toward her. âIt is the best thing in his life.â
He loves her , they said. She loves him . Again and again, everywhere we went. The hero was to marry his love; the beauty was to marry her prince. The whole land was to celebrate.
âIt is too bad,â I said once to a girl who was walking her geese alongside us, âthat the ladyâs family is not alive to see her married.â
âOh,â she said, âbut it is a miracle that she survived. That is what she says. A miracle that she lives to be wed.â
So, not a whiff of grief was to darken Aglaiaâs wedding. Not a hint of trouble to worry her bridegroomâwho was also the father of her child, I was certain. This prince was not used to refusal.
I could see the moment my sisters began to believe in Endymionâs glory. I saw how they walked with lighter steps, how they breathed freer and smiled at the people we met. They thought the girl was on her way to destiny. Not one that shrieked and shattered, but something full and beautiful, the nicest sort of end.
I let them believe it; I had to, didnât I? I couldnât expose them to the twistedness, the rot I had smelled on Endymionâs thread. I had to keep it from them for as long as I could and hope that Aglaiaâs future would be happier than her past, that this journey would end with us seeing the girl settled into as contented a life as my sisters dreamed.
It was all I could do: stay silent as we heard the stories of this brave young prince and the things they were saying about Aglaiaâ Lucky girl. He always loved her. Now sheâll have a chance to be happy! âand pray that my sisters wouldnât notice the darker underbelly hidden on the flip side of these green leaves.
Nine
A DAY BEFORE WE WERE to reach the city, the scent of Aglaiaâs thread veered off to the east. We stood at the crossroads, smelling it. We knew the way to Endymion lay straight ahead. When a woman came by with a basket of freshly picked flowers, we asked where Aglaiaâs road would lead us, if we were to take it.
âOh, that,â she said. âJust a few villages, some fields. If youâre looking for the city, itâs on ahead.â She pointed in the direction we had been heading.
âNothing else?â I said. âOnly fields and villages?â
âWell . . .â She thought, and then she said, âI suppose, a good dayâs walking, thereâs also that sad ruin. The village where our Aglaia used to live, the one whoâs to marry our prince. Nothingâs left of that, though. Thereâs no reason to visit.â
We thanked her, and we let her go her way, and then we turned east.
That night I asked our innkeeper a few pointed questions when I went down from our room to fetch some food. Yes, Aglaia had passed through here only the day before. Yes, her old village lay to the east; weâd reach it late tomorrow morning if we set out early enough.
Yes, he could tell me where the oracle lived who had given the children of that town their prophecies. She was the same oracle he had asked prophecies of for his own children. His round face brightened, and he began to tell me what those were, how they had been promised contented lives, luck, lots of love.
I cut him off; I think he was offended. But I could not stand his naïveté, and after Iâd grabbed some bowls of soup, I turned from him and walked away.
I did not tell my sisters that next day where I was going; I left them as soon as we were out of town. I said there was a place I had heard of, with views to the north and the east. I said that maybe I could catch a glimpse of the sea, or maybe Endymionâs city.
Serena offered to come along with me; I shrugged her off.
âThe path would be steep for Xinot,â I said, and when my eldest sister snorted, I went on, âOh, leave me alone, will you? If she can run outside in the middle of the night and we
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