His mouth opened, and it closed again, and he squinted into the distance. Several moments later, he didn’t turn to me, but he asked, “Do you love him?”
Heat rushed to my face, but I wasn’t sure why. It seemed like such an easy question, but it wasn’t a simple answer. “Sometimes I think I cursed myself,” I admitted. “I saw Calix, in Jitra, before the wedding, and he was handsome. I wished …” My embarrassment, my foolishness choked my words. “I wished for him. For him to be my husband. Because I thought it was that easy—I would marry a handsome king and love him. Why would I not? I’ve never met a married couple who were not at least tremendous friends, if not deeply in love. And I thought it would feel powerful, and overwhelming, like a sandstorm.” I flushed, thinking of the jolt in the earth when Galen removed my veil. “And then I understood that I had only a sheltered young girl’s idea of love, and more likely, love is something that grows between two people. And there are moments when he’s kind to me, or thoughtful, and I feel something like hope—but I hate those moments more than any other, because they mean that I am beginning to mistake the absence of cruelty for love.”
His throat worked, and he looked down and back up again. “You know the difference,” he said. “You can’t possibly care about people the way you do and not understand what it means to be truly loved in return.”
I laughed, embarrassed but warmed by his words. “I don’t know. But I do believe that my parents are very lucky. They love each other so very much.”
“Was their marriage arranged?” he asked.
“Of sorts,” I said. “My father was about to become the leader of d’Dragyn, and he wanted to marry. There were only so many suitable women across d’Falcos or d’Skorpios, and my mother was the sister of the man who would become the Falcon.”
“So the position is passed from father to son?” he asked.
“No,” I said. “Well, in a manner. The clan leader will groom someone for the position; often it is a child of theirs, but not always. The clan leader must be the strongest, the most fit to lead. It doesn’t happen often, but if need be, the leader will select someone outside his family.” I smiled. “So I suppose you could say their marriage was arranged.”
“So was there ever someone else?” Galen asked, and his mouth teased at a smile.
“For my parents?” I asked, horrified. “No. They loved each other from the start.”
He laughed, and it was unexpected. “For you,” he said. “Surely you can’t have grown up thinking you’d marry Calix. What plans did you have for your life?”
“I thought I’d be just like my mother,” I admitted. “There’s a d’Skorpios boy around my age, Alekso. He was being groomed, and my brothers had met him and said he would be a good leader. I figured that was all there was to it—he would be my husband, and as soon as he removed my veil we would fall wildly in love and have seven children.” Even I had to laugh at how that sounded now, and Galen chuckled with me. The laugh stung my cheek, and I sobered. “How life has changed in a few short months,” I said.
But he had caught the bit of information I had accidentally betrayed. “Your husband is meant to remove the veil?” he asked.
Blood rushed into my face, pounding beneath the bruise. “Yes,” I said, glancing at him.
He met my eyes. “No one told us that.”
“They wouldn’t have,” I said. “Certainly not after it happened. The unveiling is supposed to be a spiritual connection—a binding. Some higher power. It’s supposed to be the husband who unveils his wife, revealing her to him. The start of their life together. The forging of their bond.” I gave him a sad smile.
“And I unveiled you,” he said, his voice low. “Not my brother.”
His eyes met mine. They looked bright and unnaturally green, regarding me in a way that made my skin tingle and shiver, the sensation as delicious as it was dangerous. I tore my eyes away from him. “I shouldn’t have told you that.”
“No,” he said, and I glanced back to him. He was gazing ahead, sitting straighter, with a ghost of a smug smile on his face. “I’m glad you did.”
Trizala
With another stretch of breathless galloping in the afternoon, we made Trizala well after nightfall; I almost regretted my fast rides that brought us to this strange new city without the light to see by.
Galen said we were getting close when the road rose steeply, the horses slowly climbing switchbacks cut into a mountain. It was dark, and the growing height made me uneasy, but Galen seemed confident and sure, and I followed close behind him.
After another turn, Galen stopped as we faced a wall, a stone gate bridged right over the road.
“Open the gate for the Trifectate Queen!” he bellowed.
“Open the gate!” someone called back.
Without us seeing how, the gate slowly rose until we could pass easily with our horses, and Galen ducked his head and rode into the dark shadow. I followed him, holding my breath.
A torch illuminated the dark area, and the man holding it bowed. Galen nodded to him without saying anything, and rode on.
The city was built into the mountain, houses balanced along the road, which continued in switchbacks up the mountain. As we continued higher, the houses were more elaborate and huge, carved into the rock itself.
“It’s like Jitra,” I marveled. “I never knew there was another city like this.”
Galen turned around, one side of his mouth winging upward. “I thought you’d like it. I figured you’d feel safe here.”
He turned around front, and it took me a moment to spur my horse to follow him. Perhaps I was just starved for affection, but his thoughtfulness touched my heart.
We kept going until we crested the mountain. At the top, there was a great flat space carved out between the mountains, and it was lit with a hundred torches. People were gathered there, a man who I guessed was a vestai and his family, and I dismounted, taking in the grand spectacle of it. Peering off the edge into the night, I could only get a rough sense of the sweep and beauty of this view; it felt like a rich, dark mystery, full of promise.
“Definitely crafted by Elementae,” Kairos said, coming up behind me. “Maybe you’re not the first Elementa from the desert, you know. Jitra would make a lot more sense.”
I looked at the rocks. “Maybe,” I whispered back.
He put his hands on my shoulders. “How are you feeling?”
Leaning against him, I smiled the small bit that my bruise would allow. “Free,” I told him.
Like a good brother, he didn’t remind me that was a lie, even as his hawk wheeled around us and dove for something in the dark, the only creature here that was really free to do as he pleased. Kairos just rubbed warmth into my shoulders and stood behind me.