Of Thorns and Beauty by Elle Madison

Chapter Forty-Five

Einar leans over the small table with Dvain while Gunnar stands guard at the door. Every part of me wants to run or slit the man's throat, but that’s not what I’m here for. Not yet.

I approach the men, standing at the opposite side of the table from them. They’re examining several vials and notes and some of Dvain’s personal journals.

“So, no more of the petals have fallen?” he asks, and Einar shakes his head.

I paste a look of polite confusion on my face to cover the torrent of emotions I am only barely controlling. Because seeing this man again, unexpectedly, is its own sort of hell. And then there are the petals.

“There are still two left. It should happen any day now, if the pattern holds.” There is a sadness in his voice, and Dvain rests a placating hand on Einar’s shoulder.

I force down my revulsion at the false kindness.

The king sighs.

“There are still the stem and thorn. It’s not a method we’ve tried yet.” But even he doesn’t sound overly optimistic.

“We’ve been over this, Son.” Dvain sighs. “The poison is far too potent there. You could die in the process. You could kill yourself and them if you’re not careful. Alchemy is an exact science. Not magic. There are only facts in this case.”

Einar nods, his eyes pinching tighter.

I feel my chalyx stiffen beneath my hand, her body rumbling from the perpetual low growling she’s been doing since we got here.

It’s more than her not liking him. It seems every time my feelings intensify, hers do as well, as if we’re linked on a deeper level. If I’m not careful, she’ll give away every single one of my thoughts, even if my carefully controlled expressions don’t.

I focus back on the conversation at hand and desperately try not to allow myself to feel anything. Good or bad.

“Besides, as you said, there are two petals left. That means we have two more chances at this. I am working with my contact in Socair to see if we can get our hands on another rose. We have time yet.”

Einar’s fists slam down on the table, making everyone in the room jolt from the sheer force.

“That is the one thing we do not have.” His voice is full of rage, sadness, and something else...defeat.

“I wish you would just allow me to test the flower myself. With the equipment I have --”

Einar cuts the man’s words off with a shake of his head.

“I appreciate the offer, but the rose stays with me.”

Dvain and Einar speak about several of the recent ingredients he has tried, and the one they settle on having the most promise is the ‘hydrolysate extract’. The alchemist hands a large vial of the sparkling blue-green liquid over to the king before we turn to leave.

Which isn’t soon enough for me. Every second we spend in the man’s presence makes me feel like I have another layer of grime on my body that I’ll never be able to wash off.

We take an alternate route home so as to not pass by the dragon's cave again. Einar says that it adds an hour onto our journey, but I am too distracted by my thoughts to notice. Besides, it is still so much shorter than the journey here was.

We ride the hestrinn as fast as we are safely able, which leaves little room for conversation.

It's just as well. I can hardly form coherent thoughts in the wake of everything I have discovered in the past two days. More than once, I shudder at the memory of the vile man's bespectacled face, prompting Einar to ask me again if I am cold.

I assure him I am fine, but I am certain he sees it for the lie that it is.

All the broken pieces of my life are converging in the worst possible ways, swirling around me like one of the deadly sandstorms I remember from my childhood, and I am standing in the middle, as I did then, powerless to stop it all.

I am anything but fine.

“I’m surprised your ambassador is not Jokithan,” I finally manage when we stop to water the hestrinn.

“He practically is. My grandfather gave him citizenship for services rendered, and that was several hundred years ago.”

My jaw drops. Several hundred years of terrorizing innocent victims. Einar notes my surprise.

“The average Jokithan doesn’t live nearly that long, but I imagine he has concocted some sort of fountain of youth for himself.”

I think of Madame, the way she hasn’t aged even as much as Einar has when she has undoubtedly been alive longer, and I nod my agreement.

“But he’s here,” I muse aloud. “Not in whichever country he is an ambassador to.”

“That was only luck on our part,” the king responds. “He comes back every few months.”

Luck. Madame’s scheming, more likely. For someone so brilliant, Einar can be so incredibly naïve sometimes.

I want to tell him the truth, or at least that he can’t trust the disgusting little man. But...the alchemist is in contact with Madame, and he will be on alert now for any sign that I have betrayed her.

If I tell Einar, and he acts on it — which he surely would — my sisters will be punished. Probably even killed.

If I don’t tell him, Sigrid might die. And not only her, but his entire castle.

I think back to what my Madame had told me. The alchemist doesn’t work for her as much as they make deals together. He could be genuinely working toward a cure in exchange for his opulent life here.

It’s a slim chance, but more of one than my sisters will have if Madame takes out her wrath on them.

There are no good choices here.

Einar sets me back on my saddle, but his touch is markedly gentler this time, and it breaks something inside of me. I am silent again for the rest of the journey.

When we arrive back to the castle, we leave the hestrinn for the stable hands to care for and head straight inside. I do my best to acknowledge Sarah Agnes as she takes Gideon’s reins, but I don’t have the energy to pretend right now.

I hold my breath, scrambling to keep up with Einar’s longer strides, though I understand his urgency. Guards push open the enormous doors, and a figure is hurrying down the stairs as fast as his uneven gait will allow.

It takes me a moment to place him as Leif, because he is not wearing his mask. He’s nothing like I expected, though I should’ve known by now to expect nothing at all.

Leif’s skin is green and yellow, like the deepest colors of a bruise. His eyes easily take up a third of his face, and large boils — no, warts — cover his cheeks and head.

When he opens his mouth to speak, it widens a hair too far, revealing a clear lack of teeth.

"Your Majesty," he croaks and begins to bow, but Einar waves it off as unnecessary.

"Please, how is she?" the king asks.

"She is stable, but she is not well.” Grief emanates from him in a cloud that soon consumes me as well.

"The alchemist has given me another solution. I should be able to try it any day now," the king tells him.

I look sharply to Einar.

"Why would you wait?" I have to believe that there is some hope in the solution the alchemist gave us, as much as it is difficult to attribute anything good to that man.

But surely, he wouldn’t go so far as to kill an entire castle full of people he’s known for generations...

Leif’s gaze travels between us, understanding and maybe even a trace of satisfaction in his features. Einar, for his part, studies me a moment before answering, and I wonder what it cost him to be open or honest about something he has fought so hard to conceal from me. From everyone.

"It's not that simple. We have to wait until the petal falls on its own," he explains. "Or we risk killing our only source for an antidote."

He says that like it should make sense to me, but it doesn't.

"And you risk killing Sigrid if you don't," I say quietly, in case there is a chance he has missed the obvious.

"Don't you think that I know that?" he growls.

“I hoped that you didn't know that rather than that you knew and just didn't care," I bite back.

There is no part of me that comprehends why he is willing to let her die when there's something he can do to save her.

"Of course I care, Zaina." He steps closer to me, staring down at me with a mixture of hurt and disbelief.

I almost feel guilty before I remember one of the few decent people I have ever met is upstairs painfully dying, and he is just going to sit by while it happens on the off chance that something bad will happen if he doesn't.

"You don't understand," he grits through his teeth. "I have a castle full of people depending on that, depending on me."

"You're right. I don't." Because I would burn the rest of the world down for the people I love.

I practically have. I probably will, by the time this is all over.

“And that is why I declined to make a stranger a queen. There is more to ruling than putting on a crown and ordering people around!" His jaw is clenched, and his pale blue eyes are burning like the hottest part of the fire.

A beat of silence passes before Leif cuts in smoothly.

"If I may, Your Majesty, she has been asking to see you."

"Of course." He takes off toward the stairs without so much as a backward glance

I briefly debate following him, but she hadn't asked for me. I'm just a girl she has known a handful of weeks who was fortunate enough to be the recipient of her kindness, and I won't intrude on this moment.

I can't quite bear the thought of heading back to my rooms alone, knowing she will not be there to welcome me as she has each time I have come back here, something I have taken for granted. So instead, Khijhana and I head up to the study.

I pass more servants than usual today, but I'm surprised by how many of them are still wearing veils or masks.

I am seated at my favorite sofa, the one closest to the fire but facing the window, away from the door, when Khijhana abruptly stands up from where she was already seated between me and the entryway. A split second later, I hear a set of footsteps gliding across the floor toward me.

I sigh. Odger is the last person I am in the mood for.

"To what do I owe the pleasure of your spontaneous visit?" I try to keep the sarcasm from my tone.

I am expecting Odger’s oily tone, but the voice that answers freezes my bones to ice as surely as the lake had.

"Come now, Zaina. Is that any way to speak to your brother?"