Simon stormed over. “Good, you’ve met.” He took the girl by the arm and moved toward the door. “This way.”
Eliana sheathed Arabeth and followed them.
“My name is Navi,” the girl said, smiling back at Eliana as Simon hurried her out of the room.
But Eliana did not reply, for when she glanced back at the open windows of the bathing room, she saw a figure drop down from the roof to land on the terrace outside.
Tall and thin, with creamy, pale skin and fair hair tied back in one long braid, dressed all in black save for a bloodred dress cloak that swept the ground:
Rahzavel.
11
Rielle
“Of Aryava’s prophecy, there are many interpretations. Some dismiss his dying words as the nonsense ramblings of a great angelic mind gone to ruin. But all scholars do agree on this: despite the war dividing their people, the blood of both humans and angels that stained their hands, the angel Aryava loved Saint Katell the sunspinner—and that love saved us all.”
—“A Discourse on the Prophecy of Aryava”
As translated by Grand Magister Isabeau Bazinet of the Holdfast
Transcribed on October 6, Year 12 of the Second Age
After two hours, the king declared a recess, and Rielle’s guards escorted her into one of the hall’s antechambers.
She sank into the first chair she saw, so tired she felt ill. The councils had attacked her with questions—what it felt like to manipulate so many elements at once, and all with the same body. If singing the wind felt different than controlling fire or shaking the earth, or was it all the same to her?
What sort of lessons had Tal given her over the years?
Oh, he had tried to kill her, on occasion, to test her restraint?
How had he done that, and how many times?
How had she fought the instinctive desire to save herself? What a marvelous testament to her control. And where, they asked, had that control been, out on the racecourse?
They had let her sit for at least some of the questioning, but she still felt as exhausted as if she had ridden the entire Chase all over again. Twice.
Just as her eyes started drifting shut, the doors flew open, and Audric entered the room.
“Leave us,” he told the guards.
The guards did not move. There was a beat of silence in which everything hung suspended.
“I think if Lady Rielle wanted to kill me,” Audric snapped, “she would have done it years ago. Leave us.”
The guards left at once.
Rielle was now entirely awake. She stood, her heart thundering. Where to even begin with him?
“Audric,” she said, her voice coming out frayed, “I’m sorry I didn’t tell you.”
“I understand why you didn’t. God, Rielle, I… Please, don’t apologize. Are you all right?”
She let out a soft huff of laughter. “Not entirely.”
Audric came to her, cradled her hands in his. His thumb brushed against her wrist like a kiss. “I cannot forgive them for doing this to you.”
Every gentle press of his fingers made Rielle’s stomach twist. “Father and Tal?”
“They should be ashamed of their cowardice.”
“Well, I’m sure Tal is, anyway.”
“Good.”
“They thought they were doing what was best.”
Audric frowned. “For the kingdom.”
“Of course.”
“And for you?”
She hesitated. How many times had she asked this question of her father, only to be shamed into silence? “My happiness is unimportant compared to the safety of those around me.”
“Unimportant!” Audric released her, dragging a hand through his dark curls. “That’s what they’ve been telling you all these years.”
Suddenly the air around them felt charged; Rielle’s fingers prickled from the nearness of magic. The air bloomed with heat. Rielle caught the slightly singed scent of sunspinner magic—a blazing noon sky, a hot summer’s day. Audric’s eyes snapped to hers before he turned away, his shoulders high and tense. He moved to the window, placed his palm against the sun-warmed glass.
When he looked back to her, his face was not quite so furious, and the air had calmed.
“Your happiness is important, Rielle,” he said softly. “And I’m sorry I didn’t see what was happening this entire time, right before my eyes. If I’d known, I would never have let them…”
He trailed off, his jaw clenched. She wanted so badly to touch him.
“I know,” she told him instead.
“You were marvelous out there, during the race. I’ve never seen that kind of power. Rielle, it was beautiful.”