“She doesn’t get tosummonyou.”
Kai said nothing—and Adeline felt her stomach pitch.
“Kai,” she said, his name sharper on her tongue than it had ever felt before. She leaned across the table, straining to place herself in his vision even as his gaze dropped to his own hands splayed on the wooden surface. “She doesnotget to make demands of you. Ofanyone.She doesn’t get to act as though it’s over, as though she’s won—”
“And as little as I want that, this is not a decision I make for myself,” Kai cut in, with just enough heat that she could tell the burn in her veins was catching. She saw it in his eyes, too, when he finally raised them; the anger that crackled there. The frustration that fissured every taut word. “I have others to consider.”
“Iknowyou don’t believe they’d want you to bow to that woman. They want to gohome.”
“Yes, they do,” he said, too evenly. “And so do you. So what will I accomplish foreitherof us by sitting here sunning myself while your kingdom falls to the same fate as my own? I have been tooselfish for too long. But when I tell you I need to do this, I can promise you I amnotthinking of myself.”
Adeline’s heart squeezed itself into her throat, but she strained to press her voice past it, needing him to hear her even if it came out reedy and thin.
“I don’t need you to accomplishanythingfor me, Kai. I need you to take a moment to breathe, to think. I need you to understand that you can’t go back to Eisalaan armed with nothing but a festering grudge. Ineedyou alive, and so do your people—”
“My people?”
A pulse of green lit Kai’s features, casting him in a ghostly glow that hollowed his cheeks and eyes and etched shadow into the crease of his brow. He looked angry and exhausted, and his fingers tightened on the table’s edge until a low judder sang beneath his knuckles.
“My people needed my protection,” he gritted out, the green light pulsing brighter, “and look how well I’ve served them. Alun all but lost his family. I have let my sister down more times than I can count. Oswalt second-guesses my every move, as hevery well should, because it’s clear I have no damned idea what I’m doing. And none of that,none of it, compares to Eda. If we had listened to her, ifIhad onlylistenedand believed her—”
Kai’s voice cracked, but he growled past the strain and at the head of the table, an untouched jug of water rippled in time with another bright pulse of his pendant. It was only when a hand reached out to steady the jar that Adeline jolted.
“Aunt Eleni,” she said abruptly, and watched surprise leash Kai’s entire taut frame even tighter. His knotted brow went flatfor a split second, his gills tensing through a harsh swallow, the green glow blinking out.
He’d forgotten they weren’t alone; a Vanjir talent, Adeline suspected. They could shine as bright as they chose, but they knew how to dim themselves too; how to still the shimmer of their own airs when they needed to. Hadn’t she honed that same talent for all those years in her mother’s court? Learned to blend with the frozen scenery? A sideways glance told her that was exactly what Eleni had been doing. Guilt tugged the curve of her lips to one side as she met Adeline’s eye with a polite and expectant smile.
It didn’t seem right to kick the Empress from her own dining hall, but her Aunt seemed to accept it; she was already pushing back her seat, poised on the edge of it and awaiting dismissal.
Adeline forced her stiff face into a grateful smile and managed to hold it for a second or two, even as her heart renewed its valiant attempt to climb into her airways and strangle the breath from her lungs.
“His Majesty’s shoulder is badly burned, and I’m sure the pain is more than a little bit distracting. Perhaps he’d be able to think clearly with some relief.”
She could feel the dry heat of Kai’s blazing gaze on her, but she ignored him a moment longer. They’d be alone, and he could rage at her all he liked.
“Could you send for a Healer, please?” she said, pushing forth that too-tight smile again. “And perhaps someone could fetch the Merrow Court, too?”
Eleni rose with a gracious bob of her head.
“Of course,” she said, and with no further pleasantries, she turned and disappeared through the open archway.
Only when the echo of her footsteps had faded did Adeline turn back to the table—to find Kai already watching her, waiting. He’d released his hold on the table, and some of that fire had guttered along with the glow of his pendant. He didn’t look angry; he looked so very tired. His hair was tousled, damp from his leap from the crumbling ship, face still black and grey, streaked with smoke and saltwater—but he sat with the most regal bearing, his spine straight and shoulders squared, large hands curved over each armrest, a king on his throne. He washere, he was blinking and breathing, and yet his expression was blank. No golden charge behind those hazel eyes at all.
It was devastating.
“It’s not your fault,” she said softly.
“Yes, it is,” he said before she’d even finished speaking, then raised his voice in anticipation of her denial. “Yes, it is. It is my fault. Eda’s death. Simon’s.”
Simon’s. Adeline swallowed and tried not to let that reflex shift across her face. She hadn’t known. Not about Simon,the boy who’d once saved their lives.
“Itismy fault, because Avette killed them to make a statement meant entirely for me.”
She frowned. “The fire—”
“Was Avette’s doing,” he said, with unnerving certainty. “She sent the Eisalaan Gard to deliver this summons, and to deliver a blow to my people.”
“Kai,” said Adeline, then faltered.
