Page 20 of Eyes of Kings

Calla considers the question. She considers lying.

“No,” she says.

She should have taken his head during the coup. But she didn’t, for the sake of whatever sentimentality she possesses for her cousin. If she wanted to justify her actions, she could say she knew sending August back to his base meant the nobles would flock to him and evacuate San-Er, expediting the bumps in her occupation. She could even say she expected all his Weisannas and a portion of the palace guards to flee too, abandoning their posts in San-Er and hurrying into Eigi. Better to have her opposition expelled before launching an attack, or else the Weisannas in San-Er might be left in a prime position to launch an insurrection.

The truth is, Calla was not thinking about any of that. She was thinking that August was not an unfair ruler, even if he is conniving and underhanded. He wanted power, and he got in Calla’s way. She is no less indictable, so why should she sacrifice him to the earth and taint the qi that fuels Talin?

“Best not to have a martyr,” Calla says evenly.

“I’ll keep an eye on the Crescents, then,” Anton replies.

Calla nods. “Besides,” she adds. “I doubt it would be that easy to kill August. Not if Otta has anything to do with it.”

“I’ll keep an eye on her too.”

“Thank you most graciously.”

Anton collapses the umbrella and rests it against the wall. Tsosia is waving at them. Her Crescents have concluded their discussion. They begin to move, taking their exits through the narrow opening in the wall, out into the provinces.

“You’re welcome, Your Majesty,” Anton says. He offers a scabbard that he’s been holding in his other hand. It’s her sword. She left it in the coliseum. “For you.”

Calla takes it. “I didn’t ask for this.”

“I figured you may want it anyway. When the crown gets tiring.”

She loves him—in the way where it flips to resenting him every now and again, and she can’t control what stirs the difference. She loves him because she is known, and she hates him because she is known, and that has only proveddangerous when she does not know herself at all. A princess of the Tuoleimi line, an orphan from Rincun.

Another flash of lightning strikes directly outside the wall. Goose bumps prickle down the back of her neck, responding to the storm brewing from the heavens.

“Ready?” Anton asks.

“Ready,” Calla replies.

They begin their march into the provinces without any fanfare. An hour and some passes while they keep continual speed on the Apian Routes. There is no need to track direction. They’ll reach August’s camp long before they reach the point where the Apian Routes diverge in Eigi. With such a small troop, there are few instructions to call while traveling under the cover of night, short of following the natural rise and dip of the land.

It’s too dark to navigate using the stars. The clouds are impenetrable. Two Crescents at the front hold flashlights to direct the way. The moment they are within view of August’s camp, they will snap the beams off to retain some element of surprise.

Despite the soundness of their plan, Calla developed a restless itch as soon as they left San-Er. A prickling around her collar, then an irritation in her eyes. She scratches quickly, pressing into her tear duct. The sensation persists. She keeps scratching. Only when she senses a presence beside her does she lower her hand, trying to control herself before she can veer off course from scrubbing too vigorously.

“I wondered if I could offer some thoughts.”

Calla stifles a sigh. Anton is overseeing the front half of the troop. He’s walking too far ahead to catch her silent bid for rescue.

“I assume you are going to offer whether I accept or not,” Calla says wryly.

Tsosia, with her watchful red gaze, has been keeping up with her Crescents better than Calla expected. Initially, Calla wondered whether there might be anyrelation to another Crescent—the woman with the red eyes who had tried to carve Calla’s heart out—or whether it might be the very same person, having slipped into a new body upon death, as some are known to do in San-Er. But the shade of red isn’t the same, and besides, their temperaments are entirely different. Pampi was imperious. Hubristic without any backing and, like Calla, was half fueled into believing she could drag a new path through San-Er purely because she was young.

Tsosia’s spine has a faint bow to it. Her right leg is favored over her left, though only subtly, as though decades have passed since the injury and it’s worn into her very psyche. By the sight of her face alone, Calla would not put the cleric’s age at her life’s end, but this may not be her birth body. This may only be another skin that she has slipped into, even while her qi ages toward its breaking point.

“The new generations of San-Er have long forgotten about it,” Tsosia says, “but I was raised on stories about the war that tore the kingdom apart. The battles and the flaws of its rulers.”

“How old are you?” Calla asks.

Tsosia ignores the question.

“My elders spoke about the divine crown as a curse before it was a gift. Indeed, it opens a connection to the heavens, but channeling such power to the earth requires great sacrifice. The crown takes from the wearer. Where does the wearer take from? What is the cost of negotiating with a force as unfathomable as the heavens?”

Their marching army has grown drenched in the rain. Calla hardly notices new droplets landing in her hair, squirming down the metal of her crown.