"None of them will be safe." Marzonna bit out as she and Lilah walked to the dining hall.
"I know that." Said the queen. "I will end it, but I need an alternative first."
Marzonna turned her head to stare at Lilah through slitted eyes. "So until then, you wish to travel to the most dangerous place in Delladine and show all those people you are there? To put us all in harm's way?"
"You are being a coward." The queen said, her voice barely contained between the two of them. "I expected you, of all people, to want to do this."
"It is foolish and you are being too stubborn to see it." Marzonna's voice sounded like a mouse squeaking while a cat tried to snatch it out of a dark corner. "You are too practical to think this will work."
"We're going to Midrouge to pardon the men. You can come willingly or I can command it." Lilah said angrily.
Marzonna halted to a stop in the middle of the hallway. Lilah felt a twinge of pity for the guard that almost tripped to prevent himself from running into the angry woman. "You command it?"
Lilah looked squarely at Marzonna and wondered if she knew the woman at all. The queen had not anticipated having to argue with the scholar over the matter; certainly, she had thought it would be the easiest part of the plan. Marzonna had been raised in Erzulief, the kingdom to the northeast of Delladine, which had been fighting for the safety of Noduvs for as long as it had held men on its lands.
In the early years, Lilah looked at Marzonna as an older sister. When Queen Nadine had told her daughter she would need to take lessons, Lilah had feared it would be some dullard from the Imperi church. Lilah had never been so grateful as the day her mother, Nadine,
brought Marzonna into the palace, with her strange language and conjuring powers. The Erzulian was smart and well practiced in things that Lilah had never seen or even heard of before. One day they would study the land and the great families, the next they would be whispering in Marzonna's study about Boneel legends while tutor tended to her plants. The woman had passed her curiosity on to Lilah, had taught the girl how to make her own opinions, but it seemed like too many years safely behind palace walls had taken her courage.
"I have to get the support of the people before I make another law controlling how they practice Noduv." Lilah said slowly. "If they think I am trying to smother them out it could create more uprisings. And I cannot just lift the law and let people run rampant putting everyone in danger until then, so the law must stay for the time being and we must go to Midrouge."
Marzonna chuckled without humor, "There could be uprisings no matter what you do. You have inherited an unstable kingdom."
"Marzonna, listen to me." Lilah grabbed her hands and looked her right in the eyes, "There are people all over Delladine right now who believe that I had something to do with passing that law. They believe that I would actually execute Noduvs for conjuring."
Her tutors' voice was as feeble as her words when she said. "The people know you stand with Noduvs."
Lilah shook her head, "They do not. Just this afternoon Marian was afraid to talk to me about her son because he is a young Noduv. A woman who knows me and sees me interact with you every day doesn't even believe I would spare a Noduv life. How are those who do not know me supposed to believe it?"
Finally, Marzonna had nothing to say, so Lilah continued, "I cannot be a queen who cowers inside the palace, especially not when there are people dying needlessly. I will find no success if the people do not trust me. My mother taught me that."
Marzonna regarded Lilah for a moment, her expression long, and then began to walk again. "I will join this farce, but in time you will see it is juvenile."
The fury in her belly burned Lilah until she felt ill, but eventually, she walked on too. The smell of fresh mincemeat cakes were already wafting down the hall, but the queen was sure she wouldn't touch a bit of it. "We will dress in black so that we can blend in with the mourners travelling to the Boneyard Coast." Lilah said, determined to let no one chip away at her resolve.
"Clever." Marzonna said in a clipped voice, barely trying to keep their privacy as they entered the great room full of tables and people dining. Lilah impatiently motioned for everyone to return to their food when they stood for her arrival.
"We could simply carry a bundle of flowers with us and no one would suspect a thing. We would be just three travelers looking to honor the dead." The queen continued.
It had been a while since Lilah had learned about the legend of the Fallen Noduvs, but it was still burned in her mind. The lesson was one of the first Marzonna had taught the queen when she came to Della Palace. The tutor could not believe Lilah had never heard about the tradition, so she climbed to the top of a wardrobe and pulled out a dusty leather bound book with an Erzulian inscription. After giving explicit instructions to keep the book a secret, Marzonna had explained how she secretly brought the text against King Gordon's orders to leave personal belongings behind. Lilah, even in her younger years, had felt the enormity of the secret and held onto it tightly in hopes of keeping Marzonna around for a very long time. The two sat quietly in front of the fireplace and read the legend of the Fallen Noduvs while the flames warmed their faces. Before Lilah could truly understand their sacrifice though, she first had to understand where Noduv had begun.
Boneel was a religion practiced by men who had already spent thousands of years in the ground. Noduvs were people able to draw from their Boneel gods in order to conjure up animals and plants from the earth, see prophecies, and perform a number of dangerous rituals. Noduv power was said to be given to the first men who walked the earth, as a weapon against predators and a tool for prosperity. Most believed it was a gift for the faithful. As time walked on, however, mankind lost faith in its gods and its self-importance swelled so high that it blocked man from the gods. All the Boneel stories agreed, man was a feeble thing and the more time spent on the earth, the further mankind wandered from the gods. Therefore, Noduv began to dwindle until it was only a gift the gods shared with a few and it was no longer without cost. After generations of men turning their backs on the gods, Noduv had turned into something that resembled a curse more than a gift. The conjures that once came so easy to Noduvs suddenly took as much as they gave.
With small conjures, the Noduvs grew weary or sometimes ill, but the effects usually subsided after a period of rest. If the action was too big, however, the Noduv power could sometimes take the conjurer's life. Then there were even those who tried to conjure Noduv without having the gift, the false Noduvs, and they often ended up mad or rotted from the inside out until they finally perished. In the case of the Fallen Noduvs, the great conjurers had to give their lives in order to desecrate their own land.
The story began more than a century ago, when Amith had tried to invade the kingdom of Erzulief in an attempt to destroy the Boneel religion. Erzulief, an incredibly small country still trying to develop, had little it could do to stand against the wealthier Amith. The Church of Boneel, having been the primary source of leadership in Erzulief, gathered it's oldest and most renowned Noduvs together and asked for the only thing that could withstand Amith forces.
Sacrifice.
It was decided that the only way to prevent Amith from invading the kingdom was to destroy the coast so no one could navigate through it to the mainland. It was the only hope they had, but for the ability to destroy an entire kingdom's coast, the cost would be over five hundred of the greatest Noduv lives.
The legend claimed the Noduvs who gathered were the greatest conjurers left to the earth. Over five hundred men and women stood side by side and spent their last moments in stoic silence as their power drained life from the land and then their own bodies. Erzulief's once beautiful coast had turned black and the land held dangerous traps for those who tried to cross it. One wrong step would lead to certain death, though the means were varied. One man could step foot into a black pit that would suck him down and suffocate him, while another could cross a stretch of land covered in poison thorns ready to prick. At the most inward edge of the ruins lay every one of the Noduv bodies neatly lined like a wall guarding the kingdom. Their flesh melted off with time and fed the land, but the bones stayed and turned into spiked rocks larger than any man. No one man could cross the land safely, an entire army of men stood no chance at all.
Everyone, no matter what gods they served, or throne they knelt for, knew the formidable land as the Boneyard Coast. Every year since the sacrifice, Boneel believers honored the loss of the Noduvs on the anniversary of their sacrifice and called it the Mourning. As per tradition, everyone from Delladine or Erzulief who participated, travelled to the Boneyard Coast and left behind flowers and sacrificed animals to respect the lost lives. Fascinated, Lilah had always wished to see the land, even knowing it would make her feel frightfully small.
The sound of Bleu's voice snapped Lilah out of her memories and into the present where he was pouring sweet wine into their cups.
"I assume she has told you?" He asked Marzonna.
"And has ordered me to come along." Marzonna said quietly, but Lilah didn't miss the annoyance in her tone. Bleu stared at both women for a moment before he finally nodded and sighed. "We will leave in the morning, before dawn."
As the meal went on, the young queen found herself disgusted by nearly everyone in the room. The cabinet members were all at a long table with their families dressed in feathers and furs too absurd for the setting. None of the men showed any regard for the modesty dressed who were quietly serving their families.
Filling two other long tables were prominent families who lived in Vidan and had more riches than even some in the cabinet, they too were completely oblivious to those around them. Their attention could only be coaxed by those who had heavy pockets and light thoughts. Lilah found herself pulling at her own silk gown and felt her stomach turn guiltily. Although she took great care in never dressing too boastfully, she still knew her clothing was worth the cost of some family homes. She thought again of the people so poor and desperate that they were risking their lives to conjure livestock for their children to eat. The room was crowded with men who were gorging themselves, women refusing to eat in order to stay thin, and children who were playfully throwing bits of bread at one another and suddenly the queen had to leave.
Lilah stood rather abruptly and said, "I am finished."
Before she could turn to leave the table, Marzonna grabbed her arm and said, "Lilah, I could make you something to help you sleep through the night." The woman had misunderstood Lilah's disgust as anxiety for their journey.
Lilah shook her head slightly. "I am going for some fresh air." She then turned to her guard, Van, and said, "Would you be so kind as to accompany me so that Bleu and Marzonna can finish their supper?"
"Of course, Queen Lilah." Van bowed slightly and pulled her chair out more so she could leave the table.
Lilah did not turn back around to look at Marzonna or Bleu. Lately, Marzonna had developed an irritating habit of sending disapproving glares at the young queen when she spent time alone with Van. Instead, the queen kept her eyes forward and trusted that Van would follow her.
The pair had found their way outside the palace and walked across stone steps which lead to an impressive gazebo covered in ivy. The acrid smell of soil and greenery filled the cooled air as it was pushed along and bit through the queen's gown. Lilah only dared speak when they were pressed closely together on the gazebo's bench.
"Hopefully you were finished with your food." She looked up at Van and offered an apologetic smile. She knew he didn't mind, he often told her his favorite part of his day was the walk they took around the gardens every night.
"You saved me from listening to Officer Grask recount his conquests in the whorehouses again. I would miss seven suppers for that mercy. " He grinned.
Lilah laughed and almost forgot the great weight on her back for a moment. Van had joined the Queen's guard two years ago, when the queen was only a seventeen year old princess and he was the grandson of a legendary King's Guard. Lilah had heard stories of Officer Jorn Delacey and was eager to meet his grandson. The tales told of a man who served from his twentieth name day until he was an old man with tufts of snow white hair. Jorn was fearless in battle and notoriously honorable, but his name had been smeared when his only son failed to join the guard in his father's footsteps. Though Van's father had refused a life of service, Van himself had taken up the mantle and served as well as his grandfather ever had, once again returning honor to Jorn's family name.
Vannick Delacy was more than a sworn sword to the queen though. The two had grown close after Lilah asked him to work on combat with her every day under the relentless summer sun. Ever so slowly, Van began to loosen up around his queen. One day the young guard would let a smile slip when he saw Lilah, another he would make a joke under his breath so only she could hear, and then one day the two of them found themselves incredibly fond of the other without the faintest idea of when it had happened.
"I know you have heard about my plan." Lilah said softly, her worries never far from mind.
Van nodded and looked away from her, "Yes."
"Do not tell me you are going to call me foolish as well." Lilah watched his face carefully while his eyes were off of her. His golden features seemed to illuminate through the darkness of the night, his light hair was drinking in the moonlight and making him look nearly ethereal.
When Van looked back at her, his green eyes were bright with a passion Lilah had not expected. He grabbed her hand and asked. "Why aren't you taking me along?"
"You have to keep an eye on Moss in my absence." Lilah said sadly. She would have loved nothing more than to have Van by her side during the journey.
The officer stiffened a bit and said, "Moss was angry after that meeting. The first thing he did was pull the cabinet into a room and spoke with them in secret."
The queen felt her stomach tighten again. She had expected as much, but it was troubling to have it confirmed. "You see, I need you here."
Lilah frowned as a thought suddenly occurred to her. "Have you known about the execution law that was passed?" She could not believe she didn't think of it sooner. "Surely your parents have suffered because of it and wrote to tell you." Lilah said in an accusatory tone. She knew that Van had a younger brother who had Noduv gifts, although they was very weak in comparison to others.
Van flinched very slightly and said, "I've not spoken to my family in a few months, something... happened." He trailed off and fixed his eyes on the ground.
"Why?" Lilah was growing more uneasy with every passing second. "How can you keep them safe if you don't speak with them?"
"It is nothing important. My grandfather is angry with me and has started to convince the rest of my family to be as well."
Lilah repeated. "Are they safe?"
Van laughed sadly and held her face in his calloused hand, finally meeting her eyes again. "You have not yet seen what is happening outside of the palace walls. Nothing is safe anymore."
The queen frowned and regarded Van closely. He was tall and lean, hard as steel just as one would expect to see in a Queen's Guard, but he was also soft. He always wore a delicate expression when he looked at Lilah, but in that moment he looked more troubled than she had ever seen him. Before she could tell him so, there was the sound of a blade being unsheathed from somewhere in the dark.
Instantly, Van clutched Lilah and pulled them both to their feet. Lillah tugged out the dagger she had strapped to her thigh at the same time Van unsheathed his sword. The queen looked out into the gardens, but all was dark compared to the candle lit gazebo.
"Show yourself" Van called authoritatively.
The answer was a sharp, high cackle that made the hairs on Lilah's arms stand up, it reverberated through her body and gnawed on her nerves hungrily. She and Van shared the same troubled glance, the noise was not that of a human. The night had grown old and the queen could hear nothing but her own quickened breath. She had the distinct feeling of being on stage with an audience whose attention was not seen, but felt.
Van didn't waste his breath to ask the prowler to show themselves. "You will not harm a hair on the queen's head." He called out instead.
Another laugh, this time it came from the opposite direction and sounded closer than before. Lilah and Van both drew sharp breaths and put their backs together. They moved in a slow circle, their eyes were darting to everywhere and nowhere all at once. The air around them felt disturbed, tinged with something very wrong. Just as Lilah was about to suggest running for the palace doors, Van cursed under his breath.
"There," He said sharply, "Look out near the fountain, I see…" He trailed off, but Lilah looked in the direction and Van did not have to finish his sentence. There was a dark manlike figure standing only yards away, but the shape of its head was all wrong for a man. The face was long like a sheep's and it made no sound as it watched the queen.
"What is that?" Lilah's whisper trembled.
Before anything more could be done, the figure was charging towards them faster than any man should be able to move, not quite running but gliding. Van pushed Lilah behind him and raised his sword for a battle. The figure grew ever closer and Lilah's hands became damp with sweat as she began to hear its heavy breathing. Just as the creature was about to meet the light, it vanished, as silent and easy as it was for a shadow to vanish when a light flickered.
"What is happening?" Van asked no one in particular, his voice held the smallest bit of strain.
Van took his free hand and reached behind him for Lilah's. When he found it, he squeezed so hard she thought it would turn blue, and she could not tell if it was his hand or hers that was so slick. She almost said something, anything, to reassure him but the soft touch of a breath on her neck stopped her cold. When the queen turned around she found something out of a night terror. For only one moment, the creature stood right in front of her. It was watching her, although it didn't seem to have any eyes, only black smears. The mouth was hanging open, almost unhinged, cracks were all around it with blood and some kind of black sludge pouring from inside. The blackened teeth inside the mouth were all broken and missing. Before Lilah could even scream, the creature tilted its head and let out another cackle that threatened to make her ears bleed.
The next moment, the thing pulled Lilah away from Van and started to move so quickly that she couldn't see where they were going. It had an incredible strength that allowed it to drag Lilah along by only her hair until she could no longer keep her feet running along with it. A great terror filled the queen when she realized she was being dragged like a doll. She heard Van yell her name and his footsteps chasing them, but not quickly enough to make a difference.
Lilah grabbed the creature's wrist and tried to tug herself free, but it was coated in the same liquid that poured from its mouth and it became impossible for her to get a good grip. She tried desperately to shove her dagger into its body or even through it's cloak, but it was like trying to fight water. The thing was fluid and somehow anticipated her actions before smoothly dodging her.
After a few seconds, the creature dropped the queen onto the cold grass and stood over her silently. The sludge dripped from its mouth and down onto her face, try as Lilah might, she could not keep her eyes open because of the sting. The smell was like burning sulfur and a decayed animal that had perished in the sun. One second she was holding onto her knife and the next, the creature had somehow turned it around and pressed it to her throat. It laughed again and spit the sludge at her in a way that showed unexplained disgust. It put its frightening mouth to her ear and croaked in a voice unlike any she had heard before, "You are nothing. I could end your life right now." It taunted in a voice like a scraping blade.
Despite its threat, the creature lowered the knife from her throat and cut a piece of her hair off instead. Its sharp laugh was cut off by a squelching sound and then it was suddenly off of Lilah. The queen rolled onto her feet, but only found Van standing alone and shaking as he looked at the ground. She rushed to his side and looked down at the puddle of sludge, slowly spreading and painting the green grass black.
"Where did it go?" Lilah asked and looked around desperately, she clutched Van's arm tightly.
"I… I stabbed it" He mumbled.
"Then where is it?" Lilah looked everywhere frantically.
"It vanished. I stabbed it and it…" Van trailed off.
Lilah shook him fiercely and said, "It what, Van?" Her voice rising.
"It melted to this." He never took his eyes off of the puddle.
"What?" Lilah jumped away from the sludge.
Her sudden movement must have pulled Van from his shock, because he finally turned his attention from the puddle. "Did it hurt you?" His hands trailed down her arms and his eyes looked desperately around her body, looking for any sign of injury.
"No" She shook her head and could not stop it. "No, it told me it could kill me and then it cut a piece of my hair."
Van stopped in his tracks. "Why would it do that?"
"I don't know, Van. Come on, we have to get inside without anyone seeing us."
"What?" Van asked sharply. "We need to tell Bleu."
"No!" Lilah bellowed and held onto Van's arms again. He was looking at her as if she had lost her mind. "If we tell Bleu he will never agree to go to Midrouge. This has to stay between us."
"This could happen again. You could've been killed." Van's own voice was rising now, almost a scream.
Without answering, she pulled his arm and they ran back towards the palace, Lilah dragging her sleeve across her face trying in vain to get the bloody sludge off of her. When they were in the palace, she continued speaking.
"Think of Lathem. We have to stay quiet for him and all the other Noduvs being threatened." The queen felt guilty for mentioning Van's brother, but it was necessary.
Van shook his head back and forth and looked even more troubled than he had before. "Do not use my family against me." He enunciated every word through clenched teeth. "I put your life even before my own family. Of all my responsibilities, you're the most important."
Lilah recoiled as if Van had slapped her. Her guard suddenly looked like a stranger to her, someone awful who was wearing a mask of stone. The thought of Van only thinking of her as a responsibility was more than she could bear.
"Enough." She said, equally cold. "I order you not to say a word of this to anyone. If you will not protect your family, I will."
At her words, Van's mask cracked and a look of hurt crossed his eyes. "Yes, Your Majesty." He said simply, knowing it would bother her the most. His face grew blank and his posture coiled as if he could not relax. He watched her with expectant eyes, ready for another order. He meant to annoy Lilah, but she would not take the bait.
The queen ignored his words and turned her attention on what to do next. She decided the best way to get to her chambers unseen would be through the hallway behind the kitchen where she knew all the servants would still be busy with cooking and cleaning. She glided through a large corridor and around the corner to the beginning of the poorly lit hallway, but the sound of two hushed voices made her instinctively stop. Van grabbed her arm and pulled them both into a dark doorway where they pressed their bodies as closely to the wall as they could. Lilah gave Van one look and knew he would remain quiet to hear the conversation as well.
"She has insulted us all!" A high pitched man's voice filled the hallway. The words were slurred from drink, but Lilah recognized his voice immediately as Andrew Peaver, the cabinet member she argued with just hours earlier. "The usurper must be stopped before she destroys the balance of power forever." His voice had nearly reached a squeal at the end of his sentence.
"I will tell you as I have told the others, I am handling it." A calm voice replied. Lilah's blood went as cold as ice when she heard this man speak, for she knew it was none other than Borris Moss. She couldn't see them, but she could imagine the pig-like man talking down to the rail thin Peaver as if he were an upset child, despite the fact that Peaver was much taller than Moss.
"What does that mean?" Peaver screeched.
"It means, I am handling it." Moss repeated harshly. "I will not tolerate blasphemy and I certainly will not tolerate disrespect, especially from some foolish girl." Moss spat like something tasted bitter in his mouth.
Lilah clenched her hands and felt her nails digging into her palm. Van must have anticipated her anger, because he wrapped his arm around her waist and pulled her closer to the wall. Almost silently, he hushed into her ear and held her still. Lilah had to take several calming breaths before she could continue to listen again.
Moss continued, "The child is steadfast in her principles, but that often clouds her judgment. She and the others will be leaving at dawn with only anonymity and a single man to protect them. They will be vulnerable." Lilah felt her heart begin to race and had to bite the inside of her cheek to control her emotions. "I have already set a plan in motion." Moss finished, his smugness was nearly palpable.
The sound of a door opening and the clamor from the kitchen flooded the hallway. Another voice that Lilah could not easily recognize said, "He's back, sir. We must go."
Moss said, "Alright, let's go." As if it were an afterthought, he continued, "Peaver…"
Andrew did actually squeal this time, "Yes, sir?"
"Do not speak of this to anyone." Then footsteps faded with the noises of the kitchen and all was silent as the door closed again.
Lilah placed a hand on the wall beside her and began to breath heavily. "That is the second threat on my life in the last twenty minutes."
"You must stay here, Lilah. This is more dangerous than any of us anticipated." Van said in pleading whispers. Lilah noted with vague interest that he had yet to drop his arm from her waist.
"They are all cowards, and I refuse to bend to them in any way." Her voice had sounded calm and collected, but inside Lilah felt a chill filling every corner of her body. She did not fear for her life, but she did fear that all hope of justice could die with her. She knew she had to stay alive for that fact alone.
"Do not ask this of me." Van's fingers clutched the queen's arm and his forehead pressed against her own. "Please Lilah, don't ask me to stand by while you throw yourself into danger like this."
In that moment, in the dark doorway away from anyone else in the world, Lilah nearly forgot who she was. She almost forgot she was queen and ignored the duty that was always draped on her shoulders. Lilah nearly let Van talk her into staying within the palace if only so she could stay in this doorway with him. Her mind was muddled by the peppery smell of Van's hair as it fell forward and tickled her temple, and it almost confused her enough to give into him. Almost. After a moment in silence, Lilah untangled herself from Van and turned away.