CHAPTER TWENTY-FOUR
My hands are clenched together. Titania grumbles about the trauma of being forced to fly in the rain. We’re about to land in Blackforest, the capital city of Winter.
The invitation to Princess Katya’s wedding came months ago, but the first I heard of it was when Max asked me if I wanted to go with him yesterday.
“Alex and Bear will be there,” he said to me. The look in his eyes made me wonder if he knew just how badly I wanted to see my brothers again.
There was no way in the whole, wide universe that I could pass up such an opportunity.
Now I’m here, and all I can think of is the look on Alexi’s face when I won Titania. Suddenly, I wish I’d stayed on Kali like Elvar and Guinne, who never leave Kali for any reason.
“I have suffered a great many indignities in my time,” Titania informs us. “No words can do justice to the atrocities I have endured. Yet this is, by far, the worst horror to befall me. What kind of demonic activity is this?”
Having only ever flown across spaceship kingdoms and through deep space, Titania has never encountered rain before now. She’s not happy.
“I think it’s beautiful,” I say.
“I liked you until you said those words,” says Titania bitterly.
Behind me, Sybilla is nearly doubled over in fits of laughter. She’s come with us under duress, reluctant to let us go without extra protection, yet simultaneously irked because she despises celebrations. Funerals, she claims, are more to her taste.
I watch Blackforest draw nearer. Like most of Winter, it’s a cold place, with powdery snow dusted across the rooftops and between the cracks of the streets’ paving stones. It’s a densely packed, rocky city of harsh lines and grim cathedrals, lovely in a bleak, gray, cold way, but I prefer Kali’s austere, whimsical beauty.
The dock is a set of numbered holes punched into a cliff face. Beyond the dock, I can see King Ralf’s palace, a pyramid of snowy gray stone with a tower at each of its four corners. A blue wedding flag waves from the top of each tower.
I look past the city, past the snow and the forests and valleys. Alexi’s city is somewhere in that direction.
“Look at them cower,” Titania crows, tugging my attention back to the dock.
This is an exaggeration. Blackforest’s sentries are wary as they watch the unbeatable warship descend, but they aren’t exactly trembling in their boots.
I reluctantly abandon the luxury of bare feet and put on the heeled slippers Guinne’s seamstress thrust at me when she gave me my dress. “Only tall heels for you, I’m afraid,” she’d said. “You’re small, for a start. More importantly, the size of the heels will allow you to fit a tiny dagger in each one.”
“Why would I need to hide knives in my shoes?” I’d demanded.
“One can never be too cautious,” had been her enormously comforting reply.
Titania swoops out of the rain. Her main doors hiss open as she comes to a stop. “Good luck,” she says a little sadly.
Max pats the console. “I’m sorry you can’t come.”
“Hmph.”
“Could someone remind me of what our story is today?” Sybilla asks, picking up her array of extremely impressive weapons.
I frown. “Story?”
“Story,” she repeats. “Lovers? Or just Elvar’s son and niece?”
“Don’t,” Max warns.
I’m still confused. “What are you talking about?”
“Ah.” Sybilla looks like she has well and truly put her foot in it. “So you don’t know what people are saying.”
“How can she not?” Titania demands. “Even I know! Is it not true?”
“Is what not true?”
“Have you put filters in your tech to make sure you don’t get any news stories about yourself?” asks Sybilla.
“Of course I have. Why would I want daily updates on what people are saying about me?”
“People want to know why you competed for Titania against your own brother and then took her to Kali,” says Max.
Realization hits. “And naturally, the conclusion they’ve come to is that you and I must be—”
“Yes.”
My face grows hot. “I’m a princess of Kali,” I say bitterly, “I’m one of the finest archers alive today. I won the greatest warship in the world. I saved the life of a prince of Wychstar when I was twelve years old. And all they care about is who I may or may not be sharing a bed with?”
“To be fair,” says Sybilla, “they may not know the part about you saving a prince’s life.” Max growls at her. She shrugs sheepishly. “Did you really?”
“I knew that, too,” Titania says. “Rama told me himself the day you left Wychstar. He said, ‘Take good care of her, Titania. She’s as much my family as my brother and sisters. She once saved my life and she’s made me laugh every single day I’ve known her. Don’t let me lose her.’ I’ve always been fond of Rama. I promised him I would do whatever I could to ensure that he did not lose you.”
The memory of Amba’s vision rises again before I can stop it: A duel. A broken arrow. Blood on the grass. Poor Rama, destined to lose me after all.
No, I can’t think like that. I swore that wouldn’t happen. I won’t die that way.
I squeeze my eyes shut, then open them. “We’re going to be late.”
Max doesn’t question my abrupt change in tone, but something in his narrowed eyes tells me he knows there’s more going on here than I’ve told them.
My knees wobble as I step onto the solid ground outside Titania. I never get over this, how still the ground is. You don’t appreciate how much a spaceship kingdom moves until you’re not on one anymore; you don’t appreciate how much your body has adapted the way it moves to accommodate such an existence. Here, there’s no constant, almost imperceptible hum beneath my feet, no gentle tilt when the ship shifts a fraction, and there’s certainly not likely to be a rock assault. My feet don’t need to prepare to compensate for those movements. The sensation is alien to me.
So is the feeling of natural sunlight directly on my skin. It feels crisper and harsher than the softer, carefully filtered light of the sun and moon lamps on Kali and Wychstar. I blink at the bluish white clouds, breathe in raw air. I find it hard to believe that millions of people live their lives completely grounded. I can’t fathom a life away from the sky.
Airchariots wait outside the dock for the guests, suspended a foot off the ground. I climb into one, along with Max and Sybilla. Max is quiet as always, but Sybilla is completely unfazed by the sensations of solid ground and natural sun. She probably still misses them, even after six years on Kali.
We join a stream of other chariots drawing up outside the enormous palace doors as guests from all over the star system make their way inside. There’s a procession of gowns and dresses, dark formal jackets and ties, robes and saris, guests and guards and servants.
We get more than our fair share of attention, an unfortunate side effect of being a thief prince and the girl who won the greatest warship of all time. A lot of it isn’t friendly. I keep my eyes open, watching how people react to Max. The royals from Tamini don’t look pleased to see us, no surprise as we already know whose side they’ve chosen. King Ralf’s polite but cool manner seems to reinforce the war council’s view that he and Winter are inclined the same way. On the other end of the courtesy spectrum are King Darshan and his older son Rodi, who are too far away to speak with but who smile at me across an enormous wedding hall lit by blue glass windows and an arched glass roof etched with crystals of ice.
I can’t calm myself. There are so many guests that it’s impossible to search the crowd during the actual ceremony, but after the birds have been let loose and the horn has blown the wedding call and the princess and her new husband have been blessed with fresh snow, the guests disperse into the banquet hall for the feast. Movement is freer and flows more quickly here, so it’s easier to pick out faces.
I don’t know if I’m more afraid that I’ll see him, or more afraid that I won’t.
“Princess Alexa,” says a voice beside me.
“That’s Princess Esmae, thank you very much,” Sybilla snaps.
“This is Rama’s brother,” I tell her, “Rodi, Crown Prince of Wychstar.”
“Oh,” she says but is only a little mollified. “Nevertheless, sir, you will address the princess by the name she now officially uses.”
Rodi grins. “I’m so very sorry, my lady.”
“Lady?” she snorts, then remembers to be polite. “You may call me Sybilla, Prince Rodi.”
He shakes her outstretched hand, smiles at her, is surprised when she appears utterly unmoved by his smile, and then searches the room for Max, who is about ten feet away talking with a young couple from Sting. Rodi turns back to me. “My brother,” he says, “who I need hardly add felt unequal to the strenuous task of making the journey, sends his love. And how are you?”
“Overwhelmed,” I tell him frankly.
“I don’t blame you. We miss you on Wychstar, you know. Come and visit soon.” He catches his father’s eye from across the room. “I’ll leave you to it. It’s been good to see you, Esmae.”
He leans down to kiss me on the cheek. At least, I think that’s why he leans down, but as his mouth brushes my cheek, he whispers, “Rama asked me to tell you Skylark should be safe now.”
I freeze. “Really?”
“A ship came close in what we think was an attempt to assess the defenses,” he says, as quickly and quietly as he can. “It disappeared when the pilot saw that some of Wychstar’s ships were present in those defenses. If they didn’t know Father would extend his protection to Princess Shay before, they do now. Thank you.”
And then he’s gone. I turn back to Sybilla. She’s giving me a wry look. “Is that a Wych custom? Kisses on cheeks that take all day?”
“He wasn’t kissing me the whole time.”
“Oh, I know,” she says. “I could see you both whispering. Don’t worry, I won’t tell.”
“Why not? What if I were plotting against Max?”
She laughs so hard that tears actually fill her eyes. “I wish you would. I’d like to see that.” She wipes her cheeks. “Max can take care of himself. As long as no one tries to murder him on my watch, I’m not worried about anyone plotting against him. And while we’re on that subject,” she says with a wicked grin, “I’m not convinced it’s polite to be cozying up to other princes when your lover is only a few paces away.”
“You’re a real thorn in my side, you know that?”
Max walks back toward us. “What’s so funny?”
We just giggle harder.
And then I see Alexi, and my laughter sputters into silence.
He’s just a boy. I’ve never looked at him that way before, but that’s what I see now. A boy with a heavy, invisible crown on his head and a golden bow on his back, almost lost in a sea of faces.
Max’s shoulders tense as he sees him, too. There’s a heartbeat of stillness, in which no one seems to know what to do, and then Alexi moves our way. Sybilla’s hands twitch at her sides.
Alexi ignores Max completely, addressing only me. “May I have a word, Esmae? Alone?”
I blink. Behind him, Bear gives me a quick, shy smile, while General Saka scowls. She’s not the only one; glaring at Alexi like she suspects him of some nefarious scheme, Sybilla opens her mouth to argue, but Max gives a small shake of his head and she clamps her mouth shut again.
My heart begins to race. It won’t go down well with Elvar and Guinne when they find out I spoke to Alexi alone, and Lord Selwyn certainly will talk about it for months, yet I can’t pass up this opportunity. I don’t know what Alexi wants, and I have no idea if he’ll ever forgive me for what he thinks I’ve done, but this is finally my chance to tell him the truth.
“Where would you like to speak?” I ask.
He gestures to a doorway at the end of the room. I follow.