CHAPTER TWENTY-TWO #2
What should I do? I saw no benefit in confessing.
The court was still biased in my favor. For now, I would deny everything.
“I have no idea what this peasant is talking about.” I’d hoped my voice would sound confident, but it came out shrill.
I snuck a glance at Ari. He’d turned white and was trembling.
There was pain in his eyes, but also a growing rage.
Duchess Hedri continued, “Due to the destruction of all physical evidence, I’ve provided an artifact that can record memories.” She held up a small mirror. “This has captured direct images of the massacre.”
Like an idiot, I wondered where she’d gotten the memories. Then I realized that of course she’d cast her own memories into the mirror. Just how blatant could she be? Did she have no shame? Probably not. My own attempts to resemble her hadn’t even come close to this level of shamelessness.
The duchess displayed the mirror. The images were …
very bad. The jury looked ill; several had to turn away.
Ari started to silently choke at the sight of the duchess murdering his parents.
I reached out to him, but he turned and fled the courtroom.
I completely understood. If someone had shown my brother dying up there, then I would have run off to throw up.
I wished I could chase after him, but as the defendant, I wasn’t allowed to leave while the trial was in progress.
I had no choice but to watch. My fingers tightened on the podium. Someone, anyone, go after Ari!
As if in response to my silent prayer, Antonia leapt up and ran after Ari. I breathed a small sigh of relief.
With a smug smirk that I longed to rip off her face, the duchess turned to me. “Do you plead guilty or innocent?” I’d never known my own voice could sound so malicious and contemptible. It screeched against my ears.
Ysabel waggled her eyebrows frantically at me. I had no idea what she meant.
I cleared my throat. Remembering the lame excuse we’d joked about earlier, I said, “I have amnesia.”
The sound of my sister slapping her own forehead echoed around the room. Apparently that hadn’t been what she meant for me to do.
Duchess Hedri’s smirk widened. “Then a Seer’s testimony would be useless. What a shame. But I think my mirror has provided ample evidence of your crimes.”
The assembled jury muttered amongst themselves.
They were all fully aware of the truth about this situation.
Whereas it had been easy to pretend not to know about the body swap, it was hard to deny this.
Furthermore, how would we explain it to Sherda?
An Arahasnor court didn’t even have the power to dismiss charges of treason based in Sherda.
“Wait.” The door flung open. Ari stood in the doorway.
He was wiping his mouth, and his eyes were rimmed in red.
He must have actually thrown up. “I’m Ari of South Sherda.
I’m still alive, so no one can be convicted of my murder.
” His tone tried to make a joke of it, but his voice wobbled.
There was nothing funny in his shattered gaze.
“I can testify that those images are fake. If I say the duchess is innocent—”
“You can’t!” I leapt up. The rest of my words died in my throat as I realized anything I might say would be an admission of guilt.
Ari flinched. “Please don’t make this any harder for me. Just let me speak.”
“I won’t!” I could tell from the duchess’s sudden frown that Ari’s lie was not according to her plan.
Ari had the power to completely and utterly screw over whatever twist ending she intended.
But at what cost? Ari had been chasing revenge ever since he was a small child.
To deny his parents’ murders would emotionally destroy him.
My head hurt. This damn heavy hat was giving me a headache. I wrenched it off, yanking out several hairpins and letting my curls fall down over my shoulders. “This has gone too far. Duchess Hedri is guilty, and I’m not her. She murdered Ari’s family.” I pointed at the smirking killer.
“But—” Ari began.
I grabbed his wrist. “I promised you the day we first met. You’ll have your revenge.”
“You’re more important to me,” Ari said, so quietly I almost didn’t hear it. “I released you from your oath. Now I release you from any sense of obligation to help me fulfill my revenge.”
I squeezed his hand. “I never needed to be forced to help you. And I’m not going anywhere. Worst-case scenario, we can flee to Conollia together.” I glared in defiance at the stunned jury.
The duchess smiled. She’d wanted me to make this confession.
That must have been the entire point of this strange game.
But why? What did she gain from switching our identities back, right after confessing to deadly crimes?
There was something I must be missing. It nagged at me, lurking at the back of my mind, a thought not quite finished.
Before I could quite figure out what was happening, the Living Shadow erupted from the floor and stabbed Duchess Hedri clean through her borrowed chest.