I sipped my beer and winced at the bitter taste.
“Ugh.”
“Hasn’t gotten better with time, huh?”
“No.”
And yet, I took another sip. I wasn’t sure how something could taste so good and so bad at once.
“So.” He took another swig of beer. “It’s been quite awhile since you had a nighttime patrol out here. How’d it go?”
I knew a leading question when I heard one. The way Raihn was watching me out of the corner of his eye as he drank his beer told me enough.
My eyes narrowed.
His brow raised.
I leaned across the table.
He leaned back against the bench, hands behind his head.
“If I didn’t know better,” he said, “I’d say that expressive face of yours is accusing me of something.”
“What happened out here?”
“What do you mean?”
Oh, Mother damn him. He was playing with me.
“You know what,” I said. “It’s…”
“Quiet,” he provided. “Peaceful.”
“There’s no one to kill.”
He chuckled and leaned closer, his face only a few inches from mine, and murmured, “You sound so disappointed, my murderous queen.”
My gaze fell to his mouth as he said that—fell to the little smile that curled its edge, something softer and more playfully affectionate than his usual performative smirks.
I knew the way that smile felt against my lips. Knew how it tasted.
This thought struck me without permission, visceral and uncomfortable. Even more uncomfortable than that was the longing that came with it, a sudden, deep pang, like the drawing of a bow across the mournful string of a violin.
I leaned back, putting a few more inches of distance between us.
“No,” I said. “It’s a good thing. It’s just—”
“The place should be filled with criminals by now, since you, the heroic savior of the human districts, have been a little distracted.”
I glowered, because I knew he was teasing me, but nodded anyway. “Yes.”
He took an aggressively casual sip of beer. “Has it occurred to you that maybe the human districts now have another protector?”
“You?” I didn’t bother to hide my disbelief. “What, you’re telling me that you sneak out here every night to go inflict vigilante justice on these poor bastards?”
On one hand, it was ridiculous. Raihn was the Nightborn King, after all—not as if he should have the time to go skulking around in the human districts every night. Then again… was it really any more unbelievable than that person being me?
He set down his mug.
“You’re thinking too small, princess.” His voice was low, like he didn’t want to be heard. “You talk about vigilante justice, but I don’t need vigilante anything anymore. That’s what it means to rule a kingdom. It means the ability to change things.”
The little curl still clung to the corner of his mouth, like a permanent shield, but his eyes were serious. Vulnerable, even.
Realization slowly dawned.
“You—”
“I made the necessary commands and the necessary changes to make sure that the human districts are, and always will be, safe. Yes.”
“How? It was always forbidden to hunt in the human districts, but—”
“But it happened anyway. Why?”
I didn’t answer.
He gave me a sad, knowing look. “Because no one actually cared. Because no one enforced those laws. No one guarded the perimeters after dark. No one punished those who disobeyed. Well… no one except for you.”
A sour knot formed in my stomach. I thought of those districts I would hunt, night after night, always catching at least one more culprit. Thought of what my father had showed me, mere days before he died. All those humans soaked in blood, pinned to the table. Nothing but food.
“You mean Vincent,” I said. “He was happy to just let the human districts be preyed upon.”
Even now, I half expected to hear his voice in my ear—an explanation, a defense, a rebuke. But there was nothing. Not even my imaginary version of my father could justify his choice.
And that’s exactly what it had been. A choice.
Raihn was an unpopular king who had been in power for mere months, all of them tumultuous, and he had still managed to make the human districts far safer than they were before.
Vincent just never cared to. Even with his human daughter, he never cared to.
“Not just Vincent,” Raihn said. “All of them. Neculai was no better.”