Chapter Thirty-Nine Hanan
chapter thirty-nine
hanan
‘You are a treasure, Hanan,’ the queen says, kissing my forehead.
She helps me back to my room and into bed. Her strength is alarming, when mere weeks ago our roles were reversed. She tucks the blankets around my neck, swaddling me. ‘I’ll have the servants send up more food. You must gather your strength.’
‘What did you make me do?’ I croak.
‘It’s a symbiosis, isn’t it, Hanan?’
I feel drunk, like nothing really matters anymore. As though this is all happening to someone else. This is nothing like the drainings from before. Those were like a cup emptying as she gulped me down, time slowly allowing me to refill.
The queen smiles, a sharp and toothy thing. ‘Why do you think Paranish’s mainland is in a state of flux, while the seasonal isles are steadfast?’
‘Because you devour it.’ The words slip out, and they are acid on my tongue.
I don’t know what compels me to talk back.
‘The farmer’s complaints of a famine. The harvest will never be plentiful because you cut the life in its prime.
It’s never given time to grow fully. You drain life from everything, like—’
A parasite. I stop my tongue and the queen looms over me, holding the blanket tight against my body.
‘Everything must feed. The divine in their time and the salt of the earth in theirs. Speaking of which, I’ve been feeding Pocket.’
I start and sit up. The queen laughs, forcing me to lie back down. ‘You are so charming when you think you are unobserved. But shrouds have no pockets.’
I can feel my face flush, humiliation washing over me. The queen laughs at her own little joke. What has she heard? What has she seen?
‘I’m nurturing your talent, furnishing you with everything you could need to fulfil your potential.’ She strokes my cheek, and then turns away. ‘You have everything you need, right here.’
She opens my window and looks out into the world.
I’m supine but I watch her expression as she surveys the rustics at their daily toil.
I can hear laughter and chatter from the market below and in the distance, the bells of farmyard animals.
Then she faces me again, fingering the woven blanket on my bed.
‘You like this?’ she asks and I look at the fading golden threading.
I stay still, unsure what to do or say.
‘Everything fades eventually. Then it becomes dirt for seeds and the next harvest. That is the cycle of things, is it not?’
I nod, holding the stone bird in my pocket. She will tell me whether I want to hear or no. I would be stupid to do anything but lie there and listen.
‘It’s a delicate balance, and I take great pride in my duty as steward to Paranish.’ She pushes back a strand of hair and looks out the window again. ‘Not everyone understands that balance. The sacrifices it takes to maintain order.’
Beneath the potions and powders, even beneath the layer of my energy on her skin, she looks tired.
She is beautiful, no doubt, in the austere and elegant way only someone born into privilege can be.
She is soft of hand, and hard of look. For the first time I wonder if she loved the king.
If she mourned his passing as more than a dutiful widow with a dominion to rule in his stead.
But from what I knew about such arrangements, theirs was likely a political match rather than a union of affection.
My power can only sustain her and the princess for so long. She will always need more. This is what it has always been about. Paranishians are the soil underfoot in her garden. Our blood will make the mangoes taste divine.
‘I hope you understand that balance, Hanan. I’ve had such . . . disappointments.’ She smiles at me, and her look is one of genuine sadness, a hint of regret about the eyes. Then they are hard as stone again. ‘I would hate for you to dash my hopes.’
I sneak into the library as soon as she leaves. My body protests, but I don’t know how long I have until she begins to post guards at my door. I’m conscious the queen knows more than I assumed, but either way I’m cursed. I can only arm myself with knowledge.
I summon the Priestess Sinaya’s spirit as I did before. She smiles when she sees me. Can a ghost form new memories? Does she recognise me?
‘Priestess, I have need of your history.’
‘It is impossible to separate mine from the rest. We swim in the same water, all of us.’
‘What happened to you after you left the Bastion?’
‘I sought knowledge from the ones who practise the forbidden gift.’
I hold my breath, half expecting her to crumble into dust again. But she remains. ‘The forbidden gift – do you mean – necromancy?’
She says nothing.
‘Who were these people? How did you find them?’
‘That knowledge is lost to me.’
‘What do you mean?’
‘I am a specimen trapped in glass. It is all a cycle: birth, death, rebirth.’
I try to hide my frustration and try a different tack. ‘I must know more about this squandered gift. What was it?’
‘Energy trapped in a gilded cage. It sustained them all. It was their plaything. They disrespected it.’
‘Energy, an object?’
She shakes her head.
‘A living vessel, then.’
She says nothing.
‘What happened to you?’
‘I don’t know if my plan succeeded. The rest of my story is lost to me. I can only hope I hid it well.’
‘Where did you plan to hide it?’
‘Take root where the sea meets the sky.’
She says nothing else of consequence. I still don’t understand how we’re communicating, how far her consciousness stretches.
I feel a flicker of energy when I summon her, but it’s inconstant, unstable.
The energy of the dead has always felt this way to me, but this temporary resurrection of the dead is bitter, burning.
Eventually I thank the priestess and release her to her rest.
Pocket sits on the windowsill, looking at me with a questioning gaze. He tweets softly, nuzzling into my hand.
‘Go on now,’ I say, smoothing down his feathers.
He surveys the ground, judging the distance, and shakes his tail experimentally. After a couple of tentative hops, he leaps from the tower, dipping until a breeze catches him. He extends his wings and swoops around to look at me before taking off.
I watch him until he’s nothing more than a speck in the distance. The Bastion feels darker for his loss.
‘We will both be free of this place soon,’ I promise.
I am not alone when I lock up the library.
‘Shouldn’t you be resting?’ Salvacion says, startling me in the hallway.
I study her face as I let my heart rate settle. Her posture is less stiff than usual, and there’s a focus in her eyes.
‘Shouldn’t you be with the queen?’ I risk a retort.
She smiles then, coming closer. I lean back against the library door. ‘I like you,’ she says, towering over me. ‘You’ve got more spirit than the others did.’
‘Is that so?’ I ask, barely breathing.
‘Tread very carefully,’ Salvacion whispers. ‘It’s never a matter of if she’s done using you up, but when.’
I stare at her face illuminated by the torchlight. It’s weathered and hard, but this is the first time I’ve really looked at her. There are freckles on her nose.
‘Why are you telling me this?’
‘I’ve served the Bastion for many years, seen many priestesses come and go. I know about that thing you have in there. And I’ve seen you with the princess.’