Chapter Twelve
Jet
Dinners in the palace were now served nearly two hours earlier than they used to be a few years before. It was a change I’d made a half an hour at a time for months when it became clear that the more tired my father grew, the less control he had over himself and his manic ranting and ravings.
One small perk with his loosening grip on reality was it was easier to manipulate him in small ways.
“Dinner’s always been at six,” I said when he complained about the hour one night. He’d stared at me, brows pinched. But he hadn’t fought me on it.
I was hoping it was a good night. For Serin’s sake.
She was taut as a bow beside me, her breath quick and shallow, her eyes wide.
It worked in her favor that we were sticking to the ‘she doesn’t speak’ thing.
It would allow her to be in the room without needing to participate in my father’s games.
She was too naive, too protected, and too soft for my father’s particular brand of cunning wickedness.
She couldn’t handle his mind games. I’d been living with him my entire existence, and he could still best me at times.
We paused outside the dining hall so I could roll the tension out of my neck.
I could feel Serin’s gaze on me. Looking down, I saw something needy in her face. It was a distant cousin of the look I’d seen up in my study when she’d been aching for touch but not sure what she was seeking. Once again, she didn’t know what she needed but was asking for it.
I couldn’t give her a pep talk.
Couldn’t offer her reassurances.
There was too much staff shuffling around.
So I offered her my arm. Then, when she wasn’t sure what to do with that, pulled hers through mine and squeezed her hand around my arm.
Given permission to touch me, she clung, fingers going white with the pressure.
Then I nodded toward Vishen, who pulled the doors open. We’d left Nira upstairs to set up a meeting with the seamstress and keep eagle-sharp eyes on the staff as they came into the room to clean and change the bedding while we were at dinner.
Beside me, Serin stiffened all the more as we moved into the expansive dining space that was dominated by a table that easily seated a hundred.
A hearth sat toward one end of the room. Heavy black drapes hung on the window. Candlelight flickered from sconces on the walls and in candelabras down the entire length of the table.
Three places were set down near the hearth.
My father’s seat was at the head.
To his right side were seats for myself and my wife.
His guards lined an entire wall, their greedy gazes moving over Serin as we passed. I glared at them until their eyes went to their shoes.
Vishen moved with us, standing against the wall directly behind our seats after helping Serin with her chair.
“Father,” I greeted him as I moved to sit.
Cass had changed a lot over the past two years.
He’d been a youthful-looking man before his hatred and evil started to eat away at his brain.
His unlined face now had deeply dug craters, making him look much older than he was.
His eyes had sunken into the lines around them.
His skin had gone from clear to ruddy. And his constant pacing seemed to burn some weight he didn’t need to lose, giving him a somewhat skeletal look.
He looked like he’d aged fifty years in two.
“Why is this the first time I’ve seen your lovely wife?”
Oh, so he was in his charm mode.
That would be easier for Serin to tolerate, even if I knew it meant he was at his sharpest. And therefore most dangerous.
“She has been getting to know her new home and duties,” I said, reaching for the wine when he put the bottle down and pouring some for Serin and myself.
The food and drink should be safe, since no one was going to risk poisoning the king by accident—at least not until Grimwood and his friends were ready to make a move against him.
“Ah, yes, a wife’s duties,” he said with a smirk as he lifted his glass for a sip. “The only pleasant part of marriage.”
Not for the first time, my mind went to my poor mother. I hadn’t known her well, but what I did remember was a deep, almost bottomless sadness that made it impossible for her to show me any kind of joy or love.
Then one day… she was gone.
Maybe away to one of the work camps, or some dungeon somewhere. Or, perhaps, Cass had committed the ultimate crime—stripping her of her immortal life.
I shook those thoughts away and refocused on my father.
“It is a perk,” I agreed.
“And how have you been enjoying married life?” he asked, looking past me at a wide-eyed Serin.
Under the table, I squeezed her thigh as I reached for my wine.
“She doesn’t speak.”
At that, Cass’s brows rose.
“At all?”
“At all. I guess that didn’t come up when you were vetting for a wife for me.”
“It did not.” His jaw tightened, and I could practically hear his gears turning; could imagine his thoughts going to anger and treachery.
“I don’t know,” I said, taking a sip then shooting him a smirk. “I think a silent wife has its perks. I don’t have to listen to any bitching and nagging.”
My father’s lips curved too. If there was one thing he could get behind, it was subjugating someone—anyone—else.
“That’s true. All these women do is talk in circles around you.” He zeroed in on Serin again, studying her. “Was she mute from birth?”
“And how would I gather that information when she can’t speak?” I asked.
“Does she have her tongue?”
“She does.”
“Hm. Is she simple?”
“I suppose. Doesn’t seem to have any thoughts of her own. Just does as she’s told.”
“The perfect wife then,” Cass said, toasting me with his glass.
I gave Serin’s thigh another squeeze, hoping she understood that I didn’t mean what I said.
“Is she healthy?” he asked. “She seems a bit thin.”
“As far as I can tell, she is healthy. But I suppose she could put some weight on.”
“Should you not send for a midwife to inspect her? We need to make sure she is able to carry an heir. It won’t matter how many times you climb on top of her if she can’t produce the next prince.”
“I suppose there is no way to be sure until she is with child.”
“I expect that to happen soon. The stronger the line of succession, the stronger we are as a kingdom.”
It wouldn’t have been so bad if he’d let it drop there.
But this was Cass, mind stripped down to his more basic thoughts. He couldn’t just leave it be.
“If the first is a girl child, I expect you to toss her to a wet nurse and immediately try again.”
So close, I could hear the sad little sound that escaped Serin and covered it with a cough of my own.
“Women are allowed in the line of succession,” I reminded him.
“That has been changed.”
“What? Since when?”
“Since that bitch of a sister of yours took off to the Light Court.”
Oh, Celestine.
My father’s biggest trigger.
A daughter of both courts.
A fae with the power to burn with her touch.
My neck was evidence of that. And my father’s gaze slid there as he spoke of her.
What I knew, and he didn’t, was that I made her burn my neck on the day I helped her escape the castle. The burn had been my evidence that I hadn’t assisted her, that I’d been a victim just as much as the poisoned redcaps had been as well.
“I’m not letting her get her greedy hands on this throne.”
“I doubt she wants this throne, Father. She has her own.”
It was the wrong thing to say.
A growl rose up his throat as his fist slammed hard enough on the table to make our plates and silverware jump and land with a clatter.
Serin’s breath caught and I couldn’t do anything but rub her leg and hope she took it as the comfort it was meant to be.
Luckily, the doors opened right then and a line of servants came bustling in with platters, baskets, and tureens.
It was distraction enough for my father to forget about my sister and what he saw as her betrayal as we busied ourselves with the selections.
I reached for ladles, piling fresh fruit and cooked vegetables onto Serin’s plate. When I filled her bowl with steaming vegetable soup, she shot me a pinched-brow look.
Right.
She was from the lake.
She’d never had bread before.
What were the chances that she would have ever had cooked food?
As Cass spoke to one of the servants about a dish, I leaned into Serin’s side, my lips by her ear. “It’s soup. It’s good. But it’s hot. You need to let it cool a bit before you eat it.”
With that, I handed her a large serving of bread before loading up my plate.
Nothing made me less hungry than sharing the table with my father, but I had to play my part even if it felt like there was a rock sitting in my stomach.
Serin did not seem likewise afflicted.
She poked at her food and took careful bites of each new dish, not trusting it at first. But as soon as she got a taste for it all, she tore in, shoving fork and spoonful into her mouth, dipping her bread in the dregs of her soup until I passed her my bowl.
“Well, she has a healthy appetite,” my father observed, watching her with a bemused expression.
“I suppose the food at Grimwood’s table wasn’t as rich and satisfying as at yours.
” Fuck, did I hate stroking his ego. But playing nice was part of my long game.
Until it was time to make my move. And if my move included having to force the eternal death on him, well, so be it.
A lot of people would breathe more easily with him dead.
“You’re right. He’s a miserly sort. Never three dishes when two would suffice. It’s probably why he’s never gotten as far as his family expected of him.”
“What did his family expect?” I would take any opening I could get to learn about possible enemies.
Cass exhaled hard. “The crown, of course.” An arm reached across me, stealing the bread from my plate, and it took everything in me not to smile. “That’s what they all want in the end, isn’t it? What I’ve worked for. What I’ve fought to hold onto. None of them could do what I do. None of them!”
His fist banged the table, but this time, Serin didn’t jump or yelp, just reached out to steady her soup bowl.
“Of course not. They have no idea what it takes to rule this kingdom.”