The Reluctant Queen (The Queens of Renthia #2)(98)

"I assume Champion Ven has told you I reconsidered?" Naelin felt her face heat up. "I mean, about being heir. Trying to be heir. Training. Training to be heir, not . . . I wouldn't presume, that is, Your Majesty." Oh, good grief. She hadn't been this tongue-tied since she was a kid. She gave herself a mental slap. Quit it.

The queen gestured at the ornate couch near her. "Please, sit."

Naelin sank onto the cushions. It was low, too low, and the cushion sagged under her. She had to bend her legs to the side, but she managed it. It was amazing how a simple circle worn on a person's head could make one feel so awkward.

Queen Daleina glanced around the room, and Naelin was overly aware of the mess she'd made. The walls were scorched in spots, dirt was ground into the carpet, the mattress on the former queen's bed was gone-it had been drenched by a water spirit that Naelin had failed to control. "Queen Fara liked opulence," Queen Daleina said. "I see you have redecorated."

Naelin winced. She should have tried to clean. A hard scrub would have gotten out many of the stains . . . She surveyed the room, cataloguing all the things she could have fixed or cleaned. "I've been practicing here."

"I can see that." The queen studied Naelin. Even when she's not on the throne, she seems like a queen, Naelin thought. She wondered if it was an act or her natural personality, or a consequence of wearing the crown. Tapping the armrests, the queen continued to regard Naelin so intently that Naelin began to feel like an insect who had been noticed by a kitten. "You can speak freely, you know. I'm not going to have my guards chop your head off if you offend me. Besides, Captain Alet speaks highly of you."



       
         
       
        

Naelin hadn't seen Alet in days. It was nice to know that the guardswoman approved of her. She'd thought so, but she appreciated the confirmation. "You did the right thing, telling people the truth. Now they can be prepared."

"I can't predict it, so how can people prepare?" The queen stood abruptly and walked toward the balcony. She halted in the archway and looked out.

Naelin stood as well, smoothing her skirt and patting her hair. She'd changed from the brocade gown that the caretakers had provided for the funerals. She was wearing instead heavy-duty laundress clothes that would stand up to water, fire, and dirt. "Well, now that I know, I can be prepared. The next time-"

"I'll train you."

"Your Majesty?"

The queen spun to face her, and her sun-colored skirts flared around her. "I have precious little time, with the schedule my seneschal has set for me. There are many who want an audience after my announcement today. People need to be reassured. Champions need to be soothed. Not everyone feels that my announcement was the right decision . . . But that's not your problem. Your problem is that you have too much power. You've never learned to work small."

"I'm honored-"

"Oh, for spirits' sake, stop treating me like a queen. Come here." Queen Daleina beckoned. When Naelin joined her on the balcony, she pointed toward a tree spirit who was gnawing on an acorn several yards away. It was perched on a spire, with its hind legs planted in the bark. The tree spirit was no larger than Naelin's fist and so gnarled that it looked like an oversized walnut. Its face was a mash of wrinkles, and its spindly wood legs were pockmarked with deep, rotted-looking knots. "Tell me: what does it want?" the queen asked.

Death, she thought. It wanted their blood soaking into the moss, their last breath exhaled into the wind, their bodies sunk into the earth. "To kill all humans. To be free of our commands. To tear down all we've built. To rip the throats from our children and destroy our future."

"More simply. What does it want right now?"

Naelin studied the spirit. Bits of acorn flew from its teeth. "Lunch?"

"Exactly. So if you want to use the least amount of power possible to make that spirit grow a tree, choose a tree that it will want to grow. And then don't command. You don't want to bully the spirit-that requires more power. You want to nudge it. Encourage it. Trick it into doing what you want by making it think it's doing what it wants."

"Like getting children to help with the dishes by turning it into a game." Naelin thought of Erian and Llor. She'd turned housework into a contest-who could straighten their sheets fastest, who could wash their plates the best, who could remember to hang up their towels for the most days in a row. Here, caretakers did it all. "Mine will be so spoiled when we-" She stopped before she said "go home." She pictured home: her cozy kitchen with herbs drying upside down from the rafters, the beds piled high with down quilts she'd made, the wood floor worn from years of footsteps, and then she ruthlessly pushed the image away. Home is gone. Or at least so far out of reach that it might as well be. "All right, I'll try."