Bloodleaf (Bloodleaf 1)

“Your father is a liar and a traitor. You can’t believe anything he has told you. Did you think that all of this was just some big charade? That you’d come here, strut around with my name, just for . . . what? To catch me in some treasonous act? Prove my disloyalty? No, he brought you here to marry the prince, Lisette. So that you both could be married, and then murdered, and bring down the wall with your deaths. That’s what all of this is about. Everything. Toris de Lena will not stop until he’s destroyed Achlev’s wall, and the city with it.”

“No, no—?he would never! Why would he want that for me? I’m his daughter! Why not just let you marry the prince and then kill you instead?”

I took a step back. “Because I saw through him.” He’d said as much in the Ebonwilde, when I’d tried to negotiate for Conrad. Unlike you, he’s proven himself valuably malleable. “He didn’t want to use me because he couldn’t intimidate me. He couldn’t control me.” I’d never thought of it that way before. Toris removed me from his plans not because I was weak but because I was too strong to be controlled.

“And I’m a fool, is that it?”

“No,” I said. “It’s just as you said . . . you’re his daughter. He was counting on your love for him to overcome any of your doubts. And can’t you see? It worked.”

She sniffed and turned her back on me. “He wasn’t always like this, you know. When I was very little, he was affectionate, loving . . .”

“But the loss of your mother changed him. I know.” I hated mentioning Camilla; I didn’t want to remind Lisette whose fault her death was in the first place.

“What? No. They fought constantly before she died. She always said it was what he saw at the Assembly that changed him. He was there when it fell. He was the one who relayed the news back to Renalt.”

“What was he there for, Lisette?” I asked urgently. “What did he see? What did he find?”

“I don’t know!” she cried.

I placed a tentative hand on her shoulder. “I know you love Conrad. In many ways, you’re a better sister to him than I ever was. Ever could be. Thank you, truly. But look around you. The king of Achleva is dead! The water is red with algae and dangerous to drink. Anything green in the city has rotted away. Something terrible is about to happen, and I must get Conrad away from it as soon as I can.”

“All of this”—?she waved her hand at the dead terrace garden and the crimson fjord—?“is because of the wall? And for the wall to fall . . .”

It begins with three dead white ponies,

then a maid, a mother, a crone.

Then upon a bed of red rosies,

Bleed three fallen kings to leave three empty thrones . . .

“Three of Achlevan royalty will die.”

“King Domhnall, me, and . . .”

“Valentin,” I said, swallowing hard. “The prince.”

She took a step back. His name had unnerved her.

“You can judge me for going along with this, for taking your place, but”—?she gave a helpless shrug—?“I love him, Aurelia. I’ve loved him since I was a little girl, reading his letters. I kept writing to him, too. I paid one of the castle messengers to deliver the letters to me instead of you. After my mother died, they were the only thing that kept me going.” She dashed some tears from her eyes, sniffling. “I know it’s stupid. It couldn’t last forever, I knew that. But ever since we got here, he’s hardly spoken to me. And . . . and . . .”

I surprised myself and hugged her. Maybe it was Kate’s influence. Maybe it was that our long-lost friendship wasn’t so lost after all. Maybe it was because I knew what it was like to love Zan and have to let him go. She returned my hug softly, almost shyly.

“I’m leaving today,” I told her. “I want you and Conrad to come with me. We can all go back to Renalt and face the Tribunal together. Since the Tribunal is orchestrating the destruction of the wall, once the Tribunal is gone, Zan—?I mean, Valentin—?will have nothing more to fear.” I took down the black ribbon and gave it to her. “Give this to Conrad. He knows what it means.”

She took it cautiously. “Do you know where he is now?” she asked. “Valentin?”

“Gone into exile,” I said. “Safe, far away from the wall.”

Even as I said it, from a distance there came the chime of a bell.

* * *

I remembered what Zan had said: The bell at the gate tolls for only two reasons: an army is approaching, or there’s royalty coming.

Lisette and I went together, shoving our way to the front of the angry crowd as three riders from the king’s guard made their way sedately up the street from the gate. A man was stumbling behind them, tethered by ropes wrapped thickly around his wrists. Zan.

“They caught him!” someone near me shouted, celebrating. Behind me, epithets were being thrown in his direction. King killer. Murderer. Betrayer. Destroyer.