Chapter 75
CHAPTER SEVENTY-FIVE
I t took a considerable amount of self-control for me to refrain from commenting on the vast amounts of food Iiro was willing to waste mere hours after accusing me of letting him starve to death.
Like he wouldn’t rip the last roll of bread from a malnourished child before forcing himself to miss a single meal.
I wouldn’t win any allies openly criticizing him here, when those around me stood so staunchly on tradition and protocol, so I only nodded graciously like he was playing the part of a generous host rather than flaunting his disregard for every citizen in Socair.
Though my wife was used to this type of feast, even she looked a bit out of sorts as she took in the excess around us. Moreso when the ladle full of borscht hit her bowl.
I remembered her whispered joke to Korhonan before reluctantly accepting his proposal. She looked at him now like she was remembering the same thing, and he held his hands up in a display of innocence.
Irritation prickled at my skin. I might have dredged up a modicum of respect for him throughout the past couple of interactions, but that didn’t mean I loved his inside jokes with my wife. Still, I ignored their harmless interaction, focusing instead on the pride that surged through me when Rowan ate each bite without so much as a grimace.
As much as I hated to acknowledge anything here, the borscht was delicious, if a bit on the strong side. Iiro cast several glances toward my wife, and I couldn’t help but wonder if he had gone out of his way to serve food he thought Rowan would disapprove of.
He, too, had heard her comments about the borscht, had likely witnessed her first experience with it. And storms knew he would look for every way to undermine her.
It was petty, even for him, enough so that I might have thought I was just being paranoid if not for his surreptitious looks…and the dagger. Unease scraped along my spine.
Forcing a smirk to my lips, I pretended not to notice, instead interacting casually with my wife.
“At least it isn’t fish stew,” I reminded her.
Even I had struggled to stomach that particular…delicacy.
She laughed under her breath and my smile turned more genuine.
“This is true. I do prefer my food not to stare back at me.” She tilted her head as she looked at the roasted hog in the middle of the table, a caveat to her statement. “Other than delicious little pigs, of course.”
“Of course,” I agreed.
Iiro looked between us, then at his brother, narrowing his eyes. It bothered him, seeing us happy, which of course only made me want to incite another laugh from her. His jaw went rigid and he cleared his throat to speak.
“I thought we had a rather fruitful discussion today on the necessity of sharing our resources,” he said in a tone that carried.
I admirably did not roll my eyes. If by fruitful , he meant that he had suggested stealing what Bear had rightfully bartered and I shut him down, then sure.
Instead of looking at me for my reaction to his posturing, though, he turned his attention to my father.
The unease along my spine morphed into something closer to dread, even before his lips tipped up in a smile that was too close to genuine to mean anything good for me.
I opened my mouth to speak, but he went on too quickly for me to reasonably interject without publicly undermining my duke.
“Of course, Sir Aleksander and I had discussed it before, so I’m sure he will be more than prepared to sign on the new law tomorrow. Isn’t that what you said, Sir Aleksander?”
He raised his eyebrows in the pretense of a question, like he wasn’t baiting my father into agreeing. Was this what he had done at the Summit to get my father to sign?
And how in the storms-damned hell had he known it would work?
Something niggled at the back of my mind, something from the council meeting today, but I didn’t have time to consider it before my father gave a sharp nod, just as I had known he would—just as Iiro had clearly known he would.
“It is as you say, Your Majesty,” he said with all the confidence of a man who had any idea what he was agreeing to.
Damn him. Damn him and his madness and his storms-blasted pride that forced him to come here instead of letting me handle this in his stead. I hoped he would be lucid enough tonight to remember how he had cowed before the man he hated, to feel the blow to his pride when he signed a law that made our clan look nothing but weak.
It was the very least he owed his people, even if his shame would only ever be for himself.
I spent the rest of dinner making polite conversation with Andreyev and Mikhail and even Korhonan, anything to keep me from hurling my dinner knife at Iiro’s smarmy face.
Rowan likewise kept up a steady stream of polite discussion with Inessa and Lady Galina both, though the tension that thrummed through her body told me she hadn’t missed the interaction.
Sure enough, as soon as we were safely back in our rooms, she spun to face me.
“Do you want to tell me what the hell just happened?” Her voice was pitched low, but fear wound its way through every word.
I poured us both a drink since it was the closest thing I could offer to comfort without outright lying to her.
“Iiro sowing seeds of dissension.” I intentionally kept my tone even so at least my own anxiety wouldn’t pile on top of hers. “He wants to tax forty percent of the food, including your dowry.”
“What?” she demanded. “Can you say no?”
Her expression was so hopeful, filled with all the faith I had asked for from her. It ate away at something inside me that I didn’t have another answer to give.
No, Lemmikki, I don’t have any power here. I don’t have a way to fix this for us. I don’t even have a contingency plan yet.
For all the maneuvering I was capable of, I was not yet Duke, and there were things beyond even my control when my father insisted on destroying his own storms-damned clan from the inside out.
I pushed her glass into her hand, giving her the fortification she would need while I threw back the contents of my own glass.
“I could have, if my father hadn’t just said yes,” I explained shortly while my mind replayed through the events of the evening.
I was still missing something. Something I felt in my gut was important. Iiro wanted power. Over our kingdom, our resources, my wife. Me. Of course, manipulating my father helped him achieve those things.
But I couldn’t shake the oppressive feeling that he had a greater end in mind. My father wouldn’t live forever, and Iiro shouldn’t have wanted to work quite so hard to alienate me, knowing I would someday control the only clan that might pose a real threat to his rule.
Why wasn’t he more concerned about that? Was it more of his lacking judgment because of my choice in wife? Or was there something more?
“What else?” Rowan asked, accurately reading into my silence as she so often was able to do—even when I wished she wouldn’t.
I wasn’t quite ready to delve into the rest, but I had promised her to make more of an effort in that regard, so I forced myself to give her a real answer.
“This is twice now he’s baited me into publicly disagreeing with my father. I can’t tell if this is a general tactic to undermine me so it’s easier for him to get his way, or…something else.” A headache formed behind the backs of my eyes and I idly massaged at it.
Rowan’s smaller hands brushed mine aside, tracing firm patterns along my forehead that slowly eased the tension there, if not the mounting pressure on my chest.
“We’ll figure this out,” she said quietly, pressing her lips against my forehead. “Iiro is a conniving aalio , but frankly…so are you when you want to be.”
The barest hint of a smile turned the corner of her mouth, and I huffed out a semblance of a laugh.
Still, I didn’t miss the faraway look in her eyes when she glanced at the storm in the distance, like she could sense another one on its heels, one that had nothing at all to do with the churning clouds outside.