The Queen of Nothing Read online

  The Ghost reaches for another slice of the apple and hesitates, looking at the food as though seeing it for the first time. “Why did you have any of this with you? Why bring a picnic to explore a cave?”

  “I was planning on running away,” I admit. “Tonight. Before they discover I am not the sister I am pretending to be.”

  He looks up at me in horror. “Then go, Jude. Run. You can’t stay for my sake.”

  “I’m not—you’re going to help me get out of here,” I insist, cutting him off when he starts to argue. “I can manage for one more day. Tell me how to open your chains.”

  Something in my face seems to convince him of my seriousness. “Grimsen has the key,” he says, not meeting my eyes. “But you’d be better served if you used the knife.”

  The worst part is, he’s probably right.

  When I get back to the tent, the guard isn’t there. Feeling lucky, I slip under the flap, hoping to creep to my bed before Madoc gets home from whatever he’s plotting with his generals.

  What I do not expect is for the candles to be lit and Oriana to be sitting at the table, entirely awake. I freeze.

  She stands, folding her arms. “Where were you?”

  “Uh,” I say, scrambling to figure out what she already knows—and what she’d believe. “There was a knight who asked me to meet him under the stars and—”

  Oriana holds up her hand. “I covered for you. I dismissed the guard before he could carry tales. Do not insult me by lying anymore. You are not Taryn.”

  The cold horror of discovery settles over me. I want to run back out the way I came, but I think of the Ghost. If I run now, my chances of getting the key are pitiful. He will not be saved. And I will have very little chance of saving myself.

  “Don’t tell Madoc,” I say, hoping against hope I can persuade her to be on my side in this. “Please. I never planned on coming here. Madoc rendered me unconscious and dragged me to this camp. I only pretended to be Taryn because I was already pretending to be her in Elfhame.”

  “How do I know you’re not lying?” she demands, her unblinking pink eyes gazing at me warily. “How do I know you’re not here to murder him?”

  “There’s no way I could have known Madoc would come for Taryn,” I insist. “The only reason I’m still here is that I don’t know how to leave—I tried tonight, but I couldn’t. Help me get away,” I say. “Help me, and you will never have to see me again.”

  She looks as though that’s an enormously compelling promise. “If you’re gone, he will guess I had a hand in it.”

  I shake my head, scrambling for a plan. “Write to Vivi. She can get me. I’ll leave a note that I went to visit her and Oak. He never needs to know Taryn wasn’t here.”

  Oriana turns away, pouring a deep green herbal liquor into tiny glasses. “Oak. I do not like how different he is becoming in the mortal world.”

  I want to scream in frustration at her abrupt subject change, but I force myself to be calm. I imagine him stirring his brightly colored cereal. “I don’t always like it, either.”

  She passes me a delicate cup. “If Madoc can make himself High King, then Oak can come home. He won’t be between Madoc and the crown. He will be safe.”

  “Remember your warning about how it was dangerous to be near a king?” I wait until she sips before I do. It is bitter and grassy and explodes on my tongue with the flavors of rosemary and nettle and thyme. I wince but don’t dislike it.

  She gives me an annoyed look. “You certainly have not behaved as though you recalled it.”

  “Fair,” I admit. “And I paid the price.”

  “I will keep your secret, Jude. And I will send Vivi a message. But I won’t work against Madoc, and you shouldn’t, either. I want you to promise.”

  As the Queen of Elfhame, I am the one Madoc is against. It would give me such satisfaction for Oriana to know, when she thinks so little of me. It’s a petty thought, followed by the realization that if Madoc found out, I would be in a whole different kind of trouble than I have been in before. He would use me. As frightened as I have been, here by his side, I ought to have been even more afraid.

  I look Oriana in the eyes and lie as sincerely as I have ever done. “I promise.”

  “Good,” she says. “Now, why were you sneaking around Elfhame, masquerading as Taryn?”

  “She asked me to,” I say, raising my brows and waiting for her to understand.

  “Why would she—” Oriana begins, and then stops herself. When she speaks, it seems as though she is talking mostly to herself. “For the inquest. Ah.”

  I take another sip of the herbal liquor.

  “I worried about your sister, alone in that Court,” Oriana says, her pale brows drawing together. “Her family reputation in tatters and Lady Asha back, no doubt seeing an opportunity to exert influence over the courtiers, now that her son was on the throne.”

  “Lady Asha?” I echo, surprised that Oriana would think of her as a threat to Taryn, specifically.

  Oriana rises and gathers writing materials. When she sits again, she begins penning a note to Vivi. After a few lines, she looks up. “I never supposed she would return.”

  That’s what happens when people get tossed into the Tower of Forgetting. They get forgotten. “She was a courtier around the time that you were, right?” That’s the closest I can say to what I mean, that Oriana was also the High King’s lover. And while she never gave him a child, she has reason to know a lot of gossip. Something led her to make the comment she did.

  “Your mother was once a friend to Lady Asha, you know. Eva had a great appreciation for wickedness. I do not say that to hurt you, Jude. It is a trait worthy of neither scorn nor pride.”

  I knew your mother. That was the first thing Lady Asha ever said to me. Knew so many of her little secrets.

  “I didn’t realize you knew my mom,” I say.

  “Not well. And it’s hardly my place to talk about her,” Oriana says.

  “Nor am I asking you to,” I return, although I wish that I could.

  Ink drips from the tip of Oriana’s pen before she sets it down and seals up the letter to Vivienne. “Lady Asha was beautiful and eager for the High King’s favor. Their dalliance was brief, and I am sure Eldred thought bedding her would come to nothing. He rather too obviously regretted that she bore him a child—but that may have had something to do with the prophecy.”

  “Prophecy?” I prompt. I have a memory of Madoc saying something similar regarding his fortune when he was trying to convince me that we should join forces.

  She gives a minute shrug of her shoulders. “The youngest prince was born under an ill-favored star. But he was still a prince, and once Asha had him, her place in the Court was secure. She was a disruptive force. She craved admiration. She wanted experiences, sensations, triumphs, things that required conflict—and enemies. She would not have been kind to someone as friendless as your sister must have been.”

  I wonder if she was unkind to Oriana, once. “I understand she didn’t take very good care of Prince Cardan.” I am thinking of the crystal globe in Eldred’s rooms and the memory trapped inside.

  “It wasn’t as though she didn’t dress him in velvets or furs; it’s that she left them on until they grew ragged. Nor was it that she didn’t feed him the most delectable cuts of meat and cake; but she forgot him for long enough that he had to scavenge for food in between. I don’t think she loved him, but then I don’t think she loved anyone. He was petted and fed wine and adored, then forgotten. But for all that, if he was bad with her, he was worse without her. They are cut from the same cloth.”

  I shudder, imagining the loneliness of that life, the anger. That desire for love.

  There is no banquet too abundant for a starving man.

  “If you’re looking for reasons why he disappointed you,” Oriana says, “by all accounts, Prince Cardan was a disappointment from the beginning.”

  That night, Oriana releases a snowy owl with a letter attached to its
claws. As it flies up into the cold sky, I am hopeful.

  And later, lying in bed, I scheme as I have not done since my exile. Tomorrow, I will steal the key from Grimsen, and when I leave, I will take the Ghost with me. With what I know about Madoc’s plans and allies and the location of his army, I will force a bargain with Cardan to rescind my exile and to end the inquest into Taryn. I’m not going to let myself get distracted by letters I never received or the way he looked at me when we were alone in his rooms or my father’s theories about his weaknesses.

  Unfortunately, from the time I wake, Oriana will not let me leave her side. While she trusts me enough to keep my secret, she doesn’t trust me enough to let me walk around the camp, now that she knows who I truly am.

  She gives me wet laundry to spread before the fire, beans to pick from stones, and blankets to fold. I try not to rush through the tasks. I try to appear annoyed only because there seems to be a lot of work for me, though there was never so much work when I was Taryn. I don’t want her to know how frustrated I am as the day wears on. My fingers itch to steal the key from Grimsen.

  Finally, as evening sets in, I catch a break. “Take this to your father,” Oriana tells me, setting down a tray bearing a pot of nettle tea, a wrapped-up bundle of biscuits, and a crock of jam to go with them. “In the generals’ tent. He asked for you specifically.”

  I grab my cloak, hoping not to seem obviously eager, when the second half of what she said sinks in. A soldier is waiting for me outside the door, amping up my nerves. Oriana said she wouldn’t tell Madoc about me, but that doesn’t mean she couldn’t have given me away somehow. And it doesn’t mean that Madoc couldn’t have figured it out himself.

  The generals’ tent is large and cluttered with all the maps I couldn’t find in his tent. It’s also filled with soldiers sitting on goat-hide camp stools, some armored and some not. When I come in, a few of them glance up, and then their gazes slide away from me as from a servant.

  I set down the tray and pour a cup, forcing myself not to look too carefully at the map unfurled in front of them. It’s impossible not to notice that they’re moving little wooden boats across the sea, toward Elfhame.

  “Pardon,” I say, setting the nettle tea in front of Madoc.

  He gives me an indulgent smile. “Taryn,” he says. “Good. I have been thinking you ought to have your own tent. You’re a widow, not a child.”

  “Tha—that’s very kind,” I say, surprised. It is kind, and yet I cannot help wondering if it’s like one of those chess moves that looks innocuous at first but turns out to be the one setting up checkmate.

  As he sips his tea, he projects the satisfaction of someone who obviously has more important matters to take care of yet is pleased to have a chance to play the doting father. “I promised your loyalty would be rewarded.”

  I cannot help seeing how everything he says and does could be double-edged.

  “Come here,” Madoc calls to one of his knights. A goblin in shining golden armor makes an elegant bow. “Find my daughter a tent and supplies to outfit it. Anything she needs.” Then to me. “This is Alver. Do not be too great a torment to him.”

  It is not custom to thank the Folk, but I kiss Madoc on his cheek. “You’re too good to me.”

  He snorts, a small smile showing a sharp canine. I let my gaze flicker to the map—and the models of boats floating on the paper sea—one more time before I follow Alver out the door.

  An hour later, I am setting up a spacious tent erected not far from Madoc’s. Oriana is suspicious when I arrive to move my things, but she allows it to be done. She even brings cheese and bread, placing them on the painted table that was found for me.

  “I don’t see why you’re going to all this trouble to decorate,” she says when Alver has finally left. “You’ll be gone tomorrow.”

  “Tomorrow?” I echo.

  “I received word from your sister. She will be here near dawn to pick you up. You’re to meet her just outside the camp. There’s an outcrop of rocks where Vivi can safely wait for you. And when you leave a note for your father, I expect it to be convincing.”

  “I will do my best,” I say.

  She presses her lips into a fine line. Maybe I should feel grateful to her, but I am too annoyed. If only she hadn’t wasted the better part of my day, my evening would go a lot easier.

  I will have to deal with the Ghost’s guards. There will be no sneaking past them this time. “Will you give me some of your paper?” I ask, and when she agrees, I take a wineskin as well.

  Alone in my new tent, I crush the deathsweet and add a little bit to the wine so it can infuse for at least an hour before I strain the vegetal bits. That should be strong enough to cause them to sleep for at least a day and a night but not kill them. I am aware, however, that time to prepare is not on my side. My fingers fumble as I go, nerves getting the better of me.

  “Taryn?” Madoc sweeps back the flap of my tent, making me jump. He looks around, admiring his own generosity. Then his gaze returns to me, and he frowns. “Is all well?”

  “You surprised me,” I say.

  “Come dine with the company,” he says.

  For a moment, I try to dream up an excuse, to give him some reason for me to stay behind so that I can slip out to Grimsen’s forge. But I can’t afford his suspicion, not now, when my escape is so close. I resolve to get up in the night, long before dawn, and go then.

  And so I eat with Madoc one final time. I pinch some color into my cheeks and rake back my hair into a fresh braid. And if I am particularly kind that evening, particularly deferential, if I laugh particularly loudly, it is because I know I will never do this again. I will never have him behave like this with me again. But for one final night, he’s the father I remember best, the one in whose shadow I have—for better or worse—become what I am.

  I wake to the press of a hand over my mouth. I slam my elbow into where I think the person holding me must be and am satisfied to hear a sharp intake of breath, as though I connected with a vulnerable part. There’s a hushed laugh from my left. Two people, then. And one of them is not too worried about me, which is worrisome. I reach under my pillow for my knife.

  “Jude,” says the Roach, still laughing. “We’ve come to save you. Screaming would really hurt the plan.”

  “You’re lucky I didn’t stab you!” My voice comes out harsher than I intend, anger masking how terrified I was.

  “I told him to watch out,” the Roach says. There’s a sharp sound, and light flares from a little box, illuminating the jagged planes of the Roach’s goblin face. He’s grinning. “But would he listen? I’d have ordered him, if not for the little matter of his being the High King.”

  “Cardan sent you?” I ask.

  “Not exactly,” says the Roach, moving the light so that I can see the person with him, the one I elbowed. The High King of Elfhame, in plain brown wool, a cloak on his back of a fabric so dark it seems to absorb light, leaf blade in the scabbard on his hip. He wears no crown on his brow, no rings on his fingers, nor gold paint limning his cheekbones. He looks every inch a spy from the Court of Shadows, down to the sneaky smile pulling at a corner of his beautiful mouth.

  Looking at him, I feel a little light-headed from some combination of shock and disbelief. “You shouldn’t be here.”

  “I said that, too,” the Roach goes on. “Really, I miss the days when you were in charge. High Kings shouldn’t be gallivanting around like common ruffians.”

  Cardan laughs. “What about uncommon ruffians?”

  I swing my legs over the edge of the bed, and his laugh gutters out. The Roach turns his gaze to the ceiling. I am abruptly aware that I am in a nightgown Oriana lent me, one that is entirely too diaphanous.

  My cheeks go hot enough with anger that I barely feel the cold. “How did you find me?” Padding across the tent, I feel my way to where I put my dress and fumble it on, pulling it on straight over my nightclothes. I tuck my knife into a sheath.

  The Roach cuts a
glance at Cardan. “Your sister Vivienne. She came to the High King with a message from your stepmother. She worried it was a trap. I was worried it was a trap, too. A trap for him. Maybe even for myself.”

  Which is why they took pains to catch me at my most vulnerable. But why come at all? And given all the disparaging things my older sister said about Cardan, why would she trust him with any of this? “Vivi went to you?”

  “We spoke after Madoc carried you off from the palace,” Cardan begins. “And whom did I find in her little dwelling but Taryn? We all had quite a lot to say to one another.”

  I try to imagine the High King in the mortal world, standing in front of our apartment complex, knocking on our door. What ridiculous thing had he worn? Had he sat down on the lumpy couch and drank coffee as though he didn’t despise everything around him?

  Did he pardon Taryn when he wouldn’t pardon me?

  I think of Madoc’s believing that Cardan desires to be loved. It seemed like nonsense then and seems like even more nonsense now. He charms everyone, even my own sisters. He is a gravitational force, pulling everything toward him.

  But I am not so easily taken in now. If he’s here, it’s to his own purpose. Maybe allowing his queen to fall into the hands of his enemies is dangerous to him. Which means I have power. I just have to discover it and then find a way to wield it against him.

  “I can’t go with you yet,” I say, drawing on thick hose and jamming my foot into a heavy boot. “There’s something I have to do. And something I need you to give me.”

  “Perhaps you could just allow yourself to be rescued,” Cardan says. “For once.” Even in his plain clothes, his head bare of any crown, he cannot pretend away how much he has grown into his royal role. When a king tries to give you a gift, you’re not allowed to refuse it.