Palace of Silver Read online

  Text copyright © 2020 by Hannah West

  Map by Jaime Zollars. Copyright © 2020 by Holiday House Publishing, Inc.

  All Rights Reserved

  HOLIDAY HOUSE is registered in the U.S. Patent and Trademark Office.

  Printed and bound in February 2020 at Maple Press, York, PA, USA.

  www.holidayhouse.com

  First Edition

  1 3 5 7 9 10 8 6 4 2

  Library of Congress Cataloging-in-Publication Data

  Names: West, Hannah, 1990- author.

  Title: Palace of silver : a Nissera novel / Hannah West.

  Description: First edition. | New York : Holiday House, [2020] | Summary: “Corruption, uprisings, and a massive threat to elicromancy bring new queens Glisette and Kadri to arms in this sequel to Realm of Ruins”— Provided by publisher.

  Identifiers: LCCN 2019013102 | ISBN 9780823444434 (hardcover)

  Subjects: | CYAC: Magic—Fiction. | Kings, queens, rulers, etc.—Fiction. Fantasy.

  Classification: LCC PZ7.1.W4368 Pal 2020 | DDC [Fic]—dc23

  LC record available at https://lccn.loc.gov/2019013102

  CONTENTS

  COVER

  TITLE PAGE

  COPYRIGHT

  DEDICATION

  MAP

  DEITIES OF AGRIMAS

  PROLOGUE

  ONE

  TWO

  THREE

  FOUR

  FIVE

  SIX

  SEVEN

  EIGHT

  NINE

  TEN

  ELEVEN

  TWELVE

  THIRTEEN

  FOURTEEN

  FIFTEEN

  SIXTEEN

  SEVENTEEN

  EIGHTEEN

  NINETEEN

  TWENTY

  TWENTY-ONE

  TWENTY-TWO

  TWENTY-THREE

  TWENTY-FOUR

  TWENTY-FIVE

  TWENTY-SIX

  TWENTY-SEVEN

  TWENTY-EIGHT

  TWENTY-NINE

  THIRTY

  THIRTY-ONE

  THIRTY-TWO

  THIRTY-THREE

  THIRTY-FOUR

  THIRTY-FIVE

  THIRTY-SIX

  THIRTY-SEVEN

  THIRTY-EIGHT

  THIRTY-NINE

  FORTY

  FORTY-ONE

  FORTY-TWO

  EPILOGUE

  ACKNOWLEDGMENTS

  To Dr. Johnny Wink and the Bugtruck

  DEITIES OF AGRIMAS

  THE HOLIES AND THEIR SYMBOLS

  Eulippa. Lovingkindness. A broken-winged bird.

  Atrelius. Courage. Sword and shield.

  Mindaes. Moderation. Scales.

  Orico. Generosity. Wine pitcher.

  Hestraclea. Loyalty. Canine companion.

  Kromanos. Diligence. Arrow and target.

  Deliantha. Honesty. Candle and key.

  Lerimides. Humility. Bowed head.

  THE FALLEN

  Nexantius. Vainglory.

  Silimos. Apathy.

  Robivoros. Depravity.

  Themera. Cruelty.

  PROLOGUE

  Once upon a time, there were four queens.

  The sheltered queen learned that she did not need magic to be brave.

  The mortal queen learned that she was worthy of more.

  The almighty queen learned that limitless power has its own constraints.

  The last queen looked in the mirror and decided she would bend the world to her will.

  ONE

  GLISETTE LORENTHI

  PONTAVAL, VOLARRE

  A SIGH of wind snuffed out the campfire. The darkness in the belly of the forest was as dense as the black soil underneath my bedroll. I went rigid, listening to the rustle of footsteps and the rattle of rasping breaths. Enemies were near.

  My elicrin stone held reassuring warmth from nestling against my breastbone. But magic couldn’t guarantee my escape from the soulless creatures prowling in the shadows. When I opened my mouth to utter a spell, no sound emerged. No light burst from the stone. My head felt too heavy to lift.

  A blight with sallow, sore-ridden skin and milky eyes approached, raising a jagged blade to ram it through my quick-beating heart. The creature drew so close I could smell its putrefying flesh, the scent of dark magic unbridled. Yet I couldn’t react, couldn’t move. I could only hope my death would be swift.

  “Glisette?” the blight said in a cheery voice.

  I gasped and heaved awake, terrifying my younger sister, Perennia.

  Cold sweat dampened the satin sheets twisted around my thighs. Shafts of light from a flaming sunrise melted through gaps in the powder-blue drapes, skimming over gilded furniture and velvet upholstery. I was at home in the palace at Pontaval, not in the woods at night or in the throes of a bloody battle.

  Months had passed since I’d helped to overthrow the Moth King, but the most harrowing memories of the journey still stalked my sleep.

  “Sorry!” Perennia squeaked, holding aside the embroidered canopy that surrounded my four-poster bed. “Oliva said to tell you the mayors of the border towns have arrived.”

  With an irascible grunt, I swung my legs over the edge of the bed, brushing strands of blond hair from my face. “They’re early.”

  “Yes.”

  “Was Oliva afraid to wake me?”

  Perennia’s honeyed curls bobbed as she nodded.

  I could hardly blame my head maid, not after I’d accidentally unleashed a spell last week that had flung her across the room and into my open wardrobe. My heaps of flouncy dresses had padded her fall, but since then Oliva had been skittish when it came to waking me.

  I pounced into action. A year ago it would have taken me hours to prepare for a social engagement. Sometimes I missed the simple luxury of pruning in the scalding water, dozing off as a maid’s gentle fingers sifted through my long locks. Now I barely took the time to use a comb and mouth rinse before throwing back a swig of tea and hurrying off to whatever appointment awaited me first, pursued by Oliva and her flock of underling ladies-in-waiting. I could hardly even visit the lavatory alone for all the guards and servants tailing me.

  Nothing had been the same since the day I told Uncle Mathis, in no uncertain terms, that I was stepping into the role of queen of Volarre and forcing him out.

  One of the maids broke formation to scuttle ahead and open the door to the meeting chamber—I hadn’t opened a door for myself in months either—revealing my chief advisor sitting at the marble-top table with a group of strange men.

  “I present Her Majesty, Queen Glisette Lorenthi,” he said.

  As the mayors stood to bow, their gazes coasted over me, moving from the misty lavender chalcedony at my throat to the silver crown on my head, landing in unison on the scar that slashed over my right eye from forehead to cheek.

  “Gentlemen,” I said, scooping the skirts of my sapphire dress—a bit modest for my taste, despite the plunging neckline—to claim the head of the table. They took their seats. “Once again, I profoundly apologize for the decisions made by my uncle and elder sister, which brought food shortages to your towns. How are the assistance programs faring?”

  “They’re helping, Your Majesty,” answered the man to my left, who looked too youthful for his silver hair. “The problem is that when Prince Regent Mathis tripled the tolls, the produce vendors who cross the border to our markets raised their prices.”

  “But we’ve decreased the tolls,” I pointed out. “They’re even lower than before Uncle Mathis raised them.”

  “Yes, Your Majesty,” my chief advisor said, “but the vendors fear the crown might raise them again on a whim.”

  I was grateful for Hubert, who patiently filled in my gaps of
understanding. My younger brother, Devorian, had been coached to take the crown while my sisters and I learned etiquette, languages, and, of course, elicromancy. As queen, I was forced to countervail my years of deficient governing studies with tireless initiative.

  “I’ll sign a decree guaranteeing that I will not raise the tolls for a decade,” I said. “We’ll have a ceremony in one of your towns.”

  “A bold idea, Your Majesty,” Hubert said. “But it doesn’t solve the immediate problem that many poor Volarians cannot afford food.”

  A blush of embarrassment bloomed behind my cheeks. In moments like these, I missed my old life—but not sprawling in the lap of opulence and reveling in a lack of responsibilities. Instead, strangely, I longed for my time trudging through the wilderness, scared, hungry, thirsty, sore, and wounded, but driven by a singular purpose.

  The quest had been arduous, but with only one goal: deliver Valory Braiosa to the Moth King’s court so that she could kill him before he destroyed Nissera.

  The upheaval that necessitated the quest had happened so swiftly that I’d barely had time to second-guess my decision to join.

  First, Valory had touched the Water—the ancient source of elicrin magic hidden deep in the woods—without permission from the Conclave. But unlike others who had tried before her, she did not die. Nor did she receive an elicrin stone, which would have bestowed upon her a magical gift. Instead, she had dried up the Water and gained a destructive power that looked nothing like elicromancy.

  Meanwhile, my brother Devorian had come into possession of a pearl tablet inscribed with an arcane “awakening” spell written in an ancient, forgotten language. Though Devorian was an Omnilingual, the language was so strange that even he struggled to make sense of the spell. He convinced himself it would have the capacity to resurrect our parents from the dead.

  Instead, it raised Emlyn Valmarys, an elicromancer tyrant from a dark age in history. He had been kept dormant for centuries when no one—not even an alliance of elicromancers, fay, and sea folk—could defeat him. His power allowed him to take other elicromancers’ gifts for his own or lend them to his servants. He was invincible until the three groups devised a way to trap him in his mountain lair and keep him dormant using a contract engraved on the tablet.

  A group of mortals called the Summoners had given Devorian the tablet to decipher without telling him what it would do. They wanted to resurrect Emlyn Valmarys so that he would offer them a reward of magic and immortality. Devorian was a foolish pawn who unwittingly did their bidding by speaking the spell on the tablet.

  Valory accidentally cursed Devorian with a beastly form for his recklessness, demonstrating that her power could do more than just destroy. Then she crossed paths with Mercer, a Prophet from an earlier time. Mercer told her that Valmarys, whom he called the Moth King due to the tyrant’s sigil, did not hold the power to give and take elicrin gifts on his own. Mercer’s brother, Tilmorn, had; Tilmorn was a Purveyor, and the Moth King had taken him captive long ago. Now the Moth King was using Tilmorn’s power to conquer the mountain fortress city of Darmeska and unleash havoc on the realm.

  Mercer felt certain that Valory would be the one to defeat the risen tyrant at last, given her strange and unrivaled power. Thus we set out, the Moth King’s servants hunting us while we hunted him. And as we fought, the Realm Alliance unraveled. The Moth King’s servants captured and murdered many of its members, but spared Valory’s family, who had joined forces with the Summoners in order to sow political chaos and make their own magical laws. My family had fallen under Valmarys’s influence as well. Ambrosine and Uncle Mathis let the Moth King win them over with fine gifts, leading to crisis when they began overtaxing the kingdom to support the new heights of their lavish lifestyle.

  Every corner of Nissera seemed to be caving in on itself. Yorth fell to plague, Volarre fell to greed, and Calgoran fell to corruption.

  But we managed to deliver Valory to the Moth King’s tower in Darmeska. While we battled his servants, she faced the tyrant himself. She stole his power and freed Tilmorn. And in the midst of the fight, she realized that the Water had given her more than just a gift for destruction and transformation—it had given her itself. The Water had always decided who was worthy of elicromancy. And now Valory had that power, carrying the Water’s legacy. She was more than a mere Purveyor, like Tilmorn had been before she made him a Healer. She was more than a Neutralizer. She was the source of elicrin power.

  On the heels of our triumph in Darmeska, we returned to our respective homes and punished those who had wronged the realm. Devorian supported me in pushing Uncle Mathis aside so that I could become queen of Volarre.

  I had thought my trials were over. How was it that overthrowing a tyrant was somehow easier—or at least more straightforward—than taking up the scepter to rule?

  “Theft and murder have escalated in our towns, Your Majesty,” one of the mayors at the far end of the table said. “Our people have resorted to eating draft animals and seed grains. They’re desperate for food.”

  I gulped, trying to remain calm so I could think. If the mayors hadn’t arrived early, Hubert would have counseled me privately. But if he helped me now, my inexperience would be all too apparent.

  A din from outside drowned my thoughts. “What is that shouting?” I demanded.

  One of my guards hurried to the windows behind me. “There’s a crowd approaching the palace gates, Your Majesty.”

  I rose and turned to see for myself, blinded by the brilliant sun glistening on the distant hills. I blinked the stars from my eyes and found a horde marching along the cobblestone thoroughfare, winding uphill past shops and markets to our towering palace.

  “Is it some sort of parade?” I asked, squinting into the distance. “Why was I not informed?”

  “It’s not a parade.” Hubert sounded alarmed as he appeared at my side.

  My stomach clenched. Even from afar, I caught angry flashes of farm tools and fists punching into the air, unintelligible chants and jeers. “It’s a riot,” I said.

  The courtyard guards realized this before I did and slammed the wrought iron gates so swiftly that the silver-gilt lily emblems shivered. The loud clanging sliced through my skull, and when it faded, the words of the people’s chant became clear:

  No magic kings!

  No magic queens!

  Let mortals rule!

  End the suffering!

  The chant evolved into shouting as they slammed against the closed barrier, rattling the iron bars. With a boost, a young boy managed to scramble halfway up the gate and find a foothold on a silver lily petal. He threw his leg over to straddle the arch, his keen eyes searching the palace windows. Our gazes met. He slid a bulky stone from his pocket and reeled back his arm.

  I jolted away from the window a mere half second before the glass burst, shards singing as they scattered over the floor.

  Hubert clasped my elbow. “Get her to an interior room,” he said to the guard.

  “I need to speak to them,” I insisted. “They’re my people and they have grievances to air.”

  With a thunder of hooves, mounted guards cantered through the courtyard and lined up along the gates, daring the swarm to push through. One of the guards grabbed the boy by the wrist and yanked him from his perch. He hit the ground with an unsettling whap and curled into himself, writhing in pain.

  “Stop!” I cried. “Hubert, make them stop!”

  “Protecting you and the royal residence is their duty,” Hubert said, urging me toward the door. “It is below the dignity of the crown to acknowledge the demands of subjects threatening your life. We must get you to safety.”

  “I’m an elicromancer, Hubert. I am safe.” He couldn’t truly understand what I’d endured, what I’d seen others endure. “No violence. That is a command.”

  “Your guards will do what they must,” Hubert argued calmly. “I’ve served your family for many years. Your parents trusted me in these matters—”

 
“And look what happened to them,” I snapped. The ice in my gaze was even more effective now than before I earned my scar.

  Compunctious, Hubert bowed his head but didn’t avert his eyes. He lowered his voice, even toned. “That only reinforces my point. Like you, your parents thought their magic would keep them safe. And they were caught off guard.”

  The room suddenly felt too cramped, the air too warm, the riot outside as raucous as an unruly storm. Elicromancer-hating rebels had slain my parents during a diplomatic overseas excursion to Perispos. And now the crowd out there was clamoring for the fall of elicromancer rulers.

  The reign of the Moth King had not been kind to mortals—nor to elicromancers who resisted him. But mortals couldn’t see the latter fact. They only knew that their bellies had ached with hunger and their loved ones had fallen ill with plague, while Uncle Mathis and Ambrosine bled them dry with tolls and taxes. The glowing sense of appreciation for my part in overthrowing the Moth King had faded. Now all my people saw was a beautiful woman in a palace with a magical jewel at her throat, a woman resembling the elder sister who had failed Volarre; the only physical trait that truly distinguished me from Ambrosine was the gash across my eye.

  I stormed to the exit, barely remembering to acknowledge the mayors. “Hubert will work out the details when the dust settles,” I said over my shoulder. “My best wishes to you.”

  A fretful Perennia waited with the maids in the corridor, gnawing her bottom lip.

  “Go to your room and stay away from the windows,” I barked, sweeping past.

  “What will you do?” she asked.

  “Listen to them.”

  “They’re not here to speak to you.”

  I ignored her as I marched back to my bedchamber.

  “Where are you going?” she asked.

  “To change.” I flung open the door before a maid could do it for me. I stalked to my wardrobe, tuning out the deafening shouts from the distant courtyard. “We have to show them that we’re not the vain little dolls they think we are.”

  My fingertips brushed delicate beading, silk ribbons, ruffles, lace. I yanked out a spring green gown and plucked wildly at its fabric flower embellishments, maiming petals and severing threads. “Do I own a single gown without frills?”