dante's inferno emblem

How beautifully her name forms on the lips she cannot claim. “I— I think,” she manages through a cracked, bleeding throat, “I think that you should do it. He will take care of…” Of you, she’s meant to say, but this prince with no face will not lay down his life in an instant for her queen. He will not do what she— no, she cannot think that way. He is a prince, and Altena is the queen, and Eda is nothing but a guard-captain. He will take better care of Altena than Eda ever could. “Of Thracia,” she finally finishes.

“...Thracia,” Altena says, her brows drawing together. She stands, a warrior’s graceful movement, and Eda knows it is a dismissal. “I thank you for your counsel, Captain.”

The title stings. So does the way Eda’s heart pulses and heats her skin as Altena smiles at her.

Eda breathes away the fire, her eyes closing against its fuel. “I am at your disposal, my liege.” It means something different; she doesn’t dare speak the truth of it aloud. Especially not now.

Altena looks at her through narrow, sunlit brown eyes, her lashes casting long shadows against the warm light of the late-afternoon sun. “You are not disposable,” she says quietly, the conviction in her voice fading. It cuts too close to the quick of her sadness.

She has never understood the abyssal depth of her devotion. Eda would not exchange that commitment for anything— it is the only commitment she can claim. Altena’s kind heart, however, will not waver, and that, too, Eda would not change. Instead, with affection and its hungrier counterpart fitting in her chest like spearheads, she bows a shallow deference, responding, “As you will it, your Majesty.” This, at least, will not change when Altena takes this anonymous prince as her husband. Eda will always be her vassal, even if for a fleeting moment she had thought they could be something more.

Knights do not love their lieges. They do not stand in the way of advantageous political matches.

“...I fear I must go, your Majesty, if you have no more need of me.” She invokes that title like a spell, as if it will open the distance between them again, as if it will bank the raw flame that blackens her lungs.

Altena steps away. “You… You may go, then.”

Eda turns.

Later, hunched over her desk, the moon dark and far away, she pens a letter.

Dear Dean,

I have done something monumentally stupid, but first: How are things in the south? How are you keeping? I sincerely hope you are well, because the contents of this letter are sure to make you feel worse, and if you are sick or injured I worry that the shock might kill you.

I had intended to tell you this when you came to the capital next moon, but things have suddenly worsened. To put it in simple words, I believe I am deeply, irrevocably in love with Her Majesty Queen Altena. This is enough of a problem on its own, but given the political situation and the need for heirs, she has decided to consider marriage proposals, and she came to me for counsel. I of course advised her to accept. I do not know if I can make it through the engagement festivities, only I have to, because I am the captain of her guard. My duty has no space for this infatuation.

Please. If you have any advice: I beg you, dear brother, to help me.

Yours,

Eda

Somewhere between allowing herself to weep and gaining a new bruise on her shoulder from training taken too far, she receives a reply.

Dearest little sister,

You are truly— and I do not want to make you feel even worse, but I must speak the truth— the most foolish person on the face of this world.

Why (and this is underlined three times, gouging the paper) would Her Majesty, Queen Altena I of the United Kingdom of Thracia, go to HER GUARD-CAPTAIN for marital advice? Have you thought about this at all? She was hoping for you to STOP HER, you insufferable fool! Everyone who’s ever read a romance novel knows that! Are you blind as well as stupid? Have you not seen the way she dotes on you? Did she not rely on your support during the aftermath of the war?

Eda, I would bet all of my worldly possessions that she would rather marry you. I know you will call me an optimist for that, but truly, keep my words in mind. I long for your happiness, and I know that you could find it here.

But I do not mean to be cruel to you. I know your pain. Maybe it runs in the family— falling in love with those you serve. However, unlike you, I am bold enough to believe myself worthy. Take a chance, Eda, and look at yourself the way she does for a minute.

With love,

Dean

Eda is about halfway through drafting her next letter when her brother arrives at the doorstep of her barracks, arms crossed and face shadowed. Despite his full foot of height over her, she only stares up at him, tired beyond fear.

“Come on,” he says, because of all people Dean is the only one who understands: he too is a wyvern rider, and knows that the earth and the sky are two different places, that her grounded wants and fears cannot be carried on dragonback. “Kate’s saddled. Let’s go.”

It is impossible to speak while flying. Kate carries the two of them to a secluded, frozen peak, where they sit in silence under her shielding wing.

Finally, Dean says, “I flew for two days to reach you, and this is how you treat me?”

Eda huffs.

“No, really. It’s been months since I’ve seen your face. If you’re not going to let me solve your issue— which I could do with a well-placed letter, by the way— then at least speak to me about something. Anything will do.”

She looks up. Kate’s veins tangle in her wing. She can chart the skirmishes they have been through together: a small, closed-over hole where she was shot, a ragged edge where she dug Eda out of a chaos of blades, a discoloration where they flew through the flaming trail of a Meteor spell. “You said it ran in the family— loving the one you’re sworn to.”

“It does.”

He’s quiet long enough that Eda considers snapping at him— you wanted to talk, so talk. When she looks over to deliver the rebuke, he is lost in his own head. She softens.

“I thought it might end that way,” she says. “You’ve always been— and he, for all his melancholy…”

“That’s it, isn’t it? I couldn’t resist.” He smiles. “He’s here, too, you know— to see Altena. And I had hoped, while we were here, to ask your blessing. I sent Mother a letter, and she approves, of course, but I wanted to ask you, too.”

“Ask me what?”

“I want to marry him.”

Eda laughs. To her ears, it is grating. “That sounds like a question for him, not for me.” When she sees his sincerity, she shrugs her shoulders and rolls her head to one side, loosening it the way she did before drills, an old impotent comfort. Dean will be happy. Dean will marry Arion, and she will make do as she always does, echoing his happiness, living off of it, making do with what she has. “Do it. You love him. It’s simple.”

The hypocrisy makes both of them smile. Dean doesn’t say anything, until: “Thank you.”

“Don’t. It’s nothing.”

“Do something for me, Eda,” Dean says, not looking at her. “Go to the masquerade ball. I’ll take over your duties for the night.”

There are so, so many reasons not to that she settles on the easiest. “I don’t have a gown.”

“That’s easily fixed.” Dean, she growls under her breath, glaring at him, and he only raises his hands in surrender. “Look, I’ll get you a gown. Do this one thing for me and I will never ask you for anything again.”

Lying. “Why?”

“Because,” Dean says, leaning obnoxiously close to her, “I saw the way she looked at you.”

She elbows him. He elbows her. 

“Fine,” Eda mutters at last, and from the way Dean’s face lights up, she immediately regrets it.

The night of the masquerade ball comes without ceremony.

The tradition is an old one— something about anonymity, or fidelity, of the old adage of a last night of freedom before a lifetime of marriage. Eda is supposed to be posted at the sidelines, but on Dean’s promise, she instead stands in the midst of the festivities, cloaked in a midnight-dark dress and hidden behind a black mask in the shape of a dragon. She is not meant for dancing with these scarred hands and her scale-hardened legs, tough from the years of war and everything that followed. Those who dance here are unfettered by that carcass that lingers, a constant weight, upon the backs of those who fought.

It is easy, then, to find another weighted step among the lightfooted masses. Altena wears a scarlet, silken gown that seems heavy as it pools against the ballroom floor. Her face is obscured, disguised in scarlet silk, strangely subdued despite its vibrance. She does not dance, but she walks along the abandoned perimeters of the room. Here she is anonymous— they both are— so for once Eda does not resist.

The warm light that suffuses the room does not quite reach her. Colder shadows cut her into the shape of a stranger. Still, Eda knows her; even alone and masked, she is her queen, and she could not mistake her in any scene with any disguise. The binds of duty do not break in ballroom shadows. The binds of love do not break at all. So it is no surprise how she finds her way to Altena despite the merry, spinning crowd, and in a voice not her own she says, “You are not dancing.”

She should ask, but the instinct is to tend. Altena does not startle at her presence, instead looking at her through unrecognizing eyes that grieve— that grieve?

“I cannot dance tonight,” Altena says. Her voice is painfully herself, entirely undisguised. “I face a tragedy.”

What tragedy? Your marriage? She bites back the damning question: right now, Altena means to be unknown. "It is a happy occasion," she says instead. "What troubles you?"

"I—" Altena trails off, staring at the crowd, her beautiful dark eyes glassy and filled with the dancers' ghostly reflections. "Will you dance with me?"

"Of course." My queen is barely left off of the tail. Eda's stomach soars at the lack of address.

Altena, shorter than her but only barely, holds out her hand, wrapped in a glove the color of fire. Eda takes it in her own. Silk is a lovely feeling, but she would far prefer the flesh below it. Still, warmth sinks into her own bare hand from Altena's heated skin, and it is an illicit thrill. "My hand on your waist," she murmurs into her queen's ear, "your hands on my shoulder."

Altena looks up at her. Even through the mask her eyes are defiant and bright, consuming light to transform it into beauty. "You have a warrior's hands."

"That is because I am a warrior." The music, a tender string piece laying veiled over the room like a transmuting mist, eases them into motion. For the first time, Eda leads Altena and not the other way around.

She rather likes it.

"You're quite beautiful," Altena says apropos of nothing, as brazen and fierce as ever. She's had a little to drink, and her mouth is flushed red, her cheeks rouged where they're exposed. Eda doesn't drink, but she does hunger.

"You can't see my face— how would you know?"

Altena hesitates. She bites her lower lip. Gods above, Eda had thought herself seduced by Altena's small subconscious movements, by the fact of her shoulder flowing into her wrist as she writes: is this what seduction feels like when she's trying? "You're gentle," she says softly. "You're…" her voice trails off there, catching on some forbidden word, and she ends up repeating herself; "you're gentle."

"No one's ever called me that." With no lovers, no close friends, and her rapport with Dean anything but sweet, no one has ever had the chance. Sometimes she wonders how much of herself she has given for Altena's service. 

The music keeps flowing. You could dance to it forever. Altena turns her body, masked eyes meeting masked eyes, and her hand travels halfway to Eda's chest before she halts it. "Do you want to go?" she asks.

I want what you want; I want you. "Yes," Eda replies, breathless, and she is once again under Altena's oath, following her where she goes with no questions and no desires, hearing only the plucked string of her own heart.

They are as far from the dancing as two people can get. The arch of the transformed ballroom leads into a long stretch of hallway. "You have told me nothing of who you are," Altena says, twisting her hands in each other.

Eda hesitates. "I am a soldier."

"Only a soldier?"

"I was raised in Thracia. There's not room to be anything else."

Altena is silent. Then, hopeful and tender, she says, “That will change.”

“There’s no way to know that.”

“You’re right. I don’t know it, really. Tonight I know nothing. I am nobody at all.” Altena turns to face Eda, taking her hand and turning it over, observing her scars with a scouting finger. These days, so long past the end of the war, Altena’s hands are suited more to penmanship than lancework. Eda’s, by contrast, have only grown tougher. “Your hands are lovely,” she murmurs.

“You must be a politician— using flattery to guide the conversation.”

“I assure you that politics involve no flattery. You, on the other hand, demand it.” She pauses. Oh, she is so beautiful when she smiles. Eda can hardly breathe.

“I demand it?”

“My chivalry demands it, I suppose." But her smile is as ephemeral as it is sweet, and she falls again into melancholy.

Softly, Eda murmurs: "Tell me what you grieve."

Altena looks at her with arrested unhappiness. "I cannot."

"I am a stranger. Whatever we say to each other will be forgotten."

Altena doesn't speak for a long while. They are alone with their footsteps and the expanse of the palace before them, passing tapestries and paintings, the whole history of Thracia murmuring in this building's bones. "I was in love," she says finally, "and it has ended."

Together they walk, step in step. In this surreal scene Altena is sensual and tempting, lit more lurid by the bare moonlight and passing torches than she was in the romantic ballroom. "You are no longer in love?" Eda asks.

Altena laughs briefly, unhappily. "I am still in love. The one I love… has made it clear that they do not wish to be with me."

Ah. Dean was right. All this time, Dean was right. Eda's heart spins into her tongue. "I am sorry," she says in her strange voice. She should tear off her mask and cry Altena, it's me, I love you too, I love you desperately. But she will not turn her queen to reckless action— not while promised to another, someone worthier than her. Not when so much rides on this alliance. (Only the last part is a lie. She does not care about the alliance. Her duty is to Altena— no one and nothing else.)

"I will learn to be happy, I think." Her gaze hardens, her mouth firm. And then she laughs again, except this time there is humor in it: "I'm sorry. I don't know you. This is awfully personal for someone I've just met. Though you seem… familiar, somehow."

"Maybe it was destiny."

Altena might have laughed again if she didn't look so taken by the idea. "Destiny," she repeats. And then suddenly she is turning to Eda, eyes black in the half-light, and saying, "Do you think that acting on desire is dishonorable?"

Oh, what is she supposed to say to that? "It depends on what the desire is," she answers. For example: eating an extra sweet roll at dinner is acceptable, whereas shoving your sworn liege against a wall and kissing her absolutely senseless is—

"No; forget I asked that." Altena shakes her head, and then takes Eda's hand in her own. "Tonight is my last night unbound. I will not play games with words. I want you."

She delivers the line like a knife to the gut and like any trained soldier does not stop at first blood. "I want women. I only want women. I have always known that about myself. I am about to give myself to a man for my kingdom— and just once I want to taste—"

Damn it all. Damn her duty and Altena's betrothed and Thracia itself for all she cares. Eda grasps Altena's face between her hands, breathes in her gasp of shock, and pushes her into the wall, knocking something askew. "Tell me what you want," she whispers.

Altena's hands are on her shoulders. "A kiss to start. After that— whatever you will give me."

"As you will it," Eda says, and crushes her mouth to Altena's, all the years of pent-up desire bursting into one moment like the instant your teeth cut into a ripe peach. Altena gasps and then moans. Her hands claw into Eda’s hair. It’s all wet heat, desperate, Eda sucking Altena’s lower lip into her mouth, Altena allowing her to; it’s more than she’s ever dreamed of, unbelievable because it is here, it is happening, it is impossible and entirely hers. 

“Oh,” Altena whispers when they have barely come apart. “Oh. Oh.” A breath that’s also a laugh. “Again. Please.”

Eda kisses her again. Eda could kiss her for ages to make up for all the times she has abstained— Altena on the balcony with her after the war, Altena looking down on her as she swore fealty, Altena on top of her when her lance went wide, Altena touching her arm to wake her when she fell asleep on watch. This kiss is less violent, more exploratory, a thousand small sweet kisses chained together. Altena seems to like it just as much. The corners of her mouth— the bow of her upper lip— the indent of her lower— the hot muscle of her tongue; Eda memorizes her like the grain of a haft, like the heft of a blade, knowing.

How can she ever go back to looking at Altena from a distance, having known her like this?

Eda brushes a kiss along her throat and Altena almost cries out before wresting the sound back down. “Don’t,” Eda whispers. “I want to hear you.”

She goes further, to her collarbones, marking a bruising circle; to her shoulders, gentle, knowing how much they carry; to her breasts, palming one through the gown as she kisses the swell of the other. She only stops when she realizes Altena is weeping. She pulls away, but Altena’s hand reaches to stop her, and with her mask already askew from her passions—

One heartbeat. Two. The mask clatters to the floor. After that there is only silence. 

“Eda,” Altena whispers. With trembling fingers, she loosens her own mask and pulls it off.

She is so beautiful without the mask to obscure her. Her mouth is still red from Eda’s bruising hunger. Her cheeks are still flushed. It is, somehow, the same night that it was a moment ago. “I’m sorry,” Eda murmurs, stepping back.

But Altena does not look affronted. She looks wild, cut-open with hope, incredulous. “All this time,” she breathes, catching Eda’s hand so she can’t flee— “you’ve felt the same?”

“It wasn’t proper. I’ll— I’ll resign immediately. I’m sorry.” She tries to bow out of the proximity, but Altena, too, has the hands of a lancer. Her hands clamp around Eda’s wrist like warm iron. “My queen,” she pleads. Her voice snaps.

“My knight,” answers Altena, sure as her encroaching smile. She brings her in, carefully, like Eda is a creature who will run from her, and when she is close enough to feel the wine-heat of her skin, she closes the gap between them, softly this time: no teeth, no tongues, just the simple assurance of a chaste kiss. Altena kisses her like she isn’t in a hurry. Altena kisses her like they have more time.

Eda pulls herself away.

“Don’t go,” Altena says, bringing her back in with a lean arm. She raises her hands to Eda’s face, stroking it with a tender thumb. Her hands are still scarred. With the trembling clarity of a phrase shouted across battlefields, Eda’s mind catches between her skull and her mouth: I am in love. “Why would you kiss me just to run away?”

What is she to make of this? Soldier that she is, who never disentangled intention from action, she has no way to stop herself from saying it. “Altena. My queen. I— surely you know. You must.”

“I did know, and then you lied to me about it.”

“I have never lied to you about anything.” Eda crosses her arm over her heart, her eyes lowering. The twinge of pain in Altena’s voice snaps across her back like the blade that scarred her. “I told you I could not care for you the same way a prince could. I am not the choice a queen makes for her consort.”

Altena’s arms drop. For a horrifying moment Eda fears she’s talked her out of it, but then they land on Eda’s waist and draw her closer. This time, they don’t kiss. Altena cradles her, and they stay there, pressed against the palace wall, long enough for Eda’s skin to stop screaming its need. “You are not a queen’s choice, but you are mine.”

“I’ve always been yours.” The confession is a breath into Altena’s collar.

Action to action. Lance into shield. Wing into arm. They live and have always lived mutually; that is the way of a warrior. You are nothing without your brothers in arms beside you. You are nothing without your dragon beneath you. You are nothing without your queen commanding you. So a blade is answered with a hand, and a bank is met with your squadron falling into place, and Eda’s love is answered with Altena’s. 

“Don’t cry.” Altena holds her tighter. Both of their gowns are rumpled. If anyone were to walk in— to see the guard-captain trapping the queen against a wall— would either of them ever see the end of it? “I’ll call off the engagement.”

“You can’t. For Thracia—”

“It was superfluous. We can live without it. We have always found a way.” Altena laughs wetly. “I’ll marry off Leif to some foreign dignitary.”

“You wouldn’t.”

“I wouldn’t,” Altena agrees, and then turns Eda’s head to kiss her again. Her mouth tastes of salt and wine. “But for you, Eda, there’s not much else I wouldn’t do.”

How is she worth this much to her? How is she worth this much at all? I love you she should say, but it feels too small, too trite. “You’re everything to me,” she says instead. It still isn’t enough. She has spent her life proving her love: it would take a master poet to put that into words.

Altena’s mouth does something funny at the edges, like she doesn’t know whether to sob or smile. “I know,” she answers. She kisses her again— again— again, reaffirming. I love you and I want you and I will keep you. Above all else, she will keep her, when it is easier to leave her by the side. She will keep her when she should marry someone else. 

“I would have loved you anyway,” Eda says. Like a cut wrist she cannot stop speaking, every bled word cutting closer to her heart. “If you had married him, I mean— I would have loved you anyway.”

“You break my heart,” Altena whispers. She wipes at her own cheeks. 

“You’ve broken my heart every day for five years and I’ve loved you through it.”

“I’ll make it up to you.”

The strangest, most wonderful thing about this strange and wonderful night: Altena will make it up to her, and they will share their legs curled up in the royal bedchamber, and they will share mornings and nights, and Eda will never again have to look at Altena and restrain herself. Altena will make it up to her, and maybe it will take years of outright affection; maybe it will take forever. It may take Altena holding her close and introducing her as my wife; it may take a kiss each morning and a whispered confession each night.