CHAPTER THIRTY-SEVEN
Titania and I talk about the gods’ vision. I will not allow it to come to pass, but I have to take measures just in case. She promises she’ll keep my promises, even if I can’t anymore.
“If you die,” she says, “I’ll travel. The galaxy is a vast place, and I haven’t seen the half of it. I’ll stay away from wars and battles. I’ll visit the gods. I’ll vanish into space and stars.”
“Sometimes I wish I could vanish into space and stars,” I tell her. “Maybe we can both go someday.”
“There are many, many beautiful places to see out there, Esmae,” she says. “There are worse things we could do.”
That night, Rama persuades Max, Sybilla, and me to go down to the fayre by the river. There are pockets of the Hundred and One already there, scattered throughout the crowd. There are ladders propped against rooftops so that people can climb up and enjoy the view. We find a spot on one of the rooftops. Below us, there’s music and puppets and spices on the air. Above, the Scarlet Nebula is especially vivid, the reds and golds sharp against the black of the void.
Kali is currently at 71 percent human capacity, says the ship’s electronic voice. Airflow and water pressure will be increased by 2 percent for the next two hours.
It’s a subtle shift—hardly noticeable—but the air feels crisper, cooler. I breathe it in.
Rama passes a bottle of Kali’s signature gooseberry wine around, then makes a disgusted face at me as if he can’t understand how this is what passes for a drink on this realm. I prop my chin on my knees and look out over Erys. It’s funny how the sight makes my heart twist in pain and with love. I hope I’ve been able to save this kingdom from the destruction of war.
Max’s hand traces circles on my knee. I smile at him, at the others beside us. Titania is safe, Lord Selwyn will leave Kali at the end of the week, and there are people here that I love. And all of that is good. I want to hold the good close.
“Is this what it feels like to be happy?” I ask.
“Yes,” says Max, but he looks more afraid than happy.
I turn back to the view and look at Winter. It’s pale and ghostly. “Did Rickard take the proposal to Alexi?”
“Yes,” Max says quietly.
“Alex hasn’t replied?”
“Not yet.”
Rama nudges me with his elbow. “Hey,” he says, “if the war isn’t stopped after all and I decide to fight in Kali’s armies, can I be wherever you are? It seems wise to hide behind the one with the blueflower jewel in her hair.”
“You’re a horrid creature. And no, you cannot be wherever I am. I’ve already told Max you’re not permitted in Kali’s armies.”
“Max!”
“Don’t Max me,” says Max, “I’m not getting involved in a spat between the two of you.”
“Why do you want to follow me around battlefields anyway?” I ask Rama. “You know combat requires actual movement and energy, don’t you? You can’t just sleep on a palanquin while others tote you around.”
Rama’s tone stays light, but his teeth seem far too tightly clenched. “I don’t want to let you out of my sight, Ez. Who knows what kind of trouble you’ll get yourself into?”
The rooftop has suddenly gone quiet. Out of the corner of my eye, I see that Max and Sybilla have stopped smiling. Don’t look like that, I want to tell them. Don’t be afraid for me. No one can hurt me.
I squeeze Rama’s arm. “I’ll tell you what,” I say. “I’m not letting you follow me onto battlefields, but I promise to take you on a trip into the stars with Titania in a couple of weeks.”
“You can’t promise that,” he says.
“I promise it anyway,” I say, brave and certain and happy, “And you know I always keep my promises.”
Except, of course, being certain doesn’t always last. It can change in the space of a breath.
Alexi sends his response to the proposal: Let’s talk. For our safety, we’ll only meet with Esmae and one other person.
The coordinates are those of the yellow weeping trees of Arcadia. Max decides he’ll go with me. The entire journey there, Titania grumbles about how there’s a serious dearth of sentient ships in the galaxy for her to make friends with. Max, most uncharacteristically, barely pays her any attention. I can feel tension radiating off him. He looks out at the stars, jaw clenched tight like he’s trying to force himself to remain quiet.
When I point this out to him, his only reply is, “This trip is a bad idea.”
“Don’t you want this war to end?”
He stares at me for a minute, then says, “I suppose I just expect the worst.” He tries to crack a smile. “Maybe my parents have rubbed off on me.”
Max has never been to Alexi’s Arcadia before, but he remembers it when it was just a cluster of towns and forests in Winter. “It looks like Kali now,” he says quietly. He ignores the farms on the edges and gazes, instead, at the heart of the city, at the spiky towers of the palace, the snowy forests, the almost fairy-tale look of the streets and rooftops. “He made his perfect city, and he made it look like Erys.”
“It creeps into your bones,” I say. “Kali does, I mean. It creeps in and becomes a part of you.”
“You’d make a good queen,” Max tells me.
That amuses me. “I doubt that. And far too many people would have to die for that to happen anyway.”
“You have a blueflower.” He touches it, tracing the outline in my hair. “You may be the only one of us to survive a war.”
“In which case, I will gladly take the opportunity to prove that I’d make a far better ruler than any of you,” I tease. “I’ll be Queen Esmae the Merciful. Queen Esmae the Just. Queen Esmae the Grand and Glorious. Queen—”
“I will crash into the nearest rock if I have to hear another word of that,” says Titania.
“What would be the point of that?” I ask. “You’re indestructible. Wouldn’t you just bounce off?”
Max grins, but it slips away much too quickly.
Titania lands in her usual spot in the woods. We climb out. Leaves crunch farther ahead, in the direction of the hot spring. Alexi and Bear are already here.
As Max and I approach, it’s obvious immediately that the atmosphere is all wrong. Alexi looks pale and strained. Bear looks miserable.
“Hello, Max,” Alexi says. Max just nods. He’s sensed the strain, too. His shoulders tense.
“You said you wanted to talk,” I say, confused.
“I do,” Alexi replies. “Just not about the proposal you sent.”
I don’t like his tone. “What’s the matter? I know it’s not ideal—”
“Not ideal,” he repeats incredulously. “Seriously? What have they done to your mind up there?”
“What—”
“You said you wanted me to win,” he says, quiet and intense. There’s a current of pain in his voice. “Our mother warned me, but I trusted you. I believed you. You said you’d help us. But it turns out you’re just as bad as the rest of them. A shared crown? You want me to forgive them for what they’ve done to me? What they took from me? You want me to share the crown with him?” He points at Max. “With my backstabbing uncle?”
“Alex,” I say softly, “you weren’t wrong to trust me. Of course I’m on your side. Max knows that. I want you home. I just don’t want any of us to pay the price of a war.”
“It’s a price we have to pay for justice,” he says.
I shake my head. “This is about avoiding thousands upon thousands of deaths.”
“I don’t want thousands upon thousands of deaths, Esmae! I will do every single thing in my power to avoid it, but I can’t avoid a war altogether. I won’t. Our lives were taken from us. Our futures were taken. I’m not going to just let that go.”
I look at Max, but there’s not even a hint of surprise on his face. He expected this. He knew all along that Alexi would never agree to my plan.
“Then why are we here?” I demand. “Why did you say you’d meet me? Why did you want me to bring someone with me?”
“So you’d have a witness,” Alexi says. “I have Bear, you have Max.”
“A witness? To what?”
Max swallows. “Don’t do this, Alex. Please.”
Alexi’s cheekbones flush red. “I don’t have a choice.”
“Alex—” Bear tries.
“Don’t what?” I ask.
Alexi looks me in the eye, and in the split second before he speaks, I suddenly understand what he’s about to say.
I challenge you to a duel.
And he does.
I can’t speak. I can’t breathe. Time winds back to Max, his eyes dark and furious. You don’t see, he said. It’s going to break your heart.
And it does. My heart breaks.
“Why?” I croak, eventually. “You said you wouldn’t do this.”
“I’m proposing a formal duel,” Alexi says softly. “Swords. Whoever draws first blood wins. If I win, you give me Titania.”
Max knew. He knew Alexi would feel betrayed the moment he found out I’d suggested the truce. Max knew what betrayal would make my brother do. I believed nothing in the world would make my brother put any part of the gods’ vision into play, but Max knew better. He knew Alexi better.
“How can you even suggest this?” The words burst from my lips. “How can you risk what Amba and Kirrin saw?”
“First blood,” he says more gently. “Just a scratch. I can’t trust you to fight for me, Esmae, but I love you and I would never let that vision play out. I just want the ship you took from me.”
“I didn’t take her from you. I won her. I was better than you.” Rage floods my body. “I don’t accept your terms. There will be no duel.”
“If you win, our mother will see you,” he says.
I stagger back. The betrayal is so painful that I bite the inside of my cheek and taste blood. “How could you? How could you take the thing you know I want most and use it against me?”
“I’m sorry. I have no other choice. I have to go home. I have to take back my crown.”
Max is right behind me, so close I can feel the rise and fall of his chest, the rush of his heartbeat. “Just say no, Esmae.”
But that’s the problem, isn’t it?
“I can’t,” I say softly. “I need to see her. I have to, or I’ll never be free.”
“You can choose to be free of her. You can choose to put her behind you. Facing her isn’t the only way to leave the memory of the baby in the boat behind.”
“If you’re worried about Titania, you needn’t be. I won’t lose her. I’ll win this duel.”
“It’s not Titania I’m worried about!”
I look up at him. “I will win, Max. You said you believe in me. Believe in me now.”
“Then you accept?” Alexi asks.
“I accept,” I say.
Then I turn and walk away, past the water and back into the yellow woods, faster and faster so that they never see the tears on my cheeks.