46. Lilias
Lilias
HISTORY
It’s evening when Doloros returns. I’ve spent another mind-numbing day watching shadows creep across the little courtyard and trying to trace the threads of my memories back to the place where I messed up so badly that Zarek is trapped in the palace and I’m stuck here. With Blayne. Gods help me.
Doloros bows a little as she opens the door. I was expecting another meal on a tray, but she’s empty-handed.
“Master Blayne will see you now,” Doloros says.
She waves her hand at the empty hallway like I wouldn’t be able to figure out where I’m supposed to go.
I thank her, then follow her down the narrow staircase.
Sounds drift through the air from the open windows, bits of conversation, the rumble of a carriage.
I smell roasting meat and spices, and my stomach grumbles.
Doloros leads me past the room with the bookcases and into another long, narrow room with a window open to the courtyard.
There’s a polished dining table here that must have been made to fit this room exactly.
And, sitting at the other end of its long, glossy surface, is Blayne.
Rage rises in the back of my throat the moment I see him.
He does not acknowledge me when I enter the room. Instead, he nods at Doloros, then takes a sip from his wine glass. There’s a place setting in front of me, and a full glass of wine. But he hasn’t invited me to sit, so I remain standing.
Blayne puts his glass down, then dabs at his mouth with a silk napkin. Finally, he turns to me.
“Lilias,” he says, like he’s just now noticed me. “You may sit.”
I pull the chair back and sit. He looks like he’s trying not to smile. Gods, he must be delighted at how well I’m obeying him right now. It makes me want to scream.
He takes another sip of wine. I don’t move.
There must be something I can do here, something Blayne has that I could use to help Zarek. Or Elrick, and what’s left of the Kingdom of Marion.
Think, damn it, I tell myself. What does Blayne have that I could use?
Blayne picks up his fork and knife, cuts a piece of meat, and puts it in his mouth. He chews loudly. I turn to stare at the place setting in front of me. There’s no knife next to my plate.
I have to play this well, my mind whispers. Malrik thinks I lied to Zarek, that I actually want to be married to Blayne. And where did he get that idea?
From Blayne himself, I would guess. My former tutor, with his room filled with books and all his lectures about history—
History. My mouth goes dry.
Blayne always loved history. He focused on Vsenrog, naturally, but he knew all the stories, even the ones that felt more like fairy tales.
Like the elven wars. The ancient battles when the Kingdom of the Summer used dark magic to trap the Kingdom of the Fall underground.
I shiver as screams echo through my skull, carrying smoke and dust, and the horrible ripping sound as the earth pulled itself apart before the walls of Ethiria’s palace.
Blayne told me about the trapped elven Kingdom of the Fall. I thought it was a myth, or some kind of metaphor. Because magic like that is impossible. You can’t trap a kingdom underground. You can’t rip the earth apart.
“You’re not eating.”
I look up, startled out of my thoughts. Blayne is watching me with that same expression, like he thought I’d be better, stronger perhaps, or smarter. Like it’s my fault I’ve disappointed him.
I smile politely.
“I guess I haven’t worked up much of an appetite,” I say.
Blayne’s frown deepens into a scowl. I glance down at my plate.
My meat has already been cut into pieces, as if I were a child.
I stab one of them with my fork and put it in my mouth.
Blayne’s expression shifts slightly, from the frown back to his usual look of annoyance.
I swallow the lump of meat and give Blayne what I dearly hope is a charming expression.
I can’t climb out of the window or get a message to Zarek from here. But maybe I can learn something useful about the elven monster who’s captured my husband, and the magic he used to tear apart the Kingdom of Ethiria.
Because maybe that kind of magic has been used before.
“I wonder,” I say, like the thought just occurred to me, “if I might have a book.”
“A what?” Blayne asks, raising an eyebrow.
I glance down, like I’m embarrassed to be asking for something so trivial.
“Just…to pass the time,” I say.
Blayne chuckles. I used to think that laugh meant I’d done something to make him happy. Now, it sounds like he’s laughing at me.
“What would you want to read?” Blayne asks.
I glance up at him, then turn my head away.
“Maybe,” I begin, “something about elves?”
Blayne laughs. It’s a harsh, barking sound, and it’s so sudden that I flinch.
“Aren’t you a little old for fairy stories?” he asks.
He doesn’t know.
Cold certainty fills my chest. Perhaps Blayne hasn’t heard the stories coming out of Ethiria, or perhaps he’s heard them and doesn’t believe them.
Either way, Blayne has no idea that the weapon King Malrik dug out of the Dragon Mine is an elf with magic that can rip the earth apart to swallow an army.
He doesn’t know I’m asking about something that’s horrifyingly real.
My teeth grind together behind my polite smile.
“I know,” I reply, trying to look embarrassed. “You’re right. But, they aren’t all fairy stories, are they?”
Blayne raises his eyebrow again. Once again, I’m back in the castle of Marion, stammering through an answer to some complicated question, growing less and less certain the longer I talk.
“What about the elven wars?” I ask. “The Kingdom of the Fall, locked underground after a magical battle—”
Blayne laughs again, then finishes his second glass of wine. “That history is so old it’s practically a myth,” he says. “Besides, history is written by the winners. Only the gods know what actually happened that long ago.”
My jaw clenches again. I think about the summer of misery, the king of Vsenrog torching Marion’s fields, and the famine that sparked Marion’s revolt against Vsenrog. Blayne would probably say that’s all a myth too.
And then I remember something else about the Kingdom of the Fall.
“But,” I begin, trying to look confused, “about the Kingdom of the Fall? Didn’t they come back somehow? They were locked underground, and then they, uh, weren’t?”
For a moment, Blayne looks almost pleased. He carves a piece of roast, then chews thoughtfully.
“You’re right,” he says. “I did teach you about that. One of the human kingdoms, about a generation ago, decided to attack the dragons in the Iron Mountains.”
Blayne snorts like he personally could have told that kingdom what a stupid idea it is to launch a war against the dragons, and then he takes another bite. The room is silent, aside from the sound of Blayne chewing.
“The dragons used magic to defeat them,” Blayne finally says, waving his knife like he’s casting a spell. “Of course. And, somehow, whatever magic it was, it ripped a hole right in the middle of the Iron Mountains.”
He laughs. I shiver as screams rise once more in my memory.
I was right. Varitan’s magical attack, King Malrik’s weapon, it has been used before. It was used in the Iron Mountains on the other side of Vederill Pass.
Suddenly, I don’t feel hungry anymore.
“I doubt that’s what they intended, the dragons,” Blayne adds, talking around a mouthful of glazed carrots. “But the hole that spell created in the mountains, it was big enough to let the survivors from the Kingdom of the Fall crawl out of their prison.”
“So they really were trapped underground,” I say, almost to myself.
It’s not a myth or a metaphor. Somewhere on the other side of Vederill Pass, someone used magic and tore the earth apart. Someone like Varitan.
“Indeed,” Blayne replies. “And that’s why you don’t attack dragons.”
And you’ve just told me exactly what I wanted to know, you arrogant ass.
I bring my hand to my mouth to cover my smile.