara?

The same question had been plaguing Duja since the previous evening.

She and the king had agreed to wait until the end of the feast days before they entertained the possibility.

Given the facts, Pangil had told the truth.

Ariel was a worthy messenger, and so far, Duja’s intuition told her to trust him.

He testified as to precioso’s efficacy on her brother, and it was thanks to Pangil that Duja had access to the drug.

Maybe Pangil deserved Duja’s pardon, but the feast days were no time to grant it.

The last thing Duja needed was a scandal to erupt concerning Maynara’s exiled prince.

No?—Pangil needed to be dealt with quietly.

She could not risk seeing him until the nobles left Mariit.

In the meantime, Ariel promised to concoct a small quantity of precioso for her to sample.

Duja didn’t need her brother’s word when she could test the drug herself.

The queen saw no need to tell the Orfelian any of this.

She shook her head and diverted her gaze.

“The matter is still being debated,” she said curtly.

Unlike the nobles, Ariel did not pry.

He closed his mouth, and they turned back to the courtyard below.

Bulan pulled her father and sisters to their feet.

Hari Aki dusted his clothes off, still chuckling to himself.

He reached for his three daughters, bundling them into a bodily embrace.

Duja’s heart swelled once more.

“The king is a good man,” she told Ariel, turning away from the window.

“He is, Your Majesty.” He nodded in agreement and grabbed hold of the window screen.

Duja shook her head, gesturing for him to stand aside.

The tremors hadn’t withered her body to dust.

Not yet.

From closing a window to combing her own hair, the tasks were small victories for Duja but victories all the same.

Precioso would make them easier.

Until then?—

The queen reached past Ariel for the window screen.

This time, with steady fingers, she slid it shut behind him.