“You hold yourself apart from us,” King Morimaros said, quiet with intensity. “I made you my friend.”
“How do you come to be here, Aremoria?” Gaela asked. She stepped to the king: the black princess of Lear was nearly as tall as the foreigner. “What is your game?”
“I am here to support Elia for the crown. That is the will of Aremoria.”
“It will be war, then.”
“No!” Elia put herself between them, a hand on the king’s chest and one flat out to Gaela.
Morimaros met Gaela’s hot gaze over Elia’s head. “You will lose against me.”
The eldest sister did not smile, but behind her hard expression came a ferocious joy. “You cannot take Innis Lear. It has never been yours, and never will join with Aremoria again.”
Elia shoved hard at both. “Stop, now. This will not be war. We must—wemust—eat of the flower, and drink of the rootwater. That will decide, without bloodshed, without dividing our island.”
“Yes,” hissed Regan.
Gaela whirled to her middle sister, thrust out a hand, and grabbed her arm. “Collect yourself, sister.”
In the quiet, the wind gusted again, streaking under the tightly staked walls to tear and tease at their ankles and skirts. Candles snuffed out.
Fire,said Aefa Thornhill with a snap of her fingers, and five of the candles lit themselves again.
Through the dim orange shadows, Morimaros of Aremoria advanced. “Ban Errigal. Our business is bloodshed.” The king grasped the front of Ban’s gambeson, pulling it into his fist. “I challenge you. Fight me, if you think you are worthy.”
Gaela Lear laughed.
“To the death,” added Regan, dark fascination in her tone.
“No,” the last princess said, calmly.
But the king ignored her. “If I am defeated, Innis Lear will see no penalties from Aremoria. Novanos, called La Far, will make sure of it.”
Ban stared at Morimaros.
The silence grew heavy with monument.
The Fox had betrayed everyone; all knew it to be true. He was a shadow, a wormworker, a traitor, a spy. A bastard. He knew the secret paths behindsunlight and slipped through cracks, understood the language of ravens and the tricks of trees. He could see how, with one act, he could change everything here, destroy and re-create with a word.
And so, the wizard drew a shaky breath. He said the only thing he could: “Yes. But if I am defeated, you all three eat of the hemlock crown.”
Wind slammed into the pavilion, shrieking, whistling like triumphant horns.
In the following stillness, Gaela glared in Ban’s face, grabbing his chin. “What did you say, Fox?”
Elia pressed a hand to Morimaros’s chest, hard, as if she could force him away from the rest.
“I said,” Ban repeated, loudly in the dark chamber, “we will fight, and if I am defeated, you let the island choose its queen, and all swear to lead no army against her.”
“I can fight my own battles for the crown,” Gaela said, frowning.
“This is what a king would do, Gaela Lear. Champions fight for them; they do not make their own war. Are you a warrior or a king?”
“Stop this!” cried Elia, but Aefa touched her shoulder.
“This is the best,” Aefa said. “No war, very little danger. Only two men at risk.”
“More than that is at risk,” the princess gasped.
