Lee’s trials

Where the arrow points

*Lee*

I should smile. Usually, I would. I would say something easy and charming enough to make her forget that I have brought her into a house where every room has a history of someone being cruel quietly.

Instead I sit in the chair beside the bed and cover my face with both hands.

"I'm sorry."

"For what?"

"For this." My voice is muffled against my palms. "For him. For bringing you here and acting as though it would be some lovely holiday with trees and sugared nuts."

"It does have lovely trees."

"Thalia."

She comes closer. I see her boots beside mine, still muddy from the journey. One lace has come undone.

"You told me it was complicated," she says.

"I underplayed it."

"Yes."

I look up.

Her expression is tired. Hurt, too. She is holding it down so carefully that I almost wish she would yell at me. That would be simpler. I know how to apologize when someone is angry. I have spent my life practicing.

"I should have told you about his illness," I say.

"You didn't know."

"I should have told you about Fileas. About my father. About why the King was so eager for us to come now."

Her eyes drop to Fealor. "Did you know why?"

"No." The answer tastes awful. "I knew he was asking more often. I knew Fileas had been writing to me instead of him sometimes. I thought they were trying to pull me into court things."

"Were they?"

"Yes."

She nods once.

The healer murmurs words under her breath, weaving silver light through Fealor's chest. The lamps in the room flicker with each pulse of magic.

Thalia pulls the chair beside mine closer. She sits, knees almost touching mine.

"You do that thing," she says.

"What thing?"

"You decide you have to carry every ugly part of something alone. Then you hand me the polished version and hope I won't notice the cracks."

I swallow.

"I didn't want you to look at me differently."

"I look at you differently because you lied by omission."

I nod, "That is fair."

"It is."

"You don't have to sound so pleased about it."

Her mouth twitches despite herself. "I'm not pleased."

"No. I know."

The words hang there. I reach for her hand, slowly enough that she can pull away.

She lets me take it.

Her palm is warm, roughened at the base of her fingers. A thin green line of bark curls around her wrist, disappearing beneath her sleeve. I trace it with my thumb.

"I want you here," I say. "Not hidden in a guest room. Not tucked away so nobody can complain about what you are."

She looks at our joined hands.

"Then stop making decisions that leave me outside the door."

"I will."

She looks about to roll her eyes, but instead she sighs, "You say that very fast."

"I am trying to improve."

"You are terrible at it."

I pout, and I know it, "That feels unnecessarily cruel while my grandfather is unconscious."

"It's a stressful day. I'm branching out."

A laugh escapes me, small and helpless. She squeezes my fingers.

The healer finally leans back.

Fealor's breathing has evened, though each breath still looks like work.

"He will sleep," Edris says. "He must not be disturbed."

"Will he wake?" I ask.

Her eyes meet mine. She is old, older than Fealor perhaps, with deep lines around her mouth and silver hair twisted into a knot at the nape of her neck. She has known me since I was small enough to hide under council tables.

"I believe so."

That is not yes.

She begins packing jars and folded cloths into her leather case. "I need the palace records. Every remedy he has taken. Every meal, every tonic, every spell administered within the last month."

"Why?" Thalia asks.

Edris hesitates.

"Because I have treated hearts before," she says. "This feels like a heart being forced to fail."

The cold returns beneath my skin.

"Poison?" I ask.

"Possibly. A curse. A slow-working toxin. There are things that mimic age."

"Can you tell which?"

"Not tonight."

Thalia rises. "I can go with you."

Edris looks surprised. "Why?"

"The roots reacted when you used healing magic. They may recognize something if we go near the kitchens, storerooms, wherever he gets medicine."

"You have been in the city less than a day."

"And I have been a dryad longer than that."

For the first time, Edris gives her a faint smile. "All right."

I stand too. "I'm coming."

"No," Edris says at once. "You stay with him."

"I can search records."

"You can sit beside your grandfather while someone else does the work."

The rebuke is gentle. It still lands.

Thalia gives my hand one final squeeze. "I'll be back."

"I know."

She pauses, studying me.

"You don't," she says. "You look like you think the room will disappear if you leave it."

I do not have an answer for that.

She brushes a curl off my forehead, her fingers lingering near my temple. Then she follows Edris from the room.

The door closes.

Silence settles over the bedchamber.

Fealor sleeps. Beyond the window, Eirawen glows through the dark, all those warm lights and narrow bridges, all those people who expect their King to be there when morning comes.

I sit beside him until my legs go numb.

At some point a servant arrives with tea. I do not drink it. Another brings food, bread, roasted vegetables, soup in a covered bowl. I thank her by name because I remember her from when I was thirteen and terrified of being sent to formal dinners. Nessa looks at me sadly and leaves the tray untouched beside the fire.

I stare at it until the soup stops steaming.

When I am alone again, I reach into my coat pocket.

The compass is there.

It is small, brass, scratched around the edges. My father gave it to me when I was fifteen. We were walking through the lower market after I had failed an archery assessment and spent an hour pretending I did not care. He had placed it in my hand and told me all paths became easier once you admitted where you stood.

Two weeks later, he vanished.

I turn the compass once.

Twice.

Three times.

The needle spins wildly, then points west.

It has never done that.

I freeze.

My father's compass has always pointed north. Even when magic interfered. Even when Liam once held it beside a magnet because he claimed science was only a very organized sort of sorcery.

West.

Toward the river. Toward the human world beyond the forests and roads.

The needle trembles, then settles.

A soft knock comes at the door.

I close my fist around the compass.

"Come in."

Fileas enters alone.

His gaze goes first to Fealor, then to me. "The council has gathered."

"I'm not leaving him."

"You are not being asked to leave. You are being asked to understand what happens next."

I stand, keeping my hand in my pocket.

"Go on."

"The council will appoint a regent while Father is incapacitated."

I try to swallow the small huff, "You."

"I am the senior prince present."

"My father is senior."

"Your father is missing."

The word lands with deliberate precision.

"He may not be dead," I say.

Fileas's eyes narrow slightly. "Do you know something I do not?"

My pulse jumps.

For one terrible second, I picture him seeing the compass in my hand. I picture him taking it, weighing it between his fingers, deciding it belongs in some locked archive where hope goes to rot.

"No," I say.

He studies me.

"Then attend the council," he says. "You should hear them say it aloud."

"I said no."

"This is not school, Lyrian."

"No. It's worse. At school, people at least have the decency to insult you to your face."

His mouth tightens. "Your grandfather is dying."

The room goes utterly still.

Fealor breathes in. Out.

Fileas lowers his voice. "If he does not recover, succession will be addressed. You can either let the council decide your future in your absence, or you can walk into that chamber and remind them you exist."

I hate that he is right. I hate that he knows it.

He waits.

I look down at my closed fist. The compass needle presses against my palm through the brass casing, trembling toward the west.

"Tell them I'll be there," I say.

Fileas nods once. "Good."

After he leaves, I take the compass out again.

The needle points west.

And for the first time in five years, I let myself think the thought I have trained myself never to say aloud.

My father might be alive.