Shrouded: Heartstone Book One (15 page)

T
he sky roiled
and curled with the storm. It stared down with one red eye and witnessed his retreat. The flags rode the winds, spoke of toxins. Dolfan forgot his breather; he took three steps into the chaos before he remembered to use it. He dug into his shirt and kept walking, holding his breath and feeling like an idiot, like Mofitan, no less.

Fool.

He stopped at the edge of the plaza and slid the device in place. Another round of cheers howled through the opening behind him. He heard it, even over the fury of the storm. The sound twisted in his gut and brought on another wave of nausea.

He looked to the flags, and then eyed the stairs. Where was he going? The hover pad called him, but the new council would meet too soon for a trip to Base 14. Still, the planet had more than one crevasse. He could find a pit to sink into somewhere far from here.

A shadow moved in front of him, and Dolfan turned from the stair mid-step.

The temple door opened and a tall form stood in the entrance. The silhouette waved an arm, gestured for him to come. Where else did have to go? Dolfan spun on his heel and marched across the stones. He slipped into the temple with the wind swirling at his back and the palace cheers pushing his steps.

Shayd waited in the foyer. He paced forward and back, pausing only to toss a wild-eyed look at Dolfan. “She’s not the Kingmaker.” He stopped suddenly and stared at the doors.

“The Heart.” Dolfan stifled the surge of hope and frowned. He didn’t figure Shayd for one to doubt.

“Yes, yes.” The tall prince threw his wrap back over his shoulders and nodded, but he didn’t seem to be listening to anything besides his own thoughts. “Something odd. I was certain of the vision, but Syradan.”

“Syradan confirmed Haftan.” Dolfan pressed his lips tight. “And the Kingmaker.”

“Something, something.” His head snapped up and he looked directly at Dolfan, shook off whatever spell held him and nodded. “Come on.”

He spun around, and his robes fanned out around his legs. Before Dolfan could answer or think, Shayd pushed through the curtain and disappeared. He watched the fabric ripple for a moment before following. The Heart gave her to Haftan. The Heart was never wrong, and this—questioning the ceremony—did not happen.

The lights transformed the room into an ordinary space. Instead of smoke and shadow, he caught the whiff of fresh herbs and saw the shelves that lined the walls. They overflowed with unidentified clutter. The huge brazier sat lifeless and heavy in the center of the room, its fire untended during ordinary hours. Very little remained to hint at the temple’s ritual functions.

Shayd ignored his entrance. He dug in one of the cupboards, snatching boxes and little cloth bags and lining them up on the counter below. He talked the entire time, but the words were muttered so low, he had to be speaking to himself. Dolfan looked around the room, shifted his weight from one foot to the other, and waited. He wasn’t used to Shayd speaking. None of them were.

When the other prince loaded the supplies into his arms and headed for the brazier, Dolfan moved in and caught the few things that fell as he walked.

“Thanks.” Shayd deposited the lot on a small table and, without pause, began to open vials and toss ingredients into a crystal bowl. “Can you fetch that igniter?”

“Sure.” He sighted along the arm Shayd had flung and found the lighter on the other wall. The celebration in the Palace wouldn’t last forever. They’d miss him and Shayd both. He sighed. His window of escape narrowed with each packet Shayd fiddled with. He plucked the igniter from its rack and turned back to the brazier.

He watched the other prince—the Seer now—flick the device and set the flame to the base. The element lit and the big pot flared to life.

“Something…this particular king-making.” Shayd kept talking as if they’d been having a conversation the entire time. “I don’t know. I need to see.”

“Listen.” Dolfan took a step closer to the flaming bowl. “It’s over, right?”

“Maybe.” Shayd threw the contents of the bowl into the brazier, and a wave of smoke blasted into the air. “The lights, please.”

He turned back toward the entrance, but the lights clicked off long before he reached them. Another shadow moved into the room, crossed with heavy steps and joined them in the raging glow now spilling from underneath Shayd’s work. Mofitan.

“Haftan,” he spat. He glanced briefly in Dolfan’s direction. “I’d rather have had you.”

“Thanks a lot.”

“Shhh.” Shayd tossed another handful of something and peered at the smoke. “I must see.”

Mofitan leaned forward and looked intently, as if he too could read the clouds that billowed from the pot. The stench of it choked in Dolfan’s throat. It was only partly the odor of the herbs. This thing they worked at was more than blasphemy, it was treason. He wanted no part of it, no matter what he’d thought or felt.

“The Heart already chose,” he said.

Two heads snapped in his direction. Both faces stared at him with wide eyes. He shook his head. “Not me.” He put his hands out, palm up. “I’ll keep quiet, but I’m leaving now.”

They didn’t try to stop him, and he backed as far as the door before Mofitan spoke.

“You really didn’t want the throne?”

Dolfan didn’t answer. He pushed his way through the curtain and stormed through the foyer to the doors. This time, he slammed his breather in place before leaving. Of course he hadn’t wanted the throne. He’d wanted the Heart, had wanted
her
. He crossed to the stairway, keeping as much distance as possible between him and the Palace. Now, all things considered, he prayed it never found him.

No one ever wants to leave?
He leapt two stairs at a time to the hover platform. The council would have to wait for Mofitan and Shayd to finish their mischief. He could squeeze in a short ride, a short trip under the weight of the Shroud. His own words taunted him as he went. Today, he knew at least one Shrouded would have given anything to escape his planet.

V
ashia stumbled
after Haftan down the wide halls. Arches passed on her right, galleries and curving windows on the left. She forgot to count them. Her eyes darted from her feet to the servants drifting like a train in her wake to the hallway ahead where the back of the man she’d be forced to marry drifted like a mast down the center of the aisle.

Not forced. She’d gone into this voluntarily. Her feet stuttered and she had to throw out an arm to keep from tripping. What the hell had happened? She’d felt their Heart, had known for a few seconds that it was real. But the stone had handed her to this Haftan, and she couldn’t begin to understand why.

She looked up in time to avoid slamming into him. He stood in front of a tall doorway and eyed her sideways as she skidded to a stop. Her duffle smacked into her thigh, the strap wrenching her shoulder. She blinked up at the prince who would be her husband.

Offspring.

He frowned and tilted his head to the side. His hair hung far below his shoulders, and he wore it loose and flowing. Lilac skin covered a slimmer frame than either Mofitan or Dolfan’s. Haftan was snakelike, wiry, and his wraps bound slender, muscular limbs. His face bothered her the most. The expressions she found there left her cold and lodged a seed of fear in her gut that hadn’t rested there since Eclipsis.

“These will be our rooms.” His voice hissed, cementing the snake in her mind. His words flowed, but his face twitched and tightened. “Until the coronation.”

Vashia couldn’t formulate a response. Her brain shied away from “our rooms,” and she watched dumb while he opened the doors and vanished inside. She took a slow breath and then followed him into an enormous chamber.

Windows covered the outer wall and the Shroud blazed through, lighting the space in a blush of gold and peach. The ceilings rose higher than any in the governor’s estate on Eclipsis, and the furnishings sat like rich, exotic museum pieces around the room. Vashia tried to imagine sitting in the carved agate chairs, and cringed at the idea of tainting the embroidered silk upholstery. She was supposed to live here?

A long table faced the windows, covered in more silk and topped with stone vases that sprouted plumes of orchids similar to the varieties in the atrium on the moon. She’d never forget the scent, not if she went the rest of her life without smelling it again. It hung in the air in “their rooms” and almost washed away the tension between them.

Haftan waved the servants back out into the hallway. Once the door had closed, he pointed to an archway in the far wall. “The bedroom is through there.” He didn’t face her. His fingers found the orchids and stroked the tiny petals absently. He stared out at the Shroud. “The other is the bath.”

He’d said no more than that to her since the Heart had bound them together. Vashia watched his back and felt a surge of anger. They’d been crowded and pushed from place to place. She’d been congratulated by strangers, by the new friends that were immediately whisked away to their own fates. They’d only given her seconds to say goodbye. Her friends, Tarren and Murrel, if she could still count the girl among her friends, would follow their own path, and Vashia might never know what became of them.

Why congratulate her on one more newfound misery?

“Excuse me?” She watched Haftan sigh. His shoulders lifted and then settled again before he turned to regard her directly for only the second or third time since they’d met across the huge stone. “I’m sorry to bother you, but where would you like me to put my stuff? Do you have a side preference? Or should I just hop on in there and make myself at home?”

The tremble that snuck into her voice ruined the effect she’d aimed for, but it worked. Haftan snapped out of whatever fugue he’d been lost in and looked at her like she’d just appeared for the first time. His eyes went wide. Had he even considered their arrangement?

“You,” he said pointedly, “can have the bedchamber. I’ll be sleeping here for now.” He waved indistinctly around the main room. It had more than one couch, lounges that made her cot aboard the ship look like a plank of wood, but she’d never have suggested them for princely sleep.

She blinked at him again. If he meant it, she could relax considerably as far as her most immediate terror was concerned.

“Eventually,” he continued. This time he took a step away, putting part of the table between them. “I will need to produce an offspring. It would look odd, otherwise.”

“Offspring?” She repeated it. She sounded stupid, but what else could she say to the man? He obviously had no interest in her at all.

“I’m not going to rape you,” he said, matter-of-factly, “but you did sign a contract. I’m sure when the time comes, we’ll be able to work something out.” He turned away, sighed, and looked back to the windows, as if examining the Shroud’s patterns.

“And in the meantime?” She’d signed the contract. She said it in her head. She’d come here of her own free will.

“I’m sure you can find things to do.” He shrugged. His manner relaxed and he picked up a clear pitcher of water and poured a measure into a long goblet. “There are plenty of amusements around court. You’ll join me on the throne when I need you.”

“Will there be a wedding?” Vashia watched him drink. He’d finished the unpleasant topic of their sleeping arrangements and moved to the more pressing issue of his rule. In the process, he’d completely negated everything she’d been told about the Heart.

“A wedding?” His brows rose. “The Heart wed us the minute we touched it. A bonded pair has no need of any further ceremony.”

“A bonded pair.” Vashia felt the flare of anger again. “You mean, because the big crystal said we were perfect for one another?”

She expected to piss him off, for some reaction along that line, but Haftan turned four shades of terrified. His hand shook as he placed the cup back on the table.

“Listen to me.” His voice trembled as well. “As far as anyone outside this room knows, we
are
perfectly matched. The Heart makes no mistakes.”

She nodded and took a step backwards. Haftan might not have Dolfan’s mass, but he still towered over her.

He sighed again and shook his head. “You must understand,” he said, smiling, his voice dripping like honey, “our religious beliefs serve us well. They keep the right blood on the throne and the right amount of faith in the king’s position.”

“Absolute faith,” she said. “No questions.”

“Exactly. You understand?”

“Yes.” She understood. It was all smoke and mirrors after all. The Heart, the bonding, all of it was exactly like Tarren said—politics and religion.

“There will be a coronation,” Haftan continued. “I’ll see to it that you have the appropriate clothing made.”

He nodded and smiled again. She shivered when he passed her, watched him stride to the door and clenched her teeth together. Haftan, her husband, slipped back out into the hallway.
The Heart wed us the minute we touched it.
She waited for the doors to click shut, till she was sure her “perfect match” had gone, and then turned to the windows.

The Shroud swirled overhead, pressing down with the full force of its weight. Vashia sighed and glared at it. Haftan was an asshole, but he was still better than Jarn by a long stretch. She ignored the flash of something else: a flicker of dashed hope and the image of Dolfan that just wouldn’t go the hell away.