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At the mention of Zan, I stiffened. She motioned to one of her acolytes, and I noticed her gloves for the first time: blue-black and marbled with dark colors that shifted as she moved, like oil stains or beetles’ wings, with satin laces crisscrossing up past her elbows and punctuated by silver buttons. They were a jarring contrast her to ice-white robes.
She said, “At least, with one of these problems, I can be of assistance. Lyall, if you please.”
Bowing at her feet, an acolyte—tall, rail-thin, fair-haired—presented a satin-draped parcel. As the fabric fell away, the silent watchers in the pews let out a collective gasp.
It was my father’s crown, a circle of white-gold tines studded with oval sapphires and diamond-encrusted stars. The homemade headpiece of sticks and twisted stems on the altar looked flimsy and fragile next to the weight of gold and the history of a hundred kings.
“I don’t want to stop our king’s ascension,” Arceneaux said. “On the contrary, I wish to help prop him up, to assist him in his righteous rule. It is, as you say, a new day for Renalt. As the recently appointed leader of the Magisterial Council, I welcome the opportunity to work side by side with King Conrad and his regent. It is for this reason that I and my associates here will be setting up a permanent residency in Greythorne Village. So that we can be on hand to watch and guide him.”
I felt my hackles rise.
Watch. Not watch over. Just watch.
Arceneaux lifted my father’s crown and brought it over to me. “Generally, the king’s closest relative is asked to present the crown. Whether we like it or not, that’s you.”
I raised my hands to accept the offering; I didn’t know what else to do. As my fingers and hers touched, I felt a quick, sharp sting. I didn’t see the implement she used—likely, it was some kind of needle hidden in her gloves—but I saw her smile twist as she stepped away. “There you go, now. Crown your brother. Name him king.”
I mounted the first step toward the altar. Was there poison in the pinprick? Had she assassinated me in one single, subtle move? But I didn’t feel any sudden frailty or faintness. Just the familiar spill of magic from the tiny droplet of released blood waiting for my command.
Stars above. Magic. Was she trying to draw out my magic?
I approached Conrad with caution, gauging his expression, but he didn’t seem scared or even surprised. The only thing that betrayed his apprehension was how tightly he was clutching that silly wooden box. I gave a clumsy bow and situated the too-large crown atop his golden curls.
There was a long, laborious script meant to accompany this moment, but Father Cesare was immobile on the dais, a knife still pressed to his neck, eyes glazed with fear. I cast around in my memory for the words and found none. Instead, I put my hands on my brother’s shoulders and said, “You are king now, Conrad. Be a good one.”
From behind me, Arceneaux said, “All hail Conrad, king of Renalt. Long live the king.”
The audience reluctantly repeated her words, and Conrad raised a hand in response to their listless cheer.
Arceneaux’s voice rose again, filling every corner of the hall. “Now, for the first order of business, dear king. There is an enemy of your people here, even now, hiding in plain sight among you.” She walked the length of the nave, her white cape swirling. “Our long-held laws state unequivocally that any invasion by a hostile foreign power must be met with our full military might, and all who aid and abet our enemies must face trial by fair tribunal for treason.”
“No one has invaded our land, Magistrate,” Kellan spoke up. “We have no quarrels with our neighbors.”
“I do so wish that were true, Captain Greythorne,” she said. “But we have been invaded, and if we don’t do something about it now, the Renaltan way of life that we all cherish will be taken from us, little by little, until there’s nothing left. How many of you here”—she lifted her arms to the watching nobility—“came today not simply for the privilege of watching a new king ascend, but also to ask the ascendant king to do his duty on your behalf??”
A wave of affirmative whispers and nods crossed the pews.
Arceneaux paused to let them steep into the atmosphere. Then she said, “We all want to know, King Conrad, what you plan to do about the Achlevan infestation.”
I curled my pinpricked finger into a tight fist to muffle the urge to send magic lashing out against her. Wasn’t that what she wanted? To provoke me into demonstrating my magic in front of this collective? To turn me and mine into something monstrous so that she and hers could justify murdering us? And despite all the hunts and trials and executions Renalt had performed over the generations, it was likely that none of these assembled courtiers had ever witnessed real witchcraft. I did not relish the idea of being the one to turn their amorphous anxieties into indisputable reality.
“Infestation?” I hissed.
“Lord Gaskin?” Arceneaux said, pointing to the reedy, pepper-haired man near the front. “Six days ago, an undocumented Achlevan vessel docked without permit in your port. Can you tell us what was on it?”
“Achlevan miscreants,” he replied readily. “About a hundred of them. Dirty, squalid, riddled with disease. They wanted to sully my city with their filth. Of course, I did not allow them off the boat.”
“Leopold, Marquess of Hallett? Your land is not far from the border of the Ebonwilde. What have these last weeks been like for you?”
“We were in the middle of my mother’s funeral,” the marquess stated nervously, eyes darting from me to Conrad and then back again. “And we saw them coming down one o
f the old army trails from the woods. A caravan of at least ten wagons, two dozen men and women and so many children I couldn’t keep count. They looked like animals—wild and unkempt. I had my men herd them to a campsite outside our limits so the good folk in my town wouldn’t have to see them.”
My lip twitched. “These people you call animals, miscreants, vermin . . . they are refugees. Good people! Hard workers. Families . . . men and women who have lost everything and have faced unimaginable hardship looking to start a better life! What kind of devils must you be to see their suffering and still turn them away?”
“She calls you devils!” Arceneaux said, advancing on me. “She disparages you, the faithful, the beloved chosen of the Empyrea, in favor of the Achlevan invaders.”
“No,” I retorted steadily. “I am for the peaceful sharing of our resources with those in need, whether they be Renaltan, Achlevan, or any other country asking for our aid. What would you do, all of you, if the tables were turned? If you had lost everything, only to be spurned at the gate by the people who could save you?”
