Beatrice showed no sign of recognition, and after thinking for a moment, she shrugged. “Okay, but I’m right, aren’t I? He hardly explained anything to you.”
“Explain what, exactly?”
Beatrice grinned sheepishly. “I have to wonder why he didn’t. Maybe there’s a reason.” She looked away, her face straining in thought.
“Maybe he forgot,” Moya said, a dash irritated. “Perhaps he didn’t have time. What’s your excuse?”
“I’ve already explained that, and I don’t think he forgot,” Beatrice replied.
“So, are you going to tell us?” Brin pressed.
Beatrice squeezed her lips together, trying to decide. “Shouldn’t matter—he must have known how this would turn out. There’s no way you can get through all three realms and not learn the truth.” She muttered this mostly to herself, then nodded. “I’ll tell you what I know, which isn’t close to everything, but obviously far more than you know now. But to do that, I’ll need tea.” She headed back toward the stairs.
Moya and Gifford followed, but Brin lingered at the window, looking out at the war and the scarred land. Blackened, cracked, and barren—this was Nifrel, exactly as she might have envisioned it if her imagination had been clever enough.
Are you out there, Tesh? If I think about you really hard, can you hear me? Can you somehow feel me?
She placed her hands against the stone of Mideon’s walls, leaned out, closed her eyes, and focused on him.
I know you’re here. I know you still exist. I want to thank you for saving me and for dying in the first place. I never told you how much that meant. I should have. I should have said a lot of things. I write words, but I never think to say them. I wish I knew where you are. I don’t know what I’d do—or if I could do anything for you. It would just mean so much to know you are all right.
Just before she opened her eyes, in that momentary flash of light before she could focus, she thought she saw him crying out in pain.
Tesh never lost consciousness, but he discovered there was a maximum threshold to pain, a point of diminished return where it just didn’t matter anymore. Neither did time, which he was certain had stopped at a really inopportune moment. He also discovered that without a mouth, throat, or lungs, he could scream forever.
Forever mercifully came to an end. The pain stopped, time resumed, and Tesh lay on the white bone floor of Nifrel’s throne room, an exposed nerve waiting for what came next.
“I don’t know, maybe,” someone said. The voice reached him from far away.
“Only six left, how hard can that be?”
“What would you do?”
“Besieged like they are? I’d use the tunnels.”
“Which one? That’s the problem with Belgriclungreians, they have a network down there. A nest of rats is what they are.”
“Can we cave them in? The surface layer here is of your making, right? The real rock is below. If the Dherg can dig, then we can collapse.”
“Such a thing would—I honestly don’t know what it would do—and I don’t think the situation is that dire.” This was the queen’s voice. Tesh had no trouble recognizing it but guessed he’d have a great deal of difficulty trying to forget. “I’d rather not reshuffle this deck to such an extreme degree. As you said, there’s only six left, and we know where they’re going.”
“A trap, then? Before, or perhaps on, the bridge itself? We know they have to cross it. There’s no way to tunnel the gap, and their forces will need to converge. It’s not very wide.”
“Before, then. I don’t want them getting that close. I don’t want to risk losing my prize to the depths.” This was the queen again; her words felt once more like pinpricks of ice. “We’ll take them on the slate between the monoliths.”
Tesh opened his eyes. The light—her light—was away from him, off in the distance. A circle of dark figures was revealed by the pale pool of illumination—not a warm or life-giving brilliance, but an empty, cold light, the soul-warping gleam of glittering gems.
“I’ll have the Grenmorians make a line. Alon Rhist can lead the Galantians in a flank attack.”
“We’ll need to worry about Fenelyus. She’ll be in it this time.”
“We have Gryndal to counter her.”
“Inerus can make the push, lock them up, and drive the ambush. When they reach the narrows, they’ll have to reduce the width of their ranks. That’ll make their defenses vulnerable.”
“That ought to be more than enough.”
“I’m not interested in what ought to be,” the queen said. “I won’t lose that key. Now, if we only knew which one carried it, that would be a help. And that fool Mideon will make it harder. He’s making plans in the Bulwark—but what kind?”
Tesh felt her look at him. It hurt enough to make him wince.
“Are you sure he’s not telling the truth?” she asked Konniger.
“Tressa and I are a pair, so much alike,” he said. “Would you give me the key?”
“Very well, he’s not going to give it up. Put him in the hole.”
“But you promised me,” Sebek said.
The queen laughed. So did a few of the others. “You can never trust what I say, child. Only what I do. Throw him in the pit. We have our own planning to do.”
Tesh heard footsteps approach and saw the unmistakable outline of Sebek coming his way.
Tucked safely in Beatrice’s chambers with tea in hand, the princess sat on a soft stool in front of them. She looked very much like a child, a young girl huddled before a hearth, gripping the white cup with both hands, the base resting on her knees. A sparkle was in her eye, the hint of a smile on her lips. Both made Brin feel certain this was going to be a good story. She hoped so. She needed one.
“What do you know about how the world began?” the princess asked.
Roan, Tressa, and Rain hadn’t yet returned from the workshop. Moya and Gifford looked at Brin.
“Brin is our Keeper of Ways,” Moya explained. “She holds the stories of our people’s past.”
Beatrice looked at Brin expectantly.
Brin felt embarrassed. “Actually, I’m a little confused on a few points.”
Moya seemed surprised.
“Well, you see, there is what Maeve told me about Chaos, Eton, and Elan. And then there’s what I learned in Neith—but now after listening to Drome . . . I just don’t know anymore.”
“What did this Maeve tell you?” Beatrice asked.
“Chaos existed as a void.” Brin said, repeating the words Maeve had taught her. “Then from her came Eton the sky and Elan the world. From the union of Eton and Elan came their first children: Light, Water, and Time. From the union of Light and Time came their sons, the Sun and the Moon. From Time and Water came their daughter, the Sea. From the Sun and the Moon came their children, Day and Night. The Sea’s children are the Four Winds, and they each had one child: Winter, Summer, Spring, and Fall.” Brin hesitated. “Then in the Agave, I read about Ferrol, Drome, and Mari on tablets, and I know I made some mistakes. For instance, I thought Erebus was a person, but Drome said it was a place, a city.”