The Opal Crown (14 page)

“Think about what you know of our kingdom, of the Andewyns and our history. Ask yourself what would be done if another set of twins were ever born to the reigning king and queen of Galandria.”

Patric’s eyes stray to the mask at my feet. When he glances up, they’re filled with horror. “For the love of Eleanor.”

Echoing footsteps sound down the corridor, and the three of us turn.

“We have been gone too long,” Patric says. “The other guards will have noticed your absence.”

I turn to Elara. “At the back of the last room, you’ll find a wall covered by a tapestry of the Opal Mountains. Behind it, three feet up from the right corner, is an opal. Do you understand what I am saying?” Elara blinks and nods slowly, as though she is clearing cobwebs from her mind.

“Good. Press on it and—”

“Wilha,” Patric says, “don’t tell her about the—”

“She already knows!” I turn back to Elara. “Open the passageway and follow it all the way to the end. It’s a direct route that will take you past the armory and the Queen’s Library and will—”

“The Queen’s Library?” Elara interrupts. “You mean this isn’t the only library in the palace?”

“There are many collections of books in the palace. I’d be happy to give you a tour the
next time
you decide to make a fool of yourself and sneak in here, but as I said, the passageway is a direct route and will let out in a cottage behind the palace where our landscapers store their tools. You’ll have to circle around to the front, and it shouldn’t be a problem for you to exit through the gates. The guards are much more concerned about who wants in, rather than who is leaving.” I point to a nearby candelabrum. “Go now, and take a candle with you.”

Elara quietly ties on her mask. As usual, her eyes are unreadable. “Thank you,” she says, and leaves.

“Are you certain that was wise?” Patric says. “Are you certain she is not a threat to you?”

I toss Patric’s sword onto the ground, and pick up my mask and retie it just in time. “Your Highness?” one of my guards calls out.

“The only thing I am certain of,” I tell Patric, “is that right now I would like to be alone.”

Chapter 26

Elara

A
s I inch along the tunnel, the dim light from my candle bouncing off the stone walls, the same thought goes through my head: Wilha spared me. When she had the opportunity to turn me over to the guards—something that might have earned her favor, at a time when it sounds like she could desperately use some—she chose to let me go.

If I had been in her position, would I have done the same thing?

Who am I kidding? I
was
in her position—and I handed her right over to Lord Royce, and in turn, to Andrei and Lord Murcendor.

I watched her calm resolve as she raised her blade. I have no doubt she would have attempted to fight Patric while I escaped. She is stronger than I have ever given her credit for. But I am a wretched fool. Did I really think it would be so easy, that I would simply sail into the library and find the book?

The walls of the tunnel are smooth and I run my hand
along the stone, hoping my fingertips will brush an embed
ded opal. Is it possible, that just on the other side where I stand is the Queen’s Library? Wilha said the tunnel was a direct route to the garden. Does that mean there are no other entrances into the palace from here?

I spend hours holding my candle up and kneading the walls. Candle wax drips down my hand, burning my flesh, but it’s nothing compared to the burning in my own heart. If my mother had any last words
for me—even if it’s just the name I’ve always hoped to find—I want it like I have never wanted anything else.

But the walls won’t yield to my prodding, and soon the tunnel slopes downward, before dead-ending abruptly at a stone staircase. Cautiously, I hike up my skirts, which have become dirtied from crouching down examining the walls, and make the short climb up to what appears to be a wooden door. There’s an embedded opal winking in the candlelight, but next to it, a handhold. I grasp it and shove at the door. Loud, clattering
thunks
immediately sound on the other side of the door. I pull back, gripping the handhold, prepared to shut the passage and flee back into the tunnel at the first sound of someone disturbed by the racket.

After several minutes of silence, I push open the door and slip from the tunnel. As Wilha said, I’m in a cottage filled with gardening tools. Wooden shelves are attached to the wall I dislodged—the commotion I heard was the sound of tools falling from the shelves. Quickly, I blow out my candle and dispose of it, then exit the cottage. The palace grounds are shadowed in the moonless night, and smell of lavender and hyacinth.

By the time I’ve circled around to the front, carriages have begun leaving the palace. The guards at the golden gates are busy holding back a group of townspeople, most of them clearly drunk, who’ve gathered outside the gates, demanding an audience with Andrei. They take one look at my dusty appearance and quickly wave me through the gates.

I creep away from Eleanor Square, slinking from shadow to shadow and doing my best to avoid anyone who still roams the streets. A candle burns in Alinda’s window. Lord Royce, who looks swelled with more than a small amount of outrage, meets me at the door.

“I’ll do it,” I say, cutting him off before he can speak. “I’ll agree to everything you ask—on one condition.”

Lord Royce’s lips thin. “And that is?”

“Get Wilha out of the palace. Before we move against Andrei, I want her removed. I don’t want her to suffer for our choices. I refuse to leave my sister behind again, and I can only imagine what Andrei’s reaction will be when he hears of our plans.”

I will not spend the rest of my life in hiding; nor will I flee. Tonight, I slunk away from my late parents’ home like unwanted riffraff. Never again.

The next time I return to the Opal Palace, it will be to take the crown.

Chapter 27

Andrei

A
ndrei Andewyn sits on his throne in the Grand Ballroom. Masked couples twirl before him, yet the new king is bored. It’s another night, another party.

Is this what it means to be a king . . . and a man? To preside over another meaningless event? To lend his signature to decrees he does not write, and to accept responsibility for punishments he does not order?

Though in truth, he is not yet a man. The length of time stretching between now and the day he comes of age—the day he can begin ruling in his own right—fills him with unease, though he cannot say why.

The music plays, the wine flows, and the masquerade carries on.

The new king signals to his steward. “I should like to retire early.”

“Your Highness,” the man replies, “Lord Murcendor says you must stay until at least midnight.”

Andrei bites back the temptation to vent his temper upon the poor man.
He
is king.
He
wears the crown. His wishes will not be countered by a lowly servant.

Although he scarcely realizes it, the new king is slowly stumbling upon a new appreciation for the power of words.

Specifically, three little ones:
Lord Murcendor says . . .

Andrei searches the room. Near the orchestra, Wilhamina chats politely to a noble couple. Her dress and mask clearly stand out, even among this glittering crowd. As his loneliness has grown, the new king has watched his sister more closely these last few weeks. She does not seem to be the monster that haunted his nightmares as a child. She does, in fact, seem quite friendly.

And for the first time, the new king acknowledges that he may be in need of a friend. Andrei decides he shall seek her out; he shall try to know this sister of his. It is upon this happy thought that he retires for the evening.

But he does, of course, wait until after midnight.

Chapter 28

Wilha

A
fter Elara’s flight from the palace, I am careful. I pay Andrei much deference, and never mention the food shortages, nor the discontent I hear is growing in the city. The Guardian Council brings me word that the betrothal between me and Stefan Strassburg has been formally broken, and that a new treaty will soon be negotiated between the two kingdoms. Soon the whispers of the servants take on a
familiar tone:
I bet the crown prince of Kyrenica decided he did
n’t want her after all. Perhaps she really is cursed. . . .

I bear it silently, for I would rather they revert to rumors of the past than speak of a future with me on the throne. I hope Andrei hears these rumors and that they cool whatever jealousy may be growing in his heart.

My diligence pays off when Andrei himself visits my chambers and invites me to join him at an outdoor luncheon he has planned for members of the court the next day.

“It would have been Father’s birthday tomorrow,” he says. “I thought we should spend it together.” His haughty manner drops, and in that moment, I do not see a jealous king, but an orphaned boy.

The luncheon is held in a large gazebo surrounded by tulips. It is attended by ladies dripping with sparkling jewels and men dressed in riding gear, many of whom participated in a hunt earlier in the morning. Andrei and Lord Murcendor take their places at either end of the long table. Andrei asks me to sit next to him. A lunch of herbed quiche, apple tarts, and ripe fruit is served, and the air hums with murmured conversation, clinking silverware, and the giddy laughter of a young court.

“How go the plans for your coronation?” I ask Andrei.

“Lord Murcendor is taking care of all the plans.” He frowns. “Lord Murcendor takes care of a lot of things.”

Do I detect signs of discontent in his eyes?

“Yes, he does,” I say softly. “It seems to be a talent of his.”

Andrei falls silent, glancing thoughtfully across the table at Lord Murcendor as he eats. To my right sits a couple too deeply entranced with each other to pay me any mind, and I resist the urge to steal a glance at Patric, who stands behind me along with the rest of my guards.

Patric and I have not spoken of Elara since the night she left the palace. I am certain he will keep her existence a secret, though I am less certain Elara will not do something foolish. She is hiding in the city somewhere, but where? I still believe Lord Royce knows where she is. Yesterday at court I saw him speaking with Patric, and I wonder now if I could find a way to get a message to her.

Yet what good will a message do while she’s still in hiding? I glance again at Andrei—the food and the sunlight streaming into the gazebo seemed to have cheered him—and wonder if there’s a way to talk him into calling off the search, or, even better, welcoming Elara back to the palace as our sister?

I lean over to Andrei and whisper, “Do you still have guards searching for Elara?”

“Yes,” he says quietly through a mouthful of bread. “Though it’s difficult to find one girl in a crowded city when half the population cover their faces.”

“And if your men find her? What will you do with her?”

“What
can
I do with her? Lord Murcendor says she’s a traitor.”

“She is not a
traitor
, Andrei. She is our sister.”

“And is she as bitter as he says she is?” He seems genuinely curious.

“No more or less so than you or I would be in her place. Can you imagine discovering that the people who should have loved you most in this world deliberately betrayed you?”

“No, I cannot.” Andrei sips his goblet. “Is it true she wishes me dead?”

“Of course not! In Korynth she asked me about you often. I think she truly wants to
know you—or she did, before you decided to have her brought back to Allegria as your prisoner.”

Andrei sets his goblet down deliberately. “But Wilha . . . I never gave such an order.” He steals a look around the table before turning back to me. “I know Lord Murcendor told Lord Royce that I did, but it was just too much. Elara’s existence, Father’s death—I wasn’t capable of issuing
any
orders. Then one day Lord Murcendor came to me and said that Lord Royce had been dispatched to Kyrenica.”

I lean forward. “Andrei, are you telling me Lord
Murcendor issues orders without consulting you?”