Chapter Thirty
I would never toss Waffles from a tower window, but I would daydream about it, especially if he, like this morning, is growling incessantly after I’ve had far too little sleep.
The Mists are still pitch black outside when I wake with my face sticking to the sheets—it must be an hour or two before dawn.
My head is drumming again, and it takes a minute of me staring listlessly into the embers dying in the fire to remember what happened last night.
Roze.
My heart stutters as I reach out for him—but the bed is empty, and his side of it is cold.
Groaning, I pull myself to sitting and push my hair back from my face. “Roze?”
I look around, and my eyes fall on the side table … where the Book of Castelle lies open. And a single rose rests atop it. I swing my legs over the side of the bed and approach the rose on the table. It’s a gorgeous bloom, a deep, rich red—the color of twisted desire.
Gingerly, I pick it up, feel the sharpness of the thorns on the pads of my fingers. Beneath it, there’s a letter written on parchment, laid atop the book. I recognize Roze’s handwriting—an elegant, curling scrawl, obnoxiously grandiose even for a prince.
Viola,
By the time you recover enough to read this letter, I’ll be several hours gone. I’m sure you’ll be furious that I’ve left, but pace yourself—your anger will be much worse before this letter is done.
Consider this my confession. I’ve kept certain truths from you, which were neither advisable, nor convenient, to share until now.
Also, I didn’t want to. As you’ve pointed out on numerous occasions, I can be rather self-serving. Even if you would accept an apology for my deceit—and we both know you wouldn’t—I would not offer one. But I will apologize for how this news will reach you—from a letter and not from my lips.
When my mother ordered me to kill you, I tried, I truly did.
I concocted all sorts of plans for your demise—most of them involving my poisoned skin on yours.
But no matter how much I attempted to muster the same hatred in my heart that my mother bears for you, it was overcome by something else—another emotion, which I won’t burden you by naming.
So I contrived a new plan. Since her murder, my mother no longer cares for the formalities of Court.
She wants dominion, to rule with complete control—more a cruel goddess than a queen.
She has been gaining strength, the Kingdom’s fear feeding her magic.
Now there is only one thing my mother desires more than your death—power. And I plan to give it to her.
She made a dreadful mistake when she created me, one that has caused her to both love and resent me all my life.
In a fit of grief, she poured her magic into the earth, forming me and losing that portion of her magic to me in the process.
In exchange for your safety, I plan to offer her that magic back, giving her the power she craves.
To my grave misfortune, I cannot live without that magic, since it is the very thing that created me. So, I’m afraid this is goodbye, darling.
Lest you get it into that clever head of yours to try to stop me, I’ll tell you that by the time you read this letter it will be too late. It will be done before the sun rises.
Viola, you are free, and as it turns out, that is all I want. Believe me, I’m as surprised as you are.
Yours, always,
Roze
I stare down at the letter, Roze’s words ringing in my ears.
The rose is still in my hand. It’s my last reminder of him—this thorny, wilting thing, lovely but dead.
He tricked me. And I’m in too much shock to even be angry.
Just a few days ago I was afraid Roze would decide to kill me to save himself.
Now he’s offering his life for mine. It’s more than anyone’s ever done for me—a devastating gift.
He refused to give a name to what this is in his letter, but I know.
I feel it too. And I won’t let him offer himself to the Queen for me, not when he’s spent his whole life at her mercy.
I grip the rose tightly, not caring that the thorns pierce my palm as I squeeze my eyes shut and let tears roll down my cheeks.
Roze said it was too late, but he didn’t count on Saint Waffles waking me so early. I might have enough time to stop him. I have to try.
I drop the rose on the book, ready to bolt from the room, but then my eye catches on a red, angry blotch on the open Book of Castelle before me—drops of my own blood that have fallen on its pages from the rose’s thorns. My blood is … vibrating, full of life.
I lean closer, watching the blood form a single word, written in curling script.
Hello.
I cock my head to the side. Hello?
I move Saint Waffles off his snoozing place on the chair so that I can sit before the book. Tentatively, I pick up one of Roze’s fountain pens and write—
Hello?
For several agonizing seconds, nothing happens while my knee shakes under the table. Then more words appear, this time in ancient Aragoise.
The heart is the dominion of evil.
That damned poem again. It seems to be the only thing the book wants to say. I sit up and study the words again. Is there some deeper meaning to them that I’m meant to understand? The translation is correct, but no translation is perfect. Your translations are too wooden.
Fine, I can be flexible. There’s a lesser-known translation of the word that’s been rendered “dominion”—kingdom. I write a new sentence in the book, inserting “kingdom” in place of “dominion.”
The heart is the kingdom of evil.
My ink drains onto the page, and the book doesn’t respond. If I get this wrong, will those snakes burst from the pages again?
I bite the end of the pen. Heart. What could it mean that the heart is the kingdom? That doesn’t make much sense. But I look at the original language.
The Aragoan word for “heart” does phonetically sound similar to another word—Castelle. They share a similar root. Could that be a coincidence when the Kingdom of Death’s symbol is on the cover? I try replacing the word.
Castelle is the kingdom of evil.
That makes sense. The ink sinks into the page. The book is silent.
I frown. Everyone knows that Castelle is evil. But … I assumed that this book originated in Castelle, if its symbol was on the cover. It wouldn’t consider itself evil. My mind ventures back to Sir Patrick’s lecture, to everything he told us about the Kingdom of Death.
The pen drops from my mouth.
What was it Sir Patrick told us about meigas in Castelle? They use a darker, more sinister magic. I turn my trembling palm upward, staring down at it. Darker. More sinister.
There’s one word that I haven’t tested in the translation, only because it so often means evil. But in some very rare cases, it can mean … I scrawl the new translation quickly across the page.
Castelle is the kingdom of shadows.
The meigas there, who betrayed Aragoa, who destroyed so much—they were like me. They had my magic. Dark and sinister shadow magic. Magic that destroys.
In seconds, a new text appears.
Who is this?
My heart stops. As I stare down at the words, I quickly write back, I’ll ask you the same question.
My name is León.
León. As in King León of Castelle? A block of text appears on the page, each line coming faster as though the writer was scribbling furiously.
There are only two people who have the ability to access this book, myself and one other, and you are not him. I don’t know what trickery you have involved yourself in to be able to speak with me, but you have committed a grave error in attempting to impersonate a king.
Impersonate a king? I write back quickly. I didn’t impersonate anyone.
A pause.
What is your name?
I hesitate. I don’t know if I should trust this book, but … With the King lie the answers. With the King lies salvation. What if Professor Borges wasn’t referring to King Alexandre, but to King León? She gave me this book. She must’ve known who it would give me access to.
I put my pen to the page but hesitate again.
This is the King of Castelle—sworn enemy of Aragoa, of Roze’s family, of everything I know and everyone I love.
He sent the Mists. He’s singularly responsible for the deaths of thousands.
Professor Borges wanted me to have this book, but if she is a spy for Castelle, can she be trusted?
Without closing the book entirely, I turn to the cover so that I can run my fingers over the embossed dragon and lion intertwined there.
I’ve stared at it countless times over the last seven days, but for the first time, I’m seeing something I hadn’t before.
The way they’re curled together, claws digging into the other …
it doesn’t seem like the fight to the death that it once did.
It almost looks like the embrace of a friend or a lover. Opening the book again, I write—
Viola
The King pauses for a long time again.
Viola Sinclair?
Panic rises in my gut. How do you know my name?
The next reply comes quickly. I gave it to you.
A rock drops in my stomach as I stare down at those words.
You have access to this book because you bear my blood. It recognizes my blood and the blood of Alexandre of Aragoa. If you are able to access it, if you are Viola Sinclair, then you are my daughter.
I want to beg him to stop. I drop the pen, backing up from the book, because this is all too much. But his words keep flowing, despite the thundering of my heart.
In the war, your mother and I sent you to Aragoa to keep you safe from the growing dangers of our Kingdom.
Alexandre promised he would keep you safe.
We found a family willing to take you in, give you their name, and keep your identity a secret.
We placed you safely in their care before the Mists fell, before everything changed.