Rinni arches her eyebrows as a somewhat delighted smile creeps across her lips. “All right, I’m sure that can be arranged.”
“I don’t want it to be anything formal.” I think of one of the massive banquet halls in the castle and the illustrations I saw in books as a child. “I don’t want to be the king and queen sitting at far ends of a table that’s so long we may as well be in separate rooms.”
Rinni laughs. “I know what you’re saying.”
“Good. Will you ask him? I’m worried if I do it Eldas will say no.” Given how he seems to retreat after every time we get close, he just might. “And I’m also worried that the throne room has become either a classroom or a battle ground for us. If we meet there then we’ll—”
“Be unable to relax,” she finishes for me. “Say no more. I can make this happen.”
“Thank you.” I cross over and pull Rinni in for a quick hug. She’s stiff and just as awkward as the first time I hugged Willow. But she seems to warm up to the idea a little faster than my healer friend.
“Of course, Your Majesty,” she says, somewhat awkward as I pull away.
“We’re well past formalities.” I start for the door. “Call me Luella.”
That night as Hook curls up at the foot of my bed, I stare up at the ceiling. In a week I’ve secured two friends and a wolf. If I’m being honest, none of this is going as badly as I expected.
But the largest hurdles remain—genuinely befriending Eldas and, with his help, figuring out a way to break the cycle.
I yawn. “One step at a time,” I murmur before rolling over and falling asleep.
* * *
Eldasand I don’t meet the next day, or the day after, so I occupy myself with the journals and with Willow in the laboratory. Even if Eldas won’t help me, I will continue to search for a way out of this cycle—for myself, for him, and our worlds.
I worry that Rinni has asked him about dinner and it just went more horribly than I could’ve expected. On the third day, Rinni informs me that he’s taken up some new negotiations with the fae and that’s what’s distracting him.
I think of our conversation and I wonder if these new negotiations were, in part, inspired by me. I dare to think they might have been. Which fills me with an effervescent sensation, like I am some bubbly beverage, held under pressure.
Luckily, I’m distracted on the fourth day when my furniture arrives. The cabinetmaker makes the delivery personally and sees to helping Rinni and me set up the furniture in the space. He’s a sweet old man and I can’t help but notice him massaging his creaking fingers by the time we’re done.
After everything is settled to both our standards, I take him up with me to the laboratory and give him a poultice similar to what I made for Mr. Abbot. Blessedly, neither Willow nor Rinni tells me that helping a “commoner” is “beneath me.”
The cabinetmaker is bashful, but at Willow’s encouragement accepts the gift. The rest of the day I spend working with Willow, experimenting with my magic and learning from the books left behind by past queens.
I take my dinners in my room, alone save for Hook. My wolf curls up under my new desk that overlooks the windows in the main room—rather than the doors. I delicately skim the fragile pages of the women who came before me in search of clues. The oldest journal is just over two thousand years old. There are no records left behind by the original queen or her immediate successors. So I’m learning from women who were just as much in the dark as I was.
On the evening of the fifth day, I finally find something that may be useful. It’s about midway through Queen Elanor’s journal—four queens before me. Apparently, I wasn’t the first person to think of breaking this cycle.
With every new queen, the redwood throne takes a greater toll. Our power seems to be dwindling generation over generation. It’s possible that soon enough, there will not be a Human Queen.
I suspect that the throne itself is seeking balance with the other side of the Fade—with the Natural World. The Human Queen is not balance enough on her own. The laws of nature are stretched too thin.
If there was some way we could bring the two worlds in balance, then maybe Midscape would no longer need a Human Queen. But I have no way to prove this theory…
The next morningI’m getting ready to head to the laboratory when I hear Rinni’s distinct knock.
“May I come in?”
“I’m decent,” I call back.
“What are those clothes?” Rinni asks the moment she lays eyes on me.
“They’re something Willow helped me find.” I run my hands over heavy canvas trousers. “Don’t tell me, the day I finally dare to not wear a dress, Eldas wants to meet with me?”
Rinni smirks.
I groan. “It’s true, isn’t it?”