Niamha Langsoune, Daya of Catanduc, ruthless and unflappable negotiator, was the same age as Talasyn but more poised than Talasyn could ever hope to be even if she reached a hundred. The young woman broke the frozen tableau that the banquet hall had become, springing to her feet with an enviable litheness.
“Surakwel!” she merrily called out as she swept toward the newcomer, a dazzling smile on her face. Her pleated overskirt had been woven to resemble the scales of a carp, and it swirled with her every step in glimmers of white and orange and yellow. “How good of you to join us—”
“Save it, Nim,” the young lord snarled in the Nenavarene tongue. He brushed past her and made his way to the head of the table, his gaze meeting Talasyn’s and darkening in recognition for a fraction of a second as he passed across from where she sat.
So this was Surakwel Mantes. The vagabond and pot-stirrer that Prince Elagbi had told her about. Her father’s exact words had been, At least Surakwel is off gallivanting elsewhere, or we’d have an even bigger problem on our hands.
Now Surakwel was here, and Talasyn had a feeling that she was about to find out just how big the problem could get.
He drew to a halt before Queen Urduja and dropped to one knee, head bowed, the gesture more perfunctory than respectful. Urduja regarded him warily for several long moments, as if he were a mongoose that had infiltrated her viper’s nest, in the silence of a hall where even the orchestra had stopped playing.
“Welcome home, Lord Surakwel.” She spoke for everyone’s benefit, her icy tones ringing throughout the vast chamber in Sailor’s Common. Probably so that the Kesathese delegation would have no cause to believe that they were about to be murdered in cold blood. “I trust that your journeys have been pleasant.”
“The last time I saw that one was a year ago,” Daya Odish told the other guests, drawing Talasyn’s attention. “He showed up at court and pressed upon Her Starlit Majesty the need for us to intervene in the Hurricane Wars—rather loudly, I might add. Surakwel was convinced that the Night Empire would soon pose a grave threat to the Dominion.”
Rajan Wempuq let out a gusty snort. “Well, he was right, wasn’t he?” He glanced at Alaric from beneath bushy brows, as though only just remembering that the younger man was there, within earshot. “No offense.”
“None taken,” Alaric replied curtly.
Surakwel was now rising to his feet before the Zahiya-lachis. “My journeys were pleasant enough, Harlikaan.” Unlike most of the other nobles, he spoke Sailor’s Common with the ease of one who used it frequently. “My homecoming, not so much, as I have just learned that you are in the process of brokering an alliance with a murderous despot.”
Like every other personage in Alaric’s immediate vicinity, Talasyn stiffened in her lacquered chair, her eyes darting to him. But her betrothed showed no reaction whatsoever.
At least, at first glance.
Alaric had peeled off his black kidskin dress gloves at the start of the feast. He reached for his wine and it occurred to Talasyn that he held the goblet tighter than was strictly necessary, his bare knuckles clenched to white.
Still, his expression remained neutral as he drank. When Niamha fluttered past, clearly on her way to Surakwel’s side, Alaric called out, “Your friend doesn’t like me very much, Daya Langsoune.”
“I do apologize, Your Majesty,” Niamha hurried to say. “I’ve known him since we were children. He’s rather impulsive and opinionated. I shall set him straight at once.”
Niamha had barely taken another step when Urduja spoke again, freezing the Daya of Catanduc behind Talasyn’s seat and effectively putting an end to the ripples of scandalized murmuring that had blossomed among the diners. “First of all, my lord, you will remove your weapons in the presence of your sovereign. Secondly, there is a proper time and place to air your grievances with my decision, and this banquet is not one of them.”
“On the contrary, Harlikaan, there is no better time and place,” Surakwel retorted even as he unholstered his crossbow and tossed it onto the floor. “Everyone is here to bear witness as I formally protest this union.”
“The boy has a death wish!” Praset exclaimed, aghast.
“I’ll say,” Talasyn muttered under her breath. “Throwing a loaded weapon around like that, he’s going to impale his own foot.”
Alaric gave a nigh silent chuckle, the soft sound short-lived but tinged with dark amusement. It was the first display of emotion he’d shown since Surakwel stormed in.
“I’ve been to the Northwest Continent,” Surakwel was telling the Zahiya-lachis. “I’ve seen for myself the devastation that the Night Empire has wrought. This is not what Nenavar should stand for.”
“I won’t sit here and be lectured by a boy who spends eight months of each year elsewhere in the world,” Urduja stonily declared. “Given such a busy schedule, how could you even presume to know what Nenavar stands for?”
“I know that we don’t coddle war criminals!” Surakwel shot back heatedly. “I know that we value our independence! I know that I told you years ago that we should help the Sardovian Allfold before the situation worsened—and I was right!”
“Yes, he’s dead, the fool,” sighed Daya Odish. “What a pity. I will miss him.”
But Talasyn could see for herself that the mood at the table was slowly shifting. Some of the lords and ladies were exchanging disgruntled looks, as if they agreed with Surakwel. He was giving voice to their own resentments, their own fears.
“The Night Empire will not last, Harlikaan.” He sounded earnest, impassioned, almost as though he was now begging Queen Urduja. “Justice and liberty will win out in the end. This is an opportunity for us to be on the right side of history for once.”
There was some part of Talasyn that could appreciate how neatly Surakwel had cornered the Zahiya-lachis. By confronting her out in the open, he’d ensured that she couldn’t fall back on the same reasons she’d given Talasyn about how it would be better to let the Night Empire think that the Dominion was willing to cooperate. Still, Talasyn was shocked that Urduja would let anyone defy her so brazenly—in full view of her entire court and a fellow head of state—without having him clapped in chains or banished from her sight.
Talasyn’s confusion must have been apparent, because Niamha leaned in to whisper, “Lord Surakwel is popular with the younger set, and his family commands one of the largest private armies in the archipelago. Their matriarch is bedridden; Surakwel is her only child, and thus he is her heir. Not to mention that he is also related to House Rasmey, one of Queen Urduja’s staunchest allies. She can’t afford to step on Lady Lueve’s toes.”
Urduja’s next words substantiated Niamha’s explanation. “We will discuss this some other time, Lord Surakwel,” she said with an air of ringing finality, and that was how Talasyn realized that her grandmother had been caught off-guard and was now feeling around for a chance to regroup.
But Surakwel was having none of it. “When will we discuss it?” he pressed. “When the deal is final and Nenavar is at Kesath’s beck and call? When Her Grace Alunsina Ivralis has been sent into the jaws of the wolf? You say that you won’t sit here and be lectured by myself, Harlikaan, but neither can I just stand quietly by and let our Lachis’ka marry the Night Emperor!” He whirled around to glare at Alaric. “Well? What do you have to say for yourself, Your Majesty?”
Talasyn could hear her own heartbeat in the deathly stillness, but Alaric’s pale features were still carefully blank, even though the attention of an entire hall was now on him. He slouched back in his seat and crossed his arms. “Unfortunately, there is nothing left to say,” he drawled. “His lordship seems to have done all the talking for me.”
Talasyn hadn’t thought it possible for Surakwel to look more furious than he already did, but he was swift to prove her wrong. She could almost taste it, the rage of someone who believed in something. That was the most dangerous kind. It burned.
“Then you leave me no choice, Ossinast.” Surakwel drew himself up to his full height, his demeanor taking on a certain ceremonious bent. “By my right as an aggrieved citizen of the Nenavar Dominion—”
“Lord Surakwel!” Prince Elagbi thundered from his seat on Urduja’s left, an emphatic warning that was summarily ignored.
“—in accordance with the ancient laws of the Dragon Throne—”
Lueve Rasmey was halfway out of her chair, hand pressed to her heart. “Surakwel,” she murmured, her bottom lip quivering.
“—I, Surakwel Mantes of Viyayin, Lord of the Serpent’s Trace, hereby challenge Alaric Ossinast of Kesath to a duel without bounds!”
To their credit, Alaric’s entourage reacted with admirable celerity; before Talasyn could even finish processing what Surakwel had just said, Mathire stood up and bolted to Alaric’s side, accompanied by a man who had to be Sevraim. Devoid of helm and armor, Sevraim was lankily built, with curly dark hair and mahogany skin. He flashed Talasyn a lazy salute before speaking to Alaric.
“Your Majesty, I must strongly advise against taking Mantes up on his challenge,” Mathire said in urgent tones, but she was drowned out by Sevraim excitedly sharing his individual assessments of the Nenavarene lord’s strengths and weaknesses and what method of combat would be most effective against him. Still, Mathire made a valiant effort, continuing, “We are guests of the Zahiya-lachis; it will be a diplomatic headache if you end up killing him. You are cut off from the Shadowgate, which means that he might end up killing you—”
Alaric held up one hand in an unmistakable signal for silence. He made a show of glancing around the banquet hall, at the crystal carvings, the flowers, the sparkling cutlery, the finely dressed guests. “Here?” he asked Surakwel with a trace of bemusement.
“On your feet,” snapped the younger man, “you evil, genocidal, autocratic bastard!”
The smirk on Alaric’s face widened. “Here, it is.” He pulled on his gloves and got to his feet, making his way to the head of the table.
Talasyn rose as well, scrambling to keep up with his long-legged strides. “You don’t have to do this,” she said sharply, blocking his path. A Nenavarene duel without bounds didn’t end until one of the participants surrendered or died. Alaric was not the type to surrender. She didn’t want him to get hurt. She—
She would have happily pushed him off the nearest cliff months ago. But that was before . . . everything else.
Before they wove the black-gold barriers that saved each other from void bolts and falling debris. Before he said, You could come with me, looking so young and slightly lost beneath the blood-red eclipse. Before he took her side when her family didn’t tell her about the Night of the World-Eater. Before he told her about his mother and had been so patient in teaching her how to make a shield. Before he ate the pudding and teased her about the roast pig.
Something had changed.
She didn’t want him to get hurt.
Talasyn let out an undignified sort of squeak as Alaric picked her up by the waist and deposited her to the side, clearing his way forward. “Stand down, Lachis’ka,” was all he said, not looking directly at her.
Duel without bounds was the sole arena of Dominion jurisprudence where physical prowess mattered more than political skill. As such, it was considered a last resort. Barbaric to the point of taboo. But the rules were clear: whatever conditions were agreed upon by the participants had to be honored. It was therefore on tenterhooks that Talasyn and the rest of the diners watched from the sidelines as Surakwel and Alaric faced each other, about two meters apart.
“Terms?” Urduja demanded brusquely. She looked rather as if she was having a migraine, but not even the Zahiya-lachis herself could stop a duel without bounds once it had been declared.
“Should I win, Ossinast will forfeit Her Grace Alunsina Ivralis’s hand in marriage,” said Surakwel, “and he and his lackeys will leave the Nenavar Dominion posthaste.”
“Should I win,” said Alaric, “his young lordship will accord the Night Empire the respect that is our due and shut his mouth on matters that he knows very little of.”
“What does he think he’s doing?” Talasyn heard Mathire grumble to Sevraim. “He should ask for some strategic concession.”
No, Talasyn thought. He’s being smart.
Her mind raced, drawing on old lessons, on old conversations that Urduja had liberally sprinkled with advice. She saw the bigger picture. She considered every angle.
If Alaric pressed for a Nenavarene aristocrat’s execution or banishment, or anything that would give the Night Empire a clear advantage, that would hardly endear him to the Dominion. It might even turn Surakwel into a martyr in the people’s eyes. By being lenient in his stipulations and treating this duel as a minor nuisance, Alaric was positioning himself as a level-headed and tolerant ruler, and Surakwel as the hot-blooded troublemaker who was causing a scene at an important event.
She couldn’t take her gaze off Alaric. From across the gilded space between them, he gave every appearance of being utterly composed—perhaps even slightly bored, his gray eyes hooded in disdain. And yet there was a quality about him that was so alone, somehow, standing tall, dressed in black, encircled by the avid stares of the Dominion court and the sariman cages that lined the walls.
Talasyn wondered if her assessment of his motives was correct. And, if it was, she wondered where he had learned all of this, if it had come to him easily or if he had struggled at first, the way that she was struggling these days.
She wondered why, even after all this time, she still couldn’t figure him out.
Nearly everyone was standing up to get a better view, the feast forgotten. Queen Urduja dispatched a couple of attendants to fetch the customary weapons and, by the time they returned, the atmosphere in the banquet hall was crackling with tension.
The swords were of traditional Nenavarene make, with tapered steel blades that were narrowest at the base and had a spike protruding from the flat side of the tip. The hardwood hilts sported quillons carved with wavelike patterns and pommels that depicted crocodiles’ heads, jaws split apart in soundless and eternal bellows.
Alaric initially held his sword as though testing the heft of it in his palm, an expression akin to distaste shading his pale features. It was far heavier than a shadow-sword, less maneuverable, completely immutable. He sank into the same opening stance that Surakwel had adopted, feet apart at a perpendicular angle, knees slightly bent.
There was no ceremonial beginning to the fight. All chatter ground to a halt when Surakwel lunged and Alaric met him in the middle, a metallic clash of interlocking blades. The Nenavarene lord spun away and struck again, a blow that Alaric parried by sweeping to the side.
The two men regarded each other for a while, circling like apex predators whose paths had crossed in the wilderness. It looked as though they were catching their breath, but Talasyn knew better. They had finished sizing each other up, had each gotten a feel for their opponent’s reach and reaction time, and now the duel was about to begin in earnest.
It was odd to watch from the sidelines, her whole body thrumming with nervous energy but unable to do anything. It was odd to just stand there and compare the two men as they went at it in a frenetic series of attacks and ripostes. They were evenly matched, slashing and stabbing and crossing blades up and down the length of the gilded hall. Surakwel wielded his sword with the fluid proficiency of one who had been using this specific make since he was a child, but Alaric had more muscle, as well as a precision that broke through his opponent’s guard time and time again. He was the one who drew first blood, the spiked tip gliding across Surakwel’s bicep in one smooth slice.
Talasyn heard Lueve cry out, while, at the periphery of her vision, Niamha shuddered as though she herself had been struck. Blood dripped from Surakwel’s wound onto the marble floor, but he ignored it in favor of launching a new offensive, this one speedier and more reckless than the last.
Fall back, Talasyn urged Alaric silently without knowing why she did, without knowing why her innermost self was taking his side.
Alaric gave up ground, retreating, retreating, all the way to the far wall. Surakwel’s blade swept forward in the light of the torches and more blood spattered the tiles, this time from a cut on Alaric’s thigh. Talasyn’s heart all but leapt out of her chest. His eyes flashed with menace and she remembered the ice floes on the lake outside Frostplum. Remembered that lost winter night, the fires burning in the distance, the moonlight and the gold and the black of it all.
Alaric surged forward, driving Surakwel back until they were once more level with the banquet table. His next blow vibrated with so much raw power that Surakwel’s weapon was torn from his grasp. It skidded away, far from reach, and time seemed to slow as Alaric advanced, pulling his elbow back for another strike—
Surakwel dodged the other man’s wide-angle swing and retrieved his discarded crossbow. He raised his arm and fired, and Talasyn heard someone gasp—only to realize that it was she. She had made that sound.
Alaric automatically deflected the bolt. He wasn’t wielding a shadow-forged sword that could ward off projectiles, but the blade was Nenavarene steel nonetheless, and the bolt careened off it and into the wall and dislodged one of the sariman cages, which fell to the floor and rolled away with a thud.
Talasyn was too near another cage to benefit from the break in the nullification field, but she saw the exact moment that the Shadowgate came crashing over Alaric. She saw the triumph in his gray eyes before they turned a cold, glowing silver, the wildest and highest kind of exhilaration coursing through his broad frame. There was no more room for politics, no more room for diplomacy. He was a creature of instinct, ensnared in the nets of his magic.
He tossed the Nenavarene sword aside. A black spear took its place in his hand, the guttural shriek of the Shadowgate being opened rending the air. He hurled it at his foe as the spectators cried out, and Talasyn—
—Talasyn knew that, if Surakwel Mantes died tonight, the Dominion would be up in arms. Even though the alliance had been Queen Urduja’s idea, her people were more than capable of rebelling against her. They’d done it before.
With no thought for her own safety, Talasyn launched herself forward, into the field of combat. Her heels slipped and slid against the floor, but she managed to stay upright, darting between the two duelists. The Lightweave coursed back into her veins, golden and rich, as if some long-dormant pulse had been restarted. The crackling midnight haze of the oncoming shadow-spear filled her vision. She was panicking, she couldn’t think of a single weapon to spin that would block it, she didn’t know how to defend—
Talasyn held up a hand, unleashing a shapeless mass of radiant magic that flowed from her fingertips and collided with the spear. But Alaric had crafted his weapon with the intent to kill while she had no idea what she was doing, and shadow broke through light’s flimsy veil like a hunting knife through butter, continuing its lethal trajectory.
Beyond the darkness and the aether, she saw his silver eyes widen. She saw his arm shoot out to the side in a slashing motion, diverting the spear right before it could pierce her chest. It flew up, toward the ceiling, and there was a burst of burning pain when the edge of its blade grazed her right arm as it whizzed past her.
She sucked in a hiss of breath, but it was drowned out by the screams of the crowd and the crash of magic against marble as the shadow-spear chipped the ceiling and vanished, raining down a fine white dust.
An earth-shattering stillness fell over the hall. Talasyn lifted her chin, meeting Alaric’s gaze with a defiance that she didn’t quite feel, rattled as she was by what had just occurred. He was breathing hard and rough. His emotionless facade had cracked. Even though he was no longer channeling the Shadowgate, his eyes were bright with fury, and he had gone even paler. As he stalked over to her, she braced herself. This dress was not made for combat, but she could handle him as long as she steered clear of the other sariman cages.
Is this it? she wanted to ask. Do we fight, here and now? She tried to read his intent in the stiff set of his shoulders, in the heaving of his chest, in his every prowling step. Can I take you when you’re the angry one?
When he came to a halt right in front of her, she realized that his gaze was fixed on her injured arm. The spear had torn the sleeve a few inches above her elbow, revealing a wound that leaked crimson onto the iridescent teal fabric surrounding it.
“Get a healer to see to that at once,” he said through gritted teeth.
“It’s little more than a scratch,” she protested. “There’s no need—”
He interrupted her in an awful voice. “Don’t argue with me, Talasyn.”
The next time he moved, it was to turn to the stunned, deathly quiet nobles.
“Ever since my delegation and I arrived in Eskaya, we have made every effort to treat peaceably with the Dominion.” Alaric’s tone was cool, but Talasyn was close enough to glimpse the embers blazing in his gray irises. “Unfortunately, you have not seen fit to extend the same courtesy to us. All of you seem to be laboring under the delusion that we are pushovers. That ends now.” He turned a withering glare in Urduja’s direction. “Harlikaan, I have spent the last three afternoons training your heir, so that we can save your realm, and tonight she was injured because she still can’t make a shield. The Lachis’ka’s aethermancy will never improve as long as you keep denying her access to her nexus point. You are wasting my time and hers, and damning all of your subjects in the process—all because you are unwilling to cede control in this one matter. I will take her to Belian myself. You may no longer dictate where I can and cannot go.”
It was Talasyn’s first and most instinctive reaction to ask Alaric who he thought he was, interfering in this matter. However, just as she was about to open her mouth, he shot her a look of dark reproach. As though he knew that she was raring to pick a fight, and he was warning her to leave it.
Normally, this wouldn’t have stopped her—but, at the same time, Alaric’s choice of words leapt out at her like lightning.
He had called it her nexus point. Not Urduja’s, not the Dominion’s.
The Sever on the Belian range was made up of the same magic that flowed in her veins. It would answer to her and her alone.
“Additionally, you will no longer keep me and my Legion from the Shadowgate.” His tone had taken on a sinister bent. “Remove your precious cages—I never want to see them again. Tomorrow will be the last day of negotiations. If we have not finalized the agreement by then, consider our sides officially at war. And consider yourselves on your own in five months’ time, when the Voidfell rises.”
Talasyn braced herself, expecting the Zahiya-lachis to put up a fight. Instead, Urduja simply nodded, as if she, too, realized the peril that her entire realm was in.
Alaric returned the nod, although there was something vaguely mocking behind his gesture. Without another word, he strode out the doors, followed by Sevraim and Mathire. He was limping slightly from the cut in his thigh as Talasyn watched him go.
