Chapter 23 The Walk
The Walk
In the hallway, the air feels different from the throne room, as though the weight of it has thinned just enough to allow breath to return. Korvis lingers where the others begin to move ahead, his energy refusing to settle into the quiet that follows us out.
“I have to go,” he says, though it sounds more like a delay than a decision.
Before I can answer, he steps closer and pulls me into another quick embrace, easy and unguarded in a way that feels almost foreign after everything that has just passed.
“If they won’t let you gamble in the capital, we will do it here.
There is always a way if you are creative enough. ”
I find myself smiling despite everything.
“We will include Uncle Uralish,” he adds, lowering his voice slightly as though sharing something conspiratorial. “He is terrible. We will make a fortune.”
A scoff sounds from ahead of us.
“You will lose everything you have and blame the cards,” Uralish says without turning.
Korvis grins as he releases me. “That remains to be seen.” He steps back, offering a brief, careless salute before turning away. “Another time, then.”
He disappears down the corridor with the same ease he entered, leaving behind a quiet that feels heavier for his absence.
We walk in silence.
Uralish does not speak again until we pass through a set of doors and into the gardens, where the air opens and the light shifts into something softer, filtered through branches that have not yet decided whether they will hold their leaves or release them entirely.
The path curves beneath our feet, stone set carefully into earth that feels older than the palace behind us, and he gestures outward as though the land itself is something I should already understand.
“This was Ryaran’s,” he says, not looking at me. “She preferred this side. Said it felt less…constructed.”
I follow him, taking in what I can, the space, the quiet, the sense that this place has held more than it shows.
He waits until we are far enough from the doors, far enough that the palace feels distant rather than looming, before he speaks again. “You realize you are in danger here, don’t you?"
“Everyone keeps saying that,” I reply, “but I do not understand why.”
He exhales, long and unhurried, as though deciding how much of this he is willing to explain. “I will keep it simple. If you bond with Teorin Rathmor, Alarna renews its ancient alliance with the Threns.”
He takes a drink before continuing. “That means we are tied to them again. Trade improves. Movement between kingdoms opens. The wards loosen. People come and go like they did before.”
“Before?”
“Before the last bond ended,” he says, his voice carrying something pointed now, “and no new one began because Princess Asharanis was across the sea, under a veil.”
The implication sits between us. “I am not doing a bond with him,” I say.
“That is fine,” he replies. “I do not care, personally. Everything Rathmor is questionable at best. Teorin Rathmor thinking he should rule anything is the problem. He has never been anything worth trusting.”
I do not answer.
He continues as though my silence confirms something. “The ones who want the bond are called the Opens. Obvious name. They want the wards loosened, trade restored, movement returned. They need you alive long enough to make that happen.”
“And the ones who do not?”
“The Lights.” He lets out a short breath that almost resembles amusement. “They prefer things exactly as they are. Closed. Controlled. Unchanged. Your existence disrupts that.”
“Why would they hate me?”
“Because now the bond is possible,” he says. “Before, it was not. In their minds, if you had never returned, nothing would change. No alliance. No risk. No shift in power.”
I let that settle.
“The Lights are more dangerous,” he adds. “The Opens need you alive. The Lights do not.”
“And everyone else?”
“Royalists,” he says with a shrug. “In theory. Our family has been followed for generations. Royalists are those who support whatever choice the Crown makes. In practice, most people pretend to be loyal and act otherwise. Be careful who claims to stand with you.”
“So there are three,” I say. “Lights, Opens, and Royalists.”
He glances at me. “Maybe you are not as stupid as your mother after all.”
“She wasn’t—”
“You did not know her,” he cuts in. “She was intelligent until she fell in love and made choices that did not serve her. The fact that you are standing here without a husband tells me you may have learned something she did not.”
I do not respond to that.
He watches me a little longer, then asks, “Why did you leave?”
Syle stands beside him, so quiet I had nearly forgotten he was there.
“My husband went to the Shalvar Mountains to deal with the undead,” I say. “While he was gone, my brother tried to kill me. I asked the king for protection. He could not give it. Teorin told me Alarna would be safer.”
Uralish huffs a laugh. “And you believed him?"
“I did not realize until I was already on the ship that it was a plan to bring me here for the bond.”
“Then why is he not here?”
“I told him I would rather die than complete it,” I say. “If he followed me here, he would be bringing a corpse with him.”
Uralish looks at me in a way that is difficult to read.
“Have you had a good life, Asharanis?” he asks.
“Not really,” I answer. The words come more easily than I expect. “My father, the baron, hated me. He starved me. Beat me. I was little more than a servant in his house. He gave me to the crown to advance himself, so I was forced to marry Prince Colsar.”
His expression darkens. “That bastard—”
“But it was not all bad,” I say, before he can continue. “We fell in love. He was not treated well either. He spent most of his life in Shalvar. We understood each other.” My hand moves unconsciously to my stomach. “This child was wanted.”
“And now?”
“I do not know where he is,” I admit. “Someone was sent to retrieve him once my situation at Rathmor Palace became more...serious. But I do not know if they reached him.”
“Rathmor palace?” Uralish asks. “I thought it was your brother who hurt you.”
“My brother tried to kill me,” I say. “But King Sevrin…” I hesitate. “He had an interest in me.”
Uralish’s expression shifts into something colder.
“He did not force me in the way you are thinking,” I add. “But he confined me. Controlled what I ate. Where I went. I met Teorin when I was trying to find food in the forest after the King forbid it.”
“What a piece of shit.”
The voice is not Uralish’s. I start, the sound of it too close, too clear.
“Sorry,” it says quickly, softer now. “I was trying not to interrupt. I did not want to be…intrusive.”
I turn to Syle, studying him properly for the first time as I speak aloud. “I do not understand what this is. Can you read my mind?”
“No,” he answers, the words forming clearly in my head. “I can hear what you say in it.”
“You both are speaking mind to mind?” Uralish asks.
“Yes.”
He looks at Syle with something like recognition sharpened by surprise. “He does not speak,” he says. “Not with his voice. It is not a flaw. It is a gift. He was a born a Wisper.”
“A what?”
He gestures to Syle. “Show her.”
Syle inclines his head. Light moves through him, not outward but upward, and from that light another figure appears, standing where he stands and yet separate from him entirely.
The figure is close to his age, though different in every way that matters, darker, sharper, carrying something older in the way he holds himself.
“I am Enovar,” he says. “From the Florivar line, centuries ago.”
I stare at him. “So you are not Syle?"
“No,” he answers. “Wispers don’t have a voice of their own,” he says. “Not out loud. That’s why I'm here.” He says it as though the answer is obvious.
"I died too young," he adds.
The explanation does not help. Uralish waves his hand dismissively, and the figure dissolves back into Syle as though it had never fully separated. “Dead ancestors,” he says. “Sometimes they do not stay gone. In our line, sometimes they return.”
“That is a terrible gift,” I say.
“It has its uses,” Syle answers quietly in my mind. "One day I will show you."
I don't quite understand the benefit of sharing a body with a dead ancestor, but I keep that to myself.
“Now I am confused. If Syle can only speak through him, then why can he speak to me in his head without him?”
Uralish exhales. "Those born with golden eyes in the same bloodline can sometimes reach each other like this. You’re not unique. Korvis speaks with him the same way."
I pause, considering it. Korvis has golden eyes as well. I wondered if this was the case in all families or just House Floravar.
“I do not mind it,” Syle says in my head.
“Now that I know you are not reading everything I think,” I reply, “neither do I.”
Syle chuckles.
Uralish shakes his head slightly. “This is not why I brought you out here. It was not for history lessons."
He stops walking. “You cannot give birth here,” he says.
“Why?”
“Because if your child is born on Alarnan soil, it will be bound to the same system you are. The bond will follow them. Their life will be shaped by it whether you accept it or not.”
I feel the weight of that press somewhere deeper than thought.
“So I was born here?"
“Yes.”
“I am not accepting the bond.”
“Then you should not remain here long enough to give birth.”
“Where would I go?”
“That is what we will decide.”
We. It somehow feels good to have someone on my side. I know no one in Alarna should be trusted, but something about Uncle Uralish I trust. And Syle.
“You cannot trust anyone in that palace. Not the guards. Not the court. Many answer to Balkton, to Venya, to their son,” Uralish adds.
Syle makes a low sound of agreement in my mind.
"Venya and Balkton, are they Opens?"
"Perhaps that is what they claim in the shadows to garner support, but the truth is they are their own selfish stance. Royalists, if they are the ones ruling."
A thought enters. "Wait. Balkton and Venya have a son? I thought they were siblings? And I thought she was your wife?"
"Ex-wife, because she is a whore who fucks her brother."
I almost laugh but think of Syle. "Does it bother you when he speaks this way?"
"No. Because it is true. Besides, it is no secret that she dislikes me. She prefers Hurstinal, my half-brother.
“I will send for the Avanki,” Uralish continues. “Desert warriors. They answer only to our line. They swore themselves to your mother, and that oath extends to you.”
“They will come to you.”
“How many?”
“Enough,” he says. “Several hundred thousand.”
The number sits between us, heavy with implication.
“You will need more than that,” he adds.
I look at him. “For what?”
Something almost amused passes through his expression. “It is written all over you,” he says.
“What is?”
“You want Veynar.”
I do not deny it.
“You want all of it.” He takes the last drink from his flask and empties it into the grass beside us. “I do not blame you,” he says. “The world is not kind. You might as well have the power to control it before someone else does.”
He looks at me then, fully.
“And if that is what you want, Queen Heir,” he says, “you can have as many of my troops as you need.”