The Tale of Five Heirs

Chapter Thirty-three, in which someone reluctantly becomes the Queen

Tamara pulled her scabbard off her belt and dropped it. The sword fell by the dresser and Tamara collapsed on the bed. Her face crashed into the pillow.

"Unggh," said Tamara, trying to smile at the thought of sleeping for the first time in...she couldn't remember how long. She rolled onto her side, smearing dirt from her face onto the pillow.

"Captain Tamara!" said a voice.

Tamara ignored it. Nope. She was going to sleep.

"Tamara, General Gertrude says she needs you."

Tamara groaned and hoisted her neck up to squint at the doorway. "Trina," she said, "does General Gertrude have any idea how long it has been since I last slept?"

"General Gertrude hasn't slept in four days," said Trina.

"Okay, fine," said Tamara, pulling herself into a sitting position. Her muscles protested, and her forehead began to throb in a headache. "What does she want?"

"Queen Phoebe is going crazy!" said Trina. "Do you know, she's a commuist?"

"Yeah," said Tamara, rubbing her forehead.

"And General Gertrude wants you to talk some sense into her before she does something stupid," said Trina.

"Why does General Gertude think she'll listen to me?" moaned Tamara. "Me, of all people."

"Well, the representative from Fort Yaron seems to think you'd be a good choice."

"That clever twisted little—"

"Who?"

"Nevermind."

But when Tamara stumbled into the Queen's reception room ten minutes later, she found that the representative from Fort Yaron was actually the Central Committee Residence Logistics Staff Coordinator.

"Hello, Captain Tamara," he said. "Nice to see you again. Please, call me the butler."

"Gladly," said Tamara, eyes scanning the room. A cloaked and hooded figure was just slipping into the servants' passageway.

"Hey!" said Tamara. "Get him—"

The very exhausted guards standing by the entrance to the reception room looked up, but by then the cloaked figure had disappeared.

"Oh, that was Ago Yelldown, my traveling companion," said the butler. "He was quite insistent about accompanying me, and he would appear and disappear at the oddest times. I'm sure you won't be able to find him."

"Bastard," muttered Tamara.

"He thought you would make the ideal person to talk to Queen Phoebe," said the butler.

"Of course he did," said Tamara. "What's going on?"

Across the room, Phoebe was arguing with General Gertrude and Princess Rosanna.

"You're part of the problem!" Phoebe was saying. "The aristocracy is so corrupt, and I refuse to be a part of it. I cannot accept being queen!"

"Nomdammit," said Tamara, taking a step backwards and clapping a hand over her eyes.

Skeena winced. She and Olwyn were sitting at a table near Phoebe. "She's been saying things like that for a while," said Skeena. "Those damn communists in Fort Yaron, they've gotten into her head."

"She's not wrong though, about the corruption," said Olwyn.

"It doesn't matter," said Tamara, coming forward to slam her palms against the table. "This is ridiculous. You shouldn't have to argue with someone to get them to be the queen." She looked over at Phoebe. "This is all Yago Elldown's doing, somehow."