Long May She Reign(97)

“You have to catch sunrise,” Fitzroy said. “It’ll be most dramatic that way.”

“I know,” I said. “Believe me, I know. I just have to get ready.” I glanced down at my ruined dress, and then across at Naomi. She could help me, it was true, but if I wanted to look perfect . . .

I should have locked her up in the dungeon. I should never want to speak to her again. But Madeleine was the best at presentation, and I needed to make a statement.

And then . . . a part of me still cared about her. That part wanted to see her, wanted to work with her, to prove she wasn’t as awful as I now knew she was. As though redemption were possible after mass murder.

So I knocked on Madeleine’s door. Madeleine answered it, as elegant as always. I felt a tug in my stomach at the sight of her, honey-brown hair cascading down her back, eyes bright, standing straight and tall. Her smile was a little smaller than usual, a little sadder, but otherwise Madeleine still looked like Madeleine. Just one glance made me want to pause in the moment, forget what I knew.

“Freya? Are you all right?”

I stepped around her into the room. It smelled of oil paint and turpentine. The stone wall at the far side was covered in color, a manor on a hill, sheep in the fields, a sunset, ocean waves crashing against a cliff. Madeleine must have been painting nonstop since I locked her in here. Her paintbrush flying over her makeshift canvas, the uncertainty of her future making her desperate to create. But she was completely composed now, not a drop of paint on her.

“I need you to help me,” I said. “I need you to make me a queen.”

“You are already a queen.”

I shook my head. “Make me magnificent. Make it so when the sun rises behind me, I look like a goddess. Can you do that?”

Madeleine smiled her slight smile again. “Yes. I can do that.”

Her fingers brushed against me as she pulled a dress over my head, as she placed my hair just so, as she draped the Star of Valanthe around my neck and dabbed powder on my eyelids to capture the light. And I felt so safe, knowing Madeleine would make things right, Madeleine always knew what to do . . . but then Madeleine stepped back, her hands fanning out as if to say, “There”; and I remembered all she had done. All she had put in motion. I stepped away from her, just slightly, and looked at my reflection.

It was perfect. Of course it was perfect. My stomach twisted as I stared at myself, the image of a queen, complete with flowers in my hair and a tiara glinting in the lamplight. Madeleine’s work. Madeleine’s creation. And I hated her, I did, for all the pain she had caused. But I loved her, too. I couldn’t crush that feeling so easily, couldn’t deny how important she’d been to me the past few weeks. How Madeleine had brought me here, and how she would help me to live.

“Thank you,” I said softly. “It’s perfect.” I left the room without another word.

The sky was beginning to lighten, but the sun had yet to appear. Everything around us was still. The people who remained in the capital were hunkering down, hiding in their homes and hoping for the best. There were no soldiers in the streets, no guards. They were all on the walls, ready to begin.

My carriage jolted to a stop in front of the city gates, and I stepped out. I paused in front of the steps onto the walls and took a deep breath. I did not have to speak this time, but I had to look the part. Calm. Confident.

I climbed the stairs, my heels clinking on the stone. Rasmus Holt waited in the guard tower at the top. “Your Majesty,” he said. “Everything is ready.”

“Good.” I glanced over my shoulder at the ever-lightening sky and thanked the city builders of long ago. The main gate, the point where Sten’s men must attack, faced west, meaning any soldiers attacking in the morning must march toward the rising sun. The builders had intended for it to put glare in the soldiers’ eyes. But the sun would serve a different purpose for me now.

“The Forgotten will be with you,” Holt said.

I nodded my thanks and stepped onto the walls, alone. Men were scattered along the ramparts, too few to man it effectively.

Sten’s army approached from the west. A mass of soldiers, some on horseback, some on foot, making a slow advance, as though their mere presence might terrify me into surrender. They were a mess of armor and weapons, old tournament helmets and chain mail and leather boots, a thrown-together army of the kingdom’s past.

I reached the middle of the wall, and I turned to face the fields beyond. Crystals and cut-glass prisms had been arranged around me, hanging from the gate towers on either side.

I could only hope they would work the way I’d imagined.

Sten’s men were approaching, the sun was rising. My own men were gathered in front of the gates, a paltry force, but necessary for the show. Sten did not know about the spies in his ranks, did not know what we’d hidden in the grass in the dark. He didn’t know what I was capable of.

I stepped onto the side of the wall itself, so I towered over the fields, so everyone would look up and see me first. I was exposing myself to arrows, I risked falling, risked death, but I refused to look anything other than fierce and serene as I stared down at the approaching army, and the sun burst over the horizon behind me.

An explosion of orange and red framed my silhouette. The rays of the dawn caught in the crystals and prisms, breaking into more shafts of light, more colors, so it bounced and swelled and glared, forming a living halo around me. It stung my eyes, but I refused to blink. I would not look away. I stared down the approaching army, and the Forgotten lit me up for all to see.