Page 13 of Beyond the Shadowed Earth
“First of all, I want to apologize for my sister’s behavior, Your Imperial Majesty. Whatever her temper would suggest, wehavecome in peace. I will keep her from attending future council sessions.” His words were passive, but an intensity lurked in his eyes that belied him.
Eda leaned against the wall, the still-cool stones pressing into her shoulder blades. A honeysuckle flower fell into her lap and she brushed it dismissively onto the ground. “I appreciate your sister’s passion, Your Highness—and her honesty. Do you truly harbor no ill will against Enduena, or are you just playing a part to infiltrate my palace?”
Ileem smiled, quick and confident as a lion. “You don’t trust me at all, do you, Your Majesty? I’m glad.” He ducked under the trellis and sat down beside her, closer than was appropriate—his knee bumped hers, and she could feel his heat through the thin material of her skirt. “Only an immense simpleton would trust me, especially seeing as your Barons arranged our visit without your knowledge or consent.”
Eda opened her mouth to object, but he held up a hand to forestall her. “Please, Your Majesty—extend me the courtesy of the truth, as I am doing to you.” Ileem imitated her posture, lounging back against the stone wall and stretching his long legs out in front of him. He was near enough she could see the markings on his ear cuff: they were words in an ancient Denlahn dialect, engraved in a flowing script. She knew enough to recognize the language, but couldn’t read it.
Eda glanced to her guards, who were watching from a few paces away, their hands on their saber hilts. “All right, then. What’s the truth?”
He turned his face to hers, and she saw there were flecks of gold in his brown eyes. “The truth is, ever since I was a child, since before I pledged myself to Rudion, I was taught that Enduenans were monsters from the lowest Circle of the world, without souls or hearts. I wanted to grow into a man, so I could come here and slaughter you all, wielding the vengeance of the gods. When my father died—” Ileem swallowed, his eyes shifting away. He pulled an orange blossom from the vine and twirled it in his lap. He stared at it, his voice growing husky. “It broke me, Your Imperial Majesty. My father was the best man to ever live. I wanted to board a ship and sail to Enduena. I wanted to burn you to ashes in your beds. I wanted all of you to suffer, as I had suffered.”
“What changed?” Eda’s eyes fixed on the orange flower. From over the wall, she heard the parrots calling from the aviary.
“Rudion came to me in Halda. He gave me a vision.”
Eda grew very still. “What vision?”
“Of my city in ashes, the stones tumbled down into the dust, my mother and brothers and sister bloodied and dead, lying in a pit of bones. Of warships filled with Enduenan soldiers, death in their eyes. Of the whole world, consumed with war, weeping, dying. Of winged spirits from the void, devouring the sun. And then Rudion himself spoke to me.”
She tried to appear calm, though her every nerve was on fire. “What did he say to you?”
Ileem tucked the honeysuckle blossom behind Eda’s ear. “That if I followed the path of my vengeance, the vision would come true. That I would destroy the world with my anger, that there was a better way.” He touched her cheek with his hand, his fingers calloused and warm. “Once more I swore myself to my god. Once more I made a vow to him: a vow to forsake my anger. To continue to serve him with the whole of my being. To forge peace, instead of war. I want a better world, Your Imperial Majesty. In the name of my god I want peace. Withyou.” He let his hand fall. “I want to help you. Let me prove to you that you can trust me. That the vow I made to Rudion was in earnest.”
Her ears buzzed, her skin burned where he’d touched her. She saw the truth of his words, but she trusted him less than before. He was volatile, a flame burning too close to a vat of oil. A needle of jealousy pricked through her that Tuer spoke to him so freely, when she was left grasping at shadows. “What are you proposing?”
Casting a swift glance at her guards, Ileem gingerly folded Eda’s hand into his. “Let me help you solidify your power. Let me help you put your Barons in their place. And when I do it, whenwedo it …” She could feel his pulse, sharp and quick, in his wrist. “Marry me.”
Eda jerked out of his grasp, gaping.
Ileem didn’t move to take her hand again, he just watched her, the sunlight filtering through the honeysuckle vines and tracing lacy patterns on his skin. “We could be so strong, together. Stronger than your Barons—stronger than anyone. You would be under no one’s rule.”
“I am Empress of half the world,” she spat at him. “I’m under no one’s rule now.”
“Aren’t you?”
“I’m handling my Barons,” she said huffily, though both of them knew very well that wasn’t true.
She felt horribly exposed before him, like he could see all her darkest secrets. She rose from the bench, and he did, too. “I feel it only right to return honesty for honesty: I have no intention of adding a marriage clause to our treaty. I will work toward peace with Denlahn, in the name of the god we both serve, but that is all.”
Ileem bowed low. “Perhaps you will allow me to change your mind, Your Imperial Majesty. In any case, I thank you for hearing me.”
Eda strode quickly from the courtyard, trying to shake the knowledge that Tuer had indeed sent Ileem and that he might be her best chance at permanently subduing her Barons.
She refused to admit to herself that he might be her only chance.
Chapter Five
“SO WHATHAPPENED?”SAIDNIREN,WITHOUT LIFTINGher head. She was bent over her drawing table in the center of her sitting room, an illuminated manuscript opened before her. Light flooded through the glass dome of the roof, pooling soft and golden all around her, like she was a goddess from the very book she was slowly copying out. She used swift, bold strokes, replicating the work of whatever unnamed scribe had first written and illuminated the book. Niren couldn’t bear to be idle, and had inserted herself into the rotation of apprentice librarians and scribes who routinely copied manuscripts for the palace library. The head librarian had welcomed her gladly, because even though she’d had no formal training, Niren’s skill was unmistakable.
Eda had watched Niren copy manuscripts many times—it was horribly boring until Niren put down her pen and picked up her paints to fill in the color. Right now she was still at the dull black-and-white phase, but a glance at the original made Eda’s breath catch momentarily in her throat: between and around the neat square letters that made up the text, a petitioner knelt before the god Tuer, who had a mountain for his throne and a crown made of stars. Ileem’s voice ran through her mind:Once more I swore myself to my god.
“Well?” Niren prodded, actually looking up from her work to catch Eda’s eye. “What happened at the council? Did Rescarin steadily undermine you while Domin drooped with love and Lohnin frowned over his awful beard? Did Princess Dagger Eyes try to murder you? Did Prince Silver Ear propose?”
This was enough to shake her from her reverie. Eda laughed. “You’re not far off. No proposal, but Prince Ileem did ask to speak with me, alone.”
Niren gave Eda a wicked grin. “Alone,hmm? Must have been all that dancing last night. Tell me everything!”
Eda did, glossing over the prince’s mention of his vision and his vow to Tuer. Niren listened with interest, the manuscript forgotten.
