Of Silver and Beasts (2 page)

There’s no room for doubt.

Or regret.

The Nactue Guard sacrifices their personal life completely. They’re dedicated to our empress and our queendom, and that requires a pledge—a vow of servitude. I don’t mind. I could never see myself married and having children. The possibility of bringing a child into this world to endure someone like my father only seals my decision. Men are the furthest thing from my thoughts, and being a Nactue will make keeping them off my mind easy.

Only women can be in the Nactue Guard.

Lilly nudges my shoulder. “Hey, Kal.”

Bumping her shoulder back, I say, “Yeah, Lills.”

“Check out the guy to your right—next to the fruit stand.”

I groan. “Don’t start, Lilly.”

She turns toward Willa. “Don’t you think Kal needs to get laid or at least
kissed
before she devotes her life to the protectors?”

Willa sighs. “This could be your last chance, Kal. Once we’re on the inside of those walls”—she nods toward the high palace walls—“there’s no time for play.”

“I’m perfectly content being by myself.”

“But you’re not by yourself,” Lilly says. “You’re with us, and you’re kind of the third wheel. It’s time you got a man.”

Willa laughs, and I stop walking to face them, but Lilly takes off on a bound toward the random guy she picked out at the fruit stand. I latch on to her arm, and she tugs me behind her. “Lilly, stop—” She laughs, and Willa doubles over. “Oh, goddess. Don’t embarrass me again.”

Lilly finally stops when she has to grab her stomach, her laughs tumbling out in pants. “I won’t,” she says, and gasps in air. Then she looks into my eyes. “I just want to see you happy.”

“I am,” I say. And I mean it. “I’ve got you guys, and we’re advancing today. I couldn’t be happier.” I raise my brows. “Who needs a man?”

Willa throws her arms over both my and Lilly’s shoulders and urges us forward. “I couldn’t agree with you more.”

I shake my head and wrap my arm around her as we walk together toward the palace.

The migrating crowd clusters closer as we near the gatehouse. We form a long line and inch forward slowly. Soon, I won’t have to bother with checks. I’ll live in the palace and people will look to me to keep them safe.

I only wish I could bring my mother along. For the past few years, I’ve done well at playing the child. I’ve given her ways to feel like she’s the one taking care of me, when really it’s been the opposite. I’ve kept her fed and living in our apartment with my training salary. Made sure she saw her physicians every month when she’d fight me on it. And monitored her medication, assuring the disease in her lungs didn’t spread.

Her caretaker Emily has been with us since my father was taken away three years ago. She’s only a couple years older than me, but responsible. I hired her myself, and I’m confident in her, but when I’m not there to oversee everything, I worry. I’ll be able to visit during my leaves, and I’m not far away, but not being able to be there for her daily fills me with guilt.

I guess my mother and I are both plagued by our guilt in some form, though.

She couldn’t protect me from my father’s fits of rage, and I grew up ashamed of a woman who submitted to her husband. She wouldn’t stand up to him. I know that wasn’t her fault, though. She hadn’t been trained by the protectors to know her own strength. And any duration of time being belittled and abused can subdue the strongest of wills.

If she would’ve exposed my father—a
man
—for what he’d done to us, he would’ve been executed. Her gentle heart could never allow that, no matter the monster he was. So as I got older, I learned to keep his anger directed toward me, away from her. Still, I wonder how a mother could bear it. Maybe the goddess Farrah gave her a timid heart and me a stubborn will for a reason, a purpose. At least I discovered mine.

One of the gatehouse sentries runs a metal detector along Willa’s front and back as the one next to me mimics her motions, stopping only to give me a small, heartened smile when the tip of the wand illuminates as she passes over my chest. Claudia is her name, and she performs this routine with me nearly every day.

She knows of the cybernetic instrument, but not of the mercury. The clamp in my chest had to be revealed to her the first day I was brought here and, thank Alyah, her station has been consistent since. I couldn’t handle all the sentries knowing of my abnormality.

“Live well, in Farrah’s name, Kaliope,” Claudia says to me, smiling.

I nod once. “Live well, in Farrah’s name,” I repeat to her. Then we enter the palace court where our new life awaits.

Free-standing colonnades line the cemented path through center Court. Sheer white fabric is draped between the white columns, and it wavers slightly in the slight, warm breeze. Herb scented smoke billows from the top of large copper burners, perfuming the dry air.

As we near the middle of the gathered crowd, I see my mother standing alone near a stature of Farrah.
Where’s Emily?

“Go ahead without me,” I tell Lilly and Willa. “I’ll find you before the ceremony begins.”

Their eyes follow my gaze. Lilly spots my mother and her amber eyes sadden. “Tell her I said hello.”

I nod, then work my way toward my mother. I push past two male protectors as they wave to me. “Good luck, Kal,” one of them—Byron—says.

“Thanks. You, too.” I smile, hoping he gets the placement he most wants. Though I’m not interested in finding a suitor—despite Lilly’s persistence—I’ve always treated the male protectors with respect. And Byron is one of the best. He deserves a high ranking.

Finally, I reach my mother. “What are you doing here?”

Her green eyes, which have dulled from their bright hue since her illness, light up. “I wouldn’t miss your promotion for anything,” she says. The deep-set wrinkles around her eyes crinkle as she smiles.

My chest aches, and I take a deep breath. “Where’s Emily?” I say low, glancing around. “You know you’re too sick to be—”

“Stop, Kal.” She waves her hand. “I’m not missing this. Now come here.” She extends her arms. I sigh and allow her to hug me and kiss my cheek. The soft, worn fabric of her jade tunic brushes against my neck. She pulls back. “Don’t forget to visit me on your leaves.” She coughs into her hand. “I’m not above storming the palace to check on my little girl.”

Mock-rolling my eyes, I give her the satisfaction of embarrassing me. “I promise.” I bring her into another tight hug, wondering how I’ll be able to do my duty while my thoughts will be constantly on her. “It’s not like I’m moving across the queendom. I’m literally right down the street.”

She smiles, and runs her thumb across my check as she inspects my face. Then she uses the sleeve of her tunic to polish the silver protector emblem of wings encircling the goddess sun on my uniform. “Alyah watch over you, Kaliope.”

At the use of my full name, something she only says when she’s extremely sentimental, I blink rapidly to clear my vision. I can’t let the other Nactue see me bawling like a little girl. They’re the fiercest women in all of Cavan. And now, I think proudly, I’m one of them.

My heart beats against my breastbone as I study her face. “Mom, please do everything Emily says.” I widen my eyes at her. “Promise you’ll take care of yourself.”

A sudden sadness fills her eyes, but then it’s quickly gone. “You have to stop worrying about me, Kal. You need to live
your
life.” Her eyes roam my face as if this will be the last time she’ll see it. “I will always be with you. No matter what. Now go.”

Hesitating a moment, I consider her words, but then see protectors moving to the front of the crowd. I have to trust that she’ll be all right. That Emily will take care of her, and that my salary will continue to provide enough to keep her in good health. I nod and give her a quick smile. “I’ll visit soon.”

Tugging the pleats of my cinched uniform straight, I make my way toward the front line of protectors. They’re positioned right below the dais where Empress Iana will give her address. I spot Lilly and Willa and push toward them, then stand next to Lilly at the end of the first row.

Willa leans forward and says around Lilly, “It’s great she could be here.”

I smile and give her a sure nod. What goes unsaid is that my father could not. That he never came to any of my functions even before he was committed. It reminds me of just how different my life is from theirs and most of the citizens of Cavan.

Proving further that my home life was not of the norm, Lilly waves to her parents across the swarming crowd. Her mother stands to the side of her father and a foot ahead of him, showing her dominance in their family.

Searching the crowd, I see the same display expressed in every family gathered here. It’s not a way to put men beneath women, or to declare us superior. It’s to show that Farrah has chosen the mother and wife to guard, protect, and govern those who she cares most for. It’s a symbol of a woman’s love and devotion to her family.

My parents never attended functions together, I fear, for this very display. My father is an oddity—his misogyny something I can’t place on his part. He didn’t grow up in Cavan, though. And he doesn’t speak of his homeland. But he never allowed my mother to be ahead of him in any public fashion.

And it’s that irony, of being raised in a queendom and also by a man who looked down on women, that makes me the
oddity
that I am. Had I been brought up in a normal household, maybe I’d have a different outlook on men in general. As it is, I simply want to serve my empress, my deities, and I don’t give men a second glance.

“Here we go,” Lilly says, drawing me out of my reverie as she nods toward the dais.

The all-women Cavan Council step up first and walk a straight line across the platform, then seat themselves on the raised bench behind the dais. Their neutral colored robes cling to them in the heat, and each member wears a vissa display over one eye with a short, thin silver microphone jutting from beneath the clear screen.

Councilor Herna stands before her place in the middle of the bench. “Welcome Cavan.” Her voice booms across the court as she raises her arms in gesture to the crowd. A giant blue-green hologram of her image projects before the immense palace. “Farrah bless this day.”

The crowd echoes her in unison with “Live well, in Farrah’s name”.

She then swings her arm toward the front of the palace as the massive white doors part. “Empress Iana,” she announces, and cheers erupt.

I clap and holler along, pride for our ruler filling me with elation. Empress Iana steps onto the platform and nods to her council, then raises her hands to the gathered crowd. Her white robe opens slightly in front, and peeking beneath is a gold and ochre dress. She’s the only empress to wear colors other than white. It was a matter of debate when she was first empowered ten years ago after the war. She was fourteen then, and one of the youngest ever to be sanctioned Empress of Cavan.

The Council gave in to her whims, stating that age would mature her ways, and she’d eventually accept the purity of white as her everyday apparel. But apparently, it hasn’t. A small smile tugs at the corner of my mouth. I can think of no one more deserving to dedicate my life to then of the young, willful empress.

She steps to the center of the dais and the crowd hushes. “Welcome Cavan,” she says, the silver microphone carrying her soft voice across the palace court. “Farrah has blessed this day, and given me the strength to announce this very difficult address.” She pauses, and murmurs rumble through the crowd. “As you know, the Perinyian Kingdom was attacked two days ago by Otherworlders. We feared the day they’d resurface and strike again. It was never a matter of if . . . but when.”

I glance over at Lilly. She’s absorbing every word as she unconsciously snaps her knuckles with her thumb. A nervous habit or hers. I reach out and touch her hand.