“The queen requires blood and flesh for the princess’s training,” King Hazerial told Clarencio that morning at supper.

“Has Your Majesty considered using some of the nobles he saw fit to bring with him?” the lord suggested innocently before cutting into the fowl on his plate.

Hazerial went on as if he hadn’t spoken. “House Mattius will supply the queen with the number of bodies the yearly tribute has been lacking since your instatement.”

It felt as if a quail bone lodged in Clarencio’s throat. Like the outrageous taxes he paid to the crown each year, the number of men he sent to the body tax were always correct. His father had been meticulous in his dealings with Hazerial; out of necessity, Clarencio was perfect beyond reproach. At times, when the exact calculation for the yearly levy came out to a fraction, he had been tempted to send body parts. He always reigned in the impulse, knowing mockery from the son of a traitor would not be well received.

Hazerial’s mention of insufficient levies was obvious nonsense. An apparently petty show of power. The question was how this bullying fit into the Eketra-blessed king’s overall plan.

Clarencio took a sip of wine before responding. “If Your Majesty would be gracious enough to remind his subject how many that comes out to…”

“Deliver fifty men of your holding to the queen by dusk.”

House Mattius didn’t owe the crown one man, let alone fifty, but there was no way to skirt the king’s direct order. Like his father before him, Clarencio sent only volunteers to fulfill the yearly body tax—there were no shortage of bored miner’s sons and farm boys desperately dreaming of adventure and fortune—but that was with twelve months to prepare for the next collection date.

Horror stories of the mad queen’s bloody rituals had circulated even as far out as the Cinterlands, but if the bodies his staff had cleaned out of the royal suite that evening were any indication, those gory fictions were nothing compared to what Jadarah could do when she put her mind to it.

It certainly made one wonder what she might be teaching his future wife to do.

The only certainty was that the fifty men he handed over to her wouldn’t leave Blazing Prairie in one piece. He couldn’t ask anyone to give themselves up to that.

“Consider it done, Your Majesty.”

Clarencio beckoned to his elderly steward. Jarik would have to send riders to turn the condemned men out of every gaol in his holdings and hope that was enough.

As the steward left to carry out his orders, Clarencio looked down at his unfinished meal. He couldn’t eat another bite with all that idealism and means to ends he’d spouted to the crown prince sticking in his craw.

***

Kelena stood as still as a pressed flower in the middle of the bedchamber, while the autumn sun slowly shifted the shadows on the floor. Her feet and back ached. The fire in the hearth burned low, her breaths getting easier to see as the air became chillier.

Blazing Prairie wasn’t as ornately appointed as the Zinote mansion had been, but her chamber here was larger, and the beautiful bedstead had been laid with furs just for her. There was a lump at the foot where a thoughtful servant had shoved a firepan under the blankets to warm it for her arrival.

She shouldn’t even be looking at the bed. Mother always knew. To do something unforgiveable like wish for luxury she didn’t deserve would only make things worse—and there were already consequences coming. On days when Mother forgot to lock Kelena away, there were always consequences.

The narrow wardrobe in her chamber stood open against the north wall. She should climb in, cram herself against the frosted-covered wooden panel that butted up against the cold north wall, and pull the door shut. If she yanked it hard enough, it might even have locked on its own. Would that be the right thing to do?

No! Imbecile! Her mother would know she had stood in the middle of the floor wishing for the bed before getting into the wardrobe. If Kelena were going to get into the wardrobe on her own, she should have done it immediately. Whatever she did now, there would be consequences.

Sometimes there were consequences even after she was locked away for the day in some cramped, close, suffocating hole. As ugly and stupid as Kelena was, all consequences, no matter how awful, were deserved.

So she was stuck in the center of the chamber, rigidly still, waiting for her mother to punish her for once again failing at the simplest of possible tests. She was so stupid that she couldn’t even understand what these tests were for.

At least she would be able to move again when Mother came. She wouldn’t be paralyzed with indecision and fear anymore. That burning pain in her shoulders would ease with movement, and the pain in her legs would lessen if they changed positions. Anything but more waiting would be a relief.

Before Izakiel had left, it had been easier for Kelena to pretend that she wasn’t as awful as she knew she was. He never believed anything Mother said. Sometimes he could even make it sound as if the queen were wrong. Mother hated him, but he was Kelena’s hero. Izakiel wasn’t afraid of anything. Just thinking about his courage almost made her feel brave enough to take a step.

The chamber door opened.

Kelena flinched. Mother.

The sun outside those tall windows barely touched the western horizon. Mother must have been summoned by Kelena’s traitorous thoughts of her older brother—without sensing those, Jadarah would still be soundly asleep until midnight.

The queen swept into the room, bringing a cold draft and the smell of death and gore that evidenced her zealous dedication to the strong gods. An outsider would have pegged the mother and daughter at close to the same height, but in Kelena’s estimation the queen towered over her, a monstrous thunderhead crackling with power.

Kelena trembled from head to foot, unsure whether to collapse with fright or burst into tears.

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“What are you doing in the middle of the floor?” Mother snapped. “Idiot child, were you there all night? Are you too stupid to get into your own bed? Do you need an attendant to do everything for you, like some sort of invalid? Wipe that disgusting snivel off your face before I tear it off! I don’t know why I expect an empty little nothing to have a brain when she has nothing else. Come with me.”

Mother stopped in the doorway. “Well, Nobody, do you have enough sense to follow me yourself or do I need to drag you by the hair?”

Kelena shook her head and hurried to follow. On her first step, her leg, stiffened from a night of rigid motionlessness, buckled. She collapsed.

She looked up in horror at her mother.

“Roll your big, ugly, cow eyes around all you want, you empty little dunce. No one’s going to step in now and clean up your mess. Who do you think would help you, anyway? Tell me, what fool would care about something that’s not even human?”

Silence. The queen was waiting.

Kelena tried a few times to stammer out an apology, but she could hardly force a sound through her throat.

“Shut up!” Mother shrieked and slapped her mouth. “Not even the strong gods care about you. You don’t exist to them. You don’t exist to anybody! No one cares about an inhuman little nothing. Are you thinking Izak will come to your rescue? That backbiting crotch louse? What did he tell you? That if you pleased him often enough, he would kill me? Or was it your latest lover boy, the blind prince? They’re lying to you, telling you whatever you want to hear, because they know all you are is a shell, an empty shell, only good for one thing.”

Desperately, Kelena shook her head. Her fists formed white-knuckled balls against the flagstones. She wished she could cover her ears and scream that her mother was wrong—wrong about Izakiel, wrong about Etian—wrong, wrong, wrong!

Mother grinned.

The blood felt as if it were draining from Kelena’s heart when she realized she had shaken her head at Mother. How could she dare? A stupid nothing like her telling Mother that she was wrong?

Shuddering, Kelena squeezed her eyes shut tight, bracing for another slap or worse.

Warm, stinking arms wrapped around her trembling body.

“My empty little baby.” The queen’s breath was hot against Kelena’s hair. “No one—absolutely no one—cares about you but me. Not the strong gods. Not Izak or Etian or Hazerial. If they cared, they would be here. But who is here, little stupid one, little hated one, little nothing? Who is here with you?” Venomous red lips kissed Kelena on the forehead, and the arms squeezed gently. “I am.”

Kelena was so bewildered at the sudden switch to affection that she burst into tears. Mother patted her back, shushing sweetly, until the outburst was under control.

“Come, my nothing child.” The queen pulled Kelena to her feet. “Come with Mother, come now.”

She led the bewildered princess through the sprawling estate, down, down, down, into underground rooms that smelled of damp disuse. They passed winter stockpiles and aging wine, the queen still beckoning downward, to caverns that had once served as storerooms but had been replaced when the residence overhead had been expanded.

Someone was standing up ahead with a torch.

Mother chuckled and broke into a skip.

The waiting person was the Lord of the Cinterlands, leaning on his walking stick. He glared at their approach, his dark, handsome features pulled into a scowl. He looked as if he could barely contain his hatred for the empty little nobody coming his way.

The queen pranced to a halt and Kelena stopped just behind her, safely shielded from the angry lord. The echo of their footsteps carried on without them. It sounded like murmuring.

“Where are they?” Mother demanded.

Lord Clarencio stepped aside. The torch illuminated a grating in the sloped floor. Inside, Kelena saw the source of the movement and murmuring.

“Fifty men,” the lord growled.

Kelena’s throat ached with a silent scream. She hadn’t thought they would continue training here, so far from any high place or ghost city. She would take all the consequences she deserved and more if only she could avoid this.

The queen’s smile said that she knew that, too.

Mother pulled open the grating.

“Get in.”

***

Under normal circumstances, Hazerial preferred to keep the early part of his night to himself, tending to his toilette, breakfasting alone, then reading communiques which had made it past his chancellor. When the request for an urgent audience came from the lord of House Mattius, however, Hazerial felt the attention of his favored strong goddess turning his way.

Eketra was sending him opportunity.

“Show him in.” Hazerial set aside the latest report on the war with the pirates. It was the same as always—requests for more men, more bloodslaves, more provisions, more funding for the war that should have been filling the royal treasury to bursting.

The tap of the man’s walking stick on the stone announced his arrival before he appeared in the doorway. His expression was dark, eyes burning, posture tense. The aura of suffering hung about him like a cloud, though it was too faint to be his.

Hazerial smiled. Somebody was in a high temper.

The traitor’s whelp remembered to bow at least. “Your Majesty, may I make a request of the crown regarding the marriage contract?”

“Our secretary is drafting it now,” Hazerial said.

“If it pleases the king, I would like to request that the wedding take place immediately.”

Hazerial leaned back in the chair and studied the lord. Flecks of gore clung to the younger man’s carefully shined boots and blood splashed the left leg of his trousers. Evidence of the fifty men he had delivered, no doubt. Jadarah had capered off to collect them when word of their arrival came. Perhaps that was at the root of this sudden attitude shift.

“We cannot possibly take our beloved daughter from her mother yet. She is barely out of the nursery. To say nothing of her apprenticeship to the queen. Kelena is an instrument of the strong gods and must be trained to reach her full potential. She will need at least ten more years under her mother’s wing.”

The grip on the walking stick tightened. “Forgive my misunderstanding, Your Majesty, but last night it seemed as if the wedding was settled for next year.”

The web was taking shape, somewhere just beyond what Hazerial could see. Grisly puppet strings twisted into the shape of a noose.

“And you agreed to be present with the court during your betrothal period,” Hazerial said. “Where we are, there our daughter is also. You need not fear her extended absence.”

It was a delicious thing to watch one of the Josean-blessed struggling to force himself to give up the source of his weakness.

“Your Majesty, your daughter finds her training…distasteful.”

So the son of the traitor had an even worse bleeding heart than his father. The disease got more severe by the generation, it seemed.

“When her training is completed, she will no longer feel that way,” Hazerial said.

“Is there no way to release her from it? Surely the strong gods have enough instruments.”

“Which do you question—their will or the will of your sovereign?”

“Neither, Your Majesty. I apologize that my ignorance makes it seem so. Without a proper high place, my family’s connection to the strong gods has always been limited. And, I admit, I’ve never seen a child treated in such a way.”

With a gracious nod, Hazerial pretended to understand Clarencio’s misgivings.

“We will not rip our daughter from her mother’s loving arms so soon. However,” he let the bloody noose settle around the young lord’s neck, “we may make certain concessions for our future son-in-law. Especially in the Hall of Law, where we believe your family’s interests have frequently lain in the past.”

The tip of the walking stick dug into the stone as the young lord wrestled with one principle versus another. How would a Josean-blessed man weigh one little girl he had no control over against all the people his father had always gone on about, whose lot in life it appeared he might be able to affect?

Clarencio met Hazerial’s stare. “I live to serve Your Majesty, but I am thirty-one years old, and my line is prone to sickness. It would be folly of me to wait ten years before attempting to produce a legitimate heir.”

“Perhaps if your presence benefits the crown sufficiently, the betrothal period might be shortened. One might presume that for each act of assistance you provide, months—or even years—may be subtracted.”

“And my future wife’s training?”

Hazerial smiled at the sight of a man pulling his own noose tight. “There is every chance the strong gods will decide they have enough instruments by then.”