*COMPLETE* Allayria promised to do what it takes to stop the Jarles, to make the ugly decision. She thinks, at last, she understands what the dynast meant. The lesson earned from the top of that lonely cliff and given the dark murky water below.
It...
Oops! This image does not follow our content guidelines. To continue publishing, please remove it or upload a different image.
The inferno is growing.
Fae watches it from the window, watches as the tiny specks of her soldiers go not to quench it, but to feed it. The southeastern quarter of Solveigard City is ablaze, and no one is stopping it.
Her spymaster does not try to lure her away from the window this time; they have both learned that some things must be endured.
"Beinsho will be here in the morning," Keno says instead, a low voice in the darkness, the quiet messenger of secrets and knives. "We have eyes on them in the western woods."
Fae nods. Of course they do, with birds and their human partners, relaying and conveying details and guises. But as surely as Fae's men do, the Cabal will also, which is why a fourth of her city burns.
"Aren Dost continues to move south; she passes through Halften, not Keesark."
No. It is not safe to come to Keesark anymore. Fae wonders if it ever really was.
"Feuilles remains where he is."
A smile answers this, cracked and bitter. She expects no less of the haughty king and his deep-rooted self-interest. She only hopes that, when her people are ashes, the Jarles march through it straight to him.
No, she tells herself not for the first time, nor for the last. We will endure, and I will come for Feuilles. I will bring the bones of our children to his feet and see if he can do anything but sneer.
She doesn't know if she believes this more than her first thought; she only knows she must hold both if she is to move forward.
Beneath the heavy weight of her obsidian crown, Fae exists in a haze. The panic, the fear, the grief, and the nail-biting fury are there, but somehow tampered down. It's as if they belong to someone else, someone suffering, and all she can do is look on and choose. Does she hang the Cabal supporters at the front of the Tower or does she take them down into the dungeons, where Keno and others whittle away? Does she hold court or does she retreat, up in her rooms where no one can see her, where she's more a figment than flesh and bone—should she be an unkillable idea or a fallible being? And she picks, trying to choose the path that stops them from tearing themselves apart.
It's a hand at her elbow, light, but still pressuring, checking maybe if she is still here, still real. She doesn't need to turn to know Keno stands behind her, that he is looking down at the delicate profile of her face.
"It's not over yet," he tells her.
No, she thinks, it will never be over.
"Beinsho will bring supplies," he continues, and his hand deftly trails down, wrapping around hers, light, but solid. "People are calmer, more reasonable on a full stomach."
"Speaking from personal experience?" she murmurs, her voice a low and scratchy whisper.
