Page 96 of Rise of the Vicious Princess

Charis drew her sword and held it ready.

“He just showed up! No appointment. No warning. I was barely dressed.” His words tumbled over themselves. His eyes stayed on Charis. “He was talking nonsense. Said he’d made a reasonable offer to you to let the High Emperor of Rullenvor make us a protectorate under their rule. Utter rubbish. Begged me to see that convincing you to accept the offer was in Calera’s best interests.”

“And did you agree to that?”

“Of course not! How could it be in our best interests to give another kingdom control over us? Let a foreigner rule us.” He spat the words. “Probably steal our wealth and make our titles meaningless.”

Charis shared a long look with her mother and then lowered her sword. Lord Everly’s words, full of shock and self-interest, had a ring of truth to them.

“You are dismissed,” the queen said.

Lord Everly bowed, blotted at the sweat on his forehead, and hurried from the room. As soon as he left, a footman entered. “Ambassador Shyrn from Rullenvor has arrived.”

“What a nice way to say he was summoned,” Charis said.

“This ends with him leaving us, dead or alive,” Mother said. “Let’s get any useful information out of him that we can before that happens.”

Charis nodded and kept her sword out of its sheath.

Ambassador Shyrn entered the room and hurried toward them. His shirt was half tucked, his collar stood up on one side, and there was a tear down one pant leg.

“Your Majesty, I am grateful to finally be called before you again.” He bowed low, revealing a stain on the back of his dress coat. His graying red hair looked like it hadn’t been properly washed in days.

“Why is that?” the queen asked.

He straightened and smoothed the front of his jacket, completely missing the untucked shirt and the undone collar. “Well, of course, I’ve been expecting to be able to send your reply to the High Emperor’s generous offer back to Rullenvor. I do hope, with these ship sinkings, you have considered their offer and are ready to accept help.”

“Their offer?” Charis cocked her head. “You led us to believe this offer came from the High Emperor.”

“Of course! Yes! From both the High Emperor and the leader of Te’ash.” He wrung his hands, then seemed to realize he wasn’t doing himself any favors and dropped them to his sides. “Shall we sit?”

“No,” Charis said coldly.

“Interesting that you should bring up the ships sinking.” Queen Letha’s tone was a delicate razor poised above his neck.

He looked from one to the other, prey sensing a trap. “It’s all anyone is talking about.”

“That’s not quite true, is it, Charis?”

“Not true at all.” Charis slowly raised her sword. “In fact, I believe the most popular topic of conversation is the news that we’ve signed a peace treaty with Montevallo and will soon have full use of their army and their considerable stockpile of jewels.”

“The jewels . . . you’ve signed a treaty?” He was back to wringing his hands.

“Indeed.” The queen sounded almost sympathetic. “Ambassador Shyrn, you’ve been visiting my royal council, trying to convince them to pressure us to take your offer. And you stand before us now clearly upset and nervous. Tell me about that.”

“I . . . I had to!” He fell to his knees before the queen. “Please, you have no idea. None. But this can still be fixed. It can still be all right. You have access to the jewels now. You can send them to Rullenvor as payment—”

“Payment for what?” Fury burned through Charis. “For calling off your armada?”

He turned to her, his hands up in the air like a supplicant. “You don’t even have to be a protectorate. You can just arrange a regular shipment of the required jewels, and the Rakuuna will protect you. Everything will go back to the way it was.”

“We seem to have run into a misunderstanding, Ambassador Shyrn.” The sympathy in the queen’s voice had turned to stone. “You are laboring under the delusion that we are going to send blood money for the High Emperor to call off his ships, but—”

“Please.” His voice cracked. “If you refuse to pay, you are sentencing me and my family to death.”

“You were willing to sentence my entire kingdom to servitude, were you not?” Mother’s eyes pinned the ambassador.

“I beg you for mercy.” Ambassador Shyrn looked wildly from Charis to the queen. “Pay the Rakuuna. I’m sure I can convince them to protect your ships if you just do that much for me. You have no idea what happens if I fail. None. It would be better for me to kill myself than to face them.”

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