Home > The Bridge Kingdom (The Bridge Kingdom #1)(5)

The Bridge Kingdom (The Bridge Kingdom #1)(5)
Author: Danielle L. Jensen

Barely feed them, Lara amended, her chest clenched tight as the children ran to line the caravan route, their ribs visibly protruding from beneath their tattered clothes.

“God bless His Majesty,” they shouted. “God bless the Princess!” Little girls ran alongside Serin’s camel, reaching up to hand her braids of wildflowers, which Lara draped across her shoulders, then across the saddle when they grew too many.

Serin gave her a sack of silver coins to disperse, and it was a struggle to keep her fingers steady as she pressed them into tiny hands. They learned her name soon enough, and as the muddy creek turned to crystal rapids racing down the slopes toward the sea, they shouted, “Bless Princess Lara! Watch over our beautiful princess!” But it was a growing chant of “Bless Lara, Maridrina’s Martyr” that turned her hands cold. That kept her awake long after Serin had finished his lessons each evening, then filled her head with nightmares when sleep finally took her. Dreams where she was trapped by taunting demons, where all her skills had failed her, where no matter what she did, she could not get free. Dreams where Maridrina burned.

And every day, they traveled closer.

As the earth turned lush and moist, the caravan was joined by a larger contingent of soldiers, and Lara was moved from the camel to a blue carriage pulled by a team of white horses, their trappings decorated with the same silver coins as her father’s horse. And with the soldiers came a whole retinue of servants tending to Lara’s every need, washing and scrubbing and polishing her as they traveled to Maridrina’s capital city of Vencia.

Their whispers filtered through her tent walls: that her father had kept the future bride of Ithicana hidden in the desert all these long years for her own safety. That she was a treasured daughter, born of a favored wife, hand-selected by him to unite the two kingdoms in peace, her charm and grace destined to see Ithicana grant Maridrina all the benefits an ally should have, which would allow the kingdom to thrive once more.

The very idea that Ithicana would concede so much was laughable, but Lara felt no amusement at their naiveté. Not as she took in the desperate hope in their eyes. Instead, she carefully stoked her fury, hiding it beneath gentle smiles and graceful waves from the open window of the carriage. It was a strength she needed, given that she’d heard the other whispers, too. “Pity the poor gentle princess,” the servants said with sorrow in their eyes. “What will become of her amongst those demons? How will she survive their brutality?”

“Are you afraid?” Her father pulled the carriage curtains closed as they approached the outskirts of Vencia, much to Lara’s dismay. It was the city of her birth, and she hadn’t seen it since she’d been taken from the confines of the harem and brought to the compound to begin her training at the age of five.

She turned to him. “I’d be a fool not to be afraid. If they discover I’m a spy, they’ll kill me and then cancel the trade concessions for spite.”

Her father made a noise of agreement, then pulled two knives encrusted with Maridrinian rubies from beneath his coat, handing them to her. Lara recognized them as the ceremonial weapons that Maridrinian women wore to indicate they were wed. They were supposed to be used by a husband in the defense of his wife’s honor, but typically they were kept dull. Decorative. Useless.

“They’re lovely. Thank you.”

He chuckled. “Look more closely.”

Pulling them from their sheaths, Lara tested the edges and found them keen, but the balance was off. Then her father reached over and pressed one of the jewels, and the gold casement fell away to reveal a throwing knife.

Lara smiled.

“If they won’t allow you to communicate with the outside world, you’ll need to bide your time while you learn their secrets, then escape. Perhaps even fight your way free and return to us with what you’ve learned.”

She nodded, flipping the blades back and forth to get the feel of them. There was no chance of her willingly returning to hand-deliver her invasion strategy. To do so would be a death wish.

After learning her father’s intention to kill her and her sisters at the dinner, Lara had had time to consider why her father wanted the daughters not destined to be queen dead. It was more than a desire to keep his plot a secret until he’d succeeded in taking the bridge. Her father wanted this plot kept secret forever, for if anyone learned of it, his ability to use his other living children as negotiating tools would be negated. No one would ever trust him. Just like he’d never trust her. Which meant if Lara ever returned, successful or not, she too would be silenced.

Her father interrupted her thoughts. “I was there when you girls had your first kills,” he said. “Did you know?”

The blades stilled in her hands as Lara remembered. She and her sisters had been sixteen when the line of chained men had been brought to the compound under Serin’s watchful eye. They were raiders from Valcotta who’d been captured and brought to test the mettle of Maridrina’s warrior princesses. Kill or be killed, Master Erik had told them as they were pushed one by one into the fighting yard. Some of her sisters had hesitated and fallen beneath the raider’s desperate blows. Lara had not. She would never forget the meaty thunk her blade made as it sank into her opponent’s throat from across the yard. The way he stared at her in astonishment before slowly collapsing onto the sand, his lifeblood pooling around him.

“I didn’t know,” she said.

“Knives, as I recall, are your specialty.”

Killing was her specialty.

The carriage was rumbling over cobbled streets, the horses’ hooves making sharp little sounds against the stone. Outside, Lara heard intermittent cheers, and flicking aside the curtain, she tried to smile at the filthy men and women lining the streets, their faces pale from hunger and illness. Worse were the children among them, eyes dull and hopeless, flies buzzing near their eyes and mouths.

“Why don’t you do something for them?” she demanded of her father, whose face was expressionless as he stared out the window.

He turned his azure eyes on her. “Why else do you think I created you?” Then he reached into his pocket and gave her a handful of silver to toss from the window, which she did. She closed her eyes as her impoverished people fought each other for the gleaming metal. She would save them. She would wrest the bridge from Ithicana’s control, and no Maridrinian would go hungry again.

The horses slowed, making their way down the steep switchbacking streets to the harbor below. Where the ship waited to take her to Ithicana.

She tugged aside the curtain to get her first look at the sea, the scent of fish and brine on the air. There were whitecaps on the water, the rise and fall of the waves stealing her attention as her father plucked the knives from her hands to be returned when the time was right.

The carriage pulled through a market that appeared nearly devoid of life, the stalls empty. “Where is everyone?” she asked.

Her father’s face was dark and unreadable. “Waiting for you to open the gates to Ithicana.”

The carriage rolled into the harbor, then came to a stop. There was no ceremony as her father helped her out. The ship awaiting them flew a flag of azure and silver. Maridrina’s colors.

He led her swiftly down the dock and up a gangplank onto the ship. “The crossing to Southwatch takes less than an hour. There are servants waiting to prepare you below.”

Hot Books
» House of Earth and Blood (Crescent City #1)
» A Kingdom of Flesh and Fire
» From Blood and Ash (Blood And Ash #1)
» A Million Kisses in Your Lifetime
» Deviant King (Royal Elite #1)
» Den of Vipers
» House of Sky and Breath (Crescent City #2)
» The Queen of Nothing (The Folk of the Air #
» Sweet Temptation
» The Sweetest Oblivion (Made #1)
» Chasing Cassandra (The Ravenels #6)
» Wreck & Ruin
» Steel Princess (Royal Elite #2)
» Twisted Hate (Twisted #3)
» The Play (Briar U Book 3)