Page 48 of The Shrouded Queen
“This is a wedding ceremony,” I stated dubiously as Rade resumed his seat beside me. When he didn’t respond, I looked to Keir. “You brought me here to marry him?”
He didn’t even flinch. “Yes.”
I almost laughed. The Kaldfolk, instead of fleeing the palace when the Khada Guard turned on them, risked life and limb to kidnap my queen—not to eat or kill her, but tomarryher.
But my laughter fizzled before reaching my lips.
It was too… small. That couldn’t be the whole plan. There was something here I wasn’t seeing. If Queen Amunet were here, she would know it instantly. Even if the Kaldfolk weren’t heretics, even if they hadn’t torn me apart like they’d done to those guards—
A wedding.
A merging of magic.
Because they wanted my queen’s power.
That was what this was about. Not uniting against a common foe. This was about power. A wedding ceremony that would bind magic… merge it as one. If Rade had access to the Gods-Chosen’s power, if he could use it however he pleased, he could drain her entirely.
He could steal it.
Why should I trust their story? Maybe the Shroud wasn’t the Underworld. Maybe it was just a blight affecting Kaldfold, somecorrupt magic left behind by their strange powers. That certainly seemed a lot more probable than the Underworld bleeding into our realm.
This might just be an elaborate ruse. Rade wanted to scare Amunet so that she’d feel she had no choice but to unite her magic with his. And with the Gods-Chosen’s power at his fingertips, who knew what the Kaldfold king would do? Take revenge against Ashorah, for sure.
That was a plan worth drilling into the Frozen Sands for, worth months—if not years—of preparation, worth the risk of infiltrating Khada Palace and its legions. The Kaldfolk wanted the power of the Gods-Chosen.
Though Rade’s gentle eyes didn’t look like a thief’s…
“I needed you to see it for yourself, Amunet.” His breath brushed my cheek. I hadn’t realized we were both leaning over the pages until then. “To see the threat. The magnitude of it, and understand that no army would be able to stop it, nooneperson, either.” He lifted his eyes from the book to meet mine. “A Gods-Chosen and a Gods-Blessed. If we don’t do it, your people and mine will be doomed to the Shroud, to that perpetual night stuck between realms, a fate so much worse than the Trench.”
My gaze caught on another drawing, and my mouth went dry.
The man and woman lay on altars, head to head, with their arms hanging limply over the tabletop. Blood streamed from slit wrists.
“What is that?” I asked.
“The last part of the Merging,” Rade replied. “It looks much scarier than it is. Our magic will protect us from the wounds.”
“But I—I—” I grappled for an excuse. “I haven’t gone through the Igniting. I don’t have access to any power for another—”
“Twenty-two days. I know. If we begin quickly, the Merging will end on your birthday, when you’ll have your powers. It’s perfectly safe. You could save us immediately, before any more are lost to the Shroud.”
I shook my head again. This was how they’d find me out. It didn’t matter how much he pleaded, what he said. I didn’t have that power. The ritual would kill me. I couldn’t do it. I couldn’t—
I drew a deep breath, staring down at the book, and forced my panicked thoughts to calm.
I could leave. That was what Rade had promised. I could turn my back on all this. It wasn’t something I could fix anyway.
But my queen had twenty-two days left. Still plenty of time for word of her location to reach the Kaldfolk, for them to track her down and steal her power.
And then it hit me.
I didn’t actually have to finish the ritual.
All I had to do was stall.
If they believed I was Queen Amunet for twenty-two days, if I could keep their attention fixed solely on me for twenty-two days, then the Gods-Chosen would be able to claim her birthright and Rade wouldn’t have a chance to steal her magic.
If what Rade said was true, if the Shroud was the Underworld reaching into this realm, my queen would fight it off. She may have been chosen by Shaya, but her purpose was to saveus. She wouldn’t let this darkness spread and claim her people, no matter who was at the root of it. And with her powers, she wouldn’t need a Kald at her side to do it.
