“Wreck. You stay. Everybody else, get out of my sight.”
Wreck is a junior courtier. He has not served long. That is why I trust him. It has become clear that it is time to replace the old guard and bring in the korabi I know. The ones I trained and served with. What they might lack in experience, they make up for in loyalty. At least, that is the theory I am operating under.
“How may I serve you, sire?” He looks at me with those nearly innocent eyes.
“I want the entire court, anybody who served under my father, anybody with allegiance to Tusk, to be transported with him. Their families as well. Next, I want the guards who were on security detail questioned, then put on the same transport. Someone allowed this to happen on their watch. I want to make an example of these korabi. I want those who serve in my court to know that there are consequences for treachery and failure.”
Eight
Jax
There are a lot of ships leaving. The whole palace seems to shake every ten minutes or so with the thrusters of another interstellar bus departing for distant planets. I can see smoke and flame being thrown up from the not-quite-distant-enough launch pad, as Krush sends all his problems to outer space.
I wander freely as nobody seems to care where I am. The palace seems very empty. The chaos of the attack at the choosing ceremony has left a kind of social blast zone in its wake. I have become something of a forgotten element in this palace. Krush remembers me from time to time, but the death of the korabi woman has cast a pall over everything that did not exist before. The death of the king was one thing, but the slaughter of a fecund korabi female indicates a depth of depravity and cruelty which they are all very uncomfortable with. My death would be of no consequence, but she was a high status, beautiful, willing woman. What happened to her was not just brutal, it was cruel.
They are blaming a human for it, though it seems very unlikely to me that a human would kill one of the king’s potential brides for no reason whatsoever. They’re saying she was in a korabi suit, but by that reasoning, it could have been anything inside that suit. We might never know what happened, or why. Hell, if they asked me, which they aren't, seems to me that it’s most likely unrelated to anything happening in the palace, period. Some kind of off-world aggression come to Krush’s court. Whatever it is, he’s using it as an excuse to clean house. Good for him.
“Human!”
Krush is calling for me.
“Where were you?”
He has the royal audacity to look surprised that I wasn’t in his chambers waiting for him.
“Just walking around.”
He gives me a vaguely suspicious look. “Did you get caught so you could infiltrate my palace and…”
“No.”
I say the word swiftly and without letting him finish because I have no intention of being the next person, object, or vegetable he blames for this.
He has been in a foul temper ever since the choosing ceremony. Or maybe since I met him. I know it’s gotten worse since the murder. I suppose he feels responsible.
“And I don't think it was a human.”
“Neither do I.”
“You don’t?”
“Humans perform cowardly attacks from a distance. They do not break into the very heart of an enemy stronghold and carry out a vicious and bold attack.”
“You know humans well,” I say, not meaning a word of it. He underestimates us.
“Megaris was originally of human construction. Your species can always be relied upon to create prisons for itself. You love your petty little rules, your behavioral restrictions, your conventions, your traditions. Humans are born free and then immediately tied in a thousand different ways by the ones who have come before. You are a species which enslaves itself. You are naturally submissive beings begging to be ruled. That is why I sit on this throne, while your people beg for my mercy.”
“You really hate humans.”
“I hate many things. Perhaps even most things. I hate traitors most of all.”
“Do you hate me?”
He looks at me as if the question does not quite register. “Of course not. I love you.”
I am absolutely shocked by his blurtation. Is that a word? Should be. He blurted out a flirtation which makes absolutely no sense.
“You love me?”
“I love you.” He says it simply, as if I should accept those words at their face value and question them no deeper.
He expects me to swoon, and to feel human gratitude for his comment of affection. But truthfully, he just pissed me off. First, he tells me that humans are pathetic. Then he tells me that he loves me.
“What is my name?”
He stares at me, as if I just asked him the meaning of life.