The Chronicle of the Worthy Son

Impetus

Throughout Lark's diatribe, her excitement or agitation built to the point that her words tumbled over each other. None were more dismayed about her approach than the queen, for she grasped her husband's hand tightly and watched his face with a pleading expression.

Impetus, however, had leaned back with a ghost of a smile while he watched Lark pace and spout. He raised his hand for silence. "I notice you're directing this to myself and not Adeptson."

"You're not responsible for him?" Lark's eyes flashed with anger. "You didn't send him, knowing full well he'd make a hash of everything?"

"Calm yourself and speak as a gentleman, here forward. Or is that not what you are?"

Able thought he sensed something fatherly about this command. Lark must have as well, since she made fists of her hands and took slower breaths.

"It is true," Impetus rejoined, "I did not think him ready, but he demanded his rights, not unlike you are attempting now. I may not have prepared him to easily succeed, but I certainly did not interfere with him like I am told you did."

"To my mind, I was protecting the land, people, and resources from his-his idiocy." It seemed Lark had reduced her anger to a simmer. "Call it treachery if you like, but don't tell me it didn't need doing."

Impetus leaned forward. "What if it didn't need doing? What if you could have attempted to intervene then like you're attempting now?"

Lark hesitated, perhaps not noting that was a softer accusation than it could have been. Or maybe that didn't matter to her. "...a rogue Black Sword told me you had ordered her to put me down. I hope I have not made a mistake in trusting those who have told me I made a mistake in trusting her."

Impetus was silent a moment, his face impassive. "Can you help me understand what it is I said or did that made that so believable to you?"

Able was not the only one who thought this sounded an admittance of recognition. Pillar was unsuccessfully pushing back a smile while Queen Eminence was trying to hide her own expression of gratitude behind her free hand.

Lark's face, however, twisted with affront and incredulity. "How about all the times you threatened to call the priests and have me consigned to the Halls of Correction? Do people ever come back from those?"

"I saw it as warning you what would happen if you persisted with your behavior," the king's tones measured and regal, "but it is also not God's order for a father to treat his child's life as invaluable. I accept that you feel I failed you in this way, but to my mind, my reasons were the opposite. Your life is valuable, and I meant to protect it."

"...I see." Lark lowered her gaze and closed herself off. No one in this room would be privy to how this destroyed her inside.

Except Able. They had expected this—of course, they had expected this. But hope is a tenacious weed that only succumbs to the most painful deathblow, no matter how you try to kill it more kindly. This deathblow, this guise of understanding while refusing to understand, this public showing with a circle of approving, even heart-warmed faces... Able had to hide his hands in his pockets so no one could see his trembling fists.

"So you're here...despite being in fear for your life, or near enough," Impetus mused, "apparently out of loyalty to the people of Borealund." He looked along the back wall and his gaze settled on Able with a distasteful frown.

Had Able's heartbreak shown on his face? Did the king know— Half out of instinct, Able looked to his right for Chessie's reaction. Of course! Impetus was looking at her and Flower, not Able.

"Say I overlook the treachery, then, this loyalty to foreigners at the expense of your kin—"

Lark barked an unamused laugh. "I approached Gentle—offered him my help. He ordered me hanged. Where'd he learn that sort of loyalty to kin?"

The king had been leaning against the back of his chair, but he slowly straightened with a scowl. "Say I overlook that too."

"Say you do," Lark said with an easy nod, not intimidated but avoiding aggression all the same. "You still have a mess so disastrous that Gentle took his own life rather than facing up to it. The populace is starving and has nothing left to lose while your agents are trapped. Who do you have excited to go freeze their ass off? And what are they proposing?"

"As it happens, I'd been planning military intervention and have yet to consider anyone to manage the territory after." Impetus leaned forward even further, but with an expression of peaked interest now. "So what are you proposing? Having never held an office or even trained for one, why are you so confidant that you can do a better job?"

"Maybe I've never held an office," she began, "but I know the land, and the people there respect me. You don't need military intervention when I can get them to stand down. Do you want more war, or do you want ships? Now is the harvesting season for lumber. I'm going to need aid to make it happen since the people were not able to put their fields to work this summer, thanks to Adeptson's policies of seizing what little they had to fill your coffers. No, I won't do that—can't do that. My financial adviser estimates at least five years before the region produces enough surplus to restart any sort of collection. To be exact..." She fished the cheat sheet from her pocket and began to unfold it.

Impetus turned to his wife, who had been gripping his left hand this whole time, to pat her hand with his right one and give her a reassuring smile. "He's beginning to sound like a worthy son."

Eminence let her tears go as she leaned closer to Impetus to whisper something. She then flew down the steps to embrace Lark, who seemed a moment unsure how to handle being the taller person in this situation. She soon sorted that and was openly weeping as well. As the assembled moved into cheers and applause, Able smiled.