Alaric nods at me, and I release the memory from the silver button once more. Instead of watching the past, though, I watch the crowd, their eyes wide with shock as the golden light of the past surrounds them. It’s so quiet, I swear I can hear every beat of Alaric’s thundering heart.
Once Besnik is dead and memory Soren has commanded young Alaric to forget, real Alaric speaks again, no longer needing to shout to be heard.
“Despite these heinous crimes, I did not harm my father. He tried to shove me over a cliff edge and lost his balance, resulting in his owndemise. I’ll admit, I didn’t use my power to save him. It seemed better for one man to perish than for the entire nation of Vanzador to lose their life essence. Better that I should be your king, inexperienced though I may be, than a man who was willing to lie and take advantage of you in such an appalling manner.”
“Traitor!” Von Nevus yells. “You might as well have pushed him!”
But unlike before, very few citizens take up his cries.
Flutters of hope take flight in my rib cage and I urge Alaric on. “It’s working. Keep going!”
Alaric grips the rail in both hands and stands even taller. “Being King of Vanzador is never what I wanted or planned—my brother would have made a far better king—but I am what you have, and I vow to do everything in my power to lead and protect you in a way that doesn’t compromise your well-being. I won’t stop searching until I find an alternative means to fuel my power and a cure for those already affected by the memory sacrifice.
“My wife, Indira, has agreed to aid us in this cause.” Alaric looks down at me, and his tender, proud expression makes the butterflies beat their wings even more erratically.
Thousands of eyes are watching me, but I see only Alaric’s.
“Her bagrava is the only reason these people are still alive,” he admits gravely, “and she has generously offered to grow even more bagrava on the mountain to sustain their condition, but this comes at great cost to her and the people of Tashir. The amount of bagrava our sick require is so great, her own people are suffering on the brink of starvation. But Indira has agreed to help us nonetheless, because she has seen the goodness and strength of Vanzador and its people. She believes we are worth saving and that we can work together to sustain each other.”
Alaric raises both arms high in the air, signaling the end of his speech.
I wait for the crowd to erupt with cheering. For people throw themselves at his feet and offer their admiration and loyalty forevermore. Butno one says a word. Not even the councilors. Alaric’s panting as if he just sprinted across the Tomb Flats, and the smile plastered across his lips grows even wider, bordering on desperate, the longer the silence stretches.
How can they stand there and say nothing? How can they possibly deny this man as their king?
Mercifully, Queen Tessa clears her throat and hobbles forward. I completely forgot she was there, standing behind us throughout Alaric’s speech.
“Is it true?” Did your father really kill Besnik?” She sobs the name of her firstborn. “Was he truly responsible for this sickness?”
Alaric nods and reaches for her hands. “I’m sorry, Mother, I know you loved him. And I know you would have counseled him to make different choices, had you been aware.”
Queen Tessa pries her hands free and collapses in a heap, wailing as she tears at her skirts. It’s heart-wrenching and horrifying. The entire square is captivated.
Alaric eases down on one knee and tries to help her to her feet, but Queen Tessa swats him away.
“Don’t help me up.” She wipes beneath her eyes and places a gentle hand on Alaric’s cheek. “I want to be the first to kneel before the rightful king of Vanzador.”
She prostrates herself on the ground before Alaric, and goose bumps flash down my body as a deafening cheer rises from the square below. One by one, the multitude follows her lead, dropping to their knees, until only Garitt Von Nevus and a handful of sour-faced councilors remain.
“How do we know the king is truly dead?” Von Nevus demands. “We should bow to no one else until Soren’s body is found.”
“We recovered his body for those who wish to see and pay their respects,” Alaric announces, but other voices are surging up from the crowd.
“I never want to see Soren Alaverdi again!”
“Even if he lived, he’s no king of mine!”
The shouts of agreement are instant and deafening.
A palace guard draws his sword and aims it at Von Nevus’s chest. “You will bow before your king.”
Grudgingly, Von Nevus and the others sink to the ground until the entire nation is on its knees before me and Alaric. A Tashiri gardener and an unwanted prince. Somehow the rightful king and queen of Vanzador.
Thirty-Eight
For the second time in our brief relationship, Alaric and I march in a royal funeral procession. Though, this one feels wildly different from Rowenna’s because Alaric walks beside me. He wears a jacket of bagrava-purple silk that was made to match my gown, and our hands remain tightly clasped the entire time. Even in his grief, he makes certain to never get even a hair’s breadth ahead of me, so we’re equals—stride for stride.
A stone pyre has been erected in a large public square, and I feel myself getting unexpectedly emotional when Alaric touches a torch to the kindling and sets alight the remnants of Soren’s body we recovered.
