Rae Carson: The Girl of Fire and Thorns

He sighs. “Our marriage is part of a treaty I made with your father. And there are things you can help me with. But mostly . . .” He runs his hand through thick black hair. “Mostly, I could use a friend.” Alejandro looks me in the eye and waits for my response.

Friend . My tutor, Master Geraldo, is a friend, I suppose. Nurse Ximena and Lady Aneaxi, though they are more like mothers. I realize I could use one too. “Friend” is a comforting word, and a painful one, but it doesn’t sound nearly so frightening as “wife.”

I find it exhilarating that I can help him in some way, yet odd too. “It seems to me,” I point out, feeling a little braver, “that the king of the richest country in the world would have no trouble making friends.”

He looks up, startled. “Your sister says you have a way of getting to the soul of a matter.”

I almost scowl, but I realize that Alodia’s words may not have been criticism.

“Tell me, Lucero-Elisa.” His lips curve into that gentle smile that already feels familiar. “Do you find it easy to make friends? As a princess? As the bearer of the only Godstone in a hundred years?”

I know exactly what he means. Remembering the conde’s son who tried to kiss both my sister and I those years ago, I say, “You don’t trust anyone, do you?”

He shakes his head. “Very few.”

I nod. “I trust my nurse, Ximena, and my lady-in-waiting, Aneaxi. And Juana-Alodia too, in a way.”

“What do you mean, in a way?”

I have to consider this before answering. “She’s my sister. She wants what is best for Orovalle, but . . .” Something closes my mouth. Maybe it’s the intensity of his eyes that darken from warm cinnamon to near black. I never hesitate to grumble about Juana-Alodia with my nurse. But with Alejandro . . .

“But?” he prompts.

His face is so intent on mine, so interested in what I have to say, that I blurt, “She hates me.”

King Alejandro says nothing at first. I feel I have disappointed him, and I want to suck the words back into my mouth.

Then: “Why do you think that?”

I don’t answer. Several candles have sputtered out, and I’m glad because it is easier to avoid his eyes in the flickering shadows.

“Elisa?”

Tell him about the Godstone, I say to myself. Tell him that Alodia is envious. That she is angry because I am already sixteen but show no inclination to fulfill my destiny as God’s chosen. But his open gaze commands my honesty, and I say to him what I have told no one.

“I killed our mother.”

His eyes narrow. “What do you mean?”

My lips tremble, but I inhale through my nose and distance myself from the words. “Alodia says Mamá miscarried twice. So when she became pregnant with me, she took to bed. She prayed to God for a son, a prince.” I have to grit my teeth for a moment before I can continue. “It was a difficult pregnancy, and she was weak, and after I was born there was a lot of blood. Alodia says that when they placed me in her arms, Mamá saw that I was a girl. And dark skinned and fat.” I feel the cold edges and aching hardness of my jaw. “And grief overcame her, and she breathed her last.”

“Your sister said this? When? How long ago?” Though his questions are pressing, his voice remains kind, like he really cares.

But I can’t quite remember.

He raises one eyebrow. “A year ago?” he prods. “A few years ago? Maybe when you were both very young?”

I frown, trying to place the moment. It was when Alodia and I still studied together. Our heads had nearly touched as we poured over a musty copy of the Common Man’s Guide to Service . When Master Geraldo asked her to explain the history of the Godstone, I interrupted by reciting the passage word for word. It was after that tutoring session, while Alodia pursued me down the steps to the kitchens, that she told me the story of Mamá’s death.

I don’t want him to know how long I’ve harbored this memory, so I say nothing.

He just stares, and I want to slither beneath the sunburst quilt. “You think she still blames you for your mother’s death?”

“She hasn’t indicated otherwise.” My voice is too sharp and hard, like a petulant child’s, but I refuse to lower my gaze.

“I think you’d be surprised,” he says.

“At what?”

“At a lot of things, Elisa.”

Lots of things would surprise me, it’s true. It’s easy to be surprised when no one tells you anything. And with a start, I realize I still don’t know what he wants from me. He could have found a “friend” in Alodia, or any number of young noblewomen. The king brushed off my questions as if I were a child, just like Papá and Alodia always do, and like a twitterpated fool, I let him.

Before I can muster the courage to press the matter, he says, “I suppose we should sleep sometime tonight, since we’re traveling tomorrow.” He stands and begins flicking rose petals from the quilt.

I tell him, “You can have the bed; I’ll take the window seat.”

“The bed is large enough for us both. I’ll sleep atop the quilt,” he says.

I freeze. Then: “Fine.” I sweep the remaining petals from the bed and pull the covers back. Sleep will be long in coming, I am sure. Not even the pulsing jewel in my belly can convince me to take off my wedding terno to get comfortable, and I don’t imagine that sensing Alejandro beside me all night will help. I blow out the candles on my nightstand and slide between the sheets, my back toward my husband.

The mattress shudders as Alejandro settles his weight next to me. I hear his forced breath as he extinguishes the candles on his side. Suddenly I feel warm lips on my cheek. “I almost forgot. Happy birthday, Lucero-Elisa,” he whispers.

I sigh into the dark. I thought the worst thing that could happen would be for my new husband to turn away from me in disgust. I was wrong. It is so much worse that he listens to me, sees me. That, in addition to being beautiful, he is kind.

It will be too, too easy to love him.

I am awake, eyes wide, heart fluttering, long after the last candle on the mantel flickers out, long after the man next to me settles into the steady, even breathing of sleep.

Our carriage heads a long procession that awaits beyond the cobbled courtyard. King Alejandro’s personal guards stand tall beside it, their dark faces inscrutable. To reach them, we must pass the fountains and the jacaranda trees, through a gauntlet of nobles and servants armed with birdseed and rose petals. Alejandro reaches out to take my hand, but Papá grabs me first and enfolds me in an embrace.

“Elisa,” he whispers into my hair. “I will miss you.”

It nearly undoes me. In the last day or two, I have had more affection from my father than in the entire year previous. He is always so busy, so distant. Is it only by giving me up that he finds it in himself to care?

“I’ll miss you too,” I manage, and the words cut hard with their truth. I know I’ll never be as dear to him as Alodia, but I love him just the same.

He releases me, and my sister glides forward. She wears a simple gown of blue silk layers that drop beautifully from slender shoulders, and her face is perfect and composed, like a sculpture. It nears mine—I smell her jasmine perfume—and I see tiny lines around her brown eyes. Worry lines. Strange that I have not noticed them before.

Alodia grips my shoulders with strong fingers. “Elisa,” she whispers. “Listen well.”

Something about her manner, the intensity of her gaze perhaps, causes me to block out the sounds of tinkling fountains and buzzing crowds to focus on her voice.

“Trust no one, Elisa, save Alejandro and Nurse Ximena and Aneaxi.” Her voice is pitched so low, I doubt even our father can hear. I nod, feeling suddenly warm, and the Godstone flashes hot and hard. Is it a warning? “I’m sending pigeons with you,” she continues. “Use them if you need to contact me quickly. When you arrive, do not be afraid to assert yourself. Do not be afraid to be queen.”