Quinlen and Ceren stopped short, watching them dart across the lawn. They were both so intent on their goal, neither noticed the couple in the garden watching them race past.
“Well, she seems to be in better spirits,” Quinlen commented.
“Yes, she does,” Ceren agreed, watching Evelayn with narrowed eyes. She looked better than she had in … well, since before her mother’s death. There was color in her cheeks, her eyes were bright, and she’d been smiling.
“Do you wish to continue on, or head in to break our fast?”
Ceren forced herself to turn back to Quinlen. “Let’s walk a little bit more. Then we can go in. I’m not sure I want to face my mother just yet.”
He laughed with her again as they resumed their walk, but Ceren couldn’t get the look on Evelayn’s face as she’d run by out of her mind. If she didn’t know better, Ceren would have thought she looked … happy.
She didn’t care how mad it made her mother, tonight she was waiting until Evelayn showed up.
“Absolutely not! It’s out of the question.”
General Olena’s outburst wasn’t unexpected, and she wasn’t the only one who had reacted badly to Tanvir’s idea—even though Evelayn was the one to present it.
“Your plan is to petition Máthair Damhán? It would be a suicide mission. We only have one Royal left. If we agree to try this plan, there is no way the queen will be the one to go,” Lord Teslar agreed.
High Priestess Teca shot a pointed look at Evelayn.
“The queen is sitting right here, and she is perfectly capable of hearing you,” Evelayn bit out, her patience growing thin. “Listen, all of you.” She raised her voice to a near shout over her council, until they fell silent and turned to her. “I know that it would be incredibly dangerous. But I am the only one who can do it. A queen or king is the only one with enough power to pose a threat to her—I’m the only one who could hope to walk into her lair and not be killed immediately.”
“No, not immediately. Perhaps she’d let you think you’d survive,” General Olena griped.
Evelayn was getting very irritated with the woman her mother had placed in charge of the armies when she’d forced Kel to stay at the castle. She took a deep breath to calm her rising temper. “What possible purpose could she have for killing me? If she did, there would be no successor to the Light Throne, and the power would be uneven indefinitely. Surely an Ancient knows and understands the need for balance.”
General Kelwyn spoke up next. “This bears more thought and careful consideration. I, too, am deeply concerned at the prospect of sending our queen to do this. But if she succeeded … the silk from Máthair Damhán would be the perfect trap. If we used it correctly, Bain wouldn’t be able to scent or see it. If we could somehow ensnare him using the silk, Queen Evelayn would have the opportunity she needed.”
“I just need to bring her something worth bargaining for—something she’d want desperately,” Evelayn supplied.
“What could an Ancient possibly need from us?” Lord Teslar piped up again.
“I don’t know—yet,” Evelayn added quickly. “But we’ll figure something out. The priestesses at the Dawn Temple can search all the texts they have on the Ancients to see if they can discover something useful.”
“And you plan on getting to her … how?” General Olena pressed. “Her lair is on the northern side of the Sliabán Mountains. In Dorjhalon.”
Lord Tanvir spoke up for the first time. “We’d have to sneak into Dorjhalon and travel to her lair.”
“Oh, is that all? Just sneak into Dorjhalon?” Lord Teslar scoffed simultaneously to General Olena bursting out, “We? Does that mean you intend to accompany her on this ill-fated mission?”
Evelayn held up her hand to prevent General Olena from saying anything else. “Nothing has been decided yet, including who would accompany me if I went. I want you all to think on this today and we will reconvene tomorrow morning to discuss it further. But give it an objective, thoughtful analysis. We have to destroy Bain somehow to restore peace. We all know that in a fight he would kill me. He’s too experienced, too powerful. My only hope is setting our own trap for him, something that gives me the upper hand. I can harness the power of the sun and call it down to consume him—but I need him to be immobilized first, at least momentarily. This is the only solution any of us has come up with that could work. There is nothing lighter or stronger than Máthair Damhán’s silk. If I somehow got Bain to chase me right into it, he would be trapped for at least a few moments before he could free himself. That’s all I need.”
Evelayn made herself sound much more confident than she felt. She didn’t dare look at High Priestess Teca, who could have called her bluff. It had taken her longer than a few moments to harness and call down the beam of sunlight that had taken her mother away. But she could practice. She had a little time … she hoped.
“Until tomorrow then?” She rose before anyone else could voice any other negative opinions, and everyone grudgingly followed suit. Evelayn’s gaze strayed to Tanvir, who nodded encouragingly at her, even though she knew he didn’t want her to go any more than anyone else in that room did. But her duty was to do everything in her power to protect her people—and for the first time, she at least had hope of succeeding. And if she failed, well, it wouldn’t be any worse than not having tried. Bain would get to her eventually, and as she’d admitted, she had no hope of surviving a direct confrontation with him.
She could do this. She had to do this.
There was no other option.
THE SUN HAD LONG SINCE BURNED OFF THE MIST AND fog of the morning, and the air had turned humid and hot as Evelayn made her way through the forest to the grove where her father was buried and the ring of stones stood in memory of her mother. Her ever-present sentries kept a respectful distance, allowing her to enter the clearing alone.
Every monarch picked where they wanted their final resting place to be; her parents had picked this grove because it was where they’d met and where her father had eventually asked Ilaria to be Bound to him. As Evelayn silently moved toward the stones, she tried to imagine them when they were young and falling in love.
She knelt down at the head of the ring of stones where her mother’s body had been laid out—the same place where she’d stood to call down the power of the sun.
Did you mean what you said that day—if that was truly you? she asked in her mind, not even daring to whisper in case the sentries had better hearing than most. You said I was born to do what you couldn’t, to bring peace to Lachalonia. But I don’t know if I can do this. I’m scared, Mama.
Evelayn tilted her head up to the sunshine that washed over her from above, trying to convince herself that the warmth and comfort it gave her was her mother’s way of holding her close from where she was, high above her daughter in the Final Light.