Violet Made of Thorns (Violet Made of Thorns #1)
Gina Chen
For the readers who believed in me before I did
Today, Prince Cyrus returns to the capital with a bride, or else.
From the Seer’s Tower, the tallest point in the Sun Capital, I can see a train of purple banners fluttering amid the fields outside the city—the royal caravan making the steep approach to the south gates. Cordoned-off crowds pack the streets, waiting to welcome their prince home. Six months have passed since Cyrus departed to tour the continent, since he set out to “seek from the land and its generous people all the wisdom” that he could not learn in a palace.
Or something like that. I stopped listening to his going-away speech midway through.
Mostly, his tour was to find a bride—a solution to his curse. Cyrus didn’t mention that in his speech. I know this because his father, King Emilius, berated him afterward for the omission; then I had to mention it in my speech, a few days later, when I announced that I dreamed a new prophecy.
The best part about being Seer isn’t the tower or the amenities or the access to the king. It’s how easily everyone believes what you say.
“The capital was less lively without His Highness. I do miss those girls running amok, trying to save him,” says the peach-faced woman sitting at my divining table. “I suppose that will change for good. He’s chosen our next queen by now, hasn’t he?”
If Cyrus listened to me, he would have. “He better,” I mutter, turning from the window.
“Pardon?”
“I said, he met her.” I flash an enigmatic smile at my lone patron. With the caravan’s return, I didn’t expect anyone to visit my tower today. This woman has the weathering of someone too practical to line up for a peek at a royal face: a brimmed-hat tan and calloused hands, turned upward on the divining table’s marble surface. “If you speak of the prophecy I received before His Highness left, my dreams told me, ‘Prince Cyrus will meet his bride before his journey’s end.’ No more than that, no less.”
She nods. “I didn’t recall the exact words you used—”
“The exact words are important.” I paced this room for four nights to decide on those words, and I won’t have them misremembered now when they finally matter. Picking up my robes, I take a seat across from her and push my heavy braid over my shoulder. The sooner this reading is over, the sooner this small talk can end, and I can leave for the palace and greet the prince myself. “What is it that you want me to see?”
The woman’s brow twitches. My curtness offends her, though she won’t say so. “My only concern is the harvest season, Sighted Mistress Violet. Anything regarding my farm’s future. I pray the Fates be kind.”
I don’t like doing these fortune readings, but the king insists I interact with the populace regularly so they trust the girl behind their kingdom’s prophecies. It was either this or matchmaking, and seeing buffoons in love makes me want to empty my stomach.
I lay my hands over hers, and the brush of my fingers against her skin sparks something sun-bright in my mind. I shut my eyes and focus on the grooves of her palm, the folds and scars, the blood that pumps underneath—any physical mark of her history that I can use to anchor my magic. In my mind’s Sight, I find the threads that bind her soul to the turning of this world:
A hillside farm, golden with fayflowers.
Rides to the Sun Capital, part of her monthly routine.
A different farm in the borderlands. Family? A lover’s home? The Fairywood looms on the horizon.
Long days of fieldwork stretching into nights…
And so they go.
The clearest threads are ones that have already happened—her memories. Future threads, on the other hand, look hazy and can even be contradictory. The Fates are fickle gods, and fortunes are always changing. If I can’t see the future directly, I might feel the Fates’ intentions instead: foreboding feels like the wet gust before a storm; opportunity, like a dip into warm honey. But much of the time, the Fates don’t like showing their hands.
Not unless they mean to, anyway.
My patrons have to deal with what little I see. I’m the only Seer in the Kingdom of Auveny, the only choice they have. This is not a coincidence. There are nine known Sighted in the world, every one of us in the employ of various courts—we’re too useful to be left alone. I hear that one Seer in Yue, in addition to her prophecies, can predict storms from the ripple of a pond, and another in Verdant knows the date of every birth.
I’m the youngest Seer at eighteen, plucked from the Sun Capital’s very own streets seven years ago. All I know how to do is dream, read threads, and lie.
“I don’t think you need to worry,” I murmur as my Sight peers into the fog of the woman’s future. I embellish my vague visions with details from her memories. “Your fayflowers should grow fine this year. But stay diligent. Don’t wander so much, maybe, and keep to your farm.”
When I open my eyes, the woman withdraws her hands. “Kind Fates—that’s very good to learn,” she says. “Anything else?”
I ramble until she’s finally satisfied. Thanking me, she throws silvers into the dry fountain basin that’s become a vessel for offerings and departs my tower.
I peek over the fountain’s scalloped rim and sigh. I don’t rely on the coin, since the palace provides everything I need, but under the previous Seer, the fountain overflowed with offerings. Under my tenure, it’s gotten…dusty.