His hand reaches down to his waist, where a small pouch is dangling. He grabs the pouch, opens it, and throws its contents on the ground in front of the steps leading up to the dais.
Bile rises up my throat.
It takes me a moment to recognize what it is I am looking at, blood and gore staining the wooden floors red. A pair of eyeballs is staring up at me.
I want to throw up, the sight of the lifeless organs making my insides churn. But I keep my eyes on them until I can trust my face to remain neutral when I look back up at him.
Breathe.
I lift my eyes and incline my head.
“It seems,” I say evenly, “that someone has gone to great lengths to make their point. One might even say they were eager to…catch my eye.”
Silence.
A laugh booms from the Duke’s chest, loud enough to fill the hall, echoing off stone and pillar alike.
I can’t help but smile too; his laugh is infectious. I see severalcouncil men trying to hide their own smiles behind their hands.
Tassilo is still chuckling when he dabs at his eyes with a handkerchief. “Oh, I already like you. I did not plan on doing so, but I do. My cousin chose his wife wisely.”
“Indeed, I did.” A low voice cuts through the air, and the easy temper of the hall snaps taut with the King’s arrival.
He does not enter by the door behind the dais, but through the great doors instead, placing himself at the Duke’s back. The intent is plain enough—hardly subtle, but effective all the same. Tassilo turns with deliberate ease, as if the hall were his own and the King no more than kin.
“Cousin!” he exclaims while bowing so deeply that it could be taken as mockery. “I heard you had taken up residence in Passberg for the spring. I had to come and see for myself.”
Charles stalks past him, effectively forcing Tassilo to turn around again, a pup following round it’s mother. The Duke doesn’t seem to mind.
Charles takes a measured step, passing over the grisly offering on the ground without so much as a glance. His eyes are on me, and for a second, I see the familiar shame wash over his face. He catches himself before settling down on the throne and taking Tassilo in from head to toe.
“How kind of you to welcome us,cousin,”he drawls. “If that is all, you may be excused and allow us to continue with the council.”
It is a dismissal, plain enough.
Tassilo, however, shows no haste. He carries himself in a manner I have seen before in men of his rank. At ease to the point of arrogance, untroubled by authority, and comfortably, infuriatingly smug. I find myself envying it. To move throughthe world so certain of one’s place, never fearing to speak one’s mind…
I straighten my back almost instinctively and unclench my hands. Change must begin somewhere, and where better to learn the ways of men than at a council table surrounded by them?
“Yes, Your Majesty,” Tassilo says at last, smooth as oil. “I shall leave you to your meeting. Pray accept my apologies for the state of your floor—I thought you might wish to have your spy returned to you. Or what remains of him.” Charles purses his lips and narrows his eyes, but doesn’t say anything.
Tassilo ascends the dais and bows deeply before Charles, then turns to me. Taking my hand, he presses a light kiss to its back.
“I have my eyes on you,” he murmurs with a low chuckle.
Before Charles can thunder another command, the Duke turns and makes his unhurried way down the steps, the sound of his boots echoing as he leaves the hall.
Chapter 14
The air is mild for early spring, it smells of damp earth and new leaves, and I decide to take the girls out for a walk along the border of the property. Ella and Thea walk ahead of us, collecting flowers and sticks, dark heads bent together in deep conversation. They have taken to counting magical stones along the path, arguing fiercely over what qualifies asround enoughto be considered a magical stone.
Aileen walks at my side, her cloak fastened neatly at the shoulder. There is a new lightness to her, one I notice more with every passing week. Marriage has not diminished her; it has settled her, as if she has found the right balance of weight within herself.
“You look well,” I tell her.
She smiles, a little rueful. “So do you. Motherhood suits you, Your Majesty.”
Aileen still calls me that. I let it pass.
