I expect her to protest, but she only lifts a shoulder in a shrug. “What would you like to know?” she asks.
There are so many things I want to know. Why did she leave Cress? What has she been doing in the last decade? Who is that man—Jian—to her? Why is she here? But those are not the most pressing questions to ask.
“Have you had any contact with your daughter since she became Kaiserin?” I ask.
She blinks, surprised into silence for a moment. “How do you know who my daughter is?” she asks.
I consider lying, but I don’t see what that will get me. “She told me her mother left her, ran off with a Gorakian man. I knew her mother’s name was Brigitta. And I’ve seen a miniature painting of you—Cress wears it on her bracelet. Besides, you look just like her.”
She flinches from the name like it was a physical strike. Her eyes drop from mine, focusing instead on her hands.
“I’ve had no contact with her since I left,” she says, her voice wavering. “I’ve heard things about her, how she’s faring, over the years, but she’s heard nothing from me. I thought it would be better that way….” She trails off, shaking her head. “No. That’s a lie. I kept my distance because I feared her father would use any communication I sent her as a way to find me, and Jian. I’ve spent the last twelve years looking over my shoulder, waiting for the day he did.”
At that, I feel a pang of sympathy. After all, I know something about fearing the Theyn. The man was a constant fixture in my nightmares for a decade.
“The Theyn is dead,” I tell her.
Her smile is grim. “Yes, I heard that. I suppose I owe you a debt of gratitude. He was not a good man.”
“I’m well aware,” I say curtly. “You still left your daughter with him easily enough.”
“There was nothing easy about it,” Brigitta says, her voice taking on a sharp edge. “I left her because I had to. You must believe me, it was the best thing for everyone.”
“I have a hard time imagining how it was the best thing for her,” I say. “You let him shape her, raise her into a monster. If you had stayed, she would be a different person now.”
“If I had stayed, the world as you know it would be little more than a pile of ash,” she says sharply.
When I’m too surprised to respond, she shakes her head.
“What was the rumor?” she asks me. “That I left my husband for another man? That I fled the Kalovaxians for love? Maybe there is some truth in that—I did love Jian, do love him. I wouldn’t have left my child for that, but it was an easier rumor to spread than the truth, I suppose.”
“And what is the truth?” I ask her.
She smiles, but there is no mirth in it. “You’ll forgive me if I don’t trust you, Queen Theodosia, but I’ve seen how power corrupts, and what people are willing to do when they become desperate.”
I want to disagree, but I know there is at least some truth in her words. “I can’t help you if you don’t help me,” I say instead.
She considers this for a moment, lifting her teacup to her lips to take another sip.
“Are you familiar with alchemy, Your Majesty?”
The word is familiar, but only distantly. It’s a Gorakian practice, a blend of science and magic that created the molo varu, among other things.
“Vaguely,” I tell her.
“Jian was considered the best alchemist in Goraki before the Kalovaxians came. As with your Spiritgems, the Kalovaxians wanted to find a way to use alchemy for their own gain. My husband, the Theyn, took Jian into his household, where he could be watched, studied. Where his skills were to be used to create weapons that the world had never seen before. Jian refused, of course. For years, he gave them only trinkets, little bits of alchemy that were just enough to keep him alive—swords that could cut through anything, even muscle and bone, cannons that never missed their targets, a battering ram with the strength of a thousand men.”
My mouth goes dry. “I’ve never seen weapons like that,” I tell her.
She smiles. “You wouldn’t have. Jian was smarter than the Kalovaxians thought, and alchemy isn’t like your Spiritgems. It is more akin to a living thing—it needs tending to, nurturing, in order to last. In a matter of months, the weapons he created were useless.”
“I imagine the Kalovaxians weren’t happy about that,” I say.
“No,” she says, anguish flashing across her face. “But in those few months, the Theyn had set Jian to creating a new kind of weapon, one that would only need to work once, but that would have the power to bring thousands to their knees. Quite literally.”
I sit up a little straighter. “What weapon?” I ask.
She doesn’t answer right away. “Jian called it velastra. In Gorakian, the word’s combined roots mean something close to dream taker, but there’s a translation error. In Gorakian, a dream isn’t only something that happens when you sleep, or even a distant hope for the future. It’s closer to the soul itself, to want. Created properly, velastra takes away a person’s wants, their desires—their dreams.”
My mouth goes dry. The Kalovaxians have always had their slaves, but it seems even chains are not enough for them.
“How?” is the only thing I can think to ask.
She shakes her head. “A gas—expanding to fill whatever space it can, but a single inhalation is enough to render a person little more than a marionette. Their lives will revolve around the smallest suggestions made to them: clean the kitchen, take off your clothes, jump off a cliff. The victim would have no choice. Jian figured the formula out quite quickly, all things considered, but he kept it from them. I only discovered he knew by accident—I caught sight of some of his scribblings, and he didn’t realize that I understood enough Gorakian or science to make sense of them. We both knew what a dangerous weapon it was, that Jian couldn’t keep it from my husband forever and that when the Theyn discovered it, the world would crumble. So we hatched a plan to escape.”
“That was why you left Cress,” I say.
She hesitates, then nods. “I left Cress to protect the world,” she says. “It was not an easy decision, but it is one I stand behind.”
“And Jian still knows how to make velastra?” I ask.
She pauses. “If you had the chance, Your Majesty, to bring the Kalovaxians to ruin in a matter of moments, would you take it?”
“Of course,” I say, without hesitation.
“You could, using the velastra. Take away a person’s autonomy, their choices, what makes them human,” she says, tilting her head to one side. “Would you do it?”