The Invasion of the Tearling

“I doubt it. Look at the dust.”


Kelsea went back to glaring at her mother’s portrait. Even if she somehow found a solution to the Mort nightmare on the horizon, it did nothing for the fifty thousand Tear who had already gone to Mortmesne, her mother’s gift to the world. This was familiar territory, a problem with no solution.

“May I ask you a question, Lady?” Dyer asked.

“Please.”

“I wondered if you had decided what to do with the prisoner Javel.”

“I will let him out of prison, certainly, but only once I’ve thought of a way to keep him from drinking himself to death.” Kelsea turned away from the portraits to face her five guards, who stood in front of the sunlit windows like a row of chessmen. “I don’t know what to do with the boy, the Jailor, either. He’s earned some reward, but for the life of me, I don’t know what to give him. Does he have no friends, no one who knows him well?”

Coryn spoke up. “I know his father a little. The old Jailor, retired now. I can ask.”

“Do that. I don’t want the reward to be meaningless. They gave us a great gift, both Ewen and Javel.”

“And what will you do with the gift?” Pen asked. It was the first full sentence Kelsea had gotten in days, but she wished that she could just ignore him. “What about Thorne?”

“I don’t know.”

“Better decide soon, Lady,” Dyer cut in. “The entire kingdom is screaming for his blood.”

“Yes, but they scream for the wrong reasons. They want him to suffer because of his years as Overseer of the Census. Yet that was a government position, and as terrible as they were, Thorne’s actions as Overseer were legal under the Regency. I can’t have a rule of law that bows under public pressure. If I execute Thorne, it must be for his crimes.”

“He’s guilty of treason, Lady.”

“And yet that’s not the reason the entire kingdom will line up to watch him hang.”

The five guards stared at her, and Kelsea felt more than ever that she was on a chessboard, a pawn facing five power pieces. “You all agree? That I should execute him?”

They all nodded, even Pen, who Kelsea had thought might be a secret holdout.

“I’ll make a decision soon, but not yet. I did promise Elston his fun, you know.”

Leaving them chuckling behind her, Kelsea moved back down the gallery to have another look at the man from the fireplace. He was even more striking in daylight, and although the portrait was clearly very old, he had not aged a day since. His eyes followed her as she came closer, and although Kelsea knew it was silly, she felt as though he really could see her from a distance.

“Take this one down as well,” she said finally. “I don’t know who he is, but he’s not a monarch. He doesn’t belong on this wall.”

“Should we get rid of it?”

“No. Bring it upstairs.” She peered around her guards until she found Father Tyler, staring out the window. “Thank you, Father. Most interesting, this place.”

“Yes, Lady,” the priest replied absently. But his bleak gaze remained fixed on the mountains.

What have they done to him? Kelsea wondered again. Her eyes strayed to the cast on his knee. She was surprised by her own protective instinct toward the priest. He was an old man, one who wanted only to sit and read books and think about the past; it seemed a crime for anyone to harm him. On several mornings lately, Kelsea had found Father Tyler asleep on his favorite sofa in the library, as though he no longer wished to spend his nights in the Arvath. Had the Holy Father done something else to him? If he had—

Stop, Kelsea told herself. She couldn’t try to assert authority over the inner workings of the Arvath. That path would only lead to disaster. She pushed God’s Church from her mind, and as it went, she suddenly had an idea, a possible solution … not to Father Tyler, but to another problem.

“Lazarus? Can any of the Guard speak Mort?”

Mace blinked in surprise. “Kibb, Dyer, and Galen, Lady. And myself.”

“Do any of them speak it well enough to pass for Mort?”

“Only Galen, really.” Mace’s brow furrowed. “What’s on your mind?”

“We’re going back upstairs now, but not everyone. Two of you go down to the dungeon and bring me Javel. Try to wake him up a bit.”