Page 36

Elician

‘You . . . killed her.’ Elician glances at the sanctum door, half expecting the clerics to burst in and begin their retribution. It is the most sacred law of the Kingsclave. No violence can happen here. It is neutral ground. It is meant for the most difficult of negotiations to proceed without fear of exactly this . The Queen had come because she had known she would be safe and . . . Anslian killed her.

‘Yes,’ Anslian says. He steps towards Elician. Elician steps back, tripping over Alenée’s legs. But his uncle is persistent, certain, and when his weathered hands touch Elician’s face he means him no harm. He merely cups Elician’s cheeks between his palms and looks at him. Looks. ‘I’m so sorry, my dear boy.’

‘Uncle?’ Elician asks.

‘I was not sure I’d see you again. I’d hoped, but I . . . I was not sure.’ Anslian’s hands shift, falling to Elician’s shoulders. He pulls his nephew into the gentle glow of the blue stones in order to see him more clearly, and Elician stumbles after him. Then, once there, he finds himself unable to move. He’s trapped by confusion and uncertainty as Anslian gives him a proper examination. ‘You’ve lost so much weight. Oh . . . your hair.’ His fingers touch the ragged and torn edges.

It is too much. Elician shakes his head. He closes his eyes and tries to banish the sight and smell of this place. He tries to find some semblance of calm, of understanding. But there is no understanding. Nothing makes sense. ‘What are you talking about?’ he asks, tired of manipulation and secrecy. Tired of lies and plans that he had never been told.

Elician’s first memory of Anslian had been the feeling of his arms. Of being picked up and carried back to the palace after he had become lost in the city of Himmelsheim’s many spirals. He had rested his head on Anslian’s shoulder and smelled the perfumed sweetness of his uncle’s clothes. From that moment on, his uncle had always made sense to him. He had always been a loyal, stalwart, fierce man who placed the good of Soleb above anything else.

Killing his own brother, arranging a peace treaty with the Queen, even arranging for Elician to be taken out of the way . . . If Anslian had thought it was all for the good of the people, Elician could almost understand it. It was twisted and wrong, but he could force himself to adapt to that reality. But this . . . to have committed all these atrocities to create a treaty that was meant to ensure a lasting peace, and then just murder the only other person required for that peace to take place—

‘You killed her,’ Elician says again. ‘You’ve . . . This war will never stop if she is dead, here, like this . . . I—What are you doing ?’

‘I’m sorry, Elician.’

‘Stop apologizing .’ Elician flinches at the volume of his own voice. He glances back over his shoulder, but the door stays closed. No one is coming to check on them. No one is interfering. It is just them, a torn treaty and the corpse of the Queen. Alelune will be furious. Gillage – Gillage is going to be king. Alenée was cruel, but at least she wasn’t him .

‘I can’t stop apologizing,’ Anslian murmurs. He smiles, but it is too sad. Too tired. His face creaks under the weight of the emotions and he leans back to rest against the table behind him. ‘I owe you those apologies more than anyone else.’

Elician feels ill. He presses a palm to his forehead and tries to stave off a spasm of pain as it spears through his skull. Too much. It is too much. The past few days have been more than he has been able to bear, and it is only getting worse. He is tired of there always being one more thing. He wants this to be over. ‘She gave me my father’s head,’ he says. ‘I held it . . . You cut off his head and I had to see – why would you do that?’

Thankfully, his uncle does not apologize again. Anslian waits long enough for Elician to catch his breath, then quietly responds, ‘It was the only way to convince Alenée to leave Alerae for the Kingsclave. She had to believe I was on her side.’

‘You killed my father for a meeting ?’ Not even for a certain and sure collaboration. Just a chance at a face-to-face.

‘Your father killed himself for a meeting,’ Anslian corrects. ‘I . . . I was taking too long for his liking. Her liking.’ His shoulders curl inwards, protectively, as his head bows. ‘We had been trying to find a way to reach Alenée for years. But she never left the city. Our spies could never get close enough to her. She had no interest in peace unless it was on her terms . . . and her terms were exacting. She wanted unfettered access to the Bask and Altas, and Aliamon dead. She never forgave us for what we forced her to do for Marias. Aliamon suggested I reach out to form an alliance with her, ostensibly without his knowledge. It would be believable if I appeared to crave the throne.’

No. That doesn’t make any sense. Elician shakes his head. The stabbing pain is getting worse. Pressure builds behind his left eye, spreading across his skull. He shoves his fingers onto the pressure points at his nose, his temple. Nothing stops the agony as it builds. Anslian keeps talking. Now that he has started, he cannot seem to stop, as if he is desperate to reveal all their manoeuvrings. Elician barely has the wherewithal to understand the savage tale.

‘The negotiations have been going on for years. And I tried to stop them, to stop your father, Elician. You have to believe I tried. I never wanted your father dead or you – you in her control.’

‘Stop. Stop, none of this— Start over. Explain it to me properly. Like I’m stupid .’ Because gods he feels stupid right now. He cannot understand this trajectory or how they ended with his father beheaded and the Queen of Alelune dead on the ground of the Kingsclave. ‘How did we get here?’ Elician asks. ‘Tell me the truth.’

Anslian glances towards the door. No one has heard them, and no one will interfere. This room is meant for negotiations, and those negotiations will take as long as they need to take. They have time, and Anslian nods. Resigned.

‘Your father and Alenée hated each other long before they took up their thrones. The source of that rage, I don’t know. He never told me. But I know that I made it worse when I took Marias hostage when we were fighting to take back Altas from Alelune twenty-two years ago.’

‘Why did you?’

‘Because I believed taking him hostage would end the war. And it did. She conceded the city and the river, and her reign was continually besieged by challengers ever since, cousins and distant relatives who thought they could rule better than the woman who let Altas slip from her grasp. Where Soleb had seventeen years of peace following that victory, Alelune nobility waged silent and deadly civil war amongst themselves. She needed a daughter to secure her line, but Marias was hated for his part in losing Altas and she was pressured to divorce him. Gillage was born after a hasty marriage with a more suitable lord, and another son still was not enough. Then . . . when Alest drowned, and came back as a Reaper, she had little choice but to imprison her own child. And still: her grip on her throne became weaker. Her deciding to restart the war in an attempt to reclaim the Bask was only a matter of time.

‘And it was time that your father spent attempting to create a legacy that could not be undone. He tried first to retrieve Alest from the cells, believing he could use Alest as a bargaining chip once Alelune’s succession crisis came to a head.’

Elician’s fingers clench tight. ‘He would have saved Alest only because he could have used him against Alelune? Not because it was wrong Alest was there to begin with?’

‘When did your father ever do anything out of the goodness of his heart?’ Anslian asks.

Never. Elician knows he had never done anything just because it was right. It was only ever for glory and recognition. For the praise and acknowledgement that he, the benevolent ruler, had done well.

‘Ranio believed that Alenée was trying to find ways to remove Alest from the cells. Aliamon gave him the order to make an attempt, believing it would be a successful heist.’

‘What went wrong?’

‘We don’t know. But after he failed, Aliamon changed focus.’ Here, Anslian hesitates. He closes his eyes, preparing for a blow he knows will hurt, but finds the strength to deliver it anyway. ‘He adopted Fenlia in the hopes that should your own secret ever be revealed, someone else could stand as heir.’

‘I know.’

‘You know?’

‘Adalei and I heard you arguing about it.’ It had been a painful day. He could at least understand why his father doubted him so completely; there were laws forbidding his ascension. But to know that his father loathed Adalei for something far less tangible was simply inexcusable. Aliamon found Adalei too ill, too weak, to be a viable candidate for the throne, hence the need for another heir. For Fen. ‘He was furious when Fen became a Giver too,’ Elician murmurs. Within hours of Fen’s discovery, she had been sent from the only home she had ever known to Kreuzfurt.

Her place in the family all but rescinded.

And she never knew why.

Elician had promised to bring her back. To make sure Kreuzfurt could never hold her or any other Giver or Reaper against their will again. But he had never told her why, in the moments after her life changed for ever, her world had needed to change so drastically too.

‘I always felt it was the gods cursing him,’ Anslian reveals. ‘He tried so hard to hide his Giver child from the world, and when he feared that secret might be undone, he tried to choose another, and the gods would not forgive him his hubris.’

‘He could have adopted someone else.’ Even as he says it though, Elician doubts his father would have stooped so low. His father loved Ranio like a brother. Adopting Fen would have felt like justice, vindication to him. But to take in an unknown? Someone unworthy or unproven? It would have disgusted Aliamon. It would have ruined his dream of a legacy he could be proud of.

‘He never would have countenanced such a thing,’ Anslian confirms.

Elician shakes his head, tries to clear his thoughts. ‘Why did he arrange for Alenée to take me hostage?’

‘Because he saw one way to destabilize Alelune for generations. A way that led to Alenée’s death. With her dead, Alelune would be too busy fighting amongst themselves on who should be their ruler to stand in the way of Soleb’s continued improvement and growth. Even if they eventually sorted themselves out, they would never be able to challenge Soleb militaristically again.’

That doesn’t answer the question. Not really. ‘Why did he arrange for me to be taken hostage, Uncle?’ Elician repeats, firmer this time. ‘How does that fit into his plans for legacy?’

‘The path to Soleben stability was built on Alenée’s death. But she was too well protected by those loyal to her. She needed to be in a place where she would be alone. Unprotected.’ He waves his hand around them. The Kingsclave, where honour forbade violence, and for Solebens a vow was absolute. Alelunens called it Blessedsafe because that’s what they should have been. Safe. ‘She would only come if she believed it was worth it to her. If she believed that she would truly walk away the victor.

‘So, he would give her everything that she wanted, by making her believe it was what I wanted too. Morsen confirmed what Ranio had suspected: that Alenée had been making opportunities for Alest to escape. It seemed worth it to try that tactic again. This time, with Alenée’s involvement. I proposed to her an equal exchange. She would send her son here. He would make an attempt on your life, and you . . . in your kindness, would do what we all knew you would do: offer him a chance to live in Kreuzfurt instead. And once you ensured that her son had a life, one he would never have received in Alelune, I would ensure that you were delivered into her custody. She needed a child. A female child. And as a Giver you could give her that. It seemed so simple. Neat.’

Nothing about this was either simple or neat. Elician shakes his head. ‘She told Alest to kill you and Father. He told me that.’

‘Me as well?’ Anslian doesn’t sound entirely surprised. ‘I suppose she didn’t trust us either.’

‘Considering she’s dead , that’s not an entirely unjustified belief.’

They were lucky. They were all lucky that Alest had looked at them all in that moment, in Himmelsheim, while he was surrounded by the ancestral enemy to his people, and had done nothing . Had Alest followed through with his mission, killing Aliamon, Anslian and anyone else in the royal family who stood in his way, he could have created all the same instability that Anslian had just condemned Alelune to instead. Soleb’s royal family would have been decimated, and Elician would have remained her prisoner. For ever.

Alenée had played two hands at once, letting the pieces fall where they may. She told Alest to kill the Soleben royal family, but even without that, she had gained all the benefits that the original plan had offered. Alest safe in Soleb. Elician imprisoned, peace seemingly at hand. She had come here, just as Aliamon and Anslian had planned, to sign a peace treaty. She had believed them. And now she is dead. Just as they would have been dead had her son acted with any more malice in his heart.

They have all been so incredibly lucky.

And the people of Alelune, now, are far less so.

‘I knew she told him to kill Aliamon,’ Anslian continued. ‘I even told her the opportunity could arise. At your funeral, it would be easy enough to bring him to Himmelsheim. And it was. Easy enough to put them in a room together and wait to see what he would do.’

‘And he chose not to kill him. Father must have been furious.’

The half-smile that crosses Anslian’s face is bittersweet, his eyes wet with unshed tears. ‘He was. It would have been convenient. For all of us. Alest killing him would ensure I had no hand in his death. I would have ensured Alest vanished without being captured, free to go wherever he pleased, and no one would have questioned my succession. And yet, Alest didn’t kill him. And that . . . that returned the responsibility back to me.’

Elician cannot find it in him to feel grief for his uncle’s plight. Not in that. Not when his uncle had participated in the negotiations in the first place. It may have been easier for Anslian to let Alest do the deed, but Anslian had still gone to the negotiating table at the start promising Aliamon’s death.

‘I was . . . stunned. I had not expected it of that boy. And when I realized what it would mean . . . what I would have to do . . . I couldn’t bring myself to do it in the end. I dithered. Delayed. I left the capital and insisted I needed to be at the border, only to be summoned back time and again. Months passed. Alenée was growing impatient. I told her I was unable to act and that it was her son who had failed to accomplish the task she had given him. She sent a second Reaper. Aliamon had purposely set a lax guard to enable that assassination to succeed but—’ Anslian laughs. ‘Alest stopped that too. And with every day that Aliamon stayed alive, you remained in Alerae. We couldn’t remove you until she had left the city.’

Of course not. Their plan had been to entice Alenée to a place where they could kill her. And letting Morsen get Lio and him out sooner would have entrenched her in Alerae that much more. Anslian’s eyes fall to the Queen’s corpse.

‘I thought she would be with child. I waited to hear the news. Your father – he was almost resigned to the fact a child would be born. Once, he thought it was amusing that it was you who would have done it. Another Soleben victory in its own way. But the news never came. And she . . .’

‘She only asked after my father died.’

Surprise flickers across Anslian’s face. He frowns, glancing towards the dead queen. ‘I wonder why.’

It is far too late to ask now.

‘Maybe she didn’t find it as amusing or as appealing as you thought.’

‘She needed a female heir.’ Elician wonders if, at the end of everything, she had needed Aliamon to die to motivate her into actually doing something about that. She could have remarried. She could have found any number of suitors. She didn’t. She had known her duty, and she had still waited until the final moment to push for it. Even in the end, she couldn’t have forced him into compliance. She had been willing to exchange Elician for Fen. Resigned to contingencies, and far too easily.

‘Would you have murdered her if she came to you months pregnant anyway?’ Elician asks.

‘Yes.’ Anslian meets Elician’s eyes, unflinching in the face of condemnation. ‘After all of this . . . yes. But you never did give her a child, did you?’ That shouldn’t matter. Not when the risk had been so real. That shouldn’t have mattered at all. But Anslian continues. ‘When we planned everything from the start, we hadn’t thought it would be a concern. You were never meant to stay there as long as you did. Your father . . . he had it arranged. As soon as Alest was brought to the palace, your father would be murdered. I would take the crown. I would meet her here. And this would be done with. A few months at most. Never long enough for her to give birth to the child she would have begotten even if you had agreed.’

‘I wouldn’t have made that same choice,’ Elician replies.

‘No. I don’t think you would have made any of these choices.’ Perhaps worst of all is how Anslian says those words. Calm and gentle, filled with love and a deep respect that is counter to all the meticulous plans and machinations Anslian and Aliamon had put together. Elician’s refusal is something to be proud of. Elician wishes he could understand how Anslian had got to this point, where he could do so many things he didn’t agree with, only to be proud that Elician would never do the same.

Anslian’s attention remains on Alenée’s corpse. There is nothing close to guilt in his expression. But he looks tired. Tired and old beyond his years. ‘Lio,’ Anslian says slowly. ‘We heard that Lio . . .’

‘I brought him back,’ Elician replies. His uncle jerks back, meets Elician’s eyes at last. ‘He’s alive. I . . . brought him home. I’m going to bring him home.’ Tears stream down Anslian’s cheeks, sudden and dramatic. He presses a palm to his face and cries. His shoulders shake as tremors shudder down his spine. Elician has never seen his uncle weep before. Not after his wife’s death. Not when they stood vigil by Adalei’s mother’s casket. Nor even when Adalei had first fallen ill and had been taken to the House of the Unwanting. He had always stood tall and proud, face seemingly carved from stone.

‘You were meant to go to Kreuzfurt alone,’ Anslian says, his voice cracking. ‘I should have sent you alone. You would have been captured and . . . it would have been better.’

‘But you’re the one who sent Lio with me,’ Elician murmurs. ‘Why?’

‘Because I was still trying to stop this damn fool negotiation from the start. This plan that led to all these deaths . . . and countless more. I had hoped your father would not risk both of you. While it may never have been official – Lio’s betrothal to Adalei was almost certain. It was my last attempt to delay all of this, in the hopes Aliamon would not be willing to risk a second member of this family. I told him weeks before Alest even crossed the border what I would do, hoping it would forestall him. I hoped too that even one more blade would make the difference, that you would never be caught in the first place.’ But they had been caught.

His father had not hesitated. He had accepted Lio’s loss and what it would mean. Elician imagines the epic history book written in his father’s honour. Praising him for his sacrifices, his planning, his willingness to risk the continuation of his line, just to destroy Alelune’s chance of thriving on its own. What did Aliamon care about Adalei’s happiness? What was Lio in the face of potentially destroying Alelune’s monarchy? An afterthought, perhaps. Not even strong enough to defeat the soldiers sent to kidnap Elician, and therefore: not worth mentioning at all. Aliamon would be a king whose careful schemes saw the end of Alelune as a territorial threat. None of the rest mattered. Least of all the brave soldier who had sworn his life to Elician from the moment he knew the proper words to recite.

Fuck him.

‘I’m sorry, Elician,’ Anslian says. ‘I’m so very sorry.’ The apologies mean little. They are not coming from the right person. It is his father who should be apologizing. But his father is dead. ‘I thought I’d die, and Adalei would never be happy again. That I’d truly failed everyone I loved.’

No.

No. He hadn’t.