“Kiela . . .”
“We protect each other,” she told him. “You caught her. Now it’s my turn.” She finished loosening the knots. She met Radane’s eyes. “I am—or was—a librarian at the Great Library. Caz was my assistant. We escaped the fires and came to my childhood home. Since then, we’ve been doing our best to set up a life here. Your story now.”
Radane pushed the ropes off her ankles and then sat up.
Kiela tensed, expecting her to attack. Or bolt. It entirely depended on what kind of person Radane was, and Kiela knew nothing about her except she’d been rude and hostile . . .We’re not murdering anyone. That’snotwhat librarians do.Bit of shelving, bit of researching, bit of underhanded violence?No.
Radane studied them without either attacking or bolting. Or jumping for the boat and the books. Kiela began to hope she’d made the right choice.
“My name isn’t Radane. It’s Ravandil Etra—”
A wave crashed within the cave, rocking the boat, and splashing into them. Kiela sputtered as she spat out seawater. Radane—or whoever she was—had been drenched. Caz was shrieking and trying to climb the cave wall, and Meep darted for the boat and, using their needles as if they were climbing picks, scurried up the mast.
A herd of merhorses stampeded into the cave. Water flew around them, and they neighed like they were trumpeting. Kiela spotted Larran riding one of them, silhouetted against the light from beyond the cave, looking like a hero from an ancient tale.
“Larran? What—”
The mermaid popped up in front of the herd.
“Oh no you don’t,” Caz said, and Kiela turned to see that Caz had wrapped his leaves around Radane’s ankles. She’d begun to flee toward the cave entrance.
Half the herd beached themselves, blocking Radane’s escape on land with their hooves and powerful tails, while the others blocked the exit by sea. Larran leapt off Sian’s back and swam to the cave’s shore. He climbed out. Dripping wet, he confronted Radane. At the same time, Larran said, “You can’t arrest her! She’s innocent!” as Caz shouted, “We’re not finished here!” Kiela cried, “Everyone, calm down!” while the mermaid sounded a siren-like cry, the merhorses snorted and neighed, and the cactus shrieked, “Meep, meep, meep!”
Radane put her face in her hands and sat down hard on the shore.
Caz loosened his grip.
Larran held up one hand, and the merhorses began to calm. Seawater sloshed around them, but slowly began to steady. Meep quieted.
Radane’s shoulders were shaking.
Was she . . . crying?
She’s laughing.
Shaking her head, Radane looked up. “I escaped the best-trained guards in the entire empire, a violent mob, and every single highly qualified bounty hunter sent to retrieve me, and I’m captured by a librarian, two plants, and a farmer?” She laughed harder.
Kiela said as patiently as if she were talking with a toddler having a tantrum, “Radane. Tell us who you are and why you’re here.”
Wiping her eyes, Radane sobered, straightened her shoulders, and said, “I’m Ravandil Etra L’sari, and I’m the emperor’s heir. And I’m here because I want to be neither empress nor executed.”
Chapter Twenty-Nine
“Meep?” the cactus said.
“Exactly,” Caz said.
Larran snorted. “You . . . what?”
Kiela studied her. “Unlikely. The emperor’s heir is his firstborn son, Umele S’rov Vironin. Second in line is his daughter, the next eldest, Seviene Nicla Edin Lariviron, followed by his brother, his sister-in-law, their children.”
“I was sixteenth,” Radane said. “It wasn’t ever supposed to come to me, and I don’t want it. I lied about what happened in Alyssium—”
Caz muttered, “There’s a surprise.”
“The revolutionaries were victorious, and the generals in charge of the military, in their zeal to prove their loyalty to the cause, began executing anyone with any claim to the throne whatsoever. Whether the new government wants this or not is debatable and also immaterial, since the end result is the same. The politicians among the revolutionaries are still establishing control and cannot afford to alienate their military leaders. To put it more simply, it’s an unhealthy time to be related to the former regime. Lucky me, I’m a distant cousin on my grandmother’s side, and I was in training to be a wind-speaker. In fact, I had completed my third-year exams and was waiting for my first assignment on a ship—but that’s all over now, because someone traced a family tree and decided that a short-lived marriage was close enough. A faction of loyalists want to use me as a figurehead so they have an excuse to throw the islands into civil war, and the revolutionaries—who have not crowned an emperor but instead installed a parliament—don’t want the loyalists to have any kind of legitimacy whatsoever and are willing to turn a blind eye to any actions taken by their more bloodthirsty factions.” She spat all of this out with the bitterness of someone who has been holding words inside for much too long. “I think the empire will be far better off without an emperor or empress, but no one ever asked me my opinion. They just assumed because some relative I never met was briefly married to someone . . . I didn’t want to be an excuse for more bloodshed, so I fled.”
Kiela stared at her. “You have a ruby because you’re high-level nobility.”
