Chapter 35
JO
Messer sits on the ledge of the roof of the tavern, back to the edge, watching me pace as I work through my thoughts. “We need to talk to Kai,” he says.
“I need to talk to my mother,” I amend.
“I can’t fly to two places at once. You’re going to have to pick one over the other.”
I turn my head to the west, putting my back to the freezing wind. “She’s probably sick with worry.”
Messer nods. “I know. And I know how much it’s bothering you, but even if she is getting the army ready to invade Kenta, it’ll take Drake a week to sail to the mouth of the Yanka River, another to set up a blockade and set up camp on land.”
While I hoped to keep my people out of the war, I knew it was never guaranteed. They know it, too. The people of Maile aren’t naive. Preventing Strou’s warriors from crossing the gulf was just the preamble. But Kai was supposed to have crippled and taken Kenta by now.
Choosing sides is the same as choosing conflict.
“You’re actually considering this,” I say, voice flat.
He gawks at me. “You’re not?”
“You mean, rule in accord with Acker and his wife? Why the hell would I agree to that? I can’t trust either one of them!”
“They’re not any worse than Chryse, and if we can get Kai to agree to the alliance, it’s practically smooth sailing straight to the end of the war.”
I close my eyes, dreading his reaction to what I’m about to reveal. “There’s something I haven’t told you.”
“For the love of the Mother,” he mutters. “What is it?”
“Chryse is my uncle.”
His face screws up in confusion. “What?”
“It’s complicated, but Chryse’s brother, the previous king of Roison—Osiris—was my real father.
” Sighing, I take a seat next to him on the ledge.
“My mother killed Osiris when he admitted to taking me as a child. That’s the reason she relinquished her crown to me, because Chryse refused to negotiate an alliance with her. ”
Understanding dawns on his face. “But he would with you, his niece.”
I nod.
His face slowly turns grave. “You don’t want to screw over your own blood,” he says, putting the pieces together.
“It’s not that I have a particular connection to Chryse.
We’ve never met. I don’t even know if he still considers the alliance in good standing after Sam went to inform him of Acker’s presence in Maile, but Messer…
” He watches as I struggle to get the words together.
“… the last time I betrayed someone; it ate at me.” I shake my head.
“This is not a decision I can make lightly.”
Messer stares at me for a long beat before he rises to his feet.
It’s his turn to pace, hands on his hips as he stares at the tavern’s roof, golden hair blowing in the wind.
The only time he ever shuts up is whenever his emotions get too big.
He once told me it’s because he doesn’t like saying things he can’t take back.
I had made a joke about all the other things he has no problem saying, but he’d only shaken his head and said, when it’s important, I want to be careful.
“Let me go talk to Kai and get a feel for what he thinks before you’re forced to make a decision.”
I hesitate a moment before voicing the thing I’m most afraid of. “If we tell Kai the plan and he tells his father…”
Messer nods in understanding. “It’s a risk, but I think it’s one worth taking.”
I can’t believe I’m even considering this, especially when there’s not even one of them that I remotely trust. Not Kai, Irina, or Acker. But I suppose I have just as little faith in Chryse.
I’m grateful to at least have Messer. I’d feel lost without his council.
“I should leave before nightfall,” he says.
“You’re going to lose a wing if you fly in this temperature, Messer. At least wait until morning.”
“One night can be all it takes for word to spread that Acker stole you,” he says. “Then we have a whole new set of problems on our hands. I need to speak to Kai myself and spin the story in our favor; tell him you left Maile of your own accord.”
And I can’t help but feel as though Acker timed this entire scheme with that exact problem in mind, knowing I’d be forced to decide in a hurry.
“I hate to give Acker the satisfaction by agreeing to do anything he suggests,” I admit.
Messer smiles and it actually relieves me a little to see it. “Don’t let your pride overrule your sensibilities.”
“Since when did you become one of his supporters?”
His brows furrow. “B, I’ve always believed he was it for you.”
My face goes slack at his words, disbelieving. “What?”
“Ever since we left Kenta you’ve been a shell of yourself and I get the sense he’s been very much the same.”
I’m too stunned to formulate a response.
“No one goes to the lengths he has unless they’re a fool in love,” he says, “and Acker is the most foolish man I’ve seen.”
“Messer—”
“The kidnapping you thing was a tad excessive,” he adds, cutting me off. Then he rolls his eyes. “But I kind of have to admit … I really do think the man loves you.”
I shake my head. “Even if he did, it still wouldn’t be enough. He married Irina—”
Grabbing me by the shoulders, he turns me so I’m forced to face him. “He’s never touched her.”
My daze gives way to skepticism. “I saw it with my own eyes, Messer.”
He shakes his head. “I don’t know what you think you’ve seen. I’m telling you what I see, and that man has never laid a single finger on little miss ice princess.”
“Just because you’re a self-proclaimed expert of sexual escapades doesn’t mean you can tell if two people have slept together just by looking at them.”
“I can when it’s as obvious as the color of the sky. There might as well be a whole fucking ocean between them. He doesn’t even like breathing the same air as her, I promise you.”
The conviction with which he says it has me doubting myself. Or maybe I’m just desperate to believe it is true. I don’t like either of those options.
He releases me. “Oh, and he stayed apart from her the entire time on the boat here. Then last night, he slept on the floor in Fredrich’s room. That was after you two squabbled loud enough to wake the dead, of course, but that’s neither here nor there,” he says conspiratorially.
I narrow my eyes at him. I would accuse him of spying on me, but it’s kind of his job, especially when I’m being held captive.
We take the fire escape back to my open window, then return to the tavern’s kitchen to find that Fredrich has opened another bottle of wine and made himself comfortable on the counter.
Acker straightens from where he was leaning against the washing basin, and Irina looks up from inspecting her nails at the table.
“Kai would need to be on the Alaha throne,” I tell them. “We’d give him Roison’s territory as compensation for past grievances.”
Fredrich’s eyebrows tip up. “He wasn’t a part of the deal.”
“Take it or leave it.”
His gaze swings to Acker who simply stares at me, the reminder of his promise to end Kai’s life hanging between us. “He’s sent multiple paid men to kill me.”
My eyes shoot to Messer who returns my stare with an equally baffled look of his own.
“And you’re sure it was him?” Messer asks.
“When faced with death, men often like to bargain for their lives, and more than one of the mercenaries offered up Kai’s name.
” The twirling of the dagger in his hand slows as he contemplates the question.
“But that doesn’t mean the attacks couldn’t have come from closer to home.
My father has the power of influence. And Wren. Either could be responsible.”
“There’s only one way to know,” Messer says. “I’m going to leave tonight and fly straight to Kai.”
“You know where he’s based?” Fredrich asks.
“No, but I’m sure he does,” Messer says, nodding at Acker.
Acker walks to the butcher block and pushes what little is left of the food to the side.
Using the dagger he’s been toying with, he carves into the tabletop, and it doesn’t take long to recognize the rudimentary map he scores from end to end of the table.
He marks the boundaries, then stabs the dagger into the place where the Kenta palace stands, almost center of the landmass that makes up Kenta.
“We’re west of the capital, about here,” he says, placing a piece of cheese at our location.
“Before I left Kenta, this is where the front lines stood. That was a few weeks ago.” He scatters dried meat near the Roison border, but inside Kenta territory.
Then he stacks cheese on top of each other, north of the main battleground.
“What is that?” Irina asks.
He doesn’t look at her when he responds. “Trolls.”
“Nice diagram, but we’re aware of all of this already,” Messer says. “Where’s Kai?”
Acker isn’t bothered by Messer’s attitude, pointing to an area not far from the trolls’ location. “The giants have been finicky. We’ve gotten word that he spends much of his time keeping them compliant.”
“That’s about a two-day flight. Less if the wind is on my side,” he says.
“One last thing,” I say, drawing Acker’s attention.
“There’s a dovecote on the eastern edge of town.
I’m going to see if any birds have been left behind.
If so, there might be one that can get a letter to my mother.
” I hold Acker’s stare, letting him know I’m not asking his permission, merely informing him of my decision.
“Okay,” he says without argument. “I’ll go with you.”
Fredrich polishes off his wine with a flourish, setting the bottle down on the counter with a heavy thunk. “I’m going to head east in the morning to try to find some feed. The horses aren’t going to survive in this weather without proper food.”
We’re all in agreement as we disperse from the kitchen.
Messer and I convene in my temporary room.
We’re now too used to having to part from one another to make a big fuss about it, even knowing something harrowing could happen to the other while we’re separated.
He promises to shift into a leopard if the weather worsens on his way to Kai, and I promise to always keep my wits about me.
The guilt and worry he usually struggles to his hide during our goodbyes isn’t there, and it makes me believe that he feels I’m safe with Acker.
Which is comical, because the man literally had me chained to a bed last night.
I keep that fact in the forefront of my mind as I venture downstairs hours later.
Acker’s there, waiting with his feet propped on a table and a dagger in his hand.
But I knew that already, the tether leading me right to him.
His eyes follow me as I move toward the open entrance of the tavern.
The scrape of the chair and his feet hitting the floor sounds behind me before his footsteps follow me out into the street.
“Where’s your lap dog?” he asks.
The snap of wings draws my gaze to the bird leaping from the tavern’s rooftop.
Black wings stretch wide, the span now reaching the length of a small fishing vessel.
It’s truly a sight to behold. Feathers as black as night underneath the overcast sky, but I know how they shift to pearlescent and blue in the sunlight.
Messer’s squawk has transformed into a full bellow that would scare the most battle-hardened men into wetting themselves.
It’s a common occurrence, according to Drake.
When the eyun disappears behind the buildings and the beating of his wings dulls to a faint thump in the distance, I look at Acker. “You were saying?”
Even he cannot deny Messer’s grandeur, a hint of a smile pulling at one side of his mouth. “After you,” he says, tilting his head in the direction of the dovecote.