Page 41

Xerxes stilled when Prince Mansour returned with Ryn’s hand in his. She wore the same dress as earlier, but her hair was up now, tiny braids fashioned into a ponytail that revealed her back and shoulders in her gown. Prince Mansour carried her fingers delicately in the air, his black-gold gaze sliding to Xerxes, his reddish lips finding a smile as he led her to the ruby thrones and nodded to the one beside his. “Sit here, Adassah.”

“Whose seat is this?” Ryn asked, and Prince Mansour shrugged.

“That’s Prince Emad’s chair!” Sigilene snapped from the noble chairs nearby. The look on her face was more worried than angry. “No one can sit in Emad’s chair. Especially not enemy war heroes who killed hundreds of our people.”

Prince Mansour cast her a deadly glower. “It is Prince Emad’s chair, but Emad doesn’t have the guts to fight for it, and no one will care if he has nowhere to sit.” Then to Ryn, he said, “We’d all rather see you sitting here anyway.”

Ryn’s attention sailed around the room as if searching for the younger Prince. Her eyes found Xerxes instead as she lowered herself into the seat. Xerxes made sure his promise from earlier spoke volumes in the air between them; he cast a subtle nod in Prince Mansour’s direction while keeping his eyes on her.

Ryn tore her gaze away and settled it on the ceiling mural, then on the opening where the late morning mist was climbing into the sky from the Outer Rings. On everything except for Xerxes.

“Rebellious little Adriel,” Xerxes muttered, his fingers balling to fists around his chains as he resumed his pacing, dragging them along.

“The time is now. Warn Alecsander.”

Xerxes stopped walking. “What? Warn him?” Norkin shot him an odd look from his pedestal.

“Warn him that plagues will befall his city if he continues to test the God Original.” Xerxes gaped. “Tell him to let your people go.”

Xerxes rubbed his eyes. “You want me to march over there and look like an absolute fool? What if I do this and you don’t follow through?” They would muzzle him with a gag for this. He could already taste the fabric in his mouth again.

El Tsebaoth didn’t reply, and Xerxes worked his jaw, eyeing the red carpet, the Prince beyond it, his maiden whose gaze accidentally drifted back over to Xerxes again.

Alecsander entered on the far side, servants bowing low as he drifted to his throne. A chilly wind crawled in, jerking the smoke rising from the barrels and fluttering the kilts of nearby guardsmen.

Xerxes released his grip on his chains. If El Tsebaoth wanted him to demand that Alecsander let Per-Siana go… then that must have meant Alecsander had infiltrated Per-Siana. Xerxes scratched down his arms as his skin tingled, nerves buzzing. He’d heard no news of this. But—who would tell him? Even the B’rei Mira nobles avoided him now. He chewed on his bottom lip as Alecsander sat in his black throne. The man wore no hood today; the colour of his flesh was back to normal, and Xerxes’s eyes slid closed as he thought of the tree in the depths of this palace. A power source for the sick and beastly. And he knew he had to do it—to bring a warning to the B’rei Mira dynasty. To save his people, as Ryn had once done at the border. If Ryn would not speak the words of her god in this moment, then Xerxes would.

“Alecsander!” His shout reverberated through the Throne Room, snapping heads in his direction and making those nearby jump. Xerxes’s eyes flashed open. He breathed in the strength of the Adriel god, warmth running down into his fingertips, and he tore the chain right out from the wall. Norkin leapt to his feet beside him, and a female servant gasped, dropping a platter of leaves that tumbled across the floor. Xerxes’s eyes narrowed on the hundreds of shadows appearing in his vision around the room, swivelling beneath Prince Mansour’s chair, curling around guards’ heads. He stepped off his pedestal, dragging his chain with him. Guards assembled, but they shrank back as Xerxes walked into the centre of the room and a cannon of white light burst into the ceiling, making the shadows scream and dive beneath the furniture.

Alecsander rose from his throne, his flickering golden eyes settling on Xerxes. And only when Xerxes had the attention of every soul, god, and shadow in the room did he say, “Alecsander of B’rei Mira… let my people go.” More guards and some nobles filtered in from outside like they’d heard the commotion. Alecsander was motionless where he stood. “You have been accused of testing the God Original. Release Per-Siana from your hold, or plagues will befall this city.”

Blood had a familiar smell. Xerxes had grown accustomed to it in the war, fighting day and night, seeing his own spilled into the sand. He’d endured endless hours in the medicine tent receiving treatment alongside injured Per-Siana soldiers. The scars on his chest had once gifted him the ability to discern the metallic fragrance of an open wound.

It was the smell that gave away that something had happened. Xerxes sat awake in his cell, chewing on his fabric gag before the sun came up. He assumed he was the first awake until a guard began screaming through the palace. The hallway had just lit with a brush of early sunlight.

“The river into the palace has been turned to blood!”

There was chatter and screaming and sounds of tin bowls clattering. “The water in the palace, too!” Men, women; they all screamed. “The waterway system outside is red!”

Xerxes shoved the gag out of his mouth with his tongue. He’d spent the whole night stretching it. He climbed to his feet as best he could with his hands bound behind his back.

“What, by the Divinities, did you do?” he asked El Tsebaoth curiously. “Did you actually make a river of blood?” His face warped. “That’s utterly repulsive—”

Xerxes’s cell door swung open and Vafat flooded his room. They grabbed him by the arms, yanking him out and down the hall. His bare toes struck uneven floor tiles as he was jerked around. He found himself beneath the decorative gold strings of the Throne Room seconds later, shoulders held in place by cold Vafat hands.

Alecsander was already in his seat. Dark rings surrounded his eyes like he’d sat in that position all night and hadn’t moved. A shadow flickered over his face as if something else looked back at Xerxes as he stood there.

“What. Have. You. Done?” Ice breathed up Xerxes’s spine at the War King’s words—or, perhaps the words of something else.

Xerxes steeled himself. “This was an act of the God Original whom I warned you about. Let my people go, or greater horrors shall follow.”

Alecsander’s thick fingers dragged over the armrests of his throne into solid fists. And his whisper tangled with a vile shout, “No.”

The next morning the most repulsive reptiles Xerxes had ever seen filled the palace. Little green animals hopping about and croaking, making the squeamish vomit and the ladies shriek. After being wrestled back to the Throne Room, Xerxes repeated his plea to Alecsander who sat a lifeless being and did not respond this time.

The morning after that it was pesky, biting insects. Then whispering flies that woke nobles all throughout the palace from sleep and buzzed in their ears day and night. And on the fifth morning, cows in the city began tipping over as if being pushed by invisible hands, foaming at the mouth and dying on the spot. B’rei Mira citizens flooded the Outer Rings of the palace, banging their fists on the outermost wall, begging their King to do something about their lost cattle.

Bruises formed over Xerxes’s arms from all the times he was grabbed and dragged before Alecsander. He visited the Throne Room every morning with El’s demand upon his lips.