queen well . . . but somehow he did not think that the crone had been talking about cards. He and Gayel climbed the great staircase and emerged into the sunshine—early-morning sunshine, bright and cheerful—but Miles did not feel it, for his entire body had gone suddenly, inexplicably cold.
“Thunderclouds on the horizon!” his father had liked to shout toward the end of his illness. “Right there on the horizon, Miles!” And Miles could not calm him, not with whiskey or books or the foul-smelling medicine from the local apothecary. Until the day he died, Robert Marshall remained convinced that the storm was already upon them, a storm so strong that it would shatter the kingdom in two.
Right there on the horizon, Miles repeated to himself. The familiar landscape of the Gut passed around them, pubs and card hells and brothels, but he was not comforted, for he could only think of the seer’s milky eyes, her gloating mouth. Beneath the raucous life of the Gut around him, he could still hear her voice.
“The True Queen! She comes now! I have seen it!”
She wasn’t talking about Arla, Miles thought. Queen Arla was a ruler like her mother, Queen Elaine, and Elaine’s mother before her, a queen who did what was expected . . . and with a sudden start, Miles wondered whether the woman might have been talking about Elyssa. The Crown Princess was already a subject of some unease among the nobility, for she did not mingle with them, not even with the noblewomen her own age, preferring instead the company of servants. Rumor said that Princess Elyssa had sympathies for the poor; Lord Dillon, who spent plenty of time at court, even claimed that she believed in redistribution of wealth. The Princess was young, only twenty-one, but stubborn. Even Queen Arla had not been able to tame her. A collectivist on the throne would be a disaster for the Tearling.
And for me, Miles thought. And then, looking at Gayel beside him: For all of us.
Then he told himself not to be ridiculous. Queen Arla had many years to live yet, and the old woman had only been a village seer. Good at forecasting the weather, perhaps, but telling the weather and telling the future of a kingdom were two very different things. Miles was out a hundred pounds, but Williams had made Lady Andrews whole, and having done so publicly, he would have to reimburse everyone; in the end, Miles would have his hundred back as well. The drought would end soon, and the crops rebound, but even if not, there were still fortunes to be made in a time of need. All would surely be well, but even so, Miles could not stop thinking of stars rising and moons falling, of prophecy, and though he was a good Christian who lent no credence to such things, he could not repress a chill.
Distantly, not with his ears but with his mind, he seemed to hear thunder.
CHAPTER 2
THE WOMAN IN THE CLOAK
Elyssa Anne Raleigh—Sixth Queen of the Tearling. Also known as the Shipper Queen. Mother: Queen Arla Raleigh (Arla the Just). Father: Lord Devin Burrell, fourth lord of the Burrell seat (predeceased).
—The Early History of the Tearling (Index), as told by Merwinian
Elyssa hated her mother’s court.
She supposed she should be thankful that this wasn’t a full audience. More than six hundred people crowded the Queen’s throne room, but that was only a fraction of the number the room could hold. It was late May, but the hot weather had already come on, and many of the Tear nobles had retreated from their New London manses to the country. Elyssa supposed she didn’t blame them—well, no, she did blame them, for a whole host of other things, but not for decamping. New London stank in summer. Sewage, piss, rotten animal flesh . . . the city never smelled of roses, but in hot weather the stench could not be escaped. Even here, on the fourth floor of the Keep, some hundred and fifty feet above the rest of the city, Elyssa could smell it.
Or maybe what she smelled was right here in this room.
The man from the Blue Horizon had been beaten within an inch of his life. His visible flesh was mottled with bruising: face and arms and even bare feet. His arm appeared to be broken; it hung limply at his side. When the two jailors released his arms, Elyssa saw that at least three of his fingernails had