Initially, I was horrified to learn they burned the dead in Vanzador, rather than burying them. But now, as I watch the dancing orange flames and curling black smoke, it feels right. Like an ending and a beginning. Our journey started on the burning fields of Tashir. It feels right it should end with fire too.
“It’s beautiful,” I whisper, and I don’t know if I’m referring to the pyre itself or the overwhelming sense of peace I feel, acknowledging that people can be both good and bad. The smiling, laughing Soren who chatted with his people in the square was every bit as real as the merciless tyrant who allowed Tashir to burn. Just as the sister who told me bedtime stories and ran with me through the cornfields was the same woman who lied to me in her letters and made alliances with Von Nevus. We all contain multitudes, and it’s okay to mourn and celebrate both.
“It is beautiful,” Alaric quietly agrees.
Once the fire has burned down to embers, we turn away from the blackened altar and the painful past it represents, and move toward banquet tables and stone-throwing courts that have been arranged aroundthe perimeter of the square. Toward Alaric’s coronation, which deserves a celebration all its own.
The dancing is vigorous, the wine free-flowing, and the number of people who drop into a curtsy or kiss the back of my hand is staggering. They praise my generosity and willingness to grow bagrava, despite the toll it has taken on my people. They thank me for supporting Alaric in his bid to expose the truth about Soren. And they thank me for thejubilant celebration and how it’s lifting their spirits. Even the healers who are back at the palace tending to the sick sent letters of approval and thanks before the event.
I make certain each of them knows none of this would be possible without Alaric, our new king, and Delphine, my new head of household and organizer of the festivities.
It was her idea to have a memorial and coronation all rolled into one.
“The people need a chance to grieve, but also a reason to celebrate,” she insisted, and she couldn’t have been more right. She also couldn’t have planned a more perfect event.
I’ve felt like a proud parent watching her these past few days, boldly collaborating with Queen Tessa and the courtiers on decorations and menus, and bustling around the palace to direct florists and chefs like she’s been doing so all her life.
Delphine’s been so busy, I’ve hardly been able to steal a moment with her, and I squint through the throng now, hoping to catch a glimpse of her new silk gown with her golden hair tumbling down herback, instead of her old maid’s uniform and customary braid. But she must be ushering in the next course of food or performers because I don’t see her anywhere.
“There you are!” A horde of dancers whirls past, and Elodie Tomasko takes me by the hands, spinning me into the chaos before I have a chance to say no.
Just like the first time I met her, it’s impossiblenotto be swept up in her warmth and enthusiasm. Though it’s a different kind of enthusiasm than when I first arrived at the Fortress. Like Delphine, my noble friend has transformed before my eyes. Instead of worrying over every wrinkle in her gown, she spins with reckless abandon, completely unaware of the filth marring the hem of her rose-pink skirt. Unbothered by the braids falling from their pins and sailing around her head like a windmill. She has never looked more radiant—free from courtly pressures and gossip.
“I love seeing you like this,” I shout in her ear as we sashay through a tunnel of dancers.
“Not as much as your husband loves seeingyoulike this,” she replies, looking me up and down with a wicked grin. “He can’t take his eyes off you. I told you this gown was perfection.”
I glance over at Alaric, who’s been on a raised dais in the center of the square for the whole of the celebration, reassuring councilors and negotiating with merchants and entertaining courtiers. But finally, now, he’s coming.
“Do you mind if I steal my wife for one dance?” Alaric’s voice is as thick and rich as freshly tapped syrup, and I imagine it dripping down my body.
“Of course, Your Majesty,” Elodie says with a playful curtsy. “She’s all yours.”
Alaric offers me his hand, eyes glittering brighter than the veins of silver in his mines. “It’s been killing me to stand up there and watch you dance with everyone else,” he murmurs in my ear.
“Maybe you should stop being such a patient, empathetic king,” I say with a playful wink.
I rest my head against Alaric’s chest and listen to the rhythm of his heart, calm and steady, as we sway beneath the blazing torches and glittering stars. One song bleeds into the next, and the musicians and dancers around us change, but I could stay here forever, locked in Alaric’s embrace.
I’m so blissfully content, I yelp when someone taps my shoulder.
I shake my head and laugh as I pull away. “I suppose I shouldn’t hog every dance with the king.” But when I step aside, there’s no new partner to take my place. Frowning, I turn to find Delphine standing with her head bowed, her new gown rumpled and torn.
“What’s wrong? Are you hurt?” I take her hands and lift them to inspect her. “I told you you’ve been working too hard—”
“I’m sorry to interrupt,” she chokes out, “but I need you now, Indira.”
She looks up, her face stricken and pale. A look of unspeakable loss.
“Cloudia?” I whisper. “Is she…?”
I can’t bring myself to say the word. She can’t be dead. Not now, when we had plans to move her into the palace as soon as the healers situated the sick from the factory. Cloudia was finally going to receive proper care, and Delphine was going to have more time to sit at her sister’s bedside.
“But she was doing better,” I. “She was having more lucid moments. She led us to the hidden hospital!” I point out, like that somehow precludes her from dying.
“I’m afraid it’s the end,” Delphine whispers, “and I don’t want to be alone.”
“Let’s go to her at once,” Alaric agrees, pushing through the crowd. “I’m sure there’s something more that can be done.”
