Back in the castle, Anjine canceled her obligations for that day and the next in order to be with her devastated friend. She could not make Mateo feel happy or at peace, but she could make him feel welcome. Enifir had already opened and aired out his old rooms, adding fresh bedding, a washbasin, a pitcher of water.
Outside the castle, in the bustling Military District, the Tierran army prepared to depart for Ishalem. Per her orders, the first wave of footsoldiers, cavalry, and a supply train would march out the following morning, while other soldiers continued to arrive from the other reaches. As each group gathered in Calay over the next two months, they would be dispatched to reinforce the troops laying siege to the Ishalem wall, and the constantly swelling Tierran presence would make the Uraban enemy nervous.
The queen trusted her subcommanders to know their business; she didn’t have to mother them. She did need to be with Mateo. She had willingly accepted her role as leader of the land; she had sacrificed her life, love, and happiness for Tierra, but she needed to do this for herself and for her dearest friend. Just for a little while, she would bar the door and keep the rest of the kingdom outside. For Mateo’s sake. The heavy responsibility of the crown had enslaved her for too long.
Anjine sat beside him on the bed in his childhood room, offering her support and her love. His bleak expression tore at her heart. He looked like an empty husk of a man, a hollow sculpture of a handsome military commander who had lost his reasons to be a hero. She longed to heal his heart and give him strength, but she didn’t know how. This was something she could neither command nor delegate.
“I need you, Mateo,” she whispered, “and you need me. No one is closer to me than you are.” She stopped herself from saying more. Over the years, Mateo had pursued other girlfriends because he felt he was supposed to, and Anjine had consented to marry Jenirod because it was her duty. Shortly after her own announcement, he had impulsively married Vicka Sonnen, as if he’d finally given up on Anjine. The two of them had denied each other so much for so long because of their respective roles. She squeezed his hand. “During all the battles and setbacks, tragedy after tragedy, you’ve always been there for me.”
“I’ve been there for Tierra,” Mateo said, but it sounded false. He drew a deep breath. “But mainly for you. You can always count on me.”
Anjine looked around the room, the whitewashed stone walls, the wooden furniture, faded woolen blankets, and now-empty shelves that had held his keepsakes as a young man. The place was so familiar, because she and Mateo had spent much of their childhood here, playing games and pretending to be different people.
The future they had imagined in their youthful optimism and naiveté was not at all how their lives had turned out—Tycho and Tolli growing old together in a comfortable cottage somewhere in the woods. Even as children they both knew that would never happen, because Mateo was merely the son of a guard captain and she was a princess.
“I miss Vicka.” His voice was small, and he seemed to tear the words out of himself. He sounded even more sorrowful when he added, “She was the first woman I could show my love to, but I don’t think I ever really knew her. I never got the chance.”
Anjine put her arm around his shoulder, and he put up no resistance as she drew him close. As the queen of Tierra, she was destined to have a marriage of politics, of convenience, of duty; she had never expected to love the man she ultimately chose as her husband. Her own voice was distant in her ears. “I don’t think I have any love left inside me, after…after what happened to Tomas. Those damned Urecari! I have to be heartless, or I can’t bear to do what I have to,” she said. “I’m not just a woman—I’m the queen. The obligations of ruling Tierra make me wall myself off.” She had personally given the order to behead a thousand Urecari prisoners, and Mateo had been forced to carry out that deed. Out of loyalty. Anjine bore the guilt of the decision, but he had the memory of actually doing it.
He raised his head and met her eyes. “Oh, you still have love within you, Anjine. I see it every time I look at your face, but you try to hide it from everyone else.”
Mateo leaned toward her, but Anjine pulled back. “Sen Leo tells me that the Saedran prophecies are warning of the end of the world. Love is a weakness I can’t afford to show. Romance is for swooning schoolgirls and handmaidens.”
“Oh, Anjine—I know better than that. If the times are so terrible, then love is more important than ever.” As if heaving himself out of a deep chasm, tearing loose from his fear and guilt, he turned and kissed her. He was shaking.
Anjine kissed him back, closing her eyes to shut out everything but the smell of him, the touch of him.
And then neither of them could stop.