Cosmé glares at my sister. “I won’t give up my city easily.”
“Of course not.”
An explosion rattles the audience hall, and Cosmé clutches the table.
“Not yet within the wall,” Jacián says.
Cosmé gives him a grateful nod, but she gestures to a young page and says, “Find out exactly what that was and where it came from.” The page dashes off.
“Your Majesty,” someone yells, “we must close the city gates now!”
“Do it,” Cosmé says.
“Does anyone know if our mounts are ready yet?” Alodia calls across the room.
Cosmé whirls on her. “Why are you so eager to give up?”
Alodia blinks. “I’m just being cautious. The Inviernos could dispose of all three of us in one blow if we are not quick to flee when the time comes.”
“Is that what you’d think if the Inviernos were attacking your capital?”
I need to take charge before the situation disintegrates. I catch Hector’s eye, and he gives me an encouraging nod.
I take a deep breath. “Cosmé, Alodia,” I interrupt, and everyone turns to look at me. “We can’t flee. We must stop the Deciregi right now.”
“Who?” says Cosmé.
“These animagi are not the usual kind. Eight of them are Invierne’s ruling council of priest kings. The most powerful sorcerers in the world.”
Cosmé’s eyes burn with fierceness. “Deci-something or not, they’re close together in a phalanx formation—an easy target. When they get too near the guard towers, my archers will take them out.”
I’m shaking my head even before she’s done. “You underestimate them.”
Her face darkens. “I’ve faced the animagi in battle the same as you,” she says. “I know full well—heartbreakingly well—what they’re capable of.”
I glance at Alodia for support, but my sister just shrugs. “Unless you have a better plan,” she says, “I need to get back to strategizing our retreat. Feel free to contribute at any time.”
Something snaps inside me. My fists clench at my sides. “I do have a better idea.”
“Oh?” says Cosmé.
I ignore her. “Storm, this phalanx formation. Is it because of a barrier?”
The Invierno nods. “One of them creates the barrier, allowing the others to attack at will. It also prevents backlash from their own fire, if they’re heading into the wind.”
“Which means Her Majesty’s archers will be completely ineffective.”
“Exactly so.”
Cosmé and Alodia glance at each other in alarm. The advisers mutter among themselves. I catch the words “trebuchet” and “crossbow”—as if these more powerful weapons stand a chance against magic.
Very loudly, very clearly, I ask Storm, “Could I get through the barrier, do you think?”
He nods. “Undoubtedly.” He looks around, recognizes that we perform for an audience, and says with a dramatic flair, “You are the only person in the world who could.”
I promise myself I’ll thank him later.
“What do you have in mind?” says Alodia. “Do you think you could walk right up and tap them on the shoulder?”
“Something like that.”
Another explosion makes everyone jump. Someone’s knee jerks the table; parchment slides off and scatters all over the floor. In the distance, faintly, comes the sound of screaming.
“That was a trebuchet,” I tell them. “Such a clumsy, inaccurate weapon. The sorcerers are closing in.”
Cosmé rubs at her temples. I hope she’s having doubts about her strategy.
“Elisa, just tell us,” my sister says, and her tone is so exasperated, so familiar, that I almost smile.
“I’m going to go talk to them,” I say. “I’ll convince them to turn around and go home.”
Lord Zito, Alodia’s personal steward, steps toward my voice. A scarf covers his empty eye sockets. “No one has been able to reason with them for generations.”
“I’ll show them that their magic can’t stand against that of my living Godstone. Then I’ll convince them that we are united, that even without magic, their armies are no match for all three of our countries working together. And finally I’ll offer something they want very badly in exchange for peace.”
Cosmé starts to protest, but Alodia says, “Elisa, tell me truly. Have you attained that kind of power? The kind that would frighten an animagus?”
“I have.”
Her eyes widen and her lips part. She says to Storm, “You always speak truly, yes?”
“Yes, Your Highness.”
“You are also an animagus, are you not?”
“I am.”
“And you believe my sister has the kind of power she claims?”
“No,” he says. “She is being modest.”
Storm is overstating things. Walking up to the Deciregi while under fire could easily get me killed.
But a smile spreads across Alodia’s face.
Storm opens his mouth to say something else, but nothing comes out. He seems caught in the mesmerizing beam of my sister’s smile. I’ve seen it happen a dozen times before. My sister’s beauty is one of the most powerful weapons in her arsenal, and she always uses it to good effect. I’m a bit surprised, though, that Storm is susceptible. For some reason, I thought him above such things.
“Even if we agree that you should risk yourself,” Cosmé says, “which we do not, we would need to give them proof of our unity. There’s no way we could come up with a proper accord so quickly. Maybe an abbreviated agreement, to be filled in later? No more than a page long. We could . . .”
I sigh as she drones on. This is why I called us together, after all. As we reach a unique crux in history, when three queens regnant rule the larger part of the world, I wanted us to be in accord. I wanted to bring a treaty back to Joya d’Arena to wave around and say, “See? These monarchs have made an agreement with me, your true queen.” Such an accord would make it very difficult for anyone challenging my rule to gain leverage.
But we don’t have time. The ground shakes, and Alodia clutches her steward’s shoulder. A soldier bursts through the door. Breathlessly, he exclaims, “They’re in the city. The castle watch is flinging quarry stone at them, but they keep coming. We have not been able to injure even one. They’re burning people. . . .”
It’s time to make my last play.
“I’ll save this city,” I say. “And I’ll either destroy the Deciregi or send them home.” I let my gaze sweep the room, trying to appear composed and regal. No, imperial. “But I will do it only if Basajuan and Orovalle swear fealty to Joya d’Arena.”
Someone gasps. Cosmé and Alodia gape at me. And suddenly I am facing down a roomful of rage.
One of Cosmé’s guards puts a hand to his scabbard. My companions shift around me so that within the space of a breath, I have Hector and Storm to my left and right, with Mara, Belén, and Red at my back.
“I admit, I never guessed you were so ambitious,” Alodia says. She bites it off like she would an insult, and I am very careful not to wince.
Of course she would misunderstand me. I’ve never had ambition to rule the world. Even now, knowing it’s my best possible course, the title “empress” tastes like dirt in my mouth.
Cosmé says, “You would hold my own country hostage over me?”
I smile sadly at her. “You know me well enough by now, don’t you, Cosmé? You know I would do anything, anything, to save us all?”
Another explosion rocks the castle, even more powerful than before. The windowpanes rattle. “That was not a trebuchet,” Hector says. “That was a Deciregus.”
“So what’s it to be?” I say. “Your archers have failed. Do I go out there with your written oaths in hand? Or do I go home to defend my own kingdom?”
“This is outrageous!” says one of Cosmé’s advisers. “The audacity, the arrogance it must take to—”