Chapter 9 Bryony
brYONY
MY BEDROOM DOOR bursts open.
A jolt goes through me as Theodora storms in, coppery curls all mussed, dark circles under her eyes. She heads for my armoire and starts flinging drawers wide.
“On your feet, Bry. We need to get you dressed. I’ve been up all night trying to menace and bribe someone in the palace to drive us to the temple without alerting Uncle.” She pulls out a heap of clothes. “This place is full of spineless idiots.”
I push myself up on my elbows. “Theo, what—”
“After what happened last night, I don’t trust Idris with your safety.” She dumps the bundle of fabric on my mattress, already turning to rummage through another drawer. “I’ll threaten the Head Oracle into contacting Alexios and negotiate with him myself.”
I shiver as I swing my legs over the side of the bed and—Wait. Different nightgown. Gray silk, little vine pattern. When did I put this on?
A dream returns in snatches—those amber eyes, hot skin beneath my palms, lips against my ear.
Where do you want me? Where would you like to sink in your claws and teeth and tear?
Stupid. If the Wolf had been in my room, he’d have slit my throat and whistled while the blood pooled.
“Bry.” Theodora’s sharp voice cuts through my spiraling thoughts. “Get that nightgown off. We need to move.”
I scramble to tug the shift off. Theodora lobs a chemise at me, followed by stockings. I yank them on, my hands trembling so badly I can barely work the buttons.
“How do you know Alexios will even bother to bargain?”
“He did it with Amalthea, didn’t he? I’ll be convincing.” She spins me around and tugs a soft muslin dress over my head. “I’ve seen an Enforcer come to collect. I won’t let that happen to you.”
My breath catches. I never spoke with Theo about that day in the palace woods two years ago—how quickly the Wolf killed. The way his power had pressed down on me. His words, low and intent.
Don’t ever give me a reason to come for you.
I swallow past the sudden dryness in my mouth. “Which did you see? The Wolf?”
“The Blade. The one without proper wings. His are like… living shadow spilling down his back.” She laces up my bodice, fingers deft.
“I saw him when Aldgate stopped tithing and Uncle abandoned us. I went to speak with the village elders and remind them that nowhere is too isolated for a god’s notice. A lesson they all learned.”
“He killed them?”
“Yes. Every single one.” A shudder rolls through her. “By the time I reached the village, he was standing on a pile of corpses admiring his handiwork. I’ve never seen that much death.”
Watching the Wolf kill an oathbreaker was bad enough. I’ve heard his brother is worse. The Blade isn’t known for efficient kills; he just shows up for a massacre and makes it as bloody and brutal as possible.
“You spoke to him?” I ask, swallowing hard.
“You might say that. I got up in his face and insulted him.”
A strangled laugh escapes me. “Theo, you didn’t!”
“What was he going to do? Killing an Anchor breaks the Accords, and even an immortal attack dog has limits.”
Before I can respond, heavy footsteps thunder down the corridor. A moment later, Idris’ broad frame fills the doorway, and he scowls as he takes in my half-laced gown. “Whatever you’re planning, forget it.”
“I’m taking her to the temple myself,” Theodora tells him, finishing with my laces. “Right now, I don’t trust you to navigate your way off a toilet, much less with Bryony’s safety.”
Idris glares at her. “You take one step toward those gates with her, and I’ll have you dragged back by the hair.” He jerks his head at me. “Let’s go, Bryony.”
“Let her put shoes on,” Theodora snaps. “And don’t manhandle her in front of the servants. Grant her that small dignity.”
“Dignity?” He stalks to my dressing room, voice rising to a bellow. “She pissed that away the moment she bared her traitor’s brand to half the empire’s nobles and every royal family from here to the Southern Reaches.”
Idris storms out with a pair of my slippers. He chucks them at my feet, lip curled in a sneer. “Put those on.”
I slip into the shoes and tie up the ribbons.
Theodora grabs a cloak, settles it over my shoulders, and gently works the clasps. “Let me ride with Bryony. She shouldn’t be alone for this.”
Alone with you, she means.
“Absolutely not. Stay behind and keep the nobles calm.”
“You honestly expect me to play hostess after they all saw their princess show off an oathbreaker’s mark?”
“You’re a clever girl, Theodora. If those lords give you trouble, do what you always do and fuck them into compliance.”
Idris seizes my arm and hauls me toward the door. Panic claws up my throat. I twist around, searching for Theo’s face. She looks at me—angry, scared, her hands shaking.
“I love you,” she says.
“I love you, too.”
Idris yanks me away.
The servants won’t look at me. As my uncle drags me down the palace colonnade, everyone averts their eyes as if the sight of an oathbreaker might taint them. A few of the younger maids turn their backs.
Well. Guess I’m poison.
It’s funny, in a bleak sort of way. These same people used to fall all over themselves for a scrap of the Princess of the Blood’s attention, and now they avoid me like I’m a plague carrier. Typical. Once a god judges you, everyone’s quick to throw you to the wolves.
“Keep up,” Idris barks, tugging at my arm.
My teeth grind together, but I lengthen my stride. He wrenches the carriage door open, shoves me inside, and clambers in after me.
The interior presses in from all sides. My chest constricts. Some distant part of my mind registers the first stirrings of panic.
“Stop that,” Idris says sharply.
I blink. “Stop what?”
“The dramatics. There’s no use for it.”
Right. Silly me. How dare I have an inconvenient feeling about the Eternal completely screwing me over.
“Let’s go!” Idris bangs twice on the roof.
With a sudden lurch and a grinding of wheels, the carriage moves over the cobblestones. I watch the palace walls slide past, the ground still littered with crushed flower petals and muddy ribbons from my ruined wedding. What a waste.
Idris folds his arms and leans back, tapping the toe of his boot against the floorboards in a restless beat as the carriage rattles through the streets. Despite the early morning, crowds have already amassed along our route.
Princess Bryony! Princess!
“What if Alexios doesn’t agree to undo my mark?” I ask, keeping my face hidden behind the curtain.
Idris lets out a rough sigh. “We’ll handle it, whatever it takes. The empire is bigger than one girl’s mistakes.”
My mistakes?
“I’m being punished for your failures,” I say.
And there it is. That look. The one that says he’d like nothing more than to wrap his hands around my neck and squeeze until I stop making noise.
“I don’t want to discuss this with you, Bryony. Clearly, the Eternal thinks you hold some responsibility.”
“Theo tried warning you, but you didn’t listen. You never listen. You’re always too busy pouring more wine down your throat.”
A muscle flickers in his jaw. “You and your sister have no idea what I do for the Accords. How many dead Devaliants do you think I’ve had to arrange? How many bodies I’ve dressed and posed so our citizens don’t see our family’s decline?”
I flinch, my breath too quick and shallow.
“If you knew how many lies I’ve told, how much shit I’ve eaten to keep up the front that we’re just a tragedy-prone family…” His lips twist as he gestures to the crowds along the road. “You can’t hold an empire if they all know you’re rotting.”
I flash back to that terrible morning in the forest when they discovered Father’s body. Idris was pale, his hands shaking as he brushed my hair from my face.
Don’t look, he’d said.
He’d seemed… small. Diminished. And beneath the shock, there’d been a flicker of something bleak and resigned.
Take her inside, he’d ordered my sister, his voice distant. And don’t let her see.
The court had whispered. What had caused Emperor Titus’ sad end? They theorized, of course. Ugly rumors about his mental decline and even uglier whispers that maybe Idris had killed his brother for power.
My uncle acted quickly. A tragic hunting accident, he’d told the broadsheets. The emperor’s horse had spooked and thrown him against a tree. If people speculated after that, they did so privately. But in public, Luceni had accepted it as another Devaliant tragedy.
The shouting crowd draws my attention. The guards line the road, pushing everyone back.
Princess Bryony! Princess!
I force a smile and wave. A father hoists his daughter on his shoulders for a better look, and I blow her a kiss. It’s what Theodora would advise. Act normal. Don’t let them think anything is wrong.
Idris gives a bitter chuckle. “Even with your life going to shit, you still show up for them. That’s why they love you. Odessa had that gift, too, remember? That ability to wrap people around her finger.”
Tears sting my eyes. It’s been a year since Idris’ daughter stepped off the palace balcony.
“I’m showing them we care,” I say. “You might want to try it sometime. Wouldn’t your daughter want you to?”
His lips flatten. “You don’t know what it’s like to outlive your child and lie about her death. So spare me the accusations and the judgment. I’ve done more than enough. Maybe you should have done less.”
“I never asked for them to love me.”
A silence descends between us, punctuated by the clatter of wheels and the shouts from outside.
Then Idris sighs. “That’s the edge we walk, isn’t it?
Give them nothing, and they’ll despise you.
Give them everything, and they’ll destroy you.
Either way, we bleed. The most we can hope for is a cut that kills us quickly. ”
He reaches out to tap my knee. As if that awkward touch can somehow encompass the breadth and depth of what we don’t say. All the hollow spaces the dead leave behind.