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battles carefully, or spend the rest of my life in a state of perpetual
exhaustion.
“Good girl,” Junjie says, his condescension leaving a sour taste in my
mouth. I’m blind, not simple. Seventeen, not seven. “I’ll send word to the
court dressmaker.”
“There’s no need. Needle will make my dress.” I’m prepared to fight
for Needle’s right to ply her namesake—she’d be devastated to miss the
chance to design my coronation gown—but am saved from the battle by
swift footsteps ru
I recognize the rhythm of the run as Needle’s even before one small,
cool hand takes my wrist and the other begins to move beneath my palm,
communicating in our secret language.
The boy is hurt, Needle signs, her fingers trembling.
“What boy?”
The Monstrous boy, she signs, proving that everyone—no matter
how immense or terrifying—is a child in her eyes until proven otherwise.
Needle is only twenty-eight, but you’d think she was sixty from the way she
talks. The guards are forcing him to walk, but his legs are too weak. He’s
very pale. He’ll faint if they don’t take him back to bed.
“Yes, I would like something to drink,” I say in a controlled voice, not
wanting to arouse Junjie’s curiosity. He’s too eager for an excuse to forbid
me from taking the monster out of his cage. “Would you care for some
lemonade, Junjie?”
“I would enjoy that very much,” Junjie says, making my stomach
clench. I’d expected him to be too busy to spare time for my imaginary
refreshment. “But I have many things to attend to. I’ll make my apologies
and hope to share a drink with you this evening in the banquet hall.”
His none-too-subtle hint that I should not take di
again tonight doesn’t escape me, but I’m too grateful to learn he won’t be
tailing me inside to be bothered by it. With a nod and a softly murmured
“Good day,” I loop my arm through Needle’s and allow her to guide me
slowly up the walk.
As soon as we are through the door—stepping into shadows that
cool my flushed skin—she takes me by the hand and sets a much swifter
pace. I follow her up stairs and stairs and more stairs, nearly as many as
there are in my tower, until we reach the top floor, where the Monstrous
has been kept separate from the other ill and ailing.
As we hurry down the hall, I expect to hear sounds of a
struggle—growls and snarls—but there is only one harsh voice, shouting,
“Move, beast! On your feet!” and a muffled thud followed by a moan so
piteous, I understand immediately why Needle called the monster a boy.
He sounds like a wounded child.
For the first time I wonder what the creature must be feeling. What
must it be like to be abandoned by his family, to be held captive and
pressed into slavery to people he loathes? To be alone and hurt with no
one who cares enough to insist he stay in bed long enough to heal?
This is my fault. I told the guards to drag the Monstrous from his bed
if they had to. A wave of self-loathing rushes inside me, making my stomach
lurch and my voice break when I order the guards to, “Stop! Leave the
monster be!”
I draw a deep breath, trying to compose myself, knowing the soldiers
must be staring. “One of you, go fetch the healers. The rest, give the beast
some room.” I squeeze Needle’s arm as one pair of boots tromps down the
hall, the guard thankfully obeying my order without question. I can’t always
trust the soldiers to do as I say, especially if Junjie is close by. I may be the
queen, but Junjie is their true leader. “Take me closer,” I tell Needle.
I don’t need to add but not too close. Needle is nothing if not
protective of me. She nearly had a fit yesterday when I ordered her to help
me meet with the monster in private.
“Where does it hurt?” I ask the Monstrous as Needle settles me on
the stones near where he has fallen. “Is it your legs?” The Monstrous
doesn’t say a word, not a word, for a long, strained moment. “I only want
to help you.…”
I hesitate, realizing I have no idea what the Monstrous calls himself.
He has language, he must have a name, but in the three weeks since he was
captured no one has bothered to ask it. “What is your name?”
“Gem,” he says, forcing the word out with obvious difficulty.
“Isra,” I offer before I think better of it. A prisoner shouldn’t call the
queen by her first name, but for some reason that seems like a silly rule at
the moment. “I’m sorry. I didn’t realize you were still unwell.”
The Monstrous makes a sound—a sigh or a laugh, I can’t tell which.
Either way, the message is received. “Sorry” is a feeble word, and hardly
sufficient when a person is brought to his knees by pain.
“I don’t want you to suffer any more than you have already,” I say,
hoping he can tell that I mean it. “We’ll postpone our work until you’ve
fully recovered.”
“What if I’m never recovered?” he asks, so softly that I know only
Needle and I can hear him. “What if I never walk again?”
“You will walk.”
“You can’t know.”
“No, I can’t,” I say. “But I’ll do everything in my power to make
certain you do.”
He sighs again, a defeated sound. An alone sound.
“I wasn’t always blind,” I say, strangely compelled to convince him I
understand his fears. “There was a fire in my bedroom when I was four
years old. My nightgown caught fire and my father threw me to the ground
to put out the flames. I hit my head, and the world went dark. It has stayed
that way ever since.”
“But you still see,” he says beneath his breath, as if he knows my
moment of sightedness in the garden is a secret. “By the roses.”
“Only sometimes,” I whisper. “And only since I was ten.”
My tenth birthday, to be exact, the last day I was knowingly allowed
out of the tower. Before then, Baba and I went to the royal garden every
year on my birthday, but that was the first year that he let me explore on
my own, let me feel my way around the edge of the ancient flower bed to
the place where the vines spill over one side.
I pricked my finger by accident, and the sunlit world rushed up to
meet me. The roses showed me the city from high above, all the flowers
and the green, green springtime grass, and every tall, white building
gleaming in the morning light. It was beautiful, breathtaking to a girl who
had nearly forgotten the world of color and light.
I would have stayed there forever, grateful tears streaming down my
face, if my father hadn’t pulled me away.
As soon as he realized I was bleeding, Baba carried me back to the
tower, but the damage was already done. I knew the roses had more magic
than anyone else realized. I knew they could be my eyes. I told Baba, but he
forbade me to speak of such mad things and refused to take me to the
garden again. Months passed, but I didn’t forget that shining moment. It
took a year, but I found a way out, risking death climbing over the edge of
my balcony, rather than returning to the hopeless darkness.
The loss of hope is the worst kind of loss. I don’t want to be the cause
of that in someone, even if that someone is a monster.
“I will help you recover,” I say, with an intensity that surprises me. “I
swear it.”
“Thank you. Isra.” My name is uncomfortable in his mouth,
strange-sounding in that accent of his, but there’s something nice about it
all the same. Something nice about being Isra instead of “my lady.”