Chapter Ten

In the honeycomb of chambers beneath the temple of the Penestricans, the night had passed and dawn lay near. The candles were burning low with tired flickers. The chanting had stopped hours ago. All was silent, and in that silence anxiety stretched so strong it nearly became a sound itself.

The Lady Elandra lay on a slab of stone, straight and stiff, with her hands folded across her stomach. Robed in simple white, her unbound hair spread out beneath her, she remained unconscious and still. Her breathing was so slight she might have been dead. Her pale face was drawn, and a frown knotted her brows.

On one side of her stood two of the sisters, looking frightened and anxious. On the other side stood Anas, almost as pale as Elandra. And at Elandra’s feet stood the Ma-gria, her old face very grim indeed.

With angry eyes, she swept the faces of the others. “This has been badly handled from the start,” she said, her gaze stopping on Anas. “I told you to be kind to her. Have you grown so efficient, so cold, so brutal, Anas, that you have forgotten how to be gentle? Have you forgotten the meaning of kindness?”

Anas looked mulish and upset. “You blame me for this?”

Denial was always a clumsy line of defense. It showed how rattled Anas was.

“You pushed her into the memories,” the Magria said. “You pushed her too far.”

“The memories are an important part of the cleansing process,” Anas said half angrily, defending herself like a child. “I did not know she would go past them. We screened her before, when she was with us. She exhibited no abilities to have visions then.”

“But she has had one now,” the Magria said. She sighed, feeling every year of her age. It had taken all her strength to pull Elandra back. Even now, as she thought of what she had seen through Elandra’s vision, she shuddered. It was fearsome indeed, as clear and vivid as any of Ma-gria’s own visions, and all too likely to come true.

“The child was not prepared for this. She has had no training. She could not protect herself.”

“But you brought her back,” Anas said, insisting as though she wanted comfort.

But there was no comfort to be handed out. The Magria looked at her deputy unsparingly. “Yes,” she said. “But whether she has returned with her reason intact is something we do not yet know. Whether she can survive the shock is another question beyond it.”

“The coronation is in three hours,” Anas said. “The guard of escort is already waiting outside the temple.”

“Do not speak to me of time!” the Magria snapped. “Do you think I can simply put my hand on her forehead and revive her to her senses? Do you think she is likely to recover in time to be crowned?”

“But—”

“I told you not to do this, and you disobeyed me,” the Magria said, too angry now to soften her tone.

“The purification ceremony must be difficult—”

“Why? The girl did not require it. She is no threat to us.”

“She will be if he gives her the throne,” Anas said sharply. “You saw how much she has changed already. She must be taught to need us.”

Disappointment caught the Magria in the throat like a knife. She had trained Anas with such hopes, but Anas continued to fall short. Another candidate to succeed her must be sought, and there was no time for that now either. Not with events shaping themselves so quickly.

“You are wrong,” the Magria said flatly.

For the first time Anas looked uncertain. She opened her mouth to say more, but the Magria lifted her hand.

“You are no longer deputy,” she said in a harsh, toneless voice. “If you cannot realize what your mistake has cost us in terms of time and trust, then you are incapable of judging what needs to be done to salvage this situation. We have lost this child.”

“She still lives,” Anas said, white-faced and shaken.

“Go.”

Anas started to protest again, but the Magria glared at her and curled her fists. She was angry, so angry she could barely trust herself not to strike.

As though finally seeing this, Anas bowed her head and crept from the room.

The other two sisters exchanged frightened glances. “Excellency,” one said, “may we assist you in—”

“No. I must do this myself. There can be no more mistakes.”

The Magria steeled her heart, although already she was grieving for Anas, whom she had loved like a daughter. I was proud of her, she thought wearily to herself. I indulged her too much, overlooked too much. I have myself to blame as much as her.

“Go with Anas,” the Magria said. “Do not talk of this to the others. I must guide Anas later when this matter is back under control. For now, stay with her. Do not let her out of your sight. Comfort her if she will permit it.”

Reluctantly, the two sisters filed out.

Alone with the empress, the Magria sighed and buried her face in her hands for an unguarded moment of despair.

The sisterhood had grown so weak, and the Vindicants seemed stronger than ever. It had been Vindicant poison that had gotten past their safeguards to strike at this girl. There would be other attempts, and the Magria did not know if the sisters would be vigilant enough to thwart them.

And now this precious child had been seriously mishandled. It was an appalling blunder, but even worse was the vision of a released Beloth marching across the world again. The Magria herself had not foreseen that.

In her earlier visions she had seen that Elandra would marry the emperor but that she would turn to the man who would succeed Kostimon. One of the choices had been Tirhin. The other man was unknown. These men would war against each other, and Elandra would go to the victor to help found a new dynasty. Now it seemed the Magria’s interpretation had been wrong. Elandra had not chosen either Tirhin or the unknown.

Gently the Magria pried the topaz gem from Elandra’s fingers. The girl—so stubborn, so headstrong, so surprising—had chosen herself. Just as Kostimon—in an astonishing twist of contrariness—had chosen her.

None of this had lain in the visions.

The girl could not rule alone. The idea was impossible. Kostimon must know that. He must have some ploy in mind, but what? Did he realize that this child with her long eyelashes, mahogany hair, and Albain chin had the steel of kings in her? Did he understand what he had unleashed? Did he care? Or was he simply planning to create as much chaos as possible in his final days?

The Magria shook her head. Truly she had never felt as blind and helpless as she did now, with no inkling of how to judge the events taking place.

She took Elandra’s cold, still hand between hers. “We are falling into darkness,” she whispered. “Kostimon has given the shadow gods the means to unchain themselves. You have foreseen their return. You alone have divined our way of escape. What is it, little one? What is it?”

But Elandra lay still and wan, lost as yet to all of them.