The Queen Will Betray You Read online

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  To my family—who walked every step of this journey with me during the year we couldn’t go anywhere.

  THE CONTINENT OF THE SAND AND SKY

  KINGDOM OF ARDENIA

  Prime Rulers: King Sendoa, the Warrior King (deceased); Queen Geneva (missing); Princess Amarande; General Koldo, regent

  Sigil: Tiger

  Location: Eastern coast, in mountains sandwiched between Pyrenee, to the north, and Basilica to the south.

  Castle Seat: The Itspi

  Prime Export: Diamonds

  Attributes: The untimely death of the self-styled Warrior King Sendoa, coupled with the unwed status of the young Princess Amarande, has placed Ardenia under the regency of General Koldo and made it a tempting, jewel-filled prize for its greedy neighbors.

  KINGDOM OF PYRENEE

  Prime Rulers: King Louis-David (deceased); Dowager Queen Inés, regent; Crown Prince Renard (deceased); Prince Taillefer

  Sigil: Mountain Lion

  Location: Mountainous northeastern coast of the continent, sharing borders with both Ardenia and the Torrent. The kingdom abuts a deep strait called The Divide. The Kingdom of Eritri is on the other side of the waterway.

  Castle Seat: The Bellringe, atop King’s Crest

  Prime Export: Gold

  Attributes: Wealthy and insular, Pyrenee rules the northern tip of the continent and has a natural alliance with Ardenia as its mountainous neighbor, but the two have a frosty relationship.

  KINGDOM OF BASILICA

  Prime Rulers: King Domingu; Queen Nania (fifth wife); dozens of descendants: children, grandchildren, great-grandchildren

  Sigil: Bear

  Location: Southeastern coast; mountainous border with Ardenia and the Torrent to the north; Myrcell borders the west side; the Kingdom of Indu is across the sea to the south.

  Castle Seat: The Aragonesti

  Prime Export: Steel

  Attributes: Rich in iron ore smelted into much coveted weapons-grade steel, Basilica enjoys a robust exports business despite King Domingu’s reputation as greedy, scheming, and ambitious. The royal family tree is a sprawling one, with Domingu’s descendants seeded within every Sand and Sky kingdom, making his bloodline nearly as prevalent as his famed weaponry.

  KINGDOM OF MYRCELL

  Prime Rulers: King Akil; Queen Sumira

  Sigil: Shark

  Location: Southwestern coast; mountainous border with the Torrent to the north; Basilica borders to the east; the Kingdom of Indu is across the sea to the south.

  Castle Seat: Miragua

  Prime Export: Pearls

  Attributes: This beachfront kingdom is closely aligned with its southern kingdom neighbor, Basilica. Rich in both hemlock and pearls, it is often targeted by pirates seeking both poison and riches, who hope to take advantage of its young, inexperienced, and newly married king, Akil.

  THE TORRENT / THE FALLEN KINGDOM OF TORRENCE

  Prime Rulers: The Warlord; the lost crown prince, known as the Otsakumea (wolf cub)

  Sigil: Leaping Flames of the Fire Pit (Warlord); Black Wolf (the overthrown Otxoa ruling family)

  Location: Central portion of the continent; Basilica and Myrcell to the south; Ardenia to the east; Pyrenee to the north.

  Castle Seat: Otxazulo (Destroyed)

  Prime Export: None

  Attributes: Under the dictatorial rule of the masked Warlord. A pro-Otxoa resistance operates underground, awaiting the return of the lost Otsakumea.

  PROLOGUE

  IN the fevered hour after he narrowly escaped with his life, the young prince paused only to snatch up parchment and a quill.

  In less than a moment, he’d written two letters.

  One to a friend.

  One to someone he would not call so.

  Both held the same message, written in a flat, left-handed scrawl.

  The tiger has fled, the mountain lion is dead, the wolf has found his head.

  No signature was needed for one, nor advised for the other.

  Satisfied and running out of time, he sealed the letters and sent them on their way. Then, without so much as a glance over his shoulder, he disappeared into the night.

  * * *

  IN the captain’s quarters of the pirate ship Gatzal, the princess watched her true love open his eyes.

  From where she’d lain for the last several hours—on the wood-plank floor, her hand nestled in his—she slipped onto the edge of the bed where he slept. She was careful not to jostle him, as his chest was still raw from having been cleaved nearly in two by a prince’s mad hand, and then carefully mended with a thread, needle, and stinging sagardoa.

  As the boy’s golden eyes focused on her face, he smiled, dimples winking. “We made it, Ama.”

  She kissed him then, softly, mindful of his wounds. But her love was stronger than he seemed and put gentle fingers in her auburn hair, pulling her closer, deeper. When they parted, his fingers caressed the side of her face. “Of course we did,” she answered. “A wise pirate once told me love is the most powerful force on earth.”

  “It is indeed powerful, as it is the only reason I am still here, breathing your air. I do hope our love will readily accept the blood I’ve shed and call it settled, because I doubt I can take much more.”

  Pure joy bloomed across her face then, delight in her sea-stained eyes. “Oh, Luca, I have so much to tell you about your blood.”

  That was not at all what he’d expected her to say. “My … blood?”

  She told him everything then. About what the wolfish tattoo across his heart really meant—that he was the Otsakumea, the last of the Otxoa, ruling family of the Kingdom of Torrence. About the underground movement within the Torrent to restore the kingdom, and that the black wolf she’d encountered on the plateau was a harbinger of the resistance. She told him her father had known he had a hidden prince in his care. And that the man they’d killed at the Hand knew Luca’s true identity and had died trying to capture him.

  “Luca, this is your birthright and the people want you to lead. They’re willing to fight a ruthless tyrant to get their land back; all they need is you.”

  “But … are we sure this is true? Stableboys aren’t the chosen ones.”

  “That tattoo is proof.”

  “The tattoo is simply ink.”

  “Not to the people who have been waiting for it.” Her eyes were full and pleading, hoping that he would see. Believe. She dropped another kiss on his lips, then up the line of his jaw. Whispered in his ear. “I know this is so much. Too much. But it is your chance.… And our chance to be together.”

  * * *

  TO the south, the king who long a
go forged his legacy in his only brother’s blood sat on his balcony in the salmon-bright dawn, a contract in hand, warm salt air pushing the remains of his snow-white hair around his face.

  The royal seal was peeling off the parchment, slit straight through with the dagger he preferred for a letter opener. Crumbs of wax littered his nightshirt as he read through the amended offer one last time.

  The changes were not of consequence—silly, cosmetic things that did not matter. Worth much more was the fact that she either didn’t or couldn’t see what was actually of importance. Clearly the queen had kept her more seasoned advisors in the dark about the terms.

  A smile sliding across the craggy landscape of his face, the king plucked a quill from his inkpot and, in a flourish of just a few letters, changed the entire shape of the continent. As the ink dried, the king watched the waves crash across rocks as sharp as his worst edges.

  “My king, you’re up early,” came a small voice from within his chambers. In a moment, his fifth wife stepped into the dawn light, so young that not a line showed when she squinted from the bedroom shadows into the blinding promise of a summer day.

  The king didn’t roll or fold or otherwise obscure the content of the parchment. This wife wasn’t the type to pry in his official business. It was a quality that until that very moment had served her well. “Let’s take a walk on the beach, Nania. Just the two of us. Would you like that?”

  The girl lit up like the brilliant flash of a falling star. “Oh yes, my king. I shall dress at once.”

  CHAPTER 1

  HIGH in the mountains of Ardenia, a princess and her love stood at a crossroads.

  It was time to say good-bye.

  Tears hung in the corners of Princess Amarande’s eyes as she summoned the strength it would take to part. Standing before her, Luca’s jaw worked as she drew a shaky breath. When the words didn’t come, unable to rise past her heart, she took one last look at him.

  Luca stood there, clean, tall, broad shouldered, but dressed almost as if in mourning—a boy in black.

  Her boy in black.

  Amarande, meanwhile, was a bedraggled confection in the bloodstained tatters of her wedding dress. The lifeblood of Prince Renard of Pyrenee never had rinsed clean, the vestige of her murderous decision running the length of the entire bodice in a rusted chocolate brown. Still, Amarande wore the gown—it was evidence of the wedding she’d been forced into and then ended by taking Renard’s life. If she had truly brought war to Ardenia’s doorstep via regicide, she needed proof of what had actually happened.

  “Come with me, Princess.”

  Luca pressed the back of her hand to his lips. His eyes, golden and as fierce as the summer sun above, never left her face.

  Oh, and she wanted to go with him. To the Torrent, this time of his own volition—not tied to the back of a horse, blackmail to force her hand into a marriage with Renard that would’ve made that cruel boy king of Pyrenee. She had him back. Alive, hers, their love out in the open under the wide sky. The last thing she wanted to do was to leave him.

  But to be together forever, they both knew they must part.

  There was no other way. He would go west to the Torrent—the land that should by all rights be his. She would go north to the Itspi, the Ardenian castle they called home.

  That was how it must be.

  They’d been over it for the last few days in the close quarters of the pirate ship Gatzal. Running through every scenario as they charted a course from the Port of Pyrenee, through the Divide and into the East Sea, sweeping around the lip of the continent of the Sand and Sky to the Port of Ardenia.

  Every facet of possibility, probability, exposed to the light and considered as they ate their fill of saltwater fish, cleaned their wounds, and lay on the deck, letting the same sun that had drained them in the Torrent recharge their spent muscles and creaking bones.

  No matter how they approached it, no matter how many questions they raised, no matter how many reactions they predicted from each of the players—Ardenia, Pyrenee, Basilica, Myrcell, the Torrent—this plan always emerged the strongest.

  Amarande first to Ardenia, tasked with stabilizing the throne after the death of her father and shoring up its defenses from Pyrenee’s retaliation for the murder of Prince Renard. Next, she’d join Luca and the pro-Otxoa resistance in the Torrent, overthrow the Warlord, and restore peace and sovereignty to the Kingdom of Torrence. And then, finally, the Princess of Ardenia and the Otsakumea Luca, the rightful heir of Torrence, would stare down the remainder of the Sand and Sky, hand in hand.

  Never to be apart again.

  Her eyes met his—her best friend, her love, her future. Amarande’s father, King Sendoa, whose murder had ignited all of this, always had the words for a moment such as this one—just like he always had a plan. Survive the battle, see the war.

  The princess drew a breath, this time not so shaky. “I will come to you.”

  Luca smiled, dimples flashing. “Of that, I have no doubt.”

  She closed the sliver of space between them. Mindful not to apply pressure to his bandaged chest, she drew her arms around Luca’s neck. His lips met hers halfway. Amarande’s eyes closed as she let the rest of her senses record this moment.

  The slip of his hands down the small of her back.

  The beat of his heart, sure and steady to her ear.

  The solid warmth of him bolstered by the spicy scent of the clove oil applied twice daily to the horror slashed across his chest. The damage Prince Taillefer created with tinctures and madness had been sewn up on the ship, but healing had only just begun.

  For a moment, Amarande was back in the foyer of Pyrenee’s glittering Bellringe castle, Renard staring daggers at her as she whispered a very similar good-bye. A different crossroads, that—Luca to confinement under the watch of Taillefer, Amarande to dress for a marriage to Renard she did not want.

  What had come next had not gone well.

  Torture. Apparent death. Revenge in the form of murder and actual, irrevocable death.

  But they’d survived. They were still standing. So was their love.

  And so Amarande whispered nearly the same words she’d said to Luca in that foyer, a plan crafted for success shaping their separation rather than one forged around surrender.

  “I love you. Our time apart will not change that.”

  “I love you, too, Ama. Always, Princess.”

  With that, Amarande kissed Luca one last time—hard. As hard as she wished she had before he was kidnapped. As hard as she did when it was clear they’d escaped Pyrenee alive. As hard as she could—this kiss would have to hold her for days, if not weeks, or months.

  “You can turn around now,” she told the crew, when the kiss was finally done. Amarande met each of them with a parting nod. Ula, a pirate with a gaze as sharp as her Torrentian sword; Urtzi, the big Myrcellian brawler with a soft spot for his fellow pirate; Osana, the Basilican orphan Amarande had accidentally acquired in her escape from the Warlord—and then entrusted with her father’s sword, Egia, twin to the one on her back, Maite. “Keep him safe.”

  At the order, Ula’s gold eyes flashed. “With my life, Princess.” She nodded to her companions. “And theirs, too.”

  Osana and Urtzi didn’t object. Amarande imagined General Koldo, the current regent of Ardenia and leader of the Ardenian army—would relish immediate loyalty so unwavering. That was something that couldn’t be trained into a person.

  Amarande mounted her horse—one stolen from Pyrenee in their escape. She pointed the frost-coated gelding toward the Itspi. The sun was falling toward the jagged mountain horizon, but she’d make it to the castle well before full darkness. The sooner she got there, the sooner she could return to Luca’s side.

  Luca mounted his similarly pilfered steed and drew up alongside her—opposing directions, but still close enough to touch. Amarande’s eyes met his—blue-green on his gold—and her heart lurched, desperate to go with him. Luca seemed to sense this. “As soon
as we connect with the resistance, Ama, we will send word to the Itspi.”

  It was a promise as much as it was a plan.

  Amarande reached out and touched his face—one she knew as well as her own—his skin warm and true under her fingers. “I shall see you soon, my love.”

  CHAPTER 2

  ONCE again, Luca galloped toward the Torrent with three companions. But this time, everything was different.

  First, he was conscious.

  Second, he was willing—untied and on his own horse.

  Third, rather than acting as bait, he was acting as the leader.

  Technically, Ula and Osana led the way as they wound through a particularly steep pass through the summer-dry mountains of Ardenia, but they were less than a mile from where they said good-bye to Amarande before Luca was asked to provide direction.

  “What is the plan, Luca?” shouted Urtzi from behind, where his broad shoulders protected the rear of their single-track procession.

  This was not a question Luca had ever been asked.

  It was true, he maintained the Itspi’s royal stable, but he was nothing more than a wheel on the cart—he was not the driver. Someone who coordinated with others within the castle, most notably old Zuzen, who, beyond being the de facto educator of the palace’s children, oversaw the much larger military stable on the grounds. No one, not even Amarande, had ever seriously looked to Luca for a strategy.

  Luca hesitated. It wasn’t meant to be a test—Urtzi wasn’t the type to lay a trap. He was straightforward, steadfast, and stubbornly loyal when it came to taking orders. As usual, Urtzi was looking for guidance.

  Looking to him—the Otsakumea, the wolf cub, the heir to the throne of the fallen Kingdom of Torrence. The proof was in the wolf tattoo above his heart, a symbol in ink that he was the last of the Otxoa, ruling family for a thousand years of what was now the Torrent. He could hardly believe it, and yet they’d planned it all out on the ship—a way for him to gain both his birthright and Amarande’s hand by joining a pro-Otxoa resistance that had been simmering since the Warlord’s Eradication of the Wolf. If all went well, soon it wouldn’t be just a few friends who looked to him for guidance; it might be an entire kingdom.