She sounded bloodthirsty. She finally remembered Eshal.

  “What about King Eshal?” she asked.

  “My father is planning to make him a lord, give him a province. He says the king will not be harmed,” Cheran said.

  She was glad. It would have made more sense for the emperor to plan on killing Eshal. Vayu herself was proof of why threats to the throne shouldn’t be kept alive. The whole of Noumin had all probably given up hope long ago of having her as queen. Raval had broken her will to rebel completely as a child. She had not entertained even thoughts of fighting back while she was a novice. She had always taken a step back when she was attacked, always protecting herself and the people around her.

  That was the way people lost everything. As an adolescent she had tried for a few days at court to counter Raval’s influence. People had slipped through her fingers like sand. Some of them had switched sides, and some had been exiled or silenced. A few, she did not know what came of them. It had taken her ten years, studying history and the present, to understand that the best defense was an offense, and that too one taken early.

  “I’m thankful for that,” she said.

  “Are you serious about wanting this war?” Cheran asked. Vayu understood his confusion. Priests and priestess preached peace, taught patience, and lived by the philosophy of pacifism. They had the luxury of doing so. Most rulers did not burn down monasteries or hurt men and women of god. There was always some fear of divine retribution, and monasteries and temples passed through war like mountains weathered storms. They did not understand the plight of everyone that lived outside their cocoon.

  “Do you know what Noumin’s biggest industry is?” Vayu asked.

  Cheran balked at the sudden question. “I believe it was fishing.”

  “We are a peninsular country, and our biggest industry is fishing. We could have been a center of trade, we could have established ports for travel, we could have been the ones bringing in goods from other continents to most of Fessia. Instead, our people are stuck… fishing. If they are bolder, they dive for pearls. Noumin’s people are a victim of poor governance. Our infrastructure is non-existent, our treasury laughable, and our rulers uneducated. We can change all that if we come to power.”

  It sounded so selfish, so uncharacteristic of her. She was speaking of Noumin’s economy and helping people, but she wanted to rule Noumin as well. For the first thirteen years of her life, she had thought she would rule Noumin one day. She’d written up grand, unrealistic plans as a child of making changes to the nation. She wanted her birthright. Once they won the war, Noumin would be only a province. But it would be a province with the backing of the empire.

  Cheran looked afraid of her. Of course he did. He had seen a girl that was tossed from place to place like a sack of rice. Now she was talking about commerce, trade, and governance. It was easy for people to forget that she had spent over half her life being prepared to rule a nation. Most times, she forgot it too. He wanted to spend the rest of his life with her.

  That part of their conversation seemed too big to speak about for the moment. That part, they could come to once they were back home. He said he really liked her, but she wondered if that would change now. She was hungry for power, in a way. Perhaps it was because she spent so much time being powerless. It was not a pretty thing though, to want power so openly. It was fine for emperors and crown princes, but not for people like her. People were wary of women who wanted power.

  “We should speak to your father,” Vayu said. “I want to offer him whatever support I can.”

  Something cracked by her side. It cut through the stillness of the late afternoon, and she looked down. The rock had a jagged line down its length.

  “Did I drop it?” she asked.

  She wouldn’t be surprised if she had. She was excited at the revelation. She was excited that she was so integral to the emperor’s plans. For months, she wondered if she would be tossed aside once proper trade routes were established to the Nouminese ports, from Daivia’s borders. The castle and the luxuries it held did not hold much allure for her. If anything, sometimes the extent of the comfort bothered her.

  She didn’t want to leave Cheran behind. He seemed too kind for the kind of role he was born to play. One did not maintain empires by being kind. They lived in a world where if you offered someone a hand to help, they’d use that gesture to pull you down. She was a cynic, it was true. But she was more often right about peoples’ motivations than she was wrong. People were selfish creatures, whether it was for them or for the people they loved. She was no exception. Cheran might find someone who could make him genuinely happy, someone who did not pray so often and was better at holding a conversation. But she was selfish, and she wanted no one else by his side.

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  They both spoke of letting each other go to other people, but she was no longer sure that she could. If he ever told her of another woman, there was a chance she would send assassins after the woman. She really liked him, more than was healthy, more than was rational after just a few months of knowing one another.

  The crack extended further down the rock’s surface, and then it started to split apart. Instead of two solid chunks of stone, the rock split apart to reveal a hollow inside. It was exactly like an egg, but empty.

  “What a strange rock,” she said. Now it felt pointless, taking it back home. The leftover pieces of rock were fragile and fragmented into smaller pieces in her hand. Although, she didn’t think she would have trouble remembering this day. They rode back to the castle in silence. She was planning to meet the emperor soon, and help him in whatever way she could.

  They were at the castle walls when she felt the first of the pain. At first she thought it was only the effects of over exerting herself. She’d traveled for hours, walked around more than she usually did, and found out two life-altering things. If she went to her room and slept, she would feel better after a few hours. Perhaps she would take another vial of that medicine Cheran kept bringing to her.

  The second pang of pain, she felt from her fingertips to her skull, and she bent over. It was unbearable, a hundred times worse than the poison. She tried to breathe through it. Cheran was holding onto her shoulders, and mumbling something to her. It might have been words of comfort, questions about how bad it was. She heard nothing.

  She looked down at her hands, balled into fists. Against all her body’s internal screaming, she stretched out her hands. Her fingers were ink black up to her knuckles. Cheran reached for her hands, and she flinched away. If there was a chance it was contagious, she didn’t want to spread it to him.

  “Stay. Away.”

  She had beat death once. It was true that she was weak and she had no idea what happened to her, but she would beat it again. She didn’t want to die, not when there was so much to look forward to, so much to fight for. They raced towards the castle again, and the same physician was brought to her chambers.

  This time he did not have a cure or even an answer. The darkness slowly moved up her arms, something dark filling her veins and spreading out to the surrounding skin. Over time, she grew used to the pain. It didn’t hurt so much, and she sat up in her bed. The fluid in her veins was still moving upwards, but it no longer felt so foreign. It was dark and warm, and after the pain ebbed the warmth was almost soothing.

  She hated the unknown. It felt like she was getting better, but perhaps it was only that her body had given up trying to defend itself from the attack. Maybe this new poison was giving her mercy of a peaceful death. Cheran was still by her side, growing increasingly worried.

  “I’m starting to feel better,” she said. She didn’t want to hope too much for herself, but Cheran at least deserved hope.

  “It wasn’t anything in our food or drink,” Cheran said. He dropped his head into his hands.

  “Oh, it was the strange rock, certainly,” Vayu said. She started to giggle. “How were we so stupid? Someone threw a rock at us and I just decided to keep it by my side until it broke apart. Who knows what the rock was covered in, what it contained. Why didn’t I just try to embrace an incoming cannon?”

  The fact that she could breathe, the fact that she could move… it was giving her a false sense of security. It was letting her for a moment forget that she might be dead by the morning.

  “We were so stupid,” she said, smiling at the baffled expression on Cheran’s face.

  “How are you laughing right now?”

  She was laughing because once again, she had been blindsided by life. She always paid dearly for brief moments of happiness, and somehow was always surprised by the misfortunes that hit her just when she thought she could be happy.

  “I’m not surprised by this,” she admitted. “I find out that you truly like me, I find out that I can change Nouminese peoples’ lives for the better, and minutes later I’m at risk of dying. Isn’t it funny how quickly life gives and then takes it all away?”

  “You’re not going to die,” Cheran said.

  She shrugged her shoulders. Looking down, the dark liquid had reached her collarbones. However, it was lighter now, more like streaks from watercolor paints than something solid.

  “I don’t think I am,” she agreed. Now that the pain was gone, she actually felt better than she did in the morning. She felt better than she had in days.

  “I’ll have Obal and the others examine the pieces of rock from the estate,” Cheran said. “Perhaps one of the university scholars can glean something from it.”

  She had a feeling that they would find nothing once they went back to the estate. This time, the attack did not feel like an attempt to kill her. It did not even feel like an attack. It was like a harsh collision of two entities. Whatever was within her blood now felt like it was making room for itself within the crevices of her body, becoming one with her while trying not to cause harm.

  Again, she smiled. It was just her wishful thinking. It was probably only a poison that was not so potent. Perhaps it was something she was immune to. It was well into the evening, with the physician plying her with concoctions meant to bolster her strength and remove toxins from her body.

  “I think I want to sleep,” she said, stifling a yawn. “I have a feeling I’ll be better in the morning.”

  She had no such feelings, but she was tired and she wanted to sleep. They could fuss over her just as much while she slept.

  “I don’t think that’s a good idea,” Cheran said.

  “Regardless, I’m tired. I can’t hold out for much longer. You can try to wake me up if it feels like I’m going into something beyond sleep.”

  “And if I can’t?” he asked.

  Vayu hesitated. “Then you can try everything else as well. Resurrect me, if you find a way to. Until then, I really like you too. I don’t have anyone else I’d rather spend the rest of my life with, even if the rest of my life is just tonight.”