3. Ayna
Ayna
Early fall and city dust lace my view as I glance out the open balcony doors of the throne room, a bland smile firmly in place to please the countless nobles stepping up to the dais upon which Erina presides on his throne while I stand beside him in my emerald silk gown. The bodice is too tight for my liking, and the sleeves tug in the wrong places, making it hard to bend my elbows as I lace my fingers in front of my stomach. One after the other, the lords and ladies bow, curtsey, eager eyes scanning my figure, my features, the long braid draped around the crown of my head, the pearls resting on my collarbones. My bad hand weighs like lead where a broad golden bracelet covers the tattooed chain identifying me as a Fort Perenis prisoner, and the engagement ring Erina insists I wear everywhere only adds to the sense of being shackled.
“It’s an honor, Your Majesty.” The woman in front of the dais rises at her king’s command, her sparkling blue eyes finding me as soon as Erina turns to study me with fake adoration the way he has all morning. “Lady Milevishja, I’m honored to stand in the presence of one of the old bloodlines.” There is a cold quality to her tone that doesn’t match her warm brown skin tone and the soft waves of her grizzled hair, and I almost cringe as I meet her gaze.
“A true Milevishja in this palace after so many years,” Erina muses. “And what a lucky man I am to have found her.”
“That she agreed to marry you is more like it,” someone mutters behind the throne. I don’t need to turn around to identify the voice as that of the older guard who accompanied me from my room to the audience after breakfast; my Crow senses might have been dulled by the drug, but they surpass any human ones anyway.
Lips twitching at the signs of sarcasm, I’m tempted to turn and give him a sign of appreciation, but the woman in front of the dais rises from her curtsey, smoothing over her sweeping, gold-embroidered, chocolate satin skirts, and something flickers in her eyes that makes me wonder if she heard him, too.
With a quick glance, I confirm her ears are rounded. Clearly human, unless she is of a diluted fairy bloodline like Kaira…
“Lady Andraya,” I use the name Ephegos supplies from my other side the way he has all morning, a threatening presence running this audience in a black-and-blue uniform that makes him even more dangerous than his brass or sepia attire used to. He’s head of Erina’s armies now. However he convinced the King of Tavras to allow a Crow to lead his military forces, I don’t even want to know.
“Lady Andraya is from the southern coast of Tavras, overseeing the ports along the Gulf of Tears,” Ephegos informs us while I debate sitting down on the chair next to Erina’s throne. A restlessness has risen within me that surpasses the constant drug-induced exhaustion, and it’s become difficult to keep still, so I opt for remaining on my feet, quietly tapping my toes on the polished floor beneath my skirts where no one can witness.
“It must be wonderful to live by the coast,” I say in that same bland tone I’ve been using with all the nobles who’ve come to gawk at the Milevishja woman they believe belongs by their king’s side.
“There is nothing more breathtaking than the inky turquoise of the waters in the early morning when the sea traffic is still quiet and the town fast asleep.” Lady Andraya’s lips part in a genuine grin letting a hint of mischief slip onto her heart-shaped face that I hadn’t expected from the middle-aged woman. “I’ve heard you yourself know one or the other thing about the beauty of the oceans.”
Beside me, Erina clears his throat, his hand finding mine and clasping it so hard I rethink my response twice.
“I’ve always been an admirer of the waters surrounding our realm, but I haven’t been able to travel far enough to the south to see the Gulf of Tears for myself.” I put on my best intrigued face while keeping a hint of innocence that will not give away how far I’ve travelled otherwise. “Is it true you can see all the way to the Southern Continent from the cape?”
My father used to do trade with the Southern Continent, but I never got much out of him about what treasures could be found there. However, I don’t tell her that. It’s obvious she knows something about my past; I don’t need to give her anything else, or she might make the connection of which Milevishja I exactly am—the pirate child of a traitor merchant who tried to assassinate his way back to a throne that might, in a different life, have belonged to him. The daughter of a mother who offered up my hand in marriage to please the King of Tavras.
The air reeks of betrayal more and more with every minute I ponder that, no matter if my father hadn’t committed treason and my mother hadn’t taken me away from the city, I’d have ended up here anyway, right beside Erina. And in a different life—a life where I wasn’t a Crow Queen—I might have been content in this exact place, at Erina’s side.
I might have never known what a monster he truly is, might not have seen past his handsome mask and his courtly manners. I’ve seen the true him, though, and there is no going back. I’ve seen the vile measures he is resorting to in order to establish more power, to gain more lands, more wealth. The friends he’s made to make it happen.
A sideways glance at Ephegos makes my blood chill.
“You need to take her on a tour along the coast, Your Majesty,” Lady Andraya urges Erina with a conspiratorial expression taking over her features that makes me wonder how well the two of them know each other.
Erina doesn’t give away any sign of familiarity. All he does is give a noncommittal nod before he waves her off, eyes already on the next noble waiting in line behind her.
“I’d love to,” I tell her as she curtseys once more before walking to the side door where the guards usher the guests out into the courtyard. Where they go from there, I can’t tell; my view is on the gardens and on the seemingly endless line of elaborately dressed lords and ladies waiting to bow to their king—and stare at the Milevishja heir.
“You’re not going anywhere near the ocean,” Erina murmurs as he tugs me closer, grasp tightening painfully around my fingers.
I want to tear my hand away, want to run down the stairs past the unassuming nobility of Tavras, and disappear to my room, but Ephegos has already taken a cautionary step closer, taking a stance at my side, and while he doesn’t need to touch me to lock me in place, it’s the symbolism of the gesture that is more reminder than anything that I am a prisoner here, not the admired fiancée of the Tavrasian king the crowd believes me to be.
Biting back the retort on my tongue, I lean closer to Erina, brushing my free hand over his unmovable fingers in a pretense-affectionate touch that sure gets his attention. In a flick of surprise, his eyes meet mine as I put on a smile I know will get me his full focus. “I want to see Kaira.” It’s a murmur, and for an outsider, it might appear like I am uttering words of undying love to my husband-to-be, but it’s a bold demand, for it won’t matter where Erina believes I should or shouldn’t be going if I manage to speak to my sister through our mind connection and we make a plan to get out of here. I just need to get close enough to her to make it work.
“You aren’t in a position to demand anything from me,” Erina responds with an equally deceptive smile, and I think I hear women fawning over the gesture as he brings his free hand to my cheek, stroking a thumb along the side of my face.
I hate him. More than I hate Ephegos. He could just let me go, make a contract with me that I will abstain from ever aspiring for my throne, and we’d both have what we want. I’d even leave Eherea so he can be sure I will not interfere with his plans. But Erina needs me for his power trip, and there is nothing I can do—except to rid him of his leverage and get out of here before Myron can do something stupid such as coming to my rescue. He won’t survive it this time.
“Please?” It costs me all I have not to spit at him as I plead to see the one person I call an ally in this Shaelakforsaken palace, but I plead anyway. “I promise to sit tight and smile prettily for the rest of the audience if I can see her for a few minutes afterward.” Desperation has clearly gotten the best of me if I resort to measures such as this, but what other options do I have? What cards can I play when the drug has emptied my sleeves of all tricks and plans?
I lean down even further, not failing to tuck my elbows a bit tighter to my sides to push my breasts higher in the already tight corset, and Guardians bless him, Erina isn’t immune to the sight. It’s enough to sidetrack him long enough that, when I repeat my plea, he dips his chin, reassembling his regal expression as his gaze lifts from my décolletage back to my face. “For a few minutes.” His gaze veers past my shoulder to Ephegos, who will clearly be the person escorting me to wherever they are holding Kaira. “And if she tries anything, cut the woman’s fingers off.”
I feel myself blanch but hold it together as panic creeps through my veins like little bugs leaving poisonous trails.
“Understood?” Erina’s eyes lock on mine, his fingers lingering on my cheek, sliding down the side of my neck, along my shoulder until he clasps my other hand firmly in his.
I nod.
“Now, sit down and smile, Ayna. I have a court to please.” He releases me, already summoning the next noble to the foot of the dais with an idle wave of his hand.
Ephegos stands behind my chair as I half sit, half drop into it, catching my breath, and his hiss of warning is enough for me to assemble my best befuddled-female face.
Sit through another hundred or so nobles, smile at them, give them pleasant phrases, and make googly eyes at their king. I can do that if it means I’ll see Kaira. I might not have a physical knife to ram into Erina’s back, but a metaphorical one is waiting in the form of the mind connection Kaira and I share—and I’m ready to use it in whatever way I need to in order to get my sister out of here.