Zatal took her hand. Nelay raised her eyes and looked into the eyes of her husband. His gaze was soft with compassion and pleading, as if he was asking her to at least try. It was then that the horns sounded—the blaring warning horns of the outer gates. The Clansmen had come.
Zatal whirled around and cut through the entourage, crossing the corridor and calling as he went, “War Council, to the observation tower! Immortals, to the wall!”
Immediately, the soldiers tucked their spears under their arms and marched double time from the throne room as noblemen backed away, clearly distressed.
Jezzel dropped in next to Nelay. “Bet you wish they’d let you wear your swords.”
She didn’t answer as she ran after her husband. At the bottom of the steps, Zatal turned and leveled his gaze at someone just past Nelay. She turned to see Suka close behind them. “This better work, High Priestess, or we’re all dead.”
Suka’s gaze was distant. “Let us hope so, my king.”
Zatal hustled away, his war council falling into step behind him. Suka turned to Maran. “Go prepare her rooms. I’ll bring her up shortly.” Then she gazed flatly at Nelay. “Come with me.”
Nelay and Jezzel exchanged glances before following Suka across the throne room, which was still packed with panicked nobles. The high priestess didn’t speak as they traversed a corridor, passing great dining rooms, sitting rooms, and a gaming room. Finally, she approached the south side of the palace.
Two priestesses dressed in the armor of the Goddess Army stood at the door. Nelay knew what was beyond that door, though she’d never been there herself. The gardens over the old luminash mines.
“Did you clear the garden?” Suka asked.
They both bowed. “Yes, High Priestess. We checked it twice.”
“And Siseth?”
One of the priestesses wet her lips nervously. “She’s there.”
Nelay froze. She hadn’t heard that name in nine years, not since she’d been taken from her family. Not since the snake fairy had warned her that the price of asking for a fairy’s help was always too high.
“Is that the fairy who bit you?” Jezzel asked.
Nelay nodded.
Jezzel palmed one of her knives, but Suka turned, her eyes narrowing. “You will wait for Nelay in her rooms.”
Jezzel glanced at the priestesses then back at Nelay, her gaze asking if she wanted her to kick the high priestess’s teeth in.
Suppressing a smile, Nelay gave a slight shake of her head. “I want answers.”
Jezzel relaxed, slipping her knife back into its sheath and leaning against the wall, right next to the door, with one foot cocked.
“I said, back in Nelay’s rooms,” said Suka tightly.
Jezzel ground her teeth, obviously wanting to argue, but Nelay knew there was still a big part of her that wanted to be the Priestess Commander someday. Talking back to Suka was a good way to never see that happen.
“Go,” Nelay said. “I’ll be fine.”
Jezzel pushed off from the wall. “I’m supposed to be your guard. You’re not even armed.”
“One of my priestesses will escort her to her rooms,” Suka said with a tip of her head toward the two women still standing at the doorway.
Nelay nodded encouragingly to Jezzel, who made a sound halfway between a growl and a hiss and handed Nelay one of her throwing knives. Nelay nodded goodbye to her friend before she took off down the corridor.
Suka pushed the door open, just enough for them to slip through. Beyond was a garden the likes of which Nelay had never seen. Trees so heavy with fruit they bowed to the ground under the weight. Flowers growing in a purple carpet of lushness. But what shocked Nelay the most was the lake. She’d never seen that much water. It moved even though it had nowhere to go, lapping against the shore. And so blue! Not a bit of brown anywhere. She felt herself drawn to it, aching to feel the cool touch against her skin, wishing Rycus was here to share it with her.
But then she realized Suka was crouched beside a bush heavy with clusters of red berries, the blackened remnants of petals covering the roots. “Are you certain?” she whispered.
The high priestess was conversing with fairies.
“How long?” Suka asked. At the answer, her face went grim. “Good. Good. She’ll be weak, and battles to the north grow in pitch. She’ll be distracted.”
Nelay stepped closer and peered into the thorny bush. She gasped and stumbled back, for a viper was inside. It wasn’t very large, only about the length of her hand, but even a newly hatched viper was deadly.
“It’s not what it appears,” Suka said.
That didn’t make Nelay feel better. “I know.” Nelay hated snakes, but she was more afraid of the fairies. As her mother had always said, they were tricksy and cruel.
“It is time for you to have your Sight back,” Suka said, her expression rapturous as she gazed at the snake.
Nelay’s gaze jerked from the snake’s beady eyes to Suka’s. There was something in the other woman’s gaze, the lengths she’d gone to bring Nelay back to the temple—to even find her in the first place. It all came down to this. The thought sent a cold shiver of dread down her spine. “What have you asked of them? And what did they promise in return?”
“You’ll find out soon enough,” Suka replied.
Nelay slowly shook her head. “Whatever they have promised you will cost more than you are willing to pay. I should know, for I’ve paid their price before.” Nelay had asked the fairies to save her father’s life, and in return her infant brother had died. And then she had been taken from her family, never to see them again.
Then there was the promise she had made. A promise to grant the fairies a favor—anything they asked her. She had lived in dread of the moment that cost came due and had a feeling that moment was now.
Suka’s eyes flashed with challenge. “I will pay any price.”
A month or so ago, Nelay might have been thrilled to finally be the perfect acolyte with the perfect Sight. But now, she didn’t want it—didn’t want any of it. “I swear, I’ll go somewhere you can never find me,” she announced.
“That place does not exist. Haven’t you realized that yet?” Suka looked down at the snake that was not a snake. “I suppose we’ll have to do this the hard way then.”
The snake shot forward so fast Nelay could do little more than tense. It sank its fangs into her leg, shooting barbs up her calf and the back of her knee. She threw herself back, trying to get away before the snake bit her again. But it was only staring at her with an intelligence that belied its form.
Then the creature’s outlines became hazy and distorted before they melted, shrinking in length and growing in girth. Round eyes became almond-shaped. The face flattened, the slitted nostrils turning round and shifting into place on her face. The fairy’s eyes were solid pools of black. Thick coils of hair spread from a knot in the top of her head. The snake’s scales spread and split, becoming wings with sharp points. Her dress was made of scales, as were her boots over her long, pointed feet.
Nelay had not seen a fairy since she was nine years old—and this fairy in particular since she’d given her a gift that had turned out to be a curse. Hate welled up inside Nelay. She had thought herself incapable of forgetting their cruel faces, their expressions void of any emotion besides cunning. But she’d been wrong. They were far more terrible than she remembered.
She gasped as the pain left her. She looked down at her ankle and discovered two puncture marks dripping fluids. This was not the first time this fairy had envenomed her. “You took away my Sight—the first time you bit me.”
Siseth grunted. “And now I’ve given it back.”
“Why?” Nelay panted.
The fairy didn’t answer at first. “Because the fairies notice those with the Sight. I couldn’t risk the Summer Queen finding out what you are.”
“Summer Queen?”
“I used to call her Goddess of Fire,” Suka answered. “But that is not what th
e fairies call her, and not what I call her anymore.” She took a long breath. “Her real name is Leto. Did you know that?”
The high priestess didn’t seem to expect an answer, and Nelay didn’t give one. She was having difficulty thinking of the goddess as a queen; it was simply too human.
She looked around the garden, knowing what she would see. Fairies were everywhere. What had looked like a bird crouched in a tree was really a fairy with feather wings. What Nelay had thought was a branch was really a fairy’s lithe brown body with leaves and poison-white-berry-colored eyes with black pupils.
“If I’m part of your plan, why did you keep all of this a secret from me?” Nelay asked.
“Leto’s spies are always listening. Had she known what you were, she would have killed you as a child,” said a soft, feminine voice, her tongue smacking stickily to the inside of her mouth. “But the queen is no match for the eyes we have everywhere.”
The speaker, another fairy, scuttled from the undergrowth. In addition to the eyes in her face, six black, bulbous orbs protruded from the mane of hair piled atop her head. Her wings were woven of spider silk, and she wore what looked like a fur collar and a short, thick fur skirt.
As she came closer, Nelay realized it wasn’t fur but spider hair. She shuddered in revulsion. “You,” she gasped. This was the spider she’d impaled and thrown into the fire. The same fairy who’d tapped on the glass the day Sopora was invaded.
“Ah, Tix,” Siseth said. “What have your spies found?”
“We may speak without Leto’s spies listening,” Tix replied. “And that hurt.” The fairy shuddered. “It hurt very badly.”
Nelay glared at the fairies as her memories rose up. One in particular started the wheels of her mind spinning. The fairies always cleared out when she lit a fire. “The incense—all through the temple?” She directed her words to the high priestess.
Suka tipped her head in acknowledgment. “I was trying to keep any enemy fairies away from you. Away from our plans.”
Nelay glanced at all the fairies in turn. “Why me?”
Siseth flew back and forth, almost hypnotically. “Because you have more than the Sight, Nelay. You have the gift of life.”
“Doesn’t everyone?” She couldn’t help the sarcasm that dripped from her mouth.
Siseth hissed, her black tongue flicking out of her mouth. “No. It is the rarest of gifts. It is why you have never been sick. Why you are stronger, faster—why you survive wounds that would kill any other mortal. And why we searched for twenty years before we found you.”
So they’d been searching for her before she’d even been born. Nelay thought she’d known fear before, but she was wrong. For she felt it now, down to her very core. Whatever Suka had promised them, Nelay was to pay at least part of the price. “I don’t understand.”
“Not everyone can be a Summer Queen,” Suka answered. “Only those with the gift of life—those who’ve tasted a petal from an elice flower. Only they are strong enough to survive the transformation.”
“As those who become the Winter Queen must be touched by death,” Tix mused.
“There used to be dozens of them to choose from—three every year,” Siseth said. “But not anymore. For Leto gives the elice flower to the Winter Queen—Ilyenna—to prevent her daughter and husband from aging. The other petal Leto gives to her own husband. This goes against the Balance!”
“Why do you call them queens when they are goddesses?” Nelay asked.
“They are not goddesses to us,” Nos answered.
It had all begun when Nelay’s mother had bargained for a flower from the fairies. Had she known the price of that bargain then? The lengths she’d gone to keep Nelay’s Sight hidden indicated that she had.
“What do you want from me?” Nelay asked.
“It’s really very simple,” Suka said. “I promised that you would kill Leto. That you would become the next Summer Queen.”
They couldn’t mean what she thought they meant. “That’s impossible!”
“I assure you, it is not,” Tix said.
“She’s a goddess—I’m a mortal!” Nelay protested. “And I’ve worshipped her since I was a child!”
“She was once mortal, just as you are.” Nelay watched as another fairy flew toward them and landed in a crouch on a boulder. Her unnaturally blue eyes matched her liquid hair. Water dripped from her body. Everywhere she touched, vibrant green moss grew.
“Leto killed the previous Summer Queen,” the moss fairy said. “As you will kill Leto.”
“Nos,” Tix said to the moss fairy, “you risk breaking the web.”
Nelay had no idea what that meant. “I won’t be your player in this sick game.”
Siseth opened her black mouth in a wide smile, her white fangs standing out in sharp relief. “You don’t have a choice.”
The promise Nelay had made, to do a favor for Siseth someday. Nelay’s mind whirled, sorting through players and surveying the field. “I lied.”
Siseth hissed. “It’s not a promise you can break, fight it as you may.”
Nelay shook her head as she backed away. “No,” she said with certainty. “You can’t force me, and you can’t harm me. I’m too important to your plan.”
“You act as though this promise is something I must enforce,” Siseth said, “something you can escape. But when the time is right, you will keep the promise. The Balance will see to it—if you survive long enough.”
Nelay whirled around and started off, but Suka ran to her and gripped her shoulder. Nelay swung her arm around, trapping the high priestess’s hand. She drove Suka and pinned her against a palm tree, her forearm wedged against the older woman’s throat. Suka clawed uselessly at her grip. “So I kill their queen and take her place,” Nelay growled. “And what do you get? More wealth? More power?”
Suka’s eyes bulged and she struggled to speak. “They promised to save Idara.”
Stunned, Nelay let her go. The woman crumpled to the ground, gasping for breath. “Even if they did,” Nelay said, “Idara would be blighted and broken beyond repair. That’s how their promises work!” She glanced at all the fairies in turn. “Their price is too high. It always was. My life is my own—my choices my own. And I will not do this. I will find another way.”
Nelay whirled and started toward the palace, but the snake fairy was suddenly before her, fangs bared. Nelay staggered to a halt.
“Ilyenna is helping the Clansmen,” Suka gasped. “She’s behind the blizzard that destroyed our army when they invaded the clanlands twenty years ago. The storm that sank our navy earlier this year. She’s the reason for your parents’ deaths.”
Suddenly unable to get enough air, Nelay turned slowly to face Suka. “Did they tell you that? The fairies?”
Suka’s mouth tightened. “Leto and Ilyenna are friends. Leto is letting Ilyenna and her army invade Idara and destroy her people and the temples where she is worshipped. She cares more for the woman who should be her enemy than her own subjects!”
Nelay stormed back to Suka, who recoiled, but Nelay simply crouched before her. “They will tell you anything—anything—to get what they want.”
“Then how do you explain the clanlands invading the most powerful nation in the world within a few weeks? How do you explain the way they topple our cities, our strongholds?”
Nelay’s resolve faltered a little, but she braced herself and stood back up. “Because they have some weapon we don’t understand.”
“You’re letting fear blind you,” Suka said, the fight seeming to drain out of her.
Nelay frowned. “Why would the Goddess of Fire—Leto—betray us? We worship her!”
“Because of what Idara did,” Siseth replied. “They call us Raiders in the clanlands. Our kingdom has killed hundreds of thousands of people. Enslaved others, forcing them to let go of their traditions and beliefs in favor of ours.”
Nelay remembered Dobber calling her a Raider not long after she’d been captured.
“Leto thinks Idara deserves to be punished—to be crippled so we can never harm the world again. She refuses to see that Idara is simply the dark side of the Balance, bringing destruction and chaos to offset peace and order.”
Nelay gaped at Siseth. “We brought order and civilization.” Even as the words left Nelay’s mouth, she wasn’t sure she believed them anymore. She rounded on the fairies. “And why should we believe you? You’ve already proven yourselves traitors, and all traitors are liars by necessity.”
Nos took to the air, her wings beating furiously. “It is Leto who has betrayed summer!”
“Why would we lie?” Siseth asked.
Nelay studied the fairy whose interference in her life had changed it irrevocably once before. She would not make the mistake of letting it happen again. “You don’t want what’s good for Idara. You want what’s good for yourself. And I will not be used.”
“Our interests align!” Suka insisted as she arose to grasp Nelay’s forearms.
Nelay shook her off. “You are a fool to trust them.” She heard the city horns in the distance, calling the soldiers to the wall and urging Thanjavar to defend itself. Stand up or fall, a fall from which Idara would never rise again. And Nelay realized all her plans to run away and find Rycus would have to wait. She could not leave Idara on the brink of collapse, not when there was a chance she could help save her people. The realization left her heart broken all over again.
She pushed open the doors and fled down the hall and into the throne room, one of the priestesses falling in behind her. The jangle of gold announced Nelay’s presence, her silk robes flaring out behind her. The veil slipped from her head and puddled on the floor in a pile of silk and gold.
She passed servants, soldiers, ladies and lords. Her hair came loose, streaming behind her as she flew up the grand staircase through hundreds of delicate arches. She entered her rooms and slammed the door shut on the priestess guard. Nelay flew passed the large table, the sitting area, and the fireplace to her bedroom.
At the sight of her, Maran jumped from a chair. But it was to Jezzel that Nelay went, for she stood on the round balcony, her hands behind her back as she looked out over the city. Nelay followed her gaze, heart in her throat. She was too far away to make out anything more than squares of Clansmen that were more texture than shape. The mass went on as far as she could see.