“The Council meeting has begun,” Bel announced. “The weaves have gone up.” He glanced around the palace suite and saw the tension in all the warriors visibly increase. The dangerous part of the day was about to start.
Ellysetta stood in the center of the room, garbed in a simple, unembellished blue linen gown with a modest neckline, her hair hanging to her waist in a cascade of bright, unrestrained curls. Gaelen knelt before her, fastening a pair of empty, steel-studded leather Fey’cha sheaths to her calves.
“I’ve tied an Earth weave to these sheaths and Bel’s weapons belts,” he was saying. “Your Fey’cha will re-form exactly thirtychimes after he surrenders his steel at the cathedral door. You can enter the cathedral unarmed—and answer truthfully that you haven’t brought weapons into the cathedral, should the priests question you—but you’ll get your Fey’cha back before you enter the Solarus. If anything happens during the Bright Bell, anything at all, just blood yourself with one of these blades. Bel and I will come running.”
The rules of the church—which required that brides on the day of their Blessing arrive modestly dressed and completely unadorned as a symbol of their willingness to throw off outward trappings of wealth and vanity—meant Ellysetta could not wear hersorreisu kiyrjewelry or her Fey’cha belts. But the Fey weren’t about to let her enter the cathedral Solarus without some manner of protection.
“The sash is done,” Kieran said. He handed Bel a stiffened blue waistband that matched Ellysetta’s dress.
Bel fastened the band around Ellysetta’s waist. “How does that feel?” he asked.
“Good,” she answered. Her foursorreisu kiyrwere sewn into the band. She could feel them pressing against her skin, humming with reassuring power.
“How doyoufeel?” Gaelen asked.
The sudden rush of tears that burned in Ellysetta’s eyes caught her by surprise, and she barely managed to keep them in check. Directly on the heels of sorrow came a rush of anger. How did shefeel? Both her mother and her betrothed had reviled her, and she’d learned her birth father was the most evil man on earth. How did hethinkshe felt?
She suppressed the tears and gripped the anger, hardening it into determination.
She took a deep breath. “I feel ready,” she said, and saw pride shining on the warriors’ faces. They thought she was being brave. Nothing could be further from the truth. She was operating onpure nerves, driven not by courage but by the sheer absence of any other viable choice. “Let’s get this over with.”
A carriage was waiting for her outside the palace steps, along with well over a hundred Fey in full steel. Bel helped her inside and signaled the coachman. The palace gates swung open, the coachman snapped his reins, and the carriage rumbled out of the palace grounds, turning onto the broad cobbled thoroughfare of King’s Street. The Fey fanned out around the vehicle, magic shining.
They passed several small mobs of protestors and Brethren of Radiance followers, who booed and jeered the Fey, but the unspoken threat of sharp Fey steel kept the worst of the rabble-rousers in check.
Scarcely a mile from the cathedral, a man’s voice cried out, “Halt in the name of the queen!” and the carriage came to an abrupt stop. Ellysetta stuck her head out the window and saw a small army of armored soldiers standing in the center of King’s Street, blocking their path. Three even larger groups were approaching from the east, west, and the rear.
“We have a warrant for the arrest of the murderer Gaelen vel Serranis,” the guards’ captain announced as he drew near. “In the queen’s name, I order you to surrender him to us.”
Ellysetta didn’t dare glance back at Gaelen, who stood near the rear of her carriage. How had they found out about him? He hadn’t made any attempt to disguise himself, true, but though his name was as infamous as Rain’s, without his notoriousdahl’reisenscar she doubted more than a few people in Celieria would have recognized him. Her stomach took a sudden unpleasant lurch. Had her mother turned him in?
The captain extended to Bel a parchment bearing the royal seal. “I have been instructed to inform you that harboring vel Serranis will be viewed as an act of war.”
Ellysetta thrust open the carriage door and jumped out, ignoring Bel’s silently hissed command to stay where she was. She snatched the warrant and scanned it. Her eyebrows rose in outrage. The charges against Gaelen included murder, war crimes, and acts against the interests of the crown, many of them stemming from the Mage Wars a thousand years ago. “This is ridiculous!” she exclaimed. “Even if Gaelen was with us—and I’m not saying he is—I wouldn’t give him up to stand trial for something that happened a thousand years ago.”
“There is also the more recent matter of murdered Celierian citizens in the north.” The captain took a more aggressive stance. “Lady, I am here to arrest Gaelen vel Serranis, who is known to be in your company. If you refuse to surrender him, I’m afraid I must take you into custody in his stead.”
Bel stepped in front of her. “She is the Feyreisa of the Fading Lands,” he warned in a cold, toneless voice. “She is no longer subject to the laws of your land. If you are fool enough to try to take her from us, you and your men will die where you stand.” He did not blink. He did not raise his voice.
Behind the captain, his men shifted with visible nervousness and their fingers clenched more tightly around their blade hilts. Several of the guards even drew their swords. The captain himself stood his ground, though his face lost most of its color. “If that is the price of obeying my queen, ser, then that is the price I and my men must pay.”
“Setah.” Gaelen stepped forward. “There is no need for threats or violence.”
«Gaelen, what are you doing?»Ellysetta objected.«Let me handle this.»
«Las, kem’falla. You cannot afford the delay.»He met the captain’s gaze with glittering, icy eyes. “I am vel Serranis.”
Ellysetta didn’t think it was possible for the captain’s face to go even paler, but it did. He swallowed and clenched his jaw. “Gaelen vel Serranis, by order of the queen, I am placing you under arrest. Step forward, ser, and hold out your hands.” One of the men behind him moved closer and held out a set of black metal shackles with shaking hands.
Beside Ellysetta, Bel gave a shudder of revulsion. “Were you also ordered to bind him insel’dor?” he demanded.
“I was. The Dark Lord’s power is too dangerous to leave unfettered.”
No expression crossed Gaelen’s face as one of the soldiers approached with thesel’dormanacles, but fierce protectiveness rose up in Ellysetta. She had restored Gaelen’s soul. He had bloodsworn himself to her. He was hers. She’d not been able to stop her countrymen from torturing Bel last week, but she would not let the same thing happen to Gaelen.
“Captain,” she protested, “if binding Gaelen’s powers is what you require, the Fey can do it. There’s no need for these.” Before anyone realized her intent, she stepped between Gaelen and the approaching soldier and snatched the manacles out of the unsuspecting man’s hands.
Fiery pain scorched her palms and shot halfway up her arms. A shocked cry broke from her lips. Thesel’dorrestraints fell to the cobbles, and she stared in astonishment at her hands. The skin was bright red and already swelling with nascent blisters.
