#
Our escape happened under the drape of darkness, with Cris rousing me from sleep very early in the morning. Lucia stood ready at the door, and the three of us wound down endless hallways toward the exit.
Matu met us at the outer door and ushered Cris to a completely ordinary carriage, the kind I’d seen rambling through the countryside as I’d made my way from Iskadar to Umon last year. Solis shuttled into the carriage after Cris, and the door shut.
Lucia and Matu joined me in a second carriage. We settled ourselves inside with Lucia and I on one seat and Matu across from us. Including the two drivers, we made a party of seven. I wondered where we would sleep and what we would eat, but I knew those preparations had been made.
I also knew that a king and a queen never rode together. If one was attacked and killed, the separate nature of the convoy preserved the other. But we only had two carriages, not a convoy, and I thought we might as well have all crammed into one.
Until, through the tiny window, I noticed Cris’s carriage turn south down a dirt road. I expected our driver to follow, but we kept to the eastern course. “Why are we separating?” An edge of hysteria rode in my voice.
Lucia covered my hand with hers. “His Majesty will meet us in Chonal.”
Chonal was the last village in which to rest before the three-day walk to the outer limits of Umon. It would take all day to get there by carriage, and the thought brought me some comfort. “What are we to do in Chonal?”
“I’ll stable the horses,” Matu said.
“I’ll make dinner,” Lucia said.
Neither one of them would look at me. When I demanded they tell me what they knew, Matu leaned forward with an angry glint in his eyes.
“There’s more at stake here than any of us know,” he said. “Cris has asked you to visit the villages in the hopes that you can help them feel more connected with the city. That a unity can be forged, as they have been self-sustaining in both government and goods for many years. He’s wise to ask such a thing, for the strength in the villages may be the only way to oppose the High King.”
I leaned away from him, stung by his tone.
“Cris knows that his beloved Nyth is nothing more than a tyrannical empire. He has accepted the challenge to purge it and start anew. He’ll need your strength—and the might of Umon—to accomplish such a thing.”
“You’re upsetting her.” Lucia pushed lightly on Matu’s shoulder so that he settled back into his seat.
“No, he’s not.” I was pleased to hear Cris had purposes of his own. “Please, continue.”
“We want to integrate magic back into society, and the High King wants it all for himself,” he said. “We’re recruiting these villages to our cause, asking them to declare rebellion against the High King. We’re talking war, Echo. That is what we are doing in Chonal.” He looked out the window and resumed his usual stoic demeanor.
I copied him, my mind churning. As the carriage wheels ate up the miles between the city proper of Umon and the village of Chonal, I watched the river curve away from us in the distance. Sage and dirt replaced the floodplains, creating a landscape where nothing grew and nobody survived for long. It gradually gave way to smaller trees with trunks no thicker than my wrist. They created their own kind of beauty against the blue sky. When the trees thinned, the fields began. I recognized hay and corn, potatoes and wheat.
We didn’t stop for lunch. Lucia reached under the bench and produced a basket filled with fruits and breads and cheeses. We ate in silence, which had prevailed after Matu’s proclamation of war.
That afternoon, I felt nothing but mental exhaustion. I dozed briefly, dreaming of fiery horses, with great blazing hooves and glowing metallic eyes. The High King’s magicians had bewitched them, and they stampeded toward Cris and me as we cowered at the edge of a great abyss.
We held each other tightly, and when it seemed like all was lost and we would be trampled to death, he took my hand, and together, we leaped.
#
Dusk hadn’t quite claimed the day when we rolled to a stop on the outer edge of the village. I didn’t waste any time getting out of the carriage. I limped on stiff legs toward the water pump at the edge of the square. By the time I reached it, my muscles had remembered how to work. I washed my hands and smoothed my hair away from my face.
As I swallowed at mouthful of water, I realized the eeriness of the silence. A quick glance around confirmed it: The streets lay barren, the air held no whinnies of horses or idle chatter as people made their way home from the market.
Chonal was deserted.
Twenty-Nine
Cris watched me as we settled into an abandoned house with only a single, guttering candle for light. Matu, Solis, and Lucia quietly discussed the finer details of traveling, dividing up the assignments of food, clothing, and husbandry between the three of them. The two drivers had disappeared to attend to their carriages.
“Echo, may I have a word with you?”
“Certainly.” I stood and joined Cris in the corner.
Shadows obscured most of his face. “I’m uneasy here, in this place no one thought fit to stay.”
The abandoned village cast a certain web of terror over me as well. “What should we do?”
“I’ve stirred the villagers to riot these few months,” he whispered. “I sent word that I’d be coming to continue negotiations.”
My eyebrows rose in surprise at his initiative, but I quickly smoothed them down. “Perhaps the villagers aren’t interested in negotiating?”
He sighed as he wove his fingers through mine. “Should I have done something differently?” He kept his eyes on our entwined hands.
“You’re asking me?”
“Of course. You’re my wife, the Princess.”
I inhaled deeply, appreciating Cris asking for my opinion, for making me feel important. “Matu said we wanted the villagers to rebel against the High King. So we just need to help them understand that’s exactly what we are doing also.”
“Which is impossible if they’re not here.” Cris released me, and I immediately felt the absence of his touch. “There are many who would be glad to see us both dead, including my father. If he discovers where we are or what we’re doing . . . ” He left his unsaid words hanging in the air, stuffed his hands in his pockets, and stalked further into the house.
I turned toward the window, trying to find a way through the difficult maze of the political climate in Umon. I wondered what Cris could’ve done differently, and my simple village mind came up with nothing.
“Perhaps they feel like they are being used,” I mused to myself, my voice little more than breath.
“Come, Echo,” Lucia said, breaking into my thoughts. “It’s time for bed.” She led me into a bedroom and helped me into a narrow bed that had been pushed against the wall. “We’ll be on our way in the morning.” She left, promising to return soon.
I lay in the darkness, listening to the soft whinny of a horse and the distant scrape of wood against wood. I thought maybe it was one of the drivers, reshaping one of the carriage wheels that had been bumped out of roundness.
I was nowhere near a solution to our problems when the door creaked. I opened my eyes, but could only make out the form of a person drawing closer. When Cris’s lips came gently against my forehead, I closed my eyes again and listened to his steady breathing.
“I’m sorry,” he whispered.
I pressed myself into the wall and opened the blankets to welcome him to bed. He lay down beside me, taking me into his arms with a sigh. “I just want—I don’t want my father to find out we didn’t come straight to Nyth. I want you to be safe.”
“I know,” I said into his chest. The thumping of his heart pulsed against my cheek.
“I’m not a risk-taker, and I definitely don’t like risking you.”
I pushed away from him and planted a kiss on his cheek, too close to his mouth to play off as friendly. He kissed me like a man who was falling in love, sl
ow and easy, like he didn’t want to miss anything by going too fast or not holding on long enough.
“Do you think we can succeed?” I whispered, pulling back enough to find his eyes in the semidarkness.
“Together, we can.”
“You will counsel with me?” I thought of Castillo, and the many secrets he harbored. I didn’t wish such walls to exist between Cris and I.
“I’ll tell you everything,” he promised. “It’s my goal for you to trust me, to want to be my princess.”
With him looking at me with those liquid night eyes, I believed him. I put my cheek against his heartbeat, hoping we could become everything he spoke of.
Thirty
Cris hummed a lullaby as he stroked my hair. The melody, if sung by a powerful magician, could send anyone into slumber. As it was, Cris’s limited magic simply made my eyelids heavy. Sleep edged my mind when the door crashed open. “Your Majesty,” a man gasped. “The Heonan army approaches from the south.”
I sat up, blinking into the firelight coming from the hall, as Solis emerged from the woodwork. “The south?” he asked. “Impossible. They would need to bypass the entire city of Umon to do that.”
Cris stood slowly, looking back and forth between Solis and the driver. “Are you certain it is the Heonian army, Kiev?”
“It’s impossible, Your Highness,” Solis insisted. “They would not have dared to break your agreement—or your brother’s.” He pressed in closer to Cris, partially shielding him with his body. I was shocked to hear Castillo had also struck a bargain with Heona. One of his many plans I hadn’t been informed of.
I climbed out of bed and migrated closer to Cris, groping for the magic inside of me that had meshed with Castillo’s. It felt cold, and distant, perhaps because I wasn’t confined in the compound with its swirling magic. Or perhaps because of the many miles separating us.
Cris took a step back without looking away from Kiev. “Who’s coming?”
Kiev snarled and his face twisted into a mask of extreme hatred. He lunged forward at the same time Solis unsheathed his sword. A whistle rent the air. A primal yell echoed through the bedroom. The thump of a body followed.
I didn’t see the blood from the wide, smiling wound across the driver’s neck because Cris pressed my face to his chest and walked me backward. “Shh, shh,” he whispered into my hair. “Solis,” he said louder, and that seemed to be enough for the guard to take care of the necessities. I held tightly to Cris’s body, imagining I could feel the scars on his chest through the thick fabric of his suit.
He moved me down the hall and into the kitchen. “I shall be back in a moment,” he said. “Wait here.”
“Cris.” I shook my head. “I have no doubt Kiev saw something, and that it was not the Heonian army. He has betrayed us.”
A fire lit Cris’s eyes. “I’ll fetch Lucia. Stay here.”
Magic tickled the back of my throat as I stood in the kitchen. It unsettled me, as my magic had never itched to be released this way. I wanted to hurt Kiev for betraying us. Hurt him worse than Solis had done with his blade.
Torture him the way I’d tortured Gibson.
The thought scared me, and I pushed it away. But I couldn’t erase it completely. I feared the wicked magic Gibson had used against me had in fact infected me. I’d never felt the urge to hurt someone with my magic.
My power surged just as Lucia rushed into the room. “Come. We’re leaving.”
I followed her out the back door and into the darkness where Solis manned one of the carriages, nodding as he got an impromptu lesson from the second driver. The fierce look on his face told me that, if needed, he would confront an army by himself.
Cris threw our suitcase in his carriage where Matu stood loading baskets of food and traveling bags filled with clothing. “Get in the carriage, Echo,” Cris said. “Lucia, Matu’s coming with me. Can you manage?”
“Yes, Your Majesty.” Lucia gestured toward the carriage, urging me to seek shelter. The thought that Lucia could manage my defense scared me. I strode toward the carriage, but my magic pulled through my body, yanking back the other way. I stood still, trying to decipher the meaning of it. It felt bad to go that way, yet my magic had never led me astray.
I hummed a protective song, casting the spell around the two carriages. I forced myself to move toward the carriage. “Cris.” I suddenly didn’t want to be separated from him.
“Get in the carriage, Echo. Please.” He tossed in the last of our baggage and looked at me desperately. “I’m dangerously close to loving you,” he said. “I’ve given you the most expert driver, and I have the two best guards in the country. Please, get in the carriage.”
We held each other’s gaze for one, two, three heartbeats before I got in the carriage. Worry seethed beneath my skin, and I kept the protective rhyme buzzing through my vocal chords. We jerked to a roll, moving much faster this time. I peered through the windows into the darkness, seeing nothing from my limited perspective.
“Don’t look,” Lucia said. “You won’t like what you see.”
But I couldn’t look away. Mere minutes passed before fire lit the sky behind us, with smoke finding its way toward the heavens. The air took on a muddy green color, similar to what I’d imagined years ago after Oake’s warning about Nyth’s rumored wickedness.
I dropped the curtain, sealing us in the midnight murkiness inside the carriage.
“Matu said their intentions for us aren’t good,” Lucia said. “But that we’ll outrun them.”
“Who are they?”
Through the darkness, I felt her penetrating gaze. “Your village countrymen.”
Fear like I’d never known struck me full in the chest, leaving me gasping for air. “Cris said he sent word regarding negotiations. Why would they wish to hurt us? Have we been betrayed?”
I didn’t need Lucia to answer; her grim glance was confirmation enough.
“The driver?”
“Matu suspects Kiev was a native of Chonal, and that he’s told falsehoods about your true intentions.” She adjusted herself and opened her arms to me. “Let’s talk no more. Keep that protective spell going, but rest your mind.”
#
Morning found us pausing near a small stream in an area of the land I’d never seen before. Red rock towered above us, through which a stream carved its path. The horses drank greedily, and our driver muttered to himself about the lack of grass. He unhitched the teams and took them further along the stream to where the rocks gave way to grasslands.
I watched him do all this through the tiny window of the carriage. Lucia told me we couldn’t get out, that we had only stopped to rest the horses. She handed me my breakfast—an apple and a slice of dark bread. I nibbled on the fruit, knowing my knotted stomach wouldn’t be able to handle much more than that.
“We’ll separate now that day has broken.” Lucia ate with gusto, seemingly undisturbed by the events of the previous night.
“Our carriages will be recognized anywhere.”
“Yes,” she said. “We’re going directly to Nyth. The High King will dare not kill his only recognized heir inside his own borders.”
Her words brought little comfort. The High King had many ways to torture that the public couldn’t see. The scars on Cris’s chest testified of that.
#
I didn’t realize until later that I hadn’t once looked at the sky. I pulled back the curtain, but could hardly make out the stars from the dirt on the window. I hummed a location spell, inserting Castillo’s face into my mind. The rebound took a long time to come, but the vision showed him standing in my old courtyard, his eyes heavenward.
I switched the image to Cris, and found his face edged in moonlight as he rode in the carriage. My heart squeezed at the determined look in his eye, the strength in his expression.
Perhaps he can be the king his country needs, I thought, ending the spell, but unable to erase my husband from my mind.
Thirty-One
We did
n’t stop once the next day. I slept on and off and ate whatever Lucia put into my hands. By evening, I wished for nothing more than to get out of the vibrating carriage. I hurt from sitting all day, from the constant jarring of my bones against my muscles and my teeth against each other. The curtains remained drawn tight, and I hadn’t seen the sun for over twenty-four hours.
When we slowed to a stop, relieved tears pressed behind my eyes. Lucia got to her feet unsteadily and crawled out of the carriage. Regret shot through me. Clearly her joints ached, too. She straightened and took a few steps away and then back. Her face gave away none of her discomfort. She extended her hand to me, and helped me down the steps to the dirt below.
“Where are we?” I saw no village, no lamplight in the distance, no second carriage.
“Somewhere safe.” Lucia joined the driver in setting up our camp. He’d pulled two traveling bags from beneath the carriage and already had one of them open. Lucia tugged on the fabric, and to my great astonishment, they proceeded to set up a tent.
“We’re to sleep out here?”
“There isn’t room in the carriage for all of us,” Lucia said. “Vené and I will sleep out here, leaving you the carriage to yourself.”
I set my mouth into a tight line and got to work. The remaining travel bag held two sleeping rugs and two pillows. I laid them out and when the tent took its shape, Vené took them inside. Lucia returned to the carriage and retrieved the basket. We ate another cold meal of cheese, bread, and red grapes.
Immediately afterward, Vené disappeared into the tent, leaving Lucia and I to bathe in starlight. I lay on the ground, my head cradled by my arms as I looked into the night. My thoughts worried for Cris, and where he was.
“Do you trust Vené?” I asked to chase away the thoughts of Kiev’s betrayal or Cris’s torture at the hands of his father.
“I must,” Lucia answered. “He’s the only one who knows how to drive the carriage.”
“What if he’s taken us somewhere dangerous?” Once the question left my lips, I couldn’t hold back the others. “What if we’re supposed to be with Cris? What if we’re not safe here after all? Do you even know where we are?”