The War of Two Queens (Blood and Ash 4)

I looked away, inhaling deeply.

Sven shook his head in disbelief. “You kept this a secret for years—hundreds of years.”

Father nodded.

“This kind of information is imperative,” Aylard continued after clearing his throat. “It changes what we know about the Blood Crown. It’s not just power they want.”

Sven nodded. “It’s revenge.”

Emil let out a low, muffled whistle from Kieran’s other side. “This is awkward,” he murmured.

I had to agree with him.

“And whether or not our Queen kept this information from us due to respect or not is irrelevant. No offense meant, Your Majesties,” Aylard said. Slowly, my attention shifted back to him. My hand resting on Poppy’s hip stilled. “You knew she was virtually a god and chose to keep us in the dark while you planned to send our armies to deal with her? That is something we needed to know.”

Poppy straightened. “I will deal with Isbeth. None of our armies will.”

“That’s beside the point!” Aylard exclaimed. “You have no right—”

“Careful,” I warned.

Kieran lowered his glass to the table as he fixed his stare on the Atlantian general. “I have a feeling that things are about to get more awkward,” he said under his breath to Emil.

Emil snorted.

“I would suggest you think very long and hard about what you believe you have the right to say to my Queen.” I held the Atlantian’s gaze. “Before you speak again. Or you will discover fairly quickly how your King responds when you offend your Queen. Fair warning, it will likely be the last thing you do for quite some time.”

Aylard’s complexion became mottled as he looked away, his posture unnaturally stiff.

“All of you are right. And you’re also wrong,” I said, after I was sure that Aylard had gotten my message. “It does change what we know. It changes the history of our kingdom. But it doesn’t change the future. The Blood Crown still needs to be destroyed, and the war ended. That is what we need to be focusing on now. That is all.”

Across from us, the wolven general leaned into Hisa, whispering, and then looked at Father. “Agreed,” Damron said. “So, I think we all know why she wants Malec.”

“We do, and we don’t,” Poppy said as I gently squeezed her hip. “Obviously, there are personal reasons. She still loves him, but she also believes that he will be able to give her what she wants.”

“Atlantia?” Damron figured.

“The destruction of Atlantia,” Poppy corrected softly. Low curses followed. “She believes that he will be able to remake the realms as one. That is her ultimate plan.”

Father’s brows shot up. “There’s no way he would be of any assistance to her.” He looked to Poppy. “We know that he cannot be in a good state.”

“We do.” Poppy tucked a stray piece of hair back from her face. “That’s the part that doesn’t make sense. But you remember what Framont said—the Priest in Oak Ambler? We were right about who he believed the True King to be. It’s Malec. But what we don’t know is how or why Isbeth thinks he will be able to do anything for her.”

As Poppy spoke, I watched Malik for any hint that he would bring up the prophecy or any of the parts about Poppy being the Harbinger. He didn’t. Yet.

“But he would be able to recover eventually,” Vonetta said from where she sat, the chair Poppy had sat in empty between us. “Wouldn’t he?”

Father nodded. “He would need to feed a lot, and I imagine it would take time. At that point, even once he recovered, there’s no telling what mental state he’d be in or what he might do.”

I sent Naill a curt nod, and he rose, along with Emil. They quietly nudged Malik from his seat, escorting him from the chamber. Malik may have agreed to aid us in defeating the Blood Crown, and he may already know what we planned when we returned with Malec, but he didn’t need to know any of the details. I trusted him to a point, but I wasn’t a fool.

“But we won’t allow that time to transpire,” I informed them once Malik was gone. Our father’s jaw had hardened with Malik’s departure, but he remained quiet. “We will do as she asks and bring her Malec, but only to lift the curse she placed on Kieran and to draw her out of Carsodonia. She will not get a chance to use Malec in any way. When we meet with her in two weeks, we will end this war, once and for all.”

All the generals listened intently as Damron said, “I’m liking the sound of that.”

The discussion of how we would take Carsodonia went rather smoothly, considering how it had begun, mainly because Aylard was practicing his shut-the-fuck-up rule of life. Plans were made to call Murin and La’Sere in from the surrounding cities. Cyr was too far out in Oak Ambler. There was no time for us to reach him and for the general to join us, but word would be sent to him anyway. We talked over what we could of how we planned to lay siege to Carsodonia, doing so with the knowledge that we had to be fluid in those plans—plans we would also need to include the draken in on when they returned from their flight.