Dragon Kin

33

Alicja

That afternoon they confirmed that Uncle Max is in the madness. He is declared unfit. He can't be Regent any longer.

We're standing on the balcony, overlooking the largest forum they have in the city. It is spread out below us. The venue seats five thousand. It takes up a large chunk of the North side of the hill. We're standing in an area above the populace below, and with fifty nobles from the houses standing around us.

Below are the fifty members of the council, and the twelve of the senate. To the right of them are the three judges but they have no capacity at this gathering, which is to declare Uncle Max's new state of citizenship.

With their declaration, the throne is vacant.

This has not been a state of affairs anyone can remember happening in their lifetime. There are, I was informed by Jeffery, who it turns out is a trivia nerd, three mentions in the histories he's read, where this has occurred.

The wars that followed each of those three, were devastating to the country, and the second one left them so vulnerable that they were in servitude to the Sidhe for a hundred years afterward.

If Victor doesn't accept the throne, there will be civil war. Uncle Max assured me the night we had dinner; war was the only alternative. And this was Victor's strongest desire — to make that alternative moot. To bring the possibility of a peaceful transference of power into being.

"I don't have an heir," he told me a few days ago. "If I die, this country will be ravaged over a matter of state. A matter which should have a better answer than, 'kill them all and let god sort it out.'"

I searched the crowd as I listened to the Reader announce the council's decision. I saw the crowd, and the stonework, and envisioned blood splashed across them both.

Was it mine to say? Did I have a voice in his ear on this?

What was it to be with him?

Thousands of eyes were on him, and more on the council. They knew what they were saying. They knew his mind on this!

A murmur went through the populace and I knew I wasn't alone in my observation. There were some shouts of ill defined angst. I had no idea if they were for or against or if they just broke a leg.

How does he stand this? I marveled.

He's not oblivious. He can hear them. He wants to hear them. They are an extension of him, his second mind, ... and he needs to do this, as much for himself as for them. But how does he bear the weight of that many hungry eyes?

The expectant stare is not massless. Everyone has felt that weight between their shoulders, as they walked away from something they had to walk away from. The cables and weights of energy become a drag, and every judgment becomes more weight.

Yet he stands. At ease. Listening. Waiting.

I would burn them all!

...

The voice is not mine, but it is in my head. I feel my eyes have widened. They're stretched open.

I've heard it before. That voice, I've heard it before. She has a snarl in her words, with unfamiliar vocal ticks which sound slightly mad. As in, angry and incensed. And logically fluid.

Just because they were after Ismael, doesn't mean they aren't after me.

I'm trembling. A dark shadow passes across my eyes, inside me!