Page 38 of Embrace the Serpent

A hideous silence.

“Give her three days.”

Faced with the sacrifice he was prepared to make, many of them seemed to settle on his side. But there were a few who muttered

things—I caught one saying, “Never trust a jewelsmith”—and I felt their gazes digging into the side of my face.

The leader of the eagle folk spoke. “We’ll get you your three days.”

The solemnity in his gaze stuck with me long after the meeting ended.

Rane and I returned to the entry hall. The night was middle-aged, and the townspeople were arriving in batches as boats ferried

them across the lake. Families, groups of friends, always overladen with items, things too precious to give up. But I didn’t

mind that. If they were worried about a tapestry, then they still had hope that they’d one day have a place to hang it.

“Why did you tell them about me?” I asked.

“If we get through this, this will be your home. I wanted you not to have to lie about who you are.”

He made it so the blame would rest on him.

The grand hall echoed with the sounds of hurried footsteps and anxious whispers.

Two folks were carrying a crate of foods. One’s grip slipped, and it crashed to the floor.

Rane dove into helping them, lifting the crate easily and carrying it to the edge of the hall, where palace cooks were sorting and storing food.

I bit my lip. They were stealing glances at me. They knew I was their king’s bride. I had never felt so visible.

Two gazes lingered. Two gold-skinned, goat-horned children, clutching each other and staring at me. I wrangled a smile onto

my mouth and crouched to be eye level. “I know where the other children are playing,” I said, showing them where a half dozen

children were engaged in some sort of game with marbles. “If any of them are mean to you, come get me.”

I scanned the crowd until I caught sight of a frantic gold-skinned woman and pointed the children out to her. She thanked

me, clutching my arms, and went to them.

Just one more , I thought, as I guided families to the ballroom. Large bouquets of flowers fragranced the air—wedding preparations that

no one had a chance to get rid of. Bedrolls were scattered on the polished floor, cushions strewn about, families gathering

with each other.

The cook and six of his assistants were handing out an evening meal, portioning out steaming breads, saffron rice, stewed

eggplant, something hearty made with gourds, and a half dozen other things—a whole feast. Perhaps eel was on the menu.

A stooped figure shambled in, struggling to carry a heavy basket filled with herbs and medicines.

Her skin was like moss-covered rock, and she left a small trail of pebbles in her wake.

I rushed to her side, and she let me lift the basket out of her hands.

She held on to my arm, and I helped her to a seat by the hearth.

She didn’t let go and looked to me beseechingly. Out of her craggy mouth came a very sweet voice like falling gravel. “Przprzp,

dzzry.”

“You’re welcome,” I said.

She beamed at me and patted my hand, which was still wrapped around the basket of herbs. “Rrssn drrzn.”

“Yes, I’m sure they’ll be useful. Thank you.”

As I dropped off the herbs, I thought of her, stooped and toiling to pick herbs for the soon-to-be injured. My chest ached.

She, like all of them, was well aware of the battle that had come to us. No one spoke about the unfairness of it, that they

were once again forced from their homes. There was no need. We were all in the same situation, we all felt the same horror.

I met Rane’s eyes across the hall. Part of me had been aware of his presence this whole time. Part of me had taken this small

reprieve.

He strode to me, and I knew I could no longer run.

“Is it time?” I asked anyway.

Before he could answer, a voice called his name. Rane’s grandmother hurried across the hall, her face pinched. “I have heard

what you mean to do,” she said. “You cannot. I forbid it.”

Rane’s eyes were kind. “Forgive me, grandmother. But I am king.”

Her imperiousness faded, and fear shone from her eyes. “You don’t know what he became.”

“I do,” Rane said. “I know the stories.”

“They’re not just stories.” A flicker of pain. “Do not do this.”

Rane wrapped his arms around her, kissed her on the top of her head, and let her go.

He took my hand and strode away, and I would’ve said something, but for the shadows in his eyes.

We were several paces away when she called, “Rane?”

His grip tightened as he turned.

In a voice that shook like dry leaves, she said, “I never told him I loved him. I never told him goodbye.” She took a deep

breath. “Goodbye, my dear boy.”

Every order had been given, every preparation was underway. All but one.

The moonlight haloed him, and he was never more a storybook creature, ethereal, belonging to a world different from mine.

Rane wore no illusion, and I drank in the sight of his secret face. He was clad in a robe that left his chest exposed. There

was only a small scar where the arrow had hit him.

I wanted to etch this moment into my memory—the way his hair framed his face, the slight curve of his lips as he tried to

reassure me, the unwavering warmth in his gaze. I reached up, but I stopped before I touched his cheek.

The walls seemed to pulse in time with my heartbeat.

He took my hand and pressed something into it. It fit in my palm, silvery and iridescent, like a scale from an immense creature.

“I’ve anchored an illusion to this, one that will let you move freely. If you speak the word written on it, it’ll activate.

And you have access to the treasury. Take what you need for a new life.”

“I’m not running away,” I said.

“I won’t hold you to this. To me. It was one thing when I could offer you my kingdom. But you deserve better than what is coming.”

I pushed the scale against his chest. “We’re already married.”

“Saphira. I’m trying to protect you.”

“I don’t need you to be noble.”

He huffed. “What do you want from me?”

“Marry me again. This time for no other reason than we want to.”

He looked startled, and then something warm simmered in his expression. “I will. I would. But we don’t have time—the dresses,

the altar, the flowers—”

I pulled my mother’s ring from my finger. “Will you marry me?”

He laughed, delighted. “Yes.”

I slipped it on his finger. He had no rings, no jewelry, and I tapped the scale in his hands.

He flourished it and said, “And you, will you marry me?”

A warmth rose in me from my toes to the tips of my hair. “Yes.” I took the scale from him.

He kissed me, and I rose onto the tips of my toes to kiss him back. I didn’t want to think. I wanted to drink him in, to get

lost in the softness of his lips, in how his hair slipped through my fingers, in how he smiled into the kiss and that smile

sank into my skin and settled deep in my bones.

If this was our last kiss, I wanted it to be everything. It would have to last me a lifetime.

We broke apart, and he whispered to me. “They can take out my heart. But it isn’t just my heart that loves you. My eyes, the

tips of my fingers.”

I laughed into him. “Your liver? Your toes?”

“Everything,” he said. “Even my nose hairs.”

“You can keep those.”

A mild cough came from behind us. The healer had arrived.

I pulled away, but Rane held on to me and said, “You won’t lose me.”

I wanted to believe him. I didn’t want to lose him. And I didn’t want him to lose himself. He was so good at playing the Serpent

King or the charming just-a-huntsman role of Rane. He hid his secret face so well that I worried he might not care for it.

I didn’t think he found it as precious as I did.

It was just a room, a spare bedroom. But in the moonlight the bed looked like an altar. A small, wizened figure waited by

the bed, with bluish skin and long whiskers.

“Are you ready, my lord?” the figure said in a deep, melodious voice. “Do not fear. My father was once called to your great-grandfather’s

side for the same ritual we do now.”

Rane lay down on the bed. “Let’s get on with it, then.”

The healer put his hand on Rane’s chest, right above the scar, and he began to chant what sounded like a lullaby in breathy,

whispered tones.

The healer’s entire body became translucent, and slowly, he reached into Rane’s chest, his hand disappearing.

Rane’s gaze locked on to mine. Fear flickered in his eyes, and his hands gripped the sheets so hard his knuckles went white.

Rane’s entire body tensed like a wire pulled to the brink of snapping.

The healer withdrew his hand, and clutched in it was an immense jewel of deepest, darkest red.

A choked sound came from Rane, his eyes shuttering. The healer handed the heartstone to me.

I clutched it to my chest—it was warm, and I felt its power seeping into me, all curiosity and joy and cheeky mischief—and

finally I could touch him. I stroked his hand, his arm, his face, until the tension left his body.

His eyelids trembled. I whispered a prayer. When he opens his eyes, let him be there. Let me not have lost him. Let him still be mine.

A shimmer went through the air around him, as he knitted an illusion over himself almost unconsciously, wiping away every

last trace of his true face.

He opened his eyes, and I met the cold gaze of the Serpent King.