Page 24 of Sky’s Edge

I shut up, because…

What was he talking about?

I didn’t have to verbalize my question. He told me.

“My brother launched an unprovoked attack on a foreign realm. Beings died. Others were maimed. Dozens, if not hundreds, will experience trauma remembering that night, doing this likely for the rest of their lives. For decades, during my father’s reign, my beings experienced the feeble rule of a weak king. That being, he didn’t rule. Tatra did.”

Tatra was Arnaud’s mother, the dowager queen, and from all accounts, a real bitch.

“Then Arnaud inflicted his depravity on them,” Tanyn continued. “Only for that to culminate in them living with the fear of three realms declaring war on them. We need an alliance with Night’s Fall. We need the alliance with Night’s Fall. One with the premier family. The first demons to ally themselves with the Fall after the Rift. A ceremonial healing of a centuries-old fracture. But it’s far more. It’s a ceremonial, but very meaningful healing of a very recent one.”

It was absolutely true, even though weeks had passed, alliances had been confirmed, Tanyn had taken over, and (obviously) Mira was working overtime, still…

All over the social tapes, Night’s Fallians and Sky’s Edgians were at each other’s throats about the troll attack.

Not to mention how Edgians weren’t big fans of being painted with Arnaud’s brush after all he’d done, culminating in him murdering the “love of his life,” the twelve-year-old Tula Longshot.

Tanyn kept at it.

“Assisting with this, it will be known we met at the Masque, which might have some effect on how beings remember it. It won’t only be a disastrous scheme launched by an insane king. It’ll be the event where their monarch met his queen. What you’ll be doing, assuming your position on a throne at my side, will be mostly for the benefit of those in the Edge. Yes. But it will also benefit relations with the Fall.”

Well, one thing you could say about that.

It explained why he picked me.

I’d allow it made sense, politically.

What I couldn’t think on was that it didn’t feel good knowing I was a pawn in this game and not that he actually wanted me for, well…

Me.

Though this was expedient, it didn’t quite cover all the issues there were about his decision.

“You do know, once that wears off, I will not be a popular choice for your beings,” I reminded him.

“Why not?” he asked.

Why not?

Was he crazy?

“You’re beautiful,” he continued, and my mind blanked at his shocking words coming from his well-formed lips.

But he wasn’t finished.

“You’re stylish. You’re well-educated. You’re accomplished. You have a forceful personality, and everyone knows demons admire a forceful personality.”

“Demons from the Edge hate the ones from the Fall,” I told him something he should know.

His eyes narrowed. “What are you talking about?”

“We go skiing up there, sire,” I shared. “We’ve felt it.”

“Felt what?”

“The prejudice.”

“From whom?”