Chapter Seven
“Yallara!”
Lunelle hadn’t expected to see anyone in the far wing of the palace, but she was delighted to see the princess back out and about. She’d only briefly seen her at meals and, even then, Yallara had avoided speaking with anyone.
Not that Lunelle had been much more sociable. She’d spent her last few mornings tucked into the corner of a small library, lost in one of her novels, enjoying the peace and quiet.
Yallara swept into the room with her own book, clearly surprised to find her favorite room in the palace occupied.
“I see I’ve been found out. This room has the best view of the Plutonian silver pools.”
Lunelle glanced out the window. A dozen small pools ran from the window down the hill, liquid moonlight slipping from one to another in a rhythmic breath. She found herself lost in their whispers for nearly an hour on her first morning there.
“They are quite something.”
“I’m sure nothing compared to the Lunar Court’s views.”
“We’re both quite fortunate, I think,”
Lunelle returned. She leaned back in the soft armchair as Yallara settled into the settee across from her.
“Do you mind if I join you?”
“Not at all,”
she said. Astra would have leaned over, demanding to know what Yallara was reading. If she liked it, should she read it too? But Lunelle was happy to let the princess live in her own world as she stared at the map, distracting herself from the weight of her decisions as a certain invitation came to mind.
“Can I ask you something?”
“Of course,”
Lunelle said.
Yallara tucked her legs beneath her in a soft posture that immediately eased Lunelle’s tension. She was shaken, of course, but she was still the bubbly princess Lunelle had met in the garden upon her arrival.
“I’ve heard rumors about the Lunar Court.”
Lunelle twisted toward her.
“We can’t read minds,”
she said stoically. It was always the first question anyone asked.
Yallara’s chin dropped as a shocked gasp slipped between her lips.
“Are you sure?”
Lunelle giggled, crossing one leg over the other.
“Well, I suppose in some ways we can. My sister and I, for example, are able to communicate within the confines of our minds. But that’s quite uncommon these days.”
“It wasn’t always?”
Yallara asked.
“No,”
Lunelle said, her eyes dropping to her hands as she twisted her fingers.
“It wasn’t.”
“Your sister…”
Yallara looked toward the door of the study, half open to the hall. They were far enough away from most of the action, but Lunelle appreciated her discretion.
“Is it true she breathes fire?”
“She’s not a dragon,”
Lunelle scoffed.
“But she does have some… heated tendencies. Yes.”
Yallara sighed.
“Fascinating.”
“Plutonians have their own peculiarities, I’m sure.”
Yallara set her book aside, leaning her elbow on the back of the couch.
“We’ve all sorts of strange creatures, I suppose. The Sirens, the Harpies. There are occultists in the city. The proximity to death draws them from all over the courts. The Descendants reside in caves along the cliffs.”
“The Descendants?”
Yallara’s eyes moved toward the window, searching for the words.
“They are not human, but nor are they gods. They’re believed to come from somewhere between here and the Court Below—half alive, half dead. They have a foot in each world.”
Lunelle held her breath, the thought quite paralyzing.
Yallara’s sapphire eyes wandered back toward her.
“Things seem to be shifting quickly, don’t you think? Every morning I wake up and it feels like another piece of some horrible puzzle has fallen into place.”
Lunelle nodded, understanding her all too well. She decided now was as good a time as any to test the waters.
“We’ve had an increase in rebel activity in our cities. Our courtiers are unsettled, to say the least.”
And she had done exactly that, said the least she could on the subject in the hopes that it might spark something within Yallara worth noting.
“What sort of rebels?”
Her onyx brows tucked inward, her eyes darting to the door.
Lunelle ran her finger over her invitation’s severed seal, letting the cracked wax warm against her fingertip.
“I’m not sure,”
Lunelle lied.
“We haven’t been able to infiltrate and identify who they’re in service to.”
Yallara’s tongue pushed at the edge of her lips, debating on how much to reveal to the demigoddess before her.
“My brother is cautious with my exposure to what happens outside of these opulent walls.”
She stretched her neck, eyes slipping from the window to Lunelle’s face.
“But I hear things, of course.”
Lunelle expected more to flow from the young princess’s mind, but she seemed hesitant to divulge more.
So Lunelle did what she did best.
She waited.
“He thinks I don’t hear the whispers amongst the soldiers as they return from our southern territories,”
Yallara finally admitted, her velvet voice falling into a hushed whisper.
“We’ve lost control of Charon and Sephonia. It’s why he was so sure that the man the other night?—”
“Hold that thought,”
Lunelle said, the hair on the back of her neck prickling as she heard the clamor she’d learned to associate with Arcas and his unending posse of advisors and bodyguards bouncing off the hall. She rose from her seat and crossed the library slowly, like a beam of moonlight brushing silently over the ornate rug. She wrapped her fingers around the bronze handle and pushed it shut slowly, aware that a slamming door drew more ears than hushed gossip.
She turned to Yallara.
“Your brother and his council certainly make their presence known.”
Yallara giggled.
“Arcas is not what one would call… graceful.”
Lunelle tucked herself onto the plush couch across from Yallara, mirroring her relaxed position in the hopes it would ingratiate her to the young princess. She wouldn’t call the prince gracious, she supposed, but he wasn’t without a certain air about him.
“What would you call him?”
Lunelle asked.
“Scared,”
Yallara laughed, her gemstone gaze hardening as she stretched her shoulders.
“I’m curious what you would call him?”
Lunelle folded her hands in her lap, weaving her fingers together as she thought about the smartest answer. The answer her mother would give.
“I think your brother is up against a myriad of forces that would scare any man.”
“But not a demigoddess,”
Yallara snorted.
“Excellent, Princess. Your mother would be proud.”
Lunelle dropped her shoulders, melting her posture into something less curated, less calculated.
“Scared leaders make brash choices in order to appear decisive.”
“So you agree, then? You think he’s scared?”
“I know he is,”
Lunelle sighed.
“Because we all are, Yallara. Anyone who claims otherwise is worse than scared—they’re arrogant. Arrogant leaders get innocent people killed.”
The notion seemed to appease Yallara and unlock a small chamber within her chest, the secrets flowing much more easily.
“There are rebels in the palace,”
she whispered.
“He cannot purge them no matter how hard he tries.”
Lunelle’s neck flushed.
“Why get rid of them? Is he so unwilling to hear them out?”
Yallara’s eyes widened.
“And start a civil war on the back of an inter-court conflict? The city streets would be soaked in blood by the Solstice.”
“Not necessarily,”
Lunelle countered, squeezing her nails into her palms.
“Couldn’t there be a peaceful transition brokered? Work with the rebels and not against them?”
“The Plutonian elite have squashed any whiff of rebellion for centuries, Lunelle. This is not a new battle. Think of your own court’s nobility. Would the demigoddesses of Lunaria release their power quietly?”
Lunelle inhaled slowly. No, she knew, they would not.
“He has a good heart,”
Yallara murmured, her eyes falling again to the window beside them.
“I hope you see that.”
”Does it matter how good his heart is if it never circulates to his mind?”
Lunelle asked.
The princess tossed her a crooked smile—so similar to her brother’s bemused smirk.
“Perhaps if someone could quicken his pulse,”
she whispered.
A warmth spread over Lunelle’s chest, blossoming through her lungs and into her ribs. She’d suspected, of course, when they came here that things would move in this direction, but it still felt strange to imagine.
“You are going to court him, aren’t you?”
Lunelle thought about this. The word court felt silly. It implied action on her part, but she knew—and she was sure Yallara did, too—that her mother would ultimately make the call. Oestera was still on the throne, still the queen. Whatever she decided would go.
The library door cracked inward as Arcas slithered through—his face pale, his breath rapid.
“Oh,”
he sighed, catching Lunelle’s eyes.
“Apologies, ladies, this room is usually unoccupied.”
“As it will be again soon,”
Yallara teased, rising from her seat.
“I’ve business to attend to,”
she announced, winking at Lunelle as she skipped lightly from the room. Lunelle sat straighter in her chair, sliding her ankles toward the floor slowly, as if the prince might not notice her relaxed posture.
“I can arrange for a chaperone,”
Arcas said quietly, tilting his head toward the library door.
“A chaperone?”
Lunelle asked.
“Are we going somewhere?”
“No,”
Arcas answered, setting his books on the writing desk against the wall.
“Only, I thought, if we’re to be here together…”
Lunelle’s eyes flitted about the room.
“Are you threatened by me, Your Highness?”
Arcas’s pale blue lips tightened into a flat line.
“Of course not, Princess, I?—”
“I am teasing,”
she said softly, blushing as she realized her humor did not land.
“We do not require chaperones in the Lunar Court. I was unaware the Plutonians had such customs.”
Arcas arched his onyx brows, settling into an armchair across from her, still posed as if someone might show up to paint a portrait, but his lips relaxed.
“We do not,”
he said.
“I was always told that Lunarian women practice strict rules of engagement within courtships?—”
Lunelle jolted. Yallara suggesting it was one thing, but Arcas was another entirely.
“Courtships?”
“I am not implying—well, I suppose I am. Gods above,”
he muttered.
“Forget I said it.”
Lunelle turned her eyes away from him, afraid that his bumbling nature was beginning to warm to her as endearing.
“If I were to court you, not saying that I am…”
“Understood.”
“...I’m afraid I’ve no clue what you’re referencing as far as rules of engagement.”
Arcas rose from his seat, darting to the wall of bookshelves behind her.
“It’s somewhere here,”
he whispered as he scanned dozens of bound spines. “Ah! Yes.”
He tilted a deep amethyst volume from a shelf packed with Inner Court writings and handed it to her.
“A Delicate Dance: A Complete History of Lunarian Courtship Rituals,”
Lunelle read as she thumbed through the pages.
“Arcas, where in the Nether did you get this?”
Arcas shrugged, settling back into his chair.
“It’s a commonly referenced text amongst the nobility here.”
Lunelle battled back an unbecoming laugh as she read the section headings, dozens of strange rules she’d never heard of before, documented in bold lettering.
“We don’t practice a single one of these,”
Lunelle said through a stunned giggle.
Chaperones are required in any room in which a Lunarian woman is present. If a Lunarian woman is found to have touched a suitor with her bare hand, she must engage in ritualistic cleansing until her next completed cycle in the Lunar Temple. Lunarian women are docile in nature and easily frightened, one must always send a female attending into the room to signal your presence before following.
“None of this is even remotely true, Arcas.”
“I thought it was strange that you danced with me so willingly,”
he admitted.
“But I thought perhaps since we were outdoors and within view of others?—”
“Where is this from?”
she asked, rotating the book in her hands. A gilded icon shimmered at the base of the spine. She held it close, rotating it to catch the light from the window. Lunelle snorted.
“Arcas, this was written by an Ellumian satirist.”
She held the book up and flipped to the final page, where the author had included a brief biography and explanation.
“This author must warn any readers of this handbook that attempting to abide by these rules will only result in one of the deepest wounds known to the Living Courts—a Lunarian woman’s pity.”
His pale blue complexion flushed violet as blood rushed to his cheeks.
“I am late for a meeting,”
he mumbled, snatching the book from her hands and tossing it into a bronze basket beside the desk. He hadn’t been the subject of her pity before—but he certainly forced it from her as he stomped out of the room rather like a child.