A Queen of Thieves & Chaos (Fate & Flame, #3)

“No, Zander would castrate himself before joining leagues with Neilina. This caster of theirs must have captured it somehow.”

“I would have said the same once, not long ago, about him joining leagues with Princess Romeria after her crimes.”

“She has certainly won him over,” I agree. My brother is hopelessly in love with her.

“Anything else of value in the letter, Your Highness?”

My eyes graze the feminine writing at the bottom of the page. She is determined to end the blood curse. That is impossible.

Isn’t it?

Suddenly, I wish I’d paid more attention to my studies as a child.

There is someone who might be able to answer that question. So far she has been unwilling to speak, but maybe seeing Romeria’s own words will inspire her to share what she knows. They became close in those weeks after the attack.

“Nothing but fairy tales and lies.” I fold the letter and tuck it into my vest for safekeeping. I don’t need to seek Boaz’s counsel on the rest of it. I can already hear his words.

Deceptions.

Treachery.

Disregard.

He may even decide I’m unfit to wear the crown should it appear I am taking a Ybarisan’s advice to heart.

“How do you wish to respond?”

“You handed me this letter five minutes ago, Boaz. I need more than that to consider my options.”

“Of course. The taillok waits on a roost. For how long, I cannot say.”

“It will wait there as long as it’s been instructed to. A minute or a lifetime.” At least that’s what Romeria told me once, when I asked that very question, eyeing the odd thing as it sat idle on top of a wagon. “But time is something we don’t have, if Neilina is on her way.” I move for my desk, collecting paper and quill. How do I respond to such wild claims and requests?

“Do you think the marriage proposal between Tyree and Annika will sway her decision? Change her course at the rift?”

“I doubt it has reached her yet, and even when it does, how is she to swiftly respond, now that we have her carrier?”

“I’m sure she can find other methods of communication. She has a tower full of those elementals, after all.” Boaz’s lips curl with distaste.

“Perhaps. In the meantime, I must do a better job selling the idea to Annika.” She’s currently somewhere in the castle, spitting my name onto the stone floor. “Have Tyree brought to the same rooms where his sister was once imprisoned. Bring him clothes and food he can eat without convulsing. Station three guards at his door and triple the ones below the balcony. Arm them all with merth bolts.”

A knock sounds on the door.

“What now?” I shout.

The door creaks open, and a guard escorts Corrin in.

I chuckle. This is a first.

“A lady’s maid does not seek an audience with the king!” Boaz barks.

I wave him off. “It’s fine. Thank you. I will bring a letter for the taillok shortly.”

“Your Highness.” His jaw tightens at the dismissal, his steel boots heavy as he marches out.

I lean back in my chair, smiling. “This should be interesting.”

“Your Highness,” Corrin begins, her voice crisp, her chin lifted. What this mortal lacks in size—she reaches my chest in stature—she makes up for in attitude. My mother always valued and trusted her. “I do not know what your intentions are with the baker—”

“Nor should you. She’s my subject, and I am the king to do with her what I wish,” I say evenly.

“Yes, of course you are. I would never suggest otherwise.” She pauses to choose her words. Or perhaps to bite back the salty ones she wishes she could utter. “I merely want to make sure you are aware of what sort of keeper she faced before she arrived here.”

“A lying, thieving, conspiring one?”

Her brow furrows. “Yes, perhaps he is all of those things as well, but I mean what he did to her.”

My smug smile slips off. “Continue.”

“When Gracen and her children came to the castle, they were skin and bone. I doubt those children had had a proper meal in their entire lives. And Gracen … I helped her into the bath once and”—she flinches—“there were marks all over her body. Bruises and bites, worse than anything I’d ever seen. So many of them.”

“A tributary should not wear those.” Not if their keeper is treating them correctly. Even the teeth marks should fade quickly.

“She should not even have been a tributary!” Corrin’s voice fills with indignation. “She was carrying a child. A third one, that he forced her to bear, with some stranger she’d never met before! The law states—”

“I know what the law states. Thank you, though.” My anger simmers as I hear these new facts.

She purses her lips. “Not only was he still feeding off her regularly as she reached term, but he would invite other keepers over to feed off her and use her in other ways. He liked an audience.” She gives me a knowing look.

My fist closes over my quill, snapping it in half.

A knock sounds.

“Fates, grant me an hour to myself.” There has been a parade of people all morning. “Is there anything else you feel you need to share, Corrin?”

She clears her throat. “When Princess Romeria rescued her from that dreadful situation, Gracen believed her days of serving as tributary were over, and she was very relieved about that.”

So that’s why Corrin is here. She’s noticed my interest in Gracen and has put two and two together. I shouldn’t be surprised. “Sometimes things change. In case you didn’t know, I’m running out of tributaries.” And yet her words spark my disappointment.

“It is a dangerous position to hold in the castle as of late,” she agrees. “Very dangerous for anyone, but especially a mother of three, who might find herself in a dungeon or execution square through no fault of her own.”

Corrin would never dare come outright and tell me I can’t have Gracen as my tributary, but she may as well have. Her defiant expression says as much.

“I think we are done here. You may enter!” I holler to whoever waits outside.

Rhodes strolls in. The lithe warrior’s smooth, umber skin glows as if he ran hard all the way here. Kazimir is behind him. “Your Highness,” they echo each other.

“Thank you, Corrin. You may go.”

“Your Highness.” She bows and strolls out, ignoring the captains as if they don’t exist.

“Are you sure she’s not the one trying to poison you?” Kazimir says the moment the door shuts.

“That would be beneath Corrin. What have you found out, Rhodes?”

“I followed Lord Danthrin to Port Street last night, as requested, Your Highness.”

“And?”

“He spent an hour at Jadelight.”

One of the pricier brothels in the area. “Drowning the sorrow of his recent losses between a mortal’s legs? He doesn’t spend like an impoverished lord.”

“From what I hear, he has been there every night this week.”

“And did you find out who the unlucky lady is?” After what Corrin told me, she certainly is unlucky.

Rhodes’s deep brown eyes crinkle with his smile. “Not yet, but I will. Afterward, he made his way across the street to the Goat’s Knoll.”

“A step down, if he was looking for another vein.” The tavern is a seedy meeting place for ale and sex and blood—or all three.