Rielle laughed a little and found the strength to stand.

Thank you, Lu, she said. I needed that.

I know. Then more quietly, accompanied by a gentle press of tender feeling: Please don’t worry for me. The pain of my scar is one I gladly bear.

Rielle stood, bowed her head to the queen, and then turned to face the room at large.

Give me time, Lu, Rielle said firmly. Soon your pain will flee from me in terror.

Then she began to speak. “Queen Obritsa. Grand Magisters. People of Kirvaya. Thank you for your generosity in hosting myself, my prince, and my Celdarian family.” She hesitated, then extended her hand to Audric. He took it and rose to his feet. She hated making speeches. She silently pleaded with him to find the words that she could not.

Of course, he understood at once.

“We know that these times seem unnerving,” he said, his rich voice easily filling the room, “that dark whispers and black rumors shadow your streets, just as they do at home in Celdaria. But we are not afraid of the days to come, whatever they may hold. Your new queen is one of vigor and energy, with a lifetime of work and achievement ahead of her.”

Starry-eyed and rapt, Queen Obritsa sat up a bit taller in her too-large chair.

“We have recently rekindled a friendship between our nation and the kingdom of Borsvall,” Audric continued. “There is much work yet to be done to rebuild that friendship, but in my view, it is work of great promise, and it will mean that your neighbor to the west will be stronger, steadier, and more able to come to your aid if the need should arise. Across the entire northern span of this great continent—from Celdaria, to Borsvall, to here in Kirvaya—there will stand a united region of friendship, strong enough to weather any storm. And, of course, we now have our Sun Queen.”

Audric looked at Rielle, the adoration on his face so unabashed she would have felt embarrassed if she weren’t so pleased to see it. “I know you have all heard of her great deeds—first in Celdaria and more recently in the Borsvall capital. And that is only the beginning of her power. Every day, she grows stronger. Every day,” he said, his voice softening, “I love her more deeply than I did the day before.”

The room murmured, waves of delight and curiosity rippling throughout, and Rielle’s cheeks warmed to hear it. She would forever remember the sight of Audric in this moment—lit by the candles flanking their dinner plates; his clean, square jaw freshly shaven; the steady, solid presence of him at her side a tangible force, physical and gentle and hers.

Audric turned back to face those gathered in the hall. “We are not afraid. We look to the future with clear eyes, and we urge you to join us in this—to hold hope in your own hearts and to come together in the face of uncertainty, rather than allow it to fracture us.”

Rielle beamed up at him, a quiet pride kindling in her chest at the sound of his voice—so similar to the one that murmured endearments against her skin every night, and yet so different, so poised and practiced. The voice of a king. Was it possible to love a person so completely? Could one’s heart literally split open under the weight of such feeling? She would have grabbed his coat and kissed him right there in front of everyone if Ludivine weren’t insistently poking at her thoughts, begging her to restrain herself.

Instead Rielle turned away from him, lifted her hands to the ceiling, and summoned to her palms all the fire lighting the hall.

Thousands of tiny flames rushed to her, accompanied by gasps and cries from the crowd. She stood, arms outstretched, a skull-sized knot of fire in each hand. She held them there for a moment, the flames quivering and eager, and marveled at the ease of her own power. Her mind felt supple, energized. She felt that she could have run all the way home to Celdaria without breaking a sweat. She could have slammed her palms to the ground and shattered mountains on the other side of the world.

Instead, she exhaled slowly and pushed her palms out as if to nudge open a set of doors.

The fire rushed out from her fingers, silent and spinning, a thousand tiny kernels of light rather than the pointed flames of their previous lives. Fire stars, winking amber. Rielle held her breath, her eyes unfocused. She saw nothing but vague, dark shapes—the tables, the crowd, the tapestries hugging the walls—and connecting it all, a thin, shimmering expanse of gold.

How marvelous, how strange and spectacular, to remember that this beauty of the naked empirium was hers alone to see.

She sighed with pleasure, then flicked her fingers once more.

The fire froze in the air—across the tables, above the feathered heads of the nobility, throughout the room from floor to ceiling—each glittering grain held suspended by Rielle’s will.

She barely heard their cheers, their astonished applause, and only at last acknowledged Queen Obritsa because Ludivine urged her to. The girl was beside herself, nearly weeping with enthusiasm. She even embraced Rielle before her horrified guard pulled her gently away.

Rielle spared a thought of pity for her, and for all of them—their blindness, their ignorance and inability. She gazed at the beauty of her own creation and tried to imagine what she must seem like to their eyes. An inhuman creature, perhaps; something indecipherable and colossal.

Something closer to God than they could ever hope to be.

19

   Eliana

“And when the horn of Veersa sounds,

Rise, my neighbors, my family, my friends.

Rise against the tide of malice;

Stand firm on the soil of your homeland.”

—“The Battle Cry of Lady Veersa,” traditional Astavari war hymn

The doors to Navi’s rooms slammed open, the Horn of Veersa’s long, low wails so deafening that Eliana felt their hum in her teeth. Her hand flew to Arabeth.

“What will we do?” she asked. “How far away is the Kaavalan Passage?”

Four royal guards entered the room and began helping Navi to her feet.

“Don’t worry,” she told Eliana, moving stiffly. “The mouth of the passage is over one hundred miles away. We have time to prepare a counterattack.”

Leaning on one of her guards for support, she tugged on trousers, boots, a tunic and sweater, and a long coat. She tightened the sash, then grabbed two knives from a drawer in her bedside table and shoved them into sheaths at her belt.

Despite everything, Eliana smiled a little. “You’d never know you were lying here half alive only a few days ago, slowly transforming into a monster.”

Navi shot her a wry look. “You’re going to anger my guards, Eliana.” She glanced at one of the guards in question, a broad-shouldered woman with a square jaw and freckled skin. “Ruusa, you may have to carry me downstairs.”

Ruusa nodded once. “I will carry you to the edge of the world, Your Highness.”