Chapter Twenty-Eight
Lunelle was unsettled—she’d spent most of her day reeling after sifting through Astra’s documentation from Ellume.
Their hunches, it seemed, were right.
Selenia was hiding something, and Oestera knew.
But bigger than that was the note she’d received from Yallara.
Dearest Lunelle,
In my brother’s absence, the movement has gained traction. I fear what he’ll do to me when he returns—if he returns—but you would be proud.
Come see for yourself soon.
It should have been good news. She should have felt excited.
But she could only find dread.
She feared what lengths Arcas would go to when his duty here was done.
“You seem tense,”
Lura said, moving in circles around Lunelle as she placed a few final pins in her coronation robes. They were velvet and heavy on her frame, with silver Moons embroidered across the hem, exactly as brilliant as she’d always dreamed they’d be.
“Do I?”
Lunelle laughed as Lura stuck another pin between her lips.
“I’m sorry, of course you are.”
“Astra and Luxuros have uncovered many details that point to the Plutonians being right about Selenia’s involvement in The Flare,”
Lunelle confessed. Lura’s shoulders flexed uncomfortably as they spoke.
“Ameera showed me the Shadow Bargaining manual,”
Lura shared.
“I can’t explain it,”
Lunelle said quietly.
“It all seems so wrong, but I can feel in my bones that we’re onto something.”
Lura glanced at Lunelle with her amethyst gaze, an uncertainty churning within her eyes.
“Your mother has not seemed herself these last few months either, Lunelle.”
“How do you mean?”
“Her maidens have been worried about her. She seems… distraught. She and your father have not been sleeping well since Astra’s return. They’re restless.”
Lunelle’s head tilted.
“I just mentioned to Astra this morning that something seems off. I can’t place it. Perhaps something to do with Solan?”
“Perhaps,”
Lura muttered, leaning back to examine her markings.
“All right, you’re free to remove them.”
“They look gorgeous,”
Lunelle said.
“It’s odd, though. They still don’t feel like mine.”
“It will all feel real soon, Lunelle.”
The princess nodded, feeling Lura’s words bounce off her chest and land somewhere on the floor.
“Psst,”
Mirquios whispered as Lunelle and Lura walked by the Andromeda wing on their way to bed for the evening.
“I’ll see you when you return,”
Lura said, winking at Lunelle.
She twisted on her heels, glancing over her shoulder before darting into the king’s chambers.
Mirquios pulled the door shut behind her and pressed her against it, wasting no time tangling himself up in her. He tasted like tea and honey as her lips parted for him.
“Gods above,”
the king whispered as her hands snaked up his shirt, her mouth leaving a hot trail across his neck.
“Mirquios!”
Lux’s panicked voice boomed on the other side of the door, followed by three harsh raps. “Mirq!”
The king hung his head back, pushing Lunelle gently to the side. He cracked open the door, his mouth open to beg his leave, but Lux pushed past him, a wild storm in his eyes.
“He took her,”
Luxuros gasped.
“Who?”
Lunelle asked, her lips swollen and face flushed.
Luxuros paid their indiscretion no mind.
“We were… we were in a dream, and a voice called to her. I do not understand it exactly, but he reached for her, and he took her. She is not in her room!”
“Astra?”
Lunelle breathed.
Ameera appeared moments later, her face ashen.
“Commander—”
Lux paced back and forth as he repeated the details of what happened beneath his breath.
“How could someone take her from a dream?”
Lunelle asked, her voice rising as panic set in.
“Not someone,”
Lux said, his eyes widening.
“It has to be a deity, yes? Someone much more powerful… we could send for Ehlaria,”
he said, mostly to Ameera.
“She has much more knowledge on the subject?—”
“We should tell the queen,”
Mirquios said.
Luxuros stopped pacing as Lunelle said, “No!”
Ameera stepped between them, reaching for Lux’s chest. She yanked at an amulet around his neck, snapping the leather knot as she held it out to him.
“You can find her,”
she said quietly. Luxuros’s eyes searched Ameera’s for truths he could not say out loud, but within a moment of the amulet falling away, his head snapped skyward.
“Meet me in Mercury,”
he said to Mirquios.
“I do not know what shape Astra will be in. Gather your medical supplies, Meer.”
Meer, Lunelle thought as she looked at her sister’s maiden. Ameera was too busy mentally cataloging what she needed to meet Lunelle’s gaze.
Mirquios grasped his brother’s shoulder.
“We’ll be there. If you do not return before daybreak, Maeve will activate the Nova response.”
Luxuros was gone before Lunelle could catch her breath.
Lunelle watched the Sun climb over the city below, the morning beams waking the Mercurian Gate.
“Mirquios, perhaps it’s time to send for Maeve,”
Ameera said from a table laden with food no one had touched in hours.
“Yes—”
“No need,”
Lunelle gasped, taking perhaps her first full breath since Luxuros had come for them, pointing through the window as the commander and Astra faded from the Rift.
“He’s got her!”
She smacked the king’s arm as she raced from the library into the hall.
Lunelle cried, “You found her!”
and flung her arms around her sister’s neck, desperate to know she was really there, she was safe.
“Are you hurt? Who took you? How did you find her?”
She could not stop the flow of questions as she looked between Astra and Luxuros.
“I’m fine, Lu,”
Astra mumbled into her neck, pulling away from her clutches.
Lunelle dragged Astra down the hall and into the library, even bigger than the one she’d fallen in love with back in Pluto. The morning Sun seeped in through the windows, painting the crimson carpets in shadows and flames. Ameera’s eyes widened as they approached, the tension in the air thinning.
“I’m fine,”
Astra assured everyone. Lunelle had not noticed her sister’s warmer tones in the moonlight—the gilded freckles falling over her skin.
She rather looked like the Sun herself.
Gods, she’d fucked up letting Astra out of her sight. She should never have told her about any of this, they would have been none the wiser.
“I cannot believe I let this happen. Anyone could have grabbed you. I told you she shouldn’t be in the Rift!”
She glared at Mirquios, who gracefully did not argue with her.
Astra sneered.
“You sound like Mother.”
Lunelle stopped pacing. Of all the things she could have said to justify her pit of loathing, that was the cruelest.
“Sorry,”
Astra apologized.
“But I wasn’t in the Rift. I was dreaming, Lunelle. It could have happened anywhere.”
Lunelle sighed.
“You were gone for hours, Astra! The Lunar Court will awaken any moment and we’re lucky we aren’t bringing back a corpse!”
Her sister sat on the couch, the silver slips of silk and the crown on her head lighting up in the sunbeams.
“I attended a ball with a bunch of deities and drank some wine, Lunelle. That’s a Tuesday in the Lunar Court.”
Lunelle glared at her king as he scoffed in the corner.
“What did Selenia want?”
Ameera asked.
Astra shrugged nonchalantly as if all of this were normal.
“To make a deal.”
The blood racing beneath Lunelle’s skin seemed to freeze its currents. No deal with Selenia would be worth it—the gods were never fair to bargain with. She kneeled before her sister, searching her eyes.
“What did you do, Astra?”
“She wants me to go to the Court Below with you and Arcas to retrieve something for her,”
Astra said—the veneer of this being just another night flickered slightly, a tick in Astra’s jaw giving her away.
“And Mirq,”
she added.
Lunelle pitched forward, her hands landing on her sister’s knees as her head swirled.
“Mirquios?”
she asked, unsure if she’d heard correctly.
“In exchange for my help, Selenia will nominate Mirquios as a champion.”
The room blurred around her.
“What—Astra. No. No!”
This had gone far enough already—there was no way Lunelle could allow her to make such a trade on her behalf.
“Lu, it’s the solution we’ve been looking for. If Selenia nominates Mirquios, no one can argue. Not Mother. Not Arcas. It will be seen as a formal decision of the gods.”
Astra’s words did not soothe Lunelle’s tense muscles.
“It’s too dangerous!”
“You’ll both be there with me,”
Astra insisted.
“When I’m not knocked unconscious by an Ascended god, I actually handle myself quite well.”
This sister of hers—she did not know what she was committing to. She did not understand what she was possibly giving up.
For her.
Lunelle pulled her sister into another hug, this one much deeper, much harder to let go of.
“I do not deserve a sister like you.”
She whispered the words against Astra’s neck, praying they’d absorb into her bloodstream and be worth something, though they’d never be enough compared to Astra’s own sacrifice. The king’s swift glance to Luxuros pulled her attention. The commander’s lips fell into a frustrated tilt.
Lunelle leaned back on her heels.
“What does she want you to retrieve?”
Astra pressed her lips together, the answer bubbling to her tongue but reluctant to escape.
“Leona.”
The air left Lunelle’s lungs. “As?—”
“I know it sounds crazy! But she wants to make amends. Leona has never Ascended. Selenia believes that there’s been a misunderstanding.”
Luxuros crossed his arms, his shoulders pulling together with a lightning bolt of tension. He’d never forgive her if Astra got hurt.
And she understood.
“She can do it,”
Mirquios said to him.
“If anyone can do it, it’s Astra.”
Ameera leaned forward, her sharp features drawn together.
“And there’s no catch? You bring her Leona’s Soul and she’ll leave it at that?”
Tears threatened to spill from Lunelle’s eyes.
Astra sighed, waving her hand between them.
“There’s always a catch. I just haven’t figured it out yet. But until then, I have her word. She’s going to crash your Trial Ball and announce it.”
Lunelle giggled nervously, it was the only sound she could make in response to the image Astra’s words conjured.
“Oh, Mother is going to hate that.”
She could not fault Astra as a grin broke over her face.
“A big part of the appeal for me, if I’m being honest. Now, if you all don’t mind, this crown is becoming a permanent part of my skull and I am drunk on the wine of the gods. I desperately need to get home.”
“Of course. We can talk more tomorrow,”
Lunelle said. She crossed the room, leaning into Mirquios’s side, drawing any of the calm grace she could from his poised spine.
His fingers brushed hers in a silent prayer.
Lunelle could only see him, only feel him, only hear his breath catching as they both wondered if perhaps they had reason to hope once more.
Astra offered Lunelle one more embrace, her arms circling her shoulders tightly.
“Thank you,”
Mirquios said as Astra untangled herself from Lunelle. He glanced at the commander, who quietly seethed against the wall.
“Will you make sure Astra makes it back to her chambers safely, Commander? I’d rather she not enter the Rift alone after tonight.”
Lunelle waited for the thuds of the commander’s boots to fade before she turned to Ameera.
“How much does he hate me?”
Ameera rested a hand on Lunelle’s shoulder.
“He does not hate you. He envies you. You’re allowed to love her as fervently and as publicly as you want.”
Lunelle’s cheeks heated as Ameera darted into the hall. Mirquios pulled her toward him, looping an arm around her waist.
“He’ll never forgive me for this,”
she sighed.
“I’ve known that man for thirty years, Lunelle. I believe this is the first time I’ve seen him scared.”
“You don’t think…”
Lunelle gestured to the Tether singing between them, raising her eyebrows.
“He’d never tell me,”
Mirquios answered.
“I’ll force it out of her after she goes to hell and back on our behalf,”
Lunelle sighed, her heart aching. He stroked her shoulder in the quiet of the library, pressing his lips to her temple.
“Would you like to stay here tonight?”
he asked, his hands wandering her back.
“I have a few things I need to tend to, but it shouldn’t take me too long.”
She leaned back, placing her hands on his chest.
“Believe me, I would. I’m just… I’m a little overwhelmed by Astra. What if…what if—”
Lunelle could not bring herself to say the words.
Mirquios understood the implication in her strangled silence.
“We will protect her, Lunelle. Exactly as you always have.”
She lingered in his arms for one more moment before heading back to the Rift, finding herself tempted to grip the shimmering sapphire thread above her and make a deal with a certain goddess to protect her sister.