“Sorry, sorry.”
It was all new and happening so fast, but I was here and she was with me. I played with the ends of her hair, the soft strands escaping her intricate crown of braids and curling around my fingers. She shuddered.
“This isn’t so bad though.” The crowd hid us from prying eyes, too many loves and friends caught up in their own lives to care. Elise’s fingers crept farther up my neck with each step. I leaned forward to ease her grip. A spot of ink freckled her nose. “What was the poem?”
Elise blushed, eyes widening. “What?”
“You wrote a poem on my arm.” I trailed my fingers down the arch of her neck, her shoulder, her wrist, and laced our fingers. The music pitched and we spun into the press of bodies. I pulled her closer. “I want to know what it said.”
Whatever I was now, whatever Our Queen had made me, I had Elise, and she would have me. The ink was washed from my skin, but the memories would never fade.
“It was only part of one.” She ducked her head into the curve of my throat. Rosewater and lemons lingered in her hair, sharp and fresh and clearing the scent of death from my new mask. “It’s not even from Igna.”
I laughed. “You wanted me to translate a poem in a language I don’t know and wasn’t learning?”
“I’m still learning it. The poetry was for practice.” She exhaled, breath fluttering against my throat. “Under the moon alone, I broke as ice breaks.”
I slid to a stop in the middle of the dance floor. “What?”
“It’s only one line,” she murmured.
“But it’s sad.” I spun her as the dancers swelled around us, heels whispering across the tile with each pluck of the strings. “Breaking—it’s dying, isn’t it?”
“It’s not literal.” Elise laid her cheek against my shoulder. Hidden in the crowd and by the twisting collar of her dress, she kissed the skin beneath my ear. “And sometimes a little death is a good thing.”
I’d have to ask Ruby about poetry.
The song died and the crowd stilled. Elise brought us to a stop, and I brushed her cheek, straightening, no better at dancing. She dropped her hands, and I bowed slightly as she stepped back.
“I want you to meet my father.” She smiled, tugging me from the dance floor. “He’s still sick, so he won’t talk long. Don’t worry.”
I pressed the mouth of my mask to her cheek. “Anything you want.”
She shook her head and darted off. Meeting him wouldn’t be bad so long as she was at my side. A servant drifted past with a tray of drinks, and I followed them, picking up a cup of mulled wine to warm my hands. I settled into a window seat, a cold breeze at my back.
“Beware the Erlend winter,” a soft voice said to my left. “It will come quickly and quietly if we’re already getting northern winds.”
Forty-Six
“Our new Honorable Opal.” Nicolas del Contes bowed next to me, tall frame barely fitting in my small nook. “Welcome to court.”
“Lord del Contes.” I nodded back. He was predatory up close, and the runes peeking out from under his clothes set my teeth on edge. A Master of the Soul—one of the only ones left, the only one who’d nothing to do with the shadows—with the ink beneath the thin flesh of his hand and feet to prove it. During the old days, he could’ve transported himself from place to place no matter the distance with just a rune. And now he was stuck here.
“What’s that mean?” I held my hand out the window, the current of the Caracol rushing far beneath us. “About the Erlend winter?”
“Old saying—Erlend winters are bitterly cold.” He leaned against the wall, gaze scanning the dancers. “Sooner the wind blows in, longer and colder the winter will be. Makes it hard to counter Lord del Weylin, but he should be easier to manage now that you took Seve out of the equation.”
It took everything within me not to tense and deny it immediately. I cocked my head to the side, turning slightly to him. “Didn’t he fall out a window?”
“Well, off the roof but only after you pushed him.” Nicolas stared at me, face even but eyes cold. “Please don’t insult me by playing the fool. You’re after the people who allowed Nacea to fall, a list nearly identical to the list of noble Erlend houses, I’m sure.”
“If you’d cleaned up your messes, Lord del Contes, I wouldn’t have to be.” Rage straightened my spine and forced me to stand taller. I was already Opal. He couldn’t touch me. “You let your fellows get away with it.”
“You should call me Nicolas. We’ll work together often enough.” He raised his hand to his mouth and held it there in the telltale sign of keeping a secret. “The art of keeping a very fragile, very new country intact without falling back into the violence that preceded it is that you must separate your personal feelings from your nation’s needs. Which is why Our Queen designed your final test—do not kill anyone but Thorn da Tonin.”
That didn’t make it any better. I shrugged.
“Why was Three flayed? In the forest?” Nicolas leaned down so he could look me in the eyes. “Exactly like the shadows. Why?”
“To scare me.”
“No, to scare everyone.” Nicolas set his glass down on the window ledge behind us and wiggled his fingers, casting long shadows on the stones. “Our Queen’s claim to the throne, to the nation she created, is based on her history as the mage who cast out magic and destroyed the shadows to protect us. But if there were proof that magic still existed, that the shadows still lived, that she had not truly gotten rid of them, no one would have cause to listen to her. She would just be a woman with a crown. The only reason most Erlend nobles bowed to her rule was because they feared her, and we needed them because we needed their land to prevent famine and revolts.”
“They were the war,” I said. “They were the whole reason we were at war.”
“And it is much better politically for us if they start the wars.” He straightened up and dropped his voice to a whisper. “It’s true though—Erlend culture is a river overflowing with violence. It may be dammed, it may be guided and useful, but it wears away at the rest of the world. I was born in its currents and know its path, and while I may leave its waters, I will never be free of its pull. But all rivers have a source. If you want to stop Erlend from committing such atrocities again, you must stop Erlend at its source.”
“Lord del Contes, why are you telling me this?” I asked, finally finding the words I wanted to say amid the swirling mess of uncertainty and anger within me.
He grinned. “Because we don’t need them anymore.”
I shifted, not at all happy with that answer but no longer as angry. “That’s it? You just don’t need them anymore?”
“We. You’re a part of this nation too.” He took a sip of his wine, completely at ease. “Did Seve tell you anything?”
I hummed, weighed my options, and shook my head. “Nothing I can’t tell you tomorrow.”