Page 56 of Black Salt Queen

“Laya? Really?” Duja raised an eyebrow at him, incredulous.

“She requested an early Salmantican lesson. We’ve actually had a few lessons this week,” Ariel said. He took off his spectacles, diverting his gaze as he polished the lenses on the embroidered hem of his shirt.

Duja’s brow furrowed in suspicion. Laya was far from the studious type, and her distaste for foreign languages was no secret. The king had introduced Ariel to the girls, and they knew he was living in the palace. As for the Orfelian’s true purpose there?—Duja’s stomach churned when she took in Ariel’s shifting gaze and nervous fidgeting. Laya had a way with the opposite sex, a gift she no doubt inherited from her father. Duja could see she had already cast a spell over the Orfelian, even if he did not seem to be aware of it yet himself. The realization brought a frown to Duja’s face. Ariel was not a bad-looking man, with his soft eyes and high-boned features, but he possessed none of the danger Laya sought in her suitors. Duja knew her daughter; Laya would not have wasted her time with Ariel if she did not have something to gain from him.

The queen stiffened. Her daughter was too clever for her own good. When it came to Ariel’s presence in Maynara, Laya could sense something was amiss. If she did not yet know about the precioso, she would soon. Duja prayed she would have a better explanation for her interest in the drug by then. For Laya was as clever as she was impatient. She would not understand Duja’s hesitancy to pass down the title. She would assume Duja didn’t trust her to hold that much power, and the discovery would render her furious.

But that conversation, like most of the queen’s worries, would have to wait until another evening. Duja was almost late for the midnight feast.

“Thank you again for your efforts, Dr. Sauros,” she said as she brushed past Ariel on her way out of the workshop. “I will visit you again in the morning to see how the precioso has progressed.”

Ariel dropped his head into a respectful bow. “Of course, Your Majesty. I hope the feast goes well.”

Duja gave him a curt nod before shutting the workshop door behind her. She hurried downstairs and across the courtyard. She entered the great hall to find it empty save for the long table spanning the full length of the room. Despite her detour to Ariel’s workshop, she was the first to arrive, but the datus were expected at the palace within the next few minutes. This was no ordinary meeting. The midnight feast marked the end of the past week’s celebrations, and only the six ruling families were invited. It was a peculiar, closed-door spectacle that felt to Duja as old as the gods themselves. Once she had been crowned queen, Duja dreaded the midnight feast, because it required her to play a role she despised.

“Are you ready, darling?” Hari Aki asked as he strode through the open doors of the hall. Their daughters trailed in after him, and for a brief moment, the sight of them rendered Duja breathless. Not long before, they were little round-faced girls wreaking havoc in the palace. Those little girls were slipping away fast. They were growing into beautiful women, each with awe-inspiring powers of her own.

“As ready as I’ll ever be.” Duja leaned in as he kissed her on the cheek. They took their seats?—Aki, the king, at the opposite end of the table and Laya, her heir, to her right. Since they had spoken earlier that week, Laya was noticeably more churlish with her. Duja sighed, resolving to make amends the following morning. She did not possess the patience to mitigate another clash with Laya at the moment.

Through the doors strode Datu Luma, Datu Patid, and their respective families. They bowed their heads respectfully to Duja as they entered. She straightened her back and greeted them with the distant regard of a sovereign. She needed to fully commit to her role with the arrival of the first guests.

Duja wished they had music, like at the opening ceremony. The midnight feast’s atmosphere was somber, almost funerary, the only noise coming from the faint murmur of conversation as the datus and their families filed in.

Before long, servants arrived with platters stacked high with food: pork buns and pan-fried milk fish and sweet sausages on steaming beds of rice. Absently, she served herself. As she ate, servants kept her wine goblet full without her asking. She swallowed its contents, too lost in her thoughts to taste anything.

“Mother,” Laya whispered. It was the first word she had spoken to Duja since the start of the evening.

Duja looked up. “What is it, Laya?”

Once again, Duja was struck by how much her heir had grown. Not even the flickering shadows of the great hall could hide Laya’s beauty. A cunning spark pierced through the murky-brown depths of her eyes. From behind her head, sconces lit her temples in crowning rays.Regal,Duja thought.Without even trying.

Duja was queen by blood, but not queen by nature?—not the way a Gatdula was meant to be queen. If her older brother’s crimes had been pardonable, she never would have sat upon the throne. In a way, it was a blessing. To grow up her mother’s heir would have been a heavy burden. Laya had borne it for years. That night, when Duja met her daughter’s gaze, she saw the queen she would become?—swift-fingered in the way she shifted her pawns about the court. Godlike in her justice, as in her cruelty. The kind of Gatdula their subjects would come to respect and, one day, adore.

Born a queen, in all the ways Duja could never hope to be.

“Look.” Laya nodded toward Aki’s end of the table, where two seats remained empty. “The Kulaws have yet to arrive.”

“It isn’t like them to be tardy.” Duja kept her voice calm, but her gut twisted with an uneasy feeling.

Her last meeting with Imeria had resurrected painful memories. Duja knew Imeria resented her, but she had not known that buried deep beneath her bitterness dwelled a tiny spark of hope. It was the last surviving speck of the love they had felt for each other as girls. Imeria had clung to it, unwilling to let go. By granting Laya and Luntok the future they could never have, Imeria wanted to see the sentiment echoed in their children. If she were crueler, Duja might have played on her love, teased a gentleness out of Imeria, and cajoled her to join her side for once. Instead, she crushed Imeria’s hope. She had thought she was being merciful. Suddenly, she feared she had misjudged her.

She waited as the feast continued. Servants emerged once again with dessert: pillow-light sponge cakes, sticky-rice balls drenched in coconut sauce, and glutinous rolls wrapped in pandan leaves. Her goblet was filled and refilled, and time ticked on, and still, the Kulaws did not appear. As midnight grew closer, Duja’s gut flipped in apprehension. Imeria’s absence had not gone unnoticed by the other datus. They could not conduct the closing ceremony without her.

Once the servants came to clear the plates, Maiza appeared at Duja’s shoulder. “The ceremony must start soon, Your Majesty,” she said in a low voice.

She nodded and met Aki’s eyes at the other end of the table, where the two seats remained empty. The king’s brow was knitted in confusion. This was unlike Imeria. Although she had insulted the Gatdulas with a string of absences in the past, not once had she forgone the closing ceremony. After all, Imeria was not an idiot. She knew the evening was too vital for her position on the council, and for the functioning of the Maynaran government, to miss.

The queen thought hard about their last conversation for any hints she might have forgotten. She would have heard if Imeria had left Mariit, but Imeria would never have dared return to the south before the end of the feast days. Any other absence could have been forgiven. This was the one night she needed to be in the palace.

Duja scanned the hall, her gaze landing on General Ojas, stationed at the wall across from her, flanked by two of his men. He met her gaze and swept across the room when she gestured him over.

He stood beside Maiza, leaning over Duja’s other shoulder. “Yes, Your Majesty?”

Duja glanced at the guests seated nearest her. Datu Luma and his wife were sitting within earshot. Although they were close friends of the crown, she didn’t want them to know the extent of her troubles with Imeria.

She lowered her voice to a whisper. “Could you sweep the perimeter? See if perhaps Datu Kulaw and her party have gotten lost somewhere in the palace grounds.”

Recognition flickered in Ojas’s eyes. “Right away, Your Majesty.” He straightened and strode out of the room, a pair of junior guardsmen marching at his heels.

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