KINGSLAYER

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Act 1 Chapter 70
JAYLAH

Jaylah felt Alexander's loss as soon as night fell. She checked into the inn alone, ate alone, existed alone. Her lips felt sewn together with no one to talk with. Everything she did now felt s thousand times more vulnerable, though she knew there was no way he would have jumped to save her from attack.

There was only a single bed. Jaylah sat on it with legs primly crossed as if watched by the entire world. She did not know who she still performed for now that no one was looking.

Her shoulders nearly slumped. The weight of the single bed, the aloneness, was heavier than she expected. The whole day was heavier than expected, although she supposed anything felt heavy to someone so unused to bearing things.

Perhaps she was being too sentimental for the fool, but she really thought he would be by her side at least until their work was finished.

All this time, she feared he would kill her eventually or turn her over to the twisted characters he was connected with. Pride made her label the thought as ridiculous, but she had feared it all the same. He was always the one slated to do her in.

How ironic that it turned out to be the opposite. She was never the one to leave.

Kill or be killed. Have one's life ruined or ruin another's. Jaylah made her damning choice, no matter how long that choice would be enacted.

She ate her cold, flavorless soup and wondered what had become of him. The toxin in his bloodstream was unknown to her, meaning she had no idea how long his unconsciousness would span. He said he was always an unruly boy. Surely they would not take any chances by letting him wake to see his fate until they arrived. Until his containment was assured.

It was too soon after his mother's death. It never should have happened, but it was too soon. He would wake to find himself in the same living nightmare that claimed her life. Jaylah often recognized hollowness in his eyes, as if there was nothing but a gaping pit behind them. He hid his grief well, but she knew how to recognize it. The spiny claws of regret, too. Would he fight at all? Or would he simply accept defeat?

Jaylah hoped he did not hate himself enough to accept it. She also prayed he would lie low until she issued the order that would set him free tomorrow. And that day would be the day she combed the streets for those slavers, not put at ease until their blood was underneath her nails.

That was the thought she went to bed to, the thought she relished in when she could not find sleep easily with her own breathing the only one in the room.

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Jaylah marched through Naxaros, not caring who saw her. She wore her periwinkle dress, the one with a cape-like backing sewn in over the shoulderswhich made all the cloth fall seamlessly together. It was far from efficient; the thicker cloth fell in perfect pleats to the slightest of apexes at her feet, trapping in all the warmth. Because her arms were covered at her sides, her swords were not easily accessible. She would have to become accustomed to not needing them.

Heads turned as she walked. There was no reverence in their eyes. Upon first glance, Jaylah appeared too unlike herself. But she would know those looks when she saw them, for she had spent nineteen years doing everything she could to garner them.

Contrary to the late afternoon sky, Naxaros seemed to be gradually awaken at her arrival. High-class folks stepped out of their carriages and leafy the tranquility of their marble homes to catch a glimpse of her. If she was not so intent on keeping her face an unreadable mask, she may have smirked. This was what she had missed. The mockery of her father's men seemed leagues away now.

They may have been bowing, but Jaylah did not care enough to check. She felt like a new person as I approached the gates of the royal estate, not bothering to assert my place to the guards. They scrambled to unbar them when she was still in the distance.

Her home. She took in the domed roofs so high above, the thousands of windows that surely held watchers who sought a glance to see if the rumors were true, the outside balconies stacked on top of each other by repeated columns. Everything was glittering silver, slate and onyx. For so many weeks, Jaylah wished to be in the place she was in now. Somehow, it had lost some of its luster.

But not all of it. She started down the lengthy bridge, not lowering my face against the blinding sunset. She wore no crown, but her braids were weaved securely around her head, just as good as a circlet.

Jaylah did not need a crown or a scepter or jewels for her people to recognize her as their Queen now. The few courtiers traveling the bridge stopped in their tracks alongside statues of the greats when they saw her. She did not feel their gazes; their eyes were averted as they should be.

Her own gaze fixed onto the place where dozens of soldiers were dutifully lining in their ranks near the palace's entrance, their uniforms a sea of navy blue. She was off the bridge now, marching the grand pathway lined with artfully-designed topiaries and bubbling fountains. The columns holding up the spectacular spires on the palace's front were wrapped with pure silver vines that shone in the sun's final light before it dimmed for the night.

The entrance was as massive as ever, dwarfing all of them. But Jaylah advanced as if she bore the superior standing of a goddess. When she passed the ranks of soldiers, they fell on their knees. The sounds of their knees hitting the ground in unison was music to her ears.

The doors were opened to welcome their returned Queen and Jaylah strode in.