Behooved

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Behooved by M. Stevenson

Bianca of House Liliana, one of the nine noble houses of Damaria, is called for a howdy with her parents. Even though she’s going through a painful flare of her incurable condition, and took a double dose of her tonic to rein in her symptoms, she has to go because her duty to her family is the only way she can prove her worth to them. Bianca has no idea what it could be about, though, she couldn’t have embarrassed her parents more than her magically-gifted, Adept sister, Tatiana, after the tempest-in-a-teacup rodeo. No matter how similar they look, Tatiana is a horse of a different color.

Bianca’s parents behoove her to agree to the terms of a treaty with Damaria’s rival country, Gildenheim, to stop them from declaring war. The threats don’t surprise Bianca. As far as she knows, Damaria is superior to Gildenheim in every way. Her home has devices forged by their Adept guild, widespread oceanic dominance, and a council that provides public education. Backwards Gildenheim doesn’t regulate their magic, they have fairy-tale monsters prancing around freely, and they still have a monarchy. Lassoing Damaria’s technology in trade for their abundant natural resources would cement Gildenheim as a world power. Bianca doesn't expect the condition that she has to wed their heir apparent before he takes his assassinated mother’s place on the throne. At first she doesn’t want to agree, but duty and the opportunity to remake her life away from her parents compel her to sign the treaty.

Bianca says goodbye to Tatiana before she sets sail to meet her fiancé. Tatiana compares the arranged marriage to the last time Bianca chose duty over her own needs, when she broke things off with her first love and former best friend, Catalina. Bianca’s fiancé, soon-to-be King Aric, is known to be cold and reclusive, and is rumored to have arranged his own mother’s death, and may even use blood magic. She gives Bianca a magical locket she made, but warns it can only protect her from an attacker once. Aboard the ship, Bianca’s personal Apothecary, Julieta, accompanies her, along with Catalina, acting as captain of her herd of guards. Catalina, now engaged to a different filly, also checks to make sure Bianca is agreeing to this marriage willingly, for the sake of their old friendship. Bianca dismisses her, eager to escape the old wounds Catalina’s concern kicks up.

When Bianca’s ship lands at Gildenheim, she sees no sign of her fiancé. She meets his older half-brother, a courtier named Varin, who seems to think he would be a better fit for the throne than Aric and who tells Bianca his younger brother is lovers with the captain of the guard, Marya. She’s greeted by the Damarian Ambassador, Evito Dapaz, who explains how Gildenheim’s royal family supposedly has magic in their blood from a mythical greenwitch—Gildenheim’s name for their magic users. But Aric himself spooks from her at every turn until a ball to celebrate her arrival. Their opening dance is thick with tension, and Aric treats her as if he hates her already, even though he was the one who threatened war against Damaria. Bianca meets him kick for kick, veiled insult for veiled insult, just like one of her sparring lessons. They don’t see each other again until their wedding days later, which Bianca has to endure while hiding a flare. The wedding ritual requires both Bianca and Aric to drip their blood in a goblet and drink it along with their vows. The spot where Bianca pricks her finger heals with a gold scar. Aric confirms blood magic was part of the ritual, and that now Bianca is a full member of the royal family.

Bianca downs more tonic than Julieta recommends, and manages to hoof it to her wedding night. Aric seems to dread consummating their union even more than Bianca, and she demands to know what she ever did to deserve such mistreatment. An argument breaks out, with both of them acting like the other is to blame for the ultimatum of marriage or war. Bianca begins to suspect she’s missing something important, but an assassin charges in from her secure suite of rooms. Bianca races to fight the assassin off, protecting her new husband because it feels right, no matter what he’s done. She cuts her hands in the process, and opens Tatiana’s locket as a last resort. Aric dives between her and the assassin at the same time. The locket’s spell hits him instead.

In Aric’s place is a panicking, magnificent…white stallion. The assassin lays unconscious across the room. Bianca rolls her eyes at her sister’s absurd sense of humor and tries to see past the horse to find the sire to her dam. But Aric isn’t there. And a voice talks in her mind coming from…the horse. Still galloping on adrenaline and not questioning it, Bianca follows the horse’s demand to mount him. The stallion leaps through the nearest window, into the rain, right as guards reach the door. They ride to a magically hidden, run down stable, a secret sanctuary for the royal family. By now, it’s clear the horse is actually Aric, and he and Bianca verbally bite at each other until they both figure out their stories don’t match up. Aric would never decide to decimate Gildenheim’s natural resources and destroy its wild places if Damaria hadn’t threatened his country first. If Aric didn’t want war with Damaria, and Damaria’s Council of Nine didn’t want war with Gildenheim, who set up the treaties and the assassination? Bianca and Aric come to a truce until they can find the mastermind, and find a way to turn Aric back to a human. There’s only one dry stall, so they share it for warmth.

The next day, Marya wakes up Bianca with a sword pointed at her. Bianca and Aric convince Marya to believe their story, even though Bianca is the only one who can hear Aric. The three hatch a plan: pony a message to Tatiana to meet them at the Gildenheim/Damarian border so she can fix Aric, steal supplies—a saddle for Aric and tonic for Bianca—and leave Marya to find the mastermind. They have to return before Aric’s coronation on the equinox in five days, or it will unbalance Gildenheim’s natural magic and monsters will throw the whole country into a stampede. Marya and Bianca sneak into the castle, and Bianca gives her message for Tatiana to Ambassador Dapaz to send. He promises to give Bianca updates, and tells her that Julieta, Catalina, and the rest of her guards have been put in the dungeon for questioning. The Gildenheim court thinks Bianca assassinated Aric, and if Bianca doesn’t prove them wrong by the coronation, her friends could be sent to the glue factory.

They ride through the rest of the day, and when night falls, Bianca gets thrown from Aric’s back. The fallen saddle blanket is draped over…a naked Aric! After getting dressed in Bianca’s spare clothes, Aric predicts his curse works in a “horse by day, human by night” cycle. They decide to continue to the border, and Tatiana, to give Marya more time to find the mastermind. Bianca thinks Varin, or someone who wants him on the throne, is behind it. Aric still thinks the Damarian Council of Nine plotted the scheme. They put the conflict aside, and try to get to know each other. Bianca finally tells Aric about her condition, and learns about his love of books and strained relationship with his mother. Aric asks about Bianca’s family too, and says she’s a lot stronger than she gives herself credit for. He offers to help her find the source of her condition, not to “fix her” but to help her live with less pain.

They arrive at an inn and spend most of their coin on a warm room and a hot meal, keeping their identities secret because the Gildenheim guard is still trotting around, looking for Bianca. There’s only one bed, and they share it with a different kind of tension forming between them as they continue talking. Bianca confesses her worry about her friends and guards, and explains about Catalina. She wasn’t allowed to open herself to love, her parents seeing it as an unnecessary weakness. Bianca also learns that Aric is insecure about his bookish nature, his courtiers believing him unfit to rule because of it, even though most of his reading since his mother died has been about improving things for his subjects. Aric spots the gold scars all over Bianca’s hands in the same places she cut them when she opened Tatiana’s locket. He tells her it’s proof she worked blood magic at some point. He explains that Gildenheim has two types of magic, the kind the Greenwitches use, and the ancient blood magic restricted to the royal family. Before they can explore this connection further, a puffin pecks at the window. It has one of the promised updates from Ambassador Dapaz, reassuring Bianca her retinue is safe, but not much else.

They fall asleep together, and right before dawn, Bianca wakes up to Aric cuddling against her, and he’s no gelding. She debates between staying that way and wrestling herself free, when she notices the sun is almost up. She wakes Aric immediately. He has enough time to scoot away from her, then transforms into a horse, destroying the frame of the bed in the process. Bianca gets on her high horse and walks Aric out the front door of the inn, passing him off as her pet. On the road, Aric can’t get over that she called him “pet,” and Bianca asks what terms of endearment he does prefer if he’s a horse. This leads to Aric going over his own scant romantic history, and revealing that he and Marya are just childhood best friends, never horsing around in the bedroom. He had a similar issue as Bianca, never wanting to open himself to love because he never had a way of knowing if his partner only wanted him for his title or not.

Bianca then notices three riders have been following them since they left the inn, robbers. Because of the terrain, they have no choice but to stick to the main road until the strangers round them up. They strip Bianca of her weapons and supplies, and go to kill her before taking Aric. Bianca sees the sun is about to set, though, and distracts the robbers until Aric turns back to a man in a flash of light. They abandon their supplies, steal one of the robbers’ horses, and escape before their attackers can regain their composure. But one of them fires a flintlock pistol, and the shot gets Bianca in the ribs.

Aric takes Bianca to a greenhaven, a place where greenwitches live and train. The greenwitch there tends her wounds and makes her rest inside while Aric spends his time as a horse outside. Bianca realizes that greenwitch magic is just as powerful as Adept magic, and wonders how much good Demaria’s Adepts could do by using their magic to tend life instead of making new, destructive devices. When night falls and Aric becomes a man again, he comes to her room with dinner. Bianca feels like she failed yet again, was too weak, but Aric insists he’s known her long enough to know how strong she is. His gentle treatment undoes the last of her shields, and Bianca makes hay and risks confessing how much she wants Aric. He returns her vulnerability, telling her how terrified he is of wanting her too. Bianca kisses him before she loses her nerve. They spend the rest of the night together doing what they want instead of what duty tells them to. wink wink

The head greenwitch wakes Aric and Bianca before dawn. Aric goes outside, and Bianca feels like a piece of her goes with him. The greenwitch checks her wound. While she thinks Bianca is putting the cart before the horse and wants her to have another day of rest and sleep, Bianca can ride and it won’t kill her. The greenwitch confirms Aric’s suspicion that his horse curse is linked to blood magic, and Bianca knows Tatiana wouldn’t mix blood with her spells, but she still hopes Tatiana can fix it when they see her. The greenwitch also gives Bianca a note from one of Ambassador Dapaz’s messenger birds—a chicken this time. The Gildenheim court has decided not to hold their horses and coronate Varin instead because the equinox is so close, and Marya has been arrested on suspicions of murdering Aric. Before Aric and Bianca ride off, the greenwitch says she’s seen others with a condition like hers, and tells her that she’s unknowingly poisoning herself, so if she finds the “poison” she’ll be able to prevent her flares better. Since Bianca has no tonic after the robbers, the greenwitch gives her peppermints with a magical kick instead.

They ride until dusk and reach the border town where Tatiana is supposed to meet them. After Aric transforms, they find Tatiana and catch up in her room. Tatiana has been there for days, after receiving Ambassador Dapaz’s message via barnacle goose, and traveled much faster than she should have. Tatiana reveals the source, a “seven league spittoon,” a bedpan she enchanted to let her go seven leagues in one step. Once Aric and Bianca explain everything to Tatiana, she admits the locket was only supposed to turn the attacker into a horse for a few hours, and she has no idea how to reverse Aric’s curse. She and Aric stay up reading and experimenting to try and brainstorm a possible solution, regardless. Before Bianca goes to bed, Tatiana confesses how she’s always been jealous of their parents favoring Bianca for her loyalty, even though Bianca’s always thought Tatiana was their favorite because she had magic. Even though their parents have always played them against each other, now it’s a horse of a different color, and Tatiana leaves, proud of how much Bianca has grown into her own since she left.

When Aric comes to bed, he and Bianca debate running away together. Aric is afraid to rule because of the doubts his mother planted in him, and Bianca talks him through how wrong his mother was about him while realizing how wrong her parents are about her. They commit to see their quest through, for the sake of their countries, and the people they…not love, people that depend on them. 

They spend the rest of the night together, and meet Tatiana before dawn at the inn’s stable. Before Tatiana can try to undo Aric’s curse, Gildenheim soldiers surround Bianca and try to arrest her. Tatiana distracts them with exploding buttons, and Aric tells Bianca to leave them and run to Damaria where Gildenheim can’t touch her. Bianca hesitates, but Tatiana tells her that her duty is to save herself, so she flees toward the border. She stops, in too much pain to keep going. No one has followed her, though, and the only way the guard would know where she was is if Ambassador Dapaz told Varin about it. Bianca turns back to gather more intelligence, her escape was too easy. She learns from the inn’s hostler that the guard took Tatiana, claiming she was Bianca, and sold Aric to a disreputable local horse trader. Bianca persuades the hostler to let her search Tatiana’s room, hoping she can find something to help her. She finds nothing at first. Duty tells her she should return to Damaria and convince the Council of Nine to negotiate a treaty with Varin after he’s crowned in order to save her sister. That would mean sacrificing Julieta, Catalina, and her retinue. Sacrificing Aric. Bianca has a revelation that her commitment to duty all this time was her being afraid of her own vulnerability, and she decides to be brave, get angry, and follow her heart instead. That’s when Bianca notices the brass gleam of the seven league spittoon.

Bianca gathers some supplies, including the spittoon and her magic peppermints, and hunts down the horse trader. She threatens him and makes him take her to Aric. Aric and the other horses are bruised and their movements are restricted. The horse trader attacks Bianca, but she knocks him over the head and frees Aric, and the rest of the abused horses. After riding hard a long way, Bianca makes them set up a fire so she can tend Aric’s wounds and he can rest. Aric questions why she would come save a weak and worthless nag like him when she could do anything else? She assures him she wants him, and almost confesses that she loves him. They both commit to stopping Varin’s coronation, making things right, and undoing Aric’s curse. Aric has an idea to use the magic of the coronation itself to turn him human again, as long as Tatiana places the crown on his head.

They use the seven league spittoon to walk their way back to the capital and use a secret royal passage to sneak their way into the castle. They go through the dungeons and free Marya and Catalina with Bianca’s guards, but Julieta is missing. They all make a plan while snacking on [gluten-filled] pastries. The coronation ritual has two parts, and they can sneak in and steal the crown before it’s needed for the second part of the ritual. And they make a second piece of the plan to keep the carriage holding Tatiana prisoner from reaching the castle, so they can bring her themselves. And they have to pull it all off before dawn.

While waiting for the first part of the ritual and her part of the plan, Bianca gets a flare. She takes a couple peppermints to quiet the pain. Then, right before she’s supposed to burst in to stop the first part of the coronation ritual and distract Varin and the courtiers in attendance, her pain comes back twice as bad. Bianca digs deep to do what she’s done so many times before, function through the pain, revealing the strength she’s had all along. She bursts into the chamber and declares that Varin’s coronation can’t go ahead. She is the distraction while the others get the crown.

Bianca publically accuses Varin of plotting Aric’s assassination, and he threatens to hurt Tatiana if she keeps going down that trail. So Marya and her part of the plan, to get Tatiana while Aric and Catalina got the crown, failed. Bianca pretends to go along with Varin’s demand to make an official statement that he has the right to the throne. She tries to drag it out, but guards interrupt her, dragging in Aric and Catalina. However, the guards bringing Aric to the chamber proves Aric is still alive to the courtiers. Varin sends everyone but Bianca, Aric, the guards, and Ambassador Dapaz outside. 

Varin lays out his demands for what will happen next, Aric will confess to killing their mother and be executed the following day, then Varin will marry Bianca, according to the terms of the original treaty. Aric refuses and states he loves Bianca, so he won’t go along with anything unless she goes free. Bianca asks for a private word with Ambassador Dapaz so she can get it straight from the horse’s mouth, hoping to glean more information from him so she can figure out a way to stop this. Dapaz assures her he sent the assassin, according to Bianca’s parents’ orders, but never intended for Bianca to be blamed for Aric’s murder. All along, House Liliana had meant to put their own monarch on the throne, and partnered with Varin to do it. Bianca dismisses Dapaz on the spot.

Bianca gets an idea to save Aric, by being the Damarian noble everyone expects her to be, sacrificing herself to save the person she loves. Bianca proposes that Aric be sent into exile instead, and Catalina, her guards, and Tatiana be sent back to Damaria with dignity. In return, she will stay in Gildenheim and manage negotiations of the treaty. She promises to divorce Aric and marry Varin instead to seal the agreement. Varin agrees to her proposal, and the guards prepare to take Aric and Catalina away. But Marya and Tatiana burst in with Aric’s personal guard, and Tatiana has the crown. But Tatiana hiccups, sways, and drops it as if she’s drunk.

The room descends into chaos with everyone fighting each other and struggling to get the crown first. The coming sunrise spills red through the windows. Bianca cuts Catalina and Aric free. Tatiana gets the crown again, throws exploding Adept buttons at Varin, and tosses the crown at Bianca. Bianca catches it and goes to put it on Aric. A flash of light. Did it work? Neigh! A white stallion stands beside her.

Aric is ready to give up and let Varin have the crown, but Bianca stops him by confessing she loves him, even if he’s cursed forever—she understands what it’s like to have a part of yourself you can’t control. But Marya points out she needs to hold her horses, the sun just started to rise, and it hasn’t completely risen yet. Bianca realizes they still have some time. She makes the connection that since she’s part of the royal line, she has Aric’s blood in her veins, she has the right to use their magic. She slashes her palm, smears her blood on the crown, and puts it on top of horse Aric’s head. As soon as she declares him Gildenheim’s new king, light fills the room, and a human Aric stands in front of Bianca instead, no hooves in sight. After kissing each other senseless, Aric demands a new set of clothes fit for a coronation, then they go back to kissing.

The second half of the coronation goes as planned, besides Tatiana still acting like a tipsy pony from the drugs her captors gave her earlier to keep her subdued—the drugs did the opposite. Tatiana makes eyes at Marya, and Bianca offers for her to become the new Damarian Ambassador. After all the formal celebrating, Aric and Bianca go to bed, exhausted but not enough to stop them from horsing around. 

And Julieta? She was the assassin the entire time, being blackmailed by Bianca’s parents after they commissioned her to make the poison they used to assassinate Aric’s mother. Julieta slips in and tries to quietly resign, but Bianca catches her and makes her explain herself, and asks her to stay on as her private Apothecary still.

Aric sentences Varin to exile, a kinder sentence than his brother meant for him. Tatiana lets him use the seven league spittoon to get out of there faster, and he takes it with a step toward the sea… Sadly, the magic spittoon went with him.