Chapter Eleven
C HAPTER E LEVEN
The halls of Iantas were narrow, their stained-glass windows shedding jeweled light on the sparkling mineral veins running through the granite walls. The tapestries were woven mostly in shades of gold, plum, and cobalt, while the oil paintings depicted storm-tossed seascapes and the dragons that lurked beneath the currents.
Talasyn vastly preferred it to the Roof of Heaven’s overstated grandeur, but she couldn’t deny that it had been rather lonely with just Jie and the Lachis-dalo and the comparatively small number of servants for company. That was no longer the case. With the arrival of the refugees, the castle resounded with footsteps and voices. Even the vegetable gardens outside rang with the commotion of attendants trying to place dozens of farm animals all at once.
She busied herself with getting the villagers settled in while the Kesathese contingent was shown to their rooms. Running her own household was not as difficult as she’d previously feared; she simply had to think of it in terms of the army, with everyone having their role.
The sun had begun to inch toward the horizon when Talasyn finally retreated to her quarters—or, to be more accurate, the quarters that she shared with her husband. A husband who didn’t even remember kissing her a month ago. Her hand shook a little against the bronze-wrought bedroom door, but she determinedly pushed it open.
Alaric turned to face her at the sound of her entrance. He was standing by the sliding glass panels that led out to the balcony, and he had changed out of his armor. The gauntlets were gone, too, and the light of the late afternoon sun bounced off the vulana stone on his ring finger, the one that matched hers.
“Sorry about this,” she said, a touch too loudly. “Things are different here in Nenavar. People will talk if we have separate chambers. But if you’re truly uncomfortable—”
“Are you ?” he asked, in that low and solemn rumble of his that always had the peculiar effect of making her want to crawl out of her skin, for reasons that weren’t entirely too terrible.
“It’s all right.” In the name of all the gods and the ancestors, why did she sound so faint ? “The bed’s big enough.”
Both their gazes snapped to the object in question. The canopied mattress could easily accommodate five people, and it was furnished with a mountain of plump eiderdown pillows, wine-colored silk sheets, and damask hangings trimmed in gold. Talasyn tried to suppress her blush—how many nights had she lain there all by herself, wide awake, her mind wandering to the kisses that she and Alaric had shared and the way his large hands had fumbled over her body?
“I’m not to sleep on the floor, then?” He quirked an eyebrow at her.
Her embarrassment faded, replaced by guilt. Given what she now knew of his past, it had been the height of cruelty to make him spend the night in such discomfort when she herself had not been blameless. This is your home, she wanted to tell him. This is safe harbor from your father. No one will harm you here. But what came out instead was the first sentence that she could string together in her flustered headspace: “You’re always welcome in this bed.”
It was only when Alaric drew a sharp inhale that Talasyn was struck by the double meaning of her statement. She had to get out of here before she made an even bigger fool out of herself. She—
She stayed where she was as Alaric closed the distance between them. He carefully tucked stray strands of windswept hair behind her ear, his expression losing a bit of its usual guarded edge.
“I didn’t get to finish my question earlier,” he mumbled. “How have you been?”
“You didn’t write me back,” Talasyn blurted out.
She could have kicked herself. Of all the issues to bring up.
He frowned. “Did you not receive—”
“I got the letter your aide wrote for you,” she said, dying a thousand deaths. It had bothered her on and off in the past month, certainly, but it was a juvenile concern in the grand scheme of things.
It was his fault. He was too close. She couldn’t think.
Alaric’s fingers cradled the side of her face. His thumb brushed across her cheek, similar to how he’d run it along the back of her hand that morning in his bedroom. “I’ll respond personally. Next time.”
“Who says there’ll be a next time?” she challenged with a huff. “I hate writing letters, I never had to until I was proclaimed the Lachis’ka, so they always come out all awkward—”
He chucked her under the chin. The way he had at the Belian shrine. Everything about this moment carried echoes of before , painted in a new light.
“I thought Queen Urduja might have told you what to write,” he admitted. “I assumed you told her about—about what my father—”
“I didn’t,” she said quickly.
But she had told Vela.
Guilt again, rolling through her in waves.
Talasyn tried to step back. Tried to step away from Alaric and this jumble of emotions, this labyrinth. But she found herself frozen in place as relief softened his features, taking away the years. The corner of his mouth, mere inches from hers, lifted in what was almost a smile.
“Write to me again, Tala.” There was a teasing lilt to his tone. “I’ll write back. I promise. We’ll endure your awkwardness together.”
Her spark of annoyance was eclipsed by how close he was, close enough to kiss. And maybe she should kiss him, to erase some of that smugness …
Talons scrabbled against glass, and they sprang apart.
A messenger eagle was hovering over the balcony, attempting to gain entrance. Talasyn slid open the panels, and the smell of the ocean wafted into the room as the raptor perched on her arm.
She noted the dragon-embossed seal on the scroll tied to its leg. “ This letter is from my grandmother.”
Alaric had retreated as far away from the eagle as the room would allow. “One of these almost made a meal of Kesath’s next generation of messenger skuas.”
“That was my personal bird, and you should have fed him as soon as he arrived,” Talasyn informed him, loosening the knots that held the scroll fast to Urduja’s eagle. “Pakwan flew overnight to get my letter to you. He must have been famished.”
“Pakwan.” Alaric sounded out the unfamiliar Nenavarene syllables with the same Continental accent that Talasyn was practicing so earnestly to rid herself of, and she nearly grinned.
“It means ‘watermelon.’” She began to unroll the missive, wondering what Urduja wanted.
“You named a deadly bird of prey ‘Watermelon,’” Alaric deadpanned.
“I was hungry when the falconer said I could name him …” Talasyn trailed off as she read the Zahiya-lachis’s elegant, flowing script. Then she looked up at Alaric with wide eyes. “My grandmother and my father are joining us for supper tonight.”
The diplomatic schooner from the Roof of Heaven made landfall on Iantas together with the purple-hued drape of dusk, its multitude of blue-and-gold sails rippling in wind-tossed harmony with the swaying tops of the coconut palms. Queen Urduja and Prince Elagbi disembarked and, arm in arm over the white sands, mingled with the villagers who had come out to the landing grid to receive them, asking after their welfare, commiserating with their losses.
Talasyn observed it all, standing at Alaric’s side, from where they stood at the castle entrance. If there was one thing she couldn’t fault her grandmother for, it was how she treated her people. The Zahiya-lachis would never be warm—she had her son to compensate for her in that area—but she always listened to the commonfolk’s concerns and tirelessly sought solutions for them. The Nenavarene revered her for it.
But even if Urduja had been a cruel or absent ruler, the Nenavarene had to revere her anyway. For she was blessed by the ancestors, who watched over the Dominion from their great ships in the Sky Above the Sky.
Talasyn had not grown up in Nenavar. Though she had picked up the habit of calling on the ancestors when she was cross, she felt no spiritual connection to them. She hardly even believed in the Continent’s gods; there’d been precious little room for faith in the slums and gutters of Hornbill’s Head.
Still, Urduja’s regal bearing, the way her white hair and silver dress and the gemstones she was covered in glimmered beneath the faint stars, against the crashing surf—it all contributed to the illusion of divinity. And with his golden robes and golden dragon circlet, Elagbi was the sun to his mother’s moon as he escorted her up the stone path to where Alaric and Talasyn were waiting.
“How long does it take these two to get ready for the day?” Alaric asked Talasyn out of the corner of his mouth. “Your father takes longer than the Zahiya-lachis, I’d wager.”
Thus it was that, when the Night Empress greeted her family and bade them welcome to her and her husband’s demesne, she was struggling not to laugh .
Elagbi’s easygoing confusion and Urduja’s frozen outrage at her granddaughter’s lack of composure did not help Talasyn regain control in the slightest. As she and Alaric led the way to Iantas’s dining room, her hand tucked into the crook of his elbow, she sank her nails into his arm in an attempt to ground herself and he nudged her in admonishment.
“Kindly do not pinch me, Lachis’ka.”
“It’s your fault,” she retorted through stifled laughter. “Don’t make me sic my eagle on you.”
“Please, no.” His lips twitched. “Anything but Watermelon.”
Talasyn choked . But before long she could feel Urduja staring holes into her back, and that was enough to sober her.
In the dining room, the food was laid out in communal dishes on banana leaves that bedecked the glossy, maroon-toned narra table, with attendants at the ready. Both Jie and Sevraim had made themselves scarce, neither wanting to intrude on what was technically a family meal, and so it was only the four royals who sat down—Urduja and Elagbi side by side, Alaric and Talasyn across from them.
A stilted silence reigned supreme. The sound of sloshing liquids as the attendants poured water and wine into their goblets echoed through the cavernous room, all the way up to the high vaulted ceiling.
“It’s good that the two of you are getting along,” Urduja finally said, ladling pale cubes of freshly caught mackerel cured in palm vinegar onto her plate. “This alliance could certainly benefit from some amicability between its two key components.”
Talasyn had enough experience with Nenavarene doublespeak to know that Urduja was subtly warning her, just as Vela had. Reminding her of what was at stake, of the fact that her marriage could only ever be strategic in nature and nothing more.
It stung, although she wasn’t too keen on figuring out exactly why. She glowered at each scoop of rice that she doled out onto her plate.
Alaric, for his part, seemed to be in no hurry to respond, either. It wasn’t until they’d begun eating that Elagbi made another attempt at conversation. “There is an eclipse tomorrow night, is there not? Will Their Majesties be training here at Iantas?”
“Yes, down by the beach,” said Talasyn. “Daya Vaikar and her Enchanters will be present as well. They have a new amplifying configuration that they’re eager to test.”
“I should very much like to observe.” Elagbi shot a beseeching glance at Urduja. “What do you think of sailing back to Sedek-We the day after tomorrow instead, Harlikaan?”
“ I ,” said the Zahiya-lachis, “have several councils to attend in Eskaya. It would be better to have you there as well, but—you’re free to do as you please.”
“Wonderful!” Elagbi beamed. “Then I am Their Majesties’ guest for the next two days.”
Talasyn fought back a snicker at Elagbi’s obliviousness to Urduja’s pointed hint, while Alaric looked mildly scandalized that his father-in-law had invited himself to stay at someone else’s home. But it was simply a norm among Nenavarene families, and he and the Dominion prince were family, whether anyone liked it or not. Talasyn bumped her knee against his under the table. His features smoothed into a polite mask.
“We are honored to host you, Your Highness,” Alaric told Elagbi. “Should you require anything to make your stay more comfortable, please don’t hesitate to let us know.”
“I am the picture of an undemanding houseguest,” Elagbi declared. “The Lachis’ka can well attest to that.”
“It’s true.” Talasyn smiled at her father. His occasional visits, whenever he could tear himself away from his duties, had alleviated her sense of isolation the past month, and she was happy to be able to spend more time with him.
Urduja caught Talasyn’s eye. “Since you have your hands full, Alunsina, I’ll instruct the tailor not to drop by until next sennight.”
“The tailor?” Alaric repeated, and Talasyn cringed as she realized that, with everything that had happened that day, she’d forgotten to tell him.
“We’re hosting a ball here at Iantas after the Moonless Dark,” she supplied. “A masquerade, to celebrate the Voidfell’s defeat. The tailor will be paying a visit to take His Majesty’s measurements and discuss options.”
Alaric blanched as though the array of colorful, jewel-encrusted attire worn by Nenavarene men was flashing through his mind in a parade of horrors. “I have clothes.”
“None suitable for the costume event in question,” said Urduja. “As the Lachis’ka’s consort, your ensemble needs to complement hers. It’s tradition, I’m afraid, Emperor Alaric.”
Alaric gave Talasyn a hard look. She ducked her head. She sympathized with him, but there was an uphill road to gaining the Dominion’s acceptance and they had to pick their battles.
“You can’t wear black or any other dark colors to the masquerade,” she muttered. “Or else the court will think that you aren’t happy that we stopped Dead Season—that you don’t share in their joy. So that rules out your entire wardrobe.”
She held her breath, nervous that he would argue, effectively dispelling the Dragon Queen’s notion that they were getting along , but in the end Alaric just shrugged.
“Far be it from me to go against my empress’s wishes.” He lifted his goblet to her in a droll parody of a toast, still trying—wasn’t it just like him—to get a rise out of her even when he was acquiescing. “Let your tailor do his worst, then.”
He was still debating, long after the meal had ended and he’d retired upstairs to give Talasyn more time alone with her family, whether or not saving the world as he knew it was worth being dressed by a people as garish as the Nenavarene.
Alaric deeply hoped that feathers wouldn’t be part of the equation.
He was in bed, careful to occupy only one side of it, by the time Talasyn entered the royal chambers—or, well, stormed into the royal chambers. She was pouting, and it was oddly adorable, but he wasn’t about to tell her that.
“Where does she get off, insinuating that I don’t know what I’m doing!” she burst out.
Alaric hazarded a guess. “Queen Urduja has reservations about us housing the villagers, I take it?”
“Yes, right before she left she said that it would have been easier to ship them to the transient homesteads on Delanep that are reserved for such a purpose.” Talasyn stomped over to the vanity and tugged her hair loose from its braid with a fierceness that made Alaric wince. “But what’s so difficult about this ? Iantas has enough room and enough supplies!”
“It does,” Alaric said evenly.
“She’s just annoyed that I took the initiative instead of consulting her first—” Talasyn broke off, as though it was sinking in for the first time that Alaric was in her bed. Her cheeks flushed bright pink. “I need to wash up.”
Then she all but ran to her dressing room, and he was left staring at a closed door.
Alaric closed his eyes, slumping against the headboard with an utter despair that was shameful for the Master of the Shadowforged Legion to exhibit. Living with Talasyn, having her constantly in his orbit—how was he to get through this visit unscathed? They would either kill each other or end up kissing again, and it would prove disastrous either way. Their alliance and all the murkiness surrounding it was complicated enough without adding trysts to the mix.
The solution is simple, a snide inner voice told him. Simply do not kiss her.
He could do that, surely. He hadn’t kissed her at all since their wedding night, and he hadn’t kissed her during that charged moment earlier, so he was clearly capable of some modicum of self-control.
His eyes flew open and homed in on the door to her dressing room as a horrifying possibility occurred to him. What if she marched out of there in nearly sheer robes like those she’d worn that night? He’d jump off the balcony. He truly would.
Alaric’s fears, as it turned out, were unfounded. Talasyn emerged in a baggy nightshirt and loose sleep trousers, and he almost collapsed from crushing relief.
However, when she extinguished the fire lamps and gingerly tucked herself in under the covers on her side of the bed, the smell of custard-flower soap lingering on clean, warm skin wafted over to him in the moonlight-tinted darkness, triggering an animalistic twitch of interest low in his belly.
“Goodnight,” Talasyn said in a small voice, through silk sheets.
“Goodnight,” Alaric echoed.
Doubtful, he thought.