The people on the streets don’t disperse yet. They want to watch this macabre parade since most of them probably never get to see their own royals, let alone ones from neighboring kingdoms. They watch as I’m led down from the portico and across the plaza. They call my name as I pass by the empty sarcophagus on my way to my carriage, its blue flags the only disruption in the endless array of Fifth’s purple.
Manu and Keon follow me inside, and the way is painstakingly slow and bumpy as we travel back to the castle. I keep the tranquil expression on my face as I turn toward the window, hand lifted in a wave to the people we pass who shout my name. They all want a glimpse of me. Most of them talk about my late husband, who died most suddenly, which is amusing since I haven’t thought of him since the moment I watched his body drift out to sea.
That’s the way I prefer it.
Finally, once we enter the castle’s walls, I let the placid expression fall from my face, dropping the curtain of the carriage window before I sit back against the seat with a sigh. “What a horrible way to pay homage. I don’t know what the people of Fifth were thinking, creating something as dull and grotesque as that. Their traditions are far inferior to ours.”
“Most boring thing I’ve ever had to sit through in my life,” Manu says, kicking his feet out as far as he can stretch in the cramped carriage space. “Can you imagine dying a horrific and very public death, just for the kingdom to stuff you up on a corpse stage for everyone to see your decaying body? All while everyone is trying to get a look at your carcass, bored out of their minds while they listen to a bunch of old men ring bells and sing wordlessly for three hours straight.” He shudders. “Their singing voices were the real tragedy here.”
Keon gives him a sidelong glance, but I let out a throaty laugh.
“So, sister,” he says, turning his attention to me. “Gather anything interesting?”
He’s talking about my power, of course. He knows very well that any time I’m in a public setting, or even a private one, I’m always using my magic. I let it delve out, like a bee seeking pollen. Voices constantly buzz in my head, and I gather the ones I want, collecting them to use whenever I please.
“It’s nothing we didn’t already know,” I admit. “Niven was only well loved because he was a born-prince and still young. But now, that’s all changed. They act as if he was their beloved child prince, and they’ve readily accepted that Lady Auren must’ve tricked Ravinger into killing him, or she poisoned him herself.”
“Good,” Keon says, his rumbling voice always held at an octave lower than my brother’s. “Although I suspect now we’ll never know whether he was poisoned or rotted. The state of his body…”
I can’t help but wrinkle my nose, once again remembering the grotesque veins that ran through his skin, the bulging eyes, the frothing mouth…
“Yes, his corpse was not a pretty picture,” Manu says as he fiddles with the silvery buttons down his vest. The cream fabric is fabulously embroidered with subtle waves, the only pop of color coming from the cerulean blue cravat tufted at his neck.
If only I’d been able to get Midas’s secret notebook. We searched everywhere in his rooms for it, had my own personal decipherer on standby, but we never found it. It’s probably tucked away beneath his shirt, now gilded with the rest of him.
Useless.
For a moment, we ride in silence, but even when no one is actively talking, I’m always listening to the whispers that my power has wrapped up tight in my mind.
“You’ve prepped Hagan?” I ask Manu.
“Of course. We’ve been over the coronation many times. He knows what to do.”
“Perfect.”
Everything is falling into place.
All our plans are going to go off without a hitch. We feed the information, I monitor the rumors, we’ve handpicked the heir, and soon, Fifth Kingdom will be settled, and I can focus on Sixth. It’s been running rampant without a monarch to rule it. The city of Highbell has been ransacked, the nobles have all fled. I need to get there soon, before people with magic try to claim the throne for themselves. I’m surprised they haven’t already.
When the carriage comes to a stop, I fix my skirts just before the footman holds the door open for us to descend. As soon as I stand in front of the castle, my eyes rove over the front where the splashes of solidified gold still mar it. The carpenters had to work night and day to fit a new set of doors to the entrance and drag away the incredibly heavy old ones by hacking them up into pieces. The new set looks light and out of place amongst the old gray stonework, even more so with the gold that’s clawed its way out, its tendrils hooked onto the castle’s walls and front steps.