The Queens of Innis Lear Read online

  He climbed up an oak, whispering a request that the tree hold still, and then the next, too, as he stepped across to it, so that they would not shake their leaves and reveal to the king his location. Thus, Ban walked gently from tree to tree, like an earth saint, and sank finally into the embrace of the oak under which Morimaros sat. Ban climbed down, and even when the king looked suddenly out at a cracked branch in the west, Ban was invisible to him, directly above.

  In one swift motion, Ban dropped onto the king’s back, threw an arm around his neck, and pulled. But Morimaros grasped his arm and bent, flinging Ban heels over head, hard onto the muddy shore of the spring. Ban rolled onto his hands and the balls of his feet, and glared at the king, eyes and teeth bright in his muddy, wild face.

  Morimaros had his sword free, knees bent, ready to defend himself again. “Ban?” he said after a slow moment.

  Ban stood. “You were very vulnerable, Your Majesty.”

  “Not so, it seems.” The king smiled. He sheathed his sword and picked up the fallen letter.

  “Why come out alone? I was on my way to returning.” Ban crossed his arms over his bare chest, suddenly too aware he was naked but for mud-scrawled magic.

  “I’m not allowed much solitude, and this evening is perfect for it,” Morimaros said. He ran a hand over his close-cropped hair, a sign of slight embarrassment. “And I would speak with you privately on a certain matter, ah, pertaining to this letter.” He brandished it, and Ban could see the deep blue wax of Lear still clinging to one edge.

  All his skin went cold with dread, but Ban nodded because he had to: this was his king, his commander, no matter what else they might be to each other.

  The Fox strode into the water and ducked down fully into it, allowing his entire body to be enveloped. It was not peace and cool calm he felt as the water brushed away mud, tickled his spine and the backs of his knees. No, it was a roar of suppressed memories: clenched fists and dismissive words; sheer peaks, crashing waves, and a howling, powerful wind; haunting sweet laughter and black eyes with short, curled lashes; tiny iridescent beetles.

  Ban, the bastard of Errigal, scrubbed his skin clean and turned over in the spring, spinning once, twice, and a third time. Rising, he wiped his face, spat water, shook his head like a dog.

  When he emerged, he desperately thought of his Aremore name, the one he’d earned, trying to will himself back to center.

  The Fox. Ban the Fox.

  His eyes opened to see that Morimaros offered him trousers. Ban muttered thanks and dragged them on, tied the waist up and used the plain wool shirt to wipe drips of water from his face and neck, chest and arms.

  “Now,” Morimaros said, clasping his shoulder, “I have wine in the crook of that root. Read this letter.”

  Ban followed the king, reminding himself he was trusted here, he was honored by the grand crown of Aremoria. Whatever Lear wanted, Ban would attack it from Morimaros’s side. Together, the men sat.

  Morimaros gave over the letter and uncorked the brown glass bottle of wine with his teeth. The writing was roughly scratched into the parchment. Ban read:

  To the honored King Morimaros of Aremoria,

  We of Innis Lear invite you to join us at our Summer Seat for a rare celestial occasion. The Zenith Court will commence some two weeks from the writing of this note, on the full moon after the Throne rises completely to mark the ascent of the Queens of Autumn. The greatest of our island shall attend, and we look forward to introducing you to our youngest, with whom you have corresponded these last months, with hope I am certain in your heart. We are eager to set our daughters onto their star paths, and know your attendance will aid us in that desire.

  With the blessings of the stars in our words,

  Lear

  Ban managed to remain calm, despite the implications involving Elia Lear. He read through the letter again, and Morimaros swung the bottle of wine toward him.

  Trading his thirst for the burn of memory, Ban took a long drink. It was sweet and crisp, very easy to swallow. Not like the wine and ale of Innis Lear. Not like the hard yearning that tugged at him even now to go back. To touch the iron magic of Errigal again. To set things right and show his father and that king what he’d become. A confidant of this king, a renowned soldier and spy. Important. Necessary. Honored.

  Wanted.

  “Did you know her?” Morimaros asked, interrupting Ban’s sputtering thoughts.

  “The youngest princess?” Ban lightly avoided her name.

  But the king did not.

  “Elia,” he said simply, and then easily continued. “She is the star priest, we hear, preferring this to her title. Though I met her as such, once, a long while ago. When her mother died, I traveled to Innis Lear for the year ceremony. Princess Elia was only nine. It was my first time in another country, acting as Aremoria. Though my father lived still, of course. He didn’t die until I was twenty.” Morimaros took back the wine and sipped at it. Ban studied the king, trying not to imagine him speaking with Elia, touching her fingers. Morimaros was gilded and handsome, a strong man, and one of the only good ones Ban had ever known. Elia deserved such a husband, and yet, he could not imagine her living here, in Aremoria, away from the twisted island trees, the harsh moors, the skies overwhelmed with stars.

  Ban shook his head before he could stop himself. He’d thought of her, though he’d tried to forget those years before he’d been the Fox. Thought of the smooth brown planes of her cheeks, her black as well-water eyes, the streaks of improbable copper in her cloud of dark brown spiral curls. Her warm mouth and eager young hands, her giggle, the wonder with which she dug into tree hollows with him, whispering to the heart oaks, to the roots, to the sparrows and worms and butterflies. He’d thought of her most when he was alone in enemy camps, or washing blood off his knife, or cramped and stinking for days in the hiding holes the roots made for him. She saved him, kept him quiet, kept him sane. His memories of her made him remember to stay alive.

  “Did you know her?” Morimaros asked again.

  “Barely, sir.” And yet more entirely than Ban had known anyone in his life. She once was the person who’d known him best, but Ban wondered what her reply would be, if asked the same question today. In five lonely, bloody years, she’d not written to him, and so Ban had never sent word to her on the wings of these Aremore birds. Why would she want to hear from a bastard now, if she hadn’t before? And now they were grown.

  The king said, “I’ll leave next week. Sail around the south cape to the Summer Seat.”

  Ban nodded absently, staring down at the dirt beside his toes.

  “Return to Innis Lear with me, my Fox.”

  His head snapped up. Yes, he thought, so viciously he surprised himself.

  King Morimaros watched Ban with clear blue eyes. His mouth was relaxed, revealing nothing—a special skill of this king’s, to present a plain mask to the world, holding his true opinions and heart close.

  Home.

  “I … I would not be a good man at your side, Majesty.”

  “Ban, here and now call me Mars. Novanos would.”

  “When we discuss Lear it reminds me too keenly of my place, sir.”

  Morimaros grimaced. “Your place is at my side, Ban, or wherever I put you. But I know how that old king thinks of you. Is his daughter cut of same cloth?”

  “As a girl, Elia was kind,” Ban said. “But I do not know how I can serve you there.”

  The king of Aremoria drank another portion of wine and then set the bottle firmly in Ban’s hand. The Fox recognized the low ambition in Morimaros’s voice when he said, “Ban Errigal, Fox of Aremoria, I have a game for you to play.”

  ELIA

  THE YOUNGEST DAUGHTER of Lear threw herself up the mountainside, gasping air cold enough to cut her throat. She hitched her heavy leather bag higher on her shoulder, taking the steeper path in order to reach the top on time. Her fingers scrabbled at the rough yellow grass, and her boots skidded on protruding limestone. She stumbled an
d ground her skirts into the earth, then dragged herself up to the wide pinnacle, finally reaching her goal.

  Elia Lear lay flat, rolling onto her back, and sighed happily despite her raw throat and the dirt under her fingernails. Above, the sky tilted toward night, edged in gentle pink clouds and the indigo silhouettes of the mountains cradling these moors. She shivered and hugged her arms close to her chest. This far north on Innis Lear, even summer breathed a frosty air.

  But the solitude here, as near to the sky as she could hope to reach, was Elia’s greatest bliss. Here, it was only her spirit and the stars, in a silent, magnificent conversation.

  The stars never made her feel angry, guilty, or forlorn. The stars danced exactly where they should. The stars asked her for nothing.

  Elia glanced up at the purple sky. From here she had a clear view of the western horizon, where at any moment the Star of First Birds would appear and hang like a diamond at the tip of the Mountain of Teeth.

  All around her, the golden moor swept down and away in rolled peaks and valleys, marred by jutting boulders like fallen chunks of the moon. Wind scoured the air, hissing an upland song from the northwestern edge of the mountains, heading south toward the inner White Forest and east toward the salty channel waters. The princess could have felt quite abandoned out here, but the shadowed valleys hid roads and some tiny clusters of homes; it was where the families lived, those who cared for the sheep and goats grazing this land—some of which could be seen freckling the hills with gray and white.

  If Elia looked down to the south, she would see the star tower clinging to a limestone outcrop, built centuries ago by an old lord before the island was united, for a military stronghold. The first King Lear had confiscated it for the star priests, opened up the fortified walls and left them to crumble, but with elegant wood and slate from the south he had lifted the tower itself taller, until it was the perfect vantage point for making accurate star charts and reading the signs on every point of the horizon. Elia had lived and studied there since she turned nineteen last year, and every morning she dotted white star-marks onto her forehead to prove her skills as a priest and prophet. She did not yet consider herself a master, but hoped one day she might.

  This morning’s marks had smeared slightly, as they often did, for Elia spent much of her time brushing errant, wind-tossed curls away from her face. Her companion, Aefa, often made sure to wrap a veil or scarf about Elia’s hair, or insisted on using ribbons or at least braids to keep her hair in place, as befit a princess, if not a prophet. Elia could not help preferring to leave it free, tended by nothing but bergamot oil from the Third Kingdom, and perhaps a few begrudged decorations near her face. It put her in contrast to her sisters, neither of whom would leave their bedrooms without their costumes fixed and perfect.

  Aefa was ever despairing that Elia made her worst choices whenever she did so with her sisters in mind. Such fussing was what a lady’s companion was for, and as her father, Lear’s truth-telling Fool, was always willing to argue, so did Aefa uphold the family tradition. It was enough to make the princess grateful for these stolen moments alone.

  Sitting, the princess hauled the leather bag into her lap and unknotted the thong holding it shut. She pulled out a folded wooden frame and a roll of parchment to fix to it so she could mark the progress of star appearances onto a simple chart.

  Elia’d wagered this morning with the men in the Dondubhan barracks that it would be tonight the Star of First Birds finally moved into position to sparkle exactly over the distant peak. Danna, the star priest mentoring her, had disagreed when she told him, so he watched from the roof of the star tower at this very moment, while Elia had climbed here, even higher, to see first. The dignity of winning mattered more to her than the handful of coins she had bet.

  Oh, how shocked her father would be at such a wager.

  For a moment, she wished he was here with her.

  Her smile reappeared as she imagined refitting the tale into a shape palatable for Lear. Assuming she won, of course. If she lost, she’d never confess it to her father.

  This youngest princess favored her late mother in most ways, being small and sweetly round, and warm brown all over: skin and eyes and hair that spiraled in ecstatic curls. Her father was tall and pale as limestone, with the straightest brown hair in the world. What she lacked in his looks, she made up for by sharing his vocation to the stars.

  Lear would say, The Star of First Birds is brighter than other stars, and she moves unlike any other. Out of their fixed pattern, and yet with her five sisters. The Stars of Birds fly through all the rest, influencing the shapes and constellations. When you were born, my star, the First and Third Bird stars crowned your Calpurlugh.

  She knew the patterns of her birth chart by heart, and the brilliant star at its center; Calpurlugh, the Child Star, symbolic of strong-heartedness and loyalty. The Star of First Birds was purity of intention and the Third flew near to the roots of the Tree of the Worm, so her Child Star attributes were affected—or distracted—by holy thoughts just as much as unseen decay. Her father said the influence of the Worm in this case meant Elia would always be changing others or the world in ways she could not see or predict. Elia wondered if holy bones or some other wormwork might have a different answer, but Lear refused to taint his royal star readings with such base matters, so she couldn’t say. To him, the stars were beyond reproach, disconnected from death, filth, animal lust, or instinct. All the magic of the world existed beneath the stars, and beneath them magic should remain.

  Ban would know which tree to ask, Elia thought, then covered her lips with her fingers as if she’d spoken aloud. That name needed be banished from her heart forever, as the boy himself had been banished years ago.

  Disloyalty and longing twisted together in the back of her throat. It went against her instincts to deny herself even the memory of him, yet for so long, she’d done exactly that. She breathed deeply and imagined the feelings diffuse out of her with every breath, making her cool and calm as a star. Singular. Pure. Apart. She had learned long ago that stray passions needed to be leashed.

  It was difficult, for Elia was a daughter of Lear. All her family were born of the same material, and all tended toward high emotions: Gaela, the eldest, wore her anger and disdain like armor; Regan was a skillful manipulator of her own heart as well as the hearts of others; and the king caught his grief and leftover love up in layers of rigid rules, though they never quite contained him. Elia, unfortunately, had loved too easily as a child: the island, her family, and him, the wind and roots and stars. But love was messy. Only the stars were constant, and so it was better to be exactly what her father wanted: loyal, strong, pure starlight. A saint for Innis Lear, rather than a third princess.

  Thus was she able to bear the weight of Gaela’s disappointed glares, and answer Regan’s sly mocking with simple courtesy. She was able to swallow her longings and her worries and any joy, too, as well as the enduring sorrow that her sisters did not care for her at all. She was able to bear up under the weight of Lear’s rages and soothe him instead of lashing out to make things worse as Gaela and Regan did. Able to expel any strong emotion by scattering it in the sunlight like fog off a lake, until everything she felt was naught but starry reflections.

  “There,” Elia whispered to herself now, as between one blink and the next, she caught the sparkle of the distant Star of First Birds. It was only a shimmer of light, and Elia stopped breathing to steady her gaze, wishing she could still the tremble of her heart, too, for one perfect moment.

  “Elia!”

  Twisting to peer down toward the steep southern road and the call of her name, Elia at first saw nothing but a distant flock of tiny swifts, darting close to the ground. Then she spied her companion Aefa waving at her with both arms, and beyond, a rider leaning over his saddle to press onward for the star tower’s courtyard. A star-shaped breastplate gleamed in the final evening light, belted across his dark blue gambeson to mark him a soldier of the king. From the
back of his saddle rose a trio of flags: one the white swan of Lear, one the maroon crown of Burgun, and one the plain orange field that belonged to the king of Aremoria.

  Letters.

  Elia touched a hand to the undyed collar of her dress, the space just over her heart. The last letter from her father was folded there, hidden between seam and skin. It had arrived the day before yesterday; the words he had written were not worrisome in themselves, as they were but the usual, dear ramblings he sent and had always sent. Filled with his own star chart calculations, gossip from the Summer Seat, irritation at his first daughter’s martial interests, and sneers at the temper of his second son-in-law; and yet this one was far different from any that had come before.

  Dalat, my dear, he had scrawled in his swooping, casual hand.

  Elia’s mother, who had been dead these twelve years.

  The shape of the name remained, sharp enough to break a daughter’s heart.

  Getting to her feet and stuffing the parchment back into her bag of charts, Elia reluctantly turned south, picking her way down to the road. She’d much rather have remained and done her work, but knowing a new letter waited would distract her and she’d lose count, lose the patterns threaded across the sky even as she dutifully wrote them down. Never mind the letters from those other kings, Burgun and Aremoria, courting her for their politics and war. Such things did not concern her: Elia would never wed, she’d long ago determined. Both her sisters had contentious marriages: Gaela because her husband was a beast, though one Gaela had chosen for herself, and Regan because her lord’s family was a generations-old enemy of the house of Lear, a threat Regan would gladly lose herself inside.

  No, Elia would marry only the stars, live her life as a solitary priest, and care for her ailing father, never in danger from too much earthly love.

  This latest deluded salutation from Lear was even more proof of that danger. When their mother had died, their father lost his heart, and with it everything that kept his mind at ease and actions in balance. Her sisters had turned ever more inward, away from both Lear and Elia. The island, too, seemed to have withdrawn, offering less abundant harvests and giving more weight to the cold, cutting wind. All in mourning for the lost, much-loved queen.