Maia nodded gravely, her heart blistering with heat, and descended the steps of the tower. As she left, she heard the chancellor say, “Search the entire castle. We must round up every last one.”
The main hall was engulfed in activity, and as the news spread, people jostled past each other unseeing. Maia was quickly lost in the crowd. She bumped into the edges of the wall, nearly tripping on the scattered floor rushes. The noise of the common room became deafening, and she longed for the solitude of the chancellor’s tower. She knew she would not be permitted refuge there again.
“Lady Maia.”
She barely heard the words through the fog in her mind. Someone touched her shoulder.
Maia turned, confused, to see a page. He was about her own age and dressed in the king’s livery.
“He bid me give you this,” the boy murmured softly, holding out a small package of folded paper with a wax seal. The seal was affixed with the king’s ring—the ring that the chancellor wore.
She looked at the boy, who glanced nervously around, thrust the package in her hand, and then vanished into the crowd.
Maia hastily retreated to the gardens behind the castle grounds, crushing the small packet in her hand. Her heart pounded with anxiety. The packet was heavy, as if it carried coins. But she suspected—nay, she knew—what was in it. The wax of the seal rubbed against her palm. She fought down her emotions, struggling to breathe, and found a quiet stone bench amidst the tall hedges. She glanced around furtively, making certain she was alone and had not been followed, then sank onto the bench and broke the seal.
She opened the stiff paper and saw the first words of blotchy ink. Chancellor Walraven’s handwriting. The edges of the kystrel peeked out beneath the next fold in the paper. Her heart thrummed with fear and excitement as she set the medallion on her lap. Then, smoothing the paper out, she started to read.
Lady Maia,
I did what I did for you. Your father is determined to abandon your mother and you, his rightful heir. All his thoughts are bent on it, and as you know, the Medium responds to our deepest thoughts and emotions. I fear the curse he is bringing on his kingdom as a result. To delay this collapse, your mother and I made an alliance at Muirwood. I will fall so that you may rise. You are the rightful and lawful heir to the throne of Comoros. There are no grounds for your father to forsake his marriage. I have done my best to shield you, but it is not enough. He will punish you for his failure to rid himself of his wife. In so doing, he will punish the land.
The Dochte Mandar will be expelled. When we are gone, you will soon discover that our presence held at bay a malevolent force. You will feel the presence of unseen beings who will wish to do you harm. I can no longer protect you from them, but I leave this kystrel for you.
I may never see you again, Lady Maia. I had hoped to serve under you when you became queen. I fear I may not live to see that day. My only regret is that I never sought to become a maston myself. Had I served the Medium with but half the zeal as I served your father, then it would not have left me naked to mine enemies. Until we meet again, in Idumea.
Your servant.
Maia felt the tears slip from her lashes and drip onto the folded paper, smudging some of the words. She struggled to rein in her feelings, but she could not, and hung her head, weeping softly in the gardens.
Chancellor Walraven had sacrificed his position, his eminence, and his future to preserve her right to inherit the throne. To stall the decline her father’s debauchery had caused in court and throughout the kingdom. Weeping was an unfamiliar act. She did not like the way it made her tremble and shake, her nose drip, the wildness it threatened to unleash inside her. She wiped her nose on her sleeve, trying to calm herself. What a strange mixture of emotions. Gratitude and sadness, hope and desolation. She would not be able to see her mother. She would not be able to see her friend, her mentor—the man who had taught her to read even though it was forbidden by his own people. She would remember that. She would always remember him. She sighed, struggling to tame her tears until she finally succeeded. She wiped her mouth and read the letter twice more.
Once she had it memorized, she turned her attention to the kystrel. Cupping it in her hand, she felt the hard edges of its woven, whorl-like pattern. It did not represent any specific creature. It was just a ring of interwoven leaves that were neither uniform nor precise. A kystrel—named after the falcon. A small bronze chain was affixed to it.