Chapter 4
Chapter
Four
I go to bed late, after more sessions with Nurse and a few more fittings with the dressmakers. All of my gowns have to be modified to be laced in the front, since no one will be there to help me with my sleeves or my corsets. I collapse in bed, only to be woken up by a face hovering over mine, a candle illuminating my sister’s beautiful face.
“Wake up,” Erynne tells me.
I sit up, all alertness. “Are we escaping?” I ask, a flutter of excitement in my belly. Are we fleeing King Lionel then? It’s an utterly selfish move because it will doom Lionel’s fleet of ships…but it will also destroy the crops for the next several years and make food difficult for all. Yet if Erynne wants to run, I’ll gladly go with her.
My sister shakes her head and hands her candle off to Isabella, who hovers close nearby. “No, I’m afraid not. I cannot leave.” She gestures at her belly. “Not when I carry the heir to the kingdom.”
I collapse back on the bed again and pull a pillow over my face, disappointed. “Then go away. We’ll say our goodbyes in the morning.” My sister’s guilt is likely eating at her, but I don’t want to spend my last night in my own bed comforting her.
“We need to talk,” Erynne tells me, sitting on the edge of the bed. “And it must be now, when Lionel is in with his war councilors.”
Groaning, I sit up and give my sister a petulant glance. It’s hard not to be a tiny bit resentful of Erynne sometimes. She’s incredibly beautiful, with a slender, perfect figure. I’m the plump, less pretty one, with a wide smile and one tooth that’s slightly twisted and makes me look as if I’m smirking at all times. Erynne is clever and talented and she has the good blood. And the throne. And a baby.
True, she had to marry Lionel for some of those things, but I can still be petty in the middle of the night.
“You have to think about the future, Candra. Promise me that if they take you to the tower, you’re not going to run away. That if you cross the threshold, you’re going to stay there. If you forsake your duty at the last moment, all of us will suffer.”
Did she come here to chide me? I’m not going to let our people starve just because of me, no matter how much I like the thought of getting on the back of a horse and just riding away from all my problems. Of how panicked it’d make King Lionel, whose fastest ships are waiting at the harbor for a fair wind, and that if the Golden Moon isn’t given its sacrifice, that the ships will be destroyed, driven against the rocks by the wild winds, and there will be no war with Darkfell.
I like that idea quite a bit…except I can’t ride a horse.
But other than that, I’ve thought about it a great many times, all right. All day today, in fact. But of course I can’t do it. “I’m not going to run away,” I say, bitter. “Where would I go? To Darkfell?” I snort at the absurd idea. “They will impale me on a stake in front of their great stone doors as a warning to all Liosians who venture near. I am trapped , Erynne. If I go to the tower, my life is over.” I spread my hands helplessly. “And if I don’t go to the tower, my life is still over. Lionel will make sure of that.”
Her eyes glitter with tears. “I know, sister. I know. Which is why you must promise me that you’ll go.”
“I’ll go.” I sound as defeated as I feel. “Don’t worry. I will take Meryliese’s place.”
“A shipwreck,” Erynne says, fussing with my covers as tears fall down her cheeks. “I cannot believe a shipwreck is taking you away from me, and just when I need you the most. Do you know how difficult it is to be queen? To be his queen? And with the baby…”
Her words choke off.
I reach out and rub her arm. “I know. But you’ll have Isabella with you. And Riza. She’s trustworthy. Please find a place for her with your staff. And Nurse, too.” I touch her belly briefly. “Nurse will love to take care of this little one for you.”
Erynne gives me a faint smile through her tears. “Here I thought to comfort you, and you’re comforting me.”
“Well, I’ll have seven years to weep into my pillow,” I say brightly. “So I’m saving it up. It’ll give me something to do in the tower.”
She makes another choked sound, and then my sister flings her arms around my neck. “I’m going to miss you so much.”
Even though I’m trying to be strong, it’s hard not to cry as my sister sobs against my shoulder, I hug her tightly, breathing in her scent. It’s going to be the last time I get to hug her for seven long years, and we’ll both be different people when I come out. Seven years of my life is being stolen away from me for Lionel’s war, and I’m so bitter about it I want to spit…except a princess doesn’t spit. So I just hug Erynne and try not to think about the future. One day at a time, I remind myself. Or you’ll collapse before you ever make it to the tower. “I’m going to miss you, too. So much. But you’ll have your baby soon. Every time you think of me, just hug her.”
“But I’m going to be the last Vestalin,” she chokes, hugging me tighter.
My belly clenches. “I’m not dying , Erynne. I’m just getting shut away for seven years.”
“Right. Of course. I’m sorry.” My sister pulls back, and the expression on her face is grave as she studies me. “I brought you something, but you must tell no one that you have it.”
Well this sounds properly ominous. “What is it?”
I’m not sure what to expect from my sister. Erynne has always been the dutiful one, the one who is good and sweet and follows the rules. I’m the one that got caught losing her virginity in the chapel with one of the court knights. I’m the one who falls asleep during Lionel’s speeches, or gets in trouble for embroidering mustaches onto all the important historical tapestries. What could Erynne possibly give me? A dirty book? A key so I can let myself out?
I’m more than a little perturbed when she produces a knife and holds it out to me.
“You want me to kill myself the moment I get into the tower?” I ask, blank with surprise.
“No,” she hisses, grabbing my hand and forcing me to take the sheathed weapon from her hand. “This is to protect you, Candra. Use your head.”
“I would, but right now it’s filled with all the recipes Riza has been trying to get me to learn in the past day,” I joke half-heartedly. “What am I supposed to do with a knife? Is it for cooking?”
Erynne gives me an exasperated look. “Don’t be dense, Candra.”
“I’m not being dense. You’re the one giving me a knife!”
“Look.” She closes my fingers around it and pushes it towards me. “You’re going to be trapped in that tower with someone from the Darkfell bloodline. You must defend yourself if they try anything.”
My mouth goes dry and I stare down at the little knife in horror. There’s been so much going on that I haven’t given much thought to the fact that I’m going to be trapped in a tower for the next seven years with someone whose kingdom has sworn to destroy ours. Someone who Lionel will be declaring war against the moment I step foot inside the tower.
Suddenly a knife no longer seems like a silly gift. I clutch it tightly to my chest. The hilt can’t be more than the length of my finger, and the blade small and slightly curved. “It’s rather small for a murder weapon.”
“You’ll be locked in the tower,” Erynne says. “Figure out some poisons if you like, and rub them on the blade.” The look on her face is intense. “This is the dagger mother gave me when she was on her deathbed. It’s infused with magic.”
My jaw drops. “Magic?”
Also, I’m hurt that our mother gave Erynne a secret gift as she lay dying. All I got was a pat on the hand and instructions to “be good.” I wonder what else has gone on behind my back.
Erynne nods. “The magic of the gods is bound to this blade. It can answer true or false questions. When the answer is true, the knife will shiver in your hand. False, and it will have no response.”
That sounds strange. I flip the sheathed weapon over in my hand, eyeing it. It seems rather plain for a magical weapon. “And are you magical, blade?”
The thing positively shivers .
I yelp and drop it on the bed. For a moment, it felt alive.
Erynne picks it up again and holds it out to me. “I can’t be with you in the tower, but you can ask it questions about us back here. And you can ask it to give you advice about the other person in the tower with you. You might have to take drastic action, Candra. I know you joke that you’re a weak thing, but you’re strong, and you’re determined.” The look in her eyes is fervent as she leans in. “Both you and the Fellian must step across the threshold of the tower, and no one can enter or leave for seven years. Nothing says that both of you must be alive the entire time. Remember the stories of Old Eliza?”
Wordlessly, I take the knife from her again. I do remember. Old Eliza was of the Vestalin bloodline and served the tower two hundred years ago. She went in at the age of ninety and after seven years, she did not come out. They went in to find her and found a skeleton lying in bed, hands politely folded over her breast, and she had died of old age. Yet the kingdom had seen prosperity, because Eliza had never stepped foot outside the tower. “So you’re saying that I should go to the tower, murder the Darkfell sacrifice, and sit with the body for the next seven years?”
“If it’ll keep you alive.” Erynne’s gaze is hard. “Then yes, that is exactly what you should do.”
I shake my head, horrified at her suggestion. “I’m not a murderer.”
“Then you have two days to learn to become one,” my sister the queen says. “Because after you go into the tower, Lionel’s ships are going to sail for Darkfell. And if their Royal Offering has a way to get information from outside, they might come seeking revenge on you. Seven years is a very long time to be locked away with the enemy.”
Staring down at the knife in my hands, I clasp it to my breast and nod. I hate this. I hate all of it, and the situation seems to be getting worse by the moment. At least my sister wants me to go in prepared for anything.
If it’s as bad as she says it is, I might have to strike first, and the thought sends fear racing through me.