Page 7 of The Moon Blessed King
‘The longer we wait, the more your people will suffer.’
‘Maybe. But change is hard…and your people deserve time as well. Perhaps…I will have time to prove to them that I am not their enemy too.’
‘It would help,’ Adalei approves.
‘All right then.’ The concession sounds grudging at best. But itisa concession. Adalei shares another look with Lio.
Fen doubts Adalei is fully convinced of any of this. But for good or for ill, she has agreed.
‘Then today we shall begin to prepare for the journey east,’ Zinnitzia concludes. She claps her hands, startling some of the group into slightly straighter postures. ‘And in three days’ time…we go home.’
Adalei rises. She bows her head to Elician, a perfunctory motion he does not react to. When she turns to go back up the stairs, Fen watches her go. Somehow, for all the years she prepared for the moment when Elician and Adalei would step into their roles asmonarch and heir, she never imagined their leadership to look so combative. She always thought Adalei would do as Elician said, softening blows and massaging the language as needed but never arguing or contradicting his command.
Adalei did concede in the end, just as Elician had in his own way. But she also fought and argued and insulted. Elicianisweak at the moment. Anyone could see that. But that means he deserves support, not…conflict. Adalei walks away, shameless for the things she’s done, and Elician remains exhausted at the table.
Fen reaches for him. She presses a hand to his shoulder. ‘It’s all going to be okay,’ she says out loud, even as she watches Adalei disappear up the stairs and wonders if perhaps their family friction did not, in fact, end with the death of her adoptive uncle and father after all.
CHAPTER TWO
Cat
Cat packs his bags for the capital. He does not have much. Books, mostly. He has grown fond of Elena’s collection of medical texts while staying here. Fonder, too, of the various volumes of fiction tucked into a hidden nook by the hearth in her main room that he doubts she meant for him to find. They were gregarious tales, filled with laughter and poetry and romance that was both confusing and inspiring. Hardly appropriate for him to be focusing on when there was so much more to learn, and yet charming to flick through late at night when he needed something to distract him from all the thoughts that kept on spinning.
They do not belong to him and he would not presume to take them with him, but he wishes he could. He’ll put them back. Not right this moment – Lio and Elician are still downstairs – but later…when there is no one there to take note of his selection in the first place.
A soft knock at the door gives him enough time to obscure the spines revealing the titles of the more scandalous novels, and when he calls out a welcome, he isn’t expecting Marina. He thought Fen would be there. To scold him or to complain about something. Elician even. But Marina slides inside and shuts the door behind her with a delicate click. For a long while, she doesn’t say anything. Juststays at that door, frowning a little as she looks him over, head to toe. He stays still beneath her attention. Then, in his own language, she asks: ‘Did you have a chance to sing for your mother?’
The tears that come are instantaneous. There before he knows what to do with them. His hands slap to his face, stunned by their existence. She crosses the room, wrapping her arms around him before he can tell her it isn’t necessary. Death is a celebration, something to be happy about. To be grateful that the trials and tribulations of life are over and now the loved one can move on and become something new. ‘May her change be good,’ Marina whispers into his hair, cupping the back of his head as she holds him against her. He hugs her back, clinging to her like a child. He should be happy. He should have sung.
The household moves about without them. People are talking, voices crossing up and down the stairs and the hall. No one bothers them, and by the time he feels strong enough to pull away, he is ashamed to confess: ‘I don’t want to.’
‘You don’t have to.’
‘I should.’
‘Not every death is a blessing,’ Marina says simply. ‘There were things left unsaid between you. Many things.’ She sits on the edge of Cat’s bed and Cat sits beside her, hands hanging limp as he braces his arms on his knees. ‘She didn’t want you to return to Alelune. She ensured you had your freedom secured in Soleb. You could stay here. Elician would release you from your oath, and you could live your life away from this.’
‘It would condemn Soleb and Alelune to more war,’ Cat replies. ‘It would condemn my Reapers to forever live in those cells.’
‘That’s not your burden to bear. Reapers were held in those cells long before you were ever born, and that war is happening one way or another. Anslian murdered your mother at the Blessedsafe. Alelune will respond, and Soleb will have to deal with the consequences of those actions.’
‘Unless Gillage doesn’t tell them to march. Unless…if I am king I would tell them to stop.’
‘It’s not that simple. You’ll only be able to take and keep that throne if the people believe in you. If they have faith that your choices are better than all the other options they might dare to consider. And it is one thing to become king just to stop a war and save a few tortured souls, but Cat – you will have tolead. There is more to being a king than giving one order at one moment of turmoil.’
He knows this. He knows all of this. He had seen his queen, his mother, struggle for years. Watched her make choice after choice, not because she wanted to but because it was what was expected of her. He wishes he had more time with her, in the end. Feels, perhaps for the first time, the Soleben urge togrievethe death of someone, not because she died but because he had hoped that one day…things might be different. And now he will never get the chance to see that day come to pass. He will undo the last thing she ever did by relinquishing his freedom and anonymity to stay at Elician’s side. And he will never know if she would be happy for him. It is a selfish series of thoughts, disconnected from the reality that his mother’s soul has moved on, has changed, has had a chance to become something else. And still, it aches worse than any death he has ever experienced before.
‘I know what I have to do,’ he tells Marina. ‘And I will do it. I will learn how.’
‘And after?’ she asks. ‘After you marry Elician, use his army, use his people and his support, after you aresomehowmade king. And yes, wewillneed to revisit that. But what happens then? When all this is over, what future do you expect to have?’
Cat has never been good at imagining his future. There was no point thinking of such a thing in the cells. To hope for something better was folly. Accept the world as it is, not as it ought to be. He hoped for time with his mother, perhaps. But he never dared to dream of specifics. And now, he tries to see it. Himself in a crown.
The war stopped. He tries to imagine Elician, as he once was. When they first met, Elician was kind. Sweet. He laughed and played with Lio, he told stories with such passion.
‘I want to learn the names of the birds in Alelune,’ he says.
Marina frowns, lips tugging down as her brows furrow over her eyes.
