Fist of the Furor (3 page)

King Freemont’s eyes narrowed. “Their customs?”

My gaze flew to Cadeyrn’s. His chin rose, a knowing glint entering his eyes. He knew the Henderonians, had undoubtedly spent time in their court with his first wife.

The words weren’t easy when they came. Why they were so hard, I didn’t know, but it hurt me to say them.

“He could marry them both.”

Chapter 3

“That’s preposterous!” Gabriella cried, her wild eyes roaming our faces. “It’s also against the law.”

I knew when the king grasped my logic. He scratched at his beard again, his gaze moving to Conall. “Do you think it would work?”

The queen gasped. “You’d have our son convert to those barbaric customs?”

Her gaze cut to mine, and I looked away. To the queen, I was nothing but trouble. I’d ousted her brother as a traitor. Even if it was warranted, it didn’t lessen the sting.

“Gabriella is right. It’s preposterous,” she added. The queen had a sweet, soft voice. Her name was Isabella. It suited her. Both my name and my nickname were anything but soft.

Arien reached for his mother, but she pulled away. “You’d all listen to a peasant rebel?” she asked.

Cadeyrn stepped forward, his hand on the hilt of his sword. “She’s the daughter of our Minister of Government, and it’s a logical plan.”

“A bastard daughter,” Gabriella hissed.

I didn’t flinch. I’d always been a bastard daughter.

My voice rose. “A bastard maybe, Your Majesty, but I was once the bastard child of an ambassador, a child who preferred the dusty Archives of my father’s estate. Ambassadors diffuse foreign disputes. The Henderonians have many gods, as does my nation. But their male gods also have many wives. To have many wives is a sign of power. The Henderonian king has four wives—”

“Five now,” Cadeyrn inserted.

My gaze cut to his where he stood beside me, and for the first time since we met almost six months before, I caught a glimpse of amusement in his quirked lips.

“Your Archives were a bit outdated,” he added.

I bowed my head before returning my gaze to the dais. “Prince Cadeyrn’s wife was Henderonian. Had she survived, he would have been expected to stand with his wife, to rule upon King Gregor’s death while providing an heir to assume the throne when he came of age. It stands to reason Cadeyrn would choose to convert to his late wife’s religion.”

“It’s barbaric,” Queen Isabella repeated, her cold, dark eyes full of animosity.

I met her gaze, my own eyes frosty. The rebels were a group without a ruler. With Kye’s death, they depended on me, and I refused to let him or them down. “Then you must feel the same about Medeisia, about our Mana Deea, the mother goddess and her many children. I am a child of many gods and goddesses, the daughter of the forest, of Silveet. Am I barbaric? Are my people barbaric?”

Gabriella stepped from the dais. She was taller than me, her violet dress lined in gold and silver designs that flashed in the Hall of Light. It was blinding, and she knew it.

“You take a lot of liberty, rebel. Do you not fear persecution?” Her hand rose, violet jewels twinkling from her fingers. “You insult royalty.”

I was walking a fine line, but I didn’t fear politics. I feared the battlefield. I feared the dreams war had given me, feared the lives my not standing up now could cost me later.

I stared up at her. “I don’t fear death, Your Majesty. I fear the cost of death. Death has stolen a prince from its country. It has stolen power from the people of Medeisia. It has stolen from our forests. I don’t speak for myself. I speak for the common folk …” I glanced at Lochlen, and he nodded. “I speak for the king of dragons …” My gaze went to Oran, to his silver fur. “And I speak for Silveet, for the Goddess of the Forest.”

Gabriella laughed. “And yet you interfere in foreign politics that have nothing to do with Medeisia?”

Cadeyrn stepped toward her. “Enough! The girl is right. It would not be unreasonable for me to choose to convert to … Beatrice’s religion.” He’d paused before he said his wife’s name, but the smolder on his face didn’t lessen. “I had once considered the conversion in the past. It would have been expected.”

Conall nodded, the lines in his forehead deepening. His blue tunic made his blond hair appear white, aging him. “It would be a matter of getting the king of Greemallia to agree to this, to agree to his daughter marrying a man who already had a wife.” His gaze met Cadeyrn’s. “You cannot sit at the right hand of two women rulers in two different countries.”

My chest hurt, my heart heavy as I looked up. “No, but his sons could.”

Again, silence. I took advantage of it. “Should each wife be blessed with a son, that son would be required to be raised in his prospective country, raised to take over that throne. The only thing that will matter to the king of either country is a male heir.”

Cadeyrn’s knuckles whitened on the hilt of his sword. It sounded cold, my words. I was promising to send away his first born sons with Gabriella and Catriona to be raised by foreign kings. Nevertheless, Lochlen was right, animosity between Sadeemia, Gremallia, and Henderonia would only hurt our fight with Raemon. Medeisia was my first priority.

“You learn fast, Aean Brirg,” Cadeyrn mumbled. “Checkmate.”

My lips twitched. I’d been playing a lot of chess with the prince over the past three months. Since he’d tattooed my back, I’d often found myself at his bedroom door at night. Neither of us ever spoke. He simply held his door open, his hand gesturing at a chess board set up in the room. Every night we played. Every night he won. Every night we remained silent. No words, no conversation. Nothing except the crackling sound of fire, our breathing, occasional glances, and the slide of chess pieces against wood. My eyes often strayed to his bare chest, to the Henderonian tattoo and the silver pendant he wore around his neck. Something about it drew me, made me feel connected to him in an odd way.

“My father would never agree to it!” Gabriella hissed. “I won’t share a husband with that Henderonian bitch!”

“Watch it, Gabriella,” Cadeyrn warned. “You are insulting my future wife.”

The irony of it was too amusing, and Maeve snickered from behind me. “Oh, my! It’s brilliantly crazy,” she murmured.

King Freemont looked at his son. “It could work.”

Conall was animated now, his hands waving excitedly. “And if we could get the Henderonians to promise trade between themselves and Gremallia—”

“No!” The queen’s yell was loud, her dazzling voice cracking. Her blue skirts swished as she moved to the front of the throne, her strength giving out. She fell delicately to the seat. “Our son cannot marry two women.”

Isabella was from New Hope. It was a monotheistic country with one god and little tolerance, but it was rich in silk and gold. Its resources made it an important nation despite its size.

Freemont looked back at his wife. “Politics win on this one, my Queen. You know as well as I that beliefs do not belong in government.”

Isabella glanced at him. “Don’t they?” Her gaze moved to my face. “Beliefs do not belong in government, and yet this one claims she speaks not only for her country’s people, but for a goddess?”

 
I stiffened, my wary gaze watching the way the queen’s eyes sharpened, the lines around her mouth tightening. “Do you not wonder why a rebel girl from a war torn country comes here and causes nothing but turmoil? Have you ever considered the idea that she may be in league with Medeisia’s king, that she is Raemon’s tool? He could be using her to cause chaos among us, to make us weaker so that he can attempt to usurp power.”

Cadeyrn sighed. “She doesn’t lie, Mother. I would know if she did.”

Isabella glared. “Would you? Do you trust your magic that much, son? It has failed to keep those you love safe. Could it not fail you now?”

Cadeyrn tensed, his light blue eyes going grey. “Do you question me?”

The king moved between them. “You are both right to question the other, and the girl. We are making hasty decisions that need to be brought before the council, the mages, and the scribes.”

The queen would not be placated. “Show us, daughter of Silveet! If you speak for a goddess, let us hear her. Speak!”

Oran growled, his teeth bared, and I gripped his fur.

Lochlen stepped up next to me. “She speaks for nature, Queen.” There was a bite to his words, his flat tone lacking respect. As a prince of dragons, he showed none. “You don’t do well to threaten her. She is, at all times, surrounded by friends.”

As if on cue, a loud
kek,kek
could be heard through the giant, glass ceiling, the shadow of a falcon thrown onto the floor below.

The queen stood. “Show us!”

Her yell echoed, traveling along the marble until it reached crescendo and slowly faded.

Power surged through me, the whispering sound of the trees beyond the castle becoming yells that made me cover my ears with the palms of my hands. Oran’s fur bristled. The hum from the distant ocean suddenly circled the walls, rising and falling in watery screams. The capital used the ocean, channeling its waters into the city. They didn’t drink it, but they displayed its power in complicated, beautiful sculptures and fountains. I felt the water now, its power building.

“Stop,” I whispered.

But the queen had threatened me, had threatened nature’s envoy.

“By the gods,” Daegan breathed, and I looked down to find the marble floors covered in vines, their leafy fingers crawling along the walls, wrapping themselves around the necks of the guards before crawling back down to the floor. I felt them when they moved, felt their energy as they sprouted from potted plants around the castle before traveling down into the Hall of Light.

Vines circled my ankles before climbing my legs and encircling me. Unlike the red-faced guards, the vines didn’t threaten me, they hugged me, growing so that they enfolded me like the brown robe I wore around my shoulders.

“Speak,” they hissed into my ears. “Speak for us.”

I stared at the astonished faces surrounding me, watching the fear that filled their gazes. I noted the pained look on my birth father’s face. There was disgust there. He tried to hide it, but he couldn’t. Even Maeve and Daegan cowered in awe. They knew my connection with the forest, but this was new.

The vines hugged me tighter, their reassurance filling my veins. Only Lochlen and Cadeyrn remained unfazed. They flanked me. Lochlen looked prepared to shift, his eyes dilating. Cadeyrn gripped his sword.

“Speak,” the leaves hissed again. Whispered words filled my brain, overwhelming me, and I knew when I looked at the queen my eyes were different, the turquoise color obliterating my black pupils. I knew it because I could almost see myself in her eyes.

“You dare question us?” It was my voice, and yet it wasn’t. There was something more confident about this voice, all innocence gone. “We watch you daily. We stand as sentinels, our oceans carrying your ships, our trees giving you cover from harsh sunlight, our winds blowing past your faces, and our animals sacrificed to feed you.” The vines climbed up my neck, circling it, creating a complex green necklace that closed in on itself before climbing up my face to the top of my head. There it grew, twisting and building.

“A crown,” Maeve breathed.

“We are one and many,” I said, the sound loud, louder than I could have ever spoken on my own. “And this girl is our voice, this girl who bears the blood of your nation and hers, who bears your stigmas and the stigmas of her people. We see no shame in her. For it is the mighty who fall, the weak who rise up to become kings and queens. You dare question us? You threaten each other, you make alliances, and you fight a thousand wars. In Medeisia, there lies an ancient forest full of our oldest ancestors. It, like the rest of Medeisia, is threatened. Remember this, human queen, it would take only one mighty wave, one mighty storm, to destroy your kingdom. Question us no more.”

And with that the vines unfurled, releasing me. Gasping, I fell to my knees, my arms suddenly supported on each side by Lochlen and Cadeyrn.

“Impressive,” Cadeyrn breathed.