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“Not particularly.” He sighs, and all humor slips from his voice. “What do you want?”
I peer out the window at the gallows and the bodies dangling. The executions are happening daily now, each time a new mortal is discovered with tainted blood—when their keeper dies violently—or is found with a vial hidden in their clothing or their quarters.
Mortals who thought their lives would somehow change for the better through murder. Cobblers and farriers, seamstresses and cooks. Simple people, desperate to be free of their duties. In the end, standing at the gallows, they all plead for mercy from their king.
But their king doesn’t grant it. He mustn’t, because to do so would be to show the same weakness as the previous king. So instead, he hardens his heart and watches them hang, punished for Ybaris’s betrayals.
I haven’t had to punish them all, though.
That family presented in front of the assembly still lingers in my thoughts, days later. Anyone with half a sense could see those children had been terrorized by the minor lord from Freywich. I’m certain that’s why Romeria rescued them with a bag of coins.
Gracen … that was the baker’s name.
The moment I laid eyes on her, I could see why Danthrin appeared before my assembly, insisting she be returned. She is stunning—for a mortal, dressed in worn clothes, dusted in flour. Her features are delicate and refined, a contrast to a wild mane of curly blond hair she attempts to tame with ties, and a smattering of freckles across the bridge of her nose. But it was the intensity in her blue eyes that caught me off guard. For a mortal of perhaps twenty-five, they revealed more depth than many of the century-old elven who hold court positions. Or maybe it was the way she pleaded with me to save her, and then gazed up at me with admiration that momentarily seized my breath.
Had Gracen been brought to Presenting Day in Cirilea, the crown would surely have claimed her as a tributary. If I had seen her?
I would have declared her mine in an instant.
I don’t doubt Danthrin fed off her regularly—how could he resist?—but he’s obviously bred her too. The mortal has already produced three healthy offspring with no husband in sight. The fear and loathing that radiated from her body when Danthrin spoke told me all were likely sired by different mortal men, and none of the experiences were pleasant.
She trembled as I stood before her, like a terrified lamb knowing it would be sent to slaughter. Has any male ever been gentle with her? The way her body stiffened when I gripped her waist would suggest not, but that could have been that the king was the one touching her.
The cold look in Danthrin’s gaze promised he had far worse planned for her return to Freywich. Punishment for daring to accept Romeria’s offer, if only for her children’s sake. Surely, Gracen would ingest poison to be free of a keeper like that, and I would not blame her.
But then I’d have to hang her, all the same.
At that moment, I felt a glimpse of Zander’s anger toward our kind. It took everything in my power not to draw my sword on the pompous ass, but executing even a lowly lord won’t win me the allies I need among the many detractors I’m facing. Denying the lord was already risky enough, given his tangle with Romeria and Zander.
And then fucking Adley, with his wise words in front of the assembly, didn’t help.
I sigh heavily. “So many mortals are losing their lives because you promised them something you can’t deliver. Are you proud of what you’ve accomplished? All these corpses to look upon each day?”
“Who says we are not delivering on our promises?”
“Maybe you are,” I admit. Promises to whom, though? Islor is in turmoil, gripped by fear and growing fragile because of it. “What was Ybaris’s plan the night you killed my parents, anyway?”
Tyree shakes his head. “Of course, you would have the gall to ask.”
I shift into an easy, conversational tone. “Come on, it can’t hurt you to tell me now. I’ve always considered Neilina cunning. I’m dying to know how she could be stupid enough to think she’d succeed at securing Islor’s throne.”
Tyree smooths a palm over his jaw. It hasn’t seen a razor in weeks. Finally, my taunts seem to work. “We had people positioned and ready. They were to stab the royal family and their tributaries with merth blades in the first moments after they were incapacitated from the poison.”
“Simple, but clever.” And an echo of what Neilina did to her husband, at least the stabbing part. “And Romeria?”
“She was to be injured enough that it looked like she was also a target but fended off her attacker. She would identify Kettling for the attack. Retaliation for putting a Ybarisan on the throne. Everyone knows they opposed the marriage.”
