Page 57 of Of Skulls Of Shackles

I was Perantiqua, and my mother had named me well, so I would always be perantiqua. On and on.Very ancient.

I whispered, “Your king cannot forgive you.”

She blanched, and her bottom lip trembled in a way that begged me closer. She was a siren. “My king is lost in himself.”

“In his morality.” My thought carried through the air as if spoken.

Princess Take attempted a glare, but the effect was lost as she hastily brushed at her arms to be rid of the way my voice had whispered over her skin.

She stammered, “I-in exactly t-that. If I could have the power to sever the connection and set him free, but then I fear he would be adrift in the ocean without anchor. What if that anchor is the last tether to himself. Tomeand us?”

Tether, stitch, seam. “Your instincts serve you well in this matter, Princess. You do not have the power to sever the connection and so it is not for you to do such a thing.” I would tell her not to worry in that case, but she loved him and so would worry needlessly.

I sighed. I did not wish to possess such insights on love. More by the night and the power.

The princess sucked in a breath. “You are certain this should not be severed.”

“Not by a princess who does not have the power. Perhaps not at all unless the goal is to ruin.”

She lowered her head. “He will ruin if I am not by his side. I am his anchor.”

My chest rose and fell with the revealing words of a princess. “Tether.”

The princess shivered as the breeze of my word brushed against her body again. “I s-suppose I am his tether. Yes.”

I was close to understanding how unions were seams. The knowledge hovered out of reach, but closer.Closer to a powerful queen.“Your king understands this, too, which is why he accepted your flesh while spurning the rest of you out of self-punishment.” In this way, as with his decision totakefrom Change’s beastly humans, King Take tried to lessen the impact of his purpose on his moral feelings.

And why were kings driven to their purposes? Why did ancients create princes to keep kings to their purpose too?Whywaspurpose so very dire in the fate of the world?

Ah,but of course.

Taking and changing and bringing, and not to mention seeing and raising, grew a king’s power. Kings had been forced to grow their power for twelve hundred years, with princes as their leashes. Ancients had needed them very strong for a queen.

A night might arise when I would need the strength of kings.

Princess Take was speaking. “I cannot understand how suddenly he switched! And when he decides a thing, convincing him otherwise is impossible because he believes so strongly in keeping his word.”

I could tell her that King Change had forced ruin on her union, but truth-telling did not serve me this dusk. “You are welcome in my queendom, Princess, and how will you serve the queendom?”

She pouted her full lips. “I have long felt the calling of what I must do.”

I waited.

“The queen tired of waiting for the answer,”announced my skeleton.

The princess growled over her shoulder, but nevertheless said, “I am to oversee pawns. And all monsters in this queendom, if you must know. They are all over the place under your lax attention. Coming and going as they like, picking and choosing how to interpret orders. Or whether to carry them out at all. I shall sit in on dusk meetings with pawns and then ensure these orders are carried out.”

“Even against your king, Princess?”

She pressed her lips together. “I will cross that moat when and if I must.”

Which would be very soon. “You must. So reflect on this without delay. I am meant to rule kings. That future is inevitable.” I paused, then asked, “Is monster management the full nature of your role?”

“I will handle the transportation of goods too.” She lifted a shoulder. “Any transactions with kings. Any important convoys of materials or foodstuffs for humans, in this queendom and also in your claimed kingdom and any others you might… acquire.”

This princess did not mean to see me win against her king. She planned to learn how I could be best undone. She had agenda.

A secret too.

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