Mindless

Chapter 15 Vahela

She watches the men prostrate before her with an amusement that twists inside her like rotten fruit.

"My maiden?" She asks archly. "My maiden is only a child."

"Even children can turn," Fahlan answers gravely.

"What brought you to this conclusion?"

He gestures to Haëgre. "Through a series of unexpected events, the innkeeper and I were able to speak. We discovered the maiden has been on both sides of this conflict. She holds the king's missing ring."

The queen bows her head. She knows exactly how they got here. She saw every step, felt every move; she knows more than any other person in the room, even what they saw without seeing, heard without hearing. Knowledge sits on her tongue, bulbous and heavy. It fills her mouth and pours into the open spaces of her jaw until she cannot speak. Until her head lifts. Until the smile is gone. The quiet benign. There is no surprise.

Beowulf stands before her, come to slay the vicious Grendel. And behind him, loyal Wiglaf watches all.

Vahela pulls at the lithe chain around her neck. The skin-warmed metal skims across her chest, catches at the neckline of her dress—a pale hand reaches across the darkness—then comes free and swings in the open air. "This ring?"

Fahlan's face contorts with confusion. Haëgre looks grim but unsurprised.

The captain scrubs at his face with his hand. "What?"

"Come now, you almost understand."

He looks to his companion uncertainly, but Haëgre doesn't waver from the queen.

"Fahlan," Vahela coos. Rage flows in her like a rive, fast and slow, deep and shallow. "How easy was it for you to believe him? How ready were you to take him at his word? Would that I were surprised. You would accept anything that gave you what you wanted."

"I don't understand," he replies slowly.

She rests her head on her hand, propped up by the arm of her throne. "I find that hardly surprising, though it is disappointing. Would you like to know the rest?" His answer doesn't matter—she doesn't wait for it. "There were plenty of key players in this little act. The king, of course, who had to die. You two," she gestures between them, "on either side. My dear little Sihya played the messenger very well, would you not agree, Haëgre?" Her gaze bores into his, but he exists far away. He cannot be touched. "Someone had to warn the people to revolt. Her brother helped as well, to urge you on when you flagged. I was here to urge Fahlan and the guards, but I could hardly send Sihya too often, and I could hardly come myself."

Haëgre, inscrutable, asks, "Who?"

Fahlan is putting the pieces in order, reflecting on every detail, every conversation. He looks as if he's been struck. He looks dazed. "You did this."

Vahela ignores the captain and answers Haëgre. "Have you not guessed?"

He sets his jaw.

The queen lifts her head and raises her hand into the air, gesturing for the twins to enter. They've been waiting in the small hallway surrounding the receiving room. Typically, these look-ins would be manned by guards protecting the king. The door is built into the wall itself, edges aligning with the seams of stacked stone. In the event of invasion, the king could be shuffled out this door while the guards defended the entrance. By their folly, and believing the enemy to be external, the captains had long since failed to continue this practice.

The door opens now. Sihya steps through first—she smirks at the captain. Her brother follows. Mélangé, both. Thin and wiry. They are fuller now, around the body and the face, than when she first found them, but feeding had not quite been enough to fix the years of penurious fasting. Together, the resemblance between them is apparent—the same broad nose, the same full mouth and rounded chin—but apart the similarities are subtle enough to be overridden in the mind.