I welcome the rest of the liquor burning down my throat. Ruben tenses, but his composure remains granite. He presses his lips together. "We have them imprisoned. The King will determine their execution date shortly. We will notify you."
My grip tightens around the glass at his lie, and I am grateful for the bartender when he tops me up. The pregnant woman weeps, fresh tears spilling. "How can someone be so hateful?" she says, pulling a cloth from her pocket and holding it to her leaking nose. "How can they rob a child of their father?"
Ruben heaves a sigh. "They were thoughtless and selfish."
I resist the urge to crash the glass on his stupid head and resort to kicking him under the bench. He ignores me, placing his hand gently over the lady's trembling one. "We will find you and your child justice, Lily."
She clutches the handkerchief and squeezes her eyes shut. Another tear escapes. The room sways and my muscles grow heavy. A merciful relief despite the acid burning my throat and beneath my skin. Lily drains the rest of her lemonade before trudging back out of the bar, nodding goodbye to Ruben.
He scowls at me. "Don't even try to get angry at me."
"I'm not," I admit with a slur, gripping a fresh glass of gold whiskey. "She's right. I am hateful. I tore a father from their child." A chill slithers into my bones as the raw honesty and reality of my words reverberate around us.
Hateful. The thought rattles around my head with icy resonance, like the chime of the temple bells. Am I hateful? No. I had to save my sister from those Tranqs. We'd both be long rotting beyond the walls now. Sometimes, in the Walls, we must be selfish. I did not enjoy tearing a father away from his child, of course. I know that feeling all too well. Their deaths prowl through my mind with reckless abandon, reminding me how utterly alone I am in this kingdom if it were not for my sister, who I must... I just must protect. Selfishness keeps one alive in this kingdom. It is how we survive here.
"It is quite suffocating in here," Ruben says, downing the last of his drink. "Shall we continue our walk through the streets?"
I nod, thanking the bartender. We stumble out of the bar, dodging the crowds still filling the alleyway and the street. Ruben leads me through the street, lined with various coloured buildings, balconies, and underneath stone arches. Horse hooves clatter in the distance. But carriage wheels do not screech or rattle against the smooth pavement. Hints of aromas waft into my nose, savoury and smoky, and my stomach rumbles in protest. We continue through the streets, until the buildings thin out, and we arrive at a park. In the north of the Concave Sector. Across yet another arched bridge, over a gurgling, bubbling stream, and onto the freshly mowed grass. Evergreen hedges and plants border the grassy field, with bronze park benches dotted across the landscape. Thickets of bright violet flowers shift in the icy breeze. Concave people mingle about. Walking, hands entwined with one another. Children shriek with laughter as they kick a ball between them.
My eyes linger on the water fountain in the centre of the park. A round marble pool, elevated from the grass, with porcelain sculptures of two female figures. Naked and sitting with their backs against each other. One of them wears a necklace with a crescent moon and cries tears of stars. While the other wears a floral headpiece.
"The Goddesses of the Night and the Day," Ruben says, his gaze roving my face, not theirs.
"I know," I say. "Tutella and Ruaris. Two sisters separated by Curos, God of the Earth, who cast a spell on the planet, making it so the sisters could only perform their duties without each other."
"So, they do teach you of the legends in Convex schools."
"Pig. You know our school system is basically non-existent," I say, rolling my eyes. "If it weren't for my mother, I wouldn't have even learned to read."
We leave the sculptures behind, stepping onto a narrow path leading us to the furthest end of the park. Sparse trees welcome us. With bony limbs, stripped bare of their leaves for the winter. Sodden brown leaves coat the forest floor, crunching under our boots. A sickly-sweet smell clings to the air and the frost clings to the trees. We lose the path in our wake, moving deeper.
My instincts drive to the forefront of my mind as the forest becomes merely an endless plain of white and brown. Where is he taking me?
"My father is trying to drink himself to death," Ruben says suddenly.
We step over another narrow stream, crunching fallen twigs beneath us. I raise an eyebrow.
"He is afraid." His voice sounds like a molten night sky. "My father is afraid of being alone."
I swallow the lump in my throat. "How?"
"The Convex people are festering in their suffering. Any spark of hope, any brave act of defiance, such as yours, is an opportunity for them to muster their courage collectively."
"He has agreed to cover it up, though, hasn't he?" I draw in a gulp of air as we reach an open alcove of trees. The Goddess of the Day spills her canary sunlight into the clearing, glinting off the patches of old snow like a thousand stars.
"Yes. But a scared, hateful king has never fared well in the history books. With the growing tensions outside the kingdom, he will want the Tranqs to tighten things in the Convex villages."
I shake my head. "What are the growing tensions?"
His shoulders tense and he tightens his jaw. "The outsiders want our resources, Elle." He pauses, running his finger along his shirt collar. "When our ancestors began building the city walls, they chose a piece of earth with the healthiest soils. Insane levels of carbon dioxide deposits poisoned most of the planet's soil or ravished by the blight. The outsiders are starving and angry. We have been hoarding the good soil within the walls for the last 150 years."
"So, they're threatening to invade us, right?"
Ruben leans against a bare tree trunk. "He's haunted by the threats of outside the kingdom and within."
"Who are the outsiders, Ruben?" I pace back and forth in the clearing. My chest swells with anxiety, scorching and demanding my attention. "Are they the monsters?"
He flinches at my use of his name but grinds his teeth.
"Can you not tell me?" I press.
"No, Elle," he snaps, stuffing his hands into his pockets. "I am not even sure who they are. I have only heard the few things my father has told me."
I cross my arms. "Fine. Then can you tell me what you mean by tightening up the Convex Sector?"
He hangs his head, refusing to meet my eye. "We will have to increase surveillance again. There will be more exiles. More demand from the farmers to provide for the Concaves, or further punishments and torture."
Panic slithers around my throat, like a snake, sinking its poison-dripping fangs into my flesh. Before he can react, I yank a knife from my belt, lurch forward, and press the blade against his throat. A string of startled curses falls from his lips. His nose flares. But as the blood slips from his face and utter terror sinks into his eyes, the fire pulses through my veins with the ferocity of the wildfires my father used to battle in his youth, during the summer.
"You're a coward," I say through gritted teeth.
"What the hell?" he seethes, shadows billowing around him. The night itself. The darkness between the stars.
I snort, shaking my head. The sharp tip of the blade presses into his delicate skin. His Adam's apple trembles. "You're full of shit. Acting as if you care about me, about the Convex. But it's nothing but an act to protect your ego, to help you sleep better at night. Show me you actually care, Prince."
He grunts. "You're drunk." The breeze blows the loose strings of my hair into his face.
"And you're a fool."
He lets out a low laugh that makes my bones shudder and tingle. "I don't make the rules around here, darling."
"Yet you blindly follow them." A droplet of crimson oozes from his flesh, and my blade glints like the bared fangs of a venomous creature in moonlight. "Nothing but a pawn in his little game."
His lip curls into a sneer, a feral glint in his reddening face. "Then you should have had better aim when you tried to kill me. Hateful little creature."
"Coward." I spit the word at him, hoping hits him in the gut. But my voice cracks, betraying me. My arm weakens and I lower the knife, stumbling backwards.
He gasps, holding his throat. "I am not your enemy, Elle."
"An enemy wouldn't force me into marriage or into their king's guard," I say, scrunching my fists, feeling the embarrassment as my words pepper our ears. He did save my sister... I think.
He scoffs and clicks his tongue, shadows gathering into the jade of his eyes, and the grooves of his face. "Ungrateful, hateful creature," he growls, stalking back out of the clearing the way we came. "I saved your life."
Okay. Fine. He's right. But somehow, it just isn't enough. Not with the population of skeletons across the river. If the prince can't demand justice for those in utter despair, how can the rest of us have any real hope of seeing change in our lifetime?
"But what are you doing about the humanitarian crisis across the river, Ruben?" My voice is low, drenched in disdain. "Nothing."
He flares his nostrils, face darkening. But he doesn't speak.
I roll my eyes. "Are you going to tell me why you brought me out here?"
He pauses, throwing a smirk over his shoulder. My blood boils. "There is a stream up ahead." He inclines his head past me. "In the warmer months, when I need somewhere to escape, to think without the king breathing down my neck, I come here. I thought you might want to know of the place in case you need to do the same in the years to come."
Years.
Ruben brushes past me, and I fall into step behind him. Sure enough, a bubbling stream materialises from behind a wall of bushes and naked trees. A school of tiny grey fish dart upstream. Snow coats the rocks and surrounding plants, freezing some of the water on the shore. It crunches as we step onto it, cracking like shards of glass.
"My mother used to bring me down here as a child. She taught me to swim and read me stories." He smiles fondly, sitting on the edge of a frosty boulder. "Sometimes, I think her spirit still lingers here."
My eyes suddenly spring with tears, and I blink them away. I sit next to him. "What happened to her?"
He heaves a sigh, running a hand through his hair. "She died of pneumonia."
A cool heaviness settles into my chest and I blow out my cheeks. "I'm sorry."
His eyes flick towards the treeline and I know there is more to the story. But I don't push it.
"I know my father let her die. They never got along. Forced marriage by my grandfather."
I fumble for the right words to say but find silence settles into my chest, permeating the room with its airy warmth. Somehow, the only sliver of comfort I can accept. A vague memory of the announcement of the queen's death floats into the recesses of my foggy childhood memory. My heart twists and a lump swells in the back of my throat.
"She asked me to say her eulogy at her funeral. To tell a memory. Or simply to utter the words I love you, mother. Anything. She just wanted her child to honour her. As anyone would, knowing that the king would try to erase your memory before your spirit even arrived at Netaris, the God of Souls." He sucked in a breath, hanging and clicking his tongue as if the words sting his mouth. "I didn't show up. Too afraid to face the reality of her death. Instead, I came here to cry until my father sent the Tranqs searching for me later that night. I was barely ten."
I can almost hear his heart thumping against his ribs. The surrounding trees sigh and a black bird swoops across the stream, slicing the air between us. I feel the brush of air beneath its beating wings. My vision glazes over as I lazily watch the bird perch on a low-hanging branch, cocking its head.
"Are you going to tell me something about yourself?" Ruben says, almost a growl. Demanding. But laced with the embarrassment of the realisation he might have spoken too much.
"What do you want to know?" The little black bird bursts into song, locking its eyes with mine, before darting into the shadows with such purposeful, knowing energy, as if it knows the language of the darkness between the stars.
"Anything. As you said, I know nothing about you other than the fact you have a terrible shot with throwing knives." He grins, chuckling.
The sound stirs something warm in my chest and I want to bottle up the feeling forever. I stifle a laugh. "Well, my father is the reason I believe in love. That people can be good, expecting nothing in return." Heat fills my cheeks and I want to leap to my feet and run.
Ruben leans back, placing his hands flat on the rock. "I doubt he would have liked me much," he says wryly.
I roll my eyes, revelling in the feeling of the fresh air playing with my hair, flecked with the scent of moss and the muskiness of the earth. A smile creeps across my face as I pluck the last blooming flower from the foliage, twirling the stem between my fingertips. "He went to secret meetings every night. Told me he was trying to find a solution to the blight. Every night, he would come home with a bundle of flowers from the forest for my mother. He used to make Lyra and I giggle till we forgot about our empty bellies."
Ruben shakes his head, drawing an indecipherable pattern into the frost, his fingers turning pink. "Trust a commoner to have more class and compassion than a king."
"Strange what having nothing can do to a person." A bite of panic sinks into my gut, along with the urge to flee pinpricking my bones. I want to scold myself for the ember growing and burning in my chest.
"What happened to them?" he asks, clearing his throat. "Your parents." A genuine question, coming from a place of concern, not judgment, and yet, I still cannot bring myself to release the blade of resentment embedded in my gut. The ember within me catches alight into an untamed blaze and sweat springs to my forehead. I taste nothing but bitterness and any merry feelings vanish into the wind.
"Your father killed them." Then I stand and march away, back towards the park.