CHAPTER 59
Tyghan stormed toward the rotunda door.
“Where are you going?” Eris called.
“To kill my brother. It won’t take long. I’ll be back before the meeting is over.”
No one followed him. They probably all hoped he meant what he said.
A string of curses rattled through Tyghan’s head as he made his way to Cael’s quarters.
An asset. Tyghan saw gold glittering in Csorba’s eyes.
She could provide us with advantages for centuries to come.
And suggesting she wear a collar so they could control her?
You won’t be king much longer. Tyghan had never cared about being king, but now it seemed essential he maintain the position.
He couldn’t trust Cael to keep the council in line, with his constant gallivanting around Elphame.
And to reveal himself to council members? All Tyghan needed right now was for Kormick to find out and send a fleet of his rotting restless dead to the palace in retribution.
Melizan stopped short when Tyghan almost rammed into her around a corner. “Whoa, I recognize that blood in your eye. Who are you off to dismember?” She fell into step with him.
Tyghan didn’t slow. “Our brother,” he answered.
“It’s about time. Need help?”
“I can manage. You go on to the meeting.”
“I know you can manage, but I owe you so much after that wedding. I could spare you from getting blood under your nails?”
“I don’t mind blood. Where’s Cosette?”
“Down at the river saying goodbye to her family. They all loved you, by the way. What did the bread head do this time?”
Bread head. Tyghan would have laughed if he wasn’t so enraged.
When they were children and forbidden from cursing or calling each other names, Melizan got away with bread head, claiming she loved dry tasteless things.
He hadn’t heard her say it in years. Now she used words that could singe an ogre’s hair.
Tyghan explained to her in a few terse sentences what Cael had done.
“Definitely coming,” she said. “Besides, I haven’t seen you two in a good row in a long time.”
Blood ran from Cael’s nose, but Tyghan had a bloody face too, from a gash across his cheekbone. Cael always wore those nasty rings.
Melizan watched the two brothers tire as they fought, neither one truly wanting to kill the other.
The hot fury at their temples slowly faded.
As mismatched as the three siblings were, none of them had any other family, and there was something comforting about sharing a history, having someone who had known you from the beginning and shared the same blood, the same losses.
Someone who tolerated you in spite of all your blunders.
Cael was definitely the king of bad choices, and Melizan had throttled him herself a few times, but she and Tyghan had made their share of stupid mistakes too.
Her brothers were equally matched in height and stature, their swings predictable, and Cael had gained most of his weight back, and apparently his strength too, thanks to the High Witch.
Still, Cael was a sloppy fighter, and Tyghan wasn’t.
Tygh had embraced his training as a knight.
Cael never did. He never learned that in a fight, he really had no chance against Tyghan—or her.
It was like he always believed that, one day, fate would turn, and his blows would land magnificently.
He was king, after all. That had to be worth something.
Melizan and Cael were both twelve when her father died, Tyghan only seven.
She remembered Cael coming over to her with puddles in his eyes when he heard the news.
This is going to kill my mother, please don’t let it kill you.
He had nodded toward Tyghan and said, We both need to be here for the brat.
He said it with the sincerity and bluntness that only Cael could muster, but she heard a softness in it too, and she pulled her arm back and hit him in the jaw.
She didn’t want to be necessary for anyone else, for making sure they survived, because she wasn’t sure she would survive herself.
She had already lost too much in her short life.
But she always remembered, Cael knew, through all his own worries, that this would break his mother, and he needed Melizan to lean on.
There were so many times over the years, as he floundered and grew into his role as king, when she hated him, but she didn’t forget that moment when he shared his fear and needed her.
And maybe that gave her something to need too.
“I swear, it was an accident,” Cael said, wiping a stream of blood from his mouth. “I thought I had my glamour in place.”
“You thought?” Tyghan yelled. “Are you still a child, Cael? You’re the king of the second most powerful kingdom in Elphame! That’s right, second, soon to be no kingdom at all, if you don’t stop fucking things up!”
Cael took a weak swing, barely grazing Tyghan’s jaw. “I’m not king!” he yelled. “Not anymore. You stole that from me!”
The blaze returned to Tyghan’s temples. “Stole? I didn’t ask for this! I had no choice. You disappeared because of another one of your selfish escapades. I stepped up to be king because I had to! And that’s what we’re expecting of you! Step up! There is no room for any more reckless mistakes!”
Cael slipped to his knees, out of breath, and raised one hand in surrender. “I will stay in my room until the ceremony.”
Tyghan’s chest still heaved, and he nodded.
“Well, that was quick,” Melizan said. “I thought you two would go at least a few more rounds.”
“Shut up, Melizan,” Cael snapped.
She walked over and scooped her hand under his arm and helped him to his feet. “Come on, brother, let’s get your face cleaned up. I’m sure if you grovel a bit, Tyghan will heal that darling fat lip of yours and make it kissable again.”
And Cael leaned on her all the way to his bath chamber, because he knew he could.
“Am I groveling enough?”
“Never enough,” Tyghan answered as he dabbed a small cut over Cael’s brow and then pressed his finger to it.
Cael winced. “I never wanted to be king, you know? At least not at age twelve. But I had no choice. Now it’s all I have. Without it, I’m nothing.” And then, even more glumly, he added, “I never had the same powers as you.”
It was a sore spot, the one thing they never talked about.
Cael was decent enough at glamour and the standard array of spells.
He could also control the air in small bursts by summoning an occasional strong gust, but it could barely be called a kinship, and he had no kinship whatsoever with the other elements.
They had different fathers, and Tyghan attributed it to that.
But he was good at parties, and that explained his favor with the kingdoms.
“You’ll be king again soon enough, but you’ll have to do better at keeping the council in line. You’re a good ruler when you stay focused.”
“I’m always a good ruler, little brother. I am fair. But even kings need to take breaks.”
“And you take more than your share.”
“Don’t question me on everything I do. Besides, when I step up on the Stone of Destiny, I’ll be spending a lot of time at the Elphame court, and when I’m away, you’ll be regent here. You’re the one who will need to keep the council in line.”
“Or Eris. He’s played that role before. I have my duties as Knight Commander.”
“You’re managing both jobs now,” Cael answered. “And if things are settled with Kormick and there’s peace in Elphame, there will be far less for you to do. What else could you want to be besides regent in my absence?”
A memory flashed behind Tyghan’s eyes. He saw a golden scythe clutched in his small hands, a field ripe with wheat, and Amaetheon, the only great god he had ever spoken with face-to-face, asking him a question: Will you help with the harvest?
For a few weeks, being a farmer became Tyghan’s burning passion, but then after his father died and his mother left, it was the knighthood that consumed him.
It was who and what he was now. But now he wanted even more. He wanted a life with Bristol too.
Cael didn’t wait for Tyghan to respond. “Yes, that’s what I want, you taking care of things here when I’m away. Together, the Trénallis brothers will watch over both ends of Elphame and make sure the likes of Kormick are never seen again. Until then, I will stay in my room.”
Tyghan wiped his hands with a towel and threw it in the basin. “When did you become so agreeable, Cael?”
“When your fist smashed into my face.”
“You threw the first punch.”
“Just trying to get a head start. That’s what kings do.”