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I roll my eyes. “Maybe I am.”
“Good. But Gracen has no aspirations for that role, nor is she suited to it.”
I know this, and yet my thoughts and my wants keep gravitating toward her.
Kazimir smooths a hand over his beard. “What do you plan to do with her? Make her immortal?”
“No.” The answer comes without thought.
He folds his arms over his chest in challenge. “You could. You are the king. You could break Islor’s most sacred of laws.”
“She wouldn’t want that,” I murmur, more to myself. Would she?
“No,” he agrees. “She is a simple baker from Freywich.”
“Baymeadow, actually. In the plains. She had a keeper named Cordin. He was kind to her. Taught her how to read.”
Kazimir blinks. “And tell me, where did Sabrina grow up?”
I falter on the answer, seeing his point. Have I ever known this much about any of my other tributaries?
The look on my captain’s face answers that for me.
“Gracen is a mortal mother with three young children, whom she will want to grow old with. And you are an immortal king who is taking children from their parents and executing her kind every day.”
My anger flares. “As if I have a choice!”
He raises his hands in surrender. “My read on her, Atticus, since you asked … is that she may be smitten with you, but she is not a fool, and she will do anything to keep herself and her children alive. As for why she did not come last night, perhaps she’s heard rumors of the children Boaz is prying from mothers’ arms and storing for you and isn’t so smitten anymore.”
“I’m only trying to protect them.”
“You see that, and I see that, but mortals may see it differently, and they are the ones out there ingesting poison and rebelling against the elven rule.”
I sigh. I’ve been so focused on what the lords and ladies and Boaz think of my decisions, I haven’t given any thought to what the mortals think. Another of my brother’s strengths, which is clearly a flaw for me.
I released Sabrina by Gracen’s request. It was the right thing to do, anyway, and the decision eased my weighted conscience, but it was because she asked that I did it at all.
What would she want me to do with these mortals?
And what can I do that will not make me look as ill-fitted to rule as my brother did by the end?
“I think it’s time I paid a visit to the arena.”
“For what, may I ask?”
“To ensure Boaz isn’t handling this situation in a way I may one day regret.” I haven’t told Kazimir about Romeria’s wild claims yet and I’m not sure why.
I move toward the iron staircase down to the main floor. A colorful section slows my feet, and the title on the nearest shelf catches my eye. “Hold a moment.”
The group of mortals huddle together in the center of the square, eyeing the dangling ropes with trepidation.
“Fates. This many, already?” I count thirty-four mortals with glowing emblems on their hands, standing before me. In wagons behind them, bodies are piled. Too many to count. Wendeline has been busy.
“Four in this lot are tributaries. They must have tainted themselves within the last day because the keepers all fed recently without issue. The rest are regular servants,” Boaz confirms, his hand resting on his pommel.
Regular servants who were determined to never serve as tributaries again. “And did they ingest it knowingly?” Or was it forced on them, like Sabrina?
“Does it matter? They wear the mark. They cannot be allowed to live, Your Highness. You’ve said so yourself.”
“I know what I said.” I move toward the group. The stench of piss grows stronger as I approach, the dark spots on the sandy ground marking those who’ve lost control of their bladders.
Most of them bow, despite their predicament. They’re a mix of ages, from elderly to barely past Presenting Day. One of them—a wiry old woman with spotty skin and no cuff in her ear, a Rookery inhabitant, surely—sneers. Defiant, even in her last hour of breath.
“Why did you take the poison?” I ask to no one in particular.
Silence answers.
“Really? No one has a good reason for wanting to commit murder? I find that hard to believe.” Because, despite not wanting to spare their blood any longer, what they’ve done is tantamount to that.
“These here didn’t have nothing to do with it, Your Highness.” A gray-haired man waves a hand at three women in their early thirties, gripping each other’s arms. One of them is pregnant. “I knew their keepers would be knockin’ on their doors soon enough again, so I put some in their drink. Please, spare ’em. I beg it of ya. I’ll take whatever punishment you wanna give, but show them mercy.”
Echoes of “Mercy, please!” rise from the mortals, churning my stomach. I have to turn away. Battles with enemies holding swords, I can handle. Helpless, unarmed mortals begging for their lives, on the other hand …
