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“To me, you are a child,” he says. “I just celebrated my three-hundredth birthday. Your measly two decades are a drop in the bucket for me.”
“Fair enough, but your longer lifespan does not give you the right to talk down to me.”
“In my experience, you humans take the throne far sooner than you should. You wage wars against one another that have lasting consequences and leave the realm worse than it was when you found it.”
I cross over toward him, stopping to stand directly in front of his desk. “I won’t pretend like I was fully prepared for the duties destiny threw my way. To be totally honest with you, I never wanted any of this.”
“It is my understanding that all of ‘this’ got you out of a betrothal to the king of Soreno.”
Anger singes me from the inside even as shock registers. How did he—
“Word travels, Your Highness. And the elves haven’t ceased their gossip since the moment they arrived. I have heard all about the love you have for a man who is not your betrothed.”
My gaze hardens. “If you are insinuating that I am pleased my family was slaughtered because it got me out of an unwanted marriage, you couldn’t be more wrong.”
The bastard chuckles. “Maybe so, but it doesn’t erase the facts.”
“And what are those?”
“You are young. Naïve. Yet, according to Affree, you wish me to risk my men in your war. Men who have only ever trained in the darkness of these caverns.”
“My war? In case you haven’t been paying attention, this war affects all of us. Or do I need to leave that door open so the creatures of Dead Man’s Land can remind you just what awaits you outside?”
He raises his lips in a snarl. “You wouldn’t.”
“No,” I agree. “I wouldn’t. Because there are innocent children within these caves who do not deserve to suffer due to your cowardice. But if those giants are awoken, do you really think they will let you survive? After all, was it not your mines that obsidian came from? I imagine the Tenebris would rather enjoy getting revenge for the part you played in trapping their abominations.”
“Foolish mortal.”
“I may be mortal, but I am no fool. You know I’m right even if you don’t wish to admit it.”
His chair scrapes against the stone floor as he shoves back from the table and stands. The dwarven king paces, his long brown robe dragging against the floor. “We’ve been at peace inside these caves for centuries. Until those damned elves showed up.”
“I’m truly sorry that it has come down to this, but there is no other way.”
He shakes his head, muttering something under his breath, and for the first time since I saw him, I see him as what he is. A king afraid of losing his kingdom. Of sacrificing his people. In him, I see a lot of my father.
“My father was a good leader. A great king. He loved his people and his kingdom, and sending my brother Alex along with our guard to negotiate a peaceful resolution was the hardest thing he’d ever done. It also turned out to be his biggest regret.”
The king turns to me.
“Alex and our men were slaughtered with only Fort surviving. I do not take this decision lightly because I know all too well what happens when you lose. But I am begging you to stand at my side so we can end this fight and keep the giants from ever being released.”
“You ask me to force men from their homes. To send them into a fight that may never reach them, for people they do not know.”
“I ask you to stand for this realm. To fight alongside me so that the victory may be all of ours. Would you not like to see the sunlight occasionally? Step outside and enjoy all that this realm has to offer? Or are you truly so content to reside in these caves?”
“These caves are our homes.”
“Yes. But they weren’t always,” I remind him, hoping my history is correct on this. “You used to live above ground, only coming into the mines to work. Correct?”
“That was a long time ago.” The emotion on his face is present, though. “Before even my time.”
It makes my heart ache to know that so many of his people—him included—have never experienced something that is simply a way of life back home. “The sun is warm,” I tell him. “It’s a special kind of paradise to bask in its bright glow. To feel a breeze on your cheek and smell the fresh aroma of bloomed wildflowers.” The last bit is something I’m only recently learning to appreciate. Still, I can see them now through the eyes of William, and I want desperately to paint that same picture for the dwarven king.
“Why do you taunt me?” he growls.
“Because that is what I am promising you. That you will feel the sunshine, a breeze on your cheek, and be able to smell the fresh scent of wildflowers in the spring.”
