Chapter 33

Edam starts swinging his sword around in circles.

“What are you doing?” I ask. “You look silly.” Or he would if Edam could ever look bad.

“I’m warming up,” he says. “Our other main goal today is ferreting out your natural talents and skills so we can develop the right overall strategy. Ready to show me what you can do with a sword when you aren’t busy arguing with your sister?”

Without any further warning, he comes for me, slicing, pulling back, spinning around. He moves so fast I can barely follow him, and I use my left forearm to deflect his strikes as often as my blade. The spray from my last block reaches the chandelier, and I pause for a moment to consider who will clean that up. When I glance back down, Edam almost severs my arm above the wrist. My focus narrows to the present. I really don’t want to regrow an appendage. I hear it’s the worst.

About half an hour in, Edam pauses in his attack and pulls a long knife from his right boot. He tosses it to me and bends over to pull another from his left boot. Before I can ask why he’s given me a second blade, he comes after me again.

Without thinking, I stop using my forearm and begin to use the long knife to deflect his strikes, attacking with the sword one-handed. I struggle through another half hour of attacks and subsequent healing, but my legs quiver like jelly, my right arm throbs, and I practically whimper when Edam calls for a halt.

I sink down to the ground and slump over my own knees. “Am I a lost cause?”

Edam sits across from me and looks me dead in the eye. “Do you trust Inara?”

I bob my head. “Yeah.”

“You need to ask her to send you videos of Judica fighting over the past few months. Your mother trained you in your private courtyard, so no one has ever seen you, aside from that debacle with Lark and the one match with your twin, but Judica trained in the arena. There are security feeds in there that anyone with top level clearance can access. Larena, Balthasar, Inara. You would have access too, if you were still home. If we can get those files, you can learn how Judica fights. Instead of me telling you she favors her left arm and her right leg, you can watch how she pulls back on kicks with her left. How she pauses before striking from her right with a sword. We have to focus on every single weakness, because you’re going to need to exploit them all if you want any hope of surviving this. And we have to watch the fight the two of you had that last morning, because that will also be invaluable.”

“I’ll call and ask Inara, but even without videos, I improved a little today, right?”

Edam sighs. “She’d kill you in under two minutes if you fought her tomorrow.”

Ouch. “Still that bad? Really?”

He averts his eyes.

I jump up and start to pace. “Why are we even wasting our time, then?” Tears well up in my eyes. Can I get prey cheeks from crying too much? If so, I’m sure to have them soon. Maybe my only real choice is to abdicate. It certainly feels easier. Would Mom want her murderer to rule? Maybe she would, since it’s her daughter.

But Mom chose me. I’m so confused.

“I want to help you, Chancery. I’m on your side.” He clenches his fists. “Even if I didn’t decide to be myself.”

“I’m sorry about that,” I say. “Yesterday flew past at a million miles per hour. It seemed like the right thing to do. I guess I should’ve known you’d be fine without my intervention. With your history, Judica wouldn’t really have killed you, but I swear that didn’t occur to me in the moment.” I doubt Edam can hear my last words, they’re so quiet. “I was bleeding out last night. I wasn’t thinking straight.”

“Actually with our history, she might have gone through with it. We’ll never know.” Edam stands up and grabs my hand, turning me to face him. “If you’d asked me, I’d have chosen to come with you. If I were a better person, I’d have realized that sooner and spent less time sulking about it. You need help, and you’re a good person. You didn’t deserve my temper tantrum.” He squeezes my hand quickly and then releases it. “With everything that happened to you yesterday, I shouldn’t have gotten upset. Forgive me.”

My heart picks up the pace. It’s hard to look at him without that happening, but this time it’s not about his face. It’s about his words. “Thank you.”

“I’m going to say something now and I want you to think about it,” he says. “Don’t dismiss it out of hand. And try not to get offended.” He tugs me back down to the ground and sits across from me. He looks right into my eyes. “You have a big decision to make, and you can probably guess that I don’t want to be exiled. I’m evian down to my bones. I would hate living away from our people, but that’s not why I’m offering this, I swear that to you. I really think you’d make a better ruler than Judica. I think your mom realized that and it’s why she changed the documents. I don’t know exactly what’s going on in your head, but I’ve spent a lot of time with your sister.”

A tear slides down my cheek, and then another. I can’t seem to stop it, not this time. And it’s not even about my mom, not specifically. It’s Edam’s words, his faith in me. He’s the first person to say that I’d be a better ruler without knowing about my reaction to the dumb ring.

He scoots over until he’s sitting right next to me. He pulls my head over on his shoulder. “I’m sorry,” he says. “I don’t know if I’ve told you that. There’s never a good time to lose your mom, trust me, but that had to be the worst timing in the world.”

I’m not sure how long I cry on his arm, but eventually I stop and lift my head. I slide far enough away that I can look at him again without craning my neck.

“Sorry to interrupt your tough love moment.” I hiccup. “What was your point? I’m ready to hear it.”

He offers me a half smile. “This is going to seem strange, but like I said, think about it before you turn me down. It’s an option you might not have considered or even known about. Right now you’re contemplating two very different paths: either abdicate and live with Alora as a human, or return and fight your twin to the death. If you win, you become Empress.”

He doesn’t say I’m unlikely to win. We both know that already.

“Okay,” I say. “That sounds right.”

“Here’s where I need you to remember not to get upset. I think you’ll be a good ruler, I really do. You may not have been trained as the Heir, but you spent every waking moment with one of the best evian rulers of all time. You surely learned principles of justice and mercy and when to apply each. You had to have learned about warcraft and political management, even if what you learned was only high level from watching your mother. You can be taught the basic elements quickly because you’ve seen them all in application. I have no doubt you can handle Alamecha’s affairs and do a fine job. You told me before it seems silly to choose a Security Chief based on his combat prowess. Similarly, it seems barbaric that our ultimate ruler is sometimes chosen by a duel to the death.”

I agree. It’s the dumbest method possible to choose someone who will dictate the order of the world, but it’s always been our way. It’s not like I can change the Charter to make it a history test or a bake off.

“If you go back, you’re going to lose. Judica will kill you easily. I’m going to do my best to improve your skill and teach you to beat her, but I’m not overly optimistic. It’s almost certain that if you return, you’ll die.”

This hardly seems helpful.

He reaches out and takes my hand in his. “Please listen to my point. I’m not trying to hurt your feelings. I’m being honest, and offering you a third option. Choose me as your Consort, marry me, and let me fight her for you. You know I can defeat her, as surely as she can defeat you. Let me do what you can’t, so that you can do what’s right for our people and avenge your mother.”

I’ve imagined the man of my dreams proposing to me a dozen different ways. That is so not how any of them went in my head.