*COMPLETE* Allayria promised to do what it takes to stop the Jarles, to make the ugly decision. She thinks, at last, she understands what the dynast meant. The lesson earned from the top of that lonely cliff and given the dark murky water below.
It...
"It's possible," he says, "but who are you going to tell, darling? Are you going to go stand on your balcony and read off coded messages and exchange logs to a restless crowd that can barely read, let alone do math?"
The line of Fae's mouth hardens and she leans back. Her hands clutch into fists—white-knuckled, straining fists that she doesn't need to hide now, doesn't need to conceal.
"I want him alive," she says after a moment, her gaze fixing back up on the thief. "We can make him talk. We can make him confess it all to them."
"Bring them to me," she orders, and she is a queen now, all dominion and intent.
The thief watches her carefully a moment more and then smiles, head tilting in a small incline, as deferential as it is mocking.
"Your Highness," he says.
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The room had bled red on her coronation.
She had known, anticipated, that the Cabal would not let it go smoothly, that there would be a piece of resistance, a piece of rejection, public and bold, branding her as not of them.
Those days were endured with a combination of adrenaline, quick-thinking, and the strange effect of Caj's dark, lingering presence. Although slight, the Smith Skiller, clad in ash-singed, dark gray armor acted as a silent phantom on the citizens of Solveigard City; a ghost of brutal efficiency and smoky echo of a greater problem looming on the horizon. He earned a reputation in those first few days. So did she.
She gets the letter with her breakfast, crumpled and yellowed from speed and hard travel. She unscrunches it first—food can come after—and reads Hiran's sloping, but hurried writing:
Peanut,
Sorry for the slow reply—there's not much to write here (mostly waiting and debating) but enough to do to occupy all the daylight hours. A lot of it is training—General Jin is an enthusiastic believer in stretching and structured forms. You can imagine how our particular friend feels about this.
There's not much else I can say in paper. We're all thinking of you, and (I at least am) envious of all the skull-bashing you're getting to do.
Tell the Gloomy One we all say hi,
- H
Fae sets the letter down, a strange tastelessness settling in her mouth.
"There's not much else I can say in paper." And "waiting and debating"—something is brewing. She chews on the inside of her mouth, the paper twitching in her fingers before she snatches it up and crumples it in her fist.
Skull-bashing, she repeats. I haven't put on armor in months. Haven't thrown a knife in weeks. I just have to sit up here, stuffed in all this finery—
