CHAPTER TWELVE
A bell sounds for dinner. When I open my door, Sybilla is there, her hand up as though she’d been about to knock.
“Good, you’re ready,” she says.
I’m not put off by her brusqueness. “Sorry,” I reply, aware that someone who handles palace security can’t possibly have much spare time. “I didn’t know they’d ask you to escort me—”
“It’s not a problem. I’m coming to dinner, too. Even if I weren’t, part of my job is to keep you safe, and that will probably be easiest if I stay close. I suppose that sounds absurd to you. After all, you’re you. You could probably protect me if we found ourselves in a pickle.”
“Do I need protection?” I ask. It’s not exactly a surprise. “Does someone not want me here?”
Sybilla gives a shrug. “No one is universally popular,” she says before pointing to the left. “The family banquet room is this way, Princess.”
“Esmae.”
“Princess.”
“I’ll break you eventually,” I mutter.
She doesn’t reply, but I spot the briefest hint of a smile.
Family mealtimes appear to be lavish affairs. The table is strewn with dishes, roasted roots and steamed fish with lime and chilies, peppered crab and lamb skewers in the Wychsmoked style, buttered beans and spicy lamb stew and fluffy white rice topped with feathers of steam. A gorgeous dessert selection of berries in chocolate and rich plum cakes and gooseberry tarts has been drenched in honey and wine.
My eyes pop. I think of the little ones at the Wych children’s sanctuary, and my chest tightens with guilt; I’m here while they’ll never have a feast like this.
The king, queen and Rickard are already in the room, along with a sleek, wiry man probably in his forties.
“Who is he?” I whisper to Sybilla.
“The queen’s brother, Lord Selwyn.” There’s thinly veiled dislike in her tone. “He’s on the war council. He’s very close to the king and queen.”
When we’re introduced, Lord Selwyn’s voice is like warmed honey, but I don’t trust it. It takes me a minute to work out why. It’s not just the hostility in his eyes or the fact that his is exactly the kind of slimy friendliness I had been prepared for; it’s the way he shifts when the king shifts, moves when he moves, folds himself into the spaces closest to him like a shadow. It’s not protective, it’s possessive.
I move away from him and count the number of places set at the table. Max isn’t here yet, but there’s also one other person missing. Someone offers me spiced wine and I grip my glass tight, too uneasy to relax, and I notice that Sybilla keeps shifting from foot to foot like she wishes she were anywhere but here. It’s this shared discomfort, perhaps, that sees us edge closer and closer together until we’re tucked in a corner next to one of the guards.
He’s scarcely more than a boy, this guard. He has bright brown eyes, and beigey gold skin, and he starts to chatter as soon as we get close to him. Sybilla allows it. His name is Jemsy. He’s eighteen and he’s under Sybilla’s command, as are his younger brother, Henry, and their even younger sister, Juniper.
Jemsy elbows Sybilla in the ribs, and she glances around the room to make sure no one’s watching before jabbing him back. “I’m surprised you’re here, Sybs,” he says. I’m amazed that anyone is allowed to get away with calling her Sybs, and the ferocious look on her face suggests she’d quite like to punch him, but she refrains. Jemsy turns to me. “Sybilla has been invited to family dinners for years, but I can count on one hand the number she’s actually come to.”
“Why not?” I ask.
“She’s not one for social niceties,” says Jemsy, earning another jab in the ribs.
A plate of lamb skewers appears before us. I reach for one, and the scent—the combination of succulent lamb and smoky, peppery ovens—takes me abruptly back to Wychstar. The sensation is bittersweet. It’s not just about the loss of specific things, like Rama’s lazy grin and the feel of the coarse dish soap at the children’s sanctuary and the rumble of the elevators skating up and down their shafts; it’s the loss of the known. Wychstar was predictable, the days carved into a pattern I could foresee. It was order and symmetry. Kali—disciplined, steely Kali—may as well be chaos, the numbers all askew, every variable an unknown.
Sybilla and Jemsy are still talking. When they mention the Hundred and One, I take the opportunity to ask about it.
“Who are the Hundred and One?”
“Max’s force.” Jemsy beams with so much pride, it’s hard not to smile back. “Handpicked warriors, the best and brightest of the younger generation.”
“Stop boasting,” Sybilla snaps. “We have a long way to go. The faction is quite new; we’ve only been training for five years.”
“We’ll be at the heart of the fleet if Kali goes to war,” Jemsy adds. “In the meantime, we train, we double up as guards and protectors, and we assist the sentries out by the shields.” His eyes widen with sudden excitement. “You could join us, Princess! We could become the Hundred and Two.”
I try not to look appalled at the idea of fighting for Elvar. “Thank you, but I don’t think I’d be of any use to you.”
“What?” He’s incredulous. “How could you not be? You were one of Rickard’s students! None of us have ever had even a single lesson with him, not even the prince—”
Sybilla’s annoyed now. “Stop it. She didn’t come here to be pestered.”
Jemsy’s words niggle at me. They make me think unexpectedly of a small boy in a palace, a thief prince years before he did anything wrong, and how he must have felt watching Alexi and Bear go off to learn from Rickard while he was excluded. What had Max said to me? I know what it is to feel like you’re never going to be enough. And then later, you of all people know how it feels to spend your life watching someone else get everything while you get nothing.
A heartbeat, and then it’s gone, the unhappy vision blinked away, the unwelcome feeling of kinship erased.
The guard at the other end of the room clears his throat. Jemsy gives us a quick, sheepish grin and returns to his spot in the corner.
“I’m not one of Rickard’s students anymore,” I tell Sybilla. “I know he must still go see Alexi and Bear to continue their lessons, but he hasn’t come to see me in nearly two years.”
“He does still visit them. Twice a week. Why doesn’t he do the same for you?”
“I wasn’t a suitable student,” is all I feel able to say. She stares at me but doesn’t push. I almost laugh. I envisioned Max as an envious child, but I’m just as full of envy. I’d give almost anything to be one of Rickard’s students again.
When the silence between us stretches uncomfortably long, I ask, “Do the Hundred and One really have to be at the heart of a war? Aren’t there more experienced factions already prepared for battle?”
“Yes, but their numbers aren’t what the king would like them to be. The queen first suggested the fleets needed new blood. A lot of the older soldiers have either retired, or are too old to be of any use in the field should we go to war, or—”
She stops abruptly, looking uncomfortable.
I frown. “Or?”
“Or,” Max says from behind me, “they left to join Alexi.”
“Oh.”
“Leila Saka, for example. She was once one of our best, but she’s your mother’s oldest friend and she chose their side over ours.” He smiles slightly, ruefully. “Rickard was your brothers’ teacher, but who do you think was mine?”
“You were taught by General Saka?”
“Yes.”
They barely even looked at each other on Wychstar; I never would have thought they’d once been close. I can’t imagine how much hurt and anger and betrayal must have lurked under their silence. A teacher and her student, each betrayed by the other, standing on opposite sides.
A movement to Max’s left catches my eye, and I look over to see that an elderly lady had entered the room with him. Elvar goes to greet her. She’s older than almost anyone I’ve ever seen, small and bent like a hook, leaning heavily on her stick. Her eyes flash blue, sharp, and clever.
Max notices where my attention has gone. “I promised Grandmother I’d escort her to dinner.”
“I didn’t know you had any surviving grandparents.”
“I don’t. She’s my great-grandmother. And yours, as it happens. Everyone here calls her Grandmother.”
I look at the old lady with renewed interest. We have only one great-grandparent left, Elvar’s grandmother Cassela. My father was named after her. She was Queen Consort to the King of Kali until he died. Her eldest child was my grandmother, Queen Vanya.
The old woman turns then and her eyes settle on my face. Something in her expression sends a shiver down my spine. I take a step back and my back collides with Max’s chest.
He steadies me. “What’s the matter?”
Instinct tells me to flee, but it’s too late. I find myself trying to back away even more, but there’s only so far I can go with Max right behind me.
“So this is the girl. The one Kyra tried to get rid of.” The old queen’s voice is loud and pointy, like the end of a sword, and it makes everyone turn in our direction.
“Let’s not talk about that tonight, Cassela,” Rickard says. It sounds more like a command than a request.
She flaps one of her gnarled hands to silence him, then takes one of mine between both of her own. “I’m sorry,” she says curtly. “You were an innocent and did not deserve to be punished by the curse. I didn’t expect Kyra to try to rid herself of you, but I should have. It’s always the way, isn’t it? They say the god Ness was told his child would one day kill him, so he tried to swallow all his children to prevent the prophecy from coming true, and consequently forced his daughter to fight back. His desperate quest to sidestep the prophecy made it come to pass, just as your mother tried to sidestep her curse and has only ended up setting you against her. I’m not sorry for any pain she has known, but you did not deserve to bear the brunt of it.”
“Grandmother.” Elvar finally finds a space to interrupt. “What are you talking about?”
She tuts, like the answer should be obvious. “It was I who cursed Kyra, of course. I am the reason she sent this child away.”
“You? Why would you do such a thing?”
“Why wouldn’t I?” she says. “She killed my daughter.”