Three Dark Crowns (Three Dark Crowns #1) - Kendare Blake Page 0,42
can still change her mind.
“Why do you stay?” Mirabella asks. “When I met you, you said that they would take Pepper and kill him if they knew. But your bond is so strong. Why do you not go?”
Elizabeth shrugs. “And go where? I was a temple child, Mirabella. Did I tell you that?”
“No.”
“My mother was a priestess of Kenora Temple. My father was a healer who she often worked with closely. My mother didn’t give me up to foster. I grew up there. The temple is all I know. And I am hoping . . .”
“Hoping what?”
“That you will take me with you to Indrid Down Temple, after you are crowned.”
Mirabella nods. “Yes. Many people in Rolanth hope for similar things.”
“I’m sorry,” says Elizabeth. “I do not mean to add to your burden!”
“No.” Mirabella hugs her friend. “You have not. Of course I will take you with me. But think on these”—she holds Elizabeth’s bracelets—“I do not necessarily have to bring you to the temple. You have choices. You have all the choices in the world.”
Rho does not like being called to Luca’s chambers. She stands near the window, shoulders squared and back stiff. She never tries to make herself at home. She never looks at home anywhere, except perhaps when she is supervising the younger priestesses at their tasks.
Luca can see why Mirabella does not like her. Rho is severe, and uncompromising, and when she smiles, it does not reach her eyes. But she is one of the best priestesses Luca has ever known. The queen may not care for Rho, nor Rho for the queen, but Rho will certainly be of use.
“She said that,” Rho says, after Luca tells her of Mirabella’s early visit. “She remembers her sisters.”
“I do not know if it is true. It might only be the dreams playing tricks. It might only be her nerves.”
Rho looks down. It is clear that she does not think so.
“And so?” Rho asks. “What do you wish to do?”
Luca leans back in her chair. Nothing. Perhaps nothing need be done. Or perhaps she was wrong all this time and Mirabella is not the chosen queen. She wipes at her mouth with the back of her hand.
“You will look a fool,” Rho says, “after supporting her. It is too late to change course.”
“I will not change course,” Luca says angrily. “Queen Mirabella is chosen. She has to be.”
She looks over Rho’s shoulder, at the large mosaic hanging on the wall. A depiction of the capital city of Indrid Down, the six-sided dome of its temple and the great black spires of the Volroy.
“How long will it be before we can look at that and think of it only as the capital?” Luca asks. “Instead of as the poisoners’ city?”
Rho follows her gaze and then shrugs.
“It was, once,” says Luca. “It was once ours. Ours and the queen’s. Now, it is theirs. And the council is theirs. They have grown too strong to listen, and we belong nowhere.”
Rho does not respond. If Luca had hoped for pity, she ought to have summoned a different priestess.
“Rho, you have seen her. You watch her like a hawk above a mouse. What do you think?”
“Do I think she can kill them?” Rho asks, and crosses her arms. “Of course she can. A gift like hers could sink a fleet. She could be great. Like the Queens of Old.”
“But?”
“But,” Rho says darkly, “it is wasted on her. She can kill her sisters, High Priestess. But she will not do it.”
Luca sighs. Hearing it finally spoken does not shock her. In truth, she has suspected it for some time, feared it since meeting Mirabella on the banks of Starfall Lake and nearly being drowned. The child was so angry. She had grieved the loss of Arsinoe and Katharine for nearly a year. Had she been as strong then as she is now, Luca, and every Westwood besides, would be dead.
“If only there were a way to channel that rage,” she mutters.
“Perhaps you will think of one,” Rho says. “But I have thought of something else.”
“What?” Luca asks.
“The way of the White-Handed Queen.”
Luca cocks her head. White-Handed Queens are queens who ascend the throne without ever spilling a drop of their sisters’ blood. Without staining their hands.
“What are you talking about? Mirabella was born one of the common three.”
“I am not talking about the Blue Queen,” Rho says, referring to the rare fourth-born twin, who is deemed so blessed that her sisters are drowned by the