25. Alar #2
"I suspect a great many people, which is to say I suspect no one in particular.
" A grim humor flickered and died. "Half the council would be glad to see Catonia falter.
There is not a ruler among the seventeen who has not, at some point, resented that the head of the table is always a Tekumuton.
Any of them might have decided that the table would be better with the head removed.
" He shrugged and winced at the cost of it.
"It might be the Sitorians," I said. "An attempt on the head of the Federation throws every alliance into question.
The provinces would turn on one another, jockeying for the seat, and in the scrambling no one would be watching the borders.
It is a sound strategy for anyone who wants the Federation weakened. "
Kill the king, and the seventeen provinces tear at each other over the succession, and while they are busy bleeding, the real enemy walks in through the unwatched borders.
There was one power on Aurorys that would gain more from a fractured, leaderless Federation than any rival province ever could, and it did not sit at the council table at all.
"It's not likely," my father said.
"Has there been any movement from the Sitorians?
" I pressed. "Anything unusual? Activity near the borders, kidnappings?
A suicide assassin is their signature move.
Sitorians live to die. The highest honor for a Sitorian and a ticket straight to heaven is to die in the service of their god, and what better way to serve Elusitor than to strike at the people worshiping his benevolent other half. "
My father snorted and then winced and held a hand to his ribs. "The Sitorians are the least of my concerns just now."
"They might have tried to kill the head of the Federation."
"Or someone else tried. You leap to the enemy you are obsessed with instead of looking closer.
" He shook his head slowly. "The Sitorians are a distant fire, Alar.
They have been a distant fire my whole reign, and the reign before mine.
The enemies from within the Federation are the ones who can reach me in my own gymnasium.
A man who can throw a grenade through a fourth-floor window of this palace is not some lunatic fanatic who crawled out of the South Addolian Ocean or somehow burrowed through the Elucian Mountains.
He is someone with access and a source of information within these palace walls.
Every guard and staff member has been thoroughly vetted, and yet someone is selling information to my enemies. "
I didn't doubt that someone in the palace was selling information about where and when the king and his heir would be, but they could be selling it to our enemies inside or outside the Federation.
My father had always discounted the fire beyond the Elucian Mountains and the South Addolian Ocean, because he hadn't been burned by that fire yet.
To him, the Sitorians were Elucia's problem, and as long as the Federation supplied the Elucians with enough weapons and ammunition, the small nation would hold the barbarian hordes at bay.
Did he realize how small Elucia was?
The entire Dragon Force counted seven hundred and twenty dragons and riders. If the hordes decided to attack en masse, the dragons would not be able to stop them.
But I didn't say any of it and let it go. There was no winning that argument, and tonight it was not the argument that mattered.
"This has shown me how thin the thread is," my father said.
"One grenade, a split-second response, and the Federation would have been left leaderless with me and my heir bleeding out beside me.
" He turned to my mother and took her hand.
"I cannot do that to your mother, Alar. We can't fight invisible enemies, but we can forge alliances that will fortify the bonds binding the provinces together. "
"How?" I asked, even though I suspected the answer.
"By blood," my father said. "I have five sons, which means five blood allegiances.
To move against us would mean moving against their own daughters and grandchildren.
" He looked at me steadily. "I wish I had seventeen sons, but I would make do with the five your mother gave me. " He squeezed her hand.
The ball of dread in my stomach that had shrunk a little after learning that Arlen was not dying expanded again.
This was the thing I had feared since the diplomatic demand pulled me out of Elucia. It had just been named and laid on the table between the untouched wine and the cooling food.
"Is that why you brought me home?" I turned to my mother. The bitterness rose before I could school it. "It wasn't because Father was ill and needed me by his side, but because you needed a fifth signature on a fifth marriage contract."
"It's more than that," my mother said.
I wasn't ready to listen to her excuses.
"Do you have any idea what you took me from?
I bonded with a dragon. I'm immortal now, and in time, I could amass a dragon force for the Federation, which could be the only thing standing between us and annihilation.
Is an alliance with one of the provinces worth sacrificing everything I have worked for? "
My mother flinched because I'd never raised my voice to her before, but she did not look away.
"That's one of the reasons your father and I needed you to come home, but it's not the most important one. Not even close."