The Soulstoy Inheritance (20 page)

Great,
I thought sarcastically, not even intentionally forming the word in my mind as I would have if I were trying to speak it to him. I slumped back against the booth seat and let my hands fall limply into my lap.

Do you know what my push is, Leif?

No, I don’t. When I try to see it, all I get is a mix of darkness, which could mean many things.

It means that two of my abilities are warring for the coveted spot, doesn’t it?

He didn’t answer me in my mind, but made a sound beside me. I thought it might have been a laugh, or a scoff.

Some god really has it in for you, Lady Queen. Which two abilities?

Force, and this…
I answered, pulling aside my hood, to reveal the death mark, stretching in muted black lines across the back of my neck.

I couldn’t see his expression beneath the leather mask, but I could feel him stiffen. I might have laughed, simply at the fact that I had managed to surprise him.

Did you know that Nareon also had the death ability? he
asked.

It should have occurred to me. The only reason mine is so strong is because of his energy, or his power, or whatever it was he was giving me.

His influence.

Yes, that too. He
told me that someone has been trying to break into Hazen’s prisons.

It’s true; my spies have reported the same thing.

Why hasn’t anyone told me about it? I know the whole point of the High Council is so that I won’t have to actually run the kingdom… but it seems like something I should know.

We’ve been trying to get in, but it’s too heavily guarded. I wanted to find out what it was, before I brought it to you.

Nareon told me I should invite Hazen here, so that he has an excuse to halve the number of guards on prison duty to bring a contingent here with him.

Nareon has always had a flair for the dramatics, but in this case, the idea has its merits, and the Winter Festival is coming up in a few months. It’s beneficial to have him here for a number of reasons.

To provide a united front? Nareon mentioned that as well. It can’t be a coincidence that inviting him to the kingdom in time for the Winter Festival is exactly what will allow Nareon to find out about the break-ins. 

He’s told you a lot, considering.

Considering?

Considering that he’s Nareon, Lady Queen.

I sat there mulling this over, watching Teddy from across the room, as he whispered in the ear of one of the waitresses. The woman had shocking white hair, but of course, it didn’t look any worse for her synfee beauty. She laughed and smacked his arm, and he winked at her.

What am I going to do
? I asked Leif,
I can’t bring myself to feed from those… people. It’s not that I’m disgusted by them, I’m just…

You can’t bring yourself to be the cause of their condition. It’s understandable.

What do I do?

Force-users are rare in both kingdoms, but from what I’ve heard, most of them develop a state of connection when they want to use their ability, which they can turn off, is that true of you?

Yes, it’s like a switch in my mind, that I can turn off and on. I developed a sort of muted version of Force when I was little, and that’s how I learnt to control it. When I came into it fully on my eighteenth birthday, it was probably one of the things that stopped me from going totally off the rails.

My advice would be to leave the connection always open. Destroy that switch.

That could be very dangerous.

It could be, but the push can only draw on one ability. If you are constantly using some degree of Force—no matter how small—the death ability will never have an opportunity to leak out. And eventually your Force will become more powerful, and take the ‘coveted spot’ as you put it. Your control will also increase, as you will be constantly aware of it, and—I’d assume—constantly battling it, in the first few months.

He trailed off, giving me some time to digest what he had suggested, and then began talking again, his voice in my mind quietly insistent and soothing despite the grating quality of it.

I won’t pretend that it will be easy. It has the potential to harm you greatly, let alone any person in your near vicinity. But the danger period will eventually pass, your Force will settle in as your push, and your control over it will be adequate enough that you will barely even notice it in constant motion. 

I’ll do it,
I decided.

Of course, Lady Queen
.

I smiled, absurdly pleased by his acceptance of my ultimately suicidal mission, and then—just as I began to rise from the seat—one last complication arrested me.

You said that Nareon killed any man who showed interest in my mother.

I did.

Do you think he would make up something about Harbringer? Something that could cause problems, if it were true?

What kind of problems?

I considered this, chewing my lip.

If Harbringer has lied to me about something serious, it would destroy my trust in him.

I have no doubt that Nareon would be pleased if you sent the Power Thief away, but not at your expense, Lady Queen. If he has warned you about something, I would endeavor to find out what it is as soon as possible. Nareon might be selfish, but I have spent a lot of time in his mind, and to my knowledge, he has always put your needs above his own.

He didn’t do that for my mother, why me?

Perhaps that is exactly why.

Chapter Fourteen

A Therapy of Violence

I spent the next three months split between Red Ridge and the castle. The destroyed lands were slowly coming back to life, and with the constant outpouring of energy, I didn’t once have to fear for my death ability. Flintwood was almost returned to its former woodsy glory, but I had avoided spending time there over the last week, as Sweet—who had been assigned to keep an eye on the place—had reported flesh meat being consumed at quite a high volume. There was still no hint as to where they were acquiring the stuff, and while it wasn’t in the state of poverty that I found it, it would still take time for them to return to their former economy, so Sweet hadn’t yet ruled out the possibility that they could be sacrificing among themselves.

The time I spent at the castle was devoted to training. I quickly found it beneficial to have my body in constant pain and movement, as it helped to control the dark moods that my hunger often pushed me into. I had seen Nareon only twice since his last appearance, and each time he warned me of Harbringer, which had managed to drive my suspicions despite my unwillingness to believe them. Eventually, I couldn’t even train with him anymore, and insisted on going through the daily drills with Grenlow’s men.

When Harbringer finally broached the subject, I told him that I needed someone that I could trust to go with Teddy each day to Ravenport. It wasn’t entirely untrue, as I was beginning to grow frustrated at the lack of progress in finding out who was managing to poison the waterways. Quick and Teddy took turns most nights guarding my door, while Quick shadowed me around during the day whenever I sent Harbringer away. They were the only ones who knew about my late night meetings with Leif, and sometimes Ashen.

My mind was too chaotic anymore for Harbringer to easily decipher my thoughts, so I was mostly afforded privacy. It was the first time I became truly grateful for my decision to forgo feeding. 

“Lady Queen, you’re up,” Grenlow announced, interrupting my thoughts.

I moved into the center of the circle of soldiers and caught Quick’s eye from where he perched on the lower steps of one of the portable wooden spectator stands. He winked, which caused a preparatory grin to spread across my face. Hayden, my current opponent—who was twice my width, and almost as tall—caught the grin and lowered into a crouch, bouncing on the balls of his feet to let me know that he was just as ready as I was.

My first months of training had been pandemonium. With my Force in constant flux, roots sprang from the ground to trip up whomever I fought, and often when I moved toward people, I would intentionally send out blasts of wind to precede my attack. I was better at controlling it all now, as Leif had promised.

I narrowed my eyes, and tuned out the whisperings and occasional jeering of the surrounding soldiers. They often took bets on my fights, and then tried to heckle me into whatever outcome they had predicted. Hayden flew at me, dashing to the side at the last second, and I bent beneath the arm that he threw out, the arm that usually would have snapped my top-half backward, sending me sprawling in the dirt. I spun at the same time as him, and we faced each other again, circling slowly until he made to move again.

I realised that it was a bluff a second too late, and had to alter my pounce into a roll, ducking beneath his arms again as he made a grab for me. This frustrated both of us, and when I jumped up to face him again, he was ready for it. His fist flew toward my face, and I turned, managing to avoid most of the impact. I flung out my arm, continuing to turn and bringing the side of my hand down hard into the juncture of his neck. That alone wouldn’t have done much damage, but it was a good distraction technique, which allowed me to quickly shift my touch toward his jugular notch, jabbing my fingers swiftly into the dip at the base of his neck. He gagged and I jumped back, scrunching up my face, checking to see whether my nose was broken.

“One hit each,” Grenlow announced. “Come on you two, you’re dancing around it again.”

Hayden made the mistake of shifting his attention to Grenlow then, and I dove toward his midsection, unintentionally knocking him off balance with a gust of wind that also caused a stir among the onlookers. I wedged myself beneath his meaty arms and drove him backwards, quickly slipping behind him before he could get a firm grip on me and planting my foot at the base of his spine, giving him a good shove.

I heard a scattering of cheers, and a few appreciative chuckles, and I wondered who I had managed to win money for with that move. Hayden stumbled forward, but managed to steady himself before he fell over, which I observed with begrudged admiration. I gave him a chance to get his bearings again, and then immediately jerked to the side, knowing that he would charge at me. Unfortunately, he had also guessed my dodge, and I felt his shoulder drive into my stomach with a bruising force. This time, when I tried to spin around, he was ready for me, and he threw himself to the side, the momentum sending us both crashing toward the ground. I jerked my elbows up, shaking his hold on me with just enough time to change the direction of the fall, and then I inserted my forearm beneath his chin, and grabbed a hold of his shirt with my other hand, keeping myself anchored until his back slammed against the ground, and my arm pressed too tightly into his windpipe for him to throw me off immediately.

“Three hits. Bea wins again,” announced Grenlow.

I jumped off Hayden, and he grunted, struggling back into a standing position and rubbing his neck.

“I’m sorry,” I offered with a wince. “You don’t have many weak spots.”

He managed a smile. “You’re nose is bleeding, Lady Queen.”

I put a hand to my face, surprised. “Oh, so it is.”

Quick pushed into the circle then, holding a piece of parchment nailed to a board.

“That’s your sixth win for the day, Bea. You’re flying up the ranks.”

“If only Nareon had left me a sword and a helmet instead of a kingdom.” I scoffed.

The men had grown used to my self-depreciating humour now, which had worsened considerably with my dark moods, and I was relieved to hear some of them laugh now. I walked back to the castle with Quick, and we passed through to the back garden, which had been cleared for my crossbow training. With my unpredictable Force outbursts, I had quickly declared myself completely unfit to train with long-ranged weapons in the presence of others. There were a number of barely-visible targets nailed to the trees at various distances from my starting point. Quick wore a wholly unnecessary amount of protective gear, which amused him more than it shielded him, and I wore my usual daily attire: dark tights and plain shirt, with my knife harness strapped across my chest. I shot at the first few targets, with my Force sometimes helping the arrow to fly impressively close to the center circle, and sometimes causing it to go in the complete opposite direction.

After a while, my arm grew sore, and I set the crossbow aside, rubbing my shoulder.

“I think it’s time to go back across the border,” I said, more to myself.

Quick lit up instantly. “Are you preparing for the Winter Festival?”

“What? Oh that, no… although…” I chewed the inside of my cheek—a bad habit that I had gotten into since cutting the synfee energy out of my diet—and thought about my conversation with Leif a few months earlier.

“I suppose I could ask Hazen to attend. It would show us as a unified front.”

Exactly what Nareon wants
.

“And the success of the Winter Festival is always measured by the number of monarchs in attendance.”

“Really?”

“Yeah, Nareon once had every monarch on this side of the sea here in this very kingdom.”

“How many was that?”

He tapped his chin, pretending to think, though I had a feeling he was just being dramatic.

“Five, I believe.”

“Five? Wow.”

“Yes, one of them caused quite a stir. He ruled a motley kingdom of both tainted and human races. The human subjects were oppressed into natural slavery by the stronger races, which, incidentally, were the synfee and ranger sorts.”

“Oh dear. I can’t imagine his meeting with the human king went well.”