It seemed that as quickly as my kingdom had been ripped from me, I had been given another. Well, once my grandmother abdicated or passed. Not that I had any notion to hasten either of those eventual outcomes, I fully understood that I was not ready to lead. I had much to learn, much more than I realized at first. There was more to ruling the Yser than just court politics, intrigue, and political motions; there was also the issue of magic that I apparently possessed. The castle and the land itself also felt mysterious, like I was only seeing a portion of what was real.

  I spent the first day wandering the castle alone, marveling at the strange gargoyles that towered over the garden and the intense and sometimes terrifying paintings that decorated the walls. Even the stone the castle was made of was an odd choice. It was a dark marbled grey with glints of sharp, black flecks. While smooth to the touch, there was the odd bit of flake that would subtly jut from the wall just sharp enough to cut skin. It felt like a deliberate choice as a kind of message that while the facade of everything was inviting, there was still an element of danger present.

  Aside from the walls and decoration, the castle felt foreign, yet also like home. The servants already dipped their heads to me when I passed by and gave me proper respect, not the flippant disregard for my royal blood that sometimes happened in my father's castle. There the servants had ignored me at times, perhaps unable to seriously consider a young child their better. It was refreshing to feel that respect here and I was unsure if there was such a stark difference here due to my grandmother and aunt training them well or if the passive threat of magic in the air reminding them to remember their place.

  I was still a bit wary about the idea of magic. The old commoner stories about haggard witches arriving in the night to steal young children and replace them with imps and changelings ran through my head. There was also the one about a woman with a slit neck that would frequent wells waiting for misbehaving children to wander too near and she would snatch them and throw them down the well to keep her company. Those stories felt absurd, but showed that magic typically had a negative connotation. It was something to fear, something that was likely to be used against you for harm and evil, yet there was so much about my aunt and grandmother that felt alluring and otherworldly. Their striking visions of youth despite their advanced age aside, the way they moved and the way words tumbled from their lips in ways that seemed to hypnotize everyone around them seemed anything but mundane.

  “Don't you have questions for me, child?” Evonia asked during our first dinner together. “Surely you must have some curiosities. You are a Yser and not a simple child merely happy to go along without questions.”

  The very same servants from the throne room had followed her to the dining table, taking turns feeding and fawning over her. My grandmother did not seem to need to indicate when she was ready for another bite or wanting to take a break, the servants moved as if they could read her mind for what she desired. The lack of the pin prickling sensation that I was starting to associate with magic being present told me it was likely that they were just well trained and practiced to what she expected.

  “It is part of being a monarch, you know,” she continued on after taking a moment to chew on the chunk of skewer meat presented to her by a servant. “There are many who would rather you stayed ignorant and in the dark, but it is your duty to whomever your rule and, most importantly, yourself to be aware and informed.”

  I knew that I should have been bubbling over with questions. This all seemed too good to be true, but there was something to be said about ignorance being bliss. Something so tantalizing had to come with downsides. Though I couldn't imagine any downside being bad enough to dissuade me from accepting the responsibility of being an heir. Still, I supposed that she was correct that it was better to know the downsides now so I could anticipate them rather than find out blindly later and be caught off guard.

  “You seem to have just accepted everything and have not thought hard about it. That worries me that you may be prone to making foolish decisions hastily.” While her words seemed like they should chastise, her tone told me that she did not truly believe that I was foolish. “Ease my mind on my decision, tell me what you are thinking.”

  “It is everything I wanted and perhaps more,” I replied, “it may be foolish to question too closely and lose ground. I would not want to spoil a relationship by asking possibly offensive questions when the person bestowing my title still has it within her right to rescind the offer.”

  Evonia gave an approving tilt of her head and cracked a smile. “Yes, you just might do well at this. Very well, I will tell you what you should know if you are willing to pay attention. There are some important things you should know, though thanks to your rather… lackluster upbringing thus far you might not even know to ask about.”

  I nodded in agreement, turning my attention to her and away from the plate of fowl before me. Doing so did pain me a bit, the food here was beyond reproach and a far cry from the dry and mostly tasteless meals my aunt and I had shared on the journey here.

  “My time as the head of the Yser is growing short,” she began, “though by looking at me this may be harder to believe.”

  She was right, she looked awfully spry and young to be very old at all. Any passerby may have mistaken her for my older sister rather than grandmother.

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  “I assure you this is just a vanity glamour, nothing more than an illusion,” she said with barely contained sigh. “We have tried to figure out the necessary ritualistic magic for eternal life, but I'm afraid that it will not be within my lifetime. Though I do ask that if you happen to be the one who figures it out, that you remember to resurrect your dear grandmother.” Her face displayed humor, but also a glimmer in her eye that she was also being serious. “I believe that I have just enough time left in me to ensure that you will make as fine a sorceress as I have divined you can be.”

  “Divined?” I questioned.

  I had only heard the word before whispered among servants. I believe that there had been particular women in the village who claimed to be able to tell your future with chicken bones or floating leaves. Obviously it had just seemed like an absurd way for the servants to waste what little coin they had to their names.

  “That is my particular talent,” she explained, “all I need is a steady pool of water and the visions appear before me. They show me what has been, what is now, and what might be. In them I saw that your heart pumped true Yser blood and a great potential dwells within you.”

  “If you can see what is happening, then how did you not know what my mother was doing?” I questioned.

  Despite her being generous enough to make me her heir, I would be understandably miffed if she had known what was going on and chose to let it happen anyway. It would have saved me a painful, long ride, and likely a bit of sanity, but by her reaction to hearing the news about the foul creature’s birth I believed she had been blindsided as well.

  “That is not quite how it works, though I sincerely wish it did,” she said with a bitter laugh. “The visions are not something I can control, I am shown that which I need to know and nothing more. If I was not shown that the child would be male then the powers that grant me the visions simply decided that the path was better managed with me not knowing. What I was shown was that you were born as a true daughter of Yser and that your sibling would not be. I had my suspicions, but I truly believed that your mother would not be so brazenly stupid. However, it was clear something was wrong and that your future hung in peril. That is why I sent Mari to investigate.”

  “So you knew before you even met me that I would be worthy of the title to become your heir?.”

  She nodded her head and motioned for her empty plate to be taken from her sight. One of the servants seamlessly swept up from the floor around her and performed the duty as if he had done so thousands of times.

  “Yes, of course, I need a true daughter so I can ensure that all I have worked for has not been for naught. I was granted a vision for whom that true daughter would be and your face appeared vividly.”

  “What about your sister?” I questioned. “Not that I want to give up my position, but surely aunt Mari would know better than I what your wishes are.”

  Mari let out a small laugh and shook her head. “Toria, I believe you are allowing the glamour to confuse you. I am not much younger than Evonia, I won't last forever either.”

  I nodded in understanding, but still, something felt off about this situation. “What about any of your other children or grandchildren? I remember my mother telling me that she was the youngest, which implies that she has other siblings.”

  “I have had two other children, twins,” Evonia said with a slight snarl to her voice, “but I seem to have been cursed to birth traitors.

  I could tell by her sudden, annoyed shift in mannerisms to not pursue the topic any further at this time. This was the exact type of pitfall I had been wary about. I simply did not know much about this side of my family and was unaware of what might be a forbidden topic. Every family seemed to have some sort of sore spot that everyone took care to avoid discussing.

  “And I chose to never have children,” Mari interjected, noting Evonia's soured mood and trying to smooth the conversation over away from it. “I always felt like I shouldn't have to do what I am 'supposed' to do as a woman. I control my destiny, it is not predestined or commanded of me. No heirs from my ended bloodline.”

  My forehead wrinkled up in thought, I didn't understand how a woman could choose not to have children. By the way she dressed, I certainly doubted that she was a pious, chaste woman.

  “There are ways to rid yourself of such things,” she explained with an amused smirk on her face, “there is much you have been shielded from.”

  What a wonderful thing that could be, if it were true that women did not have to bear the children they did not want. The servant women would often moan that they were with child again and did not know how they would go about feeding another mouth. It made me wonder if perhaps the methods of ridding pregnancy were just not widely known for I would otherwise think it would be quite popular.

  “Regardless,” Evonia sighed after seeming to regain some of her good humor, “you are right now the youngest, and perhaps last in the line. I have also foreseen you bringing the House of Yser to glory.”

  It seemed like a very tall order, especially to a ten-year-old girl, not that I didn't have at least some confidence that I could do it. I had the mind to make a sharp monarch and I was already shrewd and calculating.

  “Tomorrow you will start your magical studies,” my grandmother instructed. “Unfortunately, you are several years behind in your instruction, but the best tutor in the land will be working with you. I am confident that you will grow to be perhaps an even more powerful sorceress than myself.”

  The idea of magic and sorcery still seemed like a strange idea, but by the serious expressions on their face, maybe I was the silly one for never knowing about it before. It certainly was a tantalizing idea, especially if it always felt like what I had experienced while touching the great stone. The memory of the feeling of unbridled power sent shivers down my spine.

  If I were to become a powerful sorceress, then surely nothing and no one would stand in my way. I would bide my time, learn all I could, then decimate the traitors and make them rue the day they decided to turn their backs on a daughter of Yser.