Chapter 10 What Is Earned
The gardens are quiet in the late afternoon.
Sunlight filters through the lattice of climbing roses, casting soft shadows across the gravel paths. Bees drift lazily between blossoms. Somewhere nearby, water trickles from a stone fountain carved with saints and forgotten queens.
I kneel beside a bed of white lilies, my skirts gathered neatly beneath me, fingers working carefully as I cut stems at the base. The scent is clean sharp and honest. Flowers do not pretend to be more than they are.
I prefer them to people.
I know my sister is there before she speaks. I feel it in the way the air tightens behind me, in the impatience she never learned to hide.
"You humiliated me in front of the council."
I do not turn.
I set the flowers aside and reach for another stem. "You humiliated yourself."
She huffs, incredulous. "You cannot honestly expect me to remain nothing."
That makes me pause.
I straighten slowly, standing with the lilies in my hand. Only then do I turn to face her.
She looks beautiful, of course. Carefully dressed. Jewelry glinting softly at her throat and wrists gifts from me, every one of them. She lives in noble apartments. Eats from silver plates. Has servants who answer her every whim.
And yet her eyes burn with resentment.
"What is it you want?" I ask calmly.
She hesitates only a moment. "A title."
I study her.
"A title," I repeat.
"Yes," she says quickly, seizing confidence where she can. "Land. Rank. Something that makes me someone. I am your sister. I cannot simply remain a nobody."
I tilt my head slightly. "Why not?"
She blinks. "Because I am your blood."
"Blood," I say softly, "is not currency."
Her jaw tightens. "You sit on the throne because of blood."
I do not react.
Instead, I step closer to the rose trellis and gently set the flowers down on a stone bench. Only then do I look at her again.
"Isla," I say, using her name deliberately, "are you not satisfied?"
She scoffs. "Satisfied?"
"You live as nobility," I continue. "You enjoy luxury, influence, safety. You dine with lords. You are guarded, clothed, educated, indulged."
I meet her gaze steadily.
"And yet you bear none of the responsibility."
Her mouth opens. Closes. "It's not enough."
I nod once. "Then you will learn to make it enough."
Her face hardens. "You will not give me a title?"
"No," I say plainly.
She steps closer, voice sharp now. "You would deny your own sister?"
"I will not grant titles to people who have not earned them," I reply.
Her laugh is brittle. "Earned? Our father gave titles away like favors."
"Did he?" I ask quietly.
She falters.
"If our father believed you deserving," I continue, "he would have given you one. He had twenty-one years to do so."
Her eyes flicker.
"He did not," I say. "And that tells me everything."
She bristles. "He was cruel."
"He was cautious," I correct. "When even his favorite baker was granted land for service, and you were not, one must consider why."
Her face flushes red. "That is unfair."
"No," I say evenly. "It is inconvenient."
I step closer now not threatening, not soft. Just undeniable.
"I will grant titles to those who earn them," I say. "To commanders who hold lines when others flee. To stewards who turn famine into surplus. To diplomats who keep blood off our borders."
She sneers. "And what have you earned?"
There it is.
The garden seems to go very still.
"You are only queen by blood," she says bitterly. "You did not earn the crown."
I hold her gaze.
"I led armies to war," I say calmly. "I stood on battlefields while men twice my age looked to me for command."
Her confidence wavers.
"I served as a diplomat for half a decade before I turned twenty," I continue. "I negotiated treaties, resolved disputes, and kept this kingdom from bleeding itself dry."
I take another step.
"I speak languages that are no longer taught," I say. "Some that are no longer spoken at all."
Her mouth parts.
"I spent years studying law, history, finance, and warfare," I go on. "I learned to read and write strategy while you played in these very gardens."
The words are not shouted.
They do not need to be.
"You inherit comfort," I finish quietly. "I inherited responsibility."
Her shoulders sag not in defeat, but in the first brush of understanding she has ever allowed herself.
For a moment, memory flickers through me unbidden.
I see another version of this garden.
Another version of myself softer, hopeful, still believing love could fix entitlement.
I remember handing her parchment stamped with my seal. Land. Gold. A title she had not earned but demanded anyway. I remember how quickly she smiled. How easily she took.
And how little it satisfied her.
I look at Isla now. this Isla. and I do not repeat the mistake.
"If you want a title," I say, "earn it."
She swallows. "How?"
I turn back to the flowers.
"When you have done something worth naming," I reply, "come back to me."
I lift the lilies and walk past her without another word.
Behind me, she stands in the garden surrounded by beauty she never planted finally confronted with the truth that blood may open doors, but it does not justify crowns.