“Hail my sister the queen,” Abioye said skeptically, throwing us a dark glance as he pushed open the heavy door.
To reveal the real Queen Inyene, sitting at her throne and surrounded by guards.
“Ah, brother dear, do come join us!” Her voice pierced my heart like ice.
She’s not meant to be here! I froze behind Abioye, with the glare of a hundred crystal lanterns in my eyes. Was this a trap? Had Abioye deceived us? For a moment I cast a look to Montfre, who was looking just as appalled as me, but then Inyene was speaking again.
“Come in! Don’t dawdle by the door, letting the draft in – guards! Get that door closed!” Her voice was like cut glass, hard and sharp, with each syllable and consonant hard-edged and exact.
Suddenly there were guards moving across a wide, oval-shaped room towards us. These looked to be larger, better equipped versions of the mine guards outside, I saw. They were all men and women in their third or fourth decade, I thought – and had the grim, expressionless faces of those who knew their jobs well. I took in the better quality of studded leather, a bit of ring mail, and the fat leather belts that bristled with both small and larger weapons.
Should I try to kill her now? My hand was already moving to Lady Artifex’s dagger under the flap of my tunic, but suddenly Abioye’s hand was on my shoulder, pulling me forward beside him. His grip was like iron.
“So many guards just for a door, sister!” he said breezily.
“Do you not think that ones such as we need our protection?” his sister countered, and I could hear that when she said ‘we’ she meant ‘I’.
Abioye walked us across the middle of the throne room, once again paved in the checkerboard mosaic, to where there was a long line of what looked like purple cushions on the floor. Huh? I thought in confusion, before Abioye pushed me down beside him as he kneeled on the cushions, with Montfre doing the same on the other side.
In front of us were a set of black and white marble steps, leading up to the higher end of the room where Inyene’s throne sat. I found myself staring up at her in amazement.
I’ve never seen her before, I realized. It was strange to finally come face-to-face with her.
She was thin, but square-jawed like her brother. Too thin, was my next thought. The sort of thin that I had once seen in the faces of the Mitika tribe of the Plains. They lived much farther to the south than us, and once, when I had been young, my mother had insisted I travel with her on a rescue party, delivering water because their more arid region hadn’t had rain for almost an entire summer. I remember being shocked by their sunken eyes and the way that I could clearly see the veins on their temples and around their hands – and it was the same sort of emaciation that I saw here in Inyene.
But she could obviously afford any food or water she might want, I saw from her rich white robes, embroidered in stunning gold and lapis blue – as well as the throne itself that she sat upon, golden and encrusted with fat rubies.
It was also apparent that her physical stature made her no less imposing. If anything, it only added to her intensity as she leaned forward, her eyes bright and sparkling as they focused on Abioye.
“You didn’t come to our hunt, my brother. Why is that?” she said in her exact, clipped tones. “Luckily, I had my man here to help me.” She inclined her head just a fraction, and there, limping in from the shadows of the alcove where Inyene’s throne sat, came none other than Dagan Mar.
Dagan, his small frame appearing even more twisted with hate than usual, blinked when he recognized me. I gritted my teeth, my hand twitching towards the dagger hilt hidden under my folded arms.
But Dagan didn’t say anything. I saw his mouth pursed tighter, but he remained silent as he stood next to the Throne, glaring down at me, Abioye, and Montfre.
And he’s inches away from the scepter too, I thought in frustration, which lay across Inyene’s lap. It was a horrible, black-iron thing with different sized humps and rings and ended in the largest floret of Earth Light crystal that I had ever seen in my life. It glowed eerily against Inyene’s too-white hands, making her look more like an apparition out of some ghastly fairytale.
There was no way that I could wrest it from Inyene without Dagan Mar being able to stab me in the back, as well as two or three dozen of her guards jumping on me. I scowled.
“I could not assist you in the search, my sister… because I—” Abioye faltered at my side and swallowed nervously. His voice rose a notch. “I believe I have found the Stone Crown!”
The what? I thought.
“The Stone Crown,” Inyene said very slowly, drawing out every syllable like they were ripe fruit and she wanted to extract every goodness from them before she spat them out. “Her Majesty, the High Queen Delia’s Stone Crown,” she said, and her hands on the scepter gave a small shake of excitement.
“Yes, my sister! Yes – and these two have the clues to where it is hidden!” Abioye said in a rush.
I beg your pardon? All breath left my body as Inyene’s eyes swept over me, and it was like the rolling thunderhead of a storm.
“This slave?” Inyene frowned at me as I looked, aghast and quite probably stupefied, back at her. Why would Abioye lie like that? I inwardly screamed. How could he be so stupid? This is insane! I don’t know anything about any Stone Crown! My temper flared in my chest. But of course, he’s a spoiled, selfish lordling. One who would do anything to save himself, wouldn’t he! I felt betrayed.
“And I see that you have also released Montfre.” Inyene’s gaze swept away from me, discarding me as easily as if I were a beetle crushed upon her shoe. I blushed at the shame I felt, and my jaw clenched tighter.
“And you have given him a staff.” Inyene sounded less than pleased.
“My sister – I did,” Abioye once again lied, ending in his anxious high note. “I knew that Montfre would be able to help. And Narissea, the Daza girl—”
I growled to myself. I didn’t want my name thrown to the oppressor of my people so easily. I wanted her to learn my name and know what it felt to be me.
“Her people have legends about where the High Queen Delia hid the Stone Crown, out in the Plains. Between them, the girl and the mage, we will be able to decipher the map that I brought to you!”
Lady Artifex’s map? I concluded, as my shame and anger only deepened. When I saw Dagan Mar’s victorious little smirk behind Inyene, I had to lower my head and hide my face in my hair, staring daggers at the stupid purple cushion on the floor.
“The map you suggested that I send to the King of Torvald?” Inyene said sternly. “I seem to remember, brother dear, that you were suggesting that I would need to curry favor with the monarch of the Dragon Riders, and that it was imperative that I send it to him as quickly as possible?”
Abioye stammered beside me, but with no intelligible words appearing out of the jumble of sounds.
“Luckily for both of us, I have no desire to parlay with that fool of a boy,” Inyene said with obvious scorn. “He is the one who should be trying to entreat with me!”
“So, uh – you still have the map?” Abioye swallowed.