Green Wild (Thrones of the Firstborn Book 2) Read online

  Seandri’s fascinated gaze was fixed on the water, in the way he had when he was coming up with an idea. Jerya squeezed his hand and said, “I’m going back to the Plaza. Will you stay here and keep an eye on them?”

  He nodded, distractedly. “Yes, I think that’s a good idea. Their magic is very slow to take effect, isn’t it?”

  “That’s why a wizard could never defend Sel Sevanth,” Jerya agreed. “I’ll come if I’m needed.”

  As she walked back to the Tabernacle, people smiled as she passed them, and several congratulated her. She smiled back, nodded at their congratulations, and wondered how word of the rescue could have spread faster than she moved.

  Then an old woman hanging out washing on the line over the street called down to her, “What are you doing out on the streets?”

  Jerya looked up inquisitively. “What do you mean?”

  “Your Regent is awake, Princess! You should be with her.”

  Bemused, Jerya said, “I should be at my Court. There are people waiting on me.” But there hadn’t been many, she recalled.

  “Princess!” chided the old woman. “She’s our Regent too. I mourn for Lord Tomas, but last night, old though I may be, I danced in Lady Iriss’s honor. You must take care of her, for all of us.”

  Jerya realized: she thought of Iriss as hers, her friend, her helper, her center. But the Monarch’s Regent was the Regent of Ceria, with far more potential civil power than the monarch herself. The murder of Tomas, her father’s Regent, had crackled across Lor Seleni. The attack on Iriss had been another wound to the city. Nobody was comfortable with the idea of a monarch without a Regent. Her recovery became a sign of hope, and a return to normalcy.

  Jerya took the woman’s advice in the spirit it was meant, sent one of her guards to the Tabernacle to notify anybody waiting, and went back to the inn.

  Iriss sat in the parlour with Julina and Siana, bundled up in blankets. Her eyes still glowed with phantasmagory light. She had trouble seeing, too. Jerya didn’t care; she was awake, tilting her head to listen in that familiar, beloved way, and that was everything that mattered.

  She sat down on the sofa beside Iriss and greeted her. “How is the chill?”

  Iriss leaned on Jerya. She had so many blankets on that it was hard to make out a human form under them. “I’m still so cold. These blankets don’t do anything.” She placed any icy hand on Jerya’s cheek and sighed after a moment. “This is the warmth I need.”

  Jerya obligingly dug her hands into the blankets and pulled Iriss close. They’d slept in the same bed when they were children, snuggled together just like this. They stayed like that, clasped in a timeless circle where Jerya could pretend everything was all right and everything she’d lost would return to her the same way.

  Eventually, when a maid brought tea in, Iriss said, “I dreamt of you while I slept. Not often. I wished more. But I could see you when you came near me, a flickering bird of fire and shadow. I wanted to reach out for you, but my body was so cold I couldn’t move.”

  “You can move now, though,” Jerya pointed out, resting her chin on Iriss’s hair. “The Vassay healer fixed you.” She ought to do something nice for the healer, she thought. It was hard not to feel affection for the Vassay woman. “Do you want some tea? It’s hot.”

  “I still dream, though. I woke this morning—I was so glad to wake! And I remembered my dreams.”

  Jerya pulled back enough to study Iriss. She didn’t talk quite the same way she used to. She’d always been a little dreamy but now she sounded half asleep. Maybe she was; maybe that’s what the phantasmagory eyes meant. She said she only saw darkness with her faraway eyes: a darkness that Jerya and the other Blood moved through like creatures of fire.

  “What did you dream?”

  “In the dark place, there’s a man’s voice. Harsh, angry. He instructs his people, but I can’t see them. Possibly they aren’t real?”

  A handful of thoughts flickered through Jerya’s mind: things Kiar had said, stories Twist had related. The image, forever seared on her mind’s eye, of one of the andani engulfing Iriss’s head. “I hope not.”

  Iriss pursed her lips in an annoyed pout. “He wants me to obey him, too. But I shan’t, I shan’t. I’m here to look after you. As soon as I can get warm again.” She snuggled closer. “Also, I shall need to make a new dress. Siana has been telling me about the mountain waking up, and how all my belongings were swallowed up.”

  Jerya shot a look at Siana, sewing quietly. Siana glanced up and then lifted her shoulders in a little shrug. Jerya hadn’t told Iriss about the disaster; she couldn’t see where she was and Jerya didn’t want to distress her. But maybe Siana had been right.

  Iriss certainly seemed to be taking it well. “I’ve a vision of a gown in my head,” Iriss confided. “I’m happy to make it. I suppose we won’t be having any receptions for a while, but I’m sure it will help me feel more myself.”

  “It will,” said Jerya firmly. “I’ll find you some fabric somewhere, and help you.”

  “That would be lovely! Would you like to see my sketches?”

  Jerya’s eyebrows went up. “You made sketches?”

  “She’s been quite engaged by drawing,” observed Siana, with a faint smile. “She’s been humming for us, too, brightening everything.”

  Iriss blushed pinkly, and then pulled away from Jerya and turned to the table beside the couch. Her hand went unerringly to the stack of papers and she plucked several up.

  “Can you see them?” asked Jerya, intrigued.

  “Oh yes,” said Iriss. “The room is dark but I can see what I draw perfectly. Once I understood how to find the edges of the paper, it was easy. I can even see them now. Well, faintly. Enough. Here, look.” She put the sheaf into Jerya’s hand.

  Iriss had indeed been drawing a dress: a floating, ephemeral thing, descended from Lor Seleni summer sundresses but with many more layers, and interesting shaping on the bodice. But under the firm clear lines of the dress, Iriss had sketched in other things that made Jerya feel as cold as Iriss’s hands.

  The dress itself was on the shape of one of the andani. It was only that the andani looked like a basic sketch of a human, Jerya told herself at first. But that oversized smile on the figure’s face made her look away, elsewhere through the sheaf of papers.

  That didn’t help; there were more dress variations and in some of the pictures, Iriss had sketched a background for the figure. It bent to pick flowers and in the distance loomed the fortress that had clawed its way out of the earth. Jerya had seen the sketches from the scouts and the eidolon miniatures made by Kiar; she recognized it. But Iriss had been unconscious when that particular nightmare emerged. What was going on?

  Somebody coughed at the door and Jerya looked up sharply. Raffey stood there, waiting for her attention. “Your Highness, Ambassador Smith and some of his retinue are outside. They hope for an audience.”

  Jerya jumped between annoyance and an involuntary rush of pleasure. Perhaps they wanted to talk about what had happened at the levee—but she wasn’t happy they were invading her private space to do so, especially not today.

  She took a deep breath, looking at Iriss’s face and steadying herself. Then she said, “Aunt Julina, would you take Iriss into my bedchamber? She doesn’t need to deal with politics while she’s recovering.”

  Julina rose, gathering up her knitting, and said, “Come, child. We can sit close to the fire and see if you can work the needles still.”

  Iriss looked wistful, but stood as well. She moved lightly toward Julina, but didn’t see the end table in her way and slammed her knee into it. Jerya wasn’t able to catch her before she went sprawling.

  “Ow!” said Iriss, and “Ow! I’m all right, I think. Ow!” She rolled over and sat up to inspect her leg under her dressing gown. “Oh. I can’t tell. Am I bleeding?” She lifted fingers daubed with red to her eye level, frowning in consternation.

  “Just a knock, dear,” said Julina. “We’ll clean
it up in the other room.”

  Silently, Jerya helped Iriss to her feet, biting her tongue to stop herself from saying something that would communicate her sudden fear to Iriss. She’d been so happy to have Iriss back—back from the dead, it had seemed. And she was undeniably Iriss. But while she was back, she wasn’t healed, and the bright splash of blood on Iriss’s knee drove home just how fragile she was. The last two days felt like a dream that would vanish soon, if it didn’t turn into a nightmare first.

  Siana paused in passing by and said, “Jerya? It will take time but she’ll adapt.”

  Jerya woke from her introspection and said, “Aunt Siana. Don’t go, please. I was hoping you’d stay with me while the Ambassador visits.”

  Siana’s eyebrows rose. “Of course, sweetling.” Something warm moved in Jerya’s heart; Siana hadn’t called her that for years.

  Jerya seated herself again and gestured Siana to retake her place. “This is my home for now,” she explained. “I don’t know why they couldn’t wait until I was at the plaza but I am not here at their convenience. On the other hand, they did do me a very great favor. I want to be friendly.” She picked up one of the books on the end table Siana had just restored, and opened it. “There. Do I look suitably relaxed?”

  Siana started laughing helplessly. “You haven’t ever looked relaxed, Jerya. You look like you’re going to devour that book if it doesn’t go along with your plans.”

  Jerya glanced up, startled, and then back down at the book again. “Well. Maybe I am. You may bring them in, Lieutenant.”

  A few moments later, Ambassador Smith appeared in the door frame, all but filling it with his bulk. He grinned as he ducked into the room, and said, “Ah, Your Highness.” But his grin dimmed as he peered around the room. “Where’s the young woman Sora healed? Not unwell again, I hope.”

  Jerya closed her book. The rest of his ‘retinue’ turned out to be Cutter and the clerk called Scriber Stone. They both lingered near the door, while someone stood beyond the door still, only visible by shadow.

  “Please, come in. Is everything going well at the riverside?”

  The Ambassador gave her a startled look, and Scriber Stone hurried to his side and said, not quietly, “The eagle that plucked the students from the water, sir. She couldn’t have known it wasn’t necessary. I do hope she didn’t strain herself.”

  “Eh?” said the Ambassador, pushing Scriber Stone behind him. “That was you? I thought it was young Seandri. Prince Seandri,” he corrected himself.

  “We were both present,” Jerya told him mildly. “Was it unnecessary? They seemed to be drowning.”

  “They’re safe now, which is all I care about,” said the Ambassador. He looked around the room, and Jerya realized he was still looking for Iriss, as if she was hiding under a chair somewhere.

  “Iriss is very much improved, but resting,” Jerya told him, and added firmly, “Please sit down. It’s distressing to have you looming over me. Your attendants can sit near the window if they wish.” She offered Cutter a warm smile as he moved past, and listened to Scriber Stone instructing the final member of their party to wait without unless he was called in.

  The Ambassador looked around guiltily, before lowering himself into one of the parlour chairs. “Sorry, sorry. My curiosity sometimes gets the better of me.”

  Jerya hesitated before indulging her own curiosity. “Does your diplomatic corps not particularly value subtlety? You aren’t what I expected.” She didn’t look directly at Scriber Stone, but she was aware of him all the same. He stared at her with an unblinking interest she found unsettling. His manners were as bad as the Justiciars.

  Ambassador Smith chuckled, but uncomfortably. “Some of them are wretched subtle. I’m primarily a teacher and an administrator, Your Highness, which I imagine you’ve guessed by now. We thought physical assistance would be more useful than politics in your current situation.” He tapped his fingers together. “Speaking of that, how goes destroying the Blight?”

  Jerya studied the way he sat in the chair, as if eager to be on his feet again. She wondered if he paced while teaching. “Fighting a war is slow, Your Excellency. It takes time for armies to move. We’re containing it until we have the manpower to eradicate it.”

  Scriber Stone rifled through a satchel of papers. The Ambassador glanced at him, then said, “I’ve been told your baby sister is off on a secret mission to acquire a special weapon?”

  “Not so secret,” said Jerya. “Though it certainly sounds exciting to describe it that way.”

  He waited a moment, clearly hoping she’d go on. Cutter moved restlessly by the window and the shuffling of Scriber Stone’s papers seemed to fill the room.

  Jerya smiled. “Is the levee stable now? Usually we’d have to build up the waterfront, which is an annoyance at the best of times., We appreciate your work.” She could be so much more polite than Scriber Stone, oh yes. Why devalue truly useful work, even if people you disliked did it? “You mentioned the bridges in one of the notes you sent? You’ve been quite focused on the river.”

  “Well, yes,” he said vaguely, running a hand through his hair. “The levee will keep the river in place for now, although it will stay high, which creates its own problems. As for the bridges... It’d be best if we could get people back into their homes again. And...”

  Scriber Stone moved some papers again, and the Ambassador grimaced. “I will be honest with you, Princess. We would very much like to have access to the Royal plepanin reserves.”

  Jerya stared at him, long and cool. So this was why they’d healed Iriss. Not a gift, not a kindness, but just politics and greed. “And so you want to get into the Palace.”

  “Well, yes. You should get back to your home again too,” he added, a happier note in his voice.

  Cutter half raised his hand for attention. “And the supply caravan, sir. Don’t forget about that.”

  “Oh, please don’t forget about the supply caravan,” said Jerya. “What must you tell me about the supply caravan?”

  Ambassador Smith’s eyes narrowed as he considered Jerya and suddenly she realized that while he might seem foolish in his enthusiasm and lack of subtlety, he was intelligent, and hardly as oblivious as she’d first thought. “Go ahead, boy. Since you’re so eager, share with the class.”

  “Oh. Well....” Cutter came forward. “We have more supplies from Vassay coming behind us, Your Highness. It’s protected just as our own caravan was, but it’s larger, with fewer people.”

  “Tempting prey,” observed Jerya.

  He shifted. “Yes, well. It’s also late. It’s still coming, it’s simply... being careful. On the way here we did have a few problems of our own. Some of your people saw us as... well... invaders. We don’t want to hurt anybody if we don’t have to. The presence of one of your family members would help.”

  “As a deterrent,” she said flatly.

  “To show your people we’re not invaders.”

  Jerya studied Cutter. He seemed nervous and ill-at-ease, not at all like he’d been the day before. The request for an escort didn’t seem like the sort of thing that would prompt a young man to interrupt his teacher. Unless... “Is there somebody in particular you care about on this second caravan?”

  He looked down. “Yes.”

  “You’re a wretched boy and will no doubt be the ruination of my career,” said Ambassador Smith, without the faintest trace of ire. “Now that you’ve unburdened yourself to the Princess, go wait in the hall with Thorn.”

  Cutter bowed again and backed out of the room, his eyes fixed on Jerya pleadingly until he was out of the room.

  Jerya regarded Scriber Stone. “And do you have any requests to make? I’ve heard that you’ve been just as helpful to the Justiciars as Cutter has been to me. In your own way.”

  “If I have, Your Highness, I’m content to let them reward me as they see fit,” said Scriber Stone placidly. “But it is kind of you to offer.”

  “In the end, our requests do ben
efit Ceria, Your Highness,” said Ambassador Smith, as if confiding a secret to a not-very-bright student. He glanced at Scriber Stone, before adding defiantly, “And speaking of the Justiciars, I want to invite you to a special meeting with them in a day or two. I think I could put some of my administration experience to work helping sort out some of the, ah, differences in perspective we’ve heard about.”

  Jerya shrugged, unable to summon any real interest in another meeting where the Justiciars would again dismiss her based on her family history. “Perhaps. Not at the Elant, though.”

  “No, no, of course not. We’ll find somewhere.” He tapped his fingers together again, waiting on her response to the other, more difficult requests.

  Jerya glanced at Siana, who sat with her head down, making tiny stitches with her needle. If things hadn’t gone horribly wrong, right now Iriss would be in Siana’s position, and it would be Iriss she’d consult with before making a decision. She’d have access to the phantasmagory, and she’d be able to attract the eventual attention of one or more of her family just by making it ripple. She could do none of that now.

  Instead she was about to make important decisions, almost utterly alone. She’d been fighting for the power to make decisions since her father’s Regent had been murdered and they’d started investigating what was going on in their own country. This was the power she should have had all along, she who would be crowned Queen. She’d set up her own Court in the hopes of calling it to her. But when she started on this path, after her father’s Regent Tomas had died, she had neither wanted nor expected to get the power all by herself. She firmly believed the true strength of the monarchs of Ceria was based in the stability of a partnership.

  Her father had been content to leave all the decision-making in Tomas’s hands, even when it came to matters of the Blood, like the use of the Palace and the training of individual family members. Her grandfather, she understood, had been similar. That never would have been the case with Jerya and Iriss. Jerya could never let go of what was hers, and half of the annual holidays Lor Seleni celebrated told her again and again Ceria belonged to her.