Chapter 24 King Eustis at Death’s Door
King Eustis at Death’s Door
“Oh hello, darling!” said Queen Yzara, smiling.
A thick sheen of silver coated her lips.
“Your mother is besting me at poison chess,” groaned Eustis. “Again, I might add. I am at death’s door.”
“And there you shall remain until you yield your knight,” said Yzara. “Honestly, I am a bit insulted you are not eager to lose.”
“Mercy is the ambrosia of the sinner in the gallows,” said Eustis, reaching out a trembling hand toward Yzara’s face. “And since I shall know such succor from thy lips, I wish to relish their sweetness.”
Yzara smiled. She reached for her husband’s hand, cradling his blue fingertips with such gentleness that Arris felt he had intruded upon something. Eustis smiled at her.
“I have never seen anyone die so beautifully,” said Yzara.
Eustis kissed her hand.
Somewhere to the left of Arris came a loud retching sound, and he turned to see Yvlle standing and glowering at everyone.
“Have I also been poisoned?” asked Yvlle. “Because I’m feeling nauseous watching this exchange.”
“Witnessing love is certainly unsettling to the body, my viper,” said their mother before turning to Arris.
“The competition will thin considerably after tomorrow, my dear, and that is for the best. Simply because a marriage requires one to be charitable does not mean that it is a charity. There shall be no more exceptions out of pity.”
She was talking about Demelza.
“I stand by that choice,” he said.
“And I admire your tenacity, darling, I’m just reminding you that’s all,” said Yzara, grinning to herself as Eustis’s chess piece wobbled forward. “You’re slipping, husband.”
“No, I am certain the cherry pie has feathers in it,” muttered Eustis.
Yzara sighed. “I knew I made that tincture too strong. Yvlle, will you be a darling and put that towel on your father’s head. I poisoned him too much it seems.”
“It’s not that the feathers don’t taste good, but I suspect the ostriches have good reason for keeping them! Maybe they didn’t want to be in a cherry pie! What if they preferred apricot!”
Yvlle looked unbothered as she threw a towel over their hysterically giggling father. Eustis slumped forward. Immediately, he began to snore.
“We shall call that a surrender,” said Yzara, patting her husband’s head. “When you are conscious once more, I am confident you shall agree.”
The queen turned her attention back to her son.
“I am serious, Arris,” she said. “No more pitying picks after this round. Deciding upon a bride is a serious endeavor and choosing to allow some innocent and mud-bedraggled creature the chance to become a queen reflects poorly on the family.”
“Her name is Demelza, Mother,” said Arris.
“I am quite aware,” said Yzara. She took a sip of tea, and left a silver imprint upon the rim. “I am also aware that she has the manners of a boar and apparently refuses to eat with the other girls! What kind of behavior is that in a future queen? I would not be sorry to see the back of her—”
Arris cleared his throat. “But—”
“No, my love, my word is final. If she does not do well in this round, you shall not be rescuing her. Understood?”
Arris considered telling his mother that Demelza was of veritas swan descent.
But he hesitated. Demelza often said her father loved her, and yet he had been willing to cut out her heart.
His own mother had no such emotional compunction toward her and although Arris found her exceptionally loving, Queen Yzara was not known for her mercy.
What would she do to Demelza? The thought twisted Arris’s stomach.
No, he would protect Demelza’s secret for as long as he could.
“Understood,” said Arris.
Still, if Demelza failed the next trial, then there was a chance there was nothing he could do. In which case, both of them would be at the mercy of everyone else.
“What exactly do you have planned, Mother?”
Yzara smiled. “You’ll see soon enough.”
All night Arris and Yvlle tried to wheedle a hint out of their mother, but with every question, the queen’s cryptic smile only stayed more resolutely in place.
When Arris eventually hauled himself toward his bed, he knew this was the end.
There would be no more delays of the impossible, no more experimenting in the kitchen, no more music practice on the balcony, no more reading in the trees.
Once Demelza was eliminated, his arboreal future was certain.
Arris walked about his room, touching his belongings.
“Goodbye, collection of seagull poetry,” he said, stroking the spines of a pair of winged tomes. The books were sleeping, their wings tucked and pages folded inward in the manner of a dozing bird. They squawked at his touch.
“Goodbye, my strange fragrances,” said Arris, waving at his collection of vials and alembics.
In an effort to create a signature fragrance of his own, Arris had distilled all manner of smells—essence of lightning bolt and bog violet, snowfall and sun-warmed rock, flea musk and spider venom.
“I am sorry that we were never able to come to an agreement.”
On the Isle, fragrance was as much a frivolity as it was a force to be reckoned with.
Without fragrance, Queen Vania the Vain would not have been able to stabilize relations between the aristocracy of the Famishing and the lords of the Ulva Wylds.
Arris assumed that fragrance making ran in his veins.
He had always wanted something that spoke to his present and hinted at his future, but fragrance was an art …
and it was not an art Arris seemed to have been born with.
Arris’s efforts had gotten progressively worse to the point that the last time he had gone to breakfast to debut a new scent—autumn woodsmoke, ink, shredded sunshine, peppercorns, and musk of the common swamp rat, renowned for its prodigious skills at reproduction—Yvlle had conjured a rain cloud into the dining hall to drench him thoroughly.
“Goodbye, moon,” said Arris, standing by his window. “I stand here, in your light, the resplendence of Wrate’s thoughtful eye, and hope that as my end days draw near—”
“Oh stop that,” said Yvlle.
Yvlle was standing in the doorway. What appeared to be a blue glass bottle of perfume was clutched in her hand.
“I would scold you for intruding upon my solitude, but soon enough, solitude is all that I shall have,” said Arris. He sighed and stroked the window.
“No, you won’t,” said Yvlle, marching toward him. “If you turn into a tree, I shall use you for kindling.”
“At least I shall have some use, then,” said Arris.
“All this because you are convinced Demelza shall lose tomorrow?” asked Yvlle.
Arris nodded. At that moment, a tiny frisson of surprise ran through him.
As he had bid goodbye to his belongings, he had, of course, been thinking of Demelza leaving.
Without her, he would lose certainty in the truth of the candidates’ motivations.
But Arris had not been thinking of that when he said goodbye to his room.
He was thinking of each time he had climbed into her chambers and sat in the squashy armchair by her fire.
He was thinking of their conversation, the ease of their laughter, the way she had risen up on her toes to kiss him.
“She may surprise you,” said Yvlle, holding up the perfume bottle.
“What’s that?” asked Arris.
“It is in your best interest, Brother, to get some rest.”
“I would if I could!” said Arris. “But I am too frantic! And honestly, Yvlle, what is in your hand? It looks like perfume but you’re holding it an alarming angle and—”
Yvlle aimed the perfume bottle at his face and sprayed once.
“You’re welcome,” she said.
When Arris woke the next day, he was still in his dressing gown from the previous evening and was sprawled on the floor.
A thin blanket had been thrown over his body and a couch cushion had been placed beneath his head.
Arris scowled. He wasn’t sure whether his sister was spying on him, so he addressed the room instead:
“You couldn’t have at least dragged me to my own bed?”
Arris hauled himself upright. He felt … wonderful, actually. The last time Yvlle had robbed him of his consciousness, he had felt woolly and distracted the next day. Evidently she had improved her formula.
Not long after he had awakened came a knock at his door.
“Enter,” said Arris.
He stretched his neck from side to side. Though he felt well rested, that slippery coil of dread had yet to leave his body. The second trial would soon be upon them, but at least he had the morning’s hours to contemplate and write, to center himself and his thoughts—
“Your majesty, the contestants have gathered downstairs and the trial shall begin shortly. Are you ready?”
Arris whirled around and stared in absolute horror at his frog-faced valet.
“What?”
There had been no time. None at all. No time to bathe, let alone carefully select his attire. And what had his valet meant about the contestants gathering downstairs? Did that mean they were all assembled in Rathe Castle?
Out of choices, Arris had no option but to leave his chambers wearing his dressing gown.
The best that could be said of the situation was that at least his clothes were comfortable.
Oh, he hated this. The morning was in shambles.
And on top of that he had skipped his daily diary entry, and he had been so consistent about it—
“You look well-rested,” said Yvlle.
His sister was waiting for him at the bottom of the stairwell. As usual, she was attired in an all-black ensemble.
“You couldn’t have woken me up earlier?” asked Arris.
“And endure an entire morning of you moping about and slowly working yourself into a fit? I wished to spare myself and our parents,” said Yvlle. “Now come on. Everyone is here.”
Arris stopped short. “Do you mean to say that I have to greet my future bride attired like this? I have principles, you know—”