Yemi thought often about her mother as a child, whether they’d have been friends had they grown up together, the ways she’d have used freedom if she had it and wasn’t bound to rule. She couldn’t envision her mother grown and fully flesh anymore. All the memories of her from before the bullet were tainted, as if the stone skin had always been part of her.
“Heard anything from Cutter’s investigation yet?” Yemi asked.
“No, but I’m sure it’s coming along. Have you?”
“Why would I?”
“Really?” The queen raised an eyebrow. “You didn’t learn anything at all in the dungeons last night?”
Yemi sighed. “Of course you know.”
“The want of my approval has never stopped you from doing anything before. Why would this have been different?”
“You want me to have all the other experiences with leadership. I don’t understand why sitting in on a prisoner interrogation or two is the limit.”
“I don’t want you getting too comfortable with punitive violence. Treason is the highest crime and has a high price best left to rougher men to collect.”
“But if I’m the one charging someone with it, shouldn’t I know what that entails?”
“What I mean is, I don’t want you to get any ideas. You know your anger.”
Yemi scoffed. “Why is the concernmyideas? Men devised whatever these methods are, because they understand what moves Men. Between torture and war, humanity seeks out and responds to violence. That’stheirproblem. I’m just interested in answers.”
The queen pursed her lips, and Yemi knew she was in for a scolding. “Give us a moment, ladies,” she said. She waited patiently for Enna and the others to file out of the room before she spoke again. “You do realize that every time you rail against humanity, you’re talking about everyone in the room?”
“They know I’m not talking about them. They’re not the problem.” Yemi waved her off.
“Do they? Have you asked?”
“What? So I should constantly be specifying it’s ‘not all’ humans?”
“When it comes to deciding who is and isn’t an enemy of the state, yes.Thesepeople areyourpeople. You either find a way to lead them or you share each other’s fates.”
“And how can you tell the difference from all the way up here? The Green Zone’s obviously been compromised. People we thought were friends turned out to be enemies.”
“There have been threats to power in every realm since the beginning of time, and they’re not going anywhere soon. Your father knew that, which is why we have his network of eyes in every district,” the queen said in a tone that suggested she was tired of rehashing this same talking point.
“He was all human, and he knew what these people were—”
“Yes, and that temper you’ve inherited? It killed him,” the queen snapped.
“No,theykilled him,” Yemi bit back. These arguments were plaguing their conversations with increasing frequency lately. The longer her mother lived, the closer she got to dying, the more important it was to her that Yemi had therightperspective. But there was only one perspective Yemi would entertain on her father’s assassination.
“You dishonor his memory—” her mother started.
“Idishonor—” Yemi blinked as heat rose in her face. “Daddy loved you so much that preserving your honor became his life’s mission. He would have wiped out every threat in any kingdom if that meant it would be safe for us to just exist. Andyouwant to be loved by the people who murdered him.”
The queen laced her fingers together and took a deep breath, one of the things she did to keep herself calm in order not to exacerbate the poison in her blood. “We did what we had to do so that when you rule, you can do it in peace.”
Yemi’s voice rose. “How peaceful am I supposed to be when I’ve viewed my father’s body with half his face blown off and you’re sitting here, half a stone monument?”
“Gods, you’re terrifying.” The queen shook her head, incredulous. Her eyes glistened with what Yemi knew were tears of frustration. She’d seen so many of them and always felt the pangs of guilt before they ever fell. She cursed herself, unable to even remember why she’d flown into this rage in the first place.
“You’re smart.Sosmart. And you have the capacity for kindness, for greatness, but this evil streak in you… I don’t know, Yemaya. Do you hate me? Is that it?”
“Of course I don’t,” Yemi said. She meant it but rubbed an impatient hand over her face.
“I keep waiting for that moment where something clicks,” said the queen. “Where I can say, ‘She gets it, she’s going to be okay.’ But what if I’ve steered you wrong? Let you believe too much that you were human and allowed human moments? Should I have enforced royal protocols, let everyone elevate you instead of having you relate to them so that you felt some divinity? The responsibility to be above this vengeance?”
