The Power and the Glory

Book 2 Chapter XI: Just Desserts

Warning: contains references to rape, victim-blaming, and racism.

People see what they wish to see. And in most cases, what they are told that they see. -- Erin Morgenstern, The Night Circus

When you lived your entire life on the wrong side of the law you always expected it to finally catch up with you. Haliran had a dozen contingency plans in place to slip out of almost any net they tried to catch her in. She had just never expected a betrayal from such an unexpected quarter. She'd spent years making Siarvin totally dependant on her. How could he ever dare to attack her when her downfall would mean his own?

Alas, she'd reckoned without Ilaran. He was even more trouble than his mother had ever managed to be. If she had any hope of getting out of here and staying out she'd have to get rid of him.

Hiring an assassin was impossible when only her immediate family were allowed to visit. Getting one of her children to hire an assassin was if anything even more impossible. None of them had ever shown the necessary backbone for her line of work. She'd tried to keep them in the dark as much as possible just in case they ever turned against her. She hadn't needed to try very hard. It was amazing how people accepted things when they'd known nothing else all their lives. It was just as amazing how they convinced themselves everything was fine in the face of overwhelming evidence to the contrary.

Like everything else in the Silver Palace the prison cells were ridiculously elaborate. They were less "cells" and more "very comfortable rooms", complete with their own adjoining bathrooms. It would be easy to mistake her cell for a hotel room if not for the conspicuous lack of windows, the very thick door that was locked on the outside, and the absence of anything that could be used as a weapon. All of the furniture was bolted to the floor. There was no fireplace, no wall decorations, not even a bookshelf. These cells had been built for noble prisoners, and though they might be fancy they were still obviously prisons.

The walls were unusually thick and insulated to stop sound getting through. Haliran had no doubt the guards outside had devices to hear anything she said, but she couldn't hear a thing. It came as a surprise when she heard someone unbolt the door. It swung open to reveal Luamon outside, next to a guard.

"Fifteen minutes and no longer, mind," the guard said. "I'll open the door again when time's up."

She closed the door and bolted it again. Haliran and Luamon stared at each other in silence for a minute.

"How's your arm?" Luamon asked awkwardly, with an air of not knowing what else to say.

Haliran looked down at the cast around her arm. Whatever else you could say of the palace guards and their unwillingness to be bribed, they at least were conscientious about getting medical attention for an injured prisoner. The pain of the broken bone itself faded into insignificance compared to the humiliation of being so publicly attacked and the triumph of knowing Abihira had confirmed her accusation.

"It will heal soon," she said.

Both of them lapsed into silence again. Luamon opened her mouth, then closed it again without speaking. Haliran waited for her to say whatever she came to say and get it over with.

At last Luamon found the courage to speak. "Is it true? All those things about you and Father?"

There it was. The inevitable question. Haliran was not in the habit of examining her own actions or seeing things from someone else's perspective. She had done what she considered necessary when she forced Siarvin to marry her. Certainly she had never thought of it as rape. If she justified it to herself at all she did it by reminding herself how naïve Siarvin had been. What else could he expect when he was so foolish as to accept a drink from a near-total stranger?