Chapter Five: Between Starshine And Clay

Come celebrate with me that everyday
something has tried to kill me and has failed.

- Lucille Clifton

Their newly crowned king was asleep on a low camp bed in the corner of the infirmary tent when Täj arrived. It did not look like a sound sleep. Demetri's face was badly bruised from where it had met the ground at a high speed and unforgiving angle; he had a swollen lip that threatened to burst and a set of delicately tiny stitches beside one eye, now thoroughy blackened in waning shades of ochre and purple. His left hand had been bandaged, his wrist strapped - it wasn't immediately apparent whether he had broken it punching someone, or being punched.

Even asleep, Demetri managed to look stressed.

Well, maybe he wasn't asleep, for as Täj approached, Demetri turned his head and through the narrowing crack of his swollen eye there was a flash of deep green as he watched the other rebel approach. His mouth twitched like he wanted to smile, but the expression would be too painful. He said, "so I have to get thrown out of a moving vehicle before you'll visit?" and Täj could not hold back a grin and a shrug.

"If you die," Täj said. "There's an open position."

Demetri didn't seem to find that very funny.

Täj settled gingerly onto the edge of Demetri's bed and produced a cigarette from his jacket, flipping his lighter between his fingers as he lit it, ignoring Demetri's one-eyed look of disapproval. So long at one another's shoulders, and the King of Ashes still transparently disagreed with Täj's chain-smoking like he thought his disapproval would put any kind of dent into the habit. "It relieves stress," the pale man muttered darkly, offering his king the pack with one arched eyebrow.

"Täj. Of all people." Each word seemed to take a Herculean effort, but Demetri was not one to let that stop him. "What do you have." A deep breath. "To be stressed about?"

Täj shook his head and feigned that he was too traumatised to offer an explanation and Demetri managed to shudder out a laugh, though it seemed to hurt his entire body to do so.

"The Selection?"

They knew each other too well. Täj shook his head and said, quite solemnly, "you haven't met them." He put his cigarette to his mouth. "You don't know."

"Have you?" Not even Demetri could hold back the curiosity in his voice, though he clearly wanted to seem a little above it all. That lone green eye did not leave Täj. If there was anyone Demetri would feel comfortable peppering with questions, it would be the pale rebel, but for his part, Täj did not seem entirely enthusiastic about discussing Demetri's search for a queen. "Met them?"

Täj's lip curled in amusement. "Very reluctantly." He took a long drag, as Demetri leaned forward with his intact hand and pulled a cigarette from the pack. "Let's just hope they're not shallow." He gestured to Demetri's face, or what had once been a face, and the Lost King hacked out another short-lived laugh.

"Let's hope." He collapsed back against the pillows, and winced, reaching with his right hand to gently hold his side like he was trying to hold the bones together. "It looks much worse than it is."

"It looks pretty bad." Täj tossed him the lighter and exhaled pale grey smoke across the otherwise empty tent, tendrils of charcoal mist ghosting across abandoned beds and bloody bandages strewn here and there. They may be running a rebellion, but the king still got his own tent. It wouldn't have surprised Täj if the other invalids and convalescents had been evacuated hastily from the area when Demetri was brought in. All the better to keep their king's injuries a closely guarded secret. They needed to keep it a secret, because - "how did they know?"

Demetri's movements had been kept a total secret. Even Wick and Uzohola hadn't been told which path through the contested territories had been chosen for the young king's escape into the Wastelands to join the Selection. Even Täj had not known the precise details of Demetri's plans. Even Vardi Tayna had been kept in the dark about every aspect of the king's schedule, as one of the Selected ought to be. And yet there had been a set of landmines, a man with an rocket-propelled grenade launcher, and a small company of Crown forces waiting for them outside a town in Atlin, concealed in the foothills over what had once been Fort St James. Demetri had survived the car crash and the firefight that had ensued. Many of his companions had not. He still wore their blood under his nails.

"You know."

Täj's eyebrow raised, very slowly. "Compromised?" Sometimes he wondered whether even Demetri knew who their man in the royal court was, so closely guarded the secret. That knowledge belonged to Vardi Tayna, to Thiago, and to the high command alone. But if Demetri did not know, he did a marvellous job of concealing that lack of knowledge. That, Täj was starting to think, was probably the real sign of a good king - when you didn't know, acting the hell out of the idea that you did.

Demetri was clearly doing just that now. "Compromised," he agreed slowly, setting the cigarette between his teeth, his movements slow and stiff. High command would be fuming at the victory Angeles had scored by so badly wounding the face of the rebellion in this way, particularly just as his Selection was about to begin. Oh, it was still clear that Demetri was a good-looking guy, but the wounds on his face made him look slightly savage, almost feral. "Or..."

He didn't need to finish that sentence. Täj understood. Either their mole in the court had been compromised, or the court had achieved in slipping a mole into their ranks. Double agents stacked on double agents, spy following spy, a tangled web of stolen information stolen back. Well, Thiago would ferret them out. The older spymaster was tenacious when it came to these sort of things, Täj thought amusedly, and enormously prideful about their results. It was a large part of the reason they had to make sure to try and keep Wesick and Rouen separated during this Selection - Thiago had a strange, resentful fascination with those who managed to thwart him, and unlike Vardi Tayna, who had been the last girl to earn his ire in this manner, Täj thought Corvina Rouen a very unlikely candidate for becoming one of Thiago's little birds

She had too many of her own ideas for that.

"Or," Täj agreed, and took another long drag, shaking his head as he did so. Well, he thought grimly, at least it was Demetri who would have to deal with all of this nonsense. There were few better suited to it.

Demetri exhaled and pulled the cigarette away, making a face - "Vardi Tayna got you these from that Danish place in Angeles, didn't she, they're vile" - and then could not hold back a cough that shook his shoulders and clearly hurt the two cracked ribs he had sustained in the initial vehicle collision. When he caught Täj looking, he waved the tab in the other young man's direction and said, "don't tell the doctor."

Täj's smile was very faint. "Fifteen years and you still think I'd snitch on you?"

"Can't be too careful, my friend." There was a warmth in his words. Demetri set his shoulders, and, feigning a casual disinterest, said, "what do you make of them? The Selected, I mean."

Täj rolled the cigarette between his fingers. "How long do you have?"

And Demetri rolled his eyes. "Well," he said teasingly. "At least I know my Lancelot won't try to make off with my Guinevere this time around."

"You think us the Round Table," Täj said thoughtfully. He didn't think that comparison entirely tracked, and he latched on the opportunity to change the subject from one that was a little more tender for them both. "Reckon we're more like... the Fianna."

"The Fianna?" Demetri frowned. "Then I shall be Fionn, and you shall take care you are not Diarmuid. Does that work better?" He shook his head tiredly. "You're always a contrary one, aren't you?"

Täj grinned lazily. "You love it."

Demetri didn't seem to agree. "As I was saying. What do you make of them?"

Täj shrugged uncomfortably. Even with one of his oldest friends, he didn't like to air his opinions too loudly or too openly, especially when Demetri's marriage might hinge on the same. "Why don't you ask Uzohola?"

"You know why." Demetri shook his head ruefully. "I... trust you." There weren't many people he could say that about. There weren't many people for whom Täj would travel so far and so suddenly, just to sit at the end of their bed and share cigarettes. There weren't many people who had shared what they had. "Blood brothers, and all that."

Täj looked like this answer displeased him very much, for it suggested a set of expectations he could not possibly hope to satisfy. "They're fine," he said simply. "You know. Bland enough. Nice girls. I don't know what you expect me to say."

Demetri rolled his eyes. "Corvina Rouen, scion of Pandora, is not bland. Yue Yukimura, world-famous ice-skater, is not bland. Lissa Dove, leader of the outsiders, could not possibly be bland."

"I don't know what you expect me to say," Täj said again. "They must be on their best behaviour, because I'm not entirely sure I could tell you which ones are which."

"That I do not believe." Demetri was correct, even if the other man hated that he was. Täj was so quiet, so watchful, so paranoid, that not much escaped his gaze and notice, or indeed eluded his memory. He was an observant one, their Täj, and always had been - if Demetri was the face of the rebellion, then the pale man was undoubtedly their eyes, eyes that were always turned inwards. Demetri knew that Täj's notebooks would already be full of observations about the thirty-four girls in question, and indeed, the other rebel was pulling his notepad from within his jacket and passing it over to his king with a slightly apprehensive expression, like he wasn't sure Demetri would like what Täj had to say. Demetri opened it to its first page, and ran a bruised thumb along the almost incomprehensible writing that covered every inch of the paper. He hadn't been lying when he compared Täj to his brother; though he knew the handwriting might be incomprehensible to anyone else, Demetri could read it with ease. The first entry was entitled Soledad Delrío, and although the first sentence on the page said doesn't say much, the absolute tsunami of information that followed sort of defied that judgment. This weren't just Täj's opinions - he had clearly gleaned the opinions of the security details, of Uzohola, of the other Selected.

He turned a few pages, and paused at the one that had been left blank at the centre, with a simple DOMINICA in sloped calligraphy along the top line and empty lines following. "And Vardi Tayna?" When Demetri smiled, it pulled a little higher on one side, made the expression look slightly crooked and unbalanced, a tiny imperfection that somehow made the rest of it look a little bit better for not being uncannily flawless. It had been like that for as long as Täj could remember. He could recall noticing it the first time that he had met the king-that-was-to-be, when they had just been two small blonde boys adrift in the desert, lost in a rebellion that was not yet theirs. "Our girl is settling in?" He sounded like he had only just avoided calling her my girl. He looked up and met Täj's eyes, and seeing the expression that flitted across the pale man's face, the King in Exile continued quickly: " She's making friends? She's eating healthy? You know, her mother and I worry about her..."

Täj couldn't hold back a wry chuckle. This, he thought, was peak Demetri. Lying half-murdered in a tent for dead men on the edge of the desert, and still trying to make his friends laugh... and pull information out of them, at the same time. "I couldn't tell you."

"She hasn't left her room?"

Täj laughed, quite hollowly. "I mean, if she had a say in the matter..." He scuffed a heel across the dirt surface of the tent floor, and exhaled smoke, and added, "High command was pretty clear. She wants in to the Selection, then she's in." He shrugged. "That means she has to follow the rules." Demetri and Täj may as well have been strangers to her now. Well, one stranger, Täj thought, looking at Demetri, one potential husband.

"Vardi Tayna," Demetri mused. "And rules. What an awful, awful pairing." But his concern for the younger girl was obvious, and a little touching, and entirely unfair to the rest of the Selected. Rebels looked after their own. The inner circle looked after their own. Demetri looked after his own. Sometimes it was the most frustrating thing in the world, Täj thought, because Demetri protected people the same way Thiago did - almost against their will, without telling them his plans, break their hearts to save their skins.

"Just take her on a really nice date to make it up to her. You know. Break into a bank or something."

"Get into a bar fight."

"Steal state secrets."

"Something romantic," Demetri agreed. But there was something gutted about the way that he said it, like he had exhausted whatever small stores of energy he had reserved for this discussion, like his injuries had gradually depleted him once more and left him almost as pale and tired as Täj himself.

Täj patted his old friend very gingerly on his shoulder. "You're gonna be okay."

Demetri nodded tirely. "Yeah. I'll be fine. Like I said..." He gestured. "Just bad luck that they caught my face, you know?"

Täj knew. He thought Enyakatho had been on the verge of kissing Wick earlier that day when they had determined that they had enough footage of Demetri to keep Reports running until the worst of his injuries had healed - Demetri in newly won towns participating in humanitarian efforts and rescue campaigns, Demetri surveying rebel plantations and the crops they were managing to produce self-sufficiently, myriad shots of Demetri reading and looking thoughtful and laughing relaxedly at something someone had said just off-camera. The palace didn't even have to know, Täj thought ruefully. They'd just keep fitting him in here and there with old footage, making him look like the busiest invalid that there ever was.

The Selected didn't have to know, either. A regular Prince Hatt, Täj thought - here is your king, here is the man you will marry, here is the famed lost son of this great nation named Demetri Dunin, but look not upon his face or you may not like what you see.

Was Ysabel petty enough that she had aimed to accomplish exactly this?

Or was it, he thought, as Demetri had said - just bad luck.

Vivian Lahela was a short, pale woman with a severe bob haircut, light peruvian brown eyes the colour of smoky topaz, and a light sheen of sweat on her forehead betraying just how badly her nerves were fraying at this whole situation. Despite the obvious uncertainty etched in her eyes - was she expecting to offer an explanation or undergo an execution? - she had dressed impeccably for this meeting, in a green wool dress that grazed her knees and a black blazer wih a severe cut that suggested her usual position of authority, when meetings were held in the glossy skyscraper offices of Axiom, rather than this wide, white throne room. She had three strings of pearls around her wrist, and the tiny beads were clacking against each other as her hands shook.

Mordred almost felt sorry for her.

Almost.

He reclined in the throne that had been his father's, and looked away from Vivian Lahela for the first time since she had walked into the room, to look across the stony faces of his counsellors, who were fanned out in a crescent half-moon shape following the curve of the chamber's northern wall. The Queen Regent had elected, as she always did, to sit among them, shoulder-to-shoulder with Mordred's Minister for Finance and Minister for Education, old men and women with salt and pepper at the temples dressed in neat suits of muted colours, and now she leaned forward in her seat as though it were possible to focus closer on what the newspaper editor had to say.

Vivian Lahela was the kind of person the term loyalist had been crafted to describe. Her newspaper was glossy and respectable and purchased around the world as the Illéan newspaper, and the reports that appeared on its clean, brow pages were always thoroughly researched, entertainingly discursive, and slavishly in line with the palace's version of events. In other words, Mordred thought darkly, Vivian Lahela's whole business model was propping up the royal family, and her only daugher had just absconded over to the insurgent group that wanted them dead.

And no one seemed angrier about that fact Vivian Lahela herself. Though her hands were shaking, Mordred was beginning to think that might be from repressed anger rather than fear, such venom did she spit as she spoke about her daughter. Mordred didn't think it mattered what question he had just asked her - the answer was sure to be along the same lines regardless. "Your Majesty, my daughter is a traitor. I have no idea why... or how..." Her words seemed to be getting away from her. She had to pause and collect her thoughts. "My family condemns her actions, your Majesty, and more importantly, so does the entire Axiom organisation. We recognise only one royal family, one king, one nation. I am sure that you can find it in your... that your boundless mercy and unending patience will permit you to forgive my family, and see that we are innocent of the actions of our daughter."

Mordred paused. His mother had purposefully averted her eyes. He knew that whispers said she was the true power behind the throne, that the crown prince was a mere figurehead who danced on her strings and to her tunes, that she was Queen in all but title and crown. That was what appealed to them about the imposter Demetri, he thought grimly. That was what the people found attractive - the idea that he was a kind of king beyond the traditional structures of the royal family and the palace, free of the rigid formal traditions, unlikely to be bribed or make his decisions based on the favour so-and-so's great-great-great-grandfather had performed for King Marcus a dozen generations ago. He was a rogue and a rebel who could lay claim to righteousness on the back of a war that had been started long before he or Mordred had entered this world, and would continue long after they had exited it.

Plus, of course, even the girls at court in Angeles couldn't hold back from pointing out how handsome he was. Liara Lee, the daughter of Ysabel's most valued commander, had taken to saying as much when she knew Mordred was in earshot, just so that she could shoot him a cynically mocking look directly afterwards.

She was one of the only people in the entire kingdom that would survive doing as much. Liara Lee was the closest thing to a princess the Illéan military had, the daughter of the army's favourite son, and was the only person that Mordred could consider calling a friend. She had played with Mordred and Demetri when they were children - any kind of respect or fear that the ordinary person held for their king had been eroded by years of exposure to them in all the awkward aspects of childhood and adolescence. Liara had grown up in the same poisonous environment as Mordred had, had experienced the same thorny vacuum left behind after Demetri's abduction and murder, had been shaped by the same forces that had made Mordred...

Well.

Mordred's voice made the older woman look up from the tiles for the first time, her gaze very steady for her apparent fright. You didn't get to the sort of position Vivian Lahela held without having nerves of steel. "Mrs Lahela." The first thing that he had learned when he became the crown prince was that speaking in an official capacity was a simple matter of following the same formula each time, like the simplest of mathematical equations. "Thank you for your testimony." Keep her on your side. "You have been a most loyal citizen to this nation, and a most thoughtful friend to our family." Personalise it. "Indeed, I know my father used to read your newspaper every morning, and would often remark that he thought you understood what was going on in our nation much more keenly than even he." Sympathise. "I am so sorry that this tragedy has befallen your family." He wasn't sure if he was keeping the boredom from his voice. "I hope you know that the royal family stands behind our lost Daughters of Illéa, and the families that their disappearances have left bereft." Reassure her. "If your daughter has defected of her own will, then that is a sin that she has alone committed. Your family will face no retribution for the same." Commit. "If your daughter has been taken against her will by these rebels, then we shall spare no effort in achieving her..." What was that word again? "In ensuring that she is brought home safely. I will not sleep easy at night until I know that she is back where she belongs." A month ago, he would have concludedlike my brother, Demetri, but things were different now. A man with Demetri's name was Enemy Number One, and any comparison with Vivian Lahela's daughter might produce a report in the next day's Axiom that the palace was planning to shoot the rebel Selected on sight.

Vivian Lahela curtsied low. The more dogged the fighting in the south, the more loyal Axiom 's penmanship became - at its height, when the one they called Thiago Wesick had waged a battle in St George with casualties in the hundreds and thousands, the palace had been forced to dispatch a tactful handler to meet with Lahela and her editorial team, and request that they tone down the propagandist edge that the paper had taken. After all, Mordred mused, you could win people's loyalty given enough money, but authenticity and reliability was much tougher to achieve. They needed a paper that wouldn't just agree with them, but which would sell thousands of copies in Swendway and France and the Russian Federation. The dogged determination with which each anti-rebel article was written, of course, had earned Vivian Lahela a certain degree of respect and prestige within the court at Angeles. Mordred knew for a fact that she was a regular invitee to events thrown by his aunt Elyzabeta, and that her disappeared daughter had frequently been spotted around Angeles on the arms of various high-profile figures: Kristof Henderson, lead actor on Diadem, celebrity athletes, the son of Ysabel's advisor, and yet others. The Lahela women were Establishment, and that made a defected Lahela woman an absolute liability.

"Thank you," Vivian Lahela said softly. "Thank you, your Majesties. I can assure you that Axiom remains steadfast behind you, and behind your righteous cause."

"Your support is appreciated greatly." That ws Queen Ysabel, leaning forward in her chair, her eyes kind and warm. "Vivian, as a mother similarly bereaved, please know that I relate entirely to the distress you must be feeling. If there is anything else that we can do to help you and your family through this tough time, please let us know."

"With all due respect, your Highness,"Vivian Lahela replied softly. "I would prefer that you not do yourself the disservice of comparing our situations. Your son was wrongfully stolen from you. Mine betrayed our nation. But I thank you for your kindness."

Ysabel inclined her head in answer. Mordred said, "Mrs Lahela, thank you for coming here today. You have done your civic duty in doing so. Please allow our guards to show you out, and see you home."

The door had just closed behind her when Mordred reclined back in his throne and said, to no one in particular, "I want her followed. I want her entire family followed. I want her staff followed. If any of them so much as look south, I want to know about it."

He said it to no one in particular, but there was a flurry of activity in the corner as his Minister for Intelligence made note of the same. Right now, they couldn't afford to do much more to the editor of the most influential paper in the nation - particularly as he was sure she was headed straight home to compose vehement condemnations of the so-called regime in the Wastelands. That much might be enough to save her. Mordred had almost lost track of all the judgments that he had passed in this strangely airless room over the course of the past two days - some families were to suffer surveillance for the betrayal of their daughters. Some were to suffer much worse.

It was becoming very clear, however, that almost all of them had not had any idea of what their daughters were planning, and that their Selection had come as a complete surprise. The rebels had broadcast a lot of footage from Whites and Yukon from the night after the drawing had supposedly taken place on the fake Report - men and women dancing in the street, fireworks over the water - but for those girls who had escaped south from Illéan provinces, there had been only an odd, strained silence.

Much like Vivian Lahela, Mordred almost felt sorry for them. Those girls - those beautiful, accomplished Daughters of Illéa - had no idea what awaited them in the Wastelands, precisely what they were running towards, how they would be treated in the rebel heartlands. They were leaving their nation behind for a lie, Mordred thought, a lie beautifully told but a lie nonetheless.

So many lost girls.

Some more lost than others.

The Lahela family had been the last to be spoken to, interoggated and assessed, so Mordred stood, and stretched, and moved languidly down the steps to move towards the back door of the throne room, which led directly into a narrow stone corridor and out into the rose gardens beyond - originally intended as an escape hatch, Mordred thought ruefully, now more frequently used when he tired of wearing Demetri's crown and sitting on Trajan's throne and issuing Ysabel's edicts. The garden had once been the exclusive demesne of Jael, Mordred's father's first wife, until Liara had rehabilitated it and rescued it from the encroaching waste.

"Mordred."

The crown prince turned at the sound of his name, and raised an eyebrow. His uncle sounded... sorrowful.

"Set. What's wrong?"

Queen Regent Ysabel was hugging her arms. She had deep, dark shadows wrought under her eyes, and new lines turning down the sides of her mouth. Set had stepped forward from his usual position, under the window, between the oil paintings of his father and brother which adorned the southern wall of the throne room. Now, he put a hand on the queen's arm as she said,"Mordred." Set had set his jaw, and looked rather pained. "It's Liara."

Mordred blinked in confusion and smiled almost automatically, clearly not understanding what his mother was trying to say. "Liara?" He looked at the advisors that had stayed in the room - yes, and there was Liara's father, Commander Henry Lee, an imposing man with broad shoulders who had always remained one of Queen Ysabel's most fervent supporters. "I don't understand." Commander Lee didn't seem to be able to look Mordred in the eye, but kept his eyes trained on the throne, his hands clenched tightly where they rested on his lap. "Is she okay? Has something happened?"

Set stepped forward slowly. "She's gone, Mordred."

Ysabel's voice was poisonous. "She's gone south."

South. South was scrubland and hinterland and waste. South was desert flowers and blue skies and white sunlight. South was barbed wire and dirt roads and debris where towns had once been

"Gone..." Mordred blanched. "Liara's gone into the -"

He glanced around the room, sure that someone was about to contradict him, and realised that none of the advisors seemed to have the courage to meet his gaze.

None but one.

"Into the Selection," Commander Lee said, very darkly. His voice was hoarse and husky, like he was wrenching the words out by force. Mordred's eyes met his, and could not seem to look away. "My daughter has gone into the false Selection."

Mordred set his jaw. "It's not... Demetri. She knows it's not Demetri. Why would she..."

If Eden Lahela's defection looked bad, this one might destroy them.

Set put his hand on his nephew's shoulder. "We think that... she believes that it is him. That it is Demetri."

"It's not," Mordred said shortly.

Queen Ysabel had walked over towards the throne to set her hand on its arched back, but at her son's words she turned on him with a ferocity, her green eyes blazing. "Really?" She arched an eyebrow as she glared at Mordred. "It's not Demetri?"

Mordred did not react. "It can't be."

"How can you be sure?"

Mordred 's gaze did not waver. He looked around the room, at all of the assembled courtiers and advisors and councillors, and nodded, quite firmly. "Of course I can be sure," he said, and he did not allow himself to sound uncertain when he said it. "Of course it's not him. The man using my brother's name is an imposter. A liar. A killer masquerading as a king."

He cast his eyes about for anyone who wanted to disagree with him.

"And when he runs out of foxholes to hide in - and he will - I'll kill him like I killed their General."

And that, he thought, will be that.

Hi, everyone, I hope you have enjoyed this chapter! I know it's a little light on the Selected girls, but I really wanted to give you an insight into the current royal court, into Mordred's head, and into how Illéa is reacting to the Selection. Please do let me know what you thought - every single review genuinely makes my day,and I love hearing what you like and don't like so far, especially when it comes to characters that you prefer to others. I really appreciate absolutely any and all feedback you can give me.

There are still loads of spots open in the Selection!

Thanks so much. I hope you enjoyed!

- Izar