Ben rocked forward, so close to the Mecht that if the muzzle was removed, the man would only need to sigh to singe Ben’s face. But Ben reached forward, and before he realized what he’d done, he laid a finger on the Mecht’s scar.
The flames that had burned up Rodrigu and Paxben hadn’t been this hot. This heat was frantic, and Ben launched to his feet, staring at his hand as if he expected it to be on fire.
The Mecht looked up at him, eyes wide with fear.
“They branded you with the liquid,” Ben guessed. But that wouldn’t work with healing plants. He could reduce them to a thick liquid and heat them hot enough to scar, but he had helped study an Eye of the Sun flower—it let off its own natural heat. That was likely what made it brand the skin.
Ben looked back. Jakes had his back to them, still watching the sick man. Hadn’t he seen someone with Shaking Sickness before?
Then Ben remembered—Jakes’s sister and her children had died of it.
The silence from Jakes was more potent suddenly. He was too stricken even to hum that song.
Ben’s limbs flooded with anxiety—they needed to leave.
Ben dropped in front of the Mecht again. “Did they make you drink it? How did you ingest it? You had to have taken it. There has to be more.”
If Ben could make healing plants permanent, like Eye of the Sun was permanent, he could show Argridians that they didn’t need to fear magic. That good could come from it. He could break his country’s dependency on the Church, and Elazar, and—
The Mecht hissed in his own language, an unmistakable curse.
Ben reached behind the man’s head.
Jakes jolted into the cell. “My prince—”
But Ben was already unhooking the muzzle. If the Mecht had ingested the concoction that had burned his chest, he’d have scars in his mouth too.
The muzzle fell. The Mecht’s upper lip curled. “Dumb prince,” he rumbled, and blew out.
Ben jerked to the side—but no fire came, only a long string of smoke. He whirled back to see the Mecht coughing. The man leaned to the side, his chains keeping him from lying flat out, and he hung there with his arms bent behind his back, his whole body shuddering.
Jakes grabbed Ben by the waist and hauled him up, but Ben planted his feet.
“They aren’t feeding him,” Ben stated.
“With good reason,” Jakes said. “The Devil’s grip on him is too strong.”
Ben shrugged Jakes off and grabbed the Mecht’s chin. Those furious blue eyes found his, his anger intensified now that his whole face was free.
Ben lifted the fingers of his free hand. The Mecht’s jaw was warm in his palm, heat spreading into Ben’s body and planting urgency in his gut. Neither of them moved. A spell of shock linked them—Ben, that the Mecht hadn’t shoved him off yet; and the Mecht, maybe that Ben was being so gentle.
Forcing himself out of the spell, Ben parted the Mecht’s chapped lips.
The Mecht jerked away. Jakes mistook the movement for attack and slammed into the raider, who bashed his head against the wall. He cried out, body wilting, but the chains kept him upright, unable to rest, unable to lie down.
Ben had felt the rough flesh on the inside of the Mecht’s mouth, against his teeth.
His lips were scarred.
“Monxe!” Ben shouted.
The monxe appeared, hands clasped against his robes.
“Give this man food and water,” Ben ordered. “Unchain him. We don’t—”
He almost said, We don’t murder people here.
But it was a lie. One he’d helped form, obeying the Church without question, because what could he do to stop them? He’d been part of the problem for years.
He’d been as much a murderer as Elazar.
The Mechts had created a syrup from Eye of the Sun. The exact method of preparation was a mystery, and who knew what they combined the flower with to achieve the desired state? The healing magic would likely be different anyway, another combination of plants. But the information was a start—and with it, Ben would free his country.
Ben marched out of the Mecht’s cell. Jakes followed, waiting until they’d taken the first two steps up the stairwell before he grabbed Ben’s arm.
“Don’t you ever do something like that again,” he barked. “I’m used to you being reckless, but that was a new level of risk that I’m not willing to let you take.”
Ben shoved back. “I’m willing to do what I have to. If you can’t, I’ll find a guard who—”
He stopped, staring, because he never thought he’d say something like this.
Jakes’s face went cold. “Yes, my prince,” he said. “I will not question you again.”
“Jakes—”
“No. I’ll be whoever you need me to be, if it means keeping you safe.”
Ben put his hand on Jakes’s cheek.
“I love you,” Ben told Jakes in the stairwell of Grace Neus Cathedral, with condemned souls below and righteous parishioners above. “When it breached propriety, a prince and his guard; when it went against the pillar of chastity. I loved you. That was always true.”
Jakes linked his fingers around Ben’s wrist. “What—”
But Ben wanted this moment to stay pure when, one day, Jakes would realize that the rest of Argrid was right about him.
Prince Benat is a heretic, they said. He is irredeemable.
Ben started up the stairs, climbing for the light.
17
LU FOLLOWED VEX into the Tuncian refuge. They saw tents of taut animal hide and small cottages of stone or weather-beaten wood—some temporary structures, some permanent.
As they passed children rolling a ball between them, Lu asked, “What do they do here, exactly?” It came as a whisper, weighed down by the dozens of other questions waiting on the cusp of this one.
“If I tell you, you can’t get all Council-righteous on me again,” Vex said.
Lu hesitated, considering if she would, but he took her silence as agreement.
“Fatemah helps anyone with Tuncian lineage,” Vex said. “New immigrants camp out until they can get set up with houses and jobs, and any Tuncians already living on Grace Loray can hide here if they’re being threatened or need a place to stay during a rough time. Which has been a lot, lately.” He motioned to a family, a mother tending her child’s scraped knee outside a tent.
“They’re forced to join Cansu’s syndicate, then,” Lu guessed. “They become criminals.”
Vex’s jaw spasmed. “They aren’t criminals. They’re people.”
“They join the syndicate, though. They steal plants from the Council’s rivers and sell them under Cansu’s banner instead of Grace Loray’s. They have another option! That is what I find so frustrating. They don’t have to be criminals, or—”
“They’re people, Lu.” Vex rounded on her. “Sure, some join Cansu’s syndicate as raiders, but most want a good, honest life, and that’s what Fatemah helps them get. Because as soon as they land here, the Council writes them off—or, worse, targets them.”
Lu shook her head. “Many Tuncians have become Grace Lorayan and aided in the country’s progress. They help build a system that—”
“Yeah, the lucky ones. The ones who have connections, or find someone willing to give a raider or an immigrant a chance. But there’s no system set up to help people actually become Grace Lorayan—you know that, right? The Council won the war and expected people to instantly get jobs and steady lives, and when people couldn’t, they got blamed for their problems. Which is why there are so many raiders—and why they’re all really pissed that the Council took away their source of income and scream at them for not being productive members of society.”
Lu willed an argument to form. There were jobs now—for people who sought them out. There were proper lives—for people who worked to get them. But for those who arrived on Grace Loray’s shores, like that Mecht immigrant ship she’d seen in the market days ago, with nothing but hope? And for those who had b
een in poverty under Argrid’s rule, with no way to change their situations once the Council had taken control?
Whole groups of Grace Loray’s citizens were destined for failure.
The Council dismissed raiders and immigrants alike as creating their own problems. But if the Council wanted their country to function and operate for everyone, they needed to accommodate everyone—and start taking responsibility for everyone as well.
Lu watched herself grab Vex’s arm as if her mind had risen from her body.
“I’m sorry,” she said, fast and aching, as though apologizing to him would mend these wounds. “It should have worked for everyone. I’m sorry.”
Vex’s eyebrows rose. “It’s not your fault,” he said, unsure why she apologized.
It is. “Why did you bring me here if this place exists because of the Council’s shortcomings?” Lu asked.
Vex cut her a grin. He didn’t respond until he stopped outside a shack on the eastern edge of the sanctuary. Smoke floated through a hole in the top, sending out the herbal tang of cooking plants.
“Are you saying I should do a worse job of helping you?” Vex tried for amusement.
Lu didn’t encourage him. “I want to understand this.”
Vex’s smile fell. He leaned toward her, his body pressing close. Lu jolted, but Vex grabbed the door behind her and drew it open, the smirk on his face saying he’d intended to unsettle her, just as she had done to him on the falls.
It worked. Warmth rushed over Lu’s body and her mind went blank, but Vex smiled wider.
“After you.” He beckoned her on. Lu ducked inside with a glare.
The shack could have fit on the deck of the Meander. Rugs of woven dyed leather covered the floor, while drying plant clusters hung from the ceiling, filling the space with the earthy musk Lu had secluded herself in for years.
She felt, for a brief moment, home.
Lu knew magic. Everything else could be in chaos, but she would endure, because she knew that speed-giving Incris negated that bundle of immobilizing Lazonade, and that Awacia countered that Drooping Fern bunch, and—
Cansu rose from the carpets. “We’ll help, but you aren’t needed here.”
Fatemah sat by a small fire in the center of the shack, stirring a pot over the flames. She didn’t pay Lu or Vex any attention, letting Cansu play guard.
“What do you mean, you’re going to help?” Vex asked. “All we need is Fatemah.”
“My syndicate, my plants. I don’t trust that whatever you’re doing won’t hurt my people in some way.”
The way Cansu said my people made Lu’s heart twist with the same discomfort that had been building for hours.
“I can help.” Lu gestured to Fatemah. “I’ve studied every plant on this island. You’re using Budwig, yes? I’m guessing you have beans scattered across the island and have the corresponding beans here. I can listen through some of them—”
Fatemah gave her an incredulous look. She lifted a bean, but when Lu reached for it, she fed it to the pot in front of her. Lu leaned over it, noting the brew, a murky maroon color the same as the bean, with a biting spiced scent that burned her nose.
“You’re dissolving it?” Lu frowned and knelt on the floor. “I thought the beans of the Budwig plant were placed in the ears, allowing people to hear each other over great distances.”
Cansu chuckled. “Did you memorize Botanical Wonders?”
Instinctively Lu reached to her side, where her satchel usually was. But she had left it and her book on the Meander.
Lu had experimented only with the higher concentrations of plants that worked in liquid form. To cook Budwigs, or use any plant in a different state . . .
She sat up taller. “Clearly you have not read it, or you would know that you are wasting rare magic on a preparation that was never outlined in the book.”
“The original settlers of Grace Loray wrote that book more than two centuries ago,” said Fatemah. “What makes you think they knew everything about magic? What makes you believe that you, a Grace Lorayan, too bothered by war and trying to control the world, would know the secrets of this island?”
Lu drew back. “Excuse me?”
Vex sat next to her. “Be nice, Fatemah.”
“You’re wrong,” Cansu said. “What she’s trying to tell you is that you’re wrong. No one in any syndicate knows more about magic than Fatemah.”
A rebuttal rose in Lu’s throat, but she couldn’t let it past her lips.
She was wrong—or had been, with so many of her assumptions about raiders and immigrants, and admitting that much made her queasy.
She steadied on the floor, fingers splayed on the carpet. Was she wrong about botanical magic too? She had made it her purpose after the war to learn as much as she could. It had been all she wanted, to find something that connected her in a pure way to this island. Something safe.
Fatemah looked at Lu through the billowing smoke.
“We are helping you because you are Tuncian, as much as you may have forgotten. Our gods have not forgotten you,” Fatemah said. Lu’s eyes widened. They had recognized her lineage. “And because one of our own has asked it.”
“I’m not doing this for Nayeli,” Cansu muttered. There was a deeper tension in the way Cansu reacted, something different from the familial betrayal Fatemah exuded.
“The knowledge you gain here is yours to do with what you will,” Fatemah said. “But if the Council learns of this place from you, you will die.”
She said it so straightforwardly that Lu had no choice but to bow. “I will use this honorably. You have my word.”
Fatemah nodded, whether in acceptance of Lu’s promise or because she knew the Tuncians would be able to kill her otherwise, Lu couldn’t guess.
“Cansu,” Fatemah said, and sat back on her heels.
Cansu took the spoon from Fatemah and ladled a scoop of the now-syrupy Budwig. She pinned Lu with a heavy stare. “What’s the name of the Argridian?”
“I can do this,” Lu said. “I know you have no love for Argrid, but you don’t need to be involved beyond this. Vex will be the one to bring back Milo and prove that raiders didn’t abduct him. Tell me what to—”
“Don’t think we need you,” Cansu barked. “I’ll get you what information you need, and you’ll leave. This doesn’t change anything between the Council and us. Now tell me who I’m looking for, or I’ll throw you out no matter what Nayeli says.”
Lu gave in. “Milo Ibarra.”
“Where was he last seen?”
“New Deza. The castle.”
Cansu nodded, took a deep breath, and let it out long and loud. Another. On a final inhale, she brought the spoon to her lips and gulped a mouthful of the dissolved Budwig.
Lu rocked toward her as Cansu moaned, the liquid no doubt searing her throat. But Fatemah intervened, batting away Lu’s attempts to help. The motion sent an aroma wafting off her—coconut and spices and a distinct memory of Lu curled up on her mother’s lap.
“She’s done this before,” Fatemah said. “We have Budwigs in many locations around Grace Loray. With these beans dissolved and concentrated, the effects of their counter beans are enhanced. This will allow her to hear through all the Budwig plants at once. It takes a great deal of concentration to focus through the sounds each Budwig picks up—so if you don’t mind.”
Fatemah jerked her head toward the door. Vex was already peeling himself off the rugs.
“Thanks, Fatemah,” he said, taking Lu’s arm. “Let us know when she hears something.”
Vex dragged Lu out of the shack and grinned.
“You’re welcome,” he declared, hands out as if he might bow. “I told you I’d help.”
“Cansu—she can hear through every Budwig they’ve placed on the island?” Can she listen for news from New Deza? was what Lu wanted to ask. She had managed not to let herself linger on the horrors her parents might be dealing with—the furious Argridians who would be demanding justice for Milo and punishm
ent for the escaped Devereux Bell; searching for Milo, both through the Council and her parents’ loyal spies; and dragging out treaty negotiations.
Though it appeared that delaying the treaty finalization and Milo’s bill of eliminating stream raiders was not preventing soldiers from taking steps against raiders already.
Kari, at least, would be as overwhelmed by this sanctuary as Lu. She would feel the familiarity. The connection. The guilt.
Lu became painfully aware of the heat in her eyes.
“I didn’t know about any of this,” she murmured.
Vex shrugged. “Don’t be too hard on yourself.”
“Oh, no, I quite deserve this guilt. What I can’t figure out is why you feel none. Have you helped them? Why have you done nothing? If you knew how lacking the Council was in helping immigrants and raiders, why not rally to change things?”
Vex gaped at her, his face dropping muscle by muscle into a resolute stare. “This isn’t my fight,” he stated. “And I have tried, so don’t act like I’m some monster. I’d do anything they asked of me, but all they’ve asked is that I keep this place and what they do here a secret so the Council doesn’t mess it up.”
Lu opened her mouth.
For five years, her passionate belief in Grace Loray’s Council had been her guiding light. But the Council was so much less effective than she had believed, and she was powerless to change it. One mention of this secret lair, and soldiers would swarm in to dismantle it—before or after the Council put measures in place to compensate for the help Fatemah offered here?
Lu knew the answer. Immigrants? Hiding away here? They’re raiders! Arrest them!
And the things Fatemah did with the Budwig Beans. What other knowledge of plants did she have? How much would people pay for her secrets? What could be accomplished—what diseases could be cured?
Lu all but dropped to her knees right there.
Had the cure for Shaking Sickness been within Lu’s grasp the whole time? If she had broken down plants, liquefied them even though it was never mentioned in Botanical Wonders of the Grace Loray Colony, could she have saved Annalisa? Could she have even saved Annalisa and Teo’s mother, Bianca, two years ago?