THE LONG WAY ROUND
Y-you are needed by Her Highness,” the servant stuttered again, twisting her lips when Esme refused to move from her doorway after the first time she’d told her.
“What for?” Esme demanded, crossing her arms. “Tell her I’m busy.” The “busy” in question stifled a snort from their bed, Mina’s hair still a wreck from Esme’s carding through it just a minute ago.
“She said you would regret not coming,” the servant said, grimacing at having to threaten a Wraith, even by proxy.
Esme rolled her eyes, but Isobel had already proven how much she could make Esme regret.
“Where is she?” Esme slipped out of her room and slammed the door behind her.
“A floor above, in the guest suites,” the servant said, bowing and moving out of the way. “I will escort—”
“I won’t get lost,” Esme barked over her shoulder, walking too fast for the girl to keep up. She wasn’t in any mood to talk to Isobel, and she especially didn’t need a chaperone.
Esme repeated a promise to herself not to throttle Her Highness the whole way upstairs. When she got to the hallway, a Viryan slipped through a door, followed by Isobel’s screechy voice yammering about bringing back better food. Esme slinked to the door as the Viryan scurried away.
“I’m nearly healed, Issy. I don’t need any more gruel,” Mak’kon wheezed from inside the room, and Esme suddenly remembered squeezing his shadows tighter than the rest when she’d had her little show at the Valosia. She hadn’t meant to, but she’d been so damn angry.
“Stop being a man and lie back down,” Isobel snapped. “That bitch wrung your throat out.”
He sighed. “That wasn’t Esmerelda,” he said, but Esme heard a bed sag. He’d sat down. “That was the will pitching a fit over your games.”
“No. That was her trying to show me up again—”
“Esmerelda is strong but she’s not that strong,” Mak’kon bit back. Hey! Esme thought. “The Magic in that arena could have choked a bear. Those creatures invited in more than anyone could handle.”
“Don’t tell me you’ve forgotten how it feels to have her wrapped around your throat just that quickly,” Isobel snarled.
“I am not hurt. If it were the will, I’d be in worse shape than you are.
Not to mention that the general is in suspiciously fine health.
The will didn’t have favorites the last time it tried to kill us all, but Esmerelda would certainly cringe at torturing her Uhmerian warmonger.
This wasn’t the will, it was that woman. ”
There was silence. Mak’kon took a heavy breath. “Hallel is curled up in bed, weeping. Forgive me for not wanting to believe Esmerelda would do that to her.” Esme’s chest twisted. She hadn’t softened the pain for the girl at all, hadn’t even thought about it.
Actually, no—she had. She remembered knowing that Isobel would turn for her daughter the second the earthquake started, just as she always did.
She remembered wrapping Hallel’s shadows around her dainty throat and squeezing it nearly closed.
Remembered hoping that Isobel could see the dent Esme left in her precious baby’s neck.
Her blood ran cold. She’d never—
Well, she had.
“I’ll forgive you. But she would. To get her way, she would,” Isobel hissed.
Esme slumped in a shadow. Hallel was Gia’s age. Would Esme have hurt Gia if she’d been in that audience?
“She has a little girl Hallel’s age. She wouldn’t. Not unless that Magic you let face-fuck us got to her,” Mak’kon challenged.
A chill raced up Esme’s spine. She hadn’t even realized until now that Magic had been using her. It had slipped in so smoothly, robbed her of her guilt and morals.
“So, either way, it’s my fault? Sounds about right.” Isobel’s shoes clicked around the room, then something else sagged. She’d sat down, too.
“You tried to kill her wife.”
“If she’d killed Hallel—”
“You don’t know that—”
“When she throws a fit and hurts thousands, you want to be so damn understanding. When I try to keep everyone in line, I’m a monster.”
Mak’kon sighed, but Esme heard the bed shift. She could imagine them leaning on each other.
“I don’t think you’re a monster. I think you’re trying, but picking a fight with Esmerelda won’t do you any good. We only need Janos to be king. There’s no need to make an enemy of her.”
“She’s trying to ruin our plans. We’ve spent fifteen years like this and I am tired. I love you, but I have to leave, and I can’t until Hallel is safe. Why are you letting her distract you?” Isobel asked.
Esme had never heard her like this, tamed and with high-pitched youth extracted from her voice. It was deeper than Esme had ever heard it.
“I’ve turned my back on her and Urias and my family for fifteen years because of one single mistake I made,” Mak’kon replied.
“I’ve played my role for a decade and a half, but I can’t keep acting like this plan is right.
It doesn’t feel right. I don’t want to hurt her anymore.
I don’t want to hurt any of them anymore. ”
To hear him sound so distraught made Esme’s heart hurt. He missed them? All this time, Esme thought it had been the opposite, but he sounded so alone.
“When Janos wins, Hallel will be queen, and I’ll be out of the castle,” Isobel said. “Then, you can crawl back to your little family and tell them all about how evil Isobel kept you chained to the bed. But until then, you’d better play your role and keep your nose out of how I play mine.”
Esme sucked in a breath as parts of their plan filled in for her. The Mak’kon Esme had hated for the past fifteen years had been an act, and maybe Isobel’s cruelty was one too. And as soon as Isobel was gone, Mak’kon would be able to drop his.
Mak’kon groaned and moved on the bed. “Promise me to at least leave that human woman alone?”
His pleading tone would make a mess of her. He was trying to protect Mina, even after Esme had hurt Hallel, even after she’d snapped at Isobel a million times.
A beat of silence. The sound of Isobel’s nails clicking on something. “I would have let her die. And I’ll kill a million more wives if it means protecting Hallel. I hope you realize that.”
“Is—”
“But fine. I have other ways of hurting her.” Isobel fled the bed, the clicking of her heels loud and indignant.
“You do realize that you’re supposed to be fighting for Janos, right? Not just against Esme?” Mak’kon’s voice broke over the shortened version of Esme’s name, one she hadn’t heard from his mouth in eons.
“She’s outsmarted me twice since the beginning of this competition, Tamir.
At this point, it is not Balthazar and Janos who are fighting.
It is me and Esmerelda. I won’t lose to her.
” Isobel sighed. The sound of Mak’kon’s true name, pronounced correctly, with the rolling mm sound in Isobel’s voice made Esme’s spine straighten.
It wasn’t a Micrean word and its pronunciation took time to master—time Isobel had obviously devoted. “Don’t look at me like that.”
“You two should have been friends,” Mak’kon said wistfully.
“She would have been a good person for Hallel to know.” Esme heard him move across the room, heard his hands brush against something soft.
Isobel, maybe. “I wish we could have done this differently. You and me, me and them, Hallel, all of it. I wish I could have kept it all together.”
Isobel was silent, but Esme knew the sound of an embrace: swishing fabrics, skin sliding across skin, grabbing shirts and skirts.
“You did all right,” Isobel admitted. “When this is over, say whatever you have to say to get them to forgive you and go back to them. Seduce Urias and then let him seduce Esmerelda. Get your life back, Tamir.”
“I don’t regret the one I have.” Mak’kon kissed her somewhere. “Not you, not Hallel.”
Could Mak’kon be…? No, it was impossible. Omniel had made sure no Wraith would ever sire children. But Mak’kon had known Hallel since she was in her mother’s belly. Had been the one to deliver her, even. Had been the one to stop Isobel’s hemorrhaging after her birth.
He really loved her. And Isobel really loved him. Even though it didn’t sound like they were together anymore, the Isobel and Mak’kon behind these doors, Issy and Tamir, loved each other.
“Now, show me your progress,” Isobel said.
The air suddenly went tangy with Mak’kon’s magic.
“Not bad,” she said. “You’re getting closer.”
“And what plan is this for?” Mak’kon asked anxiously. He was using his glamour for something, and judging by the heady smell, it was no easy feat.
“I’ll tell you when the time is right. For now, work on these.
” Esme heard the sound of a smooch, and the air thinned as his magic ebbed away.
“Now, help me into this stupid dress. Esmerelda should be grimacing at the door soon. I told the servant to take the extra-long way when escorting her just to piss her off.” Isobel giggled.
Bitch. Even if Esme’s hatred for her was morphing into something more confused, Isobel was still a bitch.
“What are you bringing her here for? More thinly veiled threats?” Esme could hear the raising of his brow in his voice.
“No. Because what you said about the animals was right. The city is fucked, and if you’re right about the spell inside the will, then continuing the last trial as I would like to would only end in more chaos,” Isobel said.
“So you’re hoping that the less Magic is in the city, the less the will may object to your meddling?” Mak’kon asked.
“It’s a thought. Besides, that tricky bastard we bought the second Betrayer’s Serpent from bragged all about how strong an ally it was, with such a foothold in the city. Perhaps if I wash it out, I’ll pry myself a bit of leeway.”
“For twisting this competition?”
“For securing our little girl a better life, yes,” Isobel snapped, her voice hot with ire.
“Because we are her parents. We are not her queen and Wraith, not her teachers, not her friends. We will die and cheat and kill and twist this world until she is on top of it. Getting pregnant with Hallel may have been a mistake, but that doesn’t change what we are. ”