Red Queen (Red Queen 1)

I’m too busy laughing at the sheer absurdity of the name to notice the young man waving and smiling. Finally I raise my eyes, just to say I was this close to the future king. But I get much more than I bargained for.

The glass goblets in my hands drop, landing harmlessly in the sink of water.

I know that smile and I know those eyes. They burned into mine only last night. He got me this job, he saved me from conscription. He was one of us. How can this be?

And then he turns fully, waving all around. There’s no mistaking it.

The crown prince is Cal.

SEVEN

I return to the servants’ platform, a hollow feeling in my stomach. Whatever happiness I felt before is completely gone. I can’t bring myself to look back, to see him standing there in fine clothes, dripping with ribbons and medals and the royal airs I hate. Like Walsh, he bears the badge of the flaming crown, but his is made of dark jet, diamond, and ruby. It winks against the hard black of his uniform. Gone are the drab clothes he wore last night, used to blend in with peasants like me. Now he looks every inch a future king, Silver to the bone. To think I trusted him.

The other servants make way, letting me shuffle to the back of the line while my head spins. He got me this job, he saved me, saved my family—and he is one of them. Worse than one of them. A prince. The prince. The person everyone in this spiral stone monstrosity is here to see.

“All of you have come to honor my son and the kingdom, and so I honor you,” King Tiberias booms, breaking apart my thoughts as if they were glass. He raises his arms, gesturing to the many boxes of people. Though I try my hardest to keep my eyes on the king, I can’t help but glance at Cal. He’s smiling, but it doesn’t reach his eyes.

“I honor your right to rule. The future king, the son of my son, will be of your silverblood, as he will be of mine. Who will claim their right?”

The silver-haired patriarch barks out in response. “I claim Queenstrial!”

All over the spiral, the leaders of the different houses shout in unison. “I claim Queenstrial!” they echo, upholding some tradition I don’t understand.

Tiberias smiles and nods. “Then it has begun. Lord Provos, if you would.”

The king turns on the spot, looking toward what I assume is House Provos. The rest of the spiral follow his gaze, their eyes landing on a family dressed in gold striped with black. An older man, his gray hair shot with streaks of white, steps forward. In his strange clothes he looks like a wasp about to sting. When he twitches his hand, I don’t know what to expect.

Suddenly, the platform lurches, moving sideways. I can’t help but jump, almost knocking into the servant next to me, as we slide along an unseen track. My heart rises in my throat as I watch the rest of the Spiral Garden spin. Lord Provos is a telky, moving the structure along prebuilt tracks with nothing but the power of his mind.

The entire structure twists under his command, until the garden floor widens into a huge circle. The lower terraces pull back, aligning with the upper levels, and the spiral becomes a massive cylinder open to the sky. As the terraces move, the floor lowers, until it stops nearly twenty feet below the lowest box. The fountains turn into waterfalls, spilling from the top of the cylinder to the bottom, where they fill deep, narrow pools. Our platform glides to a stop above the king’s box, allowing us a perfect view of everything, including the floor far below. All this takes less than a minute, with Lord Provos transforming the Spiral Garden into something much more sinister.

But when Provos takes his seat again, the change is still not done. The hum of electricity rises until it crackles all around, making the hairs on my arms stand up. A purple-white light blazes near the floor of the garden, sparking with energy from tiny, unseen points in the stone. No Silver stands up to command it, like Provos did with an arena. I realize why. This is not some Silver’s doing, but a wonder of technology, of electricity. Lightning without thunder. The beams of light crisscross and intersect, weaving themselves into a brilliant, blinding net. Just looking at it hurts my eyes, sending sharp daggers of pain through my head. How the others can stand it, I have no idea.

The Silvers look impressed, intrigued with something they can’t control. As for us Reds, we gape in complete awe.

The net crystallizes as the electricity expands and veins. And then, as suddenly as it came, the noise stops. The lightning freezes, solidifying in midair, creating a clear, purple shield between the floor and us. Between us and whatever might appear down there.

My mind runs wild, wondering what could require a shield made of lightning. Not a bear or a pack of wolves or any of the rare beasts of the forest. Even the creatures of myth, great cats or sea sharks or dragons, would pose no harm to the many Silvers above. And why would there be beasts at Queenstrial? This is supposed to be a ceremony to choose queens, not fight monsters.

As if answering me, the ground in the circle of statues, now the small center of the cylinder floor, opens wide. Without thinking, I push forward, hoping to get a better look with my own eyes. The rest of the servants crowd with me, trying to see what horrors this chamber can bring forth.

The smallest girl I’ve ever seen rises out of darkness.

Cheers rise as a house in brown silk and red gemstones applauds their daughter.

“Rohr, of House Rhambos,” the family shouts, announcing her to the world.

The girl, no more than fourteen, smiles up at her family. She’s tiny in comparison to the statues, but her hands are strangely large. The rest of her looks liable to blow away in a strong breeze. She takes a turn about the ring of statues, always smiling upward. Her gaze lands on Cal—I mean the prince—trying to entice him with her doe eyes or the occasional flip of honey-blond hair. In short, she looks foolish. Until she approaches a solid stone statue and sloughs its head off with a single, simple slap.

House Rhambos speaks again. “Strongarm.”

Below us, little Rohr destroys the floor in a whirlwind, turning statues into pulverized piles of dust while she cracks the ground beneath her feet. She’s like an earthquake in tiny human form, breaking apart anything and everything in her way.

So this is a pageant.

A violent one, meant to showcase a girl’s beauty, splendor—and strength. The most talented daughter. This is a display of power, to pair the prince with the most powerful girl, so that their children might be the strongest of all. And this has been going on for hundreds of years.

I shudder to think of the strength in Cal’s pinkie finger.

He claps politely as the Rhambos girl finishes her display of organized destruction and steps back onto the descending platform. House Rhambos cheers for her as she disappears.