Soman Chainani - A Crystal of Time

But that wasn’t all they could see from this vantage point.

There was someone else on the stage watching the coronation too.

Someone concealed inside the balcony, out of view of the crowd.

The Snake.

He stood there in his ripped, bloody suit of scims, watching the king speak.

“First, we need our princess to become a queen,” Rhian proclaimed to the people, his voice amplified in the cell by the projection. “And as the future queen, it is Sophie’s honor to plan the wedding. Not some pretentious royal spectacle of the past. But a wedding that brings us closer to you. A wedding for the people!”

“ Sophie! Sophie! Sophie! ” the crowd brayed.

Sophie squirmed in his grip, but Rhian shoved the sword harder against her.

“Sophie has a full week of parties and feasts and parades in store,” he continued. “Followed by the wedding and crowning of your new queen!”

“ Queen Sophie! Queen Sophie! ” the masses anointed her.

Sophie’s posture straightened, listening to the adoring crowd.

In a flash, she yanked away from Rhian, daring him to do something to her.

Rhian froze, still gripping her hard. Though his face was in shadow, Hester could see him watching Sophie.

Silence fell over the crowd. They sensed the tension.

Slowly, King Rhian looked back at the people. “It seems our Sophie has a request,” he said, even and serene. “A request she’s been pressing upon me day and night and that I’ve been hesitant to grant, because I hoped the wedding would be our moment. But if there’s one thing I know about being king: what my queen wants, my queen must get.”

Rhian looked at his bride-to-be, a cold smile on his face.

“So the night of the wedding ceremony, at Princess Sophie’s insistence . . . we will begin with the execution of the impostor king.”

Sophie lurched back in shock, nearly slicing herself on Excalibur’s blade.

“Which means a week from today . . . Tedros dies ,” Rhian finished, glaring straight at her.

Shrieks rang out from Camelot’s people, who rushed forward in defense of Arthur’s son, but they were stymied by citizens from dozens of other kingdoms, kingdoms once ignored by Tedros and now firmly behind the new king.

“TRAITOR! ” one Camelot man screamed at Sophie.

“ TEDROS TRUSTED YOU! ” a Camelot woman shouted.

“ YOU’RE A WITCH! ” her child yelled at Sophie.

Sophie stared at them, speechless.

“Go now, my love,” Rhian cooed, giving her a kiss on the cheek before guiding her into the hands of his armored guards. “You have a wedding to plan. And our people expect nothing less than perfection .”

The last Hester saw of Sophie was her terrified face, locking eyes with her future husband, before the pirates pulled her into the castle.

As the crowd chanted Sophie’s name and Rhian presided calmly at the balcony, everyone inside the dungeon cell was stunned silent.

“Was he telling the truth?” a voice echoed down the hall.

Tedros’ voice.

“About Sophie wanting me dead?” the prince called out. “Was that the truth?”

No one answered him, because something else was happening onstage that the crew could see in the projection.

The Snake’s body was changing.

Or rather . . . his clothes were.

Magically, the remaining scims rearranged into a slim-fitted suit, which turned gold-and-blue all at once: a perfect inverse of the suit that Rhian was wearing.

As soon as the Snake had conjured his new clothing, Rhian seemed to sense it, for the king glanced back at the masked boy, acknowledging his presence for the first time. The quest team now saw Rhian’s tan, sharp-jawed face in full view, his hair glinting like a bronze helmet, his sea-green eyes running briefly over the Snake, who was still out of sight of the people. Rhian showed no surprise that his once mortal nemesis was alive or had magically changed his clothes or was wearing a suit that resembled his own.

Instead, Rhian offered the Snake the slightest hint of a smile.

The king turned back to the crowd. “The Storian never helps you . The real people. It helps the elite. It helps those who go to that school. How can it be the voice of the Woods, then? When it divides Good from Evil, rich from poor, educated from ordinary? That’s what’s made our Woods vulnerable to attack. That’s what let a Snake slither into your kingdoms. That’s what nearly killed you all. The pen. The rot starts with that pen .”

The people murmured assent.

Rhian’s eyes roamed the crowd. “You there, Ananya of Netherwood, daughter of Sisika of Netherwood.” He pointed down at a thin, unkempt woman, stunned that the king knew her name. “For thirty years, you’ve slaved at your kingdom’s stables, waking before dawn to groom horses for Netherwood’s witch-queen. Horses you’ve loved and raised to ride in battle. Yet no pen tells your story. No one knows about what you’ve sacrificed, who you’ve loved, or what lessons you might offer—lessons more worthy than any puffed-up princess the Storian might choose.”

Ananya blushed red as those around her gave her admiring looks.

“And you there, what about you?” said Rhian, pointing at a muscular man, flanked by three teenage boys with shaved heads. “Dimitrov of Maidenvale, whose three sons applied to the School for Good and were each denied, and yet all now serve as footmen for the young princes of Maidenvale. Day after day, you work to the bone, even though deep in your hearts you know these princes are no better than you. Even though you know that you deserved an equal chance at glory. Must you too die without your stories told? Must all of you die so ignored and forgotten?”

Dimitrov’s eyes welled with tears while his sons put their arms around their father.

Hester could hear the murmurs building in the crowd, awed that someone with such great power was honoring people like them. That he was even seeing them at all.

“But what if there was a pen that told your stories?” Rhian offered. “A pen that wasn’t controlled by mysterious magic, but by a man you trust. A pen that lived in plain sight instead of locked behind school gates. A pen made for a Lion.”

He leaned forward. “The Storian doesn’t care about you. I do. The Storian didn’t save you from the Snake. I did. The Storian won’t answer to the people. I will. Because I want to glorify all of you. And so will my pen.”

“ Yes! Yes! ” cried the people.

“My pen will give voice to the voiceless. My pen will tell the truth. Your truth,” the king announced.

“Please! Please!”

“The reign of the Storian is over!” Rhian bellowed. “A new pen rises. A new era begins!”

On cue, Hester and the crew watched as a sliver of the Snake’s gold suit peeled off and floated over the balcony wall, out of view of the crowd. The golden strip reverted to a scaly black scim as it drifted higher into the air, still unseen. Then it descended over the mob and into sunlight towards King Rhian, magically morphing into a long, gold pen, knife-sharp at both ends.

The people gazed at it, enthralled.

“At last. A Pen for the People,” Rhian called out, as the pen hovered over his outstretched hand. “Behold . . . Lionsmane !”

The masses exploded in their most passionate cheers yet. “Lionsmane! Lionsmane!”

Rhian pointed his finger and the pen soared into the sky over Camelot’s castle and wrote in gold against the pure blue canvas like it was a blank page—

THE SNAKE IS DEAD.

A LION HAS RISEN.

THE ONE TRUE KING.

Dazzled, all citizens of the Woods, Good and Evil, kneeled before King Rhian. Dissenters from Camelot were forced to a knee by those around them.