Page 28
XERXES
The door to the Folke assembly room made a clatter when Xerxes swung it open, striking the adjacent wall. A dozen nearby Folke jumped in surprise, and everyone in the room leapt to their feet to stand at attention.
Xerxes scanned their faces.
The problem was that Xerxes wasn’t sure he could trust any of these fools.
He was aware the Intelligentsia were lining the pockets of Folke guards, he just wasn’t sure which ones.
All Folke looked the same—blue and silver with slightly fearful faces whenever he got too close.
Only the Divinities knew how to tell a trustworthy guard apart from a crooked one.
Xerxes stepped into the room, and even the sounds of breathing vanished.
He searched the guards nearest the door first, then those in the middle, those furthest away…
A blond fellow with rosy cheeks stood at the very back of the room, half in shadow where the window’s light didn’t reach. He cowered amidst his fellow Folke, keeping his gaze down on his feet.
Xerxes pointed. “You,” he said.
The Folke parted all the way down the assembly room, looking backward to see who had caught the King’s attention.
The blond fellow’s face paled as he realized an open path now lay between him and the King of Per-Siana. That the King was pointing right at him.
“Come with me,” Xerxes said, dropping his hand. He turned and headed back out of the assembly. Faint sounds of the fellow scrambling filled the dead-quiet room behind him.
Xerxes headed down the twisted palace hallways and up a tetrad of stairs until he reached the library, and there, he glanced between the shelves to ensure no one else was present. He turned to the fellow. The only Folke who might be immune to bribes in this particular situation.
Xerxes meant to inform the guard of his new assignment, but “Did I not warn you she was in danger?!” was what came out instead.
The fellow’s mouth hung open. Xerxes released a heavy sigh and reached over to shove the fellow’s jaw back up so his mouth wouldn’t dry out.
“She was attacked several days ago, like I warned you she would be,” he added. “Didn’t you hear about it?”
“Wh…who?” the guard stuttered.
“Your friend. Ryn .” Xerxes bit his lips together after he said it, liking saying her nickname far too much. “Since you’re the only guard I can trust with this, I’m charging you with her safety. Stand outside her door at night and always keep her in your view. Do you understand, Folke?”
The fellow nodded with red cheeks and startled eyes. Xerxes scanned the fellow’s uniform, finding it all fitting strangely.
“I can not lose her,” Xerxes articulated.
“Yes, you can.”
“If she gets a single scratch, you’ll take responsibility and be punished,” he added.
Again, the Folke nodded, and Xerxes was beginning to wonder if the fellow had gone mute in the last few seconds.
“Go to your new post.” Xerxes waved in the general direction of the maidens’ rooms. “And go see a tailor too,” he added with a mutter as he turned for the library door.
The scent of undusted books washed over him, and his nose wrinkled.
Maybe he ought to remind the cleaners to pay more attention to the library.
The fellow finally found his voice again when Xerxes was half a step out the door: “I would give my life for hers.”
Xerxes hesitated. He turned back around, studying the Folke to see if he was serious.
It seemed he was. A crease hovered between the fellow’s brows, his head was held high, his eyes were even glossed with a strange message that made Xerxes draw back into the room.
“What sort of relationship do you have with that maiden to make you say such a thing?” he asked.
Xerxes wasn’t the jealous sort, but his jaw slid to the side as he waited for the answer.
He looked the fellow over afresh, finding him handsome enough—blond, strong, possibly sweet in an odd way once one got to know him.
Xerxes interlocked his fingers behind his back and squeezed them. Even though he was King, Xerxes knew his flaws massively outweighed his attributes. Not that he cared what Estheryn thought of him. He simply wanted her to stay alive because she and her harp might be his only cure.
The fellow’s cheeks flushed again, and Xerxes suddenly did not want to know.
“Never mind,” he said, turning to leave.
If Estheryn had romantic feelings for a Folke, that was not his business.
Though, if she was discovered, he as King would be forced to cast her out of the palace, put her in prison, or worse.
Xerxes realized his hands were in fists. He also realized he hadn’t taken a single step out the library door.
“Ryn is as good as my sister.” The Folke spoke again—wrongfully assuming Xerxes wanted him to.
Xerxes glanced back. He was making an annoying habit of trying to read this fellow’s face.
“A sister?” he asked, just to be sure.
The fellow glanced down and ran the toe of his boot along the ridge of the library rug. “It’s a long story. But yes.”
Xerxes nodded. He found himself fighting an almost-smile that didn’t belong on his face. He washed it from his mouth and turned back to the fellow one last time with all the authority of a king.
“Assassins already reached her once,” he said. “Do not let them twice.”
A loud commotion erupted outside the library. Shouts flittered down the hall and Xerxes forgot about the red-cheeked fellow as he rushed out and marched down the hall to the atrium.
Servants and Intelligentsia surrounded four men in navy war uniforms by the entrance.
Dried blood coated the men’s hands, and Xerxes’s stomach turned.
He had not seen one of those uniforms in almost ten years.
The Intelligentsia asked all sorts of questions, but Xerxes could only stare at their torn clothing, the scratches on their armour, the cuts on their faces and arms.
Signs they’d seen battle.
Were they from the border? Xerxes couldn’t find his voice to ask as he thought of the smoke he’d spotted lifting past the mountains from his window.
When a uniformed man saw Xerxes there, he pushed through the servants and Intelligentsia. “Your Majesty!” the soldier performed the army salute and dropped to a knee at Xerxes’s feet. “There’s been trouble at the border.”
Xerxes’s heel drifted back an inch. His stomach squeezed. He wanted to ask for information, to do something, but his mind spun.
“Revenge.”
“Seek revenge.”
“How dare the enemy cross you?”
“Say no more!” Belorme’s words overtook the noise in the lobby. “Not here.” The Chancellor glanced around at the eavesdropping servants and local dukes arrived for the weekly affairs meeting.
Xerxes’s throat was thick when he swallowed, but he stood tall. “What happened?” he asked, ignoring Belorme’s instruction. “Tell me.”
The soldier bowed again. “Spies got past us,” he whispered.
“Not another word more!” Belorme snapped, losing his composure for once. He pulled the soldier back up to his feet. “To the Strategy Hall,” he directed. Belorme led the soldier away, and Xerxes watched the three other soldiers follow. The Intelligentsia trailed after them all. And then…
And then Xerxes followed.
The halls felt longer than normal, the path more winding and dizzying.
He marched ahead and slipped into the Strategy Hall seconds after Belorme. The remaining Intelligentsia and council members trailed in, telling Xerxes they’d somehow already been notified.
“How many spies?” Xerxes asked to take control of the meeting. Men spread around the centre table in the room. They eyed the maps always left there—maps that showed the one hundred and twenty-seven provinces of Per-Siana and all their borders.
“I’m not sure,” the same soldier admitted. “B’rei Mira sent a diversion. We were fighting for our lives while the spies slipped past.”
Xerxes exhaled. It was worse not knowing if there was one or one hundred than knowing for sure there were thousands hiding among the people. “Can you identify them?” Xerxes asked.
The soldier shook his head, and a unanimous exhale sounded through the room.
“They might already be here. They might be hiding among your servants, or your noble guests, waiting to attack you,” the soldier said.
“Let them try.”
“We will kill them.”
Xerxes flexed his jaw. His fingers curled slowly into fists as the touch of cool water rippled over his flesh. He inhaled, and for once, he invited the dangerous sensation of icy power, that darkness inside of him that made him feel like a monster.
“Your Majesty… you’re looking a little pale,” a councilman commented.
“King Xerxes, what should we do about the B’rei Mira spies here in Per-Siana?” another asked.
Dozens of blinking eyes looked his way, men dressed in nobleman finery and Intelligentsia hoods alike, their features muted by the dimness of the windowless room.
Xerxes’s tongue flexed and he fought the urge to shout.
Instead, he said in a low, calm voice,
“Let them try.”
“Go hunt down Alecsander first. Go destroy him.”
“First kill the maiden.”
“Kill everyone.”
Xerxes carried his sword to the training field. “Quiet,” he muttered at the voices. It was impossible to focus this morning with their ruckus.
Table of Contents
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- Page 27
- Page 28 (Reading here)
- Page 29
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