Rae Carson: The Girl of Fire and Thorns

Our banquet passes too quickly. We do talk, a little, but I am mostly a fool because all I can do is watch his lips as they move and listen to his voice.

He asks about my studies. I blurt to him about my hundred-year-old copy of the Belleza Guerra . His eyes flash with interest when he says, “Yes, your sister told me you are well versed in the art of war.” I’m not sure what to say to this. I don’t want to talk about Juana-Alodia, and I realize how ridiculous I must appear, a sausage child bride who never sits a horse and who wields a dagger only to cut meat. Yet I am fascinated by war and have studied every skirmish in my country’s history.

A hush settles over the milling nobility. I follow their collective gaze toward the small wooden stage. The musicians have departed—I don’t remember hearing the vihuelas cease—and in their place stand my father and sister. She raises a goblet, her arm bare and golden from the sun, and says in a loud, clear voice, “Today we are witness to the new union between Joya d’Arena and Orovalle. May God bless this union with peace and understanding, with prosperity and beauty, and”—she grins hugely—“with many, many children!” And the banquet hall fills with laughter, like it’s the cleverest blessing in the world. My face burns, and I hate my sister more in this moment than ever in my life.

“Now, it’s time to bid the happy couple good-night,” she continues. I’ve attended hundreds of marriage feasts. Still, I jump when Lady Aneaxi’s hand grabs my shoulder. A bevy of servants, dressed in white with garlands of paper flowers, has come with her to escort us to our nuptial chamber.

We rise, the king and I, though I’m not sure how, since my legs buzz with threatening numbness. My armpits feel sticky, my heart pounds. Oh, God. I don’t know what to do. I blink rapidly, determined not to cry.

The servants, grinning and giggling, surround us and herd us from the banquet hall as the golden horde shouts blessings and encouragement. I steal a glance at my husband. For the first time since he lifted the veil from my face, he avoids my gaze.

OUR chamber is warm with the golden light and honeyed scent of beeswax candles. They flicker from all sides of the room, on the windowsill, on the stone hearth, on the mahogany tables that frame the curtained bed.

The bed . . .

On my right, my new husband is as much a statue as I, a dark pillar of shadow I dare not look at, so I stare at the bed’s canopy, a breezy red-dyed cotton. Servants scurry forward to fold back the curtains and tie them to the bedposts. An enormous de Riqueza sunburst smiles at me from the quilt. I glare at the minimalist features, at the tongues of yellow fire that flare from its points, but Lady Aneaxi tosses a bucket of rose petals onto the quilt and spreads them around with her fingertips, and I find I am glaring at nothing.

The rose petals, blushed pink, offer their delicate floral scent to the air—a heady mix with the honeyed beeswax—which makes me think of our rose-tinged wedding ceremony and the way his lips brushed mine too quickly.

I want him to kiss me again.

His was not my first kiss. A tall, gangly boy had that dubious distinction, at a wedding feast when I was fourteen years old. I was hiding in an alcove, too shy to dance with everyone else, when he found me and confessed his love. His eyes flashed an intensity that made my face pulse with warmth. His lips pressed against mine, and I tasted the basil on his tongue, but he kissed me the way I would recite a passage from the Common Man’s Guide to Service . By rote. Dispassionately.

I left the banquet flustered, and the next morning, while Juana-Alodia and I shared a breakfast of poached eggs with leeks, she spoke of a conde’s son who had pulled her into an alcove the night before, a lanky boy who’d declared his love and tried to kiss her. She had pinched his nose and walked away laughing. She said he’d been trying to get into bed with a princess.

Now Aneaxi presses her lips to my forehead. “My Elisa,” she whispers. Then she and the servants exit our chamber. Just before they close the door, I catch a glimpse of enormous sun-bronzed soldiers with steel chest plates. They wear the red silk banners of King Alejandro’s personal guard, and I wonder if His Majesty feels unsafe. But when I look at him, at the black hair curling at his neck, the strength of his sun-darkened hands, I forget the guards.

I want more than a little kiss. But the thought is terrifying.

My husband says nothing, just stares unblinking at the petal-strewn quilt. I would love to know what he is thinking, but I can’t bring myself to ask. Instead, I gaze at his profile and think of the passionless kiss of the conde’s son. Blood throbs in my ears as finally I whisper, “I do not care to become intimate tonight.”

His shoulders relax, and his lips betray a hint of a smile. He nods. “As you wish.”

I turn and plop onto the bed, displacing pink petals that flutter to the clay floor. I am hugely relieved. But I’m also disappointed at his ready acceptance, because it would have been nice to feel a little bit wanted.

With his arms crossed, King Alejandro leans against a thick bedpost. He regards me easily now; I suspect he is as relieved as I am. In the candlelight, his hair has deep red tints, like the Sierra Sangre in the evening sun. “Well then,” he says cheerfully. “I suppose we could talk.”

He has such a nice voice. Dark and warm. “Talk?” I say cleverly.

The quirk of his lips widens into a huge smile, and it is like the moon has just risen on a summer night. “Unless you would prefer to be married to a stranger, of course.”

Married . . .

Suddenly it all seems so preposterous, and I can’t stop the giggles that bubble from my chest. I cover my mouth with a fist and laugh into my knuckles.

“I admit to feeling a certain awkwardness,” he says, “but it hadn’t occurred to me to laugh.”

His words sober me. I look up, worried that I’ve angered him, but the smile remains, and his eyes hold a genuine crinkle.

I smile back. “I’m sorry, Your Majesty—”

“Alejandro.”

I swallow. “Alejandro.” The sympathy in his face breaks something inside me, and words tumble from my mouth. “Papá and Alodia always said I’d marry for the good of Orovalle. I accepted it years ago. Still, I’m only fif—sixteen. I’d hoped to have some time. . . . And I didn’t expect . . . I mean, you’re very . . .” I assure myself that his expression remains unmocking. “You’re very kind,” I finish lamely.

He moves to the window seat. “Hand me a pillow?”

I pull one from the bed, a round thing with a long red fringe, and I shake the petals off before tossing it at him. He catches it easily, then lifts long legs onto the seat and clutches the pillow at his abdomen. With his bent knees, his open gaze, he doesn’t seem so much older.

“So,” he says, looking at the ceiling. I’m glad he is willing to start the conversation. “Is there anything about me or about Joya d’Arena you would like to know?”

I think about this. I already know that his first wife died in childbirth, that his son is six years old, and that Invierne harries his borders more doggedly than our own with its need to acquire a seaport. Joya is mostly desert, but rich in silver and jewels, in cattle along the coastline. There isn’t much I don’t know. Except . . .

“What is it?” he prompts.

“Alejandro . . . what do you want? From me?”

His smile disappears. Briefly, I worry that I’ve irritated him, the way my questions always irritate Alodia, but then he moves his head and his jaw catches the light; it curves so perfectly into his hairline.