It’s time I learned who is in command. That had been Roden’s message. As much as the Avenian king wanted my land, or the pirates wanted my wealth, they had no control over me . . . yet. But there was someone within reach of my power.
Ask the right questions. Conner told me that. From nearly the moment after I left Conner’s dungeon, something had bothered me about our conversation. But for as often as I’d run his words over in my mind, I hadn’t known what questions I should be asking. Now I did.
Imogen touched my arm. “Jaron, are you all right?”
“No,” I croaked. As if the threat stood right in front of me, my hand locked on to my sword. In that moment, I knew what I had missed in Conner’s dungeon.
And I sank to my knees.
When I’d asked Conner where he had gotten the dervanis oil, Gregor had put his hand on his sword.
“Why would he do that?” I mumbled. “It was only a question. Why would Gregor reach for his sword?”
Imogen shook her head. “What are you talking about?”
Mott had told me that a month before my family’s deaths, my father had become suspicious of the regents and begun requiring them to be searched before they entered the castle walls. Yet Conner got in with the vial of dervanis oil from the pirates.
Ask the right questions.
The question wasn’t where he got the poison. It was how he got inside the castle with it.
Conner had needed help to kill my family. There was a second traitor in my castle.
Conner might not even have realized he had help. The pirates could have easily coordinated with someone else to let Conner pass through.
Only one man would have the authority to allow a regent to enter the castle without being searched. It was the same man who would have allowed the king of Avenia to enter my gates without identifying his attendants as pirates.
Gregor had reached for his sword in the dungeon because in that moment, he thought I knew he was the second traitor. He had expected to need his sword. Against me.
Gregor had known I would be attacked in the gardens. He knew Roden’s message was intended to frighten me into submission, and it allowed Gregor to make a case to the regents that I needed a steward.
And wherever Gregor wanted to send me into hiding, I was willing to wager the pirates knew about that place too.
The pirates didn’t care about killing Conner. His connection to them was already exposed. But Gregor needed him dead, to protect his own involvement in my family’s murders.
In two days, Gregor would have himself declared steward over Carthya. And all that stood between him and success was Tobias, who was, at that moment, pretending to be me. Tobias was in grave danger. And what of Amarinda, who’d be caught in the middle of them both?
I glanced up at Imogen, who looked half-panicked by then. “What’s happening?” she asked.
After standing again, I said, “It’s time to go. Meet me in the stables tonight. One hour after the last light goes out in the camp.”
“Vigils guard the camp.”
“Can you avoid them?”
“Yes.” Imogen paused a moment, then wiped a fallen tear off her cheek. “Thank you, Jaron.”
I nodded back at her and then closed my eyes, trying to piece together everything that would have to happen next. When I opened them again, Imogen was gone.
Fink was already seated when I came to dinner that night. Erick sat across the table and several men down, but Fink scooted aside to make room for me. However, after an unenthusiastic hello, he pushed his bowl forward and laid his head on his hands.
“Sleepy?” I asked. “Didn’t get your afternoon nap?”
“Hush.” Fink’s irritable tone took me by surprise. I thought we had firmly established as a rule of our friendship that I was the cranky one.
“Sit up or they’ll ladle stew onto your head.” He glared at me but obeyed. Then I asked, “What’s the matter?”
Fink snuck a look around to see whether any of the nearby pirates were listening. As if their top priority was eavesdropping on a kid too young to even be considered for piracy. Then he leaned in to me and whispered, “I want to go home.”