CHAPTER TWENTY-TWO
A False King
LUCIAN
We argued for twelve miles after leaving Selene.
Seraphine believed this meant the journey was going well.
I disagreed.
“You are not stabbing me through the heart unless there is absolutely no other option,” I said.
“That is what I have been saying.”
“No, you have been saying you refuse to do it under any circumstance.”
“Yes.”
“That is different.”
“It is better.”
Snow began falling again as we descended from the forest.
The rider from Nocthar traveled ahead to warn Nyra we were returning. Seraphine and I followed more slowly because our horses were exhausted.
The prophecy rubbing sat in my saddlebag like a second weapon.
Death freely given.
Life freely returned.
I had ruled for thirteen years and discovered that the phrase most likely to kill me was written two centuries before my birth.
Fate remained irritating.
At midday, we stopped beside a frozen river.
Seraphine dismounted and walked to the bank.
I followed.
“You have not looked at me for an hour,” I said.
“I have seen your face.”
“Recently?”
“Unfortunately.”
I caught her hand before she could walk away.
She turned.
Her anger was fear wearing armor.
I knew the disguise.
I had used it most of my life.
“Sera.”
“No.”
“We need to discuss it.”
“We discussed it. The answer is no.”
“If Malrec releases the Warden—”
“We stop him before he does.”
“If we fail.”
“We don’t.”
“That is not a plan.”
“It is today.”
Her voice cracked.
The sound broke my argument in half.
I released her hand.
She turned toward the river.
“I just got Elias back,” she whispered. “My father died in front of me. My mother was gone before I could say goodbye. Every person I love becomes a grave eventually, and now a stone tells me I may have to make you one myself.”
I had no answer worthy of that.
So I stood beside her.
Snow landed in her hair.
After a while, she said, “I know death is possible. I’m not a child.”
“I know.”
“I know you would do it if it saved everyone.”
“Yes.”
“That makes me angry.”
“I know.”
She looked at me. “Stop knowing everything.”
“I can try.”
A wet laugh escaped her.
I took both her hands.
“I do not want to die.”
The words surprised her.
Kings were supposed to speak nobly about sacrifice.
I was tired of noble lies.
“I want the ridiculous cottage you described. I want to see you bully builders. I want to argue with your brother until we are both old enough to forget what we started arguing about.”
Her eyes filled.
“I want years with you.”
“Then don’t make me kill you.”
“If the choice comes, I will be afraid.”
“Good.”
I almost smiled.
“But fear cannot make the choice for us either.”
She looked down at our joined hands.
“What if I can’t bring you back?”
“Then you tried.”
“That is not enough.”
“It has to be.”
“No.”
“Sera.”
She shook her head fiercely.
I pulled her into my arms.
For a long time, she held me as if memorizing the shape.
I let her.
Then she said against my chest, “Promise me something else.”
“What?”
“If we survive, you do not rebuild the same crown with prettier language.”
I understood.
“No sacred dominance. No hereditary right without limits. No priests above law.”
“And Moonmarked families get their land back.”
“Yes.”
“And your palace needs more doors that open from the inside.”
I laughed.
“That seems personal.”
“It is policy.”
“Done.”
She pulled back.
“I’m serious.”
“So am I.”
I looked south toward the kingdom waiting beyond the hills.
“If we survive, we build something that does not require a good king to protect people from a bad one.”
Her expression went still.
“That,” she said, “I can choose.”
We mounted again.
By dusk, smoke from Nocthar darkened the horizon.
The future we had just promised each other was already under siege.
* * *
My cousin wore my crown badly.
I learned that from a printed proclamation nailed to an inn door thirty miles south of Selene.
SEVERIN I, BY SACRED AUTHORITY, KING OF NOCTHAR.
Seraphine tore it down.
“That bothers you?” I asked.
“The typography.”
I looked at her.
She folded the proclamation and shoved it into the fire.
“Also the treason.”
We changed horses twice and rode through the night.
By the time Nocthar’s outer hills appeared, smoke stained the eastern sky.
We could not approach the gates openly. Malrec had posted temple archers on every tower and offered a thousand crowns for Seraphine alive.
Alive.
Not dead.
The vessel.
I had never hated a word so much.
A rebel guide met us at an abandoned mill and led us through irrigation tunnels beneath the south wall.
We emerged in a cellar beneath a bakery.
Darius waited upstairs.
He looked exhausted.
“You’re alive,” he said.
“Disappointed?”
“Deeply. I had just started redecorating your office.”
Then he hugged me.
Darius did not hug.
That frightened me more than the smoke.
Nyra embraced Seraphine, then punched my arm.
“You took too long.”
“We crossed half the kingdom.”
“Excuses.”
Elias stood near the window, pale but upright.
His poisoned shoulder was bound beneath his coat.
“What is the situation?” I asked.
Darius spread a city map.
“Severin controls Moon Court, the north gate, and most temple barracks. We hold the south and west districts. The east is divided. Civilians are trapped between checkpoints.”
“Deaths?”
“Forty confirmed.”
The number went through me like a blade.
I added every name I knew to the ledger in my head.
Seraphine unrolled the rubbing from Selene.
“We have the original wording.”
Elowen, seated near the fire, stood so quickly her chair fell backward.
She read it.
Tears filled her eyes.
“My father knew.”
“Yes,” Seraphine said.
Elowen pressed her fingers to her mouth.
I gave her the time she needed.
Then Darius said, “Proof only matters if anyone sees it.”
“The city printing house?” Nyra asked.
“Severin seized it.”
“The bell towers?”
“Temple guards.”
Elias tapped the river district. “There’s an old rebel press beneath the cooper’s guild. Small, but enough for leaflets.”
Seraphine looked at him. “How many?”
“Two thousand before dawn.”
“Not enough.”
“No.”
I studied the map.
Malrec had placed every force around institutions of authority.
Palace. Temple. Press. Bells.
He expected us to fight for symbols.
So we would not.
“Open the food stores,” I said.
Darius frowned. “What?”
“All royal granaries in the districts we control. Free distribution.”
Nyra understood first. “Severin closed his.”
“People remember who feeds them during a siege.”
“Bribery,” Elias said.
“Governance.”
Seraphine smiled.
“Send healers into the east under white flags,” I continued. “Royal and rebel together. No weapons visible.”
Darius nodded slowly.
“And copies of the prophecy with every food parcel,” Seraphine said.
“Yes.”
Elowen lifted her head. “I will write a statement.”
“Against your father?”
“About my father.”
There was a difference.
By midnight, the first leaflets moved through the city.
By two, workers at the eastern granary turned on Severin’s guards and opened the doors themselves.
By three, three temple novices crossed into our district carrying records from the clergy archive.
Malrec’s control began to crack without a single battle.
Then the palace bells rang.
A projection of blue flame appeared above Moon Court.
Malrec’s face towered over the city.
“People of Nocthar,” his voice thundered, “the false king returns with the cursed Moonmarked woman. They intend to break the crown stone and unleash the chained beast beneath our city.”
The streets went silent.
For once, he was telling part of the truth.
Seraphine stood beside me at the bakery window.
“He’s changing tactics.”
“Yes.”
“He wants them afraid of what happens if we win.”
“Yes.”
Malrec’s image lifted one hand.
Behind him, temple soldiers dragged prisoners onto the palace balcony.
Moonmarked citizens.
Children among them.
My wolf snarled.
“Come to Moon Court before tomorrow’s red moon,” Malrec said, “or every bearer of the mark dies.”
The projection vanished.
Silence held the room.
Elias drew his sword.
“Now we fight.”
I looked at Seraphine.
She was pale with fury.
“We fight,” she said.
I unbuckled the ceremonial crown belt I had carried since leaving the capital and placed the silver circlet on the table.
No one spoke.
“What are you doing?” Nyra asked.
“Choosing what kind of king enters that palace.”
I left the crown behind.
If I returned to the throne, it would not be because a stone beneath it commanded wolves to bow.
And if I did not return at all, the last thing Malrec would see would be the failure of the power he worshiped.