Page 39 of The Rebel and the Rose
Not that he hadn’t tried, evidently.
The king steepled his hands, bringing them to his lips. ‘I cannot quell the flames of rebellion if I do not first fell the dragon.’
‘Who is the dragon?’ asked Sera, carefully.
It was Ransom who answered. ‘The People’s Saint.’
The king grimaced. ‘The insurgent in question is my wayward nephew Prince Andreas Rayere.’ He drummed his fingers along the table, adding a percussion to the rising wave of his anger. ‘The ungrateful bastard son of my late brother, Hector. Regrettably, Andreas’s mother is a first cousin of Rafael Mondragon.’
‘As in… the newly crowned King of Urnica?’ said Theo.
‘Very astute, Versini,’ remarked the king drolly. ‘Someone is keeping up with their penny papers.’
Sera noted the subtle change of atmosphere. No longer was the king leering at them with veiled threats and insidious questions. Rather, he was holding court with them, betraying his frustrations as though they were an extension of his trusted quartet and not two warring factions who had been scrapping like hyenas in the dirt not thirty minutes ago.
‘So your nephew has ties to Mondragon’s court,’ said Nadia.
The king gave an affirming grunt. ‘A court that already has designs on conquering my kingdom.’
That much Sera knew. As neighbouring kingdoms and long-standing rivals, Valterre and Urnica shared a long and bloodied history. In recent decades, they had been enjoying a rare spate of hard-fought peace, but Sera knew from the maps that once papered the walls of her old bedroom, there was nutrient-rich land in the south-west of this kingdom that had, centuries ago,belonged to Urnica. Land that the new Mondragon king no doubt intended to reclaim. King Rafael was young and thirsty, more brutal than his predecessor, and by all accounts, eager to make a name for himself on the wider continent.
‘So war is coming to Valterre,’ said Ransom darkly.
‘War is already here,’ murmured Sera.
Fury simmered in the Dagger’s gaze, casting the rest of the room and its occupants in sudden shadow. For a moment, it felt like it was just the two of them, trading silent accusations across the table. Oh yes, war had been here all winter. It thrummed between them even now.
She looked away, biting her lip to focus her thoughts. Dutifully ignoring the hard line of his jaw and the careless sweep of his dark hair, the white scar that bisected his lip and the memory of how she had once licked it.
Something far greater than their enmity was quickly coming to the fore. Something urgent and vital and growing by the day – an uprising that could change everything.
‘Do you understand my concern?’ The king’s question jolted her from her thoughts.
Theo answered. ‘Valterre has a formidable army, but if war comes to our kingdom, you are better off using those forces along our borders. With your eyes on Urnica, it will make it difficult to defend Valterre from within… From thisPeople’sSaint, and whatever power he possesses. Not to mention whatever deal he may strike with his cousin, Mondragon.’
The king tipped his goblet in answer. ‘You were right,’ he remarked to his advisers. ‘It is indeed gratifying to watch a Versini mind at work.’
‘So this Andreas has to go,’ said Ransom, coolly.
‘Why do you need those two?’ Caruso jutted his thumb in Sera’s direction. ‘This is clearly a task for the Daggers.’
The advisers canted their heads, watching through hooded gazes as the king no doubt parroted what they had discussed in private before now.
‘All magic in this kingdom answers to the King of Valterre,’ he said, pointedly. ‘That goes for ShadeandLightfire. The Daggers have a seasoned reputation for finding and killing enemies of the Crown. But the two people sitting across from you destroyed an army of monsters never before seen in Fantome with a kind of new magic that rivals the very power of Shade.’ Peeling his lips back in challenge, he looked now to Sera. ‘If there is to be a new Order in my kingdom, it will bend the knee to me.’
It was not hard to miss the impliedor else…
‘The Flames are not to be trusted,’ said Nadia quickly. ‘Seraphine Marchant is no innocent.’
The king gave a dismissive flick of his wrist. ‘I don’t concern myself with matters of morality, Dagger. Only victory.’
He ignored their burgeoning looks of discomfort. ‘Andreas has always been a battle-shy bookworm who can barely hoist a sword, let alone wield one. He sequestered himself at the Appoline for the better part of the last decade, kissing the feet of our dead saints and forsaking his destiny on the battlefield. Indeed, he did not even deign to make the journey home to honour his father upon his death. No, there is no true blood of Valterre in that boy’s veins. Andreas was born an Urnica turncoat and coward.’
The king tapped his goblet, and a servant scurried to refill it. ‘It seems that as of recently Andreas has acquired not just a measure of actual personality, but the kind of influence that can sway even hardened battle-worn prisoners to his cause. Which is, as you may have guessed, overthrowingme.’
‘Alas,’ said Sera under her breath.
Ransom shot her a warning look.
