Page 11 of Black Salt Queen

Mournfully, Eti complied, slipping out of Laya’s shawl with a dramatic sigh. Laya reached out to tweak her nose. “Don’t fret, Eti,” she told her. “When I am queen, I’ll buy you a trunkful of pretty dresses.”

“You’d better,” Eti said. She hung her head as she followed Maiza out of the room.

Laya stepped out of her blouse and skirt to try on her next ensemble. Bulan watched her, her brow knitted in uncertainty.

“Why are you looking at me like that?” Laya asked.

“All this talk about weddings,” Bulan said. “I hope you’re not truly listening to the rumors.”

“Of course not,” she said. “You know me better than that.”

“I know. But as high counselor?—”

Laya gritted her teeth in impatience. “As high counselor, you will advise me when I ask you to, and not a moment sooner.”

She could hear in her sister’s tone that Bulan was one sentence away from lecturing her about Luntok and bloodlines and political matches. The last thing Laya wanted was another reminder of the failed rebellion led by Luntok’s relatives three decades earlier. The Kulaws’ war had slashed an ugly wound through the island, and their family had been granted clemency to keep it from festering. But as punishment, no Kulaw could come near the Maynaran throne.

To wed a Gatdula was a privilege granted only to descendants of the kingdom’s most loyal families. According to myth, the oldest bloodlines in Maynara once practiced magic of their own. There were the Lumas, who were believed to have had the ability to commune with beasts. And the Tanglaws, with their bygone talent for soothsaying. Most nobles believed that marriage to a Gatdula?—and mixing their blood together?—would allow their long-lost magic to one day reawaken. Such a phenomenon had yet to occur, but the nobles’ faith in the possibility held fierce. That faith grew stronger with each generation?—too strong even for the mighty Gatdulas to ignore. Despite their uncontested abilities and rank, faith that powerful demanded at least a modicum of appeasement. Laya hadn’t forgotten. The gods knew she received enough of those lectures from her mother.

Bulan huffed but stepped back, lowering her gaze. “I’m only saying, Laya, you don’t need to bow to the pressure. With your power, you’re strong enough to reign without a marriage alliance.”

Her sister spoke not out of jealousy, for once, but out of concern. A bolt of excitement ran down Laya’s spine at Bulan’s words. From the window on the opposite wall, the sun rose above the tiered rooftops, casting light across the mirror’s polished glass. She stared at the mirror, unblinking, until the seamstress left the room and returned with a bundle of indigo and gold.

“Arms,” the seamstress said.

Wordlessly, Laya raised them.

Bulan ducked out of the doorway, letting Laya carry on with the gown fitting in peace. Laya stood stock-still while the seamstress draped the fine silks over her body, pinning them to perfection. Her sister’s claim echoed in Laya’s ears long after Bulan left the dressing room.

Laya didn’t believe Gatdula blood could revive a nobleman’s lost bloodright. But she knew that to take a husband would be to share the throne. Although Laya grew up with two siblings, she didn’t care for the idea of sharing one bit. Ruling without a marriage alliance, however?—that was a prospect she had yet to consider.

“Almost done, Dayang,” the seamstress murmured. She reached toward the table behind Laya for the last ensemble?—a day dress of cerulean pongee, which floated down to her knees?—and a royal sash tumbled from the pile. It was a simple column of viridian silk, bearing the Gatdulas’ curled-crocodile insignia. This was the queen’s sash, meant for Laya’s mother.

“I apologize,” the seamstress said. “I don’t know how that got in there.”

“No matter,” Laya told her. “I want to try it on for myself.”

She knelt so the seamstress could lift the sash over her head, draping it over her white cotton camisole. The sash hung from her left shoulder, gathering at her opposite hip. Laya traced the hemline, and the thin fabric slipped between her fingers. She looked back at the mirror. The sunlight had shifted since the start of their fitting. Its rays glared off the glass, outlining the crown of Laya’s head in piercing light.

“You look beautiful, Dayang,” the seamstress said, bowing her head.

The corners of Laya’s lips quirked up into a smile. “Like a queen?” she asked.

The seamstress met Laya’s gaze in the glass. “More than that,” she said in a low, heavy whisper.

No one ever looked at Hara Duja the way the seamstress was looking at Laya now. Smugly, Laya committed the woman’s expression to memory. When she was queen, she would see the same expression echoed across a thousand faces. No longer would they gripe about Laya’s untamed power. No longer would they question her readiness to rule. All would fall silent the moment they saw her sitting high above them on the Maynaran throne. Whether they liked her or not, the entire country knew Laya belonged there.

Hara Duja, Maiza?—they were always telling Laya she was too young, too fickle, to understand the responsibilities awaiting her. But she understood far better than they did what it meant to reign over Maynara. Although centuries had passed since the first Gatdula king had rid the land of invaders, foreign ships still lingered on the horizon. One by one, the invaders had vanquished the neighboring kingdoms. Maynara was the last sovereign nation left for miles?—and their sovereignty hinged on the Gatdulas’ very existence. For the Gatdulas were the one thing standing between them and conquest. They stood for safety and prosperity. They were freedom made flesh. That was why their people worshipped their monarchs more than their ancestral spirits, more than Mulayri himself.

Laya knew that a Gatdula’s reign was about more than ruling a country. To become queen of Maynara was to become a god.

Unlike her mother, Laya had never shied away from her destiny. She donned it like armor. And soon, she would slip into her rightful title like a glove. In her imagination, they called to her, thousands of Maynarans chanting her name?—Hara Laya.

That bolt of excitement rushed through her again, and she thought back to Bulan’s claim. Her sister was right?—all this marriage talk was nonsense. Laya was stronger than her mother. Stronger than any Gatdula who’d come before her.

Strong enough to sit upon the throne alone.

Five

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