I was a little disappointed that I wasn't the one to catch them. But I was also proud of the King's restraint. He hadn't killed them as I thought he might. Instead, he dropped his quarry in front of the Hall of Talons where a group of officers waited to take custody of the criminals.
I dismissed my team and galloped back to the hall. Once I was within sight of it, I had to slow down. The road was congested with carriages and the sidewalks were full of people. Between the dragons and the teams of Talons searching the closed city, people were curious. Beyond curious.
“Make way!” I shouted and nudged my mount around carriages and the overflow of pedestrians. “I said, make way! I'm a claw! Make way!”
I finally made it to the Hall of Talons and handed my horse off to one of the stable hands. I raced inside to find the entry room full of talons. In their midst was a cowering Chelli family and a Ricarri woman shouting for her husband.
“Madam,” I said as I stepped up to Lady Juva. “Madam, that is quite enough!”
“Don't you speak to my wife like that!”
With that many people in the entry of the Hall of Talons, it had been noisy even without Lady Juva's shouting. But it went quiet as the General of the King's Horns barged through the crowd. An imposing man, to say the least, General Batan came storming up to me with violence in his stare.
“Release my wife this instant!”
“The fuck we will! Your wife tried to murder me and an entire Talon team today, General!” I shouted back at him.
He flinched and stopped in his tracks.
Stares slid back and forth between us.
“You're a fucking liar,” the General finally said.
“Am I? I'm the man who saved your son. Don't you remember me?”
He blinked. “You. Yes. So why would Juva try to kill you? Huh? After you saved our son.”
“Why don't you ask her, General?” another voice entered the conversation.
Everyone, including the General, turned to watch the King and all his Dragon knights march into the room. As I said, the room was crowded, but for the King, talons eased back, retreating into corridors to make space.
“Your Majesty!” The General bowed. “I was in the middle of training when I heard about the lockdown. And then I was informed that my wife was arrested.”
“Were you also informed that I was the one to catch her?” King Tor'rien countered. “Because she was fleeing the city with her coconspirators?”
“Coconspirators? What are you talking about? What is she accused of?”
“Batan, these people are crazy!” Juva cried.
“Madam, you were seen,” I said. “Witnessed in the act. There is no denying it now. You and Rulli moved the bodies from the old tunnel of the Hallax Mine into a mass grave, which Sir Gilhu discoveredafterHis Majesty unearthed a Talon team and me from the mine you buried us in.”
“Are you talking about the explosion?” General Batan went to his wife. “That was an accident. They hit a vein of flammable gas.”
“That may have been an accident, General,” the King said. “But everything else that went on in that mine was deliberate. The human employees were drugged with frang nectar, so they'd work longer hours without complaint. When the mine caught fire, the drugged humans weren't aware they were in danger. They didn't run. The Chelli made it out, leaving the humans behind. Now, I don't know if your wife and her partners saw an opportunity to save some coin or if they're just murderous bastards. Whatever the case, they sealed the mine shaft with the humans inside. And they kept that tunnel sealed because they knew that if anyone inspected those bodies, they'd learn the truth. So, they just dug a new shaft and carried on, leaving the dead to rot. ”
“No,” the General whispered. He looked at his wife.
“It's not true!” Juva cried.
“She made us!” Rulli suddenly shouted and pointed at her. “She used her status to intimidate us. She was the one who wanted to drug the humans. She said the humans would be more comfortable drugged. She was even the one to go to the Eljaffna nectar houses outside the city to buy the nectar. When the mine caught fire, they were too high to run. We didn't think abouthelping them. We were running for our lives. And we couldn't go—”
“Shut up, you fool!” Juva hissed.
“Juva?” General Batan gaped at his wife.
“It's all lies, Batan. I swear.”
“There were children,” I said to the General. “Human children were working in that mine. Drugged. That's why your son was taken, General. A vigilante called Hallaxgral, in honor of the mine, abducted your child and nearly buried him alive to scare your wife. It was an act of retribution.”
