Page 20 of The Kingdom's Crown

"More!" Camellia cried out, voice ragged.

Heat tugged at me, and I stiffened in my chair, throwing up a guard of magic almost unconsciously, shocked by the ease of the act. The man at my right groaned, whimpered almost, and slid out of his seat, crawling reluctantly in the young princess's direction.

Bryony's movements froze, her body trembling with tension, eyes finally lifting from her plate to glare in her sister's direction, green fire in her gaze. I leaned forward, putting myself in the way, and found it easier to smile than I expected, rewarded with the slow sigh that lowered Bryony's shoulders.

I was angry, I hated sitting at this table, stuck with the role of forced audience to the younger princess's performance, but so did Bryony. Her anger was palpable, and even that prickling bite of her Hunger snapping at me was more welcome than the dizzy torrent from her sister or mother.

"It's not meat on a stick, is it?" I asked, making Thao flinch by lifting what I supposed was a quail from a pile, jiggling it by its leg.

Bryony blinked and then snorted, shaking her head. "Unfortunately not." She glanced briefly up the table before turning her face away, color on her cheeks. "Royal dinners aren't… They're not so common," she said softly. "I usually just ate in my room."

"With your ladies?" Thao asked.

Bryony shook her head. "I didn't have ladies. With a book," she said, smiling to herself.

Thao opened his mouth and then shut it again, looking to me. Alone? Is that what she meant? That she usually ate her dinners alone in her room with a book?

"When we were young, sometimes Camellia and I ate with a nursemaid or one of our tutors," she added, taking another bite of her tart, not noticing the way we all stared at her.

The suite had a private dining room and I'd sneered at the room, thinking it unnecessary at the time I'd found it, but now I looked forward to dinners there. It would be like we were at the Winter Palace again, but more intimate. With this hint of how Bryony had grown up, I wanted to fill her dinners with conversation and company.

There was a moan from the head of the table, but already I'd learned not to look. Chairs squeaked, and a feminine laugh echoed as footsteps rushed away. On the floor, Camellia's cries grew louder.

Bryony's expression shuttered again. "There is music after dinner, but no one will notice if we're here or not."

It was tempting to try and find a way to make her smile again, maybe a little dancing. But it was more tempting to get away from the scene around us, and I suspected it would do Bryony more good.

* * *

The castle was orderly,easy to map in my mind, rooms defined by the rare treasures decorating every surface. A little light thieving in the castle might go unnoticed, and it could do a wealth of good in the north.

Bryony wouldprobablyforgive me.

But my role of the moment wasn't rogue, but mage. I was hunting through the castle for the royal mages, trekking up and down floors of courtly rooms, libraries, meeting halls, even down into the relatively empty dungeons. It wasn't until I accidentally tripped my way into the guard's quarters that I was able to get directions.

The mages' study was in the heart of the residential wing. After a moment of confusion, it began to make sense. Camellia stuffed her Chosen up with her Hunger, creating a constant loop of attraction, but Queen Peony seemed to let hers float about as Bryony had before learning control. By putting their studies beneath the queen's quarters, the mages provided themselves with a constant supply of power.

It was clinging to the ceiling, pale and soft, not quite as potent as Bryony's magic. A little airy like the mother. Did the nature of magic relate to the personality of the woman who created it? The thought made me smile. Bryony was a little like her fencing sword—light and elegant, flexible, unexpectedly powerful and sharp when challenged—but she was more precise than her magic, which was wild and somewhat sensual.

No, she's that too, I reminded myself, conjuring a picture of her twisting in the sheets of her bedding, chasing pleasure even as she tried to squirm away from it.

There wasn't much decoration here in the hall. Already in our suite, Bryony's magic had begun to work its way into minor details of the room, unraveling the orderly elegance and fashioning it into whimsy. Either the mages were gathering every spare scrap of the queen's power, or hers didn't have the same clever creativity as Bryony's.

I raised my hand to knock on the broad double doors and then hesitated. Did I want to ask permission to enter and risk being denied?

My lips twitched, and my hand dropped to the door handle, trying to twist, only to find it locked. Easily dealt with. I traced a quick sigil over the lock, magic flying readily from my fingertip, and listened to the tumblers turn and thunk. The handle twisted easily under my grip, and I leaned in to shoulder the door open.

The air inside the room was stiff, lamps turned up high and windows shrouded in heavy dark curtains. It was immediately clear where the queen's magic was going. At the center of the room was a massive crystal prism, throbbing with light, shimmering without cause. The most outrageously enormous and well-charged conduit I'd ever seen in my life, my dreams even.

Doors remained open on either end of the room, but there was no one here watching this prism, and I hesitated in place, almost afraid to step forward. Bryony's magic that she'd shared with me tugged me in the direction of the prism. It called magic, like to like, and I closed my fist at my sides, holding on tightly to what I possessed.

There was no furniture in the room aside from tables in the corner, and none of the trinkets other mages might use to collect power—gold coins and shells, fine gemstones cut into rings. Of course there wasn't, anything else would've interfered with the vacuum of the prism.

I stepped softly closer, moving in a slow circle around the object. It was resting in a gold stand, branches extended around the facets of the prism, pinching it between the ends like an egg held in a bird's claw. It was about a foot off the ground and as tall as my waist. Every step I made, the light changed and shifted inside, as if my eyes were playing tricks on me. Or the prism was.

This was what powered waterfalls in our bathing pool, what made the palace floors shine and the chandeliers glitter and the fires roar. This was also what held magic captive, preventing it from being so easily accessed outside of the castle.

"Who are you?"

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