Giving the mutt a quick scratch at the base of his tail, Avalon raised a hand. “Hayle is my boyfriend. Braxus tends to go where I go, if Hayle can’t be with me.”
Raising a dark brow, Zier looked between the three of us. Then, in a moment of wisdom or plain insanity, he placed the knife down on the desk in front of him. I didn’t fool myself that he was now unarmed; he could have it in his hand and lodged in my eye in a moment, if I made a move he didn’t like.
“I’ve met Hayle Taeme many times, and I’m very sure that the man you are standing beside isn’t him.”
Avalon gave him a bright smile, and his eyes widened again. Yeah, I remembered the effect of that smile. It was… gravitational. It reset the axis on which the world spun. I didn’t think she even knew.
“I’m aware. Uh, maybe I should introduce myself? I’m Avalon Halhed, Heir to the Ninth Line… though an inconsequential Heir.”
Zier didn’t hide his surprise this time. “You’re Roman Halhed’s monstrous daughter? The one he kept locked away in the mountains because you were dangerous, before sending you to your death at Boellium?”
Snorting an unamused sound, Avalon shrugged. “Sounds about right.”
Working hard to push down the rage in my chest, I kept my face impassive. I’d readA Future History of Ebrus.I knew what Roman Halhed had done to his youngest child. His reckoning was coming.
Clearing her throat, Avalon waved a hand in my direction. She looked at me once more for reassurance, and when I gave a small nod, she continued. “And this is, uh, Lierick Hanovan, Heir to the Second Line. The important one,” she added, likeshewasn’t the most important person in Ebrus right now. I couldn’t contradict her in front of Baron Zier, though—he wasn’t privy to those secrets yet.
Zier’s dark eyes bore into my own. “That is impossible. The Second Line is dead.”
I gave him a smug expression, waving a hand in front of my body. “My presence, and that glowingtalup there, would suggest otherwise. Clearly, not dead.” Clearing my throat, all mirth left me as I remembered why we were here. “But without your help, the Eleventh and Twelfth Lines might be.”
Fifteen
Avalon
The Baron of the Eighth Line wasn’t what I’d been expecting. I knew he was younger than most of the other Barons, having come into his Barony in the last few years. I remembered my father grumbling about him after his first Conclave.
I hadn’t realized he was quite this young, though. He couldn’t have been more than his mid-thirties. His skin was golden, but different to Lierick’s natural tawny complexion. Baron Tarrin—I huffed an internal laugh—had the tan of a person who spent all their hours outside, getting slowly toasted by the sun. He had soft lines beside his eyes, like he spent time squinting down the length of an arrow or laughing with loved ones.
His hair was dark brown, the soft streaks of gray at his temple the only thing really aging him. He had a short, dark beard clipped close across his square jaw, and his brows were full and straight.
He was also undeniably handsome. The guys should have warned me, so I didn’t blush like a virgin milkmaid.
He seemed calm, though, like Lines rose from the dead every single day. He was taking it better than I had, anyway. “The very act of speaking to you right now would be considered treasonous in some circles,” he said lightly. “I’m aware of the plight of myneighbors. The Eighth Line is assisting them to the best of our capabilities.”
Lierick gave him a fiery expression. “But you could do more.Wecould do more. And it isn’t really treasonous.”
Yet.
“We just need a path through the Westwoods to deliver aid to the Eleventh and Twelfth Baronies without having to go through… more official channels.”
“You want to smuggle food to them,” Baron Tarrin corrected.
I cleared my throat. “It’s not smuggling if it isn’t forbidden, right? There’s no law against it. No forms that need to be filled out, or bureaucrats who need to be informed. We’re just, uh, sharing our lunch with friends, Baron.”
He turned his eyes to me. Under his gaze, I felt like I was a bumbling idiot. An inexperienced child. It was humbling, to say the least. “Please, call me Zier,” he said softly. “I understand what you’re trying to do, but excuse me if I don’t believe that the Second Line has resurrected itself to come to the aid of others.” When Lierick opened his mouth to argue, Zier raised a hand. “I’m not besmirching the honor of your Line, Heir Hanovan.” He seemed to choke out the title. “Merely suggesting that this humanitarian crusade is a symptom, not the cause of your Line showing itself after two hundred-odd years. The Lower Lines of Ebrus have had greater disasters, for which you’ve stayed hidden away. So why now?”
Lierick licked his lip. “We want to return to our place in Ebrus. Have a place in the Conclave.” He paused. “We want to cut out the rot from the Upper Lines, starting with the Baron of the First Line.”
Zier gave a single nod. “I see. And who would you raise in his place? Or would the Second Line become the new First Line? Would I be helping to topple a dictator, only to put a new one in his place?” Zier’s tone was flat, but there was no malice in it. “Nooffense, but I don’t know the Second Line. I don’t know what your leadership is like, I don’t know your Baron, your people, your methods. It would be foolish to help you topple the devil we know for a ghost of the past.”
Shaking his head, Lierick stepped forward. “We don’t want the First Line’s place. We just want what is rightfully ours returned.”
“So you take down Feodore Vylan, and then what? Raise Yaron in his place? The son is no better than the father. None of the Vylans are anything more than hedonistic sadists.”
I shook my head vehemently. “That’s not true. Vox Vylan is nothing like his father or brother. He’s nothing like any of them. He could step up in their place.” He’d hate it, but I knew he’d do it, if he had to.
“He’s too young,” Zier argued.
