Tessa Gratton

“Elegant Waters”

a Five Mountains story

Elegant Waters set off for the capital city in a delicate carriage pulled by a single white stag. A cold breeze haunted the road down from the mountain, fluttering the blue ribbons wound among the tines of the stag’s dainty antlers. The stag was inhabited by a strong spirit, of course, whose blessings the Alrisan family had gained six generations previous and kept through strict dedication to generosity. 

With Elegant Waters and the Alrisan stag were two attendants, tucked with their young mistress into the carriage. They had no train of soldiers, for those days were peaceful ones in the Empire Between Five Mountains, and the road from the Alrisi estate to the capitol was safe. That, and horses would have held them back: the spirit stag did not require rest, and could pull the carriage day and night, cutting the travel time from three weeks to just over one. 

However, Elegant Waters insisted upon three long pauses every day—dawn, noon, and twilight—not only to stretch her legs, but to personally feed the stag and rebraid its ribbons. They were embroidered with sigils for speed and joy, and as Elegant Waters was a little bit of a witch (in addition to being the second born of her prestigious family and trained from birth in the finest of arts) she was more than capable of activating the aether.

Even with two different nights’ rest in very nice inns to soak in a bath and sleep without the constant sway of the carriage, they arrived at the capital city well in advance of the Heir’s birthday celebration. 

The Heir was turning twenty-one, an important age in an empire where all numbers divisible by seven mattered. Elegant Waters was herself not quite eighteen, but close enough her parents hadn’t hesitated to send her in response to the invitation, hoping their second daughter would be lucky enough to catch the Heir’s eye. 

Elegant Waters had always known she was destined to leave her family’s estate on the Mountain of One Thousand Falls, one of the child-mountains of the Third Mountain itself. Her elder sister would lead their family into the future, and Elegant Waters would solidify some alliance or other with her body. That was fine, she didn’t mind; this fate had allowed her to live her life studying things she loved: music, art, and poetry, in order to be as appealing as possible. A prize, even, considering her additional knowledge of politics and aetherwork. She would be able to entertain guests with harp or flute, maintain a disciplined court, and even design blessing rituals in the absence of a priest or witch.  

Only, she was unsure any of those things would interest Kirin Dark-Smile, the Heir to the Moon. Stories about him suggested his tastes were unpredictable, his moods even more so. Everyone knew he’d been kidnapped two summers ago by the Sorceress of the Fifth Mountain, because he’d gone on his Heir’s Journey in the guise of a young woman, and that the experience had been harrowing. It had ended with a short, violent war at the feet of the Fifth Mountain, a volcanic eruption, and the birth of a new great demon. In the years since, Kirin had been successfully invested as the Heir to the Moon, begun styling his hair (and occasionally his clothing) in overtly feminine ways, declared that his demon-kissed bodyguard would be his First Consort when the time came, and shown a general disinclination to find a Second Consort. 

That was the extent of the gossip Elegant Waters was aware of, having lived mostly apart from the community established around the work of her family’s estate. But her attendants spent most of the journey filling her in. 

They arrived at the capitol in the late afternoon, just as the lowering sun caught the polished roof tiles of the city, turning the dark slate and ceramic into sparks of blue and green fire. 

Elegant Waters insisted on stopping the carriage. She climbed out and stood beside the head of the spirit stag, gently scratching its soft, white chin. People moved around them, traders and pilgrims and farmers, both heading towards and leaving the city. Most ignored her, simply stepping out of the way, but some stared: she was tall and lithe, and despite having spent the better part of eight days and nights curled in a carriage, her gray and indigo gown and coral lace over-robe were pristine, her hair bound half up and fixed with silk butterfly pins, and the rest of it a black cascade down to her thighs. Her pale face, barely painted, was the picture of ethereal simplicity, especially as her cheeks flushed a pretty peach and she gazed out at the city with large honey-brown eyes. She looked exactly the part of a foreign lady come to win their prince’s affections. And the glimmering spirit stag at her side hardly detracted from the picture.

Her attention was caught up in the sprawling layers of the capital city: perched on the cliffs overlooking the sea, it fanned inland as long, graceful spokes made of broad avenues capped occasionally by temple arches. The tiled roofs gleamed in the low sun, bold colors against the pale sandstone and polished wood of the buildings. The Palace of Seven Circles itself rose over everything near the cliffs, red-washed and tiled in black and green, each level taller than the last, all enclosed by a thick red wall. Banners in colors so bold she could easily make them out from this distance fell from each level, painted with massive sigils for prosperity and blessings. As the city spread, dipping toward the wide Selegan River in the east, buildings grew closer together until they became warehouses and docks cluttered with ships. In the districts nearest the palace Elegant Waters could see gardens overflowing their yards with vibrant greens, and beyond those wide community parks and city forests bound by corner shrines with their copper bells, and white spirit flags lining many of the streets. Oh, how overwhelming and different it was from the austerity of the Mountain of One Thousand Falls: markets and temple complexes and dueling arenas, huge moon gates and a constant shifting motion from all the people she couldn’t pick out individually but contributed to the living, breathing city. 

Elegant Waters thought to herself: I could live here. 

By the time the carriage had pulled her and her attendants through the city to the walls of the palace, she was thinking, I must live here. 

The spirit stag did not join them under the arching gateway, snorting to say, The great demon of the palace will not share with me, as expected, and Elegant Waters arranged with the ostler to have her carriage and stag housed elsewhere—an arrangement quite usual for guests. It was true, the ostler said, that the great demon did not often allow spirits into its house, and sometimes even denied witches access if it did not like the flavor of their familiars. 

Elegant Waters was given a small but lovely room in the fifth circle, an internal room with no view of city or sea, but three long windows looking into one of the crescent gardens of the inner palace. She let her attendants flit about unpacking her trunks while she personally cared for her instruments and paint and calligraphy sets. Her harp needed to be restrung and first she made tea from the stores she’d brought from home, to sip as she caressed the silk strings, fitting and tightening them. When she finished, Elegant Waters played a soft song meant to echo the tumbling laughter of a rocky waterfall dashing quickly down one of the steeper sides of the Mountain of One Thousand Falls. As she finished, letting the final note hum slowly and fade with a slide of her finger, Elegant Waters distinctly felt an answering hum through her ankles where they were crossed against the polished wooden floor, and in her seat but muffled by the cushion beneath her. 

She swallowed and did not react, and the sensation dissipated. 

Next she tuned her flute, and when the tea was done, she let her attendants request a bath and a schedule of celebration events. 

That night, clean and full of pickled vegetables and fried fish—not something she’d ever tasted in the north—Elegant Waters leaned out one of the windows down onto the garden. It glowed with blue aether torches, smoothly lighting the crushed shell paths and sprays of moon lilies among beds of cultivated moss and artfully arranged nurse logs covered in tiny purple flowers and rainbows of lichen. 

Sighing softly, hoping tomorrow she could wander in that garden, she licked her finger and drew a sigil for welcome on the wall. “Hello great demon,” she murmured. “I hope you will welcome me here.”

Elegant Waters was not able to see spirits or demons unless they manifested for her, or wanted to be seen, despite her training with aether and prayer. She didn’t mind. She was patient, and uncertain she wanted to see what the great demon of the palace looked like. 

She waited, let her eyes drift closed, and touched her temple to the wall. Cool salt wind from the ocean she could not see drifted in, bringing sounds of laughter from across the garden, and a smell of more fried food. She’d been still for so long she might’ve fallen into a standing doze, when she heard like a purr under her palm: 

hello young decorative fountain 

“Elegant Waters,” she murmured, but her lips curved up into a gentle smile. Decorative fountain was not so far off. 

hmm

The great demon said nothing else, and she felt it withdraw from beneath her hand, dissolving or sinking or whatever it did, into the bowels of the palace. 

The next day Elegant Waters joined fourteen other young women from across the empire for lunch in the fourth circle water garden. Ponds tiled in contrasting ceramic spotted the lawn, some covered in lily pads, others flitting with boldly colored fish. Low benches scattered about, set with equally low tables, and everyone was paired up to share tea and trays of finger food. Most of the women wore extravagant gowns and robes, their hair done for high formality and faces painted in the styles of their families or at least with striking choices. They all hoped the Heir would stop by, naturally, and to stand out for him. All together, they were like a garden themselves, and Elegant Waters was glad of her comparatively simple gown: it was expensive layered silk, folded and tied to give the impression of waterfalls, of course. She’d thought of what the great demon had said: decorative fountain, and leaned into it this morning when she dressed. Competing for the Heir’s attention was absolutely beneath her, beneath all of them really. But Elegant Waters let her attendants braid and loop her hair into a triple fan knot, pinned with strings of red and chartreuse silk that contrasted nicely with the many blues of her gown. 

Around her conversation, gossip, and competition swirled. She was seated with Seerin All Is Well from the southeast, near the First Mountain, and found her pleasant company. Seerin was older (nearly everyone was older than Elegant Waters), but only just the Heir’s age, and laughed brightly and often. It was infectious enough Elegant Waters found herself laughing very softly in response. She did not think she would stand out here, among all these beautiful birds, and while on one hand she was glad of it, another part of her saddened. The feeling she’d had upon arriving in the city had not dissipated: she belonged here. But she wasn’t sure how to make a place for herself that didn’t involve a seduction campaign she was entirely unsuited for. 

Everyone was discussing various strategies, even as palace attendants came and went with bowls of thin fruit soup to be sipped like tea and light, tart cheeses. Some were adamant that Kirin Dark-Smile need be the only target, while others planned to interest his soon-to-be First Consort The Day the Sky Opened, a demon-kissed warrior devoted to the Heir. While winning the approval of the Empress with the Moon in Her Mouth and the current Consorts drifted through some plans, everyone knew that it would be the Heir who ultimately made the choice. Seerin cooed at the idea of being married to both Kirin and Sky, leaning across the lawn to discuss rumors of their good looks with another young woman. A third and fourth joined in, one with the gentle condescension of a person who’d grown up in the palace and had seen both Heir and bodyguard many times. 

Elegant Waters listened, sipping her tea, and wished she had her lap harp to pick out a playful melody and keep her hands busy. She found it extremely odd that everyone spoke as if only the Heir and Sky mattered in creating the next imperial triad. Did none of them remember the purpose of the investment ritual and the elaborate ceremony when the Moon passed from one mouth to the next? 

The great demon of the palace.   

Perhaps because of her lessons in spirituality and aether (or, less charitably, because she’d been raised like a monk) she recalled better than the rest that the prosperity of the empire rested on this union between three humans and the demon. A binding amulet of such power it was sometimes called a palace-amulet. 

But Elegant Waters said nothing. 

And the Heir did not happen across them in the garden. Elegant Waters was one of the first to give up and depart. She headed for the garden outside her rooms to breathe deeply of the damp moss and contemplate the nature of the nurse log, so dead its wood crumbled and made berth for such wild variety of lichen and fungus. Elegant Waters crouched, wishing to remove her shoes and slide her toes in the moss, but took care not to let her layers drag or stain. Maybe she would have a chance, later, secure in her place here, to kneel and paint the spilling bold colors of the log. 

She played for the great demon again that night, but said nothing to it beyond touching a sigil for welcome onto the hard wood beneath her. 

The great banquet for the Heir’s birthday took place on her third night in the palace, and it lasted from mid-afternoon until well past midnight. There was a meal of so many courses it lasted three hours and few remained seated for so long, wandering to visit friends or make new acquaintances, to toast the Heir with the sharp, sweet juniper jump. Elegant Waters listened to alliances be born and arguments started, stopped, were taken outside, or resolved with laughter. She remained silent herself, sipping her watered liquor. 

They were arrayed in concentric half-circles in the Circle Court, a vast semi-circular hall with red and white tiled floors and massive black pillars. At the center rose the throne dais, and the Empress with the Moon in Her Mouth reclined gracefully there, her First and Second Consorts kneeling to either side. The Empress’s face was as ever concealed by a veil of tiny silver and white chains, shimmering like rain. Her headdress arced up in five tines like the five mountains, and her sleeves and skirts were crusted with pearls and disks of mother-of-pearl. Each of her consorts contrasted brightly with her: one is vicious gold and green, the other bright pink of every sunset shade. Beneath them, Kirin Dark-Smile reclined in solid blood red robes, propped on his elbow and leaning slightly against Sky, who sat stiffly and proper behind their shared table. Kirin spoke brightly to whomever addressed him, teasing and accusing, depending on what was said. Sky’s lips moved occasionally, but Elegant Waters could rarely hear him. 

At the end of the meal, a poet offered a recitation of a long psalm to the Moon and the empire, on behalf of Kirin Dark-Smile’s twenty-first birthday. It was grandiose and impressive, though Elegant Waters preferred simpler styles that left room for the listener’s emotions to fill in the spaces—perhaps why she loved her harp so much, because of the drawn out moments when she slid a finger along a string to make its note linger. But she applauded with the rest, and then Kirin himself stood, bright and eager as if only just inspired. 

“Empress, with your permission, let us invite the suitors who’ve traveled to us today to perform as well? Impress us,” he added, sliding his gaze around the room, one corner of his mouth tilting up. It made his smile daring. 

Elegant Waters lowered her lashes with a little shiver. She was young, and inexperienced in flirtation—in most things involving bodies and innuendo—but she knew that smile was attractive.

The empress granted her permission with a hand touched to the fist-sized pearl against her left shoulder. 

Immediately, a woman stood and introduced herself, and offered a poem of her own. It was good, with an amusing rhyme scheme. After her someone played a flute, and then a beautiful girl with bright auburn hair showed off skills in aether work, pulling on the threads in the Court to make the aether torches blink and dance. Seerin All Is Well sang: her voice was infused with the same full joy as her infectious laughter, and Elegant Waters easily enjoyed it. Seerin blushed brightly at Kirin’s applause, too, and held his eyes as she bowed. 

One or two of the other suitors demurred, saying their skills were less suited to displays—painting or calligraphy or archery, in one memorable case. Leaves of Scarlet, the daughter of a local gem merchant, flirtatiously reminded the prince that he knew her skills already. 

To Elegant Water’s surprise, The Day the Sky Opened said, “Does he? I find I cannot remember them.” 

Many in the court gasped or hid scandalized laughter behind hands and cups—but Kirin laughed loud and brutally. He softened the blow by telling her Sky was jealous of the afternoon they’d shared at the dueling arena last spring—a reminder that Kirin and Leaves of Scarlet did know each other, and were friends. 

Before another suitor could offer up her name, the Empress with the Moon in Her Mouth touched her First Consort’s arm and he said, “We have heard that Elegant Waters of the Mountain of One Thousand Falls plays the harp with the grace of a willow spirit.”

At her name, Elegant Waters froze. Her eyes were lowered, her hand folded in her lap. She did not—could not—glance up. She managed a swallow, and drew in a deep breath so carefully not even the delicate silver leaves and fishes falling from her sleek hairpiece shivered with movement. Who could have said such a thing to the imperial triad?

“Oh, is that so?” slithered Kirin Dark-Smile’s pleasant voice. Coming nearer to her. 

Elegant Waters lifted her gaze finally, snapping her eyes up without moving the rest of her body out of its perfect demure posture. It had the effect of forcing her to look up at the Heir through her lashes. “Heir to the Moon,” she said softly, in acknowledgment. 

“Will you play?” The focus of his eyes—brown with shards of amber—upon her made her awareness narrow for a moment, until they were the only people in the room. 

“If you wish,” she said. “My harp is in my room.”

“We’ll send for it,” he said, with a dark smile so crooked it was nearly a smirk. 

Inclining her head again, Elegant Waters prepared herself to wait quietly. Perhaps another suitor would perform, but after a slight pause, Kirin said, “Come, join us to wait, Elegant Waters. You cannot play kneeling behind your dinner table.”

His hand appeared, and she took it instinctively: his hands were soft and strong, fingers long and without even the callouses she herself had earned with her music. She stood without relying on his strength, touching him only barely. As the Heir led her between the rows of guests toward the throne dais, she kept her expression cool, focused on maneuvering gracefully, not tripping over the heavy layers. When Kirin indicated a pillow beside The Day the Sky Opened, she sat in the way she’d practiced for years: her skirts flowed and fell into puddles and streams. There were tiny fish embroidered on the indigo hems, and silk waves of ice blue, and a delicate lace over-robe in bright spring green hopefully suggesting a pattern of shadows dappled against a stream. 

“Elegant Waters,” the demon-kissed Sky said in a low voice. He sounded slightly tense, trying to hide it. The demon-kissed people had long ago been cursed by the Queens of Heaven for some great forgotten crime, and all their descendants marked by blue or violet highlights to their eyes, skin, hair, and magical gifts, too. Sky was supposedly as strong as twenty warriors. 

She nodded to him, folding her hands in her lap as an attendant brought Kirin more wine, and the Heir poured for her, too. Her heart beat quickly, and very loud in her ears. She hoped her flush did not show under the layer of paint making her cheeks stark white—to contrast with her hair, the vivid indigo beneath her eyes, and paler purple staining her bottom lip. 

“So,” Kirin said as he leaned again on to his elbow, propped against the dais. “Idle conversation is not something you’re practiced in, either that or you don’t feel the need to converse with me.”

“Does the Heir have something he wishes to discuss?” Elegant Waters asked softly, lifting her chin. She did not look away this time, not even when he smiled again. 

“Why should you be my Second Consort?”

She sucked a tiny, quick breath in through her lips: it caught on her teeth with a tiny hiss. But all she did was raise one eyebrow and let herself think as she watched his mischievous face. Between them, Sky sighed. 

Elegant Waters let her eyes trace the lines of the Heir’s cheekbones, his jaw, his lips and nose, and rise to his braided hair and the threads of white and sharp green and pink woven throughout. Then she gazed down his neck—easily as graceful as her own—to his narrow shoulders and the lines of his chest and waist, all encased in vivid silk, to his hands with the fingers laced casually together over his stomach. Three ruby rings decorated the left hand, on each of the first three fingers. 

After a long enough perusal she could feel her cheeks heating again, she looked back at his eyes, which were slightly widened—either impressed or affronted—and she said, “Together we would make children even more beautiful than either of us.” 

Sky laughed loudly and suddenly with his entire body, causing Elegant Waters to flinch in surprise. She looked and his broad shoulders shook as he kept laughing. His teeth gleamed in his mouth, and his dark eyes glittered. This close she could see the wisps of demon-fire blue in the pupils. His magnetism was nowhere near Kirin’s, but Sky was handsome, and something about his size and square shapes made him seem welcoming. 

But next to him, Kirin’s jaw clenched. His eyes narrowed. “I see,” he said. “Tell me something else, Elegant Waters of the Mountain of One Thousand Falls. Why does my great demon know you play the harp, and why does it care?”

Blinking lightly, she did not let herself glance down at her lap as she wished to. This interview might determine her place here. She looked from Kirin to Sky, then up at the empress who’s face she could not see behind the veil of silver rain. But Kirin’s other parents, the First and Second Consorts, were paying attention. The First gently, intently, and the Second with a hopeful tilt to her violet-painted smile. 

Elegant Waters did her best to return the smile. She then leaned over and with her finger drew the blessing sigil for welcoming spirits onto the black square tile of the floor. “I greeted the great demon of the palace when I arrived, and have played for it each evening.”

The empress moved her hands to either side, placing one upon each of her consort’s shoulders. 

Kirin said, “My parent’s approval is much less important than mine for this.”

The First Consort snorted, and the Second prettily rolled her eyes as if to meet the empress’s through the veil. And Sky said, “I like her.”

“I thought you didn’t want to share,” Kirin said softly, like silk, as he leaned up toward Sky’s neck. Then he slid his gaze along Sky’s jaw to Elegant Waters beyond. 

Her heart thrummed like a hundred foot waterfall. Kirin Dark-Smile was so beautiful, and his chosen consort, too, and even the barest thought of being wed to both of them—to fitting between them—terrified her. But it was a fear like standing at the edge of a cliff, mist rising all around and a wind pushing at your back. The edge of a precipice, a tiny gesture from death, but if you stood firm the entire world spread beneath you. 

Elegant Waters did not look away, nor could she bring herself to say anything through the cold dryness of her mouth. 

The sounds of the banquet filtered through to her again, and she remembered not only were they among a hundred other courtiers and rival suitors, any moment she’d be expected to play. 

She took comfort in the thought, and when her harp arrived, Elegant Waters placed it just so, closed her eyes, and plucked the first notes of the song she’d played for the demon the night of her arrival. The babbling music, the airy layers of cascading scales, moved from her fingertips along the surface of her skin. Her blood smoothed, her heart found the proper cadence, and Elegant Waters took refuge in her song. 

As it ended, she found her breathing harder than it ought to have been, though she felt alight and balanced for the first time in hours. And then, rising up through the floor in a voice that was both whisper and loud enough for all to hear, the great demon of the palace said, 

thank you, decorative fountain

Gasps peppered throughout the court, and Elegant Waters placed her hand flat to the floor, palm throbbing with her heartbeat. 

Just for her, the demon laughed into her palm: ha ha ha

Kirin Dark-Smile said, wryly, “You’re right. We will make beautiful children.”

That night, alone in her room, Elegant Waters played again, for herself and the demon, the first few notes of a brand new song.