The Hour of the Crow

Chapter 2: A String of Suitors

Being a princess sucked.

Some days, Inna wished she would open her eyes and wake up in an ordinary bed in an ordinary house that belonged to an ordinary family. Too bad for her, the perfumed smell of the mountain of cushions around her usually shattered the illusion before it had the chance to root.

However, the bed she could live with; her father’s neverending efforts to marry her off to some wealthy prince or noble from faraway provinces, not so much.

Shah Musajah Adelhari the Third leaned back in his throne, both arms draped loosely over the armrests, and gestured for the next visitor to come in. The two guards on the other side of the throne room grabbed the ornate, gold door handles. Inna suppressed the urge to close her eyes and scream, and forced what she hoped was a charming smile onto her lips instead.

The man who entered the room was shorter than most other men she had met, but his body was muscular and his face handsome enough to stare at for a while. Contrary to most people at court, he didn’t wear excessive jewelry, although his taste in clothing was impeccable. His tunic looked simple but expensive, its burnt sienna a perfect match to his chestnut brown skin. When he bowed before the Shah, the sunlight turned his light hair into silver threads.

“It is an honor to be welcomed at your court, Your Majesty,” the man declared. His voice was soft and pleasant to listen to. His eyes, which had the same burning color as his clothes, flicked to Inna for a moment before readdressing the Shah. “I am Prince Rabyatt of Rasir, and I have come to present myself as a suitable husband for your oldest daughter, the Princess Serafina Adelhari.”

A suitable husband? Really? Inna looked him up and down once more, feeling the habitual skepticism creeping in.

He's cute, Zazi whispered in her mind. The snake tilted her green-scaled head at the prince, her forked tongue slipping in and out of her mouth. Inna doubted whether Zazi really approved of the prince as an actual candidate for marriage; her friend had a bad—or good?—habit of supporting Inna’s snide remarks about her suitors with more snide remarks.

So were the previous ones, Inna replied, hiding a smile while she sunk back into the cushions spread around the Shah's throne. That doesn't mean he can expect me to throw myself at his feet when he gives me a dazzling smile.

Zazi emitted a sharp hiss that was a snake’s best imitation at a giggle. Prince Rabyatt’s eyes narrowed when his gaze landed on her, as if he hadn’t noticed the large snake coiled around Inna’s shoulders before. An expression Inna couldn’t quite determine flashed across his face, but it was gone again the next moment, the spurious smile restored.

“What do you offer in return for my daughter’s hand, prince?” the Shah asked, casting a warning glare at Inna. She shrugged and gave him the most innocent look she could muster. He didn’t buy it. He rarely did.

The prince snapped his fingers and two servants darted forward, carrying a heavy trunk between them. Inna stifled a yawn; so he had brought coin and jewelry. How original.

However, it wasn’t just coin and jewelry. Even the Shah leaned forward in his throne, his face eager, when the servants lifted the trunk’s lid and revealed a glass sphere. A colorful mist of blues, greens and purples swirled around the sphere’s edges on the inside. Inna felt a magnetic pull at her, sensed the magic in her veins respond to that mist. The water in the pitcher next to her splashed and stirred. Zazi stiffened around her neck, the snake’s rising panic seeping into Inna’s mind as well.

“What is that?” the Shah asked with a profound reverence Inna had never heard in his voice before. She watched him out of the corner of her eye, and faint dread made her stomach churn at the sight of his unnaturally wide eyes, hypnotized.