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We slide into the cab and I touch the ring on the middle finger of my right hand. My father’s ring. It’s always been loose, and twisting it around my finger brings me comfort. I know I should get it resized, but the thought of handing it over to a jeweler makes my stomach knot. I keep meaning to buy a chain for it so I can wear it around my neck, but I just… I haven’t gotten around to it.
So, slightly oversized and not exactly my taste, but it’s on my finger—always. A little gold ball sits on the band, surrounded by twelve tiny diamonds. Running my finger over the band, then the ball, then each of the diamonds, I stare out the window. I twist the ring around my finger once, then do it all over again. Band, ball, diamonds, twist. Band, ball, diamonds, twist.
It’s soothing.
My father received the ring for thirty years of service at Lord Birchal’s manor. Thirty years tending Birchal’s gardens and maintaining the huge mansion. My father managed the house and land for a man who called him the wrong name for every one of those thirty years—every time Birchal said Mr. Crawford instead of Mr. Crawley, I wanted to scream, but Dad said nothing. He stood there, head bowed, answering to the wrong name.
All those decades, he toiled while Birchal and his family sat on their plush cushions and waited for their breakfasts to be delivered in bed. My father worked himself to the bone, waking up at dawn every single day, never taking a day off—and for what?
For a ring? For a man who was supposedly noble but couldn’t find his way out of a bathtub without the help of a servant?
The fact that my father prized this ring above everything else infuriated me. He never realized that this ring was nothing but a symbol of our servitude. It was a shackle around his finger, chaining him to his lord.
When my father gave me the ring on his deathbed, I wanted to hurl it at Lord Birchal’s face, or shove it down his son’s throat. Sniveling, lying Liam Birchal, who promised me the world then pretended he’d never said a word. I don’t know if my hatred for the monarchy started with my father’s treatment by Lord Birchal or after what happened between me and his son.
But Dad had stared at me, his withering body too weak to do anything but wheeze. He patted my hand with cold fingers and forced his lips into a smile. “Take care of your mother, Jazz. She only has you, now.”
I’d nodded, holding back the river of tears threatening to spill onto my cheeks. I would have promised anything.
Watching my father die with no one but me beside him, I wanted to wring the Queen’s neck for letting this happen. I wanted to set the capital city on fire and show all those monarchist assholes what they’d done to him. They did this. They worked him too hard. They made him forget to take care of himself and stole all the years we could have had together.
They didn’t even come to the hospital to pay their respects.
Yes, I wanted to kill them all. But all I did was take the ring and cry—then I wiped my cheeks and started writing about abolishing the monarchy.
Band, ball, diamonds, twist.
“Hey,” Rhea says, sliding her hand over mine to stop the movement of my fingers. “You okay?”
Pinching my lips into a smile, I nod. “Yeah. Fine.” I slip my hands under my thighs to stop fidgeting.
“I was thinking tomorrow we could go up to the ridge on Treo Mountain to that spot where we scattered your dad’s ashes. I bought candles and flowers this morning—we could have a little memorial.” She looks at me, eyes soft.
My heart thumps as emotion wells up inside me. Rhea planned that for me? She remembered the exact day of my father’s passing and went out of her way to do something? I…I don’t deserve her as a friend. She’s too good. She puts up with me working all the time and giving her scraps of my attention, then goes and does something like this for me.
Rhea’s lips curl as she arches her eyebrows. “Plus, the hike up to the ridge will help with the hangover.”
“I’m not planning on being hungover tomorrow.”
“That makes one of us.”
I laugh, leaning over to lay my head on her shoulder. Rhea rests her cheek on top of my head, and a tiny bit of tension is released from my body. The space between my shoulder blades eases ever so slightly, and I let myself actually see the landscape passing us by.
I love my country. My family has lived in Nord for hundreds of years, and I feel the pulse of this place in my veins. We’re in the outskirts of the city, where suburbs yield to pine trees and the wilderness starts to stake its claim on the land.
“Where is this party, again?”
“The old Velly watermill,” Rhea replies. “They’ve refurbished it.”
“Who?”
“Whoever planned this party,” Rhea laughs, shrugging. “All I know is I got an invite, and it’s supposed to be insane.”
“I don’t know why I let you drag me to these kinds of things.”
“It’s because you secretly-not-so-secretly love it, and you love me, and you love being dragged out of your boring, lame existence. You pretend you enjoy writing all those depressing revolutionary articles, but a big part of you just wants to say fuck it and actually live a little.”
“Wow. Don’t hold back, Rhea.” I pretend to roll my eyes, and I can’t help but laugh. “Savage.”
