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CHAPTER TWENTY-THREE

Cat

T ravelling to Kreuzfurt had been strange. Elician and Lio had not been in a great rush. They’d ridden without paying much attention to their surroundings. They’d chatted to each other, laughing loudly and unselfconsciously – without any of the shamed silence that had been his lot. That journey had felt like a beginning, an opening salvo, an opportunity. Here was a language he’d been taught but had never been able to hear in all its rhythmic perfection. Here were the colloquialisms, jokes and sayings of a land he had heard about in hushed whispers from cells where learning only happened when the guards turned their backs.

Leaving Kreuzfurt is not the same. Fen chatters, she complains, she tells stories. She describes Himmelsheim and the road to the capital. She teaches him how to drive the wagon, then lies outstretched in it so the sun can burn patterns onto her bare skin. She wraps ribbons up and down her arms to achieve a unique crisscross sunburn that only she seems to understand. She sometimes uses leaves to accent the ribbons’ effects, creating starlike imprints that she coos over in the evenings when they stop for the night.

But conversation by this campfire is not joyful or exuberant. No one stands up and makes animal noises or acts out the scenes of a story. No one talks about nightcats and what it would be like to find one in the dark. He misses the friendly camaraderie Lio and Elician displayed. Misses, too, sitting up with Soleb’s often sleep-deprived prince, just to look at the stars and watch the moon travel across the night sky.

Zinnitzia and Marina sit shoulder to shoulder, speaking with their heads dipped close. On the first night, Marina settles an arm around Zinnitzia’s waist and her nose nudges against the back of Zinnitzia’s neck. Fen’s face twists as she looks at them, muttering about adults and not needing to see it. ‘What do you mean?’ he asks her.

Her face burns redder than her sun-kissed skin. ‘You know they’re . . . together , right?’

‘Together?’

‘In a relationship . . . in love .’ She uses the Soleben word vak , and he knows that it would translate to ‘love’ in Alelune, but the meaning is muddled. There’s an implication he cannot remember. ‘You do have love in Alelune, don’t you?’ she asks.

He scowls at the needling. ‘Of course we do. But you have too many words for it. What does vak really mean?’

‘ Vak is . . . when you just want to be with that person, for ever, no matter what. You never want to be alone again, and if you see a world where you might be alone in it, you say and do anything to keep the person you love with you at all times.’

‘The person who keeps you from being alone, when you would have been otherwise, even when times are at their worst?’ Cat queries.

‘Yes. That. That’s vak . It’s the person you marry and stay with until the end of time.’

‘Then why did you make that face, when you saw Zinnitzia and Marina together just now?’ he asks.

Fen flushes, shaking her head and covering her eyes with her hands. Embarrassed. ‘They’re just old , okay, and I . . .’

‘She’s a child,’ Zinnitzia calls out, clearly listening with amusement. ‘And she’ll grow up and learn to deal with this herself one day. Now shut up, both of you, and go to sleep.’ Fen throws herself into her blankets, tugging them over her head to hide her shame.

Cat lies down and stares up at the stars. He wonders whether he might one day have room for a love like that. ‘Do you love someone?’ he whispers to Fen.

‘Mind your own business!’ she hisses back.

He lies there, cold and unguarded, hands unbound, and tries not to imagine either Elician or Lio in the place he knew of as home. They wouldn’t like it there. Lio would hate the lack of stimuli. But Elician . . . at least he wouldn’t be alone. At least he has Lio and all the people Cat loves most in the world.

Rolling on his side, Cat hugs his arms close, and watches the forest for a creature that no one ever sees. Hoping, dangerously, for one good thing to tell Elician when they next meet. He listens to the general chirping, screeching, staccato squeaking of the outdoors after the sun has finally gone to bed. He listens until sleep takes him, and he dreams of nightcats swimming across the river, coats bleached white under the moonlight.

In the morning Marina helps him apply the cooling ointment to his back and neck. Fen wakes up just as they finish and she stares, wide-eyed, at the procedure. ‘ That’s what makes you all smell like that?’ she blurts out after Marina explains what it does. Marina actually rolls her eyes at the comment, huffing audibly. ‘What is it made from?’ Fen wonders.

‘It’s a blend. But the main ingredient is charranseed – it grows on the keep’s grounds.’

‘Charranseed!’ It’s a large spiny tree that grows near Kreuzfurt’s southern walls. One whose seeds are large enough to knock a grown man unconscious if he is foolish enough to wander beneath its branches when it is time for them to fall. ‘Couldn’t you have added lemongrass to it?’ Fen asks. ‘Or maybe some water lily? It’s . . . not the best smell in the world.’

‘I’ll let Elena know her concoction doesn’t meet approval,’ Marina says dryly.

‘I didn’t say that,’ Fen gripes. ‘Just that it could be better if . . . if you wanted it to be better.’

‘You are more than welcome to try.’

‘Besides, how is Cat going to court a lady one day if he smells like charranseed?’

Marina laughs, rolling her eyes. ‘Perhaps we shouldn’t find problems for ourselves where there is no need. Do you want to court a lady, Cat?’

‘No.’ He wants them to stop talking about it.

‘There, problem solved.’

Fen frowns, though. She gets her things packed into the cart and asks, ‘What about a gentleman?’

Even under layers of ointment, his skin feels suddenly far too hot. He flinches at the next swipe of Marina’s hand on his back.

‘Do you want to court a gentleman, Fenlia?’ Marina asks sharply as she finishes rubbing the last of the ointment onto his skin.

Fen sputters, shaking her head quickly. Her freckles almost disappear under her fierce blush before she finally manages to spit out, ‘We’re not talking about me!’

‘We’re not talking about any of this,’ Marina agrees. She nudges Cat. ‘Get dressed. And as for you, Fenlia, I mean it. Enough. Lay it to rest.’

‘Well, if you do decide to court someone,’ Fen mutters anyway, ‘don’t wear that shit.’

‘Fenlia!’

‘I’m done!’ But she waits for Cat to promise once Marina’s back is turned, and he does because he wants to finish the conversation in its entirety.

They continue on. And as the days slip by, Cat flips through the new books Marina has given him for the journey, practising reading Soleben and studying the tables and scientific illustrations inside. One volume in particular holds his interest. He sounds out the words for Fen to explain when he stumbles over them and reads about the biological effect of hormones and neurotransmitters for most of the journey.

There’s a certain kind of frustration in knowing a language but crashing against the shores of incompetence whenever he finds a new assembly of letters. Fen had been right; Soleben’s greatest charm is that it is a very phonetic language. He can sound most of it out. But it is slow. Very slow. He spends hours on one chapter alone, reading and rereading each word until he is certain he’s got it right.

They ride with the intention of reaching Himmelsheim in a week, and on the sixth day they come across a large contingent of soldiers on the march. ‘Stay here,’ Zinnitzia tells them before guiding her horse into a swift lope along the side of the column. Fen curses suddenly, spitting out a word Cat does not know before swiftly patting down her hair and trying to smooth the wrinkles in her dress. She unwinds the ribbons on her arms to show off the sun patterns she has been developing.

‘Pull your hood up, Cat,’ Marina commands. He reaches behind his head and yanks the looping hood up and over, letting the thick veil unfold to hide his face from the world. Beneath the fabric, the air is thick and hot. He doesn’t usually rub the ointment on his face and his skin prickles uncomfortably as it stays enclosed. Only two narrow slits let him see what is happening beyond.

Oh. This is Lord Anslian’s retinue. Elician’s uncle and the high general of the army is riding towards them, Zinnitzia at his side. He is dressed in glittering gold and shimmering purple, and his horse is almost as bejewelled and shining as its rider. The general’s armour reflects light, blinding any who stare for too long. ‘Your Highness,’ Marina acknowledges to Cat’s right. He cannot see what she is doing. Perhaps she bows, awkward but polite, upon her steed.

‘Uncle,’ Fen intones from Cat’s left.

‘Why are you driving a cart?’ Anslian demands.

‘I . . .’

‘You’re not riding into the city like a beggar. You two should have known better.’ He must be addressing Marina and Zinnitzia now. ‘How dare you? Lieutenant! Get the princess a horse.’

‘With all due respect, Your Grace, we are not yet at the city gates and—’

Anslian cuts Marina off with a sharp, ‘Enough.’ Then, ‘What is this?’

‘Cat, Your Grace,’ Marina replies. ‘Prince Elician—’

‘This is the Reaper my nephew brought you?’

‘Yes.’

‘Show me his face.’ Someone tugs at the back of his hood. Marina, maybe. Cat pulls the hood off himself and Anslian frowns and nods. Then the fabric is rolled back over his face. ‘His cheek. There was a scar there once. I presume that’s your doing, Zinnitzia?’

‘Mine,’ Fen cuts in.

‘Yours? I didn’t think that was a skill of yours.’

‘I—’

‘She did it,’ Cat confirms. From beyond the slits in his veil he can just make out the way Anslian’s expression twists and his eyes narrow.

‘My, my,’ Anslian says. Angry, of course. He glances at Marina. ‘Perhaps you are capable of miracles, to take that shell of a thing and teach it to speak.’

‘He’s not a thing,’ Fen interrupts once more. Her hand touches Cat’s wrist, just over his bell. ‘He’s my friend.’

‘Then tell me, friend of the crown,’ Anslian says, leaning forward towards Cat from his seat, ‘what do you know of Prince Elician’s disappearance?’

‘Now is not the time for this,’ Zinnitzia says.

‘Perhaps it’s not. But you will tell us more, I’m sure, soon enough. Won’t you? Ah. Your horse is here, Fenlia. Get on it.’ Fen squeezes Cat’s hand and then scrambles from the wagon. She leaves the horses’ reins in Cat’s care. Anslian turns his steed towards the head of the column, Fen riding with him. She glances back once.

‘Can you manage the cart on your own?’ Marina asks. Cat nods.

The Soleben soldiers part and let Cat steer the wagon between them. Zinnitzia and Marina ride just inside his field of vision, but the veil stays on.

Thankfully, the journey to the capital is not much longer. Within a day they reach Himmelsheim, though they see it long before they reach it. The great city has been built around a massive hill, not quite a mountain but tall enough to almost earn that title. Its grand sprawl rises ever upwards and its main road coils around the almost-mountain, looping in increasingly tighter rings until it comes to a rest before the palace at the top. Only one road leads to Himmelsheim’s main gates and there are no tricks or secrets to the ascent. To reach the palace too, there is only one route – by means of the long Great Lane, which circles ever upwards to its destination.

Cat’s fingers tighten on his reins once they are inside the city – and entry is easy with Anslian at the head of their party. The horses snort unhappily, and he forces his stiff hands to relax. Anslian and Fen lead the dusty group. Pedestrians hurry to the sides of the lane, pressing themselves against the buildings to avoid the procession. Some civilians cheer as they pass, waving and clapping their hands. Fen waves back on occasion, dainty hand barely visible as it turns outwards in greeting.

The more loops of the road they traverse, the more word spreads. The clapping gets louder. Loud enough to drown out any other noise. Cat tries to breathe but the reverberations rattle his lungs. Too loud. He cannot hear his own thoughts form. It’s too loud. Panic ricochets through him. Clap. Clap. Clap. Clap. Clap. Clap. Clap. Clap. The dark enclosure of the hooded veil is too tight, too close. His skin prickles hot and cold. The noise fractures all other senses. He can barely feel the reins beneath his gloved fingers now, or the bench beneath the thick wraps of his clothing as he sits. The sound rises and rises. I don’t want to be here.

The loops of the royal lane become tighter. Tighter still. He doesn’t know if he’s driving the cart or if the horses are just following the march of the others. His vision fades in and out as his lungs and heart continue to rebel.

Then the procession stops. At last.

There are voices and his head feels heavier than his shoulders. He tilts. Someone catches him. ‘Cat?’ Marina asks. Her arm is around his back. ‘Cat, we’re going down.’ Down where? He does not ask. No point in asking. No one ever tells him the truth anyway.

She pulls him, and he can’t control the way his limbs slide from the wagon and fold as he hits the ground. A great creaking something deafens him in its intensity. The palace gates have shut, and the sound of the clapping and cheers is muffled behind their great weight. Marina pulls his hood off and the world is too bright once more. Far too bright. He squeezes his eyes shut and his sweat-damp cheeks chill at the sudden exposure to air. His teeth chatter as his knees soak up puddle water.

‘A friend?’ someone asks, high-pitched, accented and grating.

‘Yes,’ Fen replies. ‘He’s my friend.’ There are footsteps. Footsteps that are muffled even more as Marina presses Cat’s face to her chest and turns.

‘I apologize, Your Majesties, but—’

‘This is the young man Elician brought to Kreuzfurt?’ a different person asks.

The King and Queen. They are here.

He pushes back from Marina. He inhales and exhales. He blinks past the bright sun that the people of Soleb worship with far too much glee. He tilts his head up and looks at Elician’s parents.

Elician shares his mother’s cascading curls, her soft brown eyes and the deep golden-brown hue to her skin. But his height and posture, his beard – which wrapped around his jaw and teased the skin above his lips – match his father entirely. King Aliamon steps forward and it is like seeing a mirage. An older version of Elician, with straighter hair and a larger nose, but who moves with the same stride, stands just to the side. Queen Calissia delicately lifts the edges of her purple gown. She crouches before Cat and holds out her hand. There are whispers, gasps, shocked voices hissing this way and that.

‘Welcome to Himmelsheim. Welcome,’ she says, ‘to our home.’ Slowly, carefully, wrist jingling its warning, he places his gloved hand in hers. They rise together.

‘Thank you,’ he says. She smiles, and it is as beautiful as her son’s. Sweet dimples form at the corners of her lips.

‘We should go inside,’ Aliamon says. ‘We have much to discuss.’

The King meets with Fen and Anslian separately to discuss their understanding of what has happened since Elician left the warfront on his so-called ‘humanitarian mission’ to Kreuzfurt. He sends Cat, Marina and Zinnitzia to a small office not far from the throne room to wait for him. Marina requests some water as they reach the room, and not long after a bowl and cloth arrive. She presses the cloth to Cat’s face, wiping his overheated cheeks and head. He is too tired to pull away. When the King arrives, he is cool again, his ears no longer ringing. He can hear his own thoughts beyond the pulsing drum of his heart.

Aliamon comes alone, closing the door to his office with a firm hand. Marina has told Aliamon who he is. There had been two weeks of fevered correspondence between Kreuzfurt and Himmelsheim before Cat took his oath, and through it all, Cat had known there would be no hiding his identity. But still, when the King enters and greets him with, ‘Stello Alest of Alelune,’ the acknowledgement chafes.

‘That is not my name anymore,’ Cat replies. He crosses his arms, smothering the bell against his side. Aliamon’s eyes still fall to it before travelling up to the top of Cat’s head and down again.

‘No,’ Aliamon agrees. ‘My son named you something else. Cat. Tell me, do they talk about nightcats in Alelune?’ Cat does not reply, but Aliamon continues, unbothered. ‘The story started when Marina was young, if you can imagine that far back. Nearly two thousand years ago. Select groups of Alelune soldiers would swim across the Bask and hide in the wilds of Soleb. They were assassins, at first, and they excelled at sudden ambushes of anyone who strayed too far from the rest of their unit. No one heard them come or go, but witnesses consistently reported streaks of grey or white disappearing in the dark. Leaving behind victims that seemed to be torn apart by the claws of a cat.’

‘I heard they were really Soleben assassins,’ Zinnitzia muses idly, ‘who preyed on soldiers along the borders of Alelune.’

‘I heard they were both,’ Marina adds. Aliamon shrugs. He smiles. His arms are loose at his sides and he bears no weapon. Nothing to see here, the posture says. Cat meets his eyes.

‘Eventually,’ the King continues, ‘the stories grew. Rumours said the assassins were not assassins at all, but a cat, a nightcat, a creature of Alelune’s beloved goddess, Death.’

‘They really don’t exist then?’ Cat asks. Elician had been so earnest in his search. Cat had wanted to see one too.

‘Oh, a creature did at some point, but they have been extinct for generations.’ Aliamon walks to his desk. He pulls open a drawer and takes something out, tossing it at Cat. It hits his chest and falls. Marina picks it up, holding it out for him to see. ‘It’s a claw, one of the newer ones to be found.’ Spanning her palm, it curves to a sharp point. It can still cut. It can still hurt. ‘These make their way through the markets on occasion, but the nightcats – assassins or monsters or both – those are never truly seen.’

‘Why are you telling me this?’

‘You were sent to kill my son, weren’t you?’ Aliamon smiles. ‘Cat?’ He drags the name out. ‘And me too?’

‘You,’ Cat agrees. ‘Your wife. Your entire family were targets.’ He clears his throat. ‘There is a traitor; someone betrayed your family and—’

‘You could kill us all now, I’m told. Just by thinking about it.’

Cat blinks, confused. He nods slowly. ‘Yes.’

‘Why don’t you? It would make your queen proud.’

Elician shares features with his father. But he is not like his father. There is a shrewdness to Aliamon that Elician has never displayed. There is a fierce sharpness to this king that reminds Cat of his queen instead. ‘Why did you have a party when I died?’ he asks in lieu of answering. Marina shifts at his side, her fingers tightening around the claw in her hand. Zinnitzia does not move.

Aliamon’s head tilts. His posture remains relaxed. ‘Because it pleased me to do so,’ he replies.

Oh. Once a year, when his queen took him from the cells to assess him, she brought him through hidden tunnels and passages. She led him to his former rooms and dressed him in fine fabrics. She hid his face behind a mask and let him slip in amongst the people of Alelune. He could wander the streets, dance with the courtiers, watch the acrobats and listen to the music of their country. She had him kill people, sometimes, during these outings. Women who had betrayed her or tried to place their daughters in the line of succession. Spies or political enemies. Most of the time he sat at the feet of a juggling fool, eating sweets and watching one magnificent spectacle after another. Then, afterwards, on the only night of the year when he was allowed to sleep in the room that used to be his, sometimes he could hear her crying. Cursing King Aliamon’s name for everything he had ever done to them.

Elician is kind. That is a fact Cat has known since the day they met. He is kind, and when he smiles that inward beauty is put on display for all the world to see. Honest, generous, loyal, giving, empathetic. Cat feels a pang, almost of loss, as he thinks of the missing prince. Elician is kind, but his father is not. When Elician smiled, Cat never wanted to look away. As Aliamon waits patiently for a response, he too smiles. And yet, despite the pleasing symmetry of his face, Cat does not find it attractive at all. He is the man who took Cat’s father hostage and used Marias as a bargaining chip that nearly destroyed Alelune’s faith in her queen. He is a man who celebrated a child’s death and who haunts Queen Alenée’s nightmares. Had Cat met Aliamon that night by the Bask River, he would not have regretted killing the King of Soleb. In fact, he would have relished it. It would have been justice.

Could still be justice.

He would deserve it. And now, Cat knows: no one will bring him back.

Cat’s nostrils flare. He promised Fen. Made an oath. This is Elician’s father. Fen’s , now. He won’t kill him. Won’t take another father from her. Not for anything. Taking a deep breath, Cat gives his response: ‘I see no joy in celebrating someone’s death. And it pleases me to let you live.’

Aliamon’s smile fades. His brow furrows. ‘Does it truly?’ he asks. He presses his right hand to his face, rubbing his temples as his palm hides his expression. When his hand falls, he says, ‘Marina tells me you believe Elician is in the Reaper cells. But it will take months to find a way in to confirm this. They are better protected now, after Ranio tried to smuggle you out.’

‘And then, once you have confirmed this?’

‘Then we simply hope my son succeeds in escaping where you failed, Stello Alest.’ Cat tries to interject, to deny the title once more, but Aliamon presses onwards. ‘I hear you want your Reapers freed, that you will do as we say in exchange for that.’

‘Yes, but—’

‘If we do find Elician and help him escape, we may be able to help your people too. But unless the Alelunen crown has a sudden change of heart, they will not be able to stay in Alelune after that. If they can make it across the border, they would be welcome to stay in Kreuzfurt—’

‘No.’

‘No?’

‘No. Free. I want them to be free .’

‘The only way that happens is if you return to Alelune,’ Aliamon says. ‘Your queen would need to give them an order of protection. Something I doubt she would do given the circumstances. And so, are you willing to depose her? For their freedom?’ The word is unfamiliar. Cat struggles to translate, but Aliamon gives him no time to think. ‘Are you willing to stand in her place? To take control and give the order that keeps your Reapers free? Are you willing to reshape the country you will inherit, and look after all the people of Alelune – not just your Reapers? Because Queen Alenée will not cede any form of power so long as she lives, and neither will I. This war will only end after she and I die, and our history is laid to rest. What comes after, though, is your world, Stello Alest. The world you and my son will make. While you are here and he is there, think on what type of world that will be. Because when the time comes to choose, you should know the answer you intend to give. And you should be prepared to kill whoever it takes to ensure that goal comes to pass. Even if you swore an oath not to.’

‘Fen said oaths are sacred. That you do not break them.’

‘Fen,’ Aliamon sighs, ‘is still young enough to believe in honesty. But you should know better. Do you?’ He approaches. His hand reaches out as if to touch Cat’s cheek. Cat recoils, stumbling even as Zinnitzia steps between them. Aliamon smiles that ugly smile. ‘You remind me of Elician,’ the King says. ‘I wonder, did you grow fond of one another when you met? I imagine my son grew fond of you.’

‘I don’t know what he felt.’

‘A pity.’

Cat’s fingers dig into the palms of his hands. The word why burns in his mouth in response to this, begging to be asked. Something in him holds it back, militant and strong. The King turns towards his desk. He says, ‘There is nothing you can do to help my son at this time. If Elician is in the Reaper cells, I’ll see him released. Until then, wait. Learn.’

‘Learn what?’

‘Marina trained my children to fight once. Perhaps she should do the same for you. As a Reaper, you should not fear the hand of Death, no matter the form that hand takes.’

‘You want to train me to fight?’

‘I want you to be of use one day. What form that takes . . . well. We’ll see, won’t we? I’m told mastering swordplay is a rite of passage in Alelune. At the very least, when the time comes for you to make a decision on what you’ll do for the crown, you’ll have the tools needed to see you through until the end.’

Cat shakes his head. No. That doesn’t make sense. ‘What about the traitor?’ he asks. ‘The one who betrayed your son—’

‘Let me worry about that. Go. Be content in my palace. It seems you will be here for a while.’

‘But—’

Marina catches him by the arm. She squeezes it, then bows, Zinnitzia copying the motion to his left. They force him from the room. Now is not the time to argue. But Cat twists back to watch the King as long as he can. He knows, deep in his gut: something is wrong .