Chapter Fourteen
When she woke the next morning, Lunelle had made two decisions.
The first was that Proserpina had a good point. Pluto was not the villain in either of their stories, and Mercury did not know what he did not know.
She’d been silly to think her delusions about the king were anything other than fear of letting herself want what she knew she should—Arcas was not her enemy.
He was what made sense.
He was what she’d asked for.
The second decision was that she could no longer waver on what to do about the rebellion. She needed to put her feet on the ground and move, one way or another.
The further she got into her morning, the more she realized she hadn’t actually made two decisions so much as decided to make two decisions, but that was enough progress to push her through breakfast with the courtiers and a long round of debates on the merits of absorbing Pluto’s infantry into the Inner Court army, versus leaving them in Pluto as a secondary wave in closer proximity to Solan.
She knew she only had an hour before the courts were to convene for yet another lengthy debate, this time on gods knew what, but she hoped to get a break before dinner.
“Lura?”
Her maiden poked her head through the door, eyes wide.
“Will you tell me when my mother returns from her lunch with the Venusians?”
Lura nodded.
“Of course, Princess.”
Lunelle dug in her trunk for the manuscript Kwan had lent her, diving back into the article she’d left off on.
The People’s History of The Flare
The events surrounding the Solar Court’s lethal attack are not entirely clear, but of two things we can be certain:
1. The Solar Court only benefits from confusion around the king’s motives and,
2. The Lunar Court’s deity, Selenia, was spotted within the gates of Solaris on the morning of the incident.
Lunelle’s heart raced as she read the name—Selenia. It had been nearly a decade since she’d seen her mother’s mother. She did not leave her throne in the Court Above often. Even when she did, it was always fraught with stress and tension on her mother’s behalf.
She leaned toward the fire as she read, something about just seeing Selenia’s name in conjunction with The Flare chilled her to her bones.
“Princess,”
Lura whispered, but it was too late, someone was already bursting into her room.
“Arcas!”
Lunelle gasped, shoving her book aside and flipping it face down on the coffee table by the fire. The prince was paler than usual, his cerulean hues retreating for an icy shade.
“Might I speak with you privately, Princess?”
His eyes flickered to Lura, who gracefully bowed her head and backed out of the room.
Lunelle rose from the sofa, smoothing her gown. She’d seen him at breakfast, a quiet smile passing between them, but he’d given her generous space—unlike the night before.
She supposed it was time to put her first decision to work.
“Lunelle,”
Arcas said, tightly.
“I was going to wait until I discussed this with the queen, however, I was hoping to get clarity from you last night, and we got distracted…”
Arcas moved closer to her, his hands clenched at the adrenaline coursing through his veins. She could sense it, nearly see it rippling from him.
“I seem to always be distracted by you in some sense.”
She braced herself—and vaguely wondered if bracing oneself for a marriage proposal was a good omen—but the question did not come.
His gaze swept over the table, catching on something Lunelle’s had not.
A dagger piercing a crown, lightly etched over the back page, dancing beneath the firelight.
“What is that?”
His tone was frigid, every muscle in his back pulled taut as he stepped toward the table.
“Arcas—”
Lunelle was unsure of the smart thing to do—what her mother would do.
Her mother, she realized, would have been too smart to be speaking to the rebels in the first place.
“Where did you get this?”
His cold gaze turned on her, sending a bolt of ice straight to her heart.
“I-I was sent it. It piqued my curiosity.”
Arcas tilted his head.
“Do you have any idea how dangerous these people are, Lunelle?”
She snorted. There it was—the way out of this.
Play dumb, as if she were just a clueless princess—because that’s all she was to him in the end.
“It was left for me, Arcas. I was merely curious. Don’t you wish to know what your people are reading?”
“I wish to purge my city of every last one of these arrogant fools,”
he muttered, snatching the manuscript from the table.
“This is a curse upon our necks, Lunelle. It will be what sends us both to our graves. Don’t you see that?”
Lunelle shook her head.
“Aren’t you even a little sympathetic to their perspective?”
His head tilted, his entire view of her crumbling in a moment—she could see it in his eyes.
“How many pages did it take to poison your mind? You, who knows so much more than the average citizen. You, the steward of sentiment and feeling—and a few pieces of propaganda is all it takes. Imagine what will happen if we continue to let the poison spread!”
He stepped closer, the anger fading from his bones, but it only seeped out into the space between them. His hand dropped, and a flutter of pages and flame flared beside them as the manuscript landed in the fire with a hiss.
She held her breath, her face frozen in the careful mask her mother had sculpted out of her for years.
“For centuries, people have cried out against injustice because they think there is some mythical happiness that lies on the other side of revolution. But they fail to account for so much, Princess. They’ve no respect for what the crown sacrifices on their behalf. The damage to our shoulders that the weight of the worlds does over time. They think it must be easy, a life of luxury. But you’ve seen how untrue that is, I’m sure.”
“Of course,”
she whispered, hating each letter as it left her lips.
“You’re right.”
He held her stare for a moment longer, the edges of him softening as he found no threat on her tongue.
“This evening,”
Arcas said, exhaling as he reached for her hand.
“If you find yourself not sleeping again…”
Lunelle flinched as he said it, but she nodded despite it. It was better than the question she feared he’d come to ask. She nodded anyway.
“Excellent,”
he said quietly, sliding closer to her. He pitched forward, dropping his lips to hers in a kiss not much warmer than his tone had been just moments before.
Last night, she’d allowed herself to believe he was something else—something salvageable.
But as he kissed her, her decision crystallized in her chest. Arcas had no place in her court—but the people he’d just thrown into the fire did.
And she’d be damned to the Nether for eternity before finding herself on the side that burned the truth to keep their boots on the necks of the people who served them.
“Lunelle,”
Oestera called as they passed one another in the hall.
“I’ve not seen you all day!”
“Sorry, Mother,”
Lunelle said, spinning on her heels to walk with her, wherever she was headed.
“You seem tense, darling.”
The term of endearment made her flinch.
“I’ve been listening to men bark at one another for weeks over minute issues that don’t serve anyone at large. What else should I be?”
Oestera snorted but quickly settled herself.
“I hope we’re returning home soon. I don’t know how much more I can take, either.”
“Mother?”
Lunelle stopped in the hallway, her mother turning with an arched brow. Her maidens stopped and stepped back, giving them space.
“Are you certain about Arcas?”
Oestera’s eyes measured all the things Lunelle wasn’t saying, weighing them one by one.
“Are you not?”
“No,”
she said. “I’m not.”
“We don’t have to make any decisions today, Lunelle. Perhaps we need more time to better understand your hesitations.”
Lunelle hadn’t expected such a reasonable answer from her.
“Thank you,”
she whispered.
Oestera rested a hand on Lunelle’s shoulder.
“My conversations with the prince have been promising, for what it’s worth.”
Lunelle wanted to shout that it was worth nothing, that he was too arrogant, too scared, too rooted in his father’s ways to be reasoned with, but how could she explain all of that to her mother without confessing to her newfound affinity for the rebels?
“I had another question,”
Lunelle said, barely audible. She leaned close to her mother, aware that the hall was not the ideal place to discuss Selenia.
“The Flare…”
Oestera’s face drained of color. It was such a sensitive topic—one they hardly broached, despite Lunelle’s earliest memories forged in its blinding light.
“The Plutonians seem to believe that your mother was present in Solaris?—”
“Princess!”
Yallara moved through the hall, a billowing sapphire gown flowing behind her as her courtiers chased her.
“You must come with us, we have a Descendant here!”
Lunelle glanced at her mother, who squeezed her arm and bowed out of the conversation.
Godsdammit.
“A Descendant?”
Lunelle asked.
Yallara clapped her hands together.
“They’re Pluto’s devotees! They can tell you about your past Descents!”
“Oh,”
Lunelle whispered, unsure if that was information she wanted. Yallara grabbed her hands and dragged her toward the palace gardens, where a table had been set with a black tablecloth and an elderly figure was setting out crystals in varying colors and cuts.
They—the Descendant, Lunelle realized—wore black head to toe, with a smoky veil covering their head, their eyes hardly visible through the thin fabric.
“Who is first?”
the Descendant asked, their voice rough as they finished their spread.
“Me,”
Lunelle said, surprising herself. Yallara pushed her forward, standing behind her as she sank onto the iron chair across from the reader.
The Descendant’s energy was that of death itself, Lunelle thought. A drifting chill rolled from their shoulders, pushing her away as they stared at her with unseeing eyes.
“Pick one,”
they said, gesturing vaguely to the crystals between them, waving a withered hand over the stones.
Lunelle surveyed them but did not need long to decide. She reached for the small, oblong stone that shone with a rainbow gleam that reminded her of the Rift.
The stibnite.
“Mmm,”
the Descendant hummed, holding Lunelle’s palm flat with the stone resting in the center.
“Fascinating,”
they breathed as they observed her.
The crystal whirred in her hand with the same strange turning of inner light as the piece she stole from Proserpina’s festival.
The Descendant held their breath for a moment, leaning back from her, as if she were the one to be frightened of.
“What strange magic you possess,”
the Descendant said quietly.
“Magic?”
Lunelle asked.
“She does not know,”
they whispered to whoever it was they called to.
“What doesn’t she know?”
Yallara asked.
The Descendant hissed in her direction, the black veil ruffling on the breeze. Yallara stepped back, no longer her playful self.
“Who will tell her?”
they asked again, but Lunelle could not follow the thread of their thoughts.
She leaned forward.
“Tell me?—”
The Descendant jerked her hand closer, holding the stone up to Lunelle’s eyes.
“They will tell you.”
“They?”
Lunelle closed her palm over the stone, feeling the insides stutter and disappear.
“You woke your dead, Princess. Ask them.”
Lunelle blinked, a shiver running down her spine. Proserpina’s gaze flashed to her mind—perhaps that was what they meant.
“There is a star,”
the Descendant whispered, their breath rolling over Lunelle’s fingers like a morning fog.
“You must embrace it.”
Lunelle felt that second decision straining to the surface of her skin.
“If you don’t, it will embrace you, and it will be all-consuming.”
The Descendant dropped her hand, folding her fingers over the stone and leaning back, turning their eyes to Yallara.
“Pick a stone,”
they said, dismissing Lunelle with little more than a dusty breath.
She made it through Yallara’s first three lifetimes before she quietly slipped away, the stone burning a hole in her pocket.