Oh please. As if he didn’t know.
“For the talk we need to have.” She gave him a look that dared him to pretend ignorance.
He pretended anyway.
“What talk?”
“Don’t play dumb.” She lowered her voice when she realized that Ajax, the head of Thad’s personal security detail, was standing in earshot just to her brother’s right. “You know exactly what I’m talking about.”
“We don’t need to have a talk right now.” He looked down at the topics on the parchment in front of him. “We have bigger problems.”
“Bigger problems than your debt to a fae who threatened to kill you if you don’t do what he says?” Her voice was bright panic laced with anger. “I don’t think so.”
“Keep your voice down,” he whispered as he pushed the Assembly’s list toward her. “Look at these.”
She glanced at the parchment and then looked back at him. “What does that have to do with anything?”
“Did you read any of it?”
“In the half a second I took to look at the thing my brother is trying to use to distract me from the discussion we need to have? No.” She glared at him.
He took a deep breath as if reaching for patience and said quietly, “All right. We’ll have that talk. Soon. But right now I need you to see that our kingdom has bigger problems it needs us to deal with.” He pointed to an item on the list. “The western cities are being raided by bands of what they assume are refugees fleeing the unrest in Akram. They need extra protection.”
She followed his finger as he tapped another item. “Export sales of food remain strong, but our own people are buying less of everything our merchants offer. That means either their coin is going to something else, or they lack confidence in me as a leader and feel the need to save their coin in case I send our economy into ruin.”
“Or the nobility who distrust how the royal family died and who don’t think you’re old enough to make a good king are fabricating these reports in order to spread rumors of instability that doesn’t exist,” Ari said.
He gave her an approving nod. “Right. So our job today is to listen carefully, to take action where we’re sure it’s needed, and to send reliable people to research the reports we can’t verify. And we have to do it all without giving anyone in the Assembly more cause to worry about our leadership.”
She drew back as the last of the crowd found their seats and whispered, “Your leadership. I’m just a reluctantly official princess who’d rather be baking.”
The head of the Assembly stood and called for the room to come to order as Thad leaned close and said, “They need to see you as capable of ruling too. Just in case. We’re in this together, right?”
She nodded, though the slash of panic in her chest was stealing her breath.
Just in case.
Just in case Thad got on Alistair Teague’s bad side.
Just in case he didn’t survive.
The head of the Assembly gave Thad the floor, and he began moving down the items on the list, calling on each representative to explain in detail what his or her city needed from the king. Roads to the south had been nearly washed away by spring storms and needed to be repaired. Merchants from the north were concerned that the prices of merchants in the south—with their easy access to ships and tourists—were fixed low enough to drive the northern merchants out of business. Slums were growing. Jobs were declining. And everyone agreed that the introduction of apodrasi some months ago was to blame for much of the poverty and crime that was spreading across Súndraille.
Ari wondered how long it would be before the king’s decision to pull the city guard from Kosim Thalas’s merchant district made its way onto an Assembly discussion list. It had only been three days since Teague’s demand and already representatives from the capital were murmuring about a spike in violent crime.
The meeting went on for hours. Ari tried to pay attention. She nodded at the appropriate times and jotted notes on blank parchment, but between speakers, her thoughts returned to Thad’s debt to Teague and the danger he posed to her brother.
All she really knew was that Teague was fae, Thad had made a deal with him, Teague had threatened Thad’s life if the king didn’t order the city guard to stand down in Kosim Thalas, and Thad had been scared enough to obey.
And if Thad—responsible, always-serious-about-his-royal-duties Thad—was scared enough to leave parts of Kosim Thalas unprotected, then she was scared too.
She needed a plan. She needed to do something to keep her brother safe, but until she learned the truth of his dealings with Teague, she didn’t have much to go on.
As the Assembly broke for lunch and the representatives moved toward a side room where a buffet had been laid out for them, Ari turned toward Thad, a question already on her lips, only to find that he was already striding away, his head bent toward Ajax’s as they discussed something.
She hoped he was discussing how to keep a creepy fae from coming onto the palace grounds and not just running away from the conversation he needed to have with his sister. This was beginning to feel like that time he’d broken her vintage vase from Loch Talam—a gift from the visiting king who didn’t realize Ari wasn’t usually treated like royalty—and then tried his best to avoid her for over a week before finally confessing to the deed.
Ari turned and surveyed the room as it slowly emptied. If Thad wouldn’t give her information, then she’d just have to find someone who would. Maybe she couldn’t get the details of Thad’s connection to Teague, but she could figure out how to deal with the fae. She scanned the representatives who still lingered until she caught sight of a tall woman with a sturdy build, graying black hair, and dimples in her cheeks. Lady Tassi was one of two representatives from the city of Efesnero, which had the port closest to the fae isle of Llorenyae. If anyone in the crowd knew how to keep a dangerous fae from entering the palace grounds, she would.
“Lady Tassi,” she called as she stood and made her way off the platform.
“Yes, Your Highness?” Lady Tassi’s voice was soft and soothing, and for a bittersweet moment it reminded Ari of her mother’s.
Quickly swallowing against the sudden ache in her throat, Ari approached the noblewoman. “I wondered if you might eat lunch with me today.”
Lady Tassi covered the quick flash of surprise on her face with a formal curtsy. “Of course, Your Highness. Shall I get us both a plate of food? The buffet room is a bit crowded, and I’m afraid some of the Assembly members are more interested in questioning you on recent events than in letting you have the time to eat.”
Ari gave the buffet room a side glance and conceded the point. She’d never work her way through that crowd in time to question Lady Tassi about the fae. “Thank you. I’ll wait for you on the platform. You can use Thad’s chair.”
If Lady Tassi thought it was strange to be offered the king’s seat at the royal table, she gave no indication. Instead, she disappeared into the buffet room and returned within moments bearing two full plates of food.
Ari smiled as Lady Tassi set the plates down and sat. “It looks delicious. Thank you.”
“May I ask why you honored me with this invitation?” The noblewoman raised a bit of braised beef to her lips.
Ari searched her face, but there was no animosity. No calculation. Just curiosity, a trait Ari could appreciate. Lady Tassi had impressed Ari as someone who’d remained above the speculation and unrest regarding Thad’s kingship. She hoped that meant the woman would be willing to speak frankly with Ari. Deciding honesty would be the quickest way to the answers she sought, she said, “I invited you to lunch with me because I have questions about the fae, and I figured since you live close to them, you might have answers.”
Lady Tassi dabbed her lips with a napkin. “We live close enough to have a few dealings with them each year. Is the king interested in developing a trade treaty with the fae courts in Llorenyae?”
“Possibly,” Ari said as she brushed extra s
ugar off a persimmon cookie. “Our concern is the fae who can do dangerous magic. Not little magic, like the stories of the fae who can grow flowers or change the weather, but powerful fae. The creatures in children’s myths, such as the Wish Granter or the Warrior of the Winter Court.”
“All of them can do magic.” Lady Tassi reached for her glass of cherry cider. “But of course the older ones or those born with special abilities have much more power.”
How much power did Teague have? Could every fae shut a door with the snap of its fingers?
“Well, then how do we keep the palace safe in case a member of the fae courts decides to use magic against us?” Ari leaned forward, eager for the answer, but when Lady Tassi gave her a quizzical look, the princess grabbed a skewer of honey-roasted peaches as if that had been her goal all along.
Until she figured out the exact details of Thad’s dealings with Teague, she couldn’t let anyone suspect the king was tangled up with one of the fae. Especially if someone connected the rise in crime in Kosim Thalas to the king’s strange reluctance to send the city guard to patrol its busiest streets.
“For safety measures, we put iron fences around our estates and keep iron weapons handy, and we keep some bloodflower poison handy. The combination is enough to weaken or even kill most fae, though of course we aren’t trying to kill anyone we’re in business with.” Lady Tassi nodded a greeting at a passing nobleman while Ari’s mind latched onto these new pieces of information.
She couldn’t put up an iron fence without attracting attention, both from Teague and from the citizens of Kosim Thalas, and she didn’t want to advertise the fact that they were trying to keep out a member of the fae. Iron weapons and bloodflower poison, however, she could manage.
Thad was hiring a slew of new employees that afternoon to replace those who’d decided they no longer wished to work at the palace in the service of their new king. Most of the staff who’d left had been old enough to retire anyway, and Thad had settled a decent pension on all of them, no questions asked.
Once Thad had a new weapons master in charge of maintaining the armory, she could gather some iron scraps from the smithy and commission some weapons. And she could make some sort of excuse for going to the merchant district in Kosim Thalas without Mama Eleni—that woman’s watchful eye would make asking her favorite spice merchant about poison absolutely impossible unless Ari wanted to explain herself to the woman who now saw her as a girl in need of a mother’s guiding hand.
As Lady Tassi and the other representatives returned to their seats and Thad entered the room to finish the last nine items on the docket, Ari turned to a fresh sheet of parchment and began making a short list of things she needed.
Iron.
Bloodflower poison.
An excuse that Mama Eleni would accept.
Maybe a book or two on the fae so that she could learn more about how they worked and how to deal with them.
And, of course, a new weapons master capable of turning her iron into dangerous weapons.
Ari stared at her list, thoughts racing, and let the rest of the discussion slip past her. She had a starting point now. And by the time she cornered Thad and made him tell her the whole truth, she’d be well on her way to being able to protect her brother.
FIVE
THE SUN WAS just beginning to set when Sebastian Vaughn finished delivering freight to the shipyard for the merchant who’d hired him for the day. The thick, metal-studded cudgel he’d strapped inside his coat rested heavily against his chest, a reassuring weight as he faced east and began his weekly trip back to the home he’d left behind once his father had been transferred to the kingdom of Balavata and his brother Parrish’s body had been laid to rest.
When Sebastian reached the city proper with its narrow streets and its canals snaking through the busiest sections, he stopped at the first dock he saw and paid a ferryman to row him to the market closest to east Kosim Thalas. It was an indulgence he rarely wasted coin on, but it was nearly dark, and he didn’t want to be on the streets any longer than he had to.
Besides, he had some thinking to do.
He leaned against the side of the faded green boat, relishing the quiet swoosh of the water as the ferryman’s oars dipped and pulled, and considered what he’d learned at the waterfront. The new king was hiring—some said as many as forty-nine positions were available at the palace—and one of those positions was that of weapons master. Sebastian didn’t have much in the way of credentials. He’d been working any job he could find, but he’d had no steady employer. No one would hire a boy from east Kosim Thalas on a permanent basis.
But with quite a few members of the palace staff refusing to work for the new king out of loyalty to the recently deceased royal family, and with plenty of workers uneasy about casting their lot in with the king when rumor had it many in the upper class didn’t support him, Sebastian figured maybe the king was desperate enough to overlook Sebastian’s upbringing and youth.
Maybe desperate enough to not ask too many questions about why Sebastian, an eighteen-year-old boy living in poverty and filth, knew how to use every weapon in the king’s arsenal and then some.
It was the best hope Sebastian had of finding steady income and a roof over his head.
The best hope he had of finally saving up enough to leave Kosim Thalas, escape his father’s reach, and never look back.
The ferryman slowed his rowing as they bumped their way past a handful of boats leaving the dock the led into the eastern market. Once they’d docked, Sebastian tipped the ferryman and leaped from the boat.
Moments later, he’d picked up his weekly food order from a local merchant and was facing the entrance to east Kosim Thalas, his stomach sour at the thought of what lay ahead.
His mother didn’t deserve his weekly visits to fill her cupboards with food and to make sure she wasn’t lying passed out or dead, unnoticed and unmissed by anyone. He knew that. She deserved the anger and hatred she seemed to constantly expect from him, no matter how many times he refused to give it. But Sebastian wasn’t doing this because he felt obligated to the woman who’d given birth to him and his brother and then ignored their screams while her husband whipped them whenever he felt like it.
He was doing this because hatred and rage were the hallmarks of his father’s life. Making a different choice was the only way he knew to exert control over the kind of man he hoped to become.
Dusk clung to the streets in pockets of gloom that stretched hazy gray fingers toward the darkening sky. Sebastian strode toward the gate leading into east Kosim Thalas, shutting down all reflections about his parents until nothing remained but one burning thought: survive.
His steps lengthened, and he flexed his shoulders as he pushed past the last of the market’s shoppers and walked through the cracked, decrepit archway that served as an entrance to the corner of the city that only the desperately poor and those who hoped to prey on them dared to enter.
He reached for his cudgel and pulled it free as he left the gate behind. Tension hummed through his muscles. The scars on his back tingled and burned as he focused on every movement, every sound that whispered toward him.
He walked rapidly, passing buildings of faded pastel clay with weeds growing out of cracks in the walls and the bitter stench of cheap pipe weed hanging heavy in the air. The four-story buildings were depressingly uniform in their decay. Inside, tiny apartments were rented out for coin or pipe weed or the kind of favors that the nobility in their fancy estates had no idea existed.
People sat on front stoops watching the street with careful attention. Sebastian met the gaze of a few of the runners—children responsible for quickly informing the right people about the arrival of the city’s guard or an unsuspecting member of the upper class—and gave them a look that promised consequences if they interfered with him.
He didn’t want trouble with those who ran the streets.
And he’d made sure to earn a reputation for seriously injuring those who brought
trouble his way.
Sebastian turned a corner and faced the hill leading toward his mother’s house. Keeping his face expressionless in the face of the crumbling, filthy buildings took effort.
East Kosim Thalas had never been pretty, but before the recent introduction of Teague’s newest business venture, a drug called apodrasi, it had at least made a passable attempt at being clean. Now, addicts huddled on doorsteps or on broken blocks of stone, pulling at their hair and gnashing their yellowed teeth while they tried to sell their labor or their bodies for enough coin to get another vial. Now, the street bosses weren’t content to commit crimes against the merchant and noble classes. They had sellers moving through their own streets, giving free samples to those too young or too beaten down to refuse an escape from the life they led.
Apodrasi and Alistair Teague, the undisputed crime lord of all Súndraille, were east Kosim Thalas’s curse, and no one knew that better than Sebastian.
Making his way into his mother’s building, he climbed the rickety stairs to the third-floor apartment where he and Parrish had survived her neglect and his father’s whip.
He stood outside her door, scars aching, the tang of pipe weed resting on the back of his tongue, and listened while he fought to stay calm.
It had been six months since his father had left for his new job collecting payments for Teague in the neighboring kingdom of Balavata, but still Sebastian’s hands shook and his chest ached at the thought that the man who’d raised him might be on the other side of the door.
Dragging in a deep breath of dusty, smoke-scented air, Sebastian unlocked the door and entered. As the door clicked shut behind him, he rolled to the balls of his feet and raised his cudgel while he swept the room with his gaze.
His mother lay on the threadbare sofa, a filthy blanket pulled haphazardly over her legs while she slept, her fingers still curled around a pipe that reeked of the cloyingly sweet scent of apodrasi. The candle on the table beside her had guttered out, and a small puddle of wax had spilled across the surface, hardening around a layer of dust and bits of pipe weed leaf.
The Wish Granter (Ravenspire Book 2) Page 4
