Yukiko lurches forward. “You can’t do this,” she says, outraged. “If your crew wasn’t sleeping like corpses on the other side of this palace, they would tell you that you can’t just let her go.”
I incline my head slowly toward Yukiko. “You’re not a queen yet. Don’t think for a second that you can tell me what to do any more than they can.”
I wipe the dried blood from my mouth. I always seem to have it on me, but tonight is one of the few times it has been mine. Last time it was below the deck of Rycroft’s ship. Last time it was Lira’s.
On cue, Lira gets to her feet and watches for what I’ll do next. I don’t want to be shaken, but I am. I see her standing there, waiting for my next command like a loyal member of the crew, and the chains holding me together break like cords.
“Go back to where you came from,” I tell Lira. “Right now.”
I crouch down to scrape the crystal from the floor and Lira wavers. I see her shadow move uncertainly in the dim light. Time drags through the room like mud.
“I wish this could be the end,” she says.
It sounds more like a warning than a threat, if there was ever a difference between the two. A divination of the inevitable battle to come. I don’t answer. Instead I wait for her footsteps to disappear from the dome, and it’s only when I’m sure she’s gone that I stand.
“You can’t let her live,” Yukiko says darkly.
“She’ll have plenty of time to die.” I palm the crystal. “Right beside her mother.”
Yukiko is disbelieving. “I warned you about this,” she says. “Love is not for kings. You’ll see that soon enough when we’re married.”
“You can stop talking about marriage now,” I tell her. “It won’t happen.”
Yukiko matches my look with added sharpness. “A prince who goes back on his word? How novel.”
“I told you that I was going to give you an alternative.” Impatience seeps into my voice. “I may not want to be king of Midas, but I know I sure as hell don’t want you to be queen.”
“And what offer could you give me that would be any more appealing?”
I grit my teeth. Reactions are all Yukiko ever seems to want, and Lira took the last I had left in me. “I assume you know of Queen Galina’s affliction.”
“My brother made me privy to the information when he took the throne.”
“Kardiá is gaining prominence through trade deals with other kingdoms. Their queen is proving to be popular in the north. Galina can’t compete with that if she can’t interact with her people for fear of infecting them. Eidyllio is suffering because she has chosen not to take another husband to help her rule.”
Yukiko’s disinterest is well-practiced. “Why should I care?”
“Because she said nothing about not taking a wife.”
“You want me to become the queen of Eidyllio?” Yukiko cackles disbelievingly.
“A queen,” I correct.
“And why would Galina agree to that?”
“Her power doesn’t affect women. You’d be able to liaise with the other kingdoms on her behalf, meeting dignitaries and diplomats. You’d see the people and inspire loyalty. All the things that Galina can’t do.”
“And the heirs?” Yukiko asks.
“She has no interest in continuing her cursed legacy.”
“You’ve thought it all through,” Yukiko practically purrs. “Even speaking to the queen?”
“Galina agreed it would be a mutually beneficial arrangement, especially if it gives her ties to Efévresi as well as Págos. And, of course, places Midas in her debt.”
“And if I refuse?”
I set my jaw. “Either you marry a powerful queen and rule by her side, or you stay in Midas with a future king who will question your every move.” I slip the crystal into my pocket beside my compass. “Who knows if I’ll even survive today? Do you really want to be engaged to a prince with a death sentence?”
Yukiko studies me and I know that it’s irrelevant whether or not this is a good deal. Right now she only cares about winning, and if she concedes so easily, then it won’t matter if she gets a powerful kingdom as a prize. To her, losing face is worse than winning a kingdom.
“I have a condition,” she says.
“Of course you do.”
“When the time comes, I want the Princes’ Bane to die by your blade.”
My hands clench in my pocket, knuckles cracking against the compass. Just like the owner of the Golden Goose to be as immoral as her patrons and just like a princess to make demands with the fate of humanity on the line.
I blink back the image of Lira’s wavering shadow and the look in her eyes when she realized I knew the truth of her identity. How she pushed me from the path of Rycroft’s bullet and asked me to kiss her on the edge of a mountain. I force myself to remember that lying is her greatest talent.
I school my features into indifference. “I can assure you,” I tell Yukiko, “the next time I face her, I won’t even blink.”
I feel the compass jolt against my hand and, slowly, the pointer shifts.
37
Lira
I RUN FASTER THAN I thought I could. Through the maze of the ice palace and the tunnels where Elian’s crew still sleeps. I run until it doesn’t even feel like running, but as though I’m floating. Flying. Swimming through the labyrinth as I did the ocean. I run until I smell water and see light peek out from the end of the path.
Elian let me live, but it was a small act of mercy that will be undone in the coming battle. Did he do it because he knew it wouldn’t matter? Because he wanted me to see my mother die first? I don’t want to cling to the idea of it being anything more, but I can’t help myself. I toy with the possibility that the betrayal of my identity didn’t undo whatever bridge had built itself between us.
When he dropped his sword, there was something so utterly depleted about it that I can’t find the words to describe it in any language. The idea that he doesn’t want me dead is impossible, but I hold on to it more desperately than I have ever clung to anything in my vicious life. He kissed me, after all. Brushed my cheek so delicately and pressed his lips to mine in a way that shot fire through me, melting away any pieces of the mountain that had slicked itself to my skin.
Things like that can’t be forgotten any more than they can be undone.
I break free from the ice palace and grab the oars to one of the small rowboats. I reach the other side of the great moat breathless and clutching the seashell necklace in my hand. The thick grooves of it press against my palm as I debate the choice ahead of me. Elian will think he can use the eye to kill my mother and every single siren in the ocean. He’ll risk his life, believing he has a weapon, when in fact that weapon is useless in his hands.