Phantom: Chainfire Trilogy Part 2

"Not even the stars had anything to say about my condition or chances. The advisors mostly stood around wringing their hands — and probably plotting who would steal the crown when I finally died. I suspect that if it wasn't soon then one of them would have helped me along into the afterlife with my mother. I heard their worried whispers about me becoming queen."

Violet took another calming breath. "In the middle of my nightmare of pain and suffering, of anguish and grief, of my growing concern about being murdered, Six arrived and helped me." She gestured up at the woman standing beside her. "Just when I needed it most, Six came along and helped save me, helped save the crown and Tamarang itself, when no one else could or would."

"But, but," Rachel stammered, "you're not old enough to be a queen."

She knew it was a mistake the instant the words had left her tongue, before her better judgment had time to stop them. Violet's other hand whipped around, slapping Rachel across the other cheek. Violet seized her by the hair and roughly pulled her back up onto her knees. Rachel cupped a hand to the new throbbing ache and with the other hand wiped blood from her mouth.

Violet shrugged, indifferent to the pain and blood she had caused. "Anyway, I grew up in the last few years. I'm no longer the child I was back then, the child you still think of me being, back when you lived here, enjoying our kindness and generosity."

Rachel didn't think that Violet had grown up enough to be a queen, but she knew better than to say so again. She also knew better than to think of enslavement as "kindness."

"Six helped me as I recovered. She saved me."

Rachel stared up at the pale, smiling face. "I offered my services. Violet welcomed me into the castle. Her mother's advisors certainly weren't doing her any good.

"Six used her power to heal my broken and grossly infected jaw. I had grown weak from only being able to sip a thin broth. With Six's help I was at last able to begin to eat again and recover my strength. New teeth even came in. I don't suppose that anyone ever grew a third set of teeth before, yet I did.

"But still I could not speak, so when I was well enough, strong enough, Six used her remarkable powers to grow me a new tongue." Her fists tightened at her sides. "The tongue that I lost because of the Seeker."

"The former Seeker," Six corrected, under her breath.

"The former Seeker," Violet acknowledged, considerably calmer.

A smug smile returned to Violet's plump face. It was a smile that Rachel knew all too well. "And now you have been brought back." Her tone expressed a threat that her words hadn't named.

"What about all the others?" Rachel asked, trying to buy time to think. "All the queen's advisors?"

"I am the queen!" It seemed that, along with the rest of her, Violet's temper had gotten bigger as well.

A gentle touch on the back from Six brought a brief glance up and a smile to Violet's face. She again took a calming breath, almost as if she had been reminded to watch her manners.

She finally answered Rachel's question. "I have no need for my mother's advisors. They were, after all, worthless. Six fills that role now, and does so much better than any of those fools.

"After all, none of them could grow me a new tongue, now could they?"

Rachel glanced up at Six. The wolf's grin was back. The ghostly blue eyes seemed to be staring right into Rachel's naked soul.

"Such a thing was far beyond their abilities," the woman said in a quiet voice, but one that carried the undertone of profound power. "However, it was well within mine."

Rachel wondered if Violet had ordered all the advisors put to death. The last time Rachel had been at the castle, Violet, at her mother's side, was just beginning to order executions. Now that she was queen, with Six to back her, there would be nothing to restrain Violet's whims.

"Six gave me my tongue back. Gave me my voice back. The Seeker thought he had taken all of that from me, but now I have it back. Tamarang is safely in my hands."

Had it not been so frightening a thought, so horrifying a concept, Rachel might have laughed at the very idea of Violet being queen. Rachel had been Violet's playmate, her companion — really nothing more than her personal slave. Violet's mother, Queen Milena, had gotten Rachel from an orphanage, intending her to be someone upon whom Violet could practice leadership, someone younger whom Violet could easily handle and abuse.

Rachel had not only escaped, she taken Queen Milena's precious box of Orden with her, eventually giving it over to Richard and Zedd and Chase.