The queen’s apologetic aura yielded to grave sincerity. “I know you’ve continued practicing necromancy, resurrecting townsfolks’ loved ones for coin.”
Catseye gasped, a hand on his chest. “Saelihn, I am grievously offended. How dare you accuse me of—”
The queen pulled a water-stained parchment she had tucked into a silk belt and held it out before him. In fanciful lettering at the top, it read: ‘Death got you down? Let us raise you back up!’ Helspira only caught a brief glimpse of the contents that followed, but it appeared to advertise Catseye’s services as a necromancer to Nyllmas’s townsfolk.
Catseye inspected his cuticles with a casual shrug. “That proves nothing.”
“You signed it. Your wax seal is at the bottom. They’re all over Nyllmas,” the queen retorted with growing irritation.
Ben leaned toward Catseye, cupping a hand near his jaw. “I told you the flyers were a bad idea.”
“Ugh. Fine. Yes, Saelihn, I’ve been dabbling. And honestly, Itryto tell the people their loved ones will come back as undead abominations, but—” Catseye paused, cringed, and glimpsed Ben. “No offense, Benjamin.”
“None taken.”
Queen Saelihn closed her eyes. Her brows knitted together, but she kept her chin high as she tucked the parchment away. “Your permit to profit from profane magics expired four years ago. If you do not lend aid in the fight against Vessik, not only will you be chained in one of Nyllmas’s dungeons as punishment for this violation, you will be fined for each year you failed to pay taxes on those profits. Your mansion, and everything inside it, will be repossessed by the kingdom and sold, and the tales of Sikras Nikabod, the Glowing Cat’s Eye in Death’s Darkness, will fade from history. Do I make myself clear?”
“I see.” Despite the threat, playful cynicism remained in Catseye’s tone. “And here, I thought we were friends.”
“We are, Sikras. If we weren’t, you’d be going somewhere far crueler than a Nyllmas dungeon. Please know, I am intimately aware of the history you and Vessik share. I know what I ask of you is—”
“Cruel? Heartless? Profoundly detrimental to what little remains of my sanity?”
“Substantial.” Queen Saelihn rounded her shoulders, and while she clearly tried to embody poise, Helspira spied every subtle tick that shed light on her misery. “It is vile and unfair that it must be you, but you are the only one capable of ending this swiftly. I’ve prayed to Goddess Tiagon every night since Imri’s fall to present us another option, but I’ve found none.”
A false smile, absent of any amusement, stretched across Catseye’s face. “Either you and Imri put your faith in a piss poor goddess or ole Tiagon is just as hard of hearing as the rest of Siaphara’s deities.”
The queen’s pity vanished, and she bristled. “You may not have shared your wife’s faith, but you know well that it would gut Imri to hear you slander her goddess like that.”
Tension filled the air, undeniable and oppressive. Helspira’s fingers twitched. Instinct compelled her to reach for a weapon on the chance Catseye might snap again, but when he hung his head in a show of submission, her nerves settled.
“My apologies to Goddess Tiagon,” he murmured through clenched teeth. “I know she means a great deal to Imri, and I mean her no disrespect.”
Stillness dissolved the remaining tension, broken shortly by the queen’s soft voice. “Imri’s essence languishes between life and death. Is that not motivation enough to help us in this fight?”
Another groan escaped Catseye, not dramatic and sarcastic like the others but tired, frustrated, overwhelmed. He paced the room, fingers dragging into his scalp. “You act as if we haven’t tried. We have. Twice. We failed, Saelihn. Not slightly, not moderately, but spectacularly. Catastrophically. I’m down to eight lives, Benjamin is a walking corpse, and Imri is ... is ...”
The queen inclined her chin. “Say it.”
Catseye froze under Queen Saelihn’s dominating stare.
“Say it,” she repeated. “Imri is ...?”
All traces of the unflappable charmer dissolved, leaving only a man who appeared on the brink of a mental breakdown. He stared, jaw parted, his eyes seeming to relive some sort of nightmare only he could see, until Ben took a protective step forward and placed himself between the necromancer and the queen.
“With all due respect, Your Majesty,” Ben said firmly, “back off.”
The two challenged one another in a wordless stare down. It lasted only seconds. The queen relented, projecting a gentler mood, as she peered through Ben’s ribcage to find Catseye. “It’s not just my kingdom’s safety I seek. You owe it to yourself to move on and lay your heartache to rest.”
“Do I?” Catseye clapped his hands together. “Well, it’s nice to know you can impose a statute of limitations on my grief but not my outstanding tax debts.”
The queen frowned. “I take no joy in forcing your hand, but I’ve a kingdom to run. I’ve people to protect. This is a mercy. The punishment for tax evasion is far less than the punishment for practicing necromancy outside of my favor, but we can forget everything if you simply agree to lend Nyllmas your aid again.”
“So”—Catseye postured—“aside from downsizing my living quarters from a mansion to a cell, my life will be what, exactly? The same as it is now?”
“It isn’t just your life that hangs in the balance.” Queen Saelihn’s gaze flicked toward Ben.
Catseye slipped his hands to his hips. His fingers dug so deeply into his sides, Helspira spied his nailbeds turning white. “A ballsy bluff, but you’d never hurt Benjamin. You love this city too much to sentence it to the absolute fuckery I’d shower upon it if you did any such thing.”
