Dragonoak: Gall and Wormwood, page 25
I understood why I felt as I did. There was so much conspiring around us that it was impossible to believe anything we did could alter the course fifteen-hundred years of tension had set into motion. If we defeated Rylan, perhaps Agados would grow stronger; if we took down the Agadian King, freed Halla and the pane, perhaps we would act as though we had done our part, and forget the pane living in our mountains.
I could not pull one thread and watch the others come loose, no matter what Claire said. It was too tightly woven for that. The best I could do was leave the impending threat of warfare to Kouris and Akela, the politics to Claire and Kidira, and the changes in policies to Sen.
And I could do my best not to leave Claire alone.
As a meagre sort of peace offering, Queen Aren was no longer actively trying to keep me away from Claire. The guards stationed outside of her chambers didn’t cross their newly-repaired spears at my approach, and Queen Aren did not demand all of Claire’s time, either. I heard around the castle, from one of the servants who brought me my breakfast, that Queen Aren had taken three days to herself to go hunting north of Lake Lir, as she did every year. I expected she was still within the castle.
It didn’t take much convincing to get Akela in the kitchen. She said she didn’t know of any problem that wasn’t helped by baking, and after a morning spent mixing batter and licking spoons, we were as prepared as we were going to get.
Kouris, Eden and Haru-Taiki were already in Claire’s chambers. Whatever terse conversation they’d tried to build had been replaced by uncomfortable silence masked by reading. Everyone sat unnecessarily straight, unable to drop their shoulders, and when Akela and I stepped through the door, I couldn’t tell who was more relieved to see us.
More people meant less focus being put upon Claire. More people meant that any attempts at making conversation might actually gain momentum, freeing everyone’s minds from what they had become perpetually stuck on.
“Kouris, my friend, you are not looking so disappointed! I am not standing to see you like this!” Akela said, placing the first of the cakes on the table. “This one, it is being made from chocolate, but I am not so thoughtless that I am forgetting you. Or Sen!”
That was my cue. I followed with a strawberry-laden cake, and Kouris rubbed her hands together, eager for a distraction. Akela excused herself, and returned short minutes later with sandwiches and Sen. Sen smiled enough for the lot of us, excused herself, and returned with Ash in tow.
Things got off to a slow start. We gathered around and ate without saying anything, beyond the occasional appreciative hum and Haru-Taiki’s cooing. He was perched on the arm of Claire’s chair, leaning against her side. His feathers had dulled, as though he only held any power so long as we believed he did.
The rain plinked against the windows, and we were dangerously close to finishing off the bulk of the food when Ash finally spoke up.
“It’s weird being home, right?” she said, meeting Claire’s gaze. All of us were trying so hard not to say I’m sorry that our ears burnt in an effort to latch onto Ash’s words. “The last time I was here, I didn’t know you. I mean, I knew who you were, but I doubt you’d ever set eyes on me in your life. And I didn’t know about the… everything, the dragons, and when Luxon came to me and said he had a mission, shit. I thought working with a Knight was going to make my career.
“But everything in the territories and Orinhal, after Kastelir, those years felt so long it was like we’d always been on that side of the wall. This place doesn’t feel much like home now.”
“You have family here, do you not?” Claire asked. I shouldn’t have been surprised that she could still make her voice level. “Have you met with them?”
“Yeah. My mums and a brother,” Ash said, flicking cake crumbs off her jerkin. “That guard, Laus, went down to Thule with me. Talked me into it. It was—I dunno. Good to see them? But it was weird. I guess I spent so long thinking of Felheim as the enemy that I’m not sure how to sit down and have a cup of tea with any of them.”
“It’ll get easier,” Claire assured her. “Give it time. We all have too much to deal with at the moment to think about anything resembling normalcy.”
“Have you always lived in Thule?” I asked.
“Yeah. Both my mums were born and raised here, too. I used to want to be a Knight, if you’d believe it,” Ash said. “Didn’t make the cut, though.”
“You’re a better soldier than you give yourself credit for,” Claire said. “Besides, it cannot be considered a bad thing, in retrospect.”
Snorting, Ash said, “Embarrassing, though.”
“If you want embarrassing,” Eden said, lips curling into a smile around her drink, “There are plenty of stories about Claire and Thule to go around.”
Claire glowered at her, and the wind shook the windowpanes.
“Eden! My friend, my beautiful, intelligent, wonderful friend, you are not saying something like that and stopping so suddenly!” Akela said, mouth full of bread. “I am understanding that you are wanting to build suspense, but Claire, she is already squirming, and I think we are deserving to hear more.”
Setting her drink down, Eden leant back against the sofa and said, “I couldn’t possibly.”
Claire pinched the bridge of her nose, Haru-Taiki tilted his head in concern, and everyone stared expectantly at her.
“I… fell,” she said.
“In the lake,” Eden added.
“I fell in the lake,” Claire corrected herself. “Happy?”
“She was trying to show off,” Eden said, arms folded across her chest. “I told her to be careful on the edge of the boat, but no, no, I know what I’m doing, she said. Did you know that Claire actually swears? Only when it coincides with her boots slipping on wet wood and her behind thudding against the side of a boat before slipping into the water, that is.”
“Lake Lir is surprisingly deep in its centre,” Claire protested. “I could have drowned, had I hit my head.”
“But you didn’t. And you assured me beforehand that you were so very good at swimming.”
Akela laughed loudly and Claire said, “There is a small chance I may have been slightly obnoxious in my early twenties.”
“She ended up with a fish in her boot,” Eden added, and shot a wink my way.
“I did not,” Claire muttered, and turned her attention to Haru-Taiki. He was only too happy to have his feathers preened.
“Fish in a boot or not, I reckon we’re missing the important part here,” Kouris said. “We’re gonna need to hear you swear.”
“Absolutely not.”
“I-I don’t think that’s… necessary…” Sen said, as though the world might end if Claire loosened her tongue.
“Probably for the best,” I said. “Last time I swore, Kidira punched me in the face.”
Akela sighed, exasperated, and said, “That is sounding like something that is happening with Kidira. Foul language, she is not approving of it. When she is finally learning all of the words in Agadian, I am having to watch my tongue very carefully! One word she is considering bad and for a week, I am sleeping on the sofa!”
“Been there,” Kouris said, and because it wasn’t as if we were trying to lighten the atmosphere, she said, “Where is Kidira, anyway?”
“Probably off with Galal,” Ash said. “He’s being all… reclusive. Can’t blame him, I guess. I was out scouting when everything went down, but he was right there at the heart of it. He escaped, and everyone else…”
She turned her point into a shrug.
“But hey,” she concluded. “At least we’re here now. And you’re going to be Queen, right?”
Haru-Taiki recognised the word Queen and puffed his chest out proudly.
“It’s my lawful right. Beyond that, I cannot say what will happen. What my mother is planning.”
“If it helps,” Kouris said, stretching out her clawed toes, “We could lock her into some forgotten pantry until the coronation is over.”
“I am thinking Kouris and I, we are making excellent barricades!” Akela agreed.
Like the rest of us, Claire briefly considered it.
Not letting the conversation deteriorate any further, Sen decided to keep us busy with a game of cards that quickly got out of hand with so many players and a phoenix incessantly pecking at the tabletop. Still, there were smiles to be had, and the afternoon did not drag on as I feared it would.
“I think—” Eden started, but was cut off by the door thundering open.
Too much force had been put upon it. It hadn’t been locked in the first place and would’ve opened with a simple twist of the handle; there was no need for Emma to have kicked it. I’m not certain what it was about her that let me know which of the Mansels she was – the way she looked at me, perhaps – but I didn’t second guess myself.
“You,” she said, pointing at me. “Can you get out through the window?”
I didn’t have time for confusion, let alone attempted escape. Emma was joined by her sister and a dozen soldiers in a heartbeat, and they formed an arch around Queen Aren.
“Mother?” Claire asked without rising to her feet. “What is the meaning of this?”
The Mansels had each taken one of my arms before Queen Aren deigned to answer. I struggled, and they held tighter as the soldiers moved in closer. I saw Kouris and Akela rise to their feet over the soldiers’ heads and held Kouris’ gaze so that I didn’t forget to keep breathing.
“Sit down. All of you,” she said. My brow dampened with sweat because I knew what this meant. I knew what it was. I’d been here before, over and over. Nothing ever changed: only the faces around me. “I know what she is, Claire.”
The others absolutely did not sit down. Kouris reached between the soldiers with a growl, and they used their spears to bat her hand back.
“A farmer?” Claire asked. “Or did I fail to inform you of Rowan’s stint of piracy?”
“You failed to inform me that you brought a necromancer into my castle.”
The soldiers tensed at the word. Even the Mansels were on edge.
“Don’t be ridiculous,” Claire said. Her cane tapped against the ground, and I saw her step closer. “Had there been a necromancer at my side all this time, do you think I would look like this?”
My stomach swirled with guilt and gratitude. Queen Aren considered Claire’s argument. Despite myself, despite knowing that Kouris, Akela, Ash and Eden would fight for me, I struggled in the Mansels’ grasp, causing them to cling tighter.
Breathe, breathe. It would be over soon. Like everything, it would be over, and only a memory would grasp at me: not hands.
“This is absurd. I’ve little doubt that all sorts of people are spreading all manner of rumours to smear my name. Let go of Rowan immediately and I will do my best not to hold this against you.”
“The healers know what she is. They understand it intrinsically. It has merely taken them this long to put a name to what they feel.”
“You are harassing Rowan because the healers have a feeling,” Claire said, clicking her tongue. “It’s alright, Rowan. Come here.”
She held out a hand. I shot towards it, but the Mansels pulled me back.
“This is for your own good,” Queen Aren said, and directed the Mansels and the soldiers out of the room.
It is not that the others did not fight. They were outnumbered, but a dozen guards would have been as nothing to Akela and Kouris. The Mansels posed the only real threat, but as everyone prepared to clash together, everything closed in around me. All I could do was grind my teeth and say, “Stop, stop! Stop, I’ll… I’ll go.”
I’d go with her. I’d prove I wasn’t a necromancer, but I couldn’t do that if panic got the better of me and my eyes and fingertips started glowing.
I was marched through the castle. My feet moved of their own accord but the Mansels didn’t loosen their grasp on my arms. The others followed, but Queen Aren made certain our pace was brisk enough to stop Claire from biting at her heels.
All the while, I thought to myself that it did not matter how many steps I took. It did not matter if I was this side of the wall or the other. So long as I was in Felheim or Asar beyond, I would never be accepted. I would never be allowed to simply live, to keep to myself and harm no one. People had held onto their hateful beliefs for centuries and I wasn’t going to change that. I was foolish to think I could.
I needed to leave. After this, I needed to slip free and return to Canth. Canth, where I had been accepted. Where I had wasted so much time believing they could never look at me with anything but disgust but finally, finally, I’d felt like I belonged. Felheim wasn’t my home. It never had been. It had chewed me up and spat me out and spited me for surviving the gnashing of their teeth and healing from the cuts left by their incisors.
We left the castle and made for the manor house. I understood the implications and reminded myself that I was powerless. The air was thick with the constant, settled sensation of death, but it was not mine to push and pull. I was like everyone else. I was like everyone else, and I deserved to be treated as they were.
The healers were still stationed in the King’s room. The younger of the two looked more guilty than apologetic and kept his eyes on the ground, while the other stared straight through me, justified in his accusations.
The soldiers were ordered to wait outside, along with anyone who might defend me. Claire and Kouris pushed through the crowd, while Ash, Eden and Sen forced themselves to abide being locked in the corridor, only able to hear a muffled strain of what was happening.
“Revive him,” Queen Aren said, pointing at the bed. “Bring him back.”
Not having the first idea how necromancy worked or what it looked like, after a few uncertain glances, the Mansels loosened their grasp and let my arms slip free. I clasped my hands together, compulsively rubbing at my wrists.
I looked around. If there was an escape, I couldn’t find it. My head was spinning and my surroundings blurred, and the figures in the room arched, as if reaching the ceiling like a cage made of flesh.
Focus, focus. I was there to do nothing.
“Rowan,” Claire said, cutting through the haze. “There is nothing for you to do here.”
“Let her be the judge of that,” Queen Aren said.
“I don’t…” I murmured. “It’s a corpse. I don’t want to go near it.”
I didn’t have to try to sound disgusted. I was. With the effort it took to deny my powers freedom, I began to understand what was actually before me. It was not death festering, ready to heed my commands and shrink from me. It was not a form for me to control, was not something I could pour my will into.
It was flesh and bone. It was sullen and sunken, and the bitterwillow soaked up what ought to have been decay and let out a rancid stench. It was empty. All signs of the man that had once resided within were gone, and in doing nothing, for the first time I could truly comprehend how powerful I was.
Perhaps they were right to fear me.
I could make something from the nothingness in front of me. I could pour light into the void, just like in all of those stories about Isjin.
I waved my hands over the King.
Nothing, nothing.
“I can’t,” I said.
“Can’t or won’t,” Queen Aren said wearily. “One of you—cut her.”
Amy drew her blade, and there was a tumult of sound and pressure. Claire protested at the top of her voice, Kouris roared, and Akela and Sen threw themselves against the barricaded door. All the while, I lifted my hands and clamped them against my ears.
“Whoa, whoa, whoa,” Emma barked, regaining control of the room. “Look, usually I’m the first one to resort to torture, but if she’s a necromancer… I don’t know, don’t you think bribery might be a better motivation? Because if she can do all that you think she can, Your Majesty, then if we cut her, she might be kind of pissed off at us. With, uh. All due respect.”
“… Hm,” Queen Aren said, conceding that perhaps taking a dragon-bone blade to someone who could instantly drain the life from anyone in the room wasn’t the best idea. “Well? What is it that you want, Rowan?”
She said my name awkwardly, as though it belonged to a language she didn’t speak. I looked between the Mansels, Claire, Kouris and Queen Aren, and my mind swam with possibilities. Queen Aren had used a necromancer before. She didn’t condemn us to the same extent Kidira had, when she was Queen. She would not burn what she could use.
I could bargain. I could bargain with myself. I knew what I wanted: I wanted to go back to Canth, but I pushed the urge to blurt that out down, down.
“I don’t want anything. Because you can’t pay me for something I can’t do,” I said. I caught Claire’s eye and knew it was the right thing to say. This was the woman who had left a necromancer in the Bloodless Lands, unable to twist free of his chains or fall to his knees. “And if I was, what I’d want is for you to give Claire her throne! And that’s not going to happen if the King’s alive again.”
Queen Aren looked to Amy, exasperated but far from surprised, and considered using force once more.
“Here!” I said, getting ahead of myself. I moved before my mind could scream at me to stop. “If you still don’t believe me—”
Sucking in a breath, I reached out and wrapped my fingers around Amy’s sword.
I had been hurt plenty of times. I had caught my fingers in farm equipment, slipped with kitchen knives, and had blades pushed into my heart, but this was different. This was dragon-bone. My palm barely grazed the blade, but I doubted the swing of an axe could’ve cut deeper.
My skin was spliced. The blade was so sharp it took me a moment to feel the wound, for blood to rush to the surface. When it did, it poured as relentlessly as the rain had for days. Don’t heal, don’t heal, I commanded, having no idea if it actually worked that way. Had the cut not been deeper than I’d prepared for, had the pain not caused all the breath in my body to catch in my chest, the wound likely would’ve disappeared in the blink of an eye.
I’d meant to scratch myself. I’d meant to make a fist and stare Queen Aren in the eyes as the blood dripped and dripped, paltry wound refusing to close. But it hurt, it hurt in a way that steel could not, and all I could do was seethe and shake my hand to get the pain out.
