Page 8 of Beneath the Haunting Sea
Waited.
Waited.
Perhaps that’s all Eda intended for her—to waste away into nothing and fade into the stone, turn to dust for the wind to scatter.
The day was at least half gone by the time she heard footsteps on thestone outside her cell.
She went over to the door, heart pounding. There came the jangle of keys, the creak of wood, and the door opened, the sudden blur of orange torchlight making her eyes tear. She blinked rapidly, trying to adjust to the light.
Eda stood there, two guards at her back, that same gold-lily crown from last night circling her black hair. She was dressed in a deep-green gown,clasped again at the shoulders in gold. Her bare arms gleamed with scented oils and she wore a dagger at her waist. “Didn’t you ever learn to show deference to your superiors?” she said coolly. “You willbowbefore your Empress.”
Talia sank to her knees on the hard stone floor, hating that she shook, hating that Eda saw it.
“You tried to take everything from me. My birthright, my crown. Youdared imagine you could be Empress, and now you grovel at my feet.”
Talia jerked upright, staring Eda directly in her kohl-rimmed eyes. “I never wanted to be Empress—I never wanted any of this. I certainly didn’t try to take anything from you. You always thought you were so neglected and miserable, soliciting sympathy while putting yourself above the rest of us. You—the Governor of Evalla!”
Eda’s eyes glinted. “The regent never thought me capable of ruling Evalla, Talia. I decided to take the Empire instead.”
“You told the court I conspired with Denlahn!”
“Denlahn is easy to hate. Easy to blame.” Eda shrugged. “I did what I had to, fought for every scrap of power I possess. It was just handed to you, and you squandered it. That’s why this morning I bathed in the sacred pool andwas crowned Empress of Enduena, while you cowered in a cell like the miserable rat you are.”
Talia studied Eda in the torchlight. “What do you want with me?”
Eda smiled, sharp and humorless. “I want to pluck your heart out and use your sinews for harp strings.”
Talia took an involuntary step backward, but Eda caught hold of her chin, fingers digging deep, forcing her to be still. She squaredher jaw, despising her own terror.
“But death is quick. Living is not. I want you to feel the depth of your own insignificance.”
Her nails pressed even harder, cutting into Talia’s skin. “I’m banishing you from Enduena, little sister. On pain of death if you ever return. I don’t recollect which of my supporters I promised Irsa to, but I expect they’re already rearranging the furniture.”
Withoutwarning, she let go of Talia’s face and shoved her backward; Talia stumbled and fell, jamming her elbow hard against the stone.
“You thought you would be Empress of half the world. Now you will see how far you will fall.” Eda turned to the guards. “Get her out of my sight.”
“What about my mother?” Talia demanded as the guards hoisted her upward.
Eda swept away without answering, and the guardsdragged Talia through the prison, out into a bare stone courtyard. The sun was just vanishing over the western horizon, but there was enough light to see the executioner’s block in the center of the courtyard, the dark stains on the stones around it.
Where was Eda sending her that was a fate worse than death? And what had she done to her mother?
The guards brought her through a gate in the walland down a hill to the outer edge of the city. The last gleam of sunlight disappeared, and one cold star awoke in the twilight.
A carriage was waiting there. The guards shoved Talia unceremoniously into it.
“Wait,” she said as they shut the door and latched it from the outside. The windows were nailed shut, making the air inside stifling and hot. “Wait,please—”
But outside she heard the drivercrack his whip. The carriage lurched into motion.
She hurtled into the unknown, the white city and Ayah and everything she had ever understood fading fast away behind her.
Chapter Four
IT WAS NIGHT WHEN THEY REACHED THEsea. She could smell it through the rough sacking a guard had shoved over her head as he yanked her from the carriage. She could hear it, crashing against creaking wood, feel its sudden cold spray against her bare legs.
She’d spent five days rattling onward in that awful carriage, with little food and nothing but her own dark imaginings to keepher company. Worry for her mother ate her up, dwarfing even her dread for her own uncertain future.
