Page 29 of Grave Flowers

I found myself at Aeric’s side.

I could not recall the steps that took me to him, but suddenly I was there, the floorboards rough against my knees, my husband lying before me.

Convolution made my thoughts lurch one way and then another.

My addled mind made me think I’d killed him.

For so long, I’d known our tale: He was to die, by my hand, and if not, it was because I’d been arrested by his.

But everything had changed.

Fate made it easy for me.

It had killed him, so I no longer needed to.

I should stand and leave the theater.

Return home with Radix’s independence secured and lose myself in the garden so I might forget I’d ever left and that there ever was a young king I’d married.

Doing anything else was preposterous, especially when Aeric knew of my treachery.

If he died, the knowledge would pass with him.

“Madalina.”

Father coughed, and blood speckled his lips.

“Listen, girl.

Once I breathe my last, you will be queen of Radix.

You shall return to an angry kingdom.

Whatever you do, you must maintain the Sinet rule. You mustn’t let it slip through your fingers. Madalina! Look at me!”

I turned to Father.

Distantly, I saw his individual features rather than his face in its entirety.

The evils he wore upon it suddenly seemed distinct—from his nose, which had been broken and reset several times in fistfights, to his eyes, which had the glossy, lifeless stare of a dead fish.

He raged against the world, and it raged back and left its marks in every line and crease of his face. Despite all his rage, all his pacing, all his deceit and determination, he was dying. It was the most human thing I’d ever seen him do.

I looked back at Aeric.

“You gaze upon him in his death instead of me, your father?”

Father snarled.

“Fickle, stupid girl.

I tell you of your future, of your coming reign, and you turn to a boy.

Prove your worth.

Slice his throat and quicken his end. Let me see one last enemy die before I go.”

Father’s words rattled through the theater, asinine and frightening, the depths of his darkness rising as he dwindled.

Slowly, as though I might be burned, I touched Aeric’s hand.

Words crept into my mind.

The invocation from Inessa’s journal, the one Mother had tried to say in the hour of her death.

Left, right, up or down!

Let me use a roundabout so I may in right time be found.

I saw Aeric standing on the palace steps with a wine bottle in the moonlight.

Staring at me as I descended into the court party.

Kissing me with no fear or guise or deceit when it was all around us, all around me.

There were … there were things I still wanted to say to him. Things I wanted to know about him. Things I wanted him to know about me. Father and Inessa would insist it didn’t matter. They would declare that my heart was weak, that I was weak and always had been.

But I wasn’t so certain, not anymore.

Perhaps love—or whatever emotion I felt right now—wasn’t weakness.

Perhaps it was the most powerful thing in the world.

Otherwise, how would anything explain this? Death tried to claim my enemy, but I wished to save him.

Such a mystery would perplex me forever, I sensed, but I would happily spend a lifetime wrestling with it because it would mean there was something somewhere to gently sweep the dark away.

I shouldn’t say a roundabout.

Not when Inessa might use it against me.

But it was the only thing I had to save Aeric.

I whispered.

“Left, right, up or down! Let me use a roundabout so I may in right time be found.”

My scar flared on my hand.

Pain riddled it.

Once again, something moved within it, swimming beneath the skin.

I clutched it with my other hand. Whatever it was, it was much bigger than anything that had surfaced from it before. It pushed against the scar, reaching through its seams, finding the spongy parts to slip through. A bizarre pop resounded across the stage. Thin green tendrils burst from the scar, dripping with my blood. Grave flowers. Growing from inside my hand. They blossomed, translucent petals opening like lips. I recognized them from Inessa’s description.

Immortalities.

A crash followed.

Spiderwebs of cracks fractured along the theater wall, leading to the ceiling.

They splintered their way across the ceiling and tore the brass stars off.

White roots slithered through the cracks, thin and stringy.

They reached about and felt their way along the ceiling.

More and more appeared, and with a final crash, part of the ceiling fell away in a crescendo of dust, broken beams, and mortar.

Petals rained down into the theater, bringing the dense scent of grave flowers. A rush of wind gusted through the theater, and then the grave flower from Inessa’s chambers dropped. It pushed itself across the theater seats with its roots and scuttled onto the stage.

The doors to the theater flew open.

The head general and the guards had heard the tremendous crash.

Their eyes widened at the sight.

Before they could rush in, a bright gray light burst across the stage next to me. I was knocked off my feet. My breath was punched viciously from my lungs at the impact. Disoriented, I held up my hand, trying to see.

The ball of gray light took a shape—a rectangle, almost the exact size and height of a door.

Fog, driven by a furious wind, circled inside it.

Dark shapes approached from afar.

Grave flowers. Ones I’d never seen before. They poured out of the opening and formed a thicket around the stage, blocking out the head general and guards.

Some of the grave flowers had buds like mouths with snapping teeth and were covered in spikes.

Others had human hands for leaves, ears for petals, and eyeballs for pistils.

They were bizarre colors I’d never known existed, ones I could never describe, odd mixes going beyond iridescent into another glowing category.

A figure in a red dress approached from within the opening.

It reached the threshold and disappeared.

The grave flower from Inessa’s chambers twitched and tremored.

Slowly, delicately, its petals unfolded.

Inessa lay inside, and she sat up, blinking.

She was as I’d known in her life.

Healthy, alive, and very much not a ghost.

She clambered out of the grave flower and stretched.

I rose to my feet and quickly crossed to stand near Father, lest Inessa see me by Aeric’s unconscious form and realize what I’d done.

“I’ve missed this body,”

she declared.

Her voice was scratchy.

She coughed and cleared her throat.

She put her hand on her chest and smiled triumphantly.

“My heart is beating.”

Her hands traveled to explore her other features.

Delight filled her face as she touched her nose.

She looked around.

“What’s happened? I’m … on a stage? Did you—did you say the roundabout invocation?”

“I did,”

I gasped.

“I found it in your journal.”

“You read my journal?”

Inessa scowled.

“I’ve told you to stay out of my things.”

She stalked around the stage, peering at Prince Lambert, Aeric, and Father.

She knelt by Father.

“You look well.”

“I feel well,”

he choked out.

His face already held the pallor of death.

“You found a way back?”

“I’ve been in Bide this whole time, of my own volition.

I ate a flower berry but also secretly mixed in a poisonous leaf that made me look as though I were having an allergic reaction.

I had to go without a nose for a bit, but now I’m back!”

Inessa picked up her skirts and swept into a curtsy, a remarkably fitting posture, since we were onstage.

“It’s been the perfect plan.”

“Clever girl,”

Father murmured.

“Do you have any way to save me?”

Inessa approached him and knelt.

She touched his arm. “No,”

she said simply.

“But put your mind at ease.

The Sinet house shall prevail now that I’ve returned.”

“I am certain it shall,”

Father said.

“In your hands, our throne will be stronger than ever.”

Even as Father died, he thought of power.

I glanced down at my hands.

I’d never been the daughter he wanted.

It stung, one parting hurt from him.

“Do a dying king a favor—let me sleep quicker, Inessa.

A man like me needs to either be dead or alive.”

“Shush,”

Inessa said. “Rest.”

Father looked around, his gaze passing over me.

I wondered if he missed the smell of salt in the air or the richness of the grave flowers he’d always hated.

He squinted, as though trying to see through fog.

“I’ve always wondered if my ghosts would come to my death,”

he said.

“I’ve killed so many.

But I don’t see them.

Not a one.

Perhaps they’ve …”

A puff of air forced itself from his lips.

Startlement passed through his eyes, even though he’d asked Inessa to release him.

His face and body slackened together, and he dropped limply down.

Never had I seen him so still.

Inessa stood.

She tossed her dagger aside, its blade red with Father’s blood at his own request.

Blood slowly pooled around him.

I stepped back but not in time. It stained my slippers.

“So, Sister, you said the roundabout invocation all on your own.”

Sharply, her gaze cut between Aeric’s limp body and Father’s corpse.

“By the Family, you said it for Aeric, didn’t you?”

She stared at me with such loathing that I shrank inside.

I gritted my teeth and faced her, determined to remain strong.

“Does it matter?”

I asked.

“It seems I brought you back instead, but I don’t understand.

I know from your journal you can bring someone back from Bide only if their portrait is buried in the immortalities’ roots.

I didn’t bury a portrait of you, so how are you here?”

Dramatically, Inessa stalked over the grave flower that had held her body.

“There, there, Orios.”

She stroked it, causing it to purr.

“You, Madalina, are my twin and the portrait of me.

The scars you bear, I bear.

I made certain of it.

And, with the immortalities growing within your hand, you are the invocation personified—a portrait of me entangled with the immortalities’ roots. And just look at us now! Both in red … though who made yours? Sister, you do our beauty a disservice by wearing such hastily made clothes. And is that your name embroidered upon it?”

“It’s a costume,”

I blurted, as though such a thing mattered.

“You do seem to have grown in confidence.

The slits are magnificent on you,”

Inessa appraised.

“Though perhaps you’ve striven too boldly.

You summoned me much too early.

I thought I was going to discover you in the bridal chamber with Aeric dead on the bed.”

“Nothing makes sense,”

I choked out.

“Even if I had poisoned Aeric and you appeared to me as a ghost, how would you possibly get me to say the roundabout invocation after making me believe my goal was to release you from Bide?”

“Easily!”

Inessa’s eyes flashed in pleasure, as though she loved laying out her plan and watching my horror grow.

“I would’ve told you I’d found a way to bring mother back if you said the invocation.

You would say it without hesitation because of your guilt over her death.

But, Sister, for one raised at the Radixan court, you are much too trusting.

You believed that I could appear only to you simply because I said so.”

She frowned.

“Admittedly, I couldn’t see things from Bide, and my travel between here and there was difficult, forcing me to limit my trips.

I do feel like I would’ve found a way around those limitations, eventually.

I always find a way to get what I want.”

I stared at her, livid with rage, livid with fear.

Pain swam through in me in the way nausea swims through the stomach, coming in waves, building stronger and stronger until I longed to retch it out.

“And the Acusan court? How would you have swayed it to your side with no legitimate claim to the throne?”

“With coin, dear Sister.

Power hinges on three places—money, military, and religion.

The treasurer and head monasticte already proved they are bribable, and as for the head general, well, I could arrest him for a crime or have him assassinated.

Both options work delightfully well. The court would be in upheaval for a time, but they are Acusans, not Radixans. They seek comfort above all else. I’d strike horror with some executions, and then, I don’t know, frame Crus for a war or some such nonsense to distract and unify everyone.”

She scratched the grave flower, making it excitedly waggle.

“When I terrorized Queen Gertrude to death, I learned where she hid the Montario coin, so I’ll have ample resources.

Oh, it was terribly fun.

You should’ve seen it, Mads.

I appeared to her as a vile and horrifying spirit and told her she’d killed her babies. There’s something so exquisite in having such power over another, to see their fear and wield as it as you would a blade. Then I’d rule as you. I feel I look like a Madalina, don’t you think?”

“But why?”

I whispered.

Inessa’s hand stilled on the grave flower, and her head tilted to the side, as though she didn’t quite understand the question.

“Why did you decide to do this to me?”

“Because I must, Mads.

I’m not like you.

I wasn’t born with a heart, so I must find something else to put in its place.

A crown. A throne. A kingdom.”

For the first time, her voice faltered.

“I can’t—I can’t be around others.

They are warm and alive, and I’ve always … not been.”

“But you could’ve let me be your heart,”

I said.

“You don’t have to be alone—you never had to be alone.

It didn’t have to be me or you.

It could’ve been us both, together.”

“You don’t understand.”

“What’s not to understand?”

“Everything!”

She was shouting.

“Don’t you see? I’m not fit for this life, so I must make another one, one for me.

One where love doesn’t matter because it doesn’t exist.”

“But there is no such place, Inessa,”

I whispered.

“There never will be.”

“Stop.”

Inessa left the grave flower and came close to me.

We faced each other.

“I command you to stop.

You had Mother’s love—you don’t know what it is to not.

I know because I pretended to be you when we were young.

It’s how I got her to tell me about Alifair. I took the plaque we stole to her and asked her why it had his name on it. Thinking I was you, she said, ‘You must never tell Inessa.’ I knew, in that moment, that Mother feared me. But what was even worse was that I knew she should.”

“It isn’t so simple, Inessa.”

I dared to take a step toward her.

Father’s blood squelched under my slippers and stained its ribbons.

“Mother told Alifair that you were born with a heart in two pieces.

She never faulted you for it—she wished to mend it.”

“Such things can’t be mended.

Understand what I am, Sister.

Surely you of all people wish to be done with this tiresome dance, given your hatred of it.

What I say is set, as unchangeable as words carved in stone. Return in a hundred years, and it’ll say the same.”

“No, it’s not true.

There is time, Inessa.

There is time and choice.

You are the strongest girl I know. You can do anything, anything at all. We can decide what to do together. We can even go home. I will return to the garden, and you can return as the Radixan queen.”

Inessa turned away.

Her shoulders hunched within the thin embrace of the red dress, and her head bowed as though she didn’t wish to see me any longer.

Slowly, cautiously, I went to her.

I put my arms around her and hugged her.

“No,”

she whispered.

“Don’t.

It’s too late.

There’s no going back now.”

“It’s never too late,” I said.

“No, it is—it’s been done.

You don’t understand.

Bide needs a soul.

Either mine or yours. And it isn’t going to be mine.”

With that, she grabbed my wrist and thrust me toward the gray rectangle wreathed in grave flowers.

Stems lashed out.

They roped about my ankles, waist, and wrists.

Fiery bands of pain dug into me. I screamed, kicking and fighting. Bit by bit, they dragged me toward the fog and the gray light beyond it. Right before its entrance, they stopped but didn’t release me. Inessa went to Father’s body. She removed his drapery cord from one of his hidden pockets and walked to me.

“In order to be taken,”

she said softly.

“you must die, and your soul will be freed from your body.”

“No! Inessa, stop!”

I screamed.

She bent and slipped the drapery cord around my neck as gently as though it were a necklace.

She was Father’s daughter, just as I was Mother’s daughter, and suddenly her eyes seemed just as colorless as his.

The cord tightened. Pain sliced through my neck. The cord constricted tighter and tighter. Dots burst in front of my eyes, blurring the world around me.

Just like Prince Lambert, just like Aeric, just like Father, I was going to die on the stage.