Chapter 3
“Sessia!”
I jump, limbs unfurling only as far as the cramps will let them. Morning light filters through the cracks in the boards above me. I’m not in the palace in my bed. I’m in a stranger’s boat, farther down the river than I’ve ever been. And for some inexplicable reason, that feels like a relief.
I climb from the hold into gray morning light.
The small boat is lashed to a stone dock, the water level keeping us bobbing feet below the cobblestones.
If I had gotten a good view of the boatman last night, I don’t know if I would have been brave enough to approach him. His clothes are stiff with grime, his hands cracked and blackened in the creases.
I smooth my skirts. “This is Sessia?”
He nods.
“And the ferry?”
“Ferries to take you in any direction. Just ask around the docks.”
I don’t think pressing him will prove fruitful. “Right. Thank you, then.”
I reposition my velvet bag around my shoulders and step closer to the wharf. His bright, beady eyes follow my movements, like he wants to say more. Maybe to ask why I needed the ride, or what else is in my bag.
I pause. “I want your word that you won’t tell anyone you saw me last night. No matter who comes asking.”
He grunts. “I only see what I’m paid to see.”
He thinks that’s reassuring, but my father could pay him in palaces.
“Then let me tell you how to keep your payment.” I draw myself up, trying to channel Rinalda. “If anyone comes looking for me here, I’ll say you stole my jewelry. And you won’t just lose the gold. You’ll lose your head.”
His small eyes narrow further. My heart pounds, and I root around in my velvet bag, until my hand closes on a bracelet. I hold it out.
“Stay quiet, stay rich, and we’ll both keep our lives. Melt it down before you try to sell it.”
He accepts the bracelet from me, and I hoist my hip onto the street level. I struggle with my cloak as I clamber onto the wharf.
Even though my ankle still aches, I pump my legs to put distance between me and the water’s edge. Did I really just threaten him? I have never spoken to anyone like that before. But I had to. That boatman is the fastest way the guards could find me.
Despite the early hour, men haul nets and heave crates onto carts, their voices ringing out as chains clang.
Every loud sound sends my heart into a frenzy.
Even if the boatman doesn’t talk, I can’t have sailors here reporting the arrival of a strange woman with a scarf covering her hair.
I pull up my hood and dart down an alleyway.
I hide myself in a gap between two stacks of crates.
My ankle throbs and my hands shake as I gather my cloak around me.
Even though the air is warm, I still shiver from adrenaline and lack of sleep.
I have never been outside the Citadel without an armed escort before.
I knock my head against the stone behind me.
What am I doing here?
No one at the palace will believe I fled because my life was in danger.
They will think I ran from the prospect of marriage.
I’ll be just as bad as Rinalda. Defiant.
Disobedient. Unwilling to play the role I was born for.
But I have no lover to burn, and I already live sequestered in the Sunrise Palace.
I can’t even guess how my father will punish me.
All I know is that it will be bad, and it will probably last years. Staying away longer will only make it worse.
But I can’t go back.
Even thinking of returning makes my muscles lock up. I suck air in and let it out slowly, waiting for the grip on my spine to loosen. I do it again, and again, until the creeping feeling like lips at my ear or hands near my throat fades.
I’m away from the palace now. Distance is good. Distance helps.
But I can’t stay here, crouched in an alleyway. My throat is dry and my stomach is hollow. I don’t know how safe it is to be alone on the street. Even though I’m sure I saved myself from something sinister at the palace, I could fall prey to someone who sees a woman alone as an easy target.
I need a plan, and fast.
The safest place for me is in some distant noble house, under the care of my father’s allies. But if I show up and knock at a lord or lady’s door, I’ll be sent straight back to Illios. No one would hide me from the emperor once they found out I ran.
I need my father’s permission to leave the Citadel. I need proof there is danger for me there.
I need a prophecy.
I sit up straighter. The river runs through Delvos, the lush province given to the blood of Delvara, goddess of prophecy, chaos, and dreaming.
One of those purple-eyed lords or ladies could pull my future from the threads of the world and reveal what’s coming for me.
Prophecies are precious, but I have gold.
If I can reach a household with strong enough delvarian blood, I can make a trade.
I can bring a prophecy to my father as proof. Or, if this feeling is wrong and there is no danger in my future, I can prove to myself that I’ve fallen into delusion, and it’s safe to go home again.
The docks are coming alive now, voices multiplying, lanterns snuffed out as the sky brightens. A woman crosses the mouth of the alley with a canvas sack over one shoulder. She is alone. Before I can talk myself out of it, I push myself to my feet, wincing as my ankle takes my weight.
“Excuse me.” My voice comes out too high, but it catches her ear and she stops. I clear my throat. “I need to get to Delvos. Do you know which ferry to take?”
She tilts her chin toward the far end of the waterfront. “Every boat leaving from that pier heads toward Delvos. There should be one by noon. Not sure the ports.”
“Thank you. And…how do I pay?”
She looks me over. Her gaze catches on my cloak, my boots. “You pay before you board. Should cost about five chits.”
“Five chits.” All I have in my bag is jewelry. I can’t hand another heavy gold necklace to a ferryman and not expect questions. “Do you have any coins?”
Her expression closes. She takes a step back, her grip tightening on the strap of her sack.
“I can trade!” I reach into my velvet bag and pull out a plain gold bangle, keeping it low between us so no one else can see. The morning light catches the metal. “I just had to leave my home quickly. This is all I could take.”
Her eyes dart over me again, but her appraisal is different this time. She nods, as if she has come to her own conclusion about my circumstances. “I can give you some coins for it. Not what it’s worth, or even close.”
I hand her the bangle and she counts the coins. She gives me a handful of small brass ones I recognize as chits, and two silver pieces. “That’ll get you on the boat, and another if you need it. Is that home you left likely to come looking?”
“Yes.”
“Then you might want to change. You’re going to be the finest dressed person on the river in those clothes.”
The neckline of my dress is lined with pearls, while hers is plain. I hold up the edge of my satin cloak to her rough-hewn gray one. “Would you be willing to trade cloaks?”
I exchange mine for hers. It hides the top of my dress, at least.
She loops my fine one around her shoulders. “A word of advice: bargain first. Pay second. And try to find yourself some different shoes.”
I nod, throat tight, as she strides away. I realize too late I should have asked if she had any food.
Bargain first. Pay second.
I hide myself back in the alley and wait for a ferry to arrive at the pier the woman pointed me to. By the time it does, I’ve watched enough passengers board and disembark to mimic them. With five chits ready in my hand, I square my shoulders and walk across the cobblestones with purpose.
The ferry at the pier is a flat, low boat with a canvas roof stretched over the deck.
“I’m going to Delvos,” I say to the man posted alongside it.
“A tag is ten.”
“What?” I saw passengers accepting tin tags as some kind of ticket, but I can’t tell if the man is cheating me. “I heard it’s five to Delvos.”
He pats his wooden box. “Tag is for disembarking and re-boarding at ports. You give me ten and I’ll give you five back when you get off the last time in Delvos. Unless you don’t plan to leave the boat the next few days?”
“No…no, I’ll take a tag.”
I stumble out of the way as other passengers come up behind me, exchanging their ready coins for a piece of stamped tin from the box. I rifle through my bag, hoping I have enough chits. I do, although this only leaves me with three, plus the two silvers.
“Here.”
He hands me one. “Don’t lose it, or you’ll have to buy another tag. Women sleep stern side, below. Any spot you can find is yours.”
I cross the deck to an empty spot against the far railing. New passengers arrive, offering chits. Others return, showing their tin tags to get back on. Soon, the deck is crowded, and the ferryman rings a bell. The boat lurches as it pulls away from the dock.
The other passengers wear threadbare clothes, with large, patched travel bags. I see now why the woman told me to find different shoes; the gleam of the leather and delicate embossing on mine are far too fine to blend in.
As much as I want to stay glued to this railing, quiet endurance won’t work.
I need more common clothes, I need food, and I need more coins instead of a lump of tangled jewelry.
At the first stop, I approach a woman with her tin tag out, taking it as a sign she is disembarking permanently.
I trade an embroidered tunic for a crumpled handful of dirty clothes.
I remember too late that I should have asked her if she had coins or food.
Bargain first, pay second.
At the next stop, I exchange another garment for a waterskin.
At the stop after that, I swap my fine riding boots for a scuffed pair and a few more coins.
My lobellum would be as precious as the gold, but I keep the jar at the bottom of my bag, unwilling to part with it.
I rip the pearls off my dress and trade them for a loaf of brown bread and a small folding blade.
By nightfall, my clothes look like they could belong to any woman on this river, and I have gathered enough food for a few days.
The crew lashes the ferry to a post for the evening, and it rocks gently in the river’s flow.
I join the women gathering below deck. I stay out of their fight for the few benches and find a spot where I can lean against the wall.
I’m exhausted. My adrenaline spiked every time I approached a stranger, and I only dozed a few hours last night.
But there is one more thing I need to take care of before sleep. If anyone sees my hair, I have no doubt my father will find me within the day. It needs to go.
When the only sound is the constant creak of the hull, I grab an unlit lantern and my folding knife and slip above deck.
The river is black and flat around the boat. There is no crew in sight. I find a section of railing hidden by canvas and crates and kneel beside it.
The knots on the scarf give under my fingers, then the ties beneath, and my waist-length hair spills free around me, ghostly in the dim light.
My hands find tangles that never form under the care of my usual brushes and oils, as I separate a section and hold it to my collarbone.
I slide the blade underneath and begin to saw.
Each pass rasps, until a fistful comes free in my hand.
My breath shudders as I set it on the deck.
These long waves have been nothing but trouble. Losing them shouldn’t make me sad. But my eyes prickle as I cut the next section. And the next.
My father only ever took mortal, red-haired wives, to ensure all his children would inherit Ignar’s power along with his blood’s signature physical trait. Before my mother, thirteen mortal empresses bore him children with flames flying from their fingertips and shades of fiery hair.
My mother, red-haired and mortal as the rest, was the youngest empress to ever get pregnant.
She was exalted for overcoming the fertility challenges that accompany my father’s half-divine blood and thought to be the first who might manage to bear the emperor multiple children.
But her pride and the emperor’s affections both faded when I was born with milky locks, only a hint of rosiness showing my ignarian heritage.
It was Seran who named me the Princess of the Dawn, describing the color as the white clouds reflecting the glow of a sunrise. Clever words to attempt to cool my father’s anger.
It didn’t work. From what my mother hissed at me over wine, he never visited her bed again. And when my blood came and I still didn’t manifest the flames, it seemed that the color of my hair was not a coincidence, but a true signal of my weak connection to Ignar.
I was sent to the Sunrise Palace to live with Rinalda after that.
My face wasn’t dry for weeks. I didn’t unpack some of my things for a year.
But gradually, eventually, I found relief in being hidden away.
No matter how closely I read my father’s or mother’s moods, I couldn’t change my looks or my lack of power. Being far from them was easier.
Still, I’ve always felt something stir in me when the sun rises and sets. A tightness in my chest, pulling my gaze to the horizon. I’ve always hoped it meant that one day, the flame might respond to me.
I cut through the last long pieces and let the knife rest next to the heap of pale strands.
At least hair this light is easier to color.
The lantern I brought from below is caked with black, and I scoop soot from the bottom and sides.
I mix it with a palmful of water from my new waterskin and work the paste through my short hair from root to tip.
I once heard maids making fun of an elderly woman who rubbed charcoal into her roots to stretch out the time between dyes, saying it made her look like she stuck her head up a chimney.
I’ll look like I stuck my head up a chimney, as long as I’m not dragged back to the palace before I get my prophecy.
One coat turns my hair dingy, then a second turns it dusky. I refill my waterskin from a barrel on deck and rinse off the residue. I splash water over my face, then wipe it clean with my cloak.
I hold up the lantern, examining my reflection in the glass. A woman with choppy charcoal hair stares back at me. I give her a grim smile.
We’re going to survive, you and I.
I gather the clumps from the deck and hold them over the railing. I steady myself, then let go. The strands scatter over the surface. They float for a moment, waving in the current, before they disappear into the depths.
Princess Lysandra is gone now, sucked into the river’s darkness.