At its entrance, I braced myself for the agonies to come.
Each candle burned my eyes like a fiery poker, white-hot and blazing, leaving pinpoints of light lingering on my eyelids every time I blinked.
I threw my hands over my eyes, shielding myself from the worst of it. I careened down the stone steps, caught in a dizzy stupor, drunk on details, the way the flames leapt and danced, the way every dust mote was limned by their light.
Above me, the gods’ orbs burned with impossible luster, luminous as a lilac morning sky, riddled with swirls of gold, flecks of silver. They were so beautiful, so pure and dazzling, I wanted to cry. I wanted to watch them forever, hypnotized by their power, beguiled by their radiance.
Time stopped as I drank in their wonder. I didn’t want to move. I didn’t even want to blink lest I miss a millisecond of their splendor.
“Just a minute more,” I promised myself. “Just a minute…”
I paused, suddenly aware that it no longer hurt to look at the lights. The candles were not burning across my mind, blinding my vision.
My dose of the godsight was already beginning to soften and fade, and I’d not yet found Marnaigne’s candle.
With a curse, I pulled my gaze from the gods’ orbs and wandered the cavern until I found the plinth holding my candles.
My flame looked just as strong and cheery as before. The taper was tall and proud. It didn’t look as though any of the wax had melted in the years since I’d last seen it. My other two tapers lay beside it, waiting to be called into service, their wicks pristine and white. I reached out for one but my stomach lurched, reeling against what I was about to do.
“This is a bad idea,” I murmured. “This is a very, very bad idea.” I dropped my hand and sank to the ground, feeling despair claw at my throat.
I wasn’t going to do it. I would close my eyes against this horrible gift and wait until the Divided Ones pulled me back.
If they pulled me back.
I dreaded the thought of going back.
Back to the palace, back to the king’s chambers, back to where I was expected to kill him.
I opened my mind, and a new idea suddenly occurred to me: I didn’t have to return to the palace to kill the king. I could kill him here, with one errant breath, and no one could ever think it had been my fault.
The king would have passed away while I was working in the greenhouse. No one would blame me. Countless other physicians and soothsayers hadn’t been able to save him. No one had yet found a cure for the Shivers. I could return to my cottage without fear of punishment. My life, my stupidly long life, could go on as it alwayshad.
“I need to find the king’s candle,” I whispered, jumping into action. “I need to blow it out.”
I stood up, brushing off my skirts, and felt something inside one of my pockets crunch.
Euphemia’s note.
I pulled it out, guilt needling me in my middle. I thought of her tiny little face, so bright and hopeful. This was the last note she’d ever write to her father, and I’d not delivered it.
Curious, I unfolded the parchment. I would read it once, then set it to burn upon my candle’s flame. I’d kill the king, and in time, I would forget this moment. I would forget the guilt.
I smoothed out the paper. It was a picture, drawn in a talented but childish hand, showing the king and Euphemia out in the court gardens, a blanket spread beneath them as they picnicked.You’re my everything, Papa,she’d scrawled at the top of the page, beneath a showering rainbow.All my love, Euphemia.
My fingers traced her words. Inside me, the guilt grew.
Without a mother and with her older siblings drinking and dancing themselves into stupors, the kingwasher everything, I realized. Killing him would be orphaning her. She’d be left without either parent, just like my nieces.
Not just like,the voice in my head argued.She’s a princess. She has resources beyond comprehension.
But the little girl who’d made this picture hadn’t drawn her wealthy trappings, her privilege and resources. She hadn’t drawn their crowns. She’d simply drawn her father.
Marnaigne’s death would sentence her to a future full of heartache. I held her happiness in my hands now. I held…
I blinked in surprise.
My hands did hold something.
