Sophia, Princess Among Beasts Read online

  Ringed with golden light, she nodded. “My child,” she said, “I am.”

  I felt like I couldn’t bear the happiness. For my whole lonely life, this was my most precious, secret wish. My wildest, most impossible hope. I shook my head dumbly. “I don’t understand.”

  She sat down by my bed and took my hand again. “I don’t either,” she said. “The boundaries of the material world and the spiritual world are a mystery to me still.” Her warm fingers threaded their way through mine. “Maybe each bleeds into the other in ways we cannot understand. But what we can’t explain, we still can trust: I am here with you now.”

  I wiped the tears away as best I could. Everything I ever knew was different now, and immeasurably better.

  But still I felt a pang of anguish. My father wasn’t here. Nor was Raphael.

  “Mother, I hoped you’d take care of them,” I whispered.

  “Who?” she asked.

  “My father—”

  “Wherever Leonidus is, you can be sure that he is taking very good care of himself,” she said, smiling. “And someday, Sophia, we will all be together again. I believe that with all my heart.”

  “And Raphael,” I insisted, still uncomforted. “You didn’t know him, but you would have loved him.”

  My mother opened her mouth to reply, but Jeanette, who had recovered from her shock, came clucking over to the bed. “Sophia, Sophia,” she said. “You must rest.”

  “There is time for that later. Please, help me up,” I said.

  And though Jeanette shook her head in dismay and the coals in my stomach flared hotter, I stood. “I want to look outside,” I said.

  With my mother’s arms around me, holding me upright, I inched toward the window. A cool, crisp breeze met my face. Below me lay our fields, barren from winter and now blackened from fire and blood. Our enemies were gone, leaving behind broken weapons, cracked shields, and the charred skeletons of trees rising up from furrows of mud. The River Lathe curved away toward the horizon, a silvery, glittering ribbon. This, now, was my kingdom.

  “It’s a fair land,” I said quietly. “Though it needs a bit of care and labor.”

  “You will rule it well,” my mother said.

  I turned to her in surprise. “But now that you’re here, shouldn’t you rightfully be queen?”

  She shook her head. “Most crowns are inherited, Sophia. But yours, I know, was earned.”

  A crown is heavier than it looks, my father had warned me, and no doubt he was right. But I knew that I’d be strong enough to bear its weight.

  As we stood above our kingdom, the sun streamed in the window, and the wind seemed to carry the promise of spring. The land was at peace, and soon the trumpet-shaped gentians—the flower of Bandon—would raise their blue faces to the sky.

  So now you scatter the seeds in the furrow, Your Highness, and then you cover them up with the dirt, so they stay warm and safe.” Fina looked up at me, her cheeks rosy and her eyes shining with pride. “Mama said the garden is my responsibility this year, now that I am eight.”

  My spirited horse, Lumi, shook her mane, and Fina patted her satiny neck with a small, dirt-streaked hand. “It looks to me as if you’re doing a wonderful job,” I said, and Fina nodded mutely, suddenly overcome with shyness.

  I leaned down from the saddle so we were almost at eye level with one another. “Would you like to come back to the castle with me? Would your parents say it’s all right? I’ll bet the cooks have baked a treat to celebrate the new season. And I know my mother would like to see you.”

  Fina’s eyes widened. Without saying a word, she turned and dashed into the cottage, and then a moment later, she emerged, her hair hastily brushed and her hands slightly less grubby. Her father came behind her and lifted her onto Lumi’s back.

  “I’ll have her home by supper,” I told him, and he bowed so deeply his nose nearly touched the ground. Though I’d changed many things in the village these last several months—there were brand-new cottages, larger gardens, and a communal herd of fat sheep and sly-eyed goats—I’d been unable to discourage the villagers’ habits of genuflection and deference.

  Fina wrapped her little arms around my waist, I clucked my tongue at Lumi, and together we set off up the hill to Bandon Castle. We trotted steadily at first, past the square with its fresh green grass, past the well, past the cottages of Signe the weaver and Kirl the butcher, and all the others who lived at the village’s outskirts.

  When we came to the little cemetery ringed with stones, we slowed, and I felt Fina’s hold on me tighten. Rosa was buried there, as well as the hundred others who had died of the Seep. There was even a stone for Raphael, though no body lay beneath it. As we passed, I pressed my fingers to my lips, and I blew my kiss into the wind.

  Then I loosened the reins and bent low over Lumi’s neck, and the horse, who was always eager to run, turned her gait to a gallop. Behind me, Fina squealed with delight as the wind whistled in our ears and whipped through our hair. This was the way to travel—I’d never ride in a carriage again if I could help it.

  As we came to the castle drawbridge, Lumi slowed to a trot, and then I pulled her all the way to a stop. There was a figure standing in the center of it, as still as a statue and backlit by the sun so I couldn’t see his face.

  Who was it? Ares, come back for revenge? Or—worse—Reiper? Though I killed them myself, I knew now that the curtain between life and death was as thin as a spider’s web. My hand slid to the dagger that I always kept with me.

  Then the man—a boy—slowly raised his hand in greeting.

  My heart began to flutter in my chest. “Who is that, Fina?” I whispered.

  The girl didn’t answer, and I leaned forward in the saddle. I blinked. Squinted.

  Surely I was seeing things. Surely it could not be—

  Then the figure mimed throwing something at me… just like he’d done on the day we first met.

  And then I knew.

  I slid off Lumi and started running.

  “Raphael,” I cried, “Raphael!”

  I collided with him, nearly knocking us both off our feet, and then I took his warm hands in mine and pressed them to my pounding heart. I knew not to doubt it this time. Somehow, by some incomprehensible miracle, he’d come back to me, and the world was more mysterious and wonderful than I could ever hope to understand.

  “Hello again, Your Highness,” Raphael said, smiling.

  “Where have you been?” I asked, giddy with joy.

  “I’ll tell you all about it,” he said. “But not now. First—”

  And then he pulled me close to his chest, and I breathed in his scent of skin and sweat and pine. I felt I could stay like that forever.

  Life after life had truly begun.

  And it had been worth dying for.

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  About the Author

  JAMES PATTERSON received the Literarian Award for Outstanding Service to the American Literary Community from the National Book Foundation. He holds the Guinness World Record for the most #1 New York Times bestsellers, and his books have sold more than 385 million copies worldwide. A tireless champion of the power of books and reading, Patterson created a children’s book imprint, JIMMY Patterson, whose mission is simple: “We want every kid who finishes a JIMMY Book to say, ‘PLEASE GIVE ME ANOTHER BOOK.’” He has donated more than one million books to students and soldiers and funds over four hundred Teacher Education Scholarships at twenty-four colleges and universities. He has also donated millions of dollars to independent bookstores and school libraries. Patterson invests proceeds from the sales of JIMMY Patterson Books in pro-reading initiatives.

  EMILY RAYMOND worked with James
Patterson on First Love, The Lost, and Humans Bow Down, and is the ghostwriter of six young adult novels, one of which was a #1 New York Times bestseller. She lives with her family in Portland, Oregon.

  http://www.JamesPatterson.com

  http://www.facebook.com/JamesPatterson

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