CHAPTER 52

CHAPTER 52

AUREN

When the thick door ispushed open, I look up as Manu Ioana walks inside the room. He takes one look around before he turns to a man who must be his guard, dismissing him. Once the door closes behind him, Manu begins to make his way over, and we all get to our feet.

His long black hair is collected at the nape of his neck, the deep blue sleeves of his shirt swishing as he walks. The fabric is lustrous, and when the light hits it, it makes it look like the first weak rays of daylight hitting the surface of water.

The thump of his boots matches that of my heart, because as much as I liked Manu when I met him back at Ranhold, now his sister thinks I’m stealing magic and wants me to face some sort of formal trial.

“King Ravinger,” Manu says when he stops in front of us.

Slade says nothing and only tips his head.

His keen brown eyes sweep to the others. “Ah, you must be the Streahs,” he says in greeting. “It’s nice to put faces to the names signed on the correspondence.”

“Likewise,” Warken supplies.

Slade motions his hand toward the head of the table. “Please, sit.”

Manu hesitates when he realizes we mean for him to sit at the head of the table, but when he catches me watching his inward dilemma, he shoots me a wink before easing down into the chair.

I think the castle workers must have been peeking through the cracks in the door at the back of the room, because as soon as we’re all seated again, servers come out, laying down full plates of food. Steaming meat speckled with herbs, some sort of mash with a buttery gravy, and root vegetables are laid out in perfect precision on the plates that are set in front of us.

“Thank you,” I say to the woman who serves me.

Then, we start to eat, and the first ten minutes of the dinner is a lie.

It’s packed with pleasantries and trivial topics, while I skate the food around my plate with the fork and listen to Warken and Isalee open up the discourse with Manu with easygoing repartee.

Slade, however, is quiet. Watchful. It makes his presence that much more intimidating, but I have a feeling that’s his intention.

I’m about to take another tiny bite of the meat when Manu’s attention shifts to me. “Lady Auren. I have to admit, seeing you now compared to that first dinner meeting is quite a change. For the better, I believe.”

I’m not exactly sure how to answer, so all I say is, “Yes.”

“Not that I didn’t enjoy your harp playing,” he adds with a grin.

“I’ve gone off that instrument, truth be told.”

His keen eyes gleam. “I’m sure you have, Doll, and I don’t blame you in the least.”

My heart skips a beat, and I steal a sideways look at Slade, but he’s still watching Manu, his attention unwavering, his expression closed off.

“The dinner is delicious,” he says, sopping some of the gravy up with his bread. “Much better than that sugary glue that Fifth Kingdom seems to be so fond of.”

“Yes,” Slade says, speaking up for the first time. “And yet, your queen sister has decided to break our trading agreement and slow our imports. This does not please me.”

Silence screeches in with the tine of Manu’s fork scraping against his plate.

One second passes. Two, three, four.

The pause is gluttonous, eating up the space between us all, making the air bloated and uncomfortable.

Manu sets down his utensils. Then his friendly disposition. In the span of a second, he’s gone from an amicable dinner guest to royal advisor. He’s so very different from that first dinner when I met him. The easygoing jokes, the almost contagious camaraderie. Queen Kaila is a force, someone you always have to watch your words around. But I wonder if everyone, including me, has underestimated her brother—and if that’s exactly what he wants.

“Alright, King Ravinger, I see we’ve made it to the serious part of our discussion. Though, I do appreciate you letting me finish most of my dinner first.”

“Perhaps I shouldn’t have, considering your kingdom isn’t giving my people the same courtesy.”

Shit.

My eyes snap to Slade, nearly freezing in the coldness of his tone. Manu doesn’t appear fazed in the least. Though, I suppose being a queen’s advisor means that he’d have to have many difficult conversations and train himself not to react. I wish I had that same perfected ability to keep my emotions and thoughts locked away from my expression.

Manu doesn’t rise to the bait. He steeples his fingers in front of him, looking back at Slade calmly. “You haven’t answered the queen’s correspondence. She’s trying to get your attention.”

“And which correspondence would that be?” Slade replies smoothly. “Would it be the demands or the threats? Because I can tell you now, I do not tolerate either.”

It’s a challenge.

A catechism.

A pointed statement to pierce Third Kingdom through.

Manu’s brow lowers. “The fact of the matter is, Your Majesty, you are harboring a traitor and a murderer.” He doesn’t look at me as he says it.

“Your claims are that Lady Auren killed King Midas,” Slade replies. “And yet, you weren’t in the room when his death claimed him.”

Manu’s gaze shifts from Slade to me and back again. “We have witnesses that state she stole his magic. It was clear to everyone in that room that the gold wasn’t in his control.”

My pulse thumps loudly in my ears.

“Again, did you see Lady Auren kill him?” Slade presses.

“Whether I did or did not is irrelevant, because it’s the entire point of the Conflux. She’s being called to Second Kingdom to stand trial, where all of the evidence and witnessed accounts will be taken into consideration,” Manu explains.

“And yet,” Isalee cuts in, “there wasn’t just one very public, very violent death of a royal—there were two that night. So what is being done about the death of Prince Niven?”

Manu turns to look at her. “The Lady Auren will also be investigated for his death.”

My eyes go wide.

A growl forges from Slade’s chest. “You know as well as I do she didn’t have anything to do with Niven. In fact, the person who truly should be questioned about the prince’s death met his own grave shortly after.”

“So you’re implying King Midas killed the prince?” Manu asks.

“Of course I am. Just as I’m implying he had a hand in King Fulke’s death as well. Yet he was never suspected for either.”

“Yes, it is quite suspicious,” Warken says.

“Which is exactly why you should bring her to the Conflux,” Manu replies. “You will be there to sit on the council and answer any insight, and we can properly question her.”

Warken arches a brow. “Surely, you don’t mean to force King Ravinger to attend the Conflux in the ruse of questioning him as well?”

“No ruse. But the public believes that Lady Auren seduced King Ravinger into rotting the prince.” Manu shifts his gaze to Slade. “Your detailed explanation can go on record so the public can be set straight.”

Barley lets out a scoff. “That public believes such things because Queen Kaila has backed that narrative.”

“My sister has done what she must in order to keep Fifth stable after such a horrific event.”

“Yes, there’s no doubt you have all been hard at work at crowning the new king of Fifth,” Isalee says.

Her statement cuts with an underlying edge.

Manu gives her a bland smile. “The fact of the matter is, we have two dead monarchs, and the people are demanding answers. We have to call for a Conflux.” His gaze tracks to Slade. “Which is why I’m here to formally call both you and Lady Auren to attend.”

Slade leans forward, his power coiling beneath his skin. “We decline.”

The first show of emotion appears in the frustration that pinches Manu’s lips together. “I’m sure you’d like to, King Ravinger, but a king is dead because of what happened that night in Ranhold. You know as well as I do that the situation demands it.”

“And yet, as my Premier has pointed out, there was no trial when King Fulke was killed.”

Manu’s expression tells me this is the last thing he wanted Slade to bring up. He covers it well, though, with a sardonic twist of his lips. “King Fulke’s death, although still tragic, was completely different. He was betrayed by his own people. The man who killed him was already put to death for his crimes.”

“Claimed the king who had everything to gain with Fulke’s death.”

Manu laughs. “Come now, Ravinger. King Midas was a long-standing ally to King Fulke.”

Slade looks back at him, completely unimpressed. “Allies turn on each other all the time. Do they not?”

Another barbed question.

Manu’s expression holds a smile that somehow manages to be leached of anything pleasant.

“I can see we are not going to come to any sort of healthy discourse tonight, Your Majesty, so let me tell it to you bluntly.” He reaches into his pocket and pulls out a scroll, handing it to him. When Slade doesn’t open it, Manu says, “It’s all laid out for you there. First and Second are in agreement with us. Lady Auren must stand trial.”

“And I’ve already said, we decline.”

“I would think long and hard about that, King Ravinger,” he replies, motioning toward the scroll. “Because depending on your answer, First Kingdom and Second Kingdom are ready to put a block on their trade coming into your kingdom as well. We both know your own kingdom—spread with wetlands and rot—cannot sustain the food your people need. Your kingdom can’t survive without us. So unless you agree to send her, all trade agreements will officially be halted.”

I thought the room’s silence was gluttonous before, but this one is downright insatiable. It gorges itself on us, devouring every word, every movement, until we’re halted by its consuming mouthfuls.

Warken is the first to break through it. “I see. And are your kingdoms prepared to live without Fourth’s exports? Last I checked, Third in particular was very keen on buying up more rights to our oil supplies—without a lot of wood to burn in their area, they rely on our oil for eighty percent of their lantern oil.”

“The monarchs have decided that justice is far more important.”

Slade slowly rises to his feet. Manu’s bobbing throat is the only tell of apprehension that shows through as Slade’s hands brace against the table. “Tell your sister she’s not the only one who can starve a kingdom,” he practically growls. “I will rot her land from march to beach, leaving nothing in its wake. Or maybe I’ll just rot you, right here and right now, and really send a message.”

I flinch at the threat, watching his lines pulse beneath the skin at his neck.

Manu shoves his own chair back, its shrill scrape making my ears cringe. “I can see we’re done here for the night,” he says coolly. “I will stay for one week, King Ravinger, and then on the seventh day, I must have your final answer.” His gaze strays to the others. “I suggest you advise your king carefully, especially on the threats of rotting entire kingdoms. We all know your army is the strongest in Orea, but right now, we also know that your army is fatigued from traveling to Fifth and back. Can a tired army—even under the direction of your twisted Commander Rip—defeat four other kingdoms?”

He hums beneath his breath as he looks back at Slade, running his hands down to straighten his shirt, pulling the luminescent blue to swell and settle like lapping waves. “All we’re asking for is a fair trial, as is the right of our joined alliances. Do not be so quick to declare war on the rest of Orea, King Ravinger, to be responsible for hundreds of thousands of deaths. And remember, you and your rot cannot be everywhere at once.”

Manu’s eyes find me for a split second before he turns and drifts away, the door shutting behind him like the slap of a tidal wave that threatens to swallow us whole.

When Slade relays everything to Lu, Judd, and Digby, it’s met with a commotion of blunt anger and cursed threats. Except for Dig—who’s reaction isn’t one of noise, but of the burrowing of his scowl.

“Fucking Queen Kaila,” Lu says with a shake of her head, the shape of the dagger shorn into her hair looking sharper with the warm light cast off from the fireplace.

We’re in a new room I haven’t been to before, this one on the top floor, just a few doors down from Slade’s personal rooms. There isn’t much in here apart from a large table at the center and a small bar top to the left with bottles and goblets just waiting to be poured and filled. A scattering of glasses is set around the table, clutched in hands or left abandoned.

“How long?” Judd asks.

Slade takes a long drink before he answers. “Warken and Barley ran the numbers. If we implement rationing immediately across the entire kingdom, we can keep our people fed solely on reserves for...roughly four weeks without any imports.”

Only a month?

My eyes shift to Slade, his elbow bent on the table, hand running over his jaw in thought. I’m stranded in the sticky unease, wondering how monarchs can justify making innocent people starve. The stickiness glues up my memory, tacking to the time when I went through Highbell’s city—into the denied parts of the shanties. The hardship carved out into every rundown building, the weightless rags hanging on people’s thin forms. I only had that single glance at the people’s hardship, at how they’d gone without.

“Four weeks?” Judd whistles. “Well, that’s not ideal.”

“I thought they’d be too stuck on our oil and gems to do something that bold,” Lu adds.

Slade drains the last dregs of his drink. “Morale will drop with the rationing. Which means unrest and spikes in crime. We’ll need more patrols. Not an easy ask of the returning army when they’re coming off of weeks of travel through the frozen fucking Barrens.” He shakes his head. “We can sustain a siege from another kingdom. Our army can win against any other that meets them in battle. But we can’t win against all of them at once. Not with our food supplies cut off. Not with our army already tired.”

“They’re hitting when we’re most vulnerable,” Lu goes on. “And cutting off our food... It’s a pretty steep punishment for not agreeing to bring Auren for this stupid trial.”

“They’re scared of her,” Digby says. When everyone turns to him, he shrugs. “If they’re believing these rumors, then they’ll be thinking she can steal their powers too. They don’t want that.”

“What they truly don’t want is to make an enemy of me,” Slade practically snarls. “Starvation takes a hell of a lot longer than rot.”

Cold sweat curdles in frigid droplets against my skin, the dark threat of his words like a heavy fog I can’t see through, can’t breathe through. Beside me, I feel Slade’s tension as if it’s a string tied from his chest to mine. The taut line thrums with strain, knotting me with stretched pressure.

An entire kingdom. All of Fourth can only go one month living on reserves, or they’re in danger of starving. And that’s just Slade’s people. If he retaliates against the other kingdoms, it won’t just be Fourth that suffers, but everyone.

“Slade…”

“Don’t,” he snaps out. “Don’t even suggest it.”

“But maybe I should go. I don’t want your people to suffer. Or any innocent person.”

Green eyes brined with anger flick to me. “You are not going.”

My gaze drops down with the weight of the guilt on my shoulders.

Lu reaches over and taps me on the back of my hand. “Slade’s right, Gildy. That’s the worst plan. We can’t give in to threats and blackmail. Fourth is strong, and so is Rip. They’re too afraid of him to do anything for long. In the meantime, we’ll figure this out, and he’ll retaliate just enough to make them back off.”

That’s what I’m worried about.