As they pulled away, the door to the office banged open, and they all jumped apart.
“Rhea!” an old man yelled, walking into the room with his eyes closed and hands covering his temples. He was incredibly tall with a great white beard and unkempt long white hair. “Have you seen that last sketch I made? And the fandangled thing? I used it last time. Where is it?”
Cyrene stared with her mouth agape. She had no idea in the slightest what he was talking about.
And Cyrene was slightly shocked by the man’s appearance. His clothes were as disheveled as his house. He wore a long brown tunic, reaching nearly to his knees, that was threadbare at the hem and across the seams. He looked like he needed a good scrub down before he would ever be fit to be seen by the public.
“I left the sketch on your desk,” Rhea told him with a smile. “In the center, on top of your latest concept art.”
“What an odd place to leave something!” He turned in a circle, looking up at the ceiling. “What if I needed to find it?”
“That’s what I’m here for, sir,” she told him with humor in her voice.
Suddenly, Master Barca stopped mid-spin, facing the door, and craned his neck around. “Rhea,” he said softly, his madness seemingly dissipating, “you didn’t tell me that we had visitors.”
“My apologies,” she said with her ever-present easy smile. “This is my friend Cyrene. We grew up together in Byern before I moved here. And these are her two friends, Maelia and Ahlvie. They’ve just arrived on the procession with King Edric and the rest of the court.”
“Affiliates and a High Order, I see.”
“Yes, sir,” Rhea said firmly.
Cyrene recognized that tone loud and clear. She wanted to giggle because Rhea had used that exact tone with her on one too many occasions. It meant that you should hold your tongue before you got yourself in trouble. Cyrene didn’t usually listen, and it didn’t look like her Receiver was about to either.
“Well”—he turned in another circle, as if he already forgot what he was thinking earlier—“let’s go then. There’s much to do.”
He barreled out of the room in much the same manner in which he had entered it. Cyrene, Maelia, and Ahlvie stared after his retreating figure.
Rhea, however, had already hopped out of her seat. When she noticed they weren’t coming with her, she stopped and turned back around. “Come on then.”
They scurried out of their chairs and followed Rhea’s hasty steps to keep up with her Receiver.
Muttering to himself, Master Barca led them back through the cluttered ballroom. He turned down a long hallway that was completely blank and then into another courtyard. Row after row of perfectly aligned wooden racks lined the interior of the enclosure.
“Bursts,” Ahlvie murmured softly in awe.
The inventor stared off into the clear night sky for a few minutes. When he pulled his gaze away, he looked at Rhea, but his eyes were distance, as if seeing through her to a different time or a different place.
“The King commissioned that lot,” he said, pointing to a group covered in a corner.
They all just stared at him.
“You’re here for them, aren’t you?” he asked.
“Yes,” Cyrene responded immediately, having no clue how to transport them but not seeing any other option on how to get them into the castle.
“You’ll have to come back tomorrow for the rest. I don’t even remember sending word about the first lot.”
“I sent word, sir,” Rhea jumped in. “I told you earlier today.”
“Did you?” he asked absentmindedly.
“You’ve been busy replicating that explosion you created.” She tsked him like a child. “You’ve forgotten all about it, like the sketch I left on your desk.”
“Yes! It is on my desk. Rhea, girl, I know what it is!” He jumped, grabbed a candle off of the wall, and moved to the first Burst on a row.
“Sir, is it really necessary right now? Think about the Veda.”
“Oh, let them complain,” he said, suddenly lucid and vigilant. As he began to work, his madness fell off of him like a snake shedding his skin, and he immersed himself in whatever he was doing.
No one else moved an inch.
He expectantly reached his hand out to Rhea. She sighed and brought her lantern out to him. He extracted the candle out from the container and touched the flame to a cord at the end.
“Back up!” He jogged awkwardly to the overhang near the door.
They followed behind him and pressed their bodies against the wall.
Cyrene’s heart raced. She had never seen one this close, and it had been quite a while since she’d seen the last one. In fact, she couldn’t remember the previous time. It was possibly the Eos holiday two years ago.
They braced themselves, smiles growing on their faces as the speck of light traveled farther up the cord. The little piece of paper erupted, shooting out of its holster in the rack and up into the night sky. Cyrene pushed off the wall and stood in the open courtyard.
Then, it happened. With a loud bang, the sky exploded into a million bright red stars that rained down all around them. Cyrene lifted her hands, hoping to catch a star as it fell toward them. But like every other time she had seen them, the color of the Burst disappeared right before touching the ground, leaving the night sky with a smoky haze where such beauty had been before.
So, it wasn’t magic. He had simply lit a cord, and the Burst had come alive in the sky, like the fire worked its own magic.
She sighed, slightly relieved that she had been right.
“Argh!” Master Barca pulled roughly on his beard. “It didn’t work!”
They all stared at him like he was the raving lunatic that he was. Of course, it had worked! It was gorgeous and had lit up the entire night sky.
He cried out a few more times, striding over to where he had lit the Burst and angrily fiddled with the cord.
Rhea shrugged, as if this were completely commonplace. “Come on. Let’s get Rouster, so he can help you transport these.”
When they turned around to leave the inventor to his business, they found someone walking through the back door anxiously.
“I heard the commotion,” the older man from the stable yard said.
“It’s fine, Rouster,” Rhea told him. “He’s messing with the Bursts again, trying to recreate that same explosion.”
“That’s normal, Miss Rhea,” he said, pushing a piece of paper into her hands. “But the Royal Guard going from house to house, asking for a woman similar in appearance to a woman we have in our quarters, is not.”
“The Guard!” Rhea squeaked.
“It says here that Affiliate Cyrene went missing some hours ago. The city is in an uproar, looking for her. The note is signed by both Dremylon brothers. I’ve never seen anything like it,” he admitted shakily.
Royal Guard. City in an uproar. Both Dremylon brothers. Cyrene felt faint. They were out searching for her? Both of them? If all had gone right, she would have been far out of the harbor by now.
She finally found her voice. “I am Affiliate Cyrene. I believe it’s time for me to return to the castle.” She pushed her shoulders back, accepting whatever might come next.
Rhea grabbed her hand. “If they ask, you were here the whole time. I’ll swear to it. Don’t do anything rash.”
Her warning rang in Cyrene’s head loud and clear.
Cyrene turned to Maelia. “Stay here and find your own way back. I don’t want to raise suspicion.”
Maelia nodded, looking sick to her stomach, while Ahlvie stood stoically with his arms crossed.
Two Royal Guard sat on top of enormous black horses when she exited the house. “Are you the Affiliate we seek?”
“Yes. Allow me to get my horse, and I’ll come with you.” She put on the Affiliate mask that she wore around the castle so aptly. It was a demeanor that few argued with.
She walked with Rouster into the stables and swiftly untied her bag from Ceffy. It would draw unwanted attention. As much as it made her uneasy to leave the book, she moved her bag over to Astral opposite of Maelia’s belongings. She trusted Maelia to get it back to her.
Rouster helped her onto Ceffy’s back, and a guard directed her to walk her horse between them. How deep am I in trouble with the royalty for them to fear me so much that the Royal Guard would treat me like a prisoner, forcing me to walk down the street between them?
She hadn’t realized earlier how close Master Barca’s house was to the castle. Her stomach was in knots, and she was straining for composure.
Crossing the drawbridge felt like a death sentence when she saw the number of Royal Guard walking around the circular open courtyard and others stationed at every entrance. How many had they sent out after me?
The two guards jumped from their horses and walked with her toward the giant pearl doors. They must want to claim their prize for finding the fugitive.
The entranceway was eerily quiet for the amount of activity going on outside. She passed through the foyer, and the two guard stationed at the entrance to the royal throne room opened the door for them. She took a deep breath and walked into the exquisite room, ready to face whatever was coming for her.
Despite the hour, many stood around the thrones. Edric sat in his throne, his hand pressed to his head. Kaliana and Daufina were on either side of him. Kaliana looked triumphant. Duke Halston’s arm was slung across the shoulders of his sobbing pregnant wife, who was huddled in an uncomfortable position on her own smaller throne. Finally, her gaze located the one person she hadn’t wanted to see in the room, and he was the first to notice her.
Her breath caught at the mixture of emotions in Kael’s stormy eyes. Anger was the most prominent, but happiness, desire, and revenge passed across his face in nearly the same instant. As he started toward her, all eyes turned and found her standing in the room. She saw the next few seconds through slow motion.
Kael continued forward until he was standing in front of her. His hand brushed her shoulder as if to make sure that she was real. Edric arrived a second later, nearly knocking his brother out of the way, his soft hands replacing Kael’s rough ones. Her eyes locked with Edric’s, and all the worry about the deaths being associated with her and the thought of leaving him behind hit her full-on. In that moment, all she wanted to do was sink into his arms and kiss him.
Then, the commotion happened all at once, and the silence turned into deafening confusion. Everyone spoke, and she wasn’t sure which question to answer first. In fact, most of the questions didn’t even make sense, and she couldn’t process them with so much being thrown at her. All she knew was that it sounded like they had been worried about her, not angry. And she couldn’t fathom it.
Finally, Edric pulled rank and quieted the lot of them, dropping his hands from her shoulders. “Where have you been?”
She raised her chin, regaining her regal composure. “At Master Barca’s residence, retrieving a shipment of Bursts.”
“What?” Edric cried.
At the same time, Kael yelled, “Really?”
They looked at each other and then back at Cyrene.
Daufina intercepted the two men and stood next to Cyrene. “What I think they mean to ask is, why would you do such a thing?”
“I received a letter instructing me to do so,” she stated simply.
“And where is this letter?” Kaliana asked haughtily. She hadn’t moved from the throne and was staring at Cyrene as frosty as the ice queen she was.
“I believe I left it at Master Barca’s where your guard retrieved me, Your Highness.” She smiled as sweet as possible at the woman who wanted her gone.
“Well, thank the Creator, you’re all right,” Daufina said. “We were all worried about your safety.”
Cyrene tried to hide the surprise from her face, but she clearly wasn’t successful.
“Why would you go out into the city like that?” Kael demanded. “You’ve given us quite a headache.” He rubbed his temple.
She stood her ground at his insinuation and reminder. She couldn’t break in front of everyone else. It didn’t seem as if he had told anyone, and she wasn’t about to.
But why hadn’t he told them? And what price would it come at?
“I didn’t intend to give anyone a headache. I was simply following orders and my duty as an Affiliate. But might I ask, why were you so worried?” This was hardly the reception she had been expecting when the guards picked her up from Master Barca’s.
Daufina and Edric shared a knowing look.
“Another Affiliate has turned up dead,” Daufina said. “In the same manner as Affiliate Pallia and High Order Grabel.”
“Another one?” she gasped, covering her mouth.
“Yes,” Edric told her.
“That’s enough,” Kaliana spat, standing and striding toward them. “This is official royal business. She has no right knowing anything further. She’s perfectly safe, and she has no idea what we are talking about. Perhaps she should just go to her bedchambers…in the Affiliate quarters,” she added.
Edric stared at his Queen blankly. “Kaliana, you’ve stepped out of line. Have you forgotten who runs this kingdom?” His tongue was sharp.
“How could I forget?”
“Then, perhaps you should allow me to decide who requires information and who does not.”
Kaliana smiled, and it was almost worse than when she had glared at him. “As you wish,” she said with a tiny bob of her head, “my husband.”
Cyrene stood still, not wanting to interfere. She had never intended for any of this to happen. All she wanted to do was go to Eleysia and find out what the book meant. She didn’t want the King’s attention, the Prince’s infatuation, the Queen’s animosity, or the Consort’s help. She certainly didn’t want to have to think about the murder of five of the First Class. Not for the last time, she wished she had been on that ship.
Edric ignored the Queen’s last comment and turned back to Cyrene. “As I was saying, we had one other Affiliate die tonight. Affiliate Karra was part of the search committee for Affiliate Pallia and High Order Grabel. She pieced together the uncertain coincidence about High Order Zorian returning to Byern for your Presenting and the circumstances of Pallia and Grabel coming to Albion to meet the sister of Affiliate Aralyn. Aralyn is your sister, yes?”
Cyrene’s hands were shaking as Edric spoke. Her selfishness was the cause of another Affiliate’s death. Her stomach flipped, and she could barely answer, “Ye-yes.”
“When Karra discovered you were missing, she went out looking for you herself. Before sunset, she and an Eleysian sailor, Captain Lador, were found dead near the docks.”
Cyrene’s knees gave out. She closed her eyes. Kael reached out and grabbed her before she could fall. Her head lolled back as she thought about the dead captain that she had so easily dismissed when begging Captain De la Mora for passage on his ship.
How is this all connected?
“Some water!” Edric called to one of the guards standing watch. “Are you all right?” he asked as Kael set her lightly on the ground. “We didn’t mean for…”
Water appeared, and a maid tipped some back into her mouth.
She swallowed, and her eyes fluttered open. Her breathing was heavy. She didn’t want to think about what he was saying. She didn’t want to think about the blood on her hands even if she hadn’t killed them.
“I’m sorry to have upset you,” Daufina said softly. “We thought you should know.”
“When you didn’t return,” Kael said, “we all thought that the killer had chosen the next victim.”