The Great Hunt (6 page)

From that day on, Aerity was allowed into the adult conversations without question. She desperately wanted to drag her grieving cousin along with her, since they’d always done everything together, but the last thing Wyneth needed was to hear talk of the beast.

Aerity rushed straight to her father’s office for news the next morning, but it was empty. The castle was strangely silent. Aerity neared the High Hall, where a guard stood at attention outside the doors. He allowed her to pass without hesitation. She saw movement through the crack of the door and she opened it enough to peek in.

Aerity held her breath at the sight of her mother climbing the hanging silks. She hadn’t seen her mother perform, even casually, in years. Aerity recalled how weightless her mother had always seemed in her silk acts, but today there was a heaviness about her ascent. Queen Leighlane’s cabernet-colored curls were pulled up tightly and she wore a close-fitting shirt and leggings. She was halfway to the ceiling when she stopped, resting her cheek against the fabric as she swayed.

The sight filled Aerity with sadness. What was going on in her strong mother’s mind? Was all hope lost? She refused to believe it.

Queen Leighlane seemed to come back to herself. She
reclined into a lean and pulled her knees up, repositioning her feet with a glide of the cloth. Her body wound and slid into position with the silks around her waist. Aerity recognized the position of a drop roll. Her mother began to soar downward, and the princess quickly saw that her mother was not stopping the roll soon enough. Queen Leighlane reached up wildly to grab at the silks, but tumbled to the ground with a thump.

“Mama!” Aerity ran into the hall, the guard at her heels, and fell to her mother’s side.

The queen sat up, pressing a hand against her hip.

“Your majesty!” The guard crouched beside her.

“I’m fine,” she whispered, closing her eyes.

“Shall I fetch Mrs. Rathbrook?” he asked.

“No. It’s only bruising. You may leave us.”

He hesitated before standing. “I’ll be just outside the door if you need anything, Your Highness.”

The queen reached for Aerity’s hand and they clasped, moving closer.

Aerity helped her sit up. “Are you certain you’re okay?”

“I’ve had worse falls.” She managed a small smile, which quickly faltered as the queen met her daughter’s eyes. The woman’s chin trembled.

“What is it, Mama? What happened last night?”

“Your father . . .” She sniffed and composed herself. “He’s at his wit’s end, love. The men refused to hunt last night. Hundreds of them. Even after your father instated a larger reward.
We cannot stretch the kingdom’s finances further. They’re asking for higher powered weapons, more versatile versions of the cannons they use at sea, but it could take months, years, to develop and produce something like that.”

“Seas alive,” Aerity whispered.

Her mother’s eyes cleared as she looked at her. “I’m sorry. I shouldn’t put this burden on your shoulders—”

“No.” Aerity’s voice was resolute. “I need to know what is going on. The kingdom’s burdens are mine as well as yours.”

The queen’s eyes watered. “This beast. It’s too strong—too vicious. The men say their war cries only taunt it. My girl . . . I’m frightened for what’s to come.”

Aerity shivered and pulled her mother against her. She needed her mother to stay strong, for all of them. She’d never seen her like this. “Everything will be all right, Mama. Father will figure something out.”

She hoped if she kept saying it, it would become truth.

Aerity held hands with her mother as news was issued in the king’s office.

“Three fishermen were reported missing. Traces of their remains were found at daybreak at the sea’s edge. They were . . .” The adviser swallowed hard. “Their bodies were spread over a vast area, as if the beast had dragged them about.”

A bout of nausea filled Aerity.

Lady Ashley clung to her husband’s elbow and leaned her face against his arm. “It has to stop,” she whispered.

Aerity agreed. The tales were unbearable. Everything around her felt fragile and weak.

The king leaned his knuckles against his desk, his eyes shut tightly.

“Your Majesty.” One of his commanders stepped forward. “The numbers of men willing to enter the forest to fight the beast have dwindled to nearly nothing. Wives of soldiers are lined at the castle walls during daylight hours, begging for mercy for their husbands, pleading for them not to be forced into the woods.” The man sounded desperate, almost frantic. “The kingdom is petrified with fear. Businesses are shutting down because some fear leaving their homes, even during daylight. Some have taken the opportunity to loot. Many are fleeing to the coldlands of Ascomanni or mountains of Toresta.”

“Enough,” the king said in a growl. “Everyone leave me. I need to think.” He pushed up and went to the window-lined wall, staring out as the others filed away in silence. Aerity’s mother squeezed her hand before taking her leave. When the room cleared, Princess Aerity walked to her father’s side and placed a hand on his shoulder.

“Father . . .”

He continued to stare out the window, his anxiety obvious. Without looking at her he reached up and gave her hand a single pat.

“While I’ve been busy, you’ve grown into a young woman. You call me father now, not papa.”

Aerity’s heart softened. How long had it been since they’d spoken one-on-one?

“I thought I was prepared for anything. I prided myself on defending this kingdom against rebels and uprisings and foreign invasion. To be bested by a single creature . . . to see my people in despair . . .”

Her grip tightened on his shoulder. “You’ve not been bested. There is hope. You’re doing all you can, Father.”

“Am I?” He looked at her now, his watery eyes scanning her face. He ran a hand through his hair, overgrown strands of light red. He was a man in his prime, and Aerity didn’t like seeing his strength frayed.

“I don’t like being pushed to desperate measures,” he whispered, almost to himself.

Aerity swallowed back her emotions enough to speak. “Any who know you do not doubt that you act out of love for the kingdom. Always. Do what you must.”

He stared back out of the window until Aerity’s hand fell away from him.

“Seas forgive me,” he whispered. Princess Aerity left her father to think, having no idea how her own words would come to affect her.

The castle windows remained tightly locked, emptying the rooms and halls of their usual scented breeze, stifling the royal living spaces. That evening when Vixie and Donubhan feigned nightmares, Aerity let them cram into her bed. It left Aerity tired in the morning after being kicked and nudged and snored at all night, but she was glad to be able to comfort them. And their nearness was a comfort to her as well.

Something had to be done. The entire kingdom of Lochlanach was exhausted. Frazzled. On the verge of self-destruction. If the beast wasn’t caught and killed soon, fear would overtake the lands.

Fear was a dangerous, unpredictable weapon.

Princess Aerity wasn’t surprised when her father called a royal family meeting. She wondered what extreme measures he had decided upon, and hoped the people of the kingdom would come to understand and support him. One thing Aerity had learned from being the daughter of a king is that sometimes sacrifices had to be made for the greater good.

They filed into the High Hall—even cousin Wyneth, who left her bed for the first time since Breckon’s death. Aerity was proud of her for coming. She forced herself not to pounce on her cousin with affection, instead holding Wyneth’s hand tightly as the older women doted on her, smoothing her curls and flooding her with greetings.

In order to show her hope for the kingdom, Aerity wore a pale shade of periwinkle blue, her first colorful garment in days, while Wyneth still donned gray.

The king and queen sat at the head of the long table in their tall oak chairs lined with crushed blue velvet. As a child, Aerity could remember running her fingers along the carved grooves of the chairs where generations of kings and queens had sat before them.

King Charles’s younger sisters flanked the king and queen on either side with their husbands—the Wavecrests on one side, the Baycreeks on the other. The king was the eldest child and only son. He’d always been close to his sisters and brothers-in-law, and welcomed their counsel.

Princess Aerity sat beside Wyneth, who still held her hand. Wyneth preserved her tough exterior, but Aerity felt
the truth in the slight tremble of her cousin’s fingers.

On Aerity’s other side was a fidgety Vixie. Across from them were two of Wyneth’s three younger brothers, fourteen-year-old Bowen, and Brixton at twelve. Wyneth’s youngest brother, Wyatt, ran about the expansive space of the hall with Donubhan and their cousin Leo, while Caileen and Merity sat with sketchbooks and fine chalks.

The clearing of the king’s throat was loud enough to draw everyone’s attention. His face had taken on an ashen pallor, the skin drooping under his hazel eyes. It was alarming for Princess Aerity to see her father in such a state. He set his elbows heavily on the table before him.

“Never in my reign have I experienced such desperation.”

Aerity’s heart sank like an anchor to hear the truth in those words.

“I’ve spoken countless hours with my advisers and officers,” he continued. “I’ve notified the other kingdoms of our predicament, and thankfully no other lands of Eurona suffer such a beast as ours. We’ve no idea where it came from, or if there is more than one, but it must be stopped. If it continues, or, seas forbid, multiplies . . .” A shiver seemed to ricochet through him. “My men are not hunters. They are soldiers and sailors and watermen. I cannot allow my people to continue being slaughtered and terrified. If I don’t act, the people will act on my behalf. They’ve already begun.”

Revolt? Aerity’s innards shook at the idea of an uprising. Chaos.

Lord James sat forward, stiffening. “What do you mean, they’ve already begun?”

The king’s lips pursed. “In the north village, where one of the murdered fishermen lived, the townspeople went door to door as a mob, looking for Lashed. They found a man with fresh markings . . .”

“Seas alive, no,” Lady Faith whispered. Aerity’s stomach turned.

“The Lashed man was ill, could hardly walk. He told them he’d healed a baby bird that fell from a tree, but they were beyond sympathy, beyond reason. They stoned him to death.”

The queen dragged in a sobbing breath and covered her mouth. Aerity tasted bile as her own emotions rose.

“He should not have used his magic, aye, but I cannot have people taking the law into their own hands,” the king said with a pained inflection. “I cannot allow senseless killings of innocents in my land.”

“Have you any ideas what we can do?” Lord Wavecrest asked.

“One.” Aerity’s father spoke the word in a near whisper. Then he looked straight at her, his eldest daughter.

Goose bumps rippled in a cold wave across the princess’s skin.

Aerity’s mother grabbed the king’s forearm in a hard grip and turned toward him, besieging him with a whisper. “Charles, perhaps we should tell her without an audience.”

Her father eyed her mother. His gaze held something Aerity had never seen before. Something utterly unsettling. Something hardened.

“You speak of me?” Aerity whispered.

“Aye,” her father whispered in return.

“Shall we leave?” Her uncle Preston began to stand.

“No,” Aerity said. They all turned to her, as if surprised by her strong tone. “Please stay. We’ve always been as one. Whatever he has to say to me can be said in front of all of you.”

Truth be told, she was frightened and took comfort in being surrounded by family. She’d no clue what this meeting had to do with her, but they were all in this together. Everyone settled again, but not one of them appeared comfortable.

“They call me the liberal king,” her father continued in that same ominous, quiet tone. “The romantic.” He looked at his wife, who gave an encouraging nod. “Because I believe in marrying for love, not lands or money or family name, the way it was for centuries before me. I promised my daughters they could choose their future husbands, just so long as the lads met our general approval.”

Everyone around the table nodded. They all knew this, and had agreed. The king had even fought his parents for his sisters to be able to marry of their own choosing. But Princess Aerity could not nod along with them. A horrible sense of trepidation had taken root inside her.

Why was he bringing up marriage? He wouldn’t even
allow young men to court her until she turned eighteen next year.

“But these are desperate times,” he whispered.

Heavy sea snakes slithered in the pit of Aerity’s stomach.

“What are you saying, Charles?” Lady Ashley asked.

Again, her father looked directly at Aerity. “I must ask something of you that I never wanted. I never expected. As your father, it pains me. As your king, it is necessary.”

Her eyes burned, but she could only nod at his sincerity. Next to her, cousin Wyneth’s fingers flexed against Aerity’s, her first signs of life.

“Aerity . . .” Her father paused. “I must ask you to sacrifice the promise of love for the sake of our kingdom.”

He stared at her hard. She tried to swallow, but she could only stare back, frozen.

“I will be issuing a king’s proclamation to all five kingdoms of Eurona to send their best hunters, but I must make their journeys worthwhile. I must ensure that the strongest will be willing to face this foe. A monetary prize is not enough, and as you all know, most of the kingdom’s excess funds are wrapped up in my son’s land and youngest daughter’s dowry. Therefore, I have only one thing left to offer the man who kills this beast. I offer the hand of my oldest daughter in marriage.”

No.
Spirits of the seas, no.

Princess Aerity felt heavy, unable to move or take air into her lungs. On one side of her, Vixie squeaked. On the other,
Wyneth gasped. Her aunts and uncles gaped at him.

The queen leaned forward to garner Aerity’s attention, that same desperation in her eyes that the king had, her voice thick. “Please, darling, don’t think of it as sacrificing love. Who’s to say you won’t fall in love with him? I imagine he’ll be brave and . . .”

The queen had to stop and cover her mouth against the mounting emotions. Aerity felt as if she might be sick. All around the table were the shocked faces of her family, but none of their horror matched the turmoil within her. She knew she should say something, but words . . . there were no words. Her life, as she knew it, was over. Her future, and the freedom she’d imagined, was dead.

Vixie began swiping tears from her cheeks. “This isn’t fair for Aerity, Papa,” she said.

“Truly, Charles,” said Lady Ashley. “There must be another way.”

The king’s jaw set. “You don’t think I’ve thought this through? You think I came to this decision on a careless whim, Sister?”

“I think we could have discussed options as a family—”

His voice rose. “I’ve spent countless hours speaking with every able-minded adviser in the kingdom. I’ve nothing left to give! Our lands had two years of drought and two years of rotting rain. Trades are down. All land in Lochlanach is owned by commoners or claimed for our royal lines. Would you have me break off pieces of your lands as reward?” The
king pushed back in his chair; the queen placed a steadying hand on his forearm.

“There’s no need to raise your voice at her,” Lord Preston said.

“I believe there bloody well
is
reason when I’m being accused of tossing my daughter away without a care!” He looked at Lady Ashley. “You of all people should want this beast killed.”

“Of course I want it killed!” she shouted back at him. “But this is unprecedented.”

“It cheapens the royal line,” Lord Preston added.

“How so?” the queen asked. “Because hunters are mostly villagers?” She raised her eyebrows in challenge.

“You know I have no prejudice against you or commoners, Leighlane,” Lord Preston scoffed.

“Charles, please,” Lady Faith spoke. “We know you’re under pressure. We know you wouldn’t make this decision without a care. It’s just that we’re all a bit . . . surprised. You do realize a proclamation like this could invite any vagabond, brutish, scoundrel to have a lucky shot at the beast and live out the rest of his life the castle, don’t you? And with your daughter, no less.”

The queen sucked in a breath. “Don’t be crude.”

“It’s only the truth,” Lady Faith said. “We need to discuss the reality of this situation.”

“The reality is that we’re facing a beast that we struggle to beat,” the king snapped.

“I agree,” Lord James said. He sent his wife an apologetic look for opposing her. “I think this is a worthy sacrifice. Arranged marriages were the way for many years until our generation. Aerity will survive.”

As they argued, Aerity imagined the kind, handsome face of Harrison, but the comfort he brought her was suddenly beyond reach.

“Papa, please,” Vixie pleaded. “Use my dowry instead.”

Oh, sweet Vixie. Aerity’s heart cracked.

The queen shook her head. “Vix, you will need that, trust me.”

“I don’t want it!”

“You’re too young to understand the importance, love.”

“I’m old enough to know this is wrong!” Vixie was crying in earnest now.

Lord James shook his head. “This generation of royal children doesn’t understand the obligation we have to the people. These kids have lived indulgent lives with no responsibilities, playing and doing circus tricks all day.”

Queen Leighlane gasped. “Exercise and agility is nothing to frown upon.”

Lady Faith waved a dismissive hand at her husband. “They learn of hardship through their studies. No need for them to actually
experience
it.” At this, Lord James rolled his eyes, and the arguing commenced.

Vixie’s wails became background noise to the entire family fighting, emotions rising along with their voices. Aerity’s
queasy stomach continued to spin, making her dizzy. While the adults quarreled, Wyneth’s worried eyes met Aerity’s.

Am I selfish to want to refuse?
Aerity silently asked. Wyneth tightened her grip on her cousin’s hand under the table, and Aerity knew that even though Wyneth would do anything to avenge Breckon’s death, she would not hold it against Aerity if she defied her father in this.

Lord James stood, his chair flying back, knocking over a water glass as he pointed at Lord Preston. Others rose to their feet as well. Their voices echoed in Aerity’s ears, the words mashing together without meaning, making her head pound.

Thirty men had been slaughtered this week. Thirty women were grieving for the men they loved, and one of those women was her cousin. Thirty mothers had to live with images of their sons’ strong bodies being ripped apart. Now her family was at odds.

Could this proclamation end their suffering?

She forced herself to sit straighter, grasping at fleeting strands of confidence.

“Father.” The single word was lost amid a myriad of loud voices. The frustration and desperation painted on her loved ones’ faces hurt her. She yelled over them, “Father!”

The room silenced. All heads turned to her.

“I will do as I must.” Her words were strong, forceful, even though she felt nothing of the sort. She looked at her father’s red face. “I do not fault you for making this difficult
decision. Send out your proclamation. Let the hunt begin as soon as possible.”

His eyes lit in pride and gratitude. When his chin trembled, the chin of a man who never backed down and never showed weakness, Princess Aerity had to release herself from Wyneth’s grip.

The truth of everything began to soak into her, like rain, each drop speaking to her. . . .

A stranger.

A hunter.

Your husband.

Overwhelmed, she turned and gathered her skirts, forcing her chin to remain up as she walked steadily from the High Hall.