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“Touch his ears,” the King suggests.
The girl leans forward, and her small fingers fumble along the edge of my ear. She’s trembling.
She’s so different from my Juliette. Juliette weeps, panics, and trembles sometimes—she gets scared and anxious like anyone else, but beneath every natural reaction there is always a steadiness, a palpable strength. In the sweetness of her tears there is a rich confidence. She may collapse, but she always rises. She may be battered, but she’s never beaten, not really—not inside, where it matters. She adapts, she plans. She finds a way.
The poor girl on the King’s knee is already beaten. There’s a hollow, fragile distance in her eyes, a helplessness in her touch that I’d pity if I were a better man. But at the moment I’m most concerned about where the King’s depraved imagination will take us—how far he’ll go to prove his control over me. What he’ll make us do in front of the people in this room.
Lucky for me, one of the stewards approaches with a sheaf of papers and asks timidly, “We have a dispute about the bill of sale for the Laudarin Estate. It could not be resolved in the courts, so Lords Felzik and Krom are asking Your Majesty for the final say in the matter.”
“Oh, very well.” The King tugs at the crotch of his pants. “Bring them forward.”
The two lords talk for several minutes, each man trying to persuade the King to rule in his favor. The debate devolves into a full-on argument, in which they call each other some delightfully nasty names that I tuck away in my mind for future use.
“Enough!” calls the King at last, raising his hand. “I’ve made a decision. Since the true ownership of the Laudarin Estate is so hotly debated, the Crown will assume ownership. We will put the property up for sale, and either of you may purchase it if you have the funds. The proceeds will go to a worthy cause.”
A worthy cause… like funding the alliances with Darthage’s neighbors. Interesting. He annexed the property, ostensibly to resolve the argument, but he’s also looking for ways to raise the money necessary to replace the false gold he sent to his allies. Clever, cruel man.
The two lords are thoroughly dismayed by the King’s solution to their problem, and they express their displeasure so loudly they have to be escorted out of the throne room.
The King gives a few orders to the steward regarding the paperwork for the new estate, and then dumps the girl unceremoniously off his knee. He dismisses her with a gesture and she scurries away.
Leaning forward, the King seizes the leather leash attached to the collar around my neck. He could just command me to approach, but instead he jerks at the leash, nearly choking me. Grinding my teeth into the leather bit of the muzzle, I submit to his firm tug and move nearer to him.
“Sit here, between my legs,” he growls under his breath. “And think about what you’ve done.”
I can’t reply because of the muzzle, though several saucy retorts come to mind. Any of them would only make the situation worse, so perhaps it’s fortunate I can’t speak.
I should have told Juliette about the gold’s temporary status from the beginning. The transmutation was real—I did change the straw into actual, solid gold. But it was never going to last. The first time I performed the spell for her, I thought I’d be long gone before the gold reverted to straw. The second time, I persuaded myself that she didn’t need to know, because she and I were planning to destroy the King soon anyway. It was a harmless trick, one with no lasting consequences to either of us if things worked out right. I’m not sure why I assumed they would go smoothly. It’s not as if life has been particularly well-mannered toward me.
The King settles back on his throne, spreading his thighs and legs wide, and he pulls me backward until I’m sitting between his knees. He drives his fingers into my hair and yanks my head back, inspecting my muzzle for a second before shoving my head away and snapping his fingers at the steward, which I assume is the sign for another supplicant to approach.
For the next hour I sit between the King’s knees. To keep my legs from falling asleep, I have to keep shifting my position on the uncomfortably hard marble of the dais. Now and then the King collars my throat with his hand, or fondles my ears, or gives me a vindictive kick when something reminds him of the disappearing gold.
At last the King calls for refreshments, and a buxom maid trots in, carrying a tray laden with mouthwatering fruit tarts, small sugared cookies, and fragile puff pastries overflowing with whipped cream.
At another snap of the King’s fingers, a servant boy approaches, breaking off a morsel from each kind of dessert and tasting it. After a few minutes, he nods and steps back, and the maid climbs the steps to deliver the sweets to the King.
The maid pauses on the top step, her eyes slanting down to me. It’s a cool, curious glance—pity with the faint heat of admiration.
As she holds the tray out to the King, he barks, “On all fours, Half-Elf! You’re going to be my table for a while.”
I plant myself on palms and knees, keeping my spine straight and parallel to the floor while the maid sets the tray on my back.
As she moves, I catch a whiff of her scent—an earthly, floral richness, with a whisper of vanilla and the unmistakable fragrance of baked goods.
Her hair is blonder, and her face is all the wrong shape, but her scent doesn’t lie.
I would know Juliette’s fragrance anywhere.
30
Rupert’s eyes widen a fraction as I set the tray on his back.
He knows me. Somehow, despite the layers of Elven magic embedded into the plain silver bracelets I’m wearing, he knows who I am.
Don’t react, I plead with him inwardly. Stay calm, play along…
All the King has to do is take a bite—preferably a few bites. There wasn’t much of the shredded fennisley, and I had to grind it into powder and then divide it among three recipes. I’m not sure how concentrated it needs to be to kill the King. From what Rupert told me about the plant, it sounds fairly potent.
