Xara Zynthar's Arc

Chapter 7 of 16

The eel turned slow circles in its jar between them. The prince had asked her to stay. Xara sat with her hands flat on her knees and knew she had run out of time to be clever. Six days had shrunk to a handful. If she waited to make him love her first, she would leave here with nothing, and her people would still be dying under a sky she could not fix from this room. "I have to tell you something," she said. "And when I am done you will want me out of this house." He set down his cup. He did not speak. He only watched her the way he had watched the eel. She reached into the pocket sewn inside her sleeve and took out a small orb. It fit in her palm. She set it beside the jar and pressed her thumb to the base. The glass warmed. Inside it, small rooms lit up one by one. A woman at a low table grinding salt. Two children asleep on a curved sleeping pod, its panels glowing pale blue. An old man watering a row of pale plants. Her mother, still alive in the picture, folding cloth by a window. "This is my home," Xara said. "Not the north. Not any place on your maps. I was not born under your sun. My skin is not this color. My face is not this face. I have been lying to you since I walked through your gate." She kept her eyes on the orb because she could not yet look at him. "My world is dying. I came here to make you love me so you would send ships, or grain, or soldiers, or anything. I chose you because you are powerful and alone. I thought I could use that." She swallowed. "Then I met you and I could not keep it clean in my head. I am telling you now because I do not have time to earn this slowly. If you throw me out, throw me out. But my people are real. Those people are real." She made herself look up. He was looking at the orb. At the child on the sleeping pod. At her mother's hands. "Show me what you look like," he said. She had not expected that sentence. She reached up and unclasped the thin chain at her throat. The glamour thinned like steam. Her true skin came through, gray-green, her eyes wider and darker, her head smooth. She waited for his face to close. He leaned forward. He studied her the way he studied the eel. Then he said, quietly, "How many ships would you need." She started to cry and could not stop. "We will talk about the lie later," he said. "Tell me the number. Tell me what your people eat. Tell me how long they have." She told him. The orb kept glowing between them. Outside, the bell for the midday change rang, and neither of them moved.