Page 55

Chapter Nineteen

Daeros—Tenebris

It feels like a storm is looming, like the very earth under our feet groans and shifts, readying for irrevocable change.

The Prism Master keeps mostly to himself and his rooms, but every morning he saunters into Kallias’s private receiving chamber with his quartet of Iljaria behind him and demands a progress report from Kallias and Basileious, his engineer.

I know because I’m always crouched above the ceiling, watching.

“Closer,” says Basileious every day. “Soon. But not yet.”

And then the Prism Master leaves again.

Skaanda and Daeros sign the peace treaty in the great hall, all the palace watching: Kallias and Ballast first, me and Vil after.

Aelia looks on, cold and angry in her fur-lined gown.

Brandr signs, too, accepting the pledge of tribute from both nations.

Kallias doesn’t seem to care about the treaty whatsoever, but Ballast sparks with rage, and Vil seethes with it.

“It isn’t real,” Saga and I have told him, over and over. “It means nothing.”

But does it mean nothing now, with Brandr’s name affixed to it in a flourish of silver ink?

Kallias makes his Collection perform to celebrate the signing.

I force myself to sit in the semicircle of chairs, nails digging into my legs through the velvet skirt of my green gown.

Ballast slouches in his chair, eye studiously trained on his hands, clenched tight together in his lap.

Aelia makes no apologies and leaves entirely. Vil jiggles his knee beside me.

The scenes of my worst nightmares play out before my eyes, and when, when , will all this be over?

The Prism Master seems largely unimpressed with any of the children, the only exception being Finnur.

Tonight Finnur weaves a sky of stars into being, then plucks the stars down and presents them to the audience as glittering jewels, solid and real in the palm of his hand.

He hands one to Brandr, who inclines his head to the boy and turns the jewel over and over in his fingers.

Finnur gives one to me, too, and it takes everything in me to keep myself from snatching his arm and pulling him out of this horrible room.

Rute, my acrobatic ghost, performs last. I have to shut my eyes and tell myself a story in order to bear it. When I open them again, Kallias is tugging Ballast from his seat and nudging him to the front of the room.

“Do a trick for us, boy!” Kallias crows.

Ballast is hard and blank before him, and says very low: “I am not one of your pets, Father.”

Kallias laughs at him. “Of course you are. Amaze us! That’s an order.”

Ballast’s throat works, and suddenly, awfully, I find his one blue eye fixed on mine.

I feel the magic before I hear it or see it.

It hums and breathes and lives. And then the room is filled with moths, whispering and white.

They swarm around me, shaping themselves into a living gown, drawing me from my seat and spinning me around on the marble floor.

For a moment I’m caught up in the wonder of it all, borne along on their fast-flickering wings.

Then a crack of jarring, awful magic blisters the air, and the moths fall dead at my feet.

Horror twists through me and I turn back. Brandr stands, clothed in fury and power, magic sparking off every part of him. He is the one, I realize, who killed the moths.

“I am not interested in parlor tricks,” Brandr says, coldly, to Kallias. “Collar your pets, little king. Inform me the moment you breach the weapon. I have no need of your continued presence until then.” He strides from the hall, the other Iljaria at his heels.

Kallias wheels on Ballast but doesn’t strike him, not in front of the whole court. “Clean up this mess,” he snarls.

Then he’s gone, too.

Everyone else starts quietly filing out as well, and Vil grabs my wrist to tug me with him. But I shake him off. So he leaves without me.

Ballast kneels in the ruin of the moths, his head bowed. I kneel with him.

“How soon, do you think?” he says quietly. Until the weapon is uncovered, he means. Until all this is over. He knows that I know.

“Soon,” I say.

I cradle one of the moths in my hand, marveling at the tiny silver beauty of it. I blink and it turns to dust.

“You should go.” He doesn’t look at me. “I can’t afford for my father to be any angrier with me than he already is.”

I let the dust slip between my fingers. I go.

The advance scout is waiting for me in the hidden cellar tunnel. She’s young, no older than Leifur, and her black hair is braided tight against her scalp. She introduces herself as Aisa.

“How far is the army behind you?” I ask her, fighting to keep my voice low.

“At least a week,” she says apologetically. “They’re moving as quickly as they can.”

I nod, trying to get hold of myself. “I’ll report to Vil and sneak food down to you later.”

“No need, I’m well prepared.” Aisa thumps her pack. “I’ll await His Highness’s instructions.”

I thank her and slip back upstairs.

“A week,” says Vil, pacing the length of my and Saga’s room. “A week .”

“Can we last another week?” says Saga, perched on the couch, all restless, nervous energy. “What if Kallias reaches the weapon before the army arrives?”

“I can ask Finnur to make more magic to seal up the vein,” I say.

“It’s too risky with the Prism Master here,” Vil returns. “You could be caught. We’ll just have to strike early, if the weapon is breached too soon. We’ll have to hold the mountain until the army comes.”

“You said before that that was impossible,” I point out.

Vil flicks his eyes to mine, his jaw hard.

I try not to squirm with the guilt of still not having even acknowledged his confession. I want you to be my queen. I’m in love with you, Brynja.

“If we don’t, we’ll lose any control we could have hoped to have—either to Daeros or, gods forbid, Iljaria.”

“But we can’t do anything against the Prism Master,” says Saga. “No one can. And if we’re all there when Kallias uncovers the weapon, the Prism Master will be the one to seize it.”

I shake my head. “Kallias has a plan. I overheard him discussing it with his engineer,” I tell them.

Vil still doesn’t like it. “It’s a risk.”

“It’s all a risk, Vil,” I retort. “But if we’re to strike at all, it has to be then. It will be our only chance.”

“I want to be there,” puts in Saga, pulling her knees up to her chin. “I want to be there when the weapon is found, when the fates of all our nations are decided. It won’t matter if Kallias recognizes me after we’ve captured him. I’ll keep my head down until then.”

Vil’s jaw goes tight, but he doesn’t argue with her.

“So,” I say. “If the army comes before the weapon is breached, we strike then.”

“And if the weapon is breached first,” says Saga, “we strike then . Can we count on Aelia’s support, do you think?”

I nod. “At least until summer, when the emperor sends his army.”

“By then we’ll have a means to defend ourselves,” Vil says.

“Are you so confident you’ll be able to wield the Iljaria weapon?” I ask him.

“I know you have no faith in me, Brynja, but I wish you’d believe me the slightest bit capable.”

Something ugly twists inside my belly, and I’m ready to be done with the conversation. I don’t answer him.

He leaves a moment later, and Saga glowers at me over her tea. “You should be kinder to him, Bryn.”

Tears bite at my eyes, and I stalk over to the window, staring out at blurring stars.

She sets her tea down and follows me. “He cares for you a great deal.”

My throat works. “He told me he’s in love with me. He wants me to stay with him in Tenebris as his queen.”

“And what did you tell him?” Her tone is carefully neutral.

“Nothing.”

“Brynja.”

I turn from the window, a whorl of anger and grief.

“I’m tired of being in the dark, Saga. I’m so tired of the dark.

This mountain has taken half my life from me.

I can’t stay here. I can’t. And I don’t—I don’t feel those things for Vil.

I don’t think I ever will.” I realize it’s true, down to my very bones, and I can’t even quite regret it.

Saga’s eyes go soft and angry all at once. “But you feel those things for Ballast.”

I see him kneeling in a pile of dead moths, and my heart twists. “I am weary of kings and princes, Saga. I am weary of all this.”

She presses her lips into a thin, hard line. “Don’t leave Vil in his misery. Tell him the truth.”

I swallow past the lump in my throat. “Do you hate me?”

“I don’t hate you, Bryn. I understand about the mountain. You’ve been here too long, experienced too many terrible things. I get it. But I don’t understand about Vil. And I’m trying very hard not to be angry with you about it.”

“I’m sorry.” My voice breaks. “Saga, I’m so sorry.”

She just shakes her head. “Don’t tell me. Tell Vil. I’m going to take a bath.” She steps past me and slips into the bathing chamber. I scramble up into the ceiling, curl into a tight ball, and let myself cry.

Ballast is asleep when I slip down into his room. I light a candle and he wakes instantly, jerking up in bed and scrambling for the eye patch on his bedside table. He ties it on quickly, but not before I glimpse the raw red emptiness of his eye socket.

He sits there on the edge of his bed, breathing quick, and I realize with a twist of horror that he thought I was his father.

I glance to the door that joins their rooms and gnaw on my lip. “I’m sorry,” I whisper. “I didn’t know when else to speak with you.”

He shakes his head. “You startled me, is all.” His voice is rough with sleep.

“I wanted to tell you—” I pause, take a breath. Vil and Saga would kill me if they knew I was here, ready to spill their secrets. But Ballast knows most of them already.

He looks at me steadily, waiting for me to go on.

“The Skaandans will strike soon. The army is almost here.”

“You mean to seize the mountain, depose my father, put your prince on the throne instead.”

“He’s not my prince.”

Ballast shrugs. “Do you think the Prism Master will allow that?”

“There’s the weapon.”

“Yes. The weapon.” He gets off the bed and paces to the window that looks out over the Sea of Bones. I follow. The stars are quiet tonight, like they’re waiting, too.

Ballast turns to me. “What is the weapon, Brynja?”

I’m hyperaware of my pulse, thudding through the whole of my being. “I don’t know.”

His lips thin. “Why are you here? Why are you telling me this?”

“Because—because I’m worried about you.”

He laughs and folds his arms across his chest. “You’re such a liar.”

“I’m not lying. Your father will be executed, Ballast. And Vil says that—”

“That the same fate awaits me? No. I told you before that I will not allow the Skaandans to take Daeros. I will depose my father and rule in his stead. And the Skaandans will get the hell out of my country. Will you go with them, Brynja? Or will you lay all your cards on the table now, and join them with mine?”

I square my jaw. “My loyalty is with Vil and Saga. It has to be.”

“Why? What right does Skaanda have to Daeros?”

“What loyalty do you have to Daeros?” I retort.

“Do you think because I’m a half blood that I don’t belong anywhere? That I have no right to carve out a place for myself?”

“Of course not.”

“Then what right do you have to ask me what loyalty I have to my own damn country?” He’s breathing hard, magic sparking off his skin, cerulean and pink.

Anger twists through me. “What are you doing then, Ballast? What are you waiting for? For your father to hurt your mother more or to lock more children in cages? For him to get his hands on a godsdamned Iljaria weapon and burn all the world to ashes?”

“Then you do know what the weapon is!” he cries.

We stare at each other, my heart wild and my face hot. “It’s power,” I say. “Unimaginable, uncontainable power. That’s all I know, I swear.”

He scoffs at me. “ Is that all you know, Brynja? Is it?”

I fight to breathe, and I wish to the gods I hadn’t come here tonight. This was a mistake. “It’s all I know,” I say quietly.

He clenches his jaw. “You don’t need to worry about me. You just need to worry about staying out of my way. And you can tell that to your precious Skaandan prince, too.”

“He’s not my prince.”

Ballast laughs. “I don’t care.”

I leave him without another word, leaping up into the vents and crawling back to my room, where I slip into bed beside a soundly sleeping Saga. I lie there a long while, staring up into the dark and reviling myself to the depth of my bones.

I’m still awake when Vil bursts in, his clothes obviously pulled on in haste, rumpled and askew. I jerk up and shake Saga awake in the same moment.

“The weapon?” I ask.

Vil nods. “It’s time. We’ve all been summoned. Get dressed as quick as you can.”

He turns his back to us as we scramble into our clothes and wrap ourselves with furs against the mountain’s chill.

I make sure to wear my headdress.

The one with the hidden knife.