Tessa Gratton - The Queens of Innis Lear

With a huff, she stood. She supposed she could circle around town once or twice, or return tomorrow and hope Brona had found a chance to come.

“Aefa.”

It was the witch, her deep voice fond and laughing.

“Ah!” Aefa gasped, twirling with a delighted smile. “I didn’t miss you after all.”

The two women ducked together, embracing. The witch of the White Forest handed Aefa a small stoppered vial before they parted. She was a powerfully built woman with strong hands and a lovely tan face; loose black curls bound under a hood of vibrant red that matched the paint touched to lips as plump as her thighs.

Tucking the vial into a pocket of her skirts, Aefa said, “The princess is already inside the keep. I wish I could have brought her here to see you. She never speaks of you anymore, or her own mother, or truly much of anything but the stars. I’ve not caught her whispering to any flowers or wind in two entire years, Brona.”

The witch’s dark brow bent with sorrow, and she gazed toward the Summer Seat. “Be sure to put the rootwater in her mouth.”

“I slip it into her wine, or sometimes her breakfast. Shouldn’t she notice?”

Brona shrugged one shoulder. “She likely does, she only refuses to admit so, for many, many reasons.”

“Is she afraid?”

“No doubt.”

“I want to tell her,” Aefa said ferociously.

“And if you did, what would she say?”

Aefa imagined Elia’s face, her bright, black eyes. You have to listen to the island, Elia, Aefa would say, and those careful eyes would lower, perhaps flick up to the sky, or to the horizon, and the princess would take one of the great, deep breaths she used to quash the overwhelming song in her heart. But then Elia would make a sad, pretty smile, and move to some other conversation, some other answer, as if Aefa had said nothing at all.

The witch touched Aefa’s knuckles, and said, “She’ll ask you, when she’s ready. You’ll make sure she knows you have the answers?”

“I snap fire sometimes, out of air, to remind her.” Aefa pursed her lips. “She disapproves.”

Brona’s eyebrows lifted.

“She is afraid,” Aefa corrected herself, barely whispering.

“That’s good, little mushroom.” Brona smiled at Aefa’s darting glance. “Alis is well. She’s cultivating a long vine of sweet peas with charming purple flowers and a tendency to giggle at bluebirds.”

“Father wants to see her.”

There Brona’s expression closed off. “Then he should come see her. Nothing to stop him.”

After a pause, the women shared a knowing grimace. There was everything to stop the King’s Fool from a visit to Hartfare. The witch sighed. “But listen, Aefa, he will see her soon enough. All who were riven will soon return to their center.”

Aefa’s lips parted in wonder, for though the witch’s tone did not alter, the words held the weight of magic. “Is that a star prophecy?”

“I do not read stars,” Brona said with delicate distaste. “It is only the gossip of trees.”

But the witch turned her head east, and all her body followed, until Brona faced the rising land, staring as if she could see beyond it to the ocean channel, and past even that, to Aremoria.

“Even …?” Aefa whispered.

“Yes.”

A thrill straightened Aefa’s spine, and she danced a little in place. This would delight the princess, make the fire she was so afraid of flicker again and burn. “She’ll be so happy!”

“No,” Brona said suddenly, grabbing Aefa’s wrist. “She won’t be. But she will survive.”

IN INNIS LEAR it was believed that the reign of the last queen had been predicted by the stars—and had ended, too, because of them.

Lear had been middle-aged when his father and brothers died: too old to have planned for ruling, too old to easily let go of his priestly calling, his years of sanctuary in the star towers. So the first thing the new king ordered was a star-casting to point him in the direction of a bride. He needed a queen, after all, as he needed heirs of his own to ensure the survival of his line. Every star-reader on the island joined together and offered their new king a sole prophecy: the first woman to set foot on the docks of Port Comlack at the dawn of the third dark moon after the Longest Night would be his true queen. She would give him strong children and rule justly beside him, then die on the sixteenth anniversary of her first daughter’s birth.

Lear arranged to be there, ready to greet this star-promised woman, and waited all night long under the third dark moon, despite icy winds so early in the year. As the first sunlight broke through thin clouds a ship came limping to port, too many of their rowers weak from struggling against the roiling ocean. It was a trader’s ship from the Third Kingdom, an ocean and half a continent away, where an inland sea and great river met in a gulf of sand and stone. First to emerge were the dark-skinned captain and five dark soldiers; they were royal guards along to protect a granddaughter of the empress, who’d traveled north searching for adventure. Lear welcomed them, inviting the princess to come forward. She descended like a slip of night, it was said, black-skinned and robed in bright layers of wool and silk against the cold ocean. Glass beads glinted from her roped black hair like ice or tears or—like stars.

Lear married her, though she was less than half his age, and loved her deeply.

She died at dawn on her first daughter’s sixteenth birthday, twelve years ago this winter.

The pain was as fresh to Gaela as every morning’s sunrise.

Anytime she was at the Summer Seat, Gaela would make this pilgrimage, down to the caves pocking the cliffs below the keep. Dalat had brought her here at least once a year, for all of Gaela’s childhood. At first only the two of them, then when Regan was old enough they were three, and finally in the last few years even baby Elia tagged along. They’d descended to the sea farther to the southeast, where the cliffs became beaches and bluffs with more ready, safe access to the hungry waves, and with an escort of heavily armed retainers in separate boats, they rowed back up the rocky coast here to the caves. Gaela remembered especially when she’d been eleven, and Elia only three years old, wrapped up against Gaela’s chest so she could protect her baby sister while Dalat held nine-year-old Regan’s hand. Elia had danced with all her limbs, excited and gleefully singing a childish rhyme, clutching at the collar of Gaela’s tunic and at one of her braids.

Dalat had dragged the boat as high onto the beach as she could, then smiled like a young girl and dashed with her daughters to the largest cave. She laughed at the spray of salt water that splattered her cheeks, and then when they were far inside the cave, knelt upon the wet stone, disregarding the algae and saltwater staining her skirt. “Here, Gaela,” she said, patting the earth beside her, “and here, Regan. Give me my littlest in my lap.” When all were situated, Dalat taught them a soft prayer in the language of the Third Kingdom. It was a layered, complex language filled with triple meanings depending on forms of address, and to Gaela it always sounded like a song. She fought hard, scowling, to remember the prayer after only one recitation. Regan repeated the final word of every phrase, planting the rhythm on her tongue. Elia mouthed along with their mother, saying nothing with any meaning, but seeming the most natural speaker of them all.

Today the tide was out, and Gaela was strong enough she didn’t need to row up from a beach or bring retainers to assist.

The emerald grass capping the cliffs bent in the sea wind, and she unerringly located the slip of rock that cut down at an angle, crossing the sheer face of the cliff at a manageable slant. She’d left off any armor and all fancy attire, put on dull brown trousers and a soldier’s linen shirt, wrapped her twists up in a knot, and tied on soft leather shoes. Carefully, Gaela made her way along the first section, forward looking but leaned back with one hand skimming the steep rocks for balance.