Chapter 43
Cressyda
A CANDLE BESIDE her hissed and sputtered. Its soft glow made the splashes of gold on the murals glimmer and the gilded steps to the dais glisten like molten liquid. Straight ahead, the empty throne shone like fire. Regal, radiant and unoccupied.
Earlier, guards had appeared in Cressyda’s bedchamber, instructing her to follow them to the throne room for an audience with the new King.
They had not said why, only that she must come without delay.
She had tried to claim a headache, but they had refused to be dismissed and so, finally, she had reluctantly followed them here.
Then she had waited, anticipation churning in her stomach.
Three times she had tried to leave, but the guards at the door had turned her back.
Late afternoon had turned to evening. The castle grew quiet. Still, she was waiting.
Cressyda looked to her left where a long window revealed the skyline of Tormale, now enveloped in darkness, the rust-coloured rooftops dulled to brown by nightfall.
She wondered where Ottone was at this moment.
She hoped he had caught up with Alinore.
She hoped that they were on their way home. She needed them.
The doors at the back of the room suddenly snapped open. The candles fluttered, sending shadows leaping across the walls. Cressyda’s gaze darted left and right, wondering if she might see one of them – the Hidden People. She paused, but nothing appeared.
Footsteps tapped on brightly painted tiles.
‘Good evening, Little Pet. I’m sorry I kept you waiting, but there have been so many things to sort out since my return.’
Cressyda ignored a burn of fear in her stomach. ‘Peace be with Your Majesty, King Samsel Donolaino of Calestra,’ she said, dipping into a curtsey.
Samsel waited for her to rise. Their eyes met. He smiled.
‘It’s so lovely to see you,’ he said. ‘Finally.’
Cressyda had watched his arrival earlier from her bedchamber window.
As the procession had clattered into the front courtyard, courtiers had thrown spring flowers from the balconies, guards had brandished flags and street children had yelled and waved through the bars of the gates.
The castle had been in a state of tumult since, as everyone rushed to greet the new King.
Cressyda had sat alone on her bed, listening distantly to it all, unspooling and rewinding her old pink ribbon until her fingertips were raw.
‘I didn’t see you when I arrived,’ said Samsel. He was dressed in mourning clothes and his black hair had been combed with oil. ‘Nor my brother. Very rude.’
Cressyda had known he would say this and she was ready with her answer. ‘Please forgive me, I’ve been unwell.’ She kept her tone even and her expression blank. ‘And Ottone has been suffering with his grief. He went riding early this morning. I’m sure he will visit you as soon as he returns.’
Samsel held her gaze, his eyes slightly narrowed.
She stared back, refusing to look away.
‘The Queen is also unwell and shut in her bedchamber,’ said Samsel, raising his eyebrows. ‘She says you’ve upset her. Some welcome you’re all showing me.’
Cressyda’s hands were still clasped in her skirts and she squeezed her fingers together. ‘Is there a reason you called me here this evening?’ she asked. ‘It’s late and you’ve had a hard day of travel. You should rest—’
‘Don’t tell me what to do!’
His snarl took her by surprise.
‘Samsel, I—’
‘You will address me properly!’
‘Yes … Your Majesty.’
They were alone. Cressyda glanced at the doors, still ajar, and wondered if the guards outside would hear her if she screamed. But even if they did, she was not sure they would come to her aid. After all, Samsel was the King.
As if reading her mind, Samsel said, ‘There’s so much for me to celebrate.
I’ve acquired the position I’ve waited my whole life for.
’ He threw his arms out, palms open to the ceiling.
‘I’m the King of Calestra and my coronation is in just a few days.
I’m the most powerful man in this kingdom …
’ He paused. ‘But it’s funny. I’ve never felt much like anything with you around. ’
Cressyda’s pulse thudded in her ears.
‘I remember when you first arrived,’ he added, regarding her with his head tilted to one side.
‘My mother was besotted: the girl she’d always wanted.
She’d never paid me much attention. I was just the heir she had to produce and then my brother was the spare – she’s never had much time for him either.
The physicians told her she shouldn’t have another baby, but she wanted her dream little girl.
She fell pregnant too quickly and my sister, my real sister, came too early. A perfect, lifeless daughter.’
Samsel sighed, scuffing one booted foot against the floor.
‘Mother sank into a sickness far worse than anything the court had seen before and Father panicked,’ he continued.
‘So Master Jakespurcia was charged with finding a suitable distraction and that’s where you came along.
The Pet. A replacement for the daughter my mother lost that she could mould into a smaller version of herself. She lived and breathed you.’
Cressyda stood motionless, her ears ringing.
She had pieced together fragments of understanding over the winters, hints uttered in silences and half-spoken words.
She had known of the Queen’s lost daughter – the real Princess Cressyda – but she had never heard it told so starkly. No one at court spoke of those times.
‘You were such a horrid thing at first,’ Samsel continued.
He walked slowly to the large window and rested his arms on the stone sill.
‘Crying and crying and crying. I couldn’t sleep – no one could – but whenever I complained, Mother scolded me.
Then you grew older and you were quite lovely.
Even I could see that. Everyone adored you.
Your origins were forgotten and my mother’s whim was indulged.
You became a princess though you have no birthright to such a position.
It shouldn’t have happened, but my father always spoilt Mother. He was a fool.’
Samsel’s tone was light and even, but there was a tightness about his posture that made Cressyda anxious. As though he were coiled and ready to strike.
‘I always hoped you’d go away. I thought you might disappear like Mother’s other playthings.
’ Samsel spoke into the window, his breath forming a silver cloud on the glass.
‘But I suppose you were the original Pet and once you were called Princess, it was difficult to get rid of you. Mother tried to keep you small, but you just grew and grew until you weren’t a little girl any more.
I heard my father discussing it with his advisors a few times.
They didn’t know what to do. It was awkward. ’
Cressyda clenched her teeth. Samsel was telling her this to upset her, but she knew it was probably true.
‘And you were – are – very beautiful. That’s why you’ve lasted. All those spells and then something that is just you. Your own special magic, I suppose.’
Samsel pushed himself away from the window and turned back to her. When he next spoke, his voice was deeper, the tone taut and hard. ‘That’s all about to change because I won’t fall for it. I know your secret, remember.’
And here it was. Samsel’s punishment.
Cressyda had been expecting a public humiliation – something like an announcement in front of the whole court and a banishment from Syonno Castle – but rather than relief that they were alone, her fears sharpened.
Whatever Samsel had planned, it was so terrible that he needed to order it in private.
She thought of Alinore running away and she wondered if her friend was not so foolish.
Perhaps Cressyda should have run away too.
‘You see, I’ve finally managed to discover the truth of your origins,’ continued Samsel, his lips snaking into a smirk.
‘Master Jakespurcia didn’t want to tell me.
I think he worried what I would do with such information, but his apprentices got it out of him in the end with a little forceful magic.
It finished the old Master off, but he was almost dead anyway – and besides, they would never deny a request from the future King. ’
Cressyda’s breath caught in her throat. Despite herself, she took an involuntary step forward. ‘You know who my mother is?’ she whispered.
‘Was. I know who she was. She’s dead now.’
The crush of grief took Cressyda by surprise, like a punch to the chest.
‘Her name was Esmelie Tuchi and Master Jakespurcia’s record states that she was from the Pits. Probably a whore. I’ve had guards search the shacks, but she’s nowhere to be found. She must be gone. Dead. That’s the fate of those kinds of women.’
Cressyda’s eyes swam with tears as she sank to the floor, hands pressed against the cold tiles.
She thought about her cherished, faded pink ribbon.
She had tried to tell herself that the woman who gave it to her might be dead.
She had tried to harden her heart. But a tiny part of her had always hoped.
‘Most importantly of all,’ said Samsel, ‘Esmelie was one of the Mountain folk. She had Mountain blood and therefore so do you. I suspected this last autumn, of course, but now it’s confirmed. Now there’s an official record.’
Two black-booted feet appeared on the tiles before Cressyda. Then a hand grabbed hold of her chin and yanked her head back. Samsel’s face floated above her.
‘You’re eighteen winters old, Little Pet,’ he said, his gaze raking over her face. ‘It’s all worked out perfectly.’
She stared at him, tears streaming down her cheeks, his words barely registering.
‘Tomorrow is the three-hundredth Maiden Sacrifice,’ he continued. ‘The Royal Master usually chooses the name of the girl by lot, but such things can be rigged if the King requires.’
He pulled his lips back into a smile.
‘Don’t you see? It’s to be my first Maiden Sacrifice as the new King,’ he said. ‘And you, Little Pet, will be my first sacrificed maiden.’