The Invasion of the Tearling

Over the dark thing’s shoulder a shadow loomed, a shadow that turned into Beryll, coming toward them with a wooden chair grasped in his hands like a club. He swung it at the dark thing’s head, and the Queen felt the impact ricochet all through her, the dark thing’s outline shuddering inside her mind. It hissed, turned its head, and found Beryll.

“No!” the Queen shrieked. But it was too late. Her concentration had broken. The dark thing pulled free of her, grabbed Beryll by the throat, and snapped the old man’s neck with one quick twist of its hands. Beryll went down without a sound, and at that moment the fire went out, plunging the room into darkness. The bright shape in the Queen’s mind flickered, faded, and finally disappeared. She sank to the floor, panting, clutching her dislocated shoulder.

“Majesty!” her guard captain shouted. “Where are you?”

“I’m fine, Ghislaine. Light a candle. Only a candle, mind.”

Confusion and stumbling followed her words. The Queen crawled sideways, leaning on her good shoulder and groping with the bad, until she reached Beryll’s limp, still-warm body beside the wall. As the thin glow of candlelight began to illuminate the room, she found his wide eyes staring up at her. Beryll had lived a long life, yes, and he was an old man, but the Queen could only see the child she had pulled from the pit: a tall, skinny child with intelligent eyes and a ready smile. Something contracted inside her, and she wanted to cry. But that was unthinkable. She had not shed a tear in over one hundred years.

The Queen looked up and found her guards circled around her, waiting, clearly frightened; they thought they would be blamed for this disaster. Blame needed to be taken, for certain, and after a moment’s thought, the Queen realized where the culpability lay.

“My pages. Get them in here.”

When the five women were all lined up before her, the Queen looked them over, wondering where the treachery lived. Juliette, who came from one of Demesne’s best families and clearly intended to be Queen here one day? Bre, who had once taken a whip for ruining one of the Queen’s dresses? Or perhaps Genevieve, who liked to make rebellious comments in order to win the approval of the others. The Queen had never felt her own age so heavily as when she saw the five of them in front of her, a solid wall of unrelenting youth.

“Which of you lit the fire?”

She saw many emotions flit across their faces: surprise, thoughtfulness, indignation. All of them eventually settled into exaggerated expressions of innocence. The Queen frowned.

“Mina is dead, but it wasn’t Mina. She’s never been able to light a decent fire to save her life. You know me, ladies. I am not fair. If no one admits guilt, you will all face punishment. Who defied my express command by lighting a fire?”

No one answered. The Queen felt as though they stood united against her. She looked down at Beryll’s body and suddenly realized the truth of things: there was no loyalty anymore. Beryll, Liriane … her own people were all dead now, and she was surrounded by grasping young strangers. The bubble of anger inside her head abruptly deflated, lapsing into sorrow and exhaustion, a strange sense of futility. She could punish them all, yes, but what would that prove?

“Dismissed, all of you. Get out.”

The guards went, but the five pages merely stood there, their eyes wide and confused. Blonde, redhead, brunette, even a dark, exotic Cadarese named Marina. What on earth had possessed the Queen to choose these women? She should have had men all along. Men came at you directly, with raised fists. They didn’t sneak up on your back with a knife.

“We’re dismissed, Majesty?” Juliette ventured, in a tone of disbelief.

“Go. Find me a replacement for Mina.”

“What of the corpses?”

“Get out!” the Queen screamed. She felt her own control slipping, inch by inch, but there was no way to rein it in. “Get out of here!”

Her pages fled.

The Queen shuffled over to her desk, her movements strangely hunched as she tried to protect her shoulder. It was badly dislocated; probing beneath her skin, the Queen sensed the outlines of the problem, a contortion of the musculature. Setting it straight would hurt like a bastard, but the Queen had bigger problems. The dark thing’s face hovered in front of her, eyes bright and gleeful. It thought it had the girl now, and the girl was all it wanted. Worse, it had called the Queen by name.

How could it know? she raged inwardly. No one could know; she had covered her tracks too well. Evelyn Raleigh was dead. But still, the dark thing had called her by name.