Magdala couldn’t resist indulging in a brief, smug look at her father.
“We fought,” Asherton continued. “I got his knife, but he had a shotfire. He drew it, made me kneel, pressed it to my temple …” His voice trailed off.
Zephyr picked up the story. “I was searching for Asherton, and I found him in this state. I fear I lost my temper.”
“Lost your temper?” Seamus cried. “You drowned Julian and stabbed him in the chest!”
Zephyr glanced at Asherton, who said, “Fine, you may tell him the story.”
Zephyr lifted his chin and said, without a hint of regret, “I filled that monster’s lungs with water. He drowned from the inside out, and I didn’t even mind.”
Seamus swallowed. “I did not realize you could do that.”
“Well, you were a negligible warden. I remember Julian from when he and Asherton were at school. After Evander left to go to war, I was called by the headmaster because Asherton was ‘ill’. He wasn’t ill; he had been poisoned and beaten by Julian and his friends. I had to take him home for a month, and he was in bed for half that time. I thought he was going to die. I hated Julian Davenport. Asherton’s mother made me send him back to that school, and it was the worst thing I have ever had to do. There were many nights I dreamed of killing that man.”
“Julian was like a son to me …” Seamus began, but Zephyr cut him off, his voice dripping with disgust. “Did you raise him from boyhood? Did Julian live in your house, wear clothes you made with your own hands, eat food from your table? Julian was a boy you were fond of; Asherton is like a son to me. Most fathers help their children when they are in need—no questions, no hesitation. But perhaps you don’t know about that.”
Seamus flushed and, had he not recently learned that Zephyr could drown him on dry land, would probably have hit him. Prudently, he did not.
“And the knife?” Seamus demanded.
Asherton shrugged. “I panicked. I didn’t want Zephyr’s secret identity to get out, and I knew the drowning would look suspicious. I couldn’t move the body, so I stabbed the knife into him and meant to flee, but Magdala happened along.”
“And, if you’re such a doting father”—Seamus sneered at Zephyr—“why didn’t you admit your guilt?”
“He’s a nix,” Asherton said. “A faerie, and I know his real name. So, if I forbid him, he cannot go against me, and I forbade him from admitting to Julian’s murder, just as I forbade him to save me first in the river.”
Seamus tapped his fingers on the table. He was a beehive of suppressed rage. “And now you are king,” he said. Magdala disliked the timbre of his voice—she had heard it before, when he regaled the royalists with the horrors of allowing ‘the bastard’ to sit on the throne. “And we are going to war.”
When she brought Asherton here, Magdala worried Seamus would frighten him. She realized now she had underestimated Asherton. He considered Seamus with condescension, almost pity. “If we don’t enter this war, all the dragons will die in battle. My mother’s neutrality will destroy this kingdom.”
“Your mother is wise and good. Your reign will end our way of life.” Seamus’ voice grew louder with each syllable. He stood, advancing on Asherton. “You will destroy Allagesh, because …”
Asherton started to his feet, his breath whistling in his throat. “I will not apologize for your prejudices. If I donot take the throne, then my mother will try to maintain neutrality, but what will happen when the dragons are gone and we have nothing to offer the warring kingdoms? They will devour us like a pelican with a fish. And you will be swallowed with everyone else because you were so blinded by superstition you could not understand the real, solidpolitics!”
“You will bring a curse upon us.”
“Where is this curse?” Asherton raised his eyebrows and cast a sardonic look around the room. “There’s no monster lurking outside the windows or darkness crawling over the threshold. The curse was a lie all along, and you are a fool for believing it.”
“Even if the curse is a lie,” Seamus growled, “your mother would not let us fall.”
Asherton let out a choking laugh. “And how would you know that? These decisions are made in locked rooms where even I am only reluctantly granted admission. How would you know what the queen-regent is planning?”
Magdala gasped. Asherton was right, of course. But Seamus could never see himself as a lowly stone mason living in a cottage. He believed that he carried some special knowledge or intuition because, years ago, he had been a duke.
“Da …” Magdala warned, but Seamus lunged at Asherton, shoving him. Already unsteady, Asherton stumbled, fell. His injured arm cracked against the edge of the stone hearth, and he screamed through his teeth.
Magdala was on her feet before she realized she was moving. Her father bore down on Asherton, his hand balled into a fist, but he never landed a blow. Asherton was seized by a fit of hacking, then gasping. His throat constricted; he couldn’t seem to draw a breath.
Seamus froze, startled, staring down at Asherton as he struggled to breathe. Zephyr flung Seamus aside and caught Asherton in his arms as he sagged to the floor.
“DA! What have you done?” Magdala cried. She pushed her father back, and he slumped into the armchair, his face florid, his cheeks trembling.
“Breathe!” Zephyr opened Asherton’s shirt, and his fingers were webbed again, but nothing appeared under his hands. Asherton coughed until blood spattered his lips.
“It’s too heavy now,” Zephyr cried. “I can’t draw it out.”
Magdala crouched beside him, gripping Asherton’s hand. Her own lungs squeezed, her head swam, and she couldn’t breathe either. Asherton’s head dropped back on Zephyr’s arm, his eyes rolled up in his head, and his body relaxed.
