27 Imogen
Imogen
I had never been so cold.
Not even in the Serafi mountains, in the dead of winter, had I known a cold like Obelia’s.
In the days after Theodore had performed the spell successfully, the cold had increased with every northerly mile we sailed, pouring through the cracks in the ship, rising up around us from the freezing water.
Obelia’s massive bay was protected by a crooked spit of land, and even so a boisterous wind assailed the long sprawl of docking.
It was the middle of spring and the gently rolling landscape across from the port was shrouded in a heavy layer of fresh snow.
It was blinding, glowing like white fire in the noontide sun.
My cloak was too thin, but I buried my chin and mouth into its collar.
A long line of silver carriages had finally come for us, and they lined the main road like a giant chain.
Down the line, I watched Theodore and Halla enter the first carriage, silent and dismal.
They were followed by a smiling Lachlan and Agatha.
I was five carriages back, with nerves so tight they knotted my muscles as badly as the cold did.
Alone in my carriage, I shoved my feet as close to the foot warmers as I could and studied the narrow peninsula in the distance.
The empress’s palace sat at the very end, butted up to the waves, looking like a hunk of coal.
Its black stones gobbled up the bright sun so well that none of its details, its windows or turrets, came clear.
Aleka popped her head into the carriage. “Your Majesty,” she said with a reverent nod of her head. “Is there room for me and Steward Gabros?”
I swallowed. “Of course there is.”
The last few days had been a blur of preparation for all of us.
I’d been sleepless, packing a trunk with what little I owned, memorizing spells written in the books on magic, and sewing small, padded pockets into my underskirt.
Tucked safely within were two vials of severing draught, properly mixed with a few drops of my blood, just as the spell book laid out.
I’d seen very little of Theodore and even less of the marshal and steward, as they’d prepared the new contracts for the empress.
Aleka and Markis settled in across from me, shivering as violently as I did, and pulled the spare furs atop their laps.
Markis reached for the little decanter below the window and poured himself a cup. “It’s all a nightmare.” He downed the spirits. “This cold. The king’s mood.” He jutted his chin at me. “You. This meeting will be the end of all of us, I’m sure of it.”
Ever-placid Aleka turned ferocious. “You bite your tongue. Her Majesty should have you flogged for that.”
Markis jolted like he’d been slapped awake. He stared at me with sudden diffidence, but still, a drop of dislike swam within his eyes. “Forgive me, Your Majesty. It’s been harrowing… This cold has me not right.”
I dipped my chin, gave him a hard glare. “It’s all right. You’re not the first to dislike me.”
He took another drink from the decanter, then stroked his short beard. “I just cannot help but feel a terrible apprehension.”
I felt it too. We’d all prepared as best we could, but there was no way to know how any of the pieces would fall.
The carriage lurched forward. Aleka sat straight, light brown skin aglow from the sun off the snow, and pulled her fur all the way up to her chin.
“I have hope,” she said, in her serene way.
“I have served the crown for longer than you both have been alive. King Theodore’s intentions are always good—praise I could not give to his father, forgive me.
When he and the empress are face-to-face, I believe he will find a way to make it all right. ”
Aleka looked to me, her dark eyes kind. “Your contentions with the empress are another thing all together, Your Majesty, but still, what’s right and good will prevail.
” She tucked her feet closer to the foot warmer.
“Now, it’s a way to the empress’s keep. You look tired from the journey. Sleep while you can.”
I was tired, and with the air in the carriage finally starting to warm, I felt sleep tugging at my eyelids.
I took an inventory of myself. A spare dagger was tucked into my right boot, and another smaller dagger was concealed beneath the boning in my bodice.
The two vials of severing draught sat in my skirt pocket, pressed safely against my hip.
Outside, four of the six armed sailors that had been gathered to serve as my retinue stood on the carriage’s footboards.
And more than all that, the sea was all around me.
If every other protection failed me, I would still have its power, and despite how Eusia could access my lure, I wouldn’t hesitate to use it if it offered me some defense.
This was the safest I would be while in Obelia. Sleep was wise.
In the blaring light beyond the window, I could hardly delineate the details of the icy land around the empress’s black palace.
I took a quick scan of Obelia’s scattered towns and hamlets.
They snaked along its seemingly endless coastline, but there were no buildings situated in the open fields or cliffs of the nearby mountains from what I could see.
All of them were tucked close to the water.
The deep-green bay was dotted with white ships, like seed pearls stitched into dark velvet.
I yawned and they blurred.
Aleka let her head lean back against the wall of the carriage. “I will sleep too, I think.”
Markis poured yet another glass from the decanter, the crystal clattering. “I will drink.”
So as the carriage crunched its way through the winding, icy streets, I too let my head fall back against the soft carriage wall.
My tight muscles fought against me, but I ticked off my provisions once more—blades, vials, the sea—the way I used to count the stars through my window in Fort Linum.
I thought I saw their white sparkle, little flashes of bright.
I imagined my breaths were the hushing waves and finally, finally, let them pull me out to drift with them in a restive, but deep, bout of sleep.
“Why is it ordinary?” Eusia hissed. “Our agreement was clear, Nivala.”
Back in the pool chamber, back in that awful warm water. The torches flickered and the new baby wailed.
“A child in exchange for the Gods’ blood that would run through its veins. The body you gave me was only payment—”
Nivala’s face looked ashen, blue eyes like glass. “I know—”
“Did you or did you not lead me to believe that a Leucosian God was willing to go to your bed? Athan, son of Panos—he is the only one worth having. You snake. You let me assume it was him.”
Nivala shook as the baby burrowed against her chest. “I thought—at first—I thought it was a Leucosian God that had arrived in my palace. He told me he was a descendant of Jesop—”
“Jesop! Who in all the realms would want his pointless power?”
“Divine blood is what you wanted.” Nivala was a deferent, weeping mess now. “You did not specify whose.”
Eusia floated nearer the edge of the pool, her face right to Nivala’s knees, and glared up at her.
She spoke slowly, her melodic voice cutting.
“It is my mistake. I’d not taken you for an idiot, Nivala, but you’ve set me to rights.
” Through Eusia’s eyes I watched the baby squirm, watched the way Nivala’s hands would not hold its soft body with care.
“Let me guess—it was your shame that kept you from me these last months, wasn’t it?
This is why you sent others to feed me. Shall I guess whose child it is you wasted your miracle on? ”
Nivala shook her head. “It is the child of Nemea, king of the Isle of Seraf,” she said, softly. “When I met him, he led me to believe… and I… I had him many times. I think—”
“You loved him.”
Nivala pinched her lips, as if refusing to answer.
Eusia pushed away from the pool’s edge to float in the center once more.
“It would seem, Nivala, that you have gotten precisely what you asked for. My part of the bargain is upheld. But I did not get what I was promised. I am the one who will suffer your deceit, so it is only fair that I ensure you know such anguish in turn.”
“Please,” Nivala begged. “Please, I have come all this way to gift her to you.”
Eusia struck the surface of the pool with her small fist, sending water cascading over Nivala and her babe.
“What good is that useless thing to me?” Eusia cried.
Her voice went low and sober, like she was speaking a curse.
“Hear me, Nivala, empress of Obelia—that babe in your arms is the last miracle you will receive from me until your debt is paid. Let her be a reminder of your treachery, of your abject powerlessness, of your deficit.” Silent tears poured down Nivala’s cheeks, but Eusia was unmoved. “Leave.”
My eyes flew open as the carriage jostled to a stop.
The door banged wide, and a footman’s crisp, melodic accent sounded. “Welcome to Obelia.” He reached in a gloved hand.
I stared, frozen.
Nemea’s daughter. Halla was Nemea’s daughter.
My sister. Somehow, it did not strike me with the reverberation I’d expected it to.
Somehow, learning of him doing something so despicable as deceiving the empress, as claiming he was a God, was as shocking as hearing of the sun’s rising.
And still, it filled me with fury, it filled me with a deep, inescapable pain.
I could not focus on the weighty emotion, though, because something was terribly wrong. Deep in the middle of my body, I knew. Aleka and Markis watched me from across the carriage, so I set my hand within the footman’s and looked up into his water-hued eyes.
“Where are we?” I asked.
His thin mouth pursed in confusion. “At the palace, miss.”
Aleka shook her head with distaste. “She is the Queen of Seraf and Anthemoessa, you dolt,” she said. “Address her as such.”
The footman blanched, then bowed. “My apologies, Your Majesty.” He gave my hand the barest shake. “May I help you out?”
My body felt like it had been drained. “We are not at the palace. The palace was by the sea. Where are we?”
The footman inclined his head respectfully. “Ahh. Your Majesty, forgive me. Perhaps you refer to the empress’s castle keep, Mustkiva? The black one on the bay.”
I nodded my head, setting a shaking hand to my hollowed-out stomach.
“You’ve reached the empress’s palace.” He gestured behind him with a regal sweep of his upturned hand. “This is Fort Vuoria.”
I could not see beyond the carriage opening, nor could I see through the small, curtained windows, but I didn’t need to see what lay beyond to know. While I’d slept, we’d climbed the white, jagged cliffs that had loomed over the winding coastline and massive port.
We were far from the sea.
“Gods damn it,” I hissed, as I pulled my hand from the footman’s hold. “Shit.”
Markis’s brows bounced high.
Aleka’s eyes went wide. There was a bite of reprimand in her voice. “Is everything as it should be, Your Majesty?”
“No,” I snapped. At my outburst, the footman had taken a wide step back. I bounded out of the carriage unassisted, balling my full skirt in my fists so I wouldn’t trip. The courtyard was wide, ringed in high, snow-capped walls.
Frantic, I searched the swarm of people exiting the carriages and carts. The opulently dressed nobles, and dour-faced officials, the gold-armored guards. Theodore had to be near, but before I could spot him, my retinue of armored sailors filed in around me, encasing me like plaster.
I tipped my head back to take in Fort Vuoria and my alarm doubled.
Its entry doors were towering and arched, carved with the Obelian runes that were emblazoned on their flag.
Above them, the center of the building came to a tall, vicious-looking point, flanked on either side by four formidable turrets.
Just like Fort Linum.
There was no doubt in my mind that Nemea had based his mountain fort on this one. Save for the color of the stones, they were each other’s mirrors.
The cold seemed to grow and burrow toward the middle of my bones. I told myself I had not returned, but I could almost smell the dry earth and cypresses. If I spun, I half expected to see the bloodstained execution stone haunting the middle of the courtyard.
I tried to bat away my mind’s trickery and searched between my guards’ shoulders and heads.
They’d begun herding me toward the main door with everyone else.
I searched the crowd of Varians, all of whom were woefully underdressed for the wintry air, but I couldn’t spot Theodore amid them, nor could I see Halla’s white flash of hair.
He needed to know what my vision had shown me.
The crowd moved into Fort Vuoria’s tight entry, and I breathed with relief to see that its interior did not at all resemble Linum’s.
It was a tall, circular room with a steeply arched ceiling, dark and dour within.
Unlike Linum’s washed, smooth stones, Vuoria’s had a black patina clinging to its crags.
A single partially lit iron chandelier hung low above us.
“What a surprise.” The husky, composed voice rang from the upper landing of the single narrow staircase.
The empress peered down on us from the banister.
It was disarming to see the ghost of her youthful face within her older one.
She’d broadened in the cheeks, softened in the jaw, but the penetratingly keen blue of her eyes remained.
A slow smile spread over her bright red mouth. “To what do I owe this pleasure?”
The crowd had fallen quiet, and I could hear the brittle sound of Halla clearing her throat. “Hello, Mother,” said, meekly. “As a marriage gift, I requested an Obelian wedding celebration. My new husband granted me my wish.”
I stood tall amid my guards as the empress’s gaze swept over us.
She tilted her head slowly, taking her time, that wide smile of hers stuck in place.
When her eyes locked with mine, I sensed her jolt of anticipation more than saw it.
There was a widening of her eyes, a minute and hungry clamp to her jaw that rattled me to my bones.
The smile slipped off the empress’s face. “Oh, how good of him.” She drew a pale hand across the banister. “Well, come along.” She looked to me. “We have a lot to accomplish in very little time.”