Bring Me Their Hearts by Sara Wolf
King Sref chuckles, the sound muffled by the darkness of the room pressing in on us. “You’re just as bad at hiding a question on your face as she was.”
I’m thrown by how easily he sees through me, but I make my voice light. “Just the one, Your Majesty? I have hundreds.”
“I’m sure,” he agrees. Both of us remain silent, knowing if another word leaves our lips it could cross the unseen line that permeates every noble conversation—the line between our real selves and our court selves. Our masks and our faces beneath. The king clears his throat. “If I could ease the most pressing question in your mind, I’d very much like that.”
It would be simple to make up something frivolous, something intrusive about Lucien. It’s expected; I’m a Bride, after all. Maybe it’s a specialty of the d’Malvanes—to make someone feel as if they must tell the truth—because beneath the king’s gentle stare only honesty emerges from my throat.
“Why do you let Archduke Gavik have so much freedom to torment your people?”
The king’s smile fades, and I brace myself for the certain anger and indignation I’ve grown used to from Lucien. But Sref is not Lucien. He doesn’t get angry. He gets tired—the same defeated tiredness I saw in his eyes during the Welcoming. He doesn’t try to dispute it. He doesn’t try to argue. He merely sighs.
“Because, milady—he’s made me a promise.” I feel my face twist, but he speaks before me. “Have you ever lost someone dear to you?”
I nod. “My parents.”
“My condolences. But that means you’ve also longed to get back at what took them from you—at time, at chance, at death itself, if you must.”
At five men, the hunger sneers. My hands shake in my lace gloves, and I quickly hide them behind my back. I won’t let the king, of all people, see me weak. Shadows carve deep into the lines around his mouth.
“The archduke will find Varia’s killer for me. And until then—he is allowed to do whatever he must.”
“But your people—”
“The world can rot, Lady Zera, if it means finding my daughter’s killer.”
His voice is so even as he says it, so calm, and that scares me more than anything else. My very marrow chills, my skin icy with goose bumps. Reality comes rushing in as the baron’s voice outside the door crescendos. King Sref’s gaze flickers to the door, then to me.
“I hope you enjoy the banquet as much as I enjoyed our talk, Lady Zera.”
And with that perfectly crafted farewell, he sits back in a chair against the wall. Taking the hint that I’m dismissed, I turn and leave through the door, light and sound and the Baron’s friends staring at me, and for once I’m grateful for it, for them making me move, respond, think of something other than the horrifying calmness with which the king of Cavanos condemned his people so easily to suffering. The guard smiles at me ruefully, a half apology, before the baron—insisting we’re late—whisks me away to the banquet amid a tittering circle of his friends.
I cope with the unease the king’s put in me the only way I know how—with beauty. Admiring it, enjoying it, taking it in. The dining hall is filled with orb-like golden oil lamps suspended from the ceiling by impossibly delicate chains. The air carries the mouthwatering smells of roasting meat. A massive blackwood table stretches the whole length of the room, the chairs high-backed and seated with silk cushions. I spot Ulla in a corner, whispering to other servants. Archduke Gavik wears an ornate silver robe—laughing and toasting wine with a bunch of old, bearded men, some of whom I recognize as the royal polymaths who put out the fire. The king and queen are thankfully absent, but I see Charm and Grace talking to each other in pretty, laced-up dresses. When I enter, they shoot me looks and laugh behind their hands.
“They think your lack of corset funny.” Y’shennria slides up to me seemingly out of nowhere.
“And I think their lack of manners funny,” I lilt. Y’shennria’s thin lips break ever so slightly into a ghost of a smile I never thought I’d see again. I start to tell her of my encounter with the king, then think better of it; if she knew I confronted him about Gavik, she’d be furious, and I’d like to have her smiling at me for as long as it lasts.
She takes my arm (for show, of course, what aunt doesn’t link arms with her niece?) and introduces me to people she considers important; the Minister of the Blood is a squeaky, portly man whose eyes twinkle when I curtsy before him, and the Duchess Priseless all but sneers at me. She’s the mother of those irritating blond twins from the Welcoming—no doubt they told her about our little spat, but she can’t be openly rude. All she can do is compliment Y’shennria on her dress and “politely” ignore me.
I spot Fione, her curly hair in a low, modest ponytail and her dress a muted beige. It’s a far cry from the bright pink she wore yesterday. She uses the same ivory cane carved with a valkerax head. Yet unlike the visit to Y’shennria’s manor, Fione doesn’t look cheery at all. Her eyes are downcast, her body posture screaming “scared of my own shadow.” A noble says something to her, and Gavik puts a hand on her shoulder, gripping so tightly his knuckles go white. Fione recoils into herself even more at Gavik’s touch. Even if she’s faking shy, that one motion of hers is too real, too instantaneous to have been faked. Her uncle genuinely disgusts her. I might dislike her for naturally being everything I’m not, but at least we have that much in common.
Finally, Ulla rings the crystal dinner bell and announces the entrance of the royal family.
My stomach clenches as the prince walks in. I’ve learned the sound of his footsteps by now: quick, tightly wound. He’s in a black taffeta hawking suit, with a high collar framing his knife’s-edge cheekbones. His black hair is braided in one long, silken cord, and his boots are tipped with wicked-sharp gold edges, as are his pointer fingers—a clawlike gold ring on the end of each. My face grows hot at the sight of the bandage on the back of his hand, covering the scrape he got shielding me from the fall. I wonder if it still hurts? If he’s in pain?
He’ll be in leagues more pain when I’m finished with him, the hunger slavers. I focus on Malachite at his side, silent and paler than snow, with eyes like crimson fire, his breastplate a magnificent ruby-crusted thing. King Sref and Queen Kolissa follow Lucien and Malachite. The queen and king sit first, followed by the prince, then Archduke Gavik. It goes down the line until finally, finally, I sit last, Fione sitting just before me. She must be older than me, then. A New God priest comes in and says a prayer, his voice reedy.
“And from the darkness our God did come to us, and with his love gave us knowledge to light our way. He is called He Who Bore Arathess Anew, He Who Did Bring Us Out of Despair, and we say His name with great thanks and joy before our nourishment in His name.”
“In His name,” the room echoes to varying degrees. The prince doesn’t say it at all, and Y’shennria barely mumbles it, her lady’s mask pained ever so slightly. The servants bring wine and a starter course of creamed asparagus soup and almond dumplings, and I try not to look like a complete oaf eating. The king speaks to Archduke Gavik, and the entire table pays silent attention to their every word about trade routes, and how “witch aggression” could see a rise in the prices of grain. Gavik turns to Fione and asks her what she’s learned from her polymath tutors about trade routes recently.
“I-I think there was something—” She squirms under the attention of the entire table, and her elbow knocks her fork flying. The gesture is too big to be anything but planned, but why is she playing clumsy? The servants go for the fork but I beat them to it, scooping it up and laughing.
“Whoops! I dropped it.” I smile. “These Vetrisian utensils are much more slippery than the ones back home.”
This pulls a few chuckles from people, and King Sref’s eyes gleam amused. Y’shennria frowns, however, and Lucien only raises a single eyebrow.
Fione looks genuinely relieved, and when the king’s drawn the attention away from us with more conversation, she leans in and whispers, “Thank you.”
“Lady Himintell is a better cover. We aren’t supposed to have met.”
“Does your uncle always publicly grill you on your studies?” I ask.
“Since I was little he’s enjoyed inflicting emotional distress on me,” she agrees coolly. “It bothered me only until I built my armor. Now I simply pretend it does to satiate his sadism. But it used to make me want to—”
“Run off and hide in the darkest corner you could find?” I ask.
“How did you know?” She smirks.
I hold up my wineglass. “Great minds drink alike.”
She laughs behind her napkin, yet I can’t tell if it’s a genuine laugh or a polite one. She blurs the two so seamlessly. There’s a moment in which I pick at my food and she eats hers delicately. The urge to apologize for the way I acted earlier bubbles up, but what’s left of my pride drags it back down into the depths. It’s then I notice Grace and Charm watching us across the table with sharp eyes. Us? No—Fione. Just Fione.
“Looks like they aren’t fans of yours,” I murmur. Fione suddenly becomes very interested in her food.
“It’s difficult to have fans when you’re me.”
“Niece of a warmongering archduke,” I muse, stirring my pale green soup. “I can see how that’d be a slight problem.”
“As if they care about that.” She leans out and taps one of her legs with her napkin. “It’s the clubfoot most people can’t stand.”
“And here I thought you were just trying to start a fantastic new fashion trend with that cane.”
Her lips twist in a wry smile, but she quickly douses it to a more modest quiver when Gavik looks our way. He watches us for a moment with his watery blue eyes, but the queen asks him some question that captures his attention, and we blessedly escape his tyranny for the moment. The servants bring the second course—young geese fried in herb oil and lemon peel, the smells mouthwatering and the presentation incredibly delicate. I do a quick calculation—two bites of this and I can push the rest around on my plate long enough to delay my visit to the bathroom until the third course. Seven courses in total. I heave a sigh. It’s going to be a delicious—if very long and painful—night.
But what night hasn’t been, since I was made Heartless?
I glance at Fione, who eats her food with ladylike precision, a mirror image of Y’shennria farther down the table. She leans in suddenly.
“He’s been staring at you the whole time.”
I glance to where she’s looking—right at Prince Lucien. He starts when our eyes meet, quickly diverting his gaze to his dish. Fione gives a little snort.
“Don’t like him?” I ask with a hush, twisting my locket between my fingers to stop it from beating so fast.
“I debuted at the Welcoming last year,” she answers. “Against my will. It’s because of him I had to embarrass myself walking up that awful aisle in front of everyone. I’m used to people recoiling, but not so many at once.”
My deep-seated resentment for her begins to wilt at the roots. How hard has her life been here at court? I can’t begin to muster the arrogance to even imagine. Fione downs more wine, shrugging.
“Though he did criticize their disdain for my leg. Loudly. You should’ve seen the look on their faces—every noble in court being chastised at once by the Crown Prince. Not that any of it stuck in their heads. But for a single moment, after seventeen years of their jeering behind my back? It was glorious.” She cuts her goose delicately and yet with an edge of delighted viciousness. I wrinkle my nose, and she tilts her head. “Is something the matter?”
“Prince Lucien keeps insisting he has no heart,” I say. “And then he turns around and does something that directly disproves that.”
She laughs again, quietly and into her napkin. “I’ve known him since we were young. He cried so easily—over silly things like someone squishing a spider or one of the palace cats killing a bird. But then Varia died, and…well—” She struggles with her next words, her next breath. Varia. Not Princess Varia. Just Varia. Did she know the princess when she was alive? “Varia was the one who always protected him. He got it in his head he had to be tough like she’d been. I haven’t seen him cry since the day they delivered what was left of her body.”
I try to imagine it: a young Lucien, watching the guards bring the remains of his sister to the king and queen—to him. The pain in my stomach suddenly cuts through my thoughts and the wine numbness all at once. I’ve held it long enough. I get up and excuse myself. It’s much cooler and quieter in the tile bathroom, but the blood tears burn down my face. It’s been getting worse since I started regularly eating human food, and tonight is no exception. It ties me into knots around myself, and I bite my lips to stifle my groans. The hunger begs for something real and raw.
I stare at my reflection, at my fraying braids and twisted face. I carefully wipe away the bloodstains with water and practice a smile. No matter how excruciating it is, I have to keep going. Y’shennria is waiting. The court is waiting.
I push out of the door and make it halfway to the banquet before I feel a strong hand on my wrists. Both wrists. Someone’s trying to subdue me. Did the gods just decide tonight wasn’t going to be Zera’s night? I let out a startled yelp.
“Who in the afterlife—”
“Shut her up!” I hear someone hiss, and immediately a cloth roughly forces itself into my mouth. I curse my lack of sword, my excess of wine. I whip my head around wildly, only to see the Priseless twins wrapping my wrists tightly with twine and pulling me into a nearby room. They throw me to the ground—strong, despite their age. One of the twins locks the door behind him. At that moment I desperately wish all the stories humans make of us were true—super strength, speed enough to dodge any arrow. But I’m only a girl who can’t die.
“Now.” The other twin squats eye level with me, a wicked smirk on his face. “Where should we start?”
I lash out at him with a kick, but he dances away.
“We told you,” the first twin scoffs, “not to insult the Priseless family. But you did anyway. Everyone has their place here. You wouldn’t know yours, of course—you’re a commoner from a pig farm. But we’ll help you.”
The twins laugh together at that, and I squirm against my bonds violently. I’ll gladly take a hand off if it means freeing myself, but I’m versed in swordplay, not escape techniques or brute strength. A twin kneels at my side.
“I think we’ll start by making it so you’ll never be able to show your face in court again.”
He pulls a dagger from his hip, the honed edge of it glinting in the light. I slide across the floor in fear—not of the injury, not of the pain, but of the thought of them seeing me heal, right before their very eyes. If only I had my sword right now! I knew leaving it behind was a terrible idea. I kick at the first twin, but he orders his brother to sit on my legs, and his weight is enough to staunch my efforts.
I flail wildly—I trained in the sword for three years! I’ve endured agony the likes of which they could never fathom! I won’t sit here and let two arrogant little pups take my one chance at freedom from me!
I head-butt the first twin, and he howls in pain and stumbles back. The second one moves toward me, and I feel my teeth growing—out of fear, or desperation, or simply the smell of human so close, I can’t tell.
Two delicious morsels of arrogant. The hunger laughs. What color will their blood be on our pretty shoes?
If he moves any closer, I’ll bite him through. If I can’t use my sword, I’ll use my teeth. I’ll use anything. But before he ever makes it to me, a deep voice rings out.
“Why in the world wasn’t I invited to this little get-together? It seems infinitely more fun.”
There’s a resounding crack, and I look up to see Malachite, his arms crossed over his breastplate and his crimson eyes utterly unamused. The door swi
“We were just— She—” The second twin starts. “We found her like this! Someone must’ve been kidnapping her!”
“We were just trying to help,” the first twin insists, his hands shaking. They might be cruel, but they aren’t very smart.
Malachite taps his chin. “I see.” He moves in to the twins, putting one pale arm around each of their shoulders and drawing them close. “Well, if you find the person who did this, please let them know: If I ever catch them, I will disembowel them. Slowly. One inch of intestine at a time.”
They nod, fear ripe in both their eyes. Malachite shoves them toward the door.
“Be off with you.”
When their panicked footsteps are gone, he turns to me. Gratitude is the last thing on my mind as I struggle to my feet, but he wraps a strong hand around my elbow and helps me up. I’ve never been this close to him—not close enough to see the way light makes his gray mop of hair look threaded with silver stars. His skin is cooler than a human’s, like a shaded creek in summer. I flinch away as he reaches for my gag. He meets my eyes—the pupils of them small, for once, is that how they get at night?—and pulls his hands away.
“I suppose you’d want to do that yourself,” he murmurs. He saws at the twine around my wrists with a fanged dagger, huge and hefty, nothing like the smooth little things intended for human hands that the blacksmiths sell in the Vetrisian streets.
“I’d say thank you, but that would imply I didn’t have the situation perfectly handled,” I pull out my gag and retort.
“If you want to thank anyone, thank Luc,” he says. “He’s the one who sent me to look for you. Dark Below—” The way he says that sounds like a swear. “He’s going to be so pissed when I tell him what the little idiots were up to this time.”
“I wasn’t aware a bodyguard’s job includes stalking.”