Page 97 of The Rebel and the Rose
Despite a slight stiffening in his shoulders, Andreas’s voice was easy, that sureness oozing from every pore in his body. ‘I tell them to fight for the kingdom they want to live in. To claim the world they wish to leave to their children.’
‘Is this version of Valterre really so terrible?’
‘If it wasn’t, would you have founded your Order of Flames?’ he parried.
It was a fair question, and it stumped her. He was right – Valterre, and Fantome in particular, could certainly do with some improvement. But all-out rebellion… these growing rivers of fire and blood, she remained uncertain.
As if sensing that uncertainty, he said, ‘A king who thrives in darkness will never welcome in the light. Even when it’s banging on his windows.’ Reclining in his chair, he gestured to a passing waiter. Two glasses of red wine were set down on thetable in front of them. He offered one to her and Sera took it, if only to keep from wringing her hands, when she said, ‘There is a necromancer in Marvale.’ Andreas didn’t flinch. ‘We had a run-in.’
Of course this came as no surprise to the prince, but his brows twitched, implying the barest hint of frustration. A dent in that easy charm. ‘I’m afraid my necromancer has yet to familiarize himself with the rules of common courtesy.’
‘And graverobbing,’ she was quick to add.
‘It is regrettable that he frightened you.’
‘You speak like he belongs to you,’ she noted, with a slip of unease. ‘Does he?’
Again, that musical chuckle. ‘I only meant that we are of the same making. The same magic.’ He tipped his glass against hers. ‘As you are, Seraphine.’ He drank deeply, the red wine staining his lips. For a fleeting moment, he looked so like his uncle the king, the wine so like the blood that had dripped from those hanging nightguards, that she had to blink the image away.
‘I would ask you this…’ he said, his eyes imploring as leaned towards her. ‘Don’t blame my necromancer for the unpalatable nature of his power. You know as well as I do that we have no control over what kind of magic takes root inside us.’ There was a glimpse of something then – a shadow passing behind his eyes, his hand tightening around the stalk of his glass. ‘It seems that part is left up to the divine.’
She set her wine aside. ‘Isn’t it all left up to the divine?’
He drank again, draining his glass. ‘Indeed,’ he said, setting it down. ‘Indeed.’
She looked at her hands, wondering if now was the time togive voice to her insecurities, to reveal that she knew so little of her own magic she couldn’t name her power if she tried. But something was stopping her. Perhaps it was the loudness of the room, or the dizzying spiral of dancers that seemed to prance like ponies around them.
Increasingly, it seemed to her that there was no room for her in Fontaine’s foretelling. Here was the Silver-tongue sitting before her. Earlier, she had come upon the Necromancer in the graveyard. The Stone Maiden must be the acolyte, Marianne, trapped on the Isle of Alisa. If Sera wasn’t in those cards, then what on earth was she?
And what was the true meaning of the Rose card?
‘You’re troubled.’ Andreas’s words pulled her back to him. He was frowning in earnest now, his fair brows knitting.
‘Confused,’ she allowed. ‘I’m so full of questions; sometimes I can’t sleep from the noise of them bouncing around in my head.’
He smiled in understanding. ‘Stay with me and I will help you answer them. You will find your place here.’
Yes. She wanted to say it, scream it, take him by the shoulders and make him promise it loud enough for the others to hear. But the folk of Marvale were too busy twirling, lost in their own paradise. The atmosphere was so intoxicating, the air thick with sweet-smelling smoke and the light dimmed to whispering candle flames, she almost forgot the world outside it. And everything that had come before this moment:
The trial shipment of Lightfire.
Her brutal kidnapping.
The king’s dungeon.
Bibi’s incarceration.
Bibi.
Bibi.
She could have slapped herself for forgetting, the urgency of the situation making her pitch forward and dig her nails into the armrest that separated them. ‘I want to stay here and learn more about you. About the saints. But I need something from you in return.’
‘Then name your price,’ he said, the gold in his eyes flaring, like his magic was rising to the challenge. ‘I am not letting you go.’
Seraphine was too focused on Bibi to unpick the strange hunger in those words, the sudden sharpness of his teeth under the flickering lights. ‘I’ve heard what happened at the Iron Keep. How you opened the oldest prison in Valterre like a cupboard door and freed five thousand prisoners in one night.’
‘Rebels,’ he corrected her. ‘One man’s prisoner is another man’s war general.’
