“Would you put yourself in my furious sights now, Kayo?” demanded Lear. He turned to Connley and Astore. “You two, divide this island between yourselves, in equal parts. All of it to you and your issue with mydaughters. Gaela and Regan both be all the queens of Lear! There are no others!”
“Lear!” yelled the Oak Earl, slowly stretching to his feet. “I will challenge this, I will speak. Even if you tear at my heart, too. I chose this island and your family—our family!—long ago. I have defended your countenance against rumors and detractors, but now you are acting the madman all say you’ve become. My service to you—and to Dalat—insists I speak against this wildness. You are rash! Giving two crowns will destroy this island, and for God’s sake, Elia does not love you least.”
“On your life, be quiet.” The king closed his eyes as if in pain.
“My life is meant to be used against your enemies, Lear, and right now you are your own enemy.” Kayo ground out the last between his teeth.
“Get out of my sight, both of you—go together if you must, but do not be here.”
“Let me remain,BrotherLear.”
“By the stars—”
“The stars are false gods if they tell you to do this thing!”
Lear leapt to his feet again with a cry of rage.
Astore dove between the king and Kayo. “Be careful,” he said to the Oak Earl.
But Kayo shoved him away, angry as the king. He cried, “My sister,your wife,would hate you for this, Lear. She died for your stars, man! Was that not enough? And now you give over your kindest, best daughter? How can you? Howdareyou? And divide your island? Do this and you undercut everything wise and good you have ever done! One heir is all! Make one of them the queen, or this island will tear apart, and do not abandon Elia, who loves you best!”
Lear put his nose to Kayo’s, making them two sides of a raging coin. “You say you chose us, but you do not act it. You do not believe in my stars, you do not cleave to my will, and despite always saying otherwise, you have taken no wife or rooted in your lands here. Always half here and half away, Kayo! You said you were mine, but you never were. You never were!” The king’s mouth trembled. “Go to the god of your Third Kingdom, Kayo. You have the week to be gone, and if you are seen in Lear after that, you will die for heresy.”
The king’s shoulders heaved and pink blotches marred his cheeks. Before him Kayo bowed his head.
Silence dropped like rain, scattered and in pieces all around, smothering everything.
None in the great hall moved, horror and shock rippling throughout.Gaela bared her teeth until Astore put his hand to her shoulder and squeezed, his eyes wide; Regan had bitten her bottom lip until blood darkened the paint smeared there already. Connley put a hand to his sword, though whether to defend the panting Oak Earl or the wild king it was impossible to say. Beyond them, the Earl Errigal’s face was red, and he held a young man tightly by the arm. That young man stared at Elia, fury alive in the press of his mouth. Retainers gripped weapons; the creak of leather, and gasps and whispers skidded through the air.
It was all a trembling mountain ready to erupt.
They say Elia alone remained calm. The calm of the sun, it seemed, that need do nothing but silently stand. She reached out and put her trembling hand against Kayo’s arm. “Father, stop this,” she said.
“I do not see you,” Lear snarled.
She closed her eyes.
Kayo said, hard and firm, “See better, Lear.”
Then the Oak Earl turned and swiftly hugged Elia again. He cupped her head and said, “Stand firm, starling. You are right.”
Again, Elia Lear remained silent.
Before going, Kayo said to Gaela and Regan, “May you both act as though everything you’ve said today were true, if you have any respect for your mother’s heart.”
The entire court watched him stride away from the throne. At the rear he paused, turned, and flung a final word at the king: “Dalat would be ashamed of you today, Lear.”
With a flourish, he departed, and his going burst open the threads of tension that had held the Zenith Court together: it erupted into noise and fury.
ELIA
ELIA STOOD ALONEin the center of chaos: she was as still as the Child Star, fixed in the north. All around her men and women moved and argued, swelled and pressed, pushing and pulling and departing in snaps of motion.
Pressure throbbed in her skull; her heart was a dull, fading drumbeat. Sweat tingled against her spine, beneath her breasts, flushed on her cheeks. Emptiness roared in her ears, shoving everything back—back—back.
Her stomach and lungs had always served her well—breathed for her, turned her food into spirit, given her song against fluttering nerves—and now, now they betrayed her.
As her father had.
