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“To whom?” I demand. “I just told you, and you didn’t believe me!”
He stares back at me impassively, running his finger around the rim of his teacup again.
I sit back sheepishly. “Your . . . um . . . Majesty.”
“You said ‘we.’ ”
“What?” This whole conversation is leaving me a bit breathless.
“Are you referring to the Benefactors?”
“No! I don’t know who they are.”
“You said, ‘the people we are treating stay just as healthy.’ Who is we?”
I frown. There are people in the sectors who think the king is a boorish fool who’s lazy and frivolous, but sitting in front of him, I can tell that they’re wrong. I don’t get the sense that it’s easy to lie to this man.
I do get the sense that he actually wants this kind of honest discourse, which is more surprising than anything else I’ve learned since coming here.
I take a deep breath. “When my parents died, I was there. I saw it. The night patrol—they’re not . . . ?they’re not subtle. I was blind with grief. I was going to run out after them. But there was a man in the shadows who caught me and trapped me in the darkness. I thought he was an outlaw. And he was. But not . . . ?not a smuggler. He was saving lives with stolen medicine. He saved my life.” To my surprise, my throat tightens. I feel like I’m grieving Wes all over again, in a completely different way. “We became . . . ?friends. We were partners. We helped people.”
“And what became of this friend?”
I wish I still had Quint’s handkerchief. I dab at my eyes with my fingertips. “The night after you tried to execute the eight smugglers, he wanted to stop. He said it was too dangerous. But I begged him to continue. I didn’t—I didn’t—” My voice catches. I can’t breathe. I press a hand to my chest and close my eyes.
He wasn’t real. Wes wasn’t real. He didn’t die on the wall. He didn’t exist.
“He was captured,” says King Harristan.
I swallow. Nod. Breathe.
“Look at me.”
I have to force my eyes open. He’s staring at me again, but his voice is no longer impassive.
“What of the people you were helping? What will become of them?”
I swipe at my cheeks. “They’ll get sick and die,” I say. “Or they won’t. The same as will happen to anyone who doesn’t have the elixir.”
“Finn,” he says, and it takes me a moment to realize he’s not talking to me.
The footman peels away from the wall. “Your Majesty.”
“Fetch Quint.”
Quint must not have been far, because he appears in less than a minute.
King Harristan doesn’t even give him time to speak, but Quint must be used to that, because he already has a pen in hand. “I would like a meeting with the palace doctors and apothecaries about the dosage levels in the Royal Sector. Tessa will present her findings to them tomorrow, and—”
“What?” I squeak.
Quint pauses in his writing to lift a finger to his lips, and I clamp my mouth shut.
“I would like a full accounting of the medicine dispensed in each sector by population, along with records of efficacy. Have Corrick review it. Issue a statement that our breech of security was a misunderstanding, that a concerned citizen, an apothecary herself, was merely trying to deliver a reporting of her research to the palace.”
I’m staring at him.
King Harristan looks back at me levelly. “I can’t grant you your life forever,” he says, “but I can grant a few more days to corroborate your story. I am interested in hearing your theories in more detail.”
I don’t know what to say.
“She is overcome with gratitude, Your Majesty,” says Quint.
The king grants him a withering glance. “Out of here, Quint. Take her with you.”
“Indeed.” Quint snaps his book shut and offers me his arm.
“Thank you?” I whisper. I’m not sure I mean it. I’m not sure if I want to.
Quint pats my hand where it rests on his arm. “Come along, my dear. Etiquette awaits.”
