Soman Chainani - Quests for Glory

Agatha closed her eyes and exhaled.

When she opened them, he was looking right at her.

She could hardly make out his face through the lashes of rain, but he was frozen still, gazing at her from beneath his hood. It was a dead, empty look, as if their shared past had been erased. As if this was the first time he’d ever seen her.

“You won’t learn the Empress of Putsi’s name by mooning into the rain,” a voice said.

Agatha turned to see Pollux and his sheep corpse lording over her. He glared down at her soggy album, a mess of runny colors.

“I know you’re not one for ceremony or celebration or nice things, Agatha. But this is your wedding ,” said Pollux.

“And I thought it was a Leprechaun’s Ball,” she said.

“If you’re going to treat this as a joke, then maybe I should call Lady Gremlaine—”

“Run to mommy like you always do.”

“You are a sad little girl,” Pollux retorted.

“Says the dog puppeting a sheep.”

Pollux sighed. “I’m not here to torture you, Agatha. I’m here to help you get married. You have to care.”

“I care,” Agatha said quietly.

“You have to care because it’s a timeless tradition and because it’s the first time your people will see you as a queen—”

“I care,” Agatha repeated.

“You have to care because this is your legacy—”

“I care ,” Agatha said.

“Do you?” said Pollux incredulously. “Based on what I see, you don’t. Tell me why I should believe you care about your wedding—”

Agatha looked at him. “Because I need to remind Tedros that we were happy once.”

Sorrow softened Pollux’s face.

Agatha turned back to the rain, hoping her prince was still there. …

But all she could see were two guards, wiping his blood off a sword.

Agatha ate dinner in the queen’s bathroom, where no one could bother her.

She still had her Wedding History lesson, but Pollux let her eat before it without alerting her chambermaids—a clear breach in protocol, since they had to know where the princess was at all hours.

Instead, Agatha had barreled into the kitchen herself, sending ten cooks into coronary shock.

“Princess Agatha,” Chef Silkima gasped, her rich brown skin flecked with flour. “What’s happened? … Is everything all r—”

“Can I get spaghetti with cheese for dinner?” said Agatha. “Lots of cheese. Tons. Like enough to ruin the dish.”

Chef Silkima and the cooks gaped down at their finished platters of cumin-spiced coconut soup, curried chicken in a green chili sauce, potato tikki s with peas and scallions, black-lentil salad with salmon crumbs, and a five-layer kulfi pistachio cake.

“Spaghetti with … cheese?” Chef Silkima croaked.

“To go, please,” said Agatha.

One of the cooks dropped his spoon.

Now, as she sat dangling bare feet into a bathtub of hot water, surrounded by mirrors and peeling gold wallpaper, Agatha twirled creamy-white spaghetti from a porcelain bowl into her mouth, savoring the melted mozzarella.

Everyone had their comfort in times of stress: Sophie had sea-salt facials, juice fasts, yoga poses, and deep-tissue massages; Tedros had dumbbells and climbing ropes and anything to work up a sweat. …

Agatha had food.

More precisely: so much food that it induced a warm, velvety coma that dulled her senses and made her unable to think beyond the gurgles of her stomach.

Reaper moseyed into the bathroom and sniffed at a scrap of cheese. He gave Agatha a curdled look, as if he thought she’d outgrown all this, and shuffled away.

Agatha and Tedros had certainly had fights before. Fights that made Agatha doubt whether he loved her or she loved him or whether they even belonged together. But this wasn’t a fight. She was sure Tedros loved her now—or at least as sure as she could be. …

Except relationships aren’t just about love, Agatha realized. Relationships are about taking off the mask you wear to make someone like you and letting them see the real you. The one you hid all along. The one you never thought was good enough to find love in the first place.

Tedros had helped her peel off her mask in her years at school. He’d seen her at her most vulnerable and her absolute worst and loved her even more for it.

But now it was Tedros’ turn to do the same and he was acting like most boys do when asked to face their feelings. …

They run.

There was another thing that also made this rift different than the others, Agatha thought, spotting the pile of letters on her desk. She could see the latest one, which she’d read so many times, yet left unanswered.

Darling,

I know you’re not reading this. I know you’re not reading any of my letters. You’re in love and have a wedding to plan and have no time for silly old me, but if you do read this, just know that you are in my heart always. And living without you has been far harder than I could ever admit out loud. So let me say it here. I miss you.

Love,

Sophie

P.S. Did you know Hort has been getting love letters from a girl?

Agatha wiped her eyes. Back at school, she’d always had Sophie by her side, the third point in the triangle between her and Tedros.

A hollow loneliness overwhelmed her and for the first time she saw it wasn’t just her old, chivalrous prince she was yearning for, but her bold, beautiful best friend too. A best friend she’d been avoiding, just like Tedros had been avoiding her.

Now she was all alone.

Outside, she heard wind and rain batter the ships in the harbor. Glancing through a small window, she saw none of these ships could sail; they were broken, neglected, and falling apart, like the rest of Camelot. Well, not all the ships: there was one that looked sturdy, with brilliant blue-and-gold finishes and milky white sails. Along the bow, she read the ship’s name … IGRAINE .

“Agatha?” Pollux’s voice echoed outside. “Shall we resume our—”

A loud hissing noise interrupted, followed by dog barks and crashing furniture.

Pollux had met Reaper.

Twenty minutes later, Agatha was in the Library, a two-story collection in the Gold Tower that must have once been impressive, but was now a heap of cobwebs, moth-eaten books, and so much dust she could hardly breathe. There were colorful sheets slung over the bookcases and desks, as if someone had started renovating a decade ago and never got around to finishing. Agatha slouched at a desk shrouded in a purple sheet, trying to take notes as Pollux scrawled on a squeaky chalkboard, his face slashed with claw-marks, suggesting he’d lost the battle with her cat.

“You certainly don’t want to be like Princess Kerber, who was so overwrought on her wedding day she ate an entire jar of peanut butter and vomited on her poor groom’s shoes. Conversely, learn from the example of Princess Muguruza, who married a commoner, nearly prompting a revolt, until she revealed her bridal gown, made entirely out of pink pearls she’d dredged from the Savage Sea. No one dared attack a girl who’d braved such treacherous waters and in time, every last dissenter forgave her. …”

Agatha glazed over, her head drooping into the purple sheet. She tried to force herself awake, prying her eyes open—

That’s when she saw the pattern stitched on the fabric.

Tiny, silver five-pointed stars in a purple night sky, like they’d been drawn by a child.

It wasn’t a sheet at all.

It was a cape.

Agatha held in a smile, her eyes on Pollux’s back. She put her nose to the purple velvet and inhaled the scent of fresh cocoa, as if someone was brewing it right now. …

“Then there was Princess Mahalaxmi, whose father kidnapped her during the ceremony and sold her to a Never warlord in Ravenbow,” Pollux rattled. “Which goes to show all family entanglements should be sorted before the wedding. …”