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  Echo in Amethyst

  Sharon Shinn

  Echo in Amethyst

  Copyright © 2019 Sharon Shinn

  All rights reserved.

  This edition published 2019

  Cover image by Dave Seeley

  ISBN: 978-1-68068-141-3

  The characters and events portrayed in this book are fictitious. Any similarity to real persons, living or dead, is coincidental and not intended by the author.

  No part of this book may be reproduced or stored in a retrieval system, or transmitted in any form or by any means, electronic, mechanical, photocopying, recording or otherwise, without express written permission of the publisher.

  This book is published on behalf of the author by the Ethan Ellenberg Literary Agency.

  This book was initially an Audible Original production.

  Performed by Emily Bauer

  Executive Producers: David Blum and Mike Charzuk

  Editorial Producer: Steve Feldberg

  Sound recording copyright 2019 by Audible Originals, LLC

  Where to find Sharon Shinn:

  Website: www.sharonshinn.net

  Facebook: https://www.facebook.com/sharonshinnbooks/

  Amazon: https://www.amazon.com/s?k=Sharon+Shinn&ref=dp_byline_sr_all_1

  Books by Sharon Shinn

  Uncommon Echoes:

  Echo in Onyx

  Echo in Emerald

  Echo in Amethyst

  Samaria series:

  Archangel

  Jovah’s Angel

  The Alleluia Files

  Angelica

  Angel-Seeker

  Twelve Houses series:

  Mystic and Rider

  The Thirteenth House

  Dark Moon Defender

  Reader and Raelynx

  Fortune and Fate

  Elemental Blessings series:

  Troubled Waters

  Royal Airs

  Jeweled Fire

  Unquiet Land

  Shifting Circle series:

  The Shape of Desire

  Still-Life with Shape-Shifter

  The Turning Season

  Young adult novels:

  The Safe-Keeper’s Secret

  The Truth-Teller’s Tale

  The Dream-Maker’s Magic

  General Winston’s Daughter

  Gateway

  Standalones, Collections, and Graphic Novels:

  The Shape-Changer’s Wife

  Wrapt in Crystal

  Heart of Gold

  Summers at Castle Auburn

  Jenna Starborn

  Quatrain

  Shattered Warrior

  THE KINGDOM OF THE SEVEN JEWELS

  CAST OF CHARACTERS

  ROYALS

  Harold: the king

  Tabitha Devenetta: the queen, Harold’s second wife, the mother of his daughter

  Cormac: the king’s oldest legitimate son and heir

  Jordan: the king’s second legitimate son

  Annery: Harold and Tabitha’s daughter

  Jamison: Harold’s bastard son

  Edwin of Thelleron: the first king of the Seven Jewels (long dead)

  Amanda: the first queen

  NOBLES IN ALBERTA

  Elyssa: a high noblewoman

  Bentam: Elyssa’s father

  Hodia: Bentam’s sister

  Roland: a high noble who is courting Elyssa

  Cali: a young noblewoman

  Kendrick: a young nobleman

  Velda: a young noblewoman

  Vincent: governor of Alberta

  Sorrell: his daughter

  Clath: Sorrell’s betrothed (from Thelleron)

  Marietta: an older noblewoman

  Fannon: an older nobleman

  NOBLES FROM ELSEWHERE

  Leonora, Letitia, and Lavinia: triplets from Banchura

  Deryk: from Banchura

  Norbert: Deryk’s uncle, also from Banchura

  Dezmen: from the province of Pandrea; a close friend to the princes

  Darrily: Deznen’s sister

  Vivienne: from Thelleron

  Marguerite Andolin: a noblewoman from Orenza

  Garvin Andolin: her father; governor of Orenza

  Renner Andolin: Marguerite’s brother

  PROFESSIONALS & WORKING CLASS FOLKS

  Trima: Elyssa’s maid

  Gretta: another maid

  Marco Ross: a young revolutionary allied with Lord Bentam

  Lourdes: the head housekeeper at the royal palace

  Malachi: the inquisitor of the royal city of Camarria

  Bevvie: the daughter of a Camarrian innkeeper

  The abbess of the temple of the triple goddess

  CONTENTS

  THE KINGDOM OF THE SEVEN JEWELS

  CAST OF CHARACTERS

  CHAPTER ONE

  CHAPTER TWO

  CHAPTER THREE

  CHAPTER FOUR

  CHAPTER FIVE

  CHAPTER SIX

  CHAPTER SEVEN

  CHAPTER EIGHT

  CHAPTER NINE

  CHAPTER TEN

  CHAPTER ELEVEN

  CHAPTER TWELVE

  CHAPTER THIRTEEN

  CHAPTER FOURTEEN

  CHAPTER FIFTEEN

  CHAPTER SIXTEEN

  CHAPTER SEVENTEEN

  CHAPTER EIGHTEEN

  CHAPTER NINETEEN

  CHAPTER TWENTY

  CHAPTER TWENTY-ONE

  CHAPTER TWENTY-TWO

  CHAPTER TWENTY-THREE

  CHAPTER TWENTY-FOUR

  CHAPTER TWENTY-FIVE

  CHAPTER TWENTY-SIX

  CHAPTER TWENTY-SEVEN

  CHAPTER TWENTY-EIGHT

  CHAPTER TWENTY-NINE

  CHAPTER THIRTY

  CHAPTER THIRTY-ONE

  CHAPTER THIRTY-TWO

  CHAPTER THIRTY-THREE

  CHAPTER THIRTY-FOUR

  ABOUT THE AUTHOR

  ABOUT THE PUBLISHER

  CHAPTER ONE

  The pain was so intense that there was nothing else in the world. It covered me, invaded me, defined me, created me. I couldn’t see or think or move or scream, I could only be agony.

  And then I opened my eyes.

  It was as if I had never seen the world before, never noticed light or color or shape or shadow. For a moment, I was so bemused by the contours of walls and slants of light that I forgot to hurt. I just stared.

  That color there. Just a few feet in front of me. I couldn’t remember ever seeing it before, but I gaped at its silky opulence with a wash of wonder, and a word slipped unbidden into my mind. Gold. Then another word. Curtain.

  I was staring at a gold curtain. It had been gracefully swathed over a tall, open space through which all that magnificent light was pouring in. Window.

  I felt my mouth fall open with amazement. Without moving my head, I glanced around as much as I was able, greedy for other amazing sights. I seemed to be lying on a hard surface, so the only direction to look was up. But before I could get a sense of where I was, my whole field of vision was filled by one single image—a face, hovering just over mine, peering down at me.

  “You’re gazing around— Are you in there?” the face demanded. I couldn’t say how I knew that the expression she was wearing was a smile or how I could be certain her name was Elyssa. But I could definitely name the emotion that spiked through me: terror.

  Somehow I knew not to make any kind of sound in answer, not to look directly into her eyes, but I still formed a swift and comprehensive impression of her appearance. Her skin was a pale and flawless color—White, I thought—her black hair a mass of ringlets. Her gray eyes were so intense they seemed to gleam like silver. Somewhere in my head echoed the word beautiful. Then, as if someone had corrected me, I heard, exqu
isite. An entire phrase: What an exquisite child.

  She was draped in more color, a rich but delicate hue that sparked a flurry of words in my mind: lavender, violet, amethyst. The one that stuck was amethyst.

  “I hate you,” she said fiercely as she stared down at me. “I wish you would die.”

  And then the pain came again.

  The next time was longer. Pain woke me up again, but this time I could localize it more. It was in my arm and felt like a deep, welling gouge ringed with an edge of fire. I had a sense that some period of time had passed, though I didn’t understand time or how I was moving through it. But I felt heavier, bigger, clumsier.

  Elyssa’s face had changed, too. The creamy skin was still flawless, the black curls were even longer and silkier, but her cheekbones had gained prominence and her gray eyes had accrued layers. But her expression hadn’t changed at all. Still malevolent, still furious.

  “Why won’t you scream?” she burst out, her voice full of both dissatisfaction and loathing. “I’ve tried everything. You blink and your mouth moves, but you never cry out.”

  I didn’t try to form words, didn’t attempt to ask her what she had done and why she’d done it. I just fixed my eyes on a spot behind her and kept my expression blank.

  She shrugged. “At least you seem to feel something. The other two never respond at all, no matter what I do to them. Only you. Why is that?”

  I didn’t know. I didn’t know who the other two were.

  I didn’t know who I was.

  She looked ready to say something else, but suddenly there was a noise behind her and Elyssa jumped to her feet as if afraid. I found myself gazing at the painted ceiling and an edge of decorative molding where it met the wall. I must have been sprawled on my back on the floor, as I had been last time. I didn’t try to sit up and look around, but I did strain my senses to try to hear anything that might be said.

  Elyssa’s voice was filled with temper. “What are you doing just walking in here unannounced?”

  The voice that replied belonged to a woman. She sounded older, confident, unimpressed by Elyssa’s anger. “I’ve come to dress you for dinner. You don’t want to be late.”

  “I don’t want to be interrupted every five minutes, either!”

  “I’m sorry, my lady, but I—” Her voice changed, and I had the distinct impression that she had just caught sight of me. “Sweet goddess, Elyssa, are you torturing the echoes again?”

  Now Elyssa’s voice was petulant, almost childish. “I was bored.”

  “Bored. When there’s a whole houseful of guests about to arrive for dinner.”

  “Oh, yes. A couple of Empara lords who want to see if I might be a suitable bride for one of their sons.”

  “A fifteen-year-old girl is not too young to be thinking of marriage. It would please your father if you looked your best tonight.”

  Elyssa seemed to have lost all interest in me, so I carefully shifted my body and turned my head so I could try to get a better look at my surroundings. We were in a room that seemed very familiar, as if I had spent a lot of time there—a large chamber with many windows and pleasing proportions and elegant furniture. The colors were all muted versions of purple and oak and sage. I knew how to name each shade, though I didn’t remember ever learning the words.

  Elyssa and the other woman were standing near the door, arguing. The newcomer was dressed in a plain black gown and wore her brown hair pulled back in a bun. She had strong features, with a prominent nose and a firm chin. Something about her expression made me think she was no kinder than Elyssa.

  Elyssa’s voice was bitter. “My father only looks at me when he thinks I might bring him some advantage through a strategic marriage.”

  “I know it is your life’s ambition to thwart him, but if I were you, I’d want to marry and get out of this house.”

  Elyssa’s voice changed, becoming touched with anxiety. “Only if you come with me, Trima. I wouldn’t trust a maid of my husband’s choosing.”

  “Of course I’ll come. I looked after your mother until she died, and I expect I’ll look after you until I die.”

  “Well, that’s a gruesome thought!”

  “Just realistic,” Trima said. She turned my way, and I saw her eyes glance at two spots behind me before they landed on me. “Speaking of gruesome! Please stop abusing the echoes.”

  “I don’t like them.”

  Trima raised her eyebrows and brought her gaze back to Elyssa. “It’s the echoes that mark you as noble enough to marry a high lord,” she said. “So you’d better find a way to like them very much indeed. Now come over here and let’s get you ready.”

  That was the third time she had said the word. Echoes. What is an echo? Am I one? Are there others?

  Elyssa and Trima had moved off a few paces, still arguing, though the topic had turned to clothing. Moving very slowly, so I didn’t attract attention, I shifted again, and then again, hoping to see what had caught Trima’s notice behind me.

  One more slight adjustment, one tilt of my head, and I could peek over my shoulder out of the corner of my eye. I could see two straight-backed chairs set against the wall, each one occupied by a young woman who sat stiff and unmoving, eyes unblinking, hands folded, expressions perfectly vacant.

  Each one looked exactly like Elyssa.

  Did that mean I looked exactly like her as well?

  I squinted down the length of my body, straining to understand, but there was no time. The world stopped again, as completely as if I had shut my eyes and stuffed my ears. As if I had ceased to exist.

  After that, there might have been a dozen bouts of awareness over the space of a couple of years. It was hard to gauge exactly, but I could tell that significant time had passed by the changes in Elyssa’s face and by the different weight and balance in my own body. I struggled to understand where I had been just before my mind burst into consciousness, but it was such a gray and formless place. I could move, while in this place; I could, in some sense, see the world around me. But I couldn’t comprehend it, and it made few lasting impressions on my memory.

  Every period of wakefulness was preceded by a dire onslaught of pain—in my arm or my foot or my back. Each time I came to consciousness, the very first thing I did was bite back a scream of agony. Somehow I knew it was the only thing that Elyssa wanted from me, and that I didn’t want to give it to her.

  Each time, I stayed awake a little longer. But I managed to conceal that fact, maintaining the glassy stare that felt like my accustomed expression. I usually found myself slumped on some low piece of furniture, or curled on the floor where I had been driven by Elyssa’s hot irons or sharp dagger points. Often I was naked. Usually I was bleeding.

  I knew Elyssa hated me. I just didn’t know why.

  But every chance I got, I stayed in my beaten and crumpled position so I could look around stealthily and listen intensely. Trying to figure out who I was. Trying to understand the world.

  We were always in the same room of lavender and sage and tall windows. The other two women who looked like Elyssa were always sitting off to one side, wearing blank expressions. Like me, they barely moved, though I watched them closely and occasionally saw them blink or breathe. They were alive then. Like me—but somehow not.

  The maid, Trima, often came sweeping in to prepare Elyssa for some outing or another. Every time she saw me coiled up and bleeding, she would utter an exclamation of dismay. Have you been mistreating the echoes again? she would ask, in the same tone I had heard her use to say, Have you gotten mud on your best shoes? Maybe an echo had no more value than a shoe. Maybe it had less.

  I was always glad to see Trima, though. Because in her conversations with Elyssa, I learned more and more about the world.

  “Your father wants you to be especially nice to Chester tonight, even though he’s only a low noble,” Trima said one afternoon.

  “Ugh. He’s old and fat and his breath stinks.”

  “He’s rich and he has powerful
friends and he likes it when a pretty girl flirts with him.”

  “That’s all my father wants me to do? Flirt with him?” Elyssa said in a voice heavy with sarcasm.

  Trima gave her a stern look. “Don’t talk like that.”

  “He’d send me to Chester’s bed if he thought it wouldn’t damage my marriage prospects.”

  “Lord Bentam wouldn’t do that.”

  Elyssa laughed, not a pretty sound. “Of course he would! He’d have whored me out a dozen times since I turned sixteen if he thought it would have gotten him one more ally in his precious revolution.”

  “Don’t say such things. Even your father—”

  “Even my father,” Elyssa repeated. “Especially my father. But he’s still holding out for a grand alliance, so he has made sure his daughter is still a virgin.”

  “Well, I’m glad to hear that, at any rate,” Trima said. “The way you flirt with inappropriate men—”

  Elyssa laughed. “Oh, I’ve been good. So good, when I didn’t want to be. But a little flirtation now and then is the only way I have to amuse myself. There’s hardly anything else to do here.”

  “You could step up and take an interest in the manor, instead of leaving all the housekeeping decisions to your aunt Hodia. It would help your father immensely if you took on some of the duties of the lady of the manor.”

  Elyssa answered with another light laugh. “Darling Trima, why would you ever think I want to help my father in any way?”

  It might have been only a few months after that conversation that the strangest thing happened.

  I flickered to life one stormy afternoon when lashing rain turned the skies a dull pewter and made it impossible to see outside through the streaming windows. I was sitting on a pretty sofa, the other two echoes lined up on either side of me. All of us were staring in the general direction of the mirrored vanity, where Trima was arranging Elyssa’s black hair in some complicated style. I could tell by Elyssa’s reflection that Trima had already brushed delicate cosmetics on her face, for Elyssa’a bright eyes were brighter, her pale cheeks rosier, her pouting lips fuller. Whatever function she was attending this evening, she was looking forward to it because her face was brimming with excitement.

  “I do think I’ll be the prettiest girl there, and it will be so much fun to dance!” she was saying. “It’s been so dreary—weeks and weeks of rain and no one coming to visit—”