Chapter Twenty-Two
C HAPTER T WENTY -T WO
Talasyn had always prided herself on being a capable individual. Her quick thinking and resourcefulness had saved her life countless times during the Hurricane Wars. There had never been an emergency that she hadn’t dealt with using her wits, her gumption, and her ability to adapt to a rapid change in circumstance.
But she was drawing a blank on how to handle this —being caught in the act, or the prelude to the act, anyway, all wrapped up in her husband’s arms with his mouth hovering at her chest while her father postured in the doorway, features contorted in wrath.
How long had Elagbi been standing there? How much had he seen?
Alaric and Talasyn sprang apart to put a good several inches between them, placing their hands at their sides to very emphatically show that they were not touching. After what felt like an eternity, Elagbi relaxed. He offered the imperial couple an elaborate, courtly bow before walking over to them.
“Dearest,” he said to Talasyn, holding out his arm, “rumor has it that you had a bit of an adventure during the storm. I had to set sail from Eskaya as soon as the skies permitted to make sure that you were all right.”
“The flood earlier today was harrowing,” Talasyn joked weakly, slipping her hand into the crook of his elbow. “All those beautiful carpets are a loss, I’m afraid.”
Elagbi tutted. “That’s not what I meant, and you are well aware. Gallivanting off to Chal while a northwester blows in—I never! But no harm done in the end, I suppose. Shall we proceed to supper?”
“Um …” Talasyn glanced at Alaric, whose eyes were as wide as the plates they were going to be eating off of. “Certainly?”
Alaric remained where he was, rooted to the spot, as Elagbi escorted Talasyn out of the library, but this changed when the Dominion prince called out in a booming voice, “After all, there is no reason that the three of us can’t enjoy a nice meal,” which sent the Night Emperor trailing after them.
Elagbi maintained a neutral, amiable expression on the way to the small dining room on the second level—the one on the first level being out of commission as it dried out. Jie and Sevraim were already waiting for them.
Then the most awkward meal in the history of Lir began.
“We had no idea where you and His Majesty had gone off to, Lachis’ka,” Jie piped up. “I’m glad that Prince Elagbi found you without incident.”
Talasyn’s spoon clattered against her soup bowl. At the opposite end of the table, Alaric appeared to choke on a sip of wine, hastily putting down his glass and dabbing at the errant wetness on his chin with a napkin.
“They were in the library,” Elagbi replied with a pleasant smile. “I spent many hours there as a boy myself. Quite the compendium of knowledge. I would venture to say that it is a sacred space, with many old and fragile manuscripts.”
Jie blinked, appearing confused at the pointed emphasis of Elagbi’s little speech, but Sevraim came to her rescue. “Yes, the staff here at Iantas have done an excellent job of maintaining the library. I have been unable to find any reading material in Sailor’s Common thus far, but it is a lovely place.”
“Emperor Alaric seems to think so as well, from what I’ve seen,” said Elagbi.
Talasyn contemplated using the aforementioned spoon to dig a hole in the floor and burrow down into it, never to emerge again. Before she could try, however, Sevraim asked, “What were you reading today, Your Grace?”
At first, Talasyn couldn’t for the life of her remember what book she’d been holding before Alaric walked in and started kissing her breasts, but the cover finally flashed through her mind’s eye. “Sonnets. I hadn’t encountered much by way of poetry during my time on the Continent. It’s … interesting.”
Jie looked at Alaric in an effort to include him in what, from her end, was merely social chitchat. “And as for His Majesty?” She was just doing her job, of course, there was no way the poor girl could have known, and so she understandably shrank back when Alaric’s features rearranged themselves into a defensive scowl.
“Whatever Emperor Alaric was helping himself to, he undoubtedly found it edifying,” Elagbi declared. “I should very much like to discuss it with him over a bottle of rum when we’re done with our meal.”
Talasyn momentarily evaporated from her body. She knew that Alaric couldn’t refuse such a benign-sounding invitation from his father-in-law, not in front of Jie and Sevraim.
“Yes, let’s,” Alaric muttered, sounding about as enthusiastic as he would have been if Elagbi had invited him to walk barefoot over hot coals.
Although that was normally the way Alaric sounded in response to anything, so neither Jie nor Sevraim found it amiss. The conversation shifted to other matters.
But the reprieve was temporary. Once the last of the plates had been cleared, Elagbi made a show of smacking his forehead.
“Silly me, I have just remembered that I needed to speak with you, too, my dear,” he told Talasyn. “It won’t take but a moment.”
Talasyn nearly mouthed Save me at Alaric as she and her father proceeded to the salon. The only thing that stopped her was the certainty that such a plea would be futile. Alaric couldn’t even save himself.
“Talasyn,” Elagbi said once they were in private. Studying her with concerned dark eyes, he visibly deflated, his brow wrinkling while he pondered how best to approach the issue.
Talasyn said nothing. She knew that what she’d been doing was wrong—she needed no sermons on that account—but it was also impossible to process this feeling of having disappointed her father.
“This entire situation has been … difficult,” Elagbi finally confessed. They were standing by the windows that overlooked the beach, and he fiddled with the intricate carvings on their panes as he spoke. “Not just the alliance with Kesath, but everything else in general. For nineteen long years, you were a child in my memory. Tiny and precocious and energetic and so quick to throw tantrums. Did you know that you didn’t like being hugged?”
“What?” Talasyn was so startled that she let out a disbelieving laugh. “I didn’t?”
“You hated it. You kicked me and Hanan away whenever we tried to cuddle you.”
“I wouldn’t have,” she said, her voice oddly thick, “if I’d known what was going to happen.” I would have held every touch, every moment, to my heart.
He reached out to pat her cheek. She had a vague recollection of someone else doing this, someone with slender fingers and eyes like hers. “What matters is that you’re here now. And that’s the thing, you see. You came back into my life full grown, so strong and confident and self-assured. I remember when you demanded that the Zahiya-lachis listen to you on the W’taida . A twenty-year-old in soot-stained, ragged attire, confronting the Dragon Queen of the Nenavar Dominion—I was so proud of you then, and that pride only increased as the months passed and you met every new challenge head-on. You are very brave, my daughter, and yet also very hardened by the life you led before we met again. That’s why I have no desire to begrudge you whatever happiness is within your reach, but …”
Elagbi paused, still staring at her. Whatever he saw on her face brought a grim, steely look to his own, falling over his countenance like a shadow.
“This cannot go on, Talasyn,” said the prince. “You know that as well as I do. It’s an undesirable development in an already precarious situation. I must counsel you, not only as your father but also as a man who loves his country, to nip this in the bud before it affects your judgment. Your resolve. The war is coming and you will need to choose.”
“I’m not going to give up the Sardovians’ location, if that’s what you mean,” Talasyn retorted, not without some ire—but whether at Elagbi or at herself, she wasn’t sure. “It’s physical attraction, and that’s all. It might be the close proximity, or whatever it is, but I can assure you that there are no real feelings involved.”
“Well, that’s a relief,” Elagbi said faintly. “That’s what every man wants to hear from his beloved only daughter—”
She pursed her lips. “What I’m trying to tell you, Amya, is that it won’t change anything. The end remains the same.” Why did it hollow her out to say that, even though it was what she believed, what she knew to be right? “I will still do what needs to be done when the time comes.”
“Ah.” All trace of sarcasm left his tone. “Now that is something that the Zahiya-lachis would want to hear. I can’t figure out if that’s good or bad.” He regarded her in somber silence for a while, then shook his head. “For now, I can only hope that you’ll tread carefully, and that you won’t forget that I’m always on your side.”
In spite of her father’s sweet promise, the mention of Urduja sent Talasyn into a miniature but full-fledged spiral. “Please don’t—”
But Elagbi, already miles ahead of her, was making a locking gesture in front of his mouth. “I shan’t breathe a word. Frankly, I doubt that your grandmother’s heart could take it. Now send the Night Emperor in, Lachis’ka. We missed out on a lot of things, and that includes my opportunity to put the fear of the ancestors in your suitors.”
“He’s already my husband,” Talasyn pointed out. “Besides, he’s not the kind of man who scares easy.”
“I know,” said Elagbi. “That’s why I worry about you.”
“Do me a favor.” Standing just beside the open doorway to the salon, out of Elagbi’s field of vision, and speaking in a nearwhisper so he couldn’t hear, Alaric gently seized Talasyn’s arm before she could head upstairs. “Rescue me in two hours. Say we have aethermancy training.”
She blinked up at him. Those eyes were far from the worst sight a man could take to his grave, and that lifted his spirits slightly. “Should you return and discover that I have gone to the willows,” he drawled, “well, it would be no great mystery who did it.”
“You’ll be fine.” Talasyn looked at his hand on her arm, then back at his face. There was a ruefulness to the small smile that she flashed; it gave him the disquieting sensation that she was viewing him from some far-off shore. “I’ll see you in two hours.”
She left him then. Alaric took a calming breath before entering the salon, where Elagbi was retrieving the promised bottle of rum from the liquor cabinet, along with two crystal snifters, and placing them on a golden tray.
Alaric sat down, not saying a word as the Dominion prince claimed the chair across from him and poured them each a generous inch of the spirit, which had a brown hue so warm that it was almost red.
“Sugarcane rum,” Elagbi announced, “from the endless fields of Vasiyas, and the finest liquor produced in Nenavar, in my opinion. One more thing that we cannot afford to lose to the Voidfell.”
“Talasyn and I will do our best to save the rum.” Alaric took a tentative sip and nearly spat it out. “On second thought, perhaps not.”
Elagbi smirked. “It’s potent, I’ll grant you that. However, there is an intriguing sweetness, once you have grown accustomed to it.” He raised his glass. “To your health, Emperor Alaric.”
The way he said it—it was a prelude to a duel. Alaric wasn’t about to back down. He clinked his glass against the other man’s. “And to yours, Prince Elagbi.”
The rum began to taste good somewhere around his fourth pour. The deep molasses note might have come through sooner if not for the fact that his father-in-law set a pace that offered little opportunity for the drink to be savored. As a result, His Majesty Alaric Ossinast of the Night Empire and His Royal Highness Elagbi Silim of the Nenavar Dominion were—as the masses would say—three sheets to the wind.
“Two sheets,” Alaric corrected his own thoughts out loud. “Perhaps one and a half.” He was, after all, still in full command of his senses, even if these were drifting further and further out of reach.
Elagbi’s brow creased as he poured himself another glass. “Beg pardon?”
“Never mind.” Alaric looked down his nose at the shimmering droplets that Elagbi had clumsily spilled on the floor. “You’re quite inebriated.”
Elagbi snorted. “You’re the one going on about blankets apropos of nothing, my good man.”
Alaric finished off the remnants of his drink, hissing through the burn in his throat as he placed the empty snifter on the table with a dull thud. “I’m not a good man.”
“Certainly not good enough for my daughter!” Elagbi cheerfully agreed. “This may be an important political alliance, but you do not have my blessing.”
“I don’t require it,” Alaric declared with smugness. “I already married her.”
Elagbi swore at him in the Nenavarene tongue, then scratched his head. “The translation escapes me … ‘May lightning burn your milk,’ something to that effect …” The quandary apparently robbed him of steam, for he slumped in his chair and tipped more rum into Alaric’s glass. “Do you remember when we had wine on your stormship—ancestors, why are you and I always drinking—and I said you had good taste in vintages?”
Alaric nodded warily, squinting to see the trap, wondering where it could possibly spring from. Perhaps more rum would help him spot it. He downed a new mouthful.
“You reacted so awkwardly,” Elagbi mused. “As though you weren’t sure how to respond to such a small compliment. And I found myself wondering then—when was the last time anyone had a kind word for this boy?”
It was scarcely conceivable how one sentence—one simple question—could unlock a door in the human heart. Alaric truly couldn’t remember when his own father’s praise had not been mingled with admonishment. His eyes watered and he scrubbed at them, horrified, but Elagbi was thankfully too busy taking another swig to notice.
“That was the only time I was ever sympathetic to you!” slurred the prince. “You … you—daughter-defiler!”
Alaric thought about the fading love bites on his chest, the scratches on his back. “If anything, she defiled me —”
The sun chose that moment to walk into the salon.
“Amya, I must insist on retrieving the Night Emperor, we need to get some more training in …” Talasyn trailed off, looking mystified at the sight of her husband and her father clinging to the furniture, a half-empty bottle of rum between them, as though it was the most peculiar sight she had ever witnessed in her twenty years of existence.
Alaric automatically rose to his feet. It was simple good manners, but it took more effort than usual, as did the act of turning to face his wife. His very beautiful wife. She made his world spin.
No, scratch that—the room was actually spinning—
Talasyn hurried over to him, subjecting his features to intense scrutiny. He smiled at her.
She reeled back in shock—which, in all honesty, hurt his feelings a little, surely his smile wasn’t that bad—and then she rounded on Elagbi. “You got him drunk ?”
“Nonsense!” Elagbi boomed. “He’s sober as a prosperity clam! Big lad. High tolerance.”
“Yes,” Alaric agreed, because that seemed like the most intelligent thing to do.
Talasyn scowled. She looked distinctly put out—and also extremely kissable. Alaric doubted he’d be able to plant one on her and live to tell the tale, so he settled for draping an arm over her shoulders. She didn’t shrink back from his touch, and he was so relieved that he nuzzled at her temple.
“You smell good,” he mumbled, closing his eyes. He could fall asleep like this, on his feet and breathing in the mangoes and the promise jasmines and the warm, gorgeous wife.
“You smell like a distillery,” Talasyn retorted. “Let’s get you to bed. And you ”—she pointed an accusing finger at Elagbi as she led Alaric away—“you sit there and think about what you’ve done.”
“I shall ruminate on my sins!” Elagbi happily exclaimed, raising his glass to them as they left.
Castle guards and attendants alike were falling over their feet to help the Lachis’ka drag the Night Emperor to the royal chambers, but Talasyn turned them all down. It was late in the evening and she didn’t want to give anyone more work after a long day. Particularly when this was no one’s fault but that of the two men in her life.
Alaric was … well, he was managing to put one foot in front of the other, she’d give him that. He moved as though he was torn between leaning on her and not letting her take all his weight, brows drawn together from the sheer effort. He was a considerate drunk at least—and a quiet one, too. It wasn’t until they were ascending the last flight of stairs that he spoke.
“Tala,” he said, in something between a whisper and a sigh.
“Alaric,” she said dryly.
When he remained silent, she slanted a quizzical glance in his direction, only to find him already peeking down at her. He smiled again—the same lopsided grin that had so taken her by surprise in the Mouth of Night and then in the salon. Bashful and boyish, crinkling the corners of his eyes. Her stomach went all … swimmy.
“I merely wished to say your name,” he said.
“Oh gods,” Talasyn muttered. Her husband was a sappy drunk.
His silliness was good for one thing, though: it lessened the underlying nervousness that tended to flicker at the back of her mind whenever she was around people in their cups. Her time with the Sardovian regiments and at the Dominion court had taught her that not everyone acted like the orphanage keepers when they overindulged, but it was still difficult for her to let go of past associations, to quell the irrational dread that lurked in the pit of her stomach at the smell of liquor.
One slow eternity later, they were in their room. “Your father,” Alaric gravely pronounced as Talasyn coaxed him into a sitting position at the edge of the bed, “is a miscreant.”
“He takes after his son-in-law in that regard,” she countered, kneeling between his legs.
Alaric made a sound not dissimilar to someone choking on his own tongue. It was only then that the suggestiveness of her position dawned on Talasyn.
“ As if I would ever ,” she said shrilly, making it a point to yank his left boot off his foot so that there could be no mistaking her intentions.
It happened abruptly. Alaric lurched forward with his hand rising up from out of the shadows, the pungent smell of rum wafting from his skin. Talasyn cried out, shrank back, a child again, raising her arms over her head to ward off the blow.
But it never came.
When she dared to peer up at him, he was frozen in place, his hand hovering inches from his other boot. He’d only been about to help her take it off, not …
Her heart rate returned to normal. She felt foolish and small. And hopeless, with the realization that she would never be free of the things she carried.
“Did—were you—” Alaric faltered, each word laboriously plucked out from his stupor. “Did you think that I … would strike you?”
Talasyn remained silent a beat too long. Long enough for him to confirm that her answer, though unspoken, was yes.
“I wouldn’t—” He hit the floor on his knees and shuffled toward her. She straightened up with the intention of nudging him to do so as well, but he flung his arms around her waist. “Tala, I would never ”—he buried his face in her midsection—“never when we’re not sparring,” he said fiercely. “Never when I’m drunk, never in our room—”
“I know.” She carded her fingers through his soft hair, in a tentative attempt to soothe him. “Please don’t tell anyone—not even my father is aware of this—but it’s … I can’t help it sometimes. I get tense when people drink. Because the ones in charge—they’d hit me and the other children, back at the orphanage, whenever they were foxed.” He flinched, holding her tighter. “So my mind makes associations. It’s not you. I know you wouldn’t.”
“Never,” Alaric repeated. “Give me their names, I’ll find them, make them pay—”
“It’s likely that they all died the day Kesath attacked Hornbill’s Head.”
He looked up, a motion that caused her hand to slip from his hair to the side of his face. His eyes flashed silver with Shadowgate and fury even as he leaned into the curve of her palm. “Good.”
She should have chastised him for that. She should have called him a monster. So many had died when the stormship came; she had nearly died. But it was like a siren song, his anger on her behalf. It unleashed her own vindictive streak, it made her think of how everyone who had wronged her then had long rotted away beneath dust and rubble, while she was still standing.
And perhaps that made her a monster, too.
What is one night of not caring about other people? Talasyn asked herself mutinously, stroking the pad of her thumb across her husband’s cheek. She had carried that burden ever since she was fifteen and the Lightweave first sprang forth. She was tired of forgiving the past. What is one night?
Tomorrow I’ll be good again.
She led him back to bed. Once she tucked him in, he lay perfectly still, as though nervous about making any sudden movements that might scare her again. She would have interpreted this as pity in the time before, and it would have rankled. But she knew him better now. Knew enough to tell the difference between his pity and his compassion.
He had offered to find Khaede, and he’d eventually brought Talasyn news and some much-needed hope on that front. He hadn’t hesitated to help the villagers who lost their homes and livelihoods to the Void Sever’s flare. He had stopped the torture of the apprehended rebels, when Vela could not save them.
Talasyn changed into her sleep clothes and then slipped beneath the covers on her own half of the mattress. The minutes crawled along while lace curtains fluttered in the evening breeze that poured through open windows, moonlight glinting on the tapestried canopy over the bed.
“Here is something no one else knows.” Alaric’s hoarse, liquor-glossed rasp broke the silence. “My mother spoke to me the night she left Kesath. She’d timed it perfectly; my father was away, and in the sennights leading up to her escape she’d made a habit of evening strolls so the guards wouldn’t think anything was amiss. There was a ship waiting for her at the docks, but she took a detour to my room and begged me to come with her. I refused.”
“Why?” Talasyn asked in a near-whisper, afraid that too loud a voice might shatter the air of secrecy that hung around them.
“Because I was the heir to the throne. I had a duty, even if she would so willingly shirk hers. And because—” The sentence broke apart on his tongue and he tried again. “Because I thought that, if I didn’t go, she would stay.”
Talasyn’s hand inched toward him. Alaric must have heard the rustling silk, or he must have glanced down to see it moving in the moonlight. He met her hand with his own, whatever the case. The tips of their fingers touched, more tentative than anything that she had ever known before.
“When you left …”—his hand twitched against hers—“when you left, it brought me back there. That was why I needed to go somewhere else, to clear my head. It wasn’t your fault. But my mind makes associations, too.”
Talasyn’s heart squeezed within her chest, so bitingly that there was room for little else but a solemn, gray-eyed child, molded by loneliness and duty, who had still hoped enough to bet on his mother’s love and lost—and the guarded man that child had become, ruthless and terrifying in battle and yet capable of concession, too, and of gentle touch whenever it was just them and the starlight.
She laced her fingers through the gaps between his. He clasped her hand tightly, now without an ounce of tentativeness, his thumb tracing the inside of her wrist.
Somehow, such a simple act was more intimate than anything else they’d done to each other, their palms curling together there in the dark.