The Queen Underneath Read online

  He shook his head. Gemma was impressed that he hadn’t balked at her little display.

  “If it’s going to cause him pain, then let it be me.” He drew a dagger from his waist and tested the blade along his thumb. “Thank you, though.”

  When his eyes met hers, she ignored his tears. She’d let him have his silly Above masculinity.

  She put her knees atop Tollan’s shoulders in an awkward position, the king’s head cupped between her thighs. But by putting her weight on his shoulders she could keep his upper body mostly immobile, despite the muscle tremors that continued to rack his frame.

  Wince sat astride Tollan’s ass, holding his lower half still. “How deep, do you think?” he asked.

  “I don’t know. A quarter of an inch, maybe? Not so deep that you cut through muscle but all the way through the mark.”

  He nodded, holding his blade over the center of Tollan’s back. “I’m going to cut through the middle of this line, here,” he said, gesturing with the tip of his blade, “and then maybe cut through the outside circle, just in case.”

  She nodded, trying to reassure him.

  His breath gushed out of him, and then, not wasting any more time, he sliced through the center of the mark.

  Tollan’s skin separated and Gemma felt the tingling that accompanied mage work, but instead of blood seeping from the broken skin, light erupted.

  The last thing Gemma remembered was the floor shaking beneath her.

  There was pain, somewhere distant. There was warmth and light and something was tugging at his mind, but Tollan clung to the darkness, to the freedom of dreams that kept him afloat.

  Waves tipped the ship gently as a light breeze tugged at Tollan’s hair. He closed his eyes to the bright sun reflecting off the Hadriak Sea. He was alone in the place that made him happiest—on the deck of a ship. Free from the politics and pressures of home. Free to think thoughts that back home were forbidden and shameful. He stood straighter here on the boat, relieved of the usual weight on his shoulders.

  Footsteps approached, and he opened his eyes. The captain was older than he remembered—wisps of silver touched her temples and made the black of her hair stand out all the more. She wore a cheaply carved talisman on a leather thong near her heart.

  “Mother,” he whispered.

  “Get to work on those lines, sailor,” she groused as she moved past him, checking knots and shouting orders to the men and women who bustled about the ship.

  The salt air turned to ash in his lungs. She’d forgotten her own son. He meant nothing to Isbit Daghan, former Queen of Above and wife of Abram, his father.

  The weight of stone and water pressed upon him, and he clawed for the surface. Dream turned to memory.

  The seas began to heave. A man was in the water clinging to a piece of flotsam. He wore a carved wooden talisman at his neck, like the one Isbit wore. Deep in the corners of his mind, Tollan felt the overwhelming urge to let him drown.

  There was pain. A fire in his chest. The blackness pulled him back under.

  Time passed and the sailor woke. Tollan steeled himself to the pounding in his chest. He was nearly a man, and he was brave enough to speak to the sailor who watched Tollan’s mother with a gaze that made Tollan’s belly twist. He stood tall and announced in a quavering voice, “I am Tollan.” He took a step forward and held out his hand in formal greeting. “Crown Prince of Yigris and heir to the throne. Son of Abram Daghan and Isbit, his wife.” His chest swelled at his official-sounding introduction. He almost wished his father could have seen him.

  The sailor’s eyes darted back toward Tollan’s mother who slept in a chair, unwilling to leave the nearly drowned sailor’s side, then back to Tollan. “Are you really?” he asked. He sniffed, ran a hand over his forehead and through his greasy hair, then stuck out his hand to accept Tollan’s. “It’s good to meet you, Prince Tollan. I’m Jamis. Captain of the now defunct Siren’s Call and the luckiest man in the Four Winds.”

  Tollan nodded. “I’m sorry about your ship.”

  Again, the sailor’s gaze flicked to Tollan’s mother, then back again. “Well, Your Highness. That makes one of us.”

  Then the waves tossed and turned again, time passed and Tollan stood before his father’s desk. His hands grew clammy with fear as he clutched the letter that his mother had written. Her goodbye echoing in his ears so loudly that he couldn’t understand why the king didn’t look up.

  “You’re back, then?” King Abram grumbled, his gaze never rising from the papers before him.

  “Mother sent this.” Tollan pushed the envelope across the desk and fled.

  Tollan could still hear the crystal shattering within his father’s rooms. He was falling. He could no longer be sure if he even had a body. Memories and dreams tangled him, the lines snapped at him, dragging him under. He gasped for air and found nothing but salt and storm.

  He was back on the Hadriak. The sky was black as pitch, and the ship began to come apart on the wind. Bits of wood and crimson sail, hemp rope and tar, flaked off into the air around him. The once grand sloop disappeared, and in its place was the throne room of the Yigrisian Palace.

  Tollan sat on the throne, his hands and feet manacled to it with gold chains. Beside him sat his brother, also bound. Iven looked back at him with their mother’s eyes.

  CHAPTER SEVEN

  UNDER

  Tollan opened his eyes. The ground trembled beneath him, and for an instant he prayed for death. He didn’t know where he was. The flame of a candle fluttered nearby, casting eerie shadows. He rolled over and saw a large chunk of stone crash to the ground just a few feet away. The roots of some sort of plant pushed their way into the tunnel and continued to grow, winding along the ceiling and then down the wall like a vine. In the distance, Tollan could hear more stones falling. “Aegos!” he shouted, leaping to his feet.

  He remembered. He was in Under—wearing pants and boots that were not his own. He picked up the candle and searched his surroundings for something familiar. “Aw, prick,” he snapped and dove toward the prone figure of Wince, who was sprawled on the floor nearby, a knife clutched in his hand.

  “Wince, wake up!” he shouted, slapping his friend’s face and shaking him. “Come on, mate.”

  The cavern continued to tremble and shake, and a fist-size piece of stone fell from the ceiling and smashed to bits a foot from Wince’s head. Tendrils of thorny branches unfurled all around them.

  “Come on, Wince, you mother-prickling half-wit!” He slapped his friend as hard as he could and prayed to Aegos.

  Wince’s eyes flew open. “What? Oh, shit. Shit!” He scrambled to his feet. “Toll? Oh, goddess. Tollan, is that you?”

  Tollan grabbed hold of Wince’s face. “It’s me. What’s wrong with you?”

  “I can’t see, Toll, I-” Another tremor shook the cavern and Wince screamed. “What is happening? What is that sound?”

  “I don’t know,” he said, grabbing his friend by the arm, “but we’ve got to get out of here.”

  “Right. All right.” Wince took a step and stumbled over a small pile of stones. “I’m … all right,” he said, trying to regain his footing. “Where’s Gemma? Gemma?” he called out.

  Tollan finally spotted her twenty feet away, crumpled awkwardly against the wall.

  “Gemma,” Tollan said, bending down to help her up. Her eyes were glassy and her pupils were very large. A stream of blood ran down her forehead. “We’ve got to get out of here. The tunnel’s coming down.”

  He held his hand out to her, but she waved him off and in an instant she was on her feet. “I’m all right,” she said, though she wavered a little. She thrust her chin toward Wince. “What’s wrong with him?”

  “He can’t see,” Tollan said, taking Wince’s arm. “I don’t know what happened.”

  “I do,” she said, running fingers along her scalp. She grimaced as they came away crimson. “Ugh. Head injuries bleed like a virgin.” She wiped her fingers on her breeches. “Winc
e, close your eyes, press the heels of your palms against your lids and count to ten. It’ll help.”

  Wince followed her instructions.

  “And for goddess’ sake,” she said, reaching for her satchel, “take a deep breath. We’re going to be all right.” She groaned as she bent to pick up her pack but waved Tollan off when he tried to help her.

  She took Tollan by the shoulders, turned him around and looked at his back. “Huh. Worked better than I thought it would. Nice work, Wince. You can put your shirt back on, Your Grace.” She patted Tollan’s shoulder and said, “We’ve got to get out of these tunnels before they come down around our ears.” By the time Wince removed his hands from his eyes, she was grinning.

  “What’s going on, Gemma?” Tollan asked, though he followed her advice and picked up the shirt that lay discarded on the tunnel floor.

  “How’s that?” She asked, taking Wince by the hand.

  Irritation flared within Tollan at the way that Gemma ignored his question.

  “Maybe a little better,” Wince said. “I can see some shapes, now.”

  Another tremor shook the tunnel, and small bits of rubble peppered the floor around them.

  “Good—it was just a flashbang. Things will be fuzzy for a while, but no permanent damage. We don’t have time to waste, though. Follow me.”

  Gemma took the candle from Tollan, and he followed the bobbing, flickering flame. Wince held tightly to Tollan’s elbow. The tunnel was dusty, and occasionally, a plant root twisted and writhed through the tunnel ceiling or wall, lending a greater sense of urgency to their already fast pace. Tollan trembled as he walked, sure that the earth was going to crumble in on them and his final moments would be choked with stone and blood.

  “Where are we …” Tollan croaked. He cleared his throat and tried again. “Where are we going, Gemma? And what are those plants?”

  She stopped and stared at him in exasperation. “We’re going to Canticle Center,” she said. Somehow, her breath was not uneven despite the rapid pace they’d set. “And I have no idea what those plants are or where they’re coming from, but this whole tunnel reeks of magic. Do you have any other questions that are more important than getting out of here before there’s a cave-in?”

  CHAPTER EIGHT

  CANTICLE CENTER

  Before long, Tollan found himself being led into a hallway that ended abruptly. Gemma stopped and ran her fingertips along the wall then turned and said, “We’re here,” gesturing to the blank wall behind her. “Try to keep your heads down. The first part is a bit of a gauntlet. When we find Brother Elam, it’ll get better. We’ll talk inside,” she said, and she pressed her hand against Tollan’s arm for an instant. She blew out the candle.

  He tried to watch what she did in the dim light, but her hands slid rapidly into hidden cracks and crevices, and before he knew it, a wide section of the wall was sliding aside. She waved them in after her, and they stepped into a small, poorly lit storage room.

  Gemma pressed her body against Tollan’s and his back pushed to Wince’s front as she flipped the invisible switch that slid the stone panel closed behind them. “Hello there,” she whispered breathily.

  He wished in that moment he could say something witty—something smart and funny and a little crude. Something that Wince would say. Instead, he stared at her, tongue-tied, trying to ignore his unease. A lifetime as royalty apparently gave one very little to go on in the jesting-when-bodies-are-pressed-together department. Instead, he averted his gaze and blushed.

  He tried to make sense of what had happened in the Under, but the last thing he remembered before waking up in the tunnel was Gemma very inelegantly spitting on his …

  “Prick me,” he mumbled.

  “Come on.” She laughed as she flung open the pantry door and strode up a set of stairs into Canticle Center as if she owned the place.

  They wove in and out of corridors, passing statues of Aegos in all her forms. The goddess never slept, but it seemed that her temple did. Tollan had never been in this section of the church, but given the serene décor and the silent nature of the rooms they passed, he assumed they were in an area of the temple known as the Head.

  Just like Yigris, the goddess Aegos had an Above and an Under. Aegos wore two faces—the mindful, peaceful mother, cerebral and beneficent; and the vital, sanguine lover and warrior, carnal and fierce. The Head was where the prayer keepers meditated, prayed and sought the goddess’s wisdom and light. The main, public, temple was called the Heart—where the people of Yigris came to seek the enlightenment of Aegos, as well as the blessings of the prayer keepers. There was also a hospit within the Heart, and a school for the children of the craftsmen and shopkeepers of Merchant Row and Brighthold.

  Soon, Tollan began to recognize areas of the Heart. Though the royal family had a private temple within the palace, some public ceremonies required their attendance at Canticle Center. His memory conjured images of the singing, dancing and stories that had inspired faith in him as a lad, the air heavy with incense, and his father’s boredom. He was struck by a memory of his mother swaying to the sensual music—her face alight with a joy he rarely saw. A powerful sense of familiarity surged within him. This was the place where he belonged, he controlled. This was the place where things were as they should be, a part of his history, not a part of his city that he’d never even entered before.

  They passed through the large ceremonial hall, silent and empty of inhabitants, and moved down a corridor that branched off into private worship rooms. Gemma led them down the hallway through empty schoolrooms and past the stretch of pallets and cots filled with sleeping patrons of the hospit, where the sick and injured of Yigris came for healing. They passed below an archway painted bright red, then took a long set of stairs down into a distinctly separate section of the temple that consisted of dozens of small offices.

  People bustled around as if it were broad daylight. Men and women sat at long nondescript tables laden with coins of all denominations, counting and tallying.

  “Gentlemen,” Gemma said, grinning over her shoulder, “welcome to the Slit.”

  Gemma watched with glee as Tollan’s eyes grew round in his face. She knew she shouldn’t enjoy tormenting the young monarch quite so much, but the extent of his innocence was something that she had never in her eighteen years encountered. She thought he was probably only a year younger than she, but she’d bet a week’s honeycakes that he was still a virgin. And so it was with no small amount of pleasure that she led Tollan and Wince into the depths of the church, where the prayer keepers not only maintained the largest bank in all of Yigris and trained an elite military unit—the Ain—but they also maintained an exclusive society of the most exotic sex worker priests in the Four Winds, the Dalinn.

  Wince drew in a breath beside her. “Praise Aegos.”

  Tollan squared his shoulders and held his neck straight. He sighed. “Lead the way, Gemma.”

  Chuckling and shaking her head at the strange, dogmatic behavior of the Above, she strode down the hallway. A graying prayer keeper approached them. “Is there some assistance I can offer you?” he asked, gaze turned down and hands clasped before him, covered by the wide sleeves of his brown robes.

  Gemma leaned in close to the man’s ear and whispered, “I am Gemma Antos, the Queen of Under, and I come as head of the Guild.” The prayer keeper’s eyes darted to her face, then away again. Then she raised her voice. “I need Brother Elam,” she said.

  “Of course, Regency. I live to serve.”

  They followed the gray-haired prayer keeper into the depths of the Slit. If Tollan was nervous now, she could hardly wait to see how he would respond to Elam—a member of the legendary Dalinn. If their behavior tonight had told her anything about Wince and the king, she’d bet they’d laid awake plenty of nights fantasizing about the pleasures of the fabled Slit.

  The hallways grew narrower and more dimly lit as they moved deeper into the secret areas of Canticle Center, and a haze of incense and th
e distant strums of a harp filled the air. Day or night, the Slit bustled with activity—economic, sensual or visceral. Some business qualified as all three.

  They were led to an alcove hung with brightly colored silk curtains. The floor was polished wood and several brightly colored pillows dotted the space. A low table, bare save a large bottle filled with black sand, was the only furniture. “Please wait here,” the prayer keeper said, bowing deeply to her. “I’ll alert Brother Elam that you seek an audience.”

  She chose a rose-colored pillow made of velvet and sat down, stretching her legs out in front of her. Tollan seemed rather reluctant to sit but eventually chose a blue silk cushion. The breeches that Devery and Fin had brought for him were a bit snug, and as he sat, Gemma admired the muscles in his calves that pulled the thin material taught. The King of Above may be naive, but he was not weak.

  Wince sat down beside her on a yellow pillow. He rubbed at his eyes and then grinned caddishly.

  “Calm yourself, there, lightning,” she chided, though she could not keep a smile from her own face. “We’re here on business—not pleasure.”

  “So it’s true, then?” Tollan asked. “The church trains women in the art of—”

  “Not just women,” Gemma interrupted. “Men, too. The priests of the Dalinn are the best at what they do, but that’s not why we’re here.”

  “Why are we here?” Wince asked, leaning back and stretching his own legs out.

  “Privacy, and a place where I can think and talk to someone I trust. The tunnels are unstable, Aegos knows what’s happening with those plants up above, and Devery said that neither of us should go anywhere near our homes. We need information and we need someplace we can talk without fear of someone overhearing, until we figure out who’s a friend and who’s not.” She heard footsteps coming and quickly tucked her feet beneath her, putting herself in a regal, meditative position. Wince and Tollan nervously followed her lead.