Thread of Gold

Ch. 15: to bend is to break

"Well," Ryne said. "That went splendidly."

Brigid didn't look at him as she shut the door. The last council members had trickled out into the corridor now, leaving them alone in the round tower.

Ryne used to love the Chamber of Justice. The circular table, the inky blue walls, the smell of burning incense... his father rarely let him attend council meetings growing up, but Ryne had snuck into the chamber at night sometimes to lie on the floor, staring up at the starry ceiling. It was a place of peace. Of promise.

Now he dreaded this room.

Ryne slumped back in his seat. His temples ached where the crown dug into his skin. Or maybe they just ached. Maybe they had been aching since he was fourteen and he had taken a throne that he wasn't ready for.

A throne he didn't deserve.

Especially after his performance at the tavern last night. And then there was his kiss with Anna. That single, disastrous kiss. But he would deal with that later, Ryne thought tiredly. One catastrophe at a time.

"I knew they would hate it," Ryne continued. "But I thought they would at least understand why the succession laws should change. Why they must change." He rubbed his temples. "I didn't expect them to be so unmovable."

Out of the twelve council members, only two had supported changing the succession laws so that Penny would inherit the throne upon his death. Even Dex Beauchamp, whose support Ryne was counting on, had voted not to change the line of succession — although Dex had looked surprised while doing it.

Ryne wasn't sure what to make of that.

Brigid snuffed out the incense. "You must give them time, darling. These things don't happen overnight."

"I don't have time."

"Ryne."

"Well, I don't," Ryne said. "I'm dying. And if the throne doesn't go to Penny, then it will go to Eris. And you know why that would be a political disaster."

Eris Delafort was Ryne's cousin, two years older and sharp as glass. He was also, in Ryne's opinion, a world-class bastard; he could remember Eris proudly showing him his hounds, which his cousin starved until their bones protruded through the skin.

Eris had made Ryne watch as he slaughtered the skinniest pup and then fed it to its mother, laughing as the hound whined and cried and then ate its own child. He had wiped his bloodied hands on his trousers, staining the fabric red.

"Dogs are just like humans." Eris's dark eyes had glinted. "Domesticated savages. They'll do anything to survive."

Ryne swallowed, pushing away the memory.

No.

Eris could not inherit the throne.

"It doesn't matter." Brigid took a seat. "You will grow well again. Whatever this sickness is, it will pass."

Ryne took off his crown, rotating it in his hands. "I can't work out whether they hate the idea of a woman ruling the kingdom, or whether they hate Penny." Gold flashed in the fading light. "Sometimes, I fear that it's both."

"Your sister isn't a queen. She's impulsive."

"She's brilliant." Ryne knew it for a fact. "And quick on her feet. And she can read people's emotions, which is more than any of us can do."

"Penny is charming," Brigid allowed. "She could coax a man off a cliff if she chose to. But there is more to being a ruler than that."

Ryne frowned. "But yousupport me on this, don't you?" He set the crown on the table. "You promised you would."