Chapter Forty-One Ayleth
Chapter Forty-One
Ayleth
As soon as dawn breaks, Jacquetta is escorted outside to summon a raven.
Despite the early hour, most of the court is pressed together on the balconies or windows of the palace, eager to get a glimpse of the witch.
No fewer than seven guards cluster around her, each armed with iron weapons, as if Jacquetta were an ogre from one of Willa’s stories.
I stand at the back of the small party, my shadows ready to spring if Jacquetta decides to betray me.
But the other witch does as she’s instructed.
Head held high, she summons the bird and recites the words of the council’s carefully tailored message: She tells the Heirs that she can lure me to meet them.
That they can use me as a piece in their game.
It will work. Because it’s exactly what Jacquetta did to me the last time she came to the palace.
But the irony of the situation doesn’t give me the satisfaction I crave.
Instead, as I watch the raven sail away, Blodwyn’s words from last night slink through my mind:
You’re just going to throw her away? For a crown?
Jacquetta does not look at me once.
—
The covens’ answer arrives sooner than I expected.
The raven is spotted the following afternoon, carrying Selene’s response: she agrees to meet at an abandoned Sanctum about a day’s ride from the palace.
The court absorbs this news like one of the elaborate, spun-sugar desserts served at a feast. Nearly everyone is convinced that the witches’ capture signals the end of the war.
Weston is already planning a victory party.
I should be celebrating with them, if for no other reason than because, as Margaret has decided to use the witches in the final challenge, the trials are temporarily halted.
With any luck, they’ll never be reinstated.
And in a few days’ time, I’ll have the Heirs at the palace, kneeling before me at long last. I’ll have finally won.
Alone in my chambers, I lift the crown from its box and run my fingertips along the jagged facets of the Bloodstones.
Soon enough, these stones will hold the final dregs of the witches’ magic.
This realm will belong solely to Malum. My own power will be strong enough to send the lost princess back to her grave.
To be the queen the prophecy promised. The true queen.
Malum swells in my chest, as if in anticipation.
This is what I wanted. What I destroyed everything to achieve.
Then why I do feel so empty?
“Ayleth?”
My own name jolts me into the present. I put the crown back in its box as Fitz trots into the chamber, Joan following behind him. Damn everything. I’d been doing my best to avoid her since the throne room. Blodwyn as well. But I suppose I knew this was coming.
“So,” Joan begins coolly. “How long has Jacquetta been here?”
There’s no point in lying to her now.
“She was captured at the hunt,” I admit. “I was using her to help me dig up information about the duchess.”
Joan’s eyebrows lift, piecing this together. “So she’s the reason you said you had Margaret under control?”
“If you’ve come to chastise me, I won’t hear it,” I say, turning one of my rings. “You saw for yourself: Jacquetta schemed with Margaret behind my back. She intends to use the covens to destroy me.”
Joan is quiet for a moment. “Are you sure that’s what she wants?”
“Of course I am,” I scoff. “It’s the same thing she did when we served Queen Sybil.”
And I curse myself yet again for falling into her trap.
“From what I understand, when you served as maidens, Jacquetta had you arrested for being a witch,” Joan says. “Yesterday, she didn’t even hint at what you are.”
Her words carry an uncomfortable amount of truth. Joan is right. Jacquetta had multiple opportunities to reveal my identity—with Margaret, at the party. Even now, in the dungeons, she can say whatever she wants. Why hasn’t she?
It doesn’t matter, the shadows seem to whisper. She betrayed you.
“I’m done trying to guess her reasons,” I say, shrugging away Joan’s pesky logic. “We’re going to do things my way for once.”
“For once?” Joan laughs. “We’ve been doing things your way since all this started. Breaking the Veil. Taking the throne. Going to war.”
She counts the list off on her fingers and I bristle.
“It’s what you wanted, too,” I remind her. “We agreed that Riven needed to change. You said yourself—the covens are out of control. They have to be stopped.”
“I said that when I believed the covens sent that creature here,” Joan presses. “Somehow, I don’t think Jacquetta is responsible for that. Perhaps the others aren’t, either.”
Heat flames in my cheeks. I go to a sideboard and pour myself a glass of wine, then drain half of it in one gulp. “She’s responsible for the Mines.”
“Yes, and our army caused just as much chaos and destruction,” she returns. “How much longer is this going to continue?”
As long as it takes, that voice insists. Until they’re all dust.
“Jacquetta isn’t who you think she is,” I say, as much to myself as to Joan. “She—”
“I’m sure you both have very impressive wounds to display. But whatever happened in the past, I know you still care for her. You wouldn’t be this angry if you didn’t.”
“The way you cared for Anora?” I retort. “Did that make any difference in the end? She still left you.”
Joan flinches. Part of me recoils at my own cruelty, but I don’t take it back.
“Believe what you like,” she says softly. “But ask yourself: Is your victory really worth the price you will pay to achieve it?”
No. That wretched part of my heart aches. Not when it’s her.
“I will pay any price,” I answer in a hiss. “And if you can’t stomach that fact, then maybe you should leave court.”
Joan holds my gaze a long moment.
“I will, if that’s your wish,” she says. “But if you keep pushing people away, who’s going to be left? I’m your friend, Ayleth. So is Jacquetta. I hope you start to realize that.”
Her words twist like a blade inside me, but I refuse to acknowledge the pain.
“You hope too much.”
She shakes her head. “There’s no such thing as too much hope. It’s some of the most powerful magic there is. Like love.”
That feckless chamber of my heart pulses to life again.
I seal it off and turn my back on Joan. A moment later, she calls Fitz and they leave. I let them go, ignoring every instinct urging me to stop her. Because I don’t need anyone on my side. Not when I have the shadows.
“No such thing as too much hope.” A voice sing-songs. “Like love.”
I whirl around. Callen is waiting in the glass, his lips screwed into a sneer.
“By the Light, I cannot fathom why you keep her around. Absolutely no spine at all.”
Nettle bridles at the imprisoned king. And I wish now more than ever that I could smash this mirror into a thousand pieces.
“Well then, that’s something you have in common, isn’t it?”
“At least I had one to begin with,” he returns. “Love. Mark my words—once you start believing in that drivel, you’ll lose your throne faster than snuffing out a candle flame.”
He’s right, that voice agrees.
And in this moment, I’m not sure which of them I hate more.
“No need to worry about that,” I tell him. “I’m not going anywhere. In case you haven’t heard, the trials are suspended.”
“For now,” he drawls. “And my daughter doesn’t need a crown to call you what you are. She seemed upset with you earlier. How much longer do you think she’ll keep your secret?”
You will burn, Mother’s warning twines with the howl of the wind outside.
“Leave,” I bark at Callen.
“Very well,” he says, grinning. “But you’ll call me back. In fact, I suspect that you’ll wish you’d let me out of this prison when you had the chance. Your days are running thin, wife.”
This time, I do throw my glass. It shatters against the wall beside the mirror.
Nettle yowls and leaps away. Callen merely laughs.
His face vanishes into the darkness, but his words linger.
Much as I am loath to admit it, he’s right.
Even if I succeed in taking the Heirs’ power, Blodwyn still poses a problem.
Whatever friendship that started to re-form between us has clearly ended. But how can I…
One of my shadows snakes over to a drawer.
I follow it, pulling the handle to discover a small box inside. I lift it out and open the lid, revealing the runed blade nestled within the black satin lining: the knife I’d used to carve out Callen’s heart. The jewels embedded in its hilt glimmer and wink in the firelight.
The shadow winds itself around the blade and then up my wrist, raising gooseflesh on my skin.
I could use the knife again, I realize. Create another mirror.
Another servant. If Blodwyn were behind glass, I wouldn’t need to worry about her at all.
Still, taking Callen’s heart was one thing, but Blodwyn’s?
She’s just a girl. Friendless and afraid. Just like I used to be.
But I’m not that witch anymore, I remind myself. I shed her skin to become the queen I am today. The queen from the prophecy.
A beating heart must she drown. Those ancient words echo in my skull.
Maybe it’s right. If I’m going to keep my crown, my throne, I can never let that other witch, weak and wretched, rise from her grave. I trail my fingertips over the knife’s jeweled hilt, just able to glimpse my own reflection in the blade.
Fairest, the shadows whisper. Fairest of them all.