Total pages in book: 201
Estimated words: 191006 (not accurate)
Estimated Reading Time in minutes: 955(@200wpm)___ 764(@250wpm)___ 637(@300wpm)
Estimated words: 191006 (not accurate)
Estimated Reading Time in minutes: 955(@200wpm)___ 764(@250wpm)___ 637(@300wpm)
Their heads bob in unison.
“Disembark!” the ship’s captain hollers into the night.
As one, the Shadows step forward in strict formation, Solange in the lead. They look fierce within their armor, truly like their namesake. Unseen.
Brigitta’s healers are like startled doe by comparison, huddled as they follow. They are not here to appear fierce and fight, though. They are here to keep those fighting alive.
The hour is late, but Allegra warned me not to dally. “Come, ladies. The queen is anxious to meet her newest elementals.”
And I am anxious to find answers.
The guards draw open the doors to Argon’s throne room without a word to us.
“… And you do not feel you owe this to your murdered king?” Queen Neilina asks, her reedy voice quiet but cutting.
The man kneeling at the dais trembles. “My three sons have marched to the rift. I wanted to but, you see, my wife is very sick, and someone needs to remain behind to care for her and our livestock.”
“And why did you not request the services of a healer?”
“We did, Your Highness, but the healer said the sickness came from the Ill-Gotten River, and it was beyond her skill.”
Mordain has heard rumors of this lately—both mortals and elven alike afflicted by disease from these waters south of the Dead Wood. The mortals perish quickly, but the immortals suffer for years, withering away as their elven body fights whatever plagues it.
“Perhaps it is. But that was not for you to decide.”
The elven male keels over, his hands clawing at his throat.
Beside me, Beatrix gasps.
“Do not make a sound,” I warn in a hiss. The queen will consider it a flaw in her elementals.
We stand quietly and watch as Queen Neilina strips the air from the male’s lungs with her powerful affinity to Vin’nyla. Her connection is said to be unparalleled. A divine blessing. A mortal would last mere seconds, but it seems like forever before he stills, his face turning shades from pink to red to purple, his body convulsing as it struggles.
“And now your wife will suffer alone, anyway,” Queen Neilina purrs to the corpse. “Get him out of here.”
Two guards move in and, collecting a leg each, drag the man out.
Now it’s our turn.
“Come forward.”
I lead the two elementals down the aisle of the stately throne room, brimming with decadence—pristine white marble woven with gold, jeweled mosaic windows depicting three of the fates, Malachi conspicuously absent—and empty of life at this hour.
Queen Neilina’s ice-blue gaze feels heavier now than it did the last time I bowed before her in this very spot, almost fifty years ago. “The years have not been kind to you, Caster Agatha.”
Master Scribe Agatha. It’s a wonder she remembers who I am. Does she know Gesine was my mentee? I push that fear aside. I would already be clutching my throat for air, if she had any idea. “Such is the plight of a simple caster, Your Highness.”
Queen Neilina hasn’t aged a day. Maybe there is a small crease here, a single gray hair there, but it would be too minute to pick out. She is still devastatingly beautiful, with cheekbones that should cut through skin, and irises as icy as the waters high in the mountains of Skatrana, a stunning contrast to her inky-black hair and creamy, pale skin. Normally gold would not complement such a complexion, and yet her shimmering dress flatters her, as does the gleaming gold chunk of antler fastened around her neck—the largest token anyone in Mordain has ever laid eyes upon. It appeared there one day with a vague explanation about a gift from a Udralian emperor, and she has worn it devotedly ever since, in its raw form. What its purpose is, no one knows. If Neilina does, she has never shared it with anyone. Perhaps we should have paid closer attention to the fact that it materialized around the same time Neilina announced a coming heir.
The throne beside Neilina sits empty, glaringly so.
I liked King Barris. I heard him address Ybaris and Mordain on several occasions. He was soft-spoken—unexpectedly so for a king—and yet he carried himself with such grace, all would stop to listen.
Standing at Queen Neilina’s side is Commander Caedmon Tiberius, a handsome and fierce-looking immortal. It’s a blessing to the queen that her daughter inherited all of her fine looks and none of her father’s. It would have been much harder to hide Princess Romeria’s true lineage had the girl been born with the commander’s blond locks.
“Bring my new elementals forward,” she commands.
I urge Beatrix and Cressida forward with a nod. They glide toward the bottom of the dais, to kneel as they were taught.
Queen Neilina rises from her throne and strolls down the steps, her shimmering gold gown dragging behind her willowy frame. “Stand and show me your arms.”