So why does the sound of his heart taking its last beat reverberate in my mind? Why does it make me think of my mother, the questions that have always surrounded her death?
When he gets to the part about my mother’s affair, the crowd mutters angrily, and I can’t help but notice Fin shaking in the chair next to me.
“Never mind why she did it. Never mind that…” Fin stops himself, glancing at and away from me quickly.
But I don’t have time to ponder about what Fin means, because the vizier continues.
“It is with great…” the vizier pauses, “obeisance, I introduce to you, one of your own, Azrael, son of Rajeen, rightful heir to the throne, the rightful King of Naenden.”
There’s a moment of silence, but then the doors swing wide again, and out marches Azrael, clothed in the garb not of a king, but of the city dwellers. Of the humans who dwell in Meranthi.
Fin curses.
My stomach plummets at the same time the crowd erupts into cheers.
Azrael basks in the applause for a moment, though it’s all in his stance and not at all in his face. Then, with a simple gesture, he quiets the crowd and speaks.
“Friends. Family. There’s a part of me that wishes I’d been trained in how to give a speech. Something that might make me sound regal. Less like the commoner I am. But then I think…no. Because isn’t that what’s separated us from our leaders all this time? I stand here, the…” He acts as if struggling with the weight of what he’s about to say. “The heir to the throne of Naenden. But then I look out on all of you. And I see Vinley. You sold me my first knife. Do you remember that?” He lets a brilliant smile loose on the female to whom he’s speaking. “And Bezzie. How many times did you yell at me to stop leaning on your counters?”
I can’t see Bezzie’s reaction from the alcove, but the sound of her name strikes a chord in me. Does Asha’s elderly friend support the coup?
“Arun”—the sound of Asha’s father’s name makes my chest want to crack in two—“how many snakes did the two of us round up together in your home?”
My eyes search for Asha’s father in the crowd, but if he’s there, I can’t pick him out.
Azrael looks out into the distance, as if into the hovels themselves. “I’m just one of you. The offspring of a mother who worked too hard to face the end that she did. I wasn’t raised for this. Wasn’t groomed and brought up at the feet of tutors. I know…I know the feeling of a belly that never quite gets full. I know how it feels when the shadows are your only respite from the heat of the midday sun. I know you,” he says, pointing to a child in the crowd. He reaches out his hand and lifts her up onto the stage with him, her grimy hand interlocked with his.
My fists dig into the chair to which I’m tied, my chest going hollow, as the crowd radiates love, adoration. Hope.
Hope.
Something I was never able to give them. Something I stole from them. Something Asha returned.
“Kiran.” When Fin says my name, his voice is soft, possibly for the first time in years, but I can’t bear to look at him. Can’t bear to see the pity in his eyes. The pity I don’t deserve.
Because what I deserve has finally happened, and I have the best seat in the house.
“Don’t you think it’s strange that he’s got us up here watching, when he could be executing us to make a point?” Fin asks. Part of me wonders if my brother’s trying to interrupt the guilt that threatens to strangle me, to focus my attention on the immediate problem, that Azrael has us prisoner.
“No, at least not the part about making us watch. I know exactly why he’s doing that,” I say, even as my chest threatens to crack.
I dive for my Flame, but it doesn’t stir.
The memory of Solomon’s leeching stone, smooth in my hand, chills my memory.
“I don’t know how to do this on my own,” says Az, and I watch him lure the people in with honey, watch as the crowd leans into him, hanging on his every word. “But we have each other. And…” He bursts into the most genuine-looking smile I’ve ever witnessed. “And I have some help.”
He gestures, and the guards open the marble doors once again.
There’s a pause as the guards retrieve whoever is standing on the other side.
When they coax the woman out onto the balcony, my entire body goes numb.
Fin strains against his bindings.
Something roars distantly in my ears.
Because out steps Asha.
Dressed head to toe in a scarlet wedding gown.
CHAPTER 57
EVANDER
I stand outside the office of a male I would have rather avoided, but desperate times call for desperate measures, and this is one of those times.
Ellie and I only made it back to Othian yesterday.
The servants have been fawning over Ellie and little Cecilia, their lips profuse with apologies for not being attentive enough to realize Ellie was pregnant. I think all the attention, including that of both sets of our parents, is driving Ellie insane.
No one has paid a speck of attention to me, which is fine. The time will come for my father to berate me about my failure to protect my family at the Rip. I’ll deserve the verbal lashing I’ll get once he discovers the entire story.
That’s the last time I’ll ever allow my father to be right about me.
I knock on the oak door, tangled with carefully manicured and pruned vines, because of course the male just has to show off his natural talents, even on his office door.
There’s shuffling, and after a few minutes of what I’m fairly sure is a male pulling pants on, the door creaks open, and out peers Orion Elmroot.
