I bit back a laugh. It choked at my lungs with the dust, and I was coughing for close to a minute before it finally stopped. “Is that the best that you can do?” I sneered. “A dead king. My own brother can’t even think of a decent lie. YOUR PEOPLE KILLED HIM NOT TWO MONTHS AGO AND YOU ALREADY FORGOT?” I was hysterical. He was hysterical. My own brother, the world’s worst liar. How had I missed it over the course of a year?
“No.” Derrick squared his shoulders and shook me. “I’m not lying, Ry. King Lucius has been staging this war since the beginning. He had a sister, did you know that?”
I stopped laughing.
“Princess Kyra. She died on Caltothian soil—she was sick, it would have happened regardless. But his parents blamed their neighbor, and why not? Caltoth is the richest nation, you know.” I did. “Lucius told his advisors he wanted to expand two months before his wife’s death.”
“How would you possibly know? It’s just a lie they are saying to get you to join their cause!”
My brother ignored my question. “One of them, Raphael, disagreed. He didn’t speak the truth to his king, but he warned his younger sister in the north. She was a head knight at the time in one of the regiments in Ferren’s Keep. She went by Nyx.”
Commander Nyx?
“They—with the help of their most trusted friends—plotted to kill the king. It was the only way to stop him. They knew Queen Lillian would be a manageable queen and better, she wasn’t aware of her husband’s plans. They never wanted to eliminate the Crown, Ryiah; they just wanted a ruler that wasn’t corrupt and trying to cause a war between nations that would cost thousands of lives. They knew the princes would be better under the mother’s guidance than the father.”
Derrick stirred at the straw. “But Raphael mixed up the wines. Queen Lillian drank from the wrong cup. So King Lucius slaughtered the entire room that night. He probably guessed it was intended for him, after all, and he used the event as the first claim to Caltothian attacks.”
I wanted to argue, to protest… but another part of me wanted to listen. I stayed silent. That part of me that wanted to believe my brother, to know he was not a traitor—it wouldn’t be quieted.
And worst, what he was saying, it made sense.
“Lucius staged the border attacks, Ry. For years. Nyx started to suspect and sent some of her most trusted men to investigate. It was just small ones, innocent ones at first. But they started to grow. And knowing Raphael’s secrets, she knew there was more to it.” He sucked in a breath. “Nyx sent a band of emissaries to Caltoth. She had them petition his court. King Horrace claimed it was a farce. If he had been allowing the attacks he could have just as easily executed her spies, but instead he listened.” My brother paused. “Horrace might have had the coin, but he didn’t have the strength to combat a war. So he’s spent years beseeching King Joren’s favor, preparing him for King Lucius’s claims. Because Lucius was hiring Caltothian fugitives, Ry, fugitives and bandits and assassins. He was paying them to attack his own people.
“NO.” I tried to stand and caught myself against the wall. My limbs were like jelly. “Why would a king stage a war on his own people?”
“What better way to win over his people’s support? What better way to show the other countries Caltoth had broken the Great Compromise?” Derrick paused. “That didn’t mean there weren’t raids from their own. Greedy lords that wanted more. Assassins that thought to pocket Lucius’s coin and use it to their own gain… Like Ferren. Nyx told me you recalled something during the attack.”
I sucked in a breath. “You know the orders as well as I do, Wade, no survivors.” “Not if we don’t tell them.” “Do you really want to take that chance? Two times a traitor would only bring a slow and painful death.”
“Lucius paid Caltothian assassins to attack one of the patrolling regiments during the mock battle. He had never expected his son to be far enough to stop it. You and Darren and the rest of your year were supposed to be in the keep.” Eve. Something tugged at my lungs. She had died not to save us from Caltothian killers—but our own king.
She had died in vain.
“The lives we lost that day, Ryiah. They weren’t because of King Horrace. They were the final proof Lucius needed to convince the others the Great Compromise was broken. From there he just needed to secure the Pythian’s hand.”
I was breaking, and it was all I could do to breathe. And then: Wren. And the others.
“You think the rebels are so noble?” I spat. “But they were willing to kill us in the desert, Derrick! You say that was for control of trade? Well, what about Montfort? What about then?” My voice trembled and caught. “Were you one of them? Did you somehow manage to escape—”
Derrick shook his head vehemently. “That wasn’t us, Ry.”
“You said the Crown is their enemy,” I choked. “And they killed him, Derrick. Lucius is dead. They killed Wren. They tried to kill Blayne. They killed—”
“IT WASN’T US!” Derrick stood and grabbed both my arms, shaking me. “I swear to you, Ry, it wasn’t the rebels. We wanted Lucius dead but it wasn’t us. I was never there, and the rebels they caught, they weren’t us—”
“HOW WOULD YOU EVEN KNOW?” I roared. “You just nod your head at every little thing Commander Nyx tells you! She’s the rebel leader, isn’t she?”