“You’re right.” He took another step forward until he stood only a hand’s width away. “You’re even more ruthless.”
Elena felt winded, her lungs so tight she wondered how they did not collapse and pierce her heart.He is wrong, she thought weakly, hopelessly. If he were in her position, if he had been given the choices she was given, he would have chosen the same.
“I know how to handle the kings and queens of Sayon,” she said.
“And I don’t because I was born on some backwater island?” His eyes ripped into her, hard and unkind. “I am not a terrorist, Elena. I am a freedom fighter. Everything I do, everything I must do, is for Sesharian azadi. But how would you know? You were born a queen, raised in a palace, attended by simpering fools who called you brilliant. What do you know of my suffering?”
“Ravence is occupied by metalmen, and you say I don’t understand your suffering?” she said. “That’s rich, Sam. Really.”
He smiled then, and his smile was so full of grief and bitterness, an anger so potent that she felt it hook into her rib cage and slowly pull until she was peeling apart at the seams.
“You still don’t understand, do you? If they cannot respect me, then they will not respect Seshar. We will not gain Sesharian freedom. Your people might get azadi, but mine will be left behind to till the earth until we die. But I refuse. Seshar’s reckoning has finally come becauseIdemand it,” he said, each word sharp and vicious like the snaps of a whip. “AndIam a god.”
Samson gripped her chin. “Your kingdom has been occupied for how many days? A few months? Mine has been ruined fordecades. You haveonly tasted the misery my people have suffered. You can’t even begin to fathom my loss. So, spare me your moral arguments. They have no purpose here.”
She spoke against the crush of his fingers, keeping her voice steady. “We must play our cards carefully—”
He stepped back, as if struck. His throat trembled, and that look from before, a raw vulnerability she did not deserve, darkened into a dull heaviness that hit her in the chest like a fist.
“You disgust me,” he said, his voice thick. And then he left without another word, without giving her a chance to, what, argue? Ask for forgiveness? A means to salvage her self-belief of her moral superiority?
He is wrong, she thought, but the words rang hollow.
Jaya watched her quietly. “What are you planning, Elena?”
Elena drew a long, tired breath. “I am going to make a play for both Ravence and Seshar, but he is an idiot who—”
“He is right.”
She stilled. “What?”
“Samson is the symbol of Sesharian independence. If you allow Farin to smear his name, then you allow him to smear all Sesharians. The councilors already believe Sesharians are pitiful. Now, you’ll give them an excuse to turn their pity into hatred. They’ll call Seshar a country of terrorists and killers, not of bravehearted freedom fighters. They’ll never want it to be free.”
“They will.” Elena turned, reaching for her sari. “But first, I need to speak with Risha. If we want to protect Ravence and Seshar—”
“You’re only serving yourself,” Jaya said softly. “Yourthrone.Yourlegacy. You don’t give a damn about anyone else.”
Elena huffed. “I am the queen. Of course I care.”
“You aren’t a queen,” Jaya said. “Not really. A true queen fights for everyone before she fights for herself. Including for Samson Kytuu.”
“You are Arohassin,” Elena said, meeting her eyes. “You know nothing about fighting for anyone but yourself.”
But Jaya was already moving away. “You are not my queen.”
Elena watched her go, her words ringing in the empty room.
The glass walls curved around the tall chamber, stretching from floor to ceiling, so high that Elena had to crane her neck to see the top. The ikaraflashed in the dark waters as if the radiance of the moons were captured in their silver scales. Queen Risha watched them. She had changed into a kinetic headpiece with delicate white petals that fluttered like the gentle fins of a sea creature. With every turn of her head, the ikara followed. Back and forth, up and down, like an orchestra before a conductor.
“How did you train them to do that?” she asked.
Queen Risha did not turn as she answered, but the fish stilled as if in wait for her response. “You’d be surprised how quickly you can train the devoted.”
Elena watched as Risha picked up a bell from a side table and rang it, twice. At once, the ikara ribboned into a double helix formation. They spun, faster and faster, a long silver chain of quivering scales, and Elena was spellbound, unable to look away, unable to see the dark shadows of the room move until her Agni quivered in warning. She spun, tensing—but it was only Risha. She stood so close that Elena could see the blue glow of the waters reflected in her eyes.
“Strange,” she murmured.
“What?” Elena asked. Her heart clanged against the cage of her chest, and she fought to keep her voice flat, unperturbed.
