Daleina crossed to him first and embraced him warmly. “Champion Ven.” She then turned to Naelin. Usually, the other queen was unremarkable. Usually, she looked like the motherly woodswoman she used to be—sturdy, steady, rational. But now she looked wild, almost feral. Her eyes flickered around the room, at the spirits, at the papers on the desk, at the fire that now, suddenly, roared in the hearth, fed by the fire spirits. Her uncombed hair floated in a halo around her head, and she had a streak of soot on her cheek. She still wore one of the voluminous gowns from the palace courtiers, but the skirt was ripped—intentionally, Daleina thought, so it won’t impede her movement. She’d clearly come straight here from the village without another thought.
I hope the people didn’t see her. She’d cause a panic. It wasn’t that Daleina cared about the gown or Naelin’s hair. It’s just that sometimes the role of queen is reassuring people that they aren’t going to die today.
Right now, nothing about Naelin was reassuring.
“Queen Naelin, I am deeply sorry for what you have endured. Please know that we will do all in our power to determine the fate of your children.”
Naelin began to bow, then stopped as if suddenly remembering she wasn’t required to bow anymore. “Thank you, Your Majesty. I am counting on that.”
Daleina wasn’t precisely certain what to say next. She didn’t know the other woman well enough to guess what she wanted to hear, though she could guess what not to say. “All of Aratay sorrows with you. Indeed, all of Aratay has felt your pain.” She took a breath—Naelin’s expression was as blank as stone. If it weren’t for the agitation of the spirits, Daleina wouldn’t have been able to tell she felt anything at all. “I know you have suffered a tremendous loss—”
“I’m not in mourning,” Naelin snapped. “There’s no ‘loss.’ They were kidnapped.”
Daleina had witnessed enough spirit attacks to know they didn’t kidnap children. They killed. But if she needed to be in denial, that was fine. After all, the message Ven had sent described the children as “missing,” and she intended to respect that. “If the situation were any different, I wouldn’t dream of asking you to—”
From the doorway, Headmistress Hanna said in her clipped no-nonsense voice, “What our polite queen is attempting to say is: you must knock it off.”
Perfect timing, Daleina thought.
Naelin looked startled.
Daleina shot a grateful look at the headmistress as the seneschal wheeled her in, then retreated again. The headmistress had lost use of her legs in the battle with Merecot and now traveled in a special chair. It was designed to clip onto ziplines and pulleys for travel between trees and had wheels that unfolded to traverse floors and bridges. In it, Headmistress Hanna looked as if she could crush several dozen spirits beneath the wheels while calmly lopping off the heads of multiple others. Daleina knew for a fact that Ven had insisted on several hidden blades in the armrests. Times are difficult, was all he’d said.
The elderly woman was dressed seriously, with a black robe that clasped at her throat. Her white hair was pinned into a bun. She looked every inch the strict schoolteacher-warrior that she was. “Even in your dreams, you have left yourself open to the spirits,” Hanna continued, “and your emotions have leached into the spirits. All of Aratay is suffering with you. As queen, you are connected to the spirits in a way unlike any heir—the spirits fuel you, giving you a queen’s special strength, but you also influence them. You must close yourself off from them before you cause more harm. I will show you how.”
Straightening her shoulders, Naelin seemed to be steeling herself, and Daleina wondered if she was going to refuse. She can’t, Daleina thought, and she won’t—not once she’s seen what’s happened. To ensure that, though, Daleina gestured to the table before the other queen could speak. “I have collected reports from across Aratay, Naelin. There have been spirit attacks. Lives lost. Homes lost. Harvests damaged.” She tapped her finger on the list, indicating the areas worst hit. “If we work together, we can repair much of it, but we have limited time before winter. I know you didn’t intend for these consequences—”
Naelin interrupted her. “I intended to save my children, and I might have done so, if you hadn’t interfered.” Every word was clipped, as if she were holding back a landslide worth of anger.
Daleina flinched. She hadn’t looked at it that way—she’d been trying to prevent a disaster, not keep Naelin from saving her children. She glanced at Ven. He looked worried, which wasn’t good.
“You know as well as I do that those spirits were from Semo,” Naelin continued—if she noticed the glance between her champion and Daleina, she didn’t acknowledge it. “Six air spirits from Semo—they’d have no reason to cross into Aratay without orders. Spirits stay with their queen. Which means Merecot forced them to attack . . .” Her voice faltered, and she swallowed and continued on. “They acted under her orders, which means that she has Erian and Llor.”
That . . . was possible, she supposed. “All I could glean from our spirits was that they felt ‘other,’” Daleina said, bemused. She had assumed they were rogue spirits—it happened sometimes, albeit rarely, that a spirit was able to throw off the will of its queen for a brief period of time and cause deaths. Rogue spirits often had to be eliminated, regardless of the damage it caused to the land. And she might have done just that if Naelin had been here to help her, and she said as much. “I’ve searched for them without success.” The fact was, she hadn’t had as much time or energy to devote to the search as she might like, given all the other crises she’d been presented with—crises that Naelin had, however inadvertently, caused. “The thing is, we don’t know they’re from Semo. In fact, I very much doubt—”
Naelin shook her head. “They don’t matter. They’re puppets with teeth. Only the one pulling the strings matters. And if we work together, we can bring her down and save Erian and Llor, but I need your help to—”
“No,” Daleina said, as gently as she could.
Naelin reeled back as if Daleina had struck her.
Daleina reached out toward her, then let her hand fall. “Naelin . . . Queen Naelin . . .” She searched for the right words. I have to make her understand! “I know you’re in pain, but we have to think of the whole of Aratay. To wage a war against Semo—”
“Only its queen.”
Shaking her head, Daleina tried to sound as firm as she could. “You can’t attack a queen without attacking her country. Innocents will suffer, and you don’t have any proof that she was responsible.” And, as she’d said, Daleina very much doubted there was such proof. If Merecot had sent spirits to attack the queen’s children, it was a stupid move—and Merecot was many things, but “stupid” wasn’t one of them. She was subtle and devious and ruthlessly ambitious but never stupid.
She hated to say it, but the only one being stupid right now—
“Of course she was responsible!” Naelin shouted. “She had motive! Plenty of it. Revenge and ambition.” With each outburst, the spirits on the ceiling gnawed through the wood with gusto. Vines shot out of the moldings and twisted around the sconces. Fire spirits whipped in circles within their flames, tossing sparks onto the floor.
Sending soothing thoughts, Daleina tried to calm them. It wasn’t easy, though, as she had to keep her thoughts quiet and unobtrusive, not wanting to agitate Naelin any further. “Motive isn’t proof, and I can’t condone an attack—”
“You cannot prevent it,” Naelin warned. Or, rather, threatened.
Daleina stood up straight at that, chin up, posture as regal as she knew how to make it. She may not be as powerful as Naelin, but she knew what it meant to be threatened, and she was not about to let anyone presume such a tone with her.
Sensing the tension, Ven laid his hand on Naelin’s arm. “Naelin, don’t do this. You’d throw Aratay into civil war. Innocent people will die.”
Stepping back from him, Naelin pulled away. “You too?” she whispered. “You’d abandon all hope of saving them? Just because you fear the consequences?”
Daleina wished she could comfort her. This must feel like betrayal, all of us against her. But she couldn’t let the other queen start a war. We haven’t even recovered from the last battle. The forest bore the scars.
And, because of Naelin, they now bore even more.