Gaela stepped nearer and put one hand on Regan’s shoulder; the other she made into a fist and settled threateningly against Elia’s. “This is a waste of our time.”
“If you are to be queens of Innis Lear,” Elia said, “you must be part of the island, sacrifice your own selves to gain its trust, the trust it waits for you to show. Are you afraid of something our father was brave enough to undergo? If you would be the queens of Lear, this is how the crown is claimed.”
“I claim my own crown. Our father was not strong enough to do so. He was weak, and terrible. Magic did not help him.”
“He denied all but the stars; that is why the island turned on him, as it will turn on you if you reject the roots.”
“I do not need it. Let the wind rage—eventually it will stop, when it understands I dominate.” Gaela spread her arms, displaying herself.
Aefa thrust out her chin. “You cannot defeat the very rocks you stand on.”
“Quiet, Fool,” the eldest sister ordered.
Elia closed her eyes briefly, then leveled her gaze upon Gaela. “Are you less brave than our mother?”
“What,” snapped Gaela.
Regan hummed, low and soft, discordant with the wind.
Elia took Gaela’s wrist. “Dalat has everything to do with this, with us, with what we are. This is how she died: as a queen. With one action to protect us and uphold the star prophecy. She ate poison, and did not let the island save her.”
“No,” Regan whispered.
The eldest laughed like a snarling wolf, tugging out of Elia’s grip. “I don’t believe this. It was Lear’s worship of star signs that doomed our mother.”
Elia nodded. “Yes, but because she chose to let it, she chose to strengthen the people’s faith in the stars—which was faith in her. Don’t you see? Dalat’s legacy depended on that prophecy being fulfilled.”
Regan shook her head, no no no. “She loved us, and him. No one who loves like that would keep such a thing secret. Connley would—” The middle princess stopped suddenly, going still and certain and cold. “It is not possible.”
“She was wrong,” Elia said, glancing between her sisters. “She should have told us, told our father. Trusted him. But he lost her, too, haven’t you ever thought of that? He adored her, and his heart tore apart when she died. Have you no sympathy for that?”
“I crushed sympathy in myself long ago, little sister,” Gaela said.
“I do, though, have sympathy,” their witch-sister answered. “But no more for him than for myself or my sisters. No more than for the roots and wells of Innis Lear that he forsook! His pain does not excuse his actions.”
“Nor yours, Regan,” said Elia.
Gaela shook her head. In a voice sharp and regal she said, “I do not believe this, but even if I chose to, how would it change anything at all? It does not make me want to eat these death flowers, especially if my mother died of the same. You cannot manipulate my heart, out of desiring my destiny. I have always been meant for the crown. I have strived all my life to make myself into a king. I will not apologize for what I have done to achieve this, and none shall take it from me because of stars or trees. It is mine. I am the oldest and strongest. Peace will come from me.”
“And all my strength is hers,” Regan said. “Why do you not give over yours as well, Elia?”
The youngest breathed hard, struggling for calm. “I would have, before you went just as mad as Father, mad with violence and hatred, disregarding Innis Lear itself. I cannot allow the island to crumble beneath my feet for your arrogance and ambition.”
“You’re ambitious, too, Elia,” Ban Errigal said. The wizard had been quiet, following his queen’s command.
The sisters turned to him like a fearsome, three-headed dragon. Elia said, “To bring everyone together. To save everyone.”
“To forgive,” he sneered.
Morimaros of Aremoria spoke pointedly to the Fox, “Sometimes we forgive others because it keeps our own hearts whole, not because they deserve it or for any thought of them.”
Ban’s nostrils flared, but Aefa yelled, “Stop, all of you! This is a family squabble that will tear the roots from the earth and pull the stars from the sky if you allow it!”
“Yes! Don’t you see?” said Elia. “This happened because our family shattered, and if we come together again we can fix it together.”
“What would that look like? You married to this king? Always a threat at our east?” Gaela smiled a dark smile.
Regan petted Elia’s cheek before her little sister could shy back. “I like this rage in you, baby sister. Perhaps you can join with us. But you must give up your Aremore king, and these fantasies about our mother, and let go of thinking Gaela and I do not have Innis Lear’s best interest at the fore of our minds. If the rootwaters mean so much to you, as they do to me, I will eat this poison, and Gaela will be my king.”
“No,” Gaela said stubbornly. “We do not need the imagined approval of the land. It is ours.”
“Ban will tell you,” Elia said, latching her gaze onto the Fox. “You know, Ban Errigal, Fox of Aremoria, of Innis Lear, of whatever side you steal. Tell them, if they trust you so well, that they must bargain with the island.”
“You cannot use him against us, either,” Regan said, silkily. She dug her fingers into the Fox’s hair, curling a fist against his skull. “Ban is ours. You gave him up, his great strength and power, but we will not.”
The hemlock blossoms trembled as the Fool’s daughter stamped her foot. “How can you do this, Ban Errigal? Elia has loved and defended you beyond all reason, while you have betrayed all of us some time or another. How dare you stand against her?”
“How…” Ban bared his teeth. “Here are two queens who admire me for myself and give me a purpose I am suited to. Who do not treat me as a bastard, or a tool, or someone who never, never, can be an equal. They are my equals! They do not hold themselves apart from me.”
“You hold yourself apart from us,” King Morimaros said, quiet with intensity. “I made you my friend.”
“How do you come to be here, Aremoria?” Gaela asked. She stepped to the king: the black princess of Lear was nearly as tall as the foreigner. “What is your game?”
“I am here to support Elia for the crown. That is the will of Aremoria.”
“It will be war, then.”
“No!” Elia put herself between them, a hand on the king’s chest and one flat out to Gaela.
Morimaros met Gaela’s hot gaze over Elia’s head. “You will lose against me.”
The eldest sister did not smile, but behind her hard expression came a ferocious joy. “You cannot take Innis Lear. It has never been yours, and never will join with Aremoria again.”
Elia shoved hard at both. “Stop, now. This will not be war. We must—we must—eat of the flower, and drink of the rootwater. That will decide, without bloodshed, without dividing our island.”
“Yes,” hissed Regan.
Gaela whirled to her middle sister, thrust out a hand, and grabbed her arm. “Collect yourself, sister.”
In the quiet, the wind gusted again, streaking under the tightly staked walls to tear and tease at their ankles and skirts. Candles snuffed out.
Fire, said Aefa Thornhill with a snap of her fingers, and five of the candles lit themselves again.
Through the dim orange shadows, Morimaros of Aremoria advanced. “Ban Errigal. Our business is bloodshed.” The king grasped the front of Ban’s gambeson, pulling it into his fist. “I challenge you. Fight me, if you think you are worthy.”
Gaela Lear laughed.
“To the death,” added Regan, dark fascination in her tone.
“No,” the last princess said, calmly.
But the king ignored her. “If I am defeated, Innis Lear will see no penalties from Aremoria. Novanos, called La Far, will make sure of it.”
Ban stared at Morimaros.
The silence grew heavy with monument.