Page 25 of The Stolen Throne
I straighten in my saddle, looking off to our left. “Cain?”
“Yeah, Mer?”
At the shortened version of my already shortened name, Reven mutters something I’m pretty sure I don’t want to catch. Something that makes Cain grin as he glances at me to see what I want, then looks off the same direction I am. I squint against the sunlight, so bright against the sand. Searching. And then I see it. A long distance away, a tiny plume rises into the air.
Not a mirage.
It’s a zariphate of Wanderers, in number and on the move in daylight. They don’t do that unless they have to, usually resting during the day and moving in the cool of night. Cain and Reven already told me that Zariph Cainis has his people moving in daylight as a countermeasure to being tracked by Eidolon’s men.
It has to be them. At least another day’s ride across these flats and into the dunes, but still… Thank goddess.
Cain pulls up so that Achlys and I direct our horses around his. When we’re next to each other, he sets his mount walking again. “I hope you’re ready to face my father.”
Ahead of us, Reven’s shoulders tense, and I silently will him to turn around. Say something. I’d even take a glare at this point. “Look at me,” I think at his back.
My breath catches when he angles his head slightly to the side, like he might.
I wait, watching.
He urges his horse forward faster instead.
11
The Zariph
We’re set up outside the zariphate camp, separated by several dunes so I can’t see it. Waiting should be my middle name instead of Evangeline, since I do so much of it.
The crispness of desert night air surrounds me as the land transforms from the sunset shades of magentas and pinks to the navies and blacks of dusk under the two crescent rising moons. I had a whole day to work myself up for what is about to happen—what I will say to Zariph Cainis. Plenty of time for the doubts to build.
Cain is out there with them right now, preparing the zariphate for my arrival.
My arrival. The queen’s arrival.
What a cosmic joke. This is a hundred times worse than pretending to be Tabra in the palace. There, no one knows that a second one of us even exists. To them it’s not even a question that I am Queen Tabra. The immediate response upon seeing either me or my sister, regardless of which, is respect or some variation of that. But this zariphate—I’ve essentially grown up among them—they see me as a city waif. As Cain’s pet. And now, because of the way I had to send my sister and Reven and all of the Vanished to them, and the way Eidolon has hunted them…every single person knows I’m a twin. They know I’m a fraud, a phony, a charlatan.
A liar.
I try not to fidget with my clothes or glance down. Queens don’t do that. I’m all trussed up again. Achlys was incredibly clever in the clothes she grabbed, given that she was in the middle of escaping the palace. I’m wearing black robes—fashioned after the Wanderers’ clothing, but fancier and fit for royalty—with small jewels of all colors woven into the material in a colorful zigzagging pattern. The skirts are flared out behind me over my horse’s rump. Achlys even managed to twist my hair up into some towering, headache-inducing concoction. And none of it makes a single bit of difference. No way in all the seven hells are the people of this zariphate going to accept me as any kind of leader.
Maybe Tabra and I together could sway them, but I suspect that’s even more unlikely. Both Cain and Reven—in some misguided version of protecting my “delicate” sensibilities—have remained close-lipped about my sister. I’m not oblivious or deliberately ignoring that. I’ve tucked my worries away, waiting to see her in person and decide for myself how bad of a state she’s in. Until then, I’m queen.
Ish. Queen-ish.
Maybe what I should do is hand all my troubles over to the zariph. A true leader. Experienced. Wizened. Tell him what I know and let someone older, tried, and proven step in to handle this mess.
Except he ran, a tiny memory whispers inside me. When Reven and I went up against Eidolon, the Mighty Cainis took his people from the palace and left.
“Sit up straight, domina,” Achlys whispers from behind me, sounding like Omma suddenly. Knowing we likely have an audience, she’s back in servant mode.
I mind my posture and tip up my chin, calling on every last ounce of my practiced ability to transform myself into the queen to get me through this.
We agreed—more like I was informed—that when we entered the zariphate camp, I would be in the lead, Achlys and Reven behind me like servants. I don’t like it, but they all, Cain included, insisted that the posturing is critical to set the right tone from the start.
It’s not going to help. The tone was set a long time ago. Cain, Reven, Achlys—none of them listened to that argument. So here I am, preparing to do this on my own, mostly.
I press a hand against the amulet under my clothes. It’s helped me before—with the Hollow, with my fear of heights, in the Shadowood the night we fought Eidolon’s soldiers, the morning we fought Eidolon, even in quiet moments when I’d be doubting myself. Or that’s what it seemed like. I could really use help now.
“Wait.” Reven’s call rings with reluctance.
