"The night my family died, I pulled a knife from my boot and slit the throat of the guard restraining me. Then I tackled the man who shot my mother, slamming his head back against the marble floor again and again. All I could think about was how only moments before we'd been dancing across the stone that was now slippery with their blood. So I made him into just another bloodstain, another broken body. By the time they pulled me off of him, his skull was caved in, pieces of brain and bone peppering my clenched white knuckles."

"And like you, I still have dreams about it," I say softly. "I remember the sound of his scull cracking like an egg and I smile, because it felt so damned good. I want to rain down hellfire on those who destroyed my world, Roze, but everything is so tangled up now that I'm not even sure who that is. Sholu? My own family? The Vasayaste? Shikkah? Myself? Who's guilty here and who's innocent? Sometimes I don't even care; I think, I'll just kill them all and be done with it."

I chuckle darkly, meeting his eyes. I don't know what I want him to do- rear back and agree that, yes, I'm a monster? Cradle my face in his hands again and deny it all? I know which option is safer, but I also know that I want to feel that gentle touch one more time, because in that moment I almost believed that I was human again. That I could choose who I wanted to be instead of becoming who they made me, my family and Sholu both.

"So, you see, the stories they whisper about me behind my back are true. I'm the mad dog of the dimaraste. I'm Sholu's little tiger girl. I'm insanity and rage in a silk dress, and I won't apologize for that. I won't pretend, not even for you and your sad eyes, Roze Marithan. I'm not a bird with a broken wing you need to save. I'm not your dead sister. I am Sholu Verlaina's death, and if you ever get between me and my revenge, I won't just leave you with a scar. I'll take your life. I'll take everything."

You are everything, Sholu's voice whispers in my ear caressingly. I shiver with both desire and disgust. And I wait for Roze to turn and walk away from me, because I'm vile and broken and proud and headstrong and I'm making a scene. I came here to ask for his help, and here I am, showing him all the reasons why he shouldn't get within fifty feet of me. Smart, O'otani. Way to stay in control of the situation and yourself.

But he doesn't leave. He just stands there, head cocked, watching me before finally saying "you really believe all of that, don't you?"

"You don't?" I return, incensed. "You think you know me better than I know myself, that I couldn't contain such violence, such savagery, because I'm a five-foot four woman who was raised as a princess?"
"I believe that within that tiny body, there's rage enough to end worlds. Sholu was drawn to you for a reason."
I look away, tears stinging my eyes. Why the fuck am I crying? Because, I realize with a self-deprecating laugh, I did want him to deny it. To tell me I'm nothing like that mad bastard. I wanted his fealty to be disbelief.
"But that's not all," he whispers, reaching out and wiping a tear from my cheek with his finger. Before he speaks next, he brings it to his lips, tasting my sorrow. I shudder at the intimacy of the act. Somehow that small taste is just as carnal as Sholu moving inside of me hours before.

"Because the people who can end worlds, O'otani? They're the same people who can create better ones. Because in your eyes I also see a love so unselfish, so boundless, it humbles me."

I flinch. His kind words hurt more than if he had just cursed me.

"O'otani," he continues, my name rolling off of his tongue like a term of endearment, "you are vicious, and maybe a little cruel, but you aren't him. He wants power above everything, wants to control everyone around him like pieces on a chess board, and you? You want to save a life. You sacrifice, and no one else sees it, but it still matters. You still matter. You still have choices. Don't let him take that away from you, too."

"There is no letting him," I mutter, savage tears pooling in my eyes. "He gets what he wants. He always gets what he wants."

"Not this time. Not you," Roze returns, eyes steely with determination and something I desperately want to believe is truth. "He doesn't get you."

"So what? You'll stand against him? You'll protect me?" I ask. I mean to sound derisive, but the absurd, desperate hope in my words ruins the effect. It's just me reaching out to him, pleading. Stand against him. Protect me.
"I'll do what I can to keep you sane," he promises, stroking my hair like I'm a child. And I let him, because I've gone mad enough to believe that this confession might become my redemption instead. "And I'll help you when I can. I know it's not enough, but at least it's something," he tells me, eyes soft but teeth gritted. A strange dichotomy, as idealistic as he is vicious. "However, all of that is contingent upon you promising to do the same. Keep yourself sane. Help yourself."

"Gee, why didn't I think of that?" I snark, but I don't move my head away from his damned hand. It's comforting, and after last night, I desperately need to be comforted. Sholu did far worse than take my innocence: he suggested that neither my family nor I had any to begin with. If he'd just stripped me of my clothes, I wouldn't be this weak in front of a near stranger. But he stripped me of my illusions instead, telling me every single truth I never wanted to hear like it was some kind of shitty magic trick.

As much as I'd like to deny it, he shook me to my core. And all he had to do was hold up a well-placed mirror. I saw for myself that the bedrock truths I'd built my reality and self around were as flimsy as the mica that makes the Shikkan sand glitter so brilliantly. Beautiful, but thin, and far too weak to build on.

And that was where I'd erected my most sacred temple, believing the foundation eternal. My self-righteousness was a birthright, my family a pantheon. And me? I was a warrior.

I snort at my own foolishness. I was a child. A ridiculous, naive child. And I'm not sure I'm any better now.

"Roze," I say seriously, "don't ask me to stop fighting him. Don't tell me it'll go better for me if I give in. Don't tell me to content myself with lying by the hearth at his feet like a damned animal!"

"If you think for a moment I'd ever tell you such a thing, my queen, you obviously don't know me."

"You're right. I don't know you at all," I agree, leaning back and studying him. Putting space between us as I desperately try to re-establish boundaries. But each step I take back is one he takes forward. If Sholu did it, it would be a threat, yet Roze seems completely unaware that he's shifting towards me. It's like we're being acted upon by the same indominable gravity. Like we're meant to occupy the same space and our bodies are just now realizing it.

"Let me introduce myself to you, then. I'm the good man who tried to kill you last week." My bark of a laugh surprises us both. "And I'm the man offering you help when you need it the most, despite my better judgement. So tell me why you barged into my room and interrupted my reading, dizsariza. It had better be good; I'd just gotten to the best part of my novel when you came crashing in."

I realize with a flash of insight that the easy intimacy we've inexplicably tumbled into disturbs him, too. At the very least, he's suspicious of it, so he's removed his hand from my hair and stepped back. The depth of sadness in his eyes is replaced by an amused glint, and I know he's doing me a favor by using humor to rebuild portions of the crumbling walls between us. I almost thank him for it aloud; I'm not settled in myself right now, and I feel like I'm in danger of sliding too far into someone else if they just show me genuine concern. I don't know what to do with kindness without an agenda.

My eyes flicker over to the ornate side table where a small red book lies haphazardly on top of various odds and ends. A knife, some coins, a luck knot, a screw, a handkerchief, and stray buttons are strewn about, some fallen to the floor. And then I notice the title printed in elegant script along the spine of the novel, and all thoughts of sundry odds end abruptly.

"That is what you were reading this morning?" I ask incredulously, trying and failing to stifle my laugh. Then I stop trying; it feels good to laugh. Why the fuck should I keep silent? What is he going to do? I'm the queen, after all.

"Yes," he shrugs. "What of it?"

"The Fall of Lady Uluna?" I ask, my brows raised so high they must be touching my hairline. I pick up the book and thumb through its pages until I find where he's hastily folded a corner down. Something tells me that he wouldn't have used a bookmark even if he hadn't been suddenly interrupted. Roze might be a Shikkan lord, but he's as carelessly messy as a child. It shouldn't be endearing, but it is.

My eyes quickly scan the text, a hunter looking for blood. It doesn't take long. For a second it's hard to get out the scandalous words, but after the first few fall from my lips like rain drops heralding a downpour, I'm reading with more zeal than I ever have before. If my tutors could see me now, they'd be delighted, albeit not with the subject matter.

"'Then Thero took her in his arms and pressed her against him with sudden violence. His mind lost, he only knew that he needed her closer, needed to tear down every barrier between them until skin met skin and their two hearts beat as one. She was wilder than he expected, writhing beneath his dexterous touch as he ripped the bodice of her gauzy silk dress down to give himself access to her delicious breasts. He smiled as he tongued her pert nipple, knowing then that she'd deny him nothing as surely as he knew his own name.'"

I stop my dramatic reading, snapping the book shut, my own chest heaving in laughter. "Lord Ambroz Marithan, have you no shame? This is what you call appropriate reading material?"

He shrugs, unperturbed. "I never said it was appropriate, and anyways, you're the one who gave the impromptu performance like some bard spouting off lines from an epic. Did you like the book, O'otani?"

"Of course not! That's absurd. It's prurient."

"And you're the very picture of a modest Shikkan Lady, right?" he asks mockingly, eyes glittering. "And anyways, passion freely given and returned isn't prurient. The dimaraste was so bloodless it's a wonder any of the men got hard enough to reproduce."

It's a throwaway comment, a joke, but he's sorely misjudged his audience. I explode into motion, driven by devotion and guilt in equal parts, and by the time his laughter dies in his throat I have his own knife pressed against it. I walk forward, pushing him back until he hits the wall, mirroring the way he threatened me in the hall of portraits.

"I just want you to listen," I snarl, his words in my mouth. "They were not bloodless. They were vital and bright and loving and complicated and everything else people can be. I know that because they are my blood, and because I watched them bleed out on the cold floor while I waited for my own death to come for me. It never did. But if you ever mock my family again, if you dare disrespect their memory, I'll make sure yours comes to you. I will cut your throat and tell my husband it was self-defense. Do you understand, you slutty vasayastisi?"

If I expected fear, I'm sorely disappointed. He's laughing so hard he can barely breathe, his throat bouncing against the knife with enough force to draw a thin necklace of blood. "Slutty vasayastisi?" he repeats incredulously. "Are you sure you haven't mistaken me for Rillian Aidha?" His amusement makes me feel ridiculous, so I drop the knife and step back, breathing hard.

"I'm sure of nothing but my mistakes," I admit. His eyes soften; I resent that. It makes my eyes soften, too.

"Then don't make another one by confusing me with an enemy, O'otani."

"But I'm so good at it!" I snap, my ire directed entirely at myself. "I'm always mistaking friends for enemies and enemies for friends, aren't I? This morning I woke up in the arms of the man who orchestrated my family's murder. Last night I let him play my body like an instrument. What right do I have to call you a slutty vasayastisi when I'm nothing but the conqueror's whore?" I seethe.

"Did you choose him because you truly wanted him? Or did you choose to immerse yourself in the solidity of a physical connection because your loneliness and pain was momentarily unendurable?"

I actually stumble back, stunned. "How did you-?

"Do you know why I like romances?" He asks, sidestepping my question.

"Lady Uluna's heaving bosom, I presume."

"I'm an ass man."

"Why, then?" I question, ignoring the urge to laugh madly at his comment. Will I do everything madly from now on? Perhaps I always have and I'm just now realizing it. That uncomfortable possibility gives my next words some bite. "Oh, I get it. It's Thero's long, hard cock."

If I'd said as much to one of my cousins, there'd have been a fight. Even mild-mannered Riva would've demanded a pound of flesh if I'd insinuated that he was- that he wanted- that. I'm dimly aware that I'm provoking him, trying to skew the balance of power back in my direction. His comment about why I chose Sholu made me feel too transparent, and there is no blindness greater than rage. I'd rather deal with the man who knocked Sholu out than the insightful, unpredictable vasayastisi in front of me.

My claws don't seem to draw blood, though, merely an amused chuckle, and damn it, I like the sound of that laugh more than I should.

Fucking slutty vasayastisi.

"It's because they're simple," he tells me. "There are finite rules. The heroine might be in danger, but she will never die. The hero might be a proper beast, but her love will soften him into a man. The distance between the lovers might seem impassable, but by the last page, they'll be in perfect harmony."

"It's a world where it's safe to give in to whatever madness is inside of you, knowing the worst that can happens is you fuck or get fucked. But people like us?" he asks, watching me with an almost predatory intensity. "Real people who have lived and loved and lost, who are haunted and hunted and hated and burning beneath the weight of their own madness? When we let go, it is never so simple. And there is usually blood."

"That's not the worst that can happen," I say coolly. "Fucking or getting fucked has an awful habit of perpetuating bloodlines. That is neither safe nor finite." I meet his eyes, let him see the emotion in mine though the honesty feels dangerous somehow.

"If I have Sholu Verlaina's child, I'm fucked. I can't soften him into a man; I do not love him, but he knows what I love, and he'll use it against me. Our child will not be the exception to that rule. The second they draw breath, both of us will be handed a life sentence, with him as the jailor. He'll have a way to control me for the rest of my unnatural life. There will be no pitched battles, no great war. Only a numb silence." I pause, letting the last cacophonic notes of my speech fade from the air before continuing on."That's why I came here today. I need someone to get me herbs so that I can ensure that never happens."

He levels a suspicious gaze at me. "Are you asking me to help you poison the king of Shikkah, O'otani?"

"I thought you had no king," I say, and he smiles.

"And if I get you your precious herbs, soon the rest of Shikkah won't have a king, either. You must know you won't be his heir," Roze announces. "The Vasayaste will tolerate you at his side and in his bed. Once he is gone, they're more likely to take your head than bend their knees."

"It's not poison," I assure him. "I mean, it is, but I'll be the one taking it."

"So you're asking me to help you kill yourself?" Roze questions with a raised brow, "or have I somehow misheard?"

"I am asking you to help me ensure there is never an heir," I reply bluntly. "I cannot have his child. The tisane will poison away any life growing inside of me after sharing his bed, and at a lower dose will prevent future conception."

"Not suicide, then. Merely treason."

"Don't act bashful now," I tease coaxingly.

"Bashful? Over treason?" he asks with a smirk. "I barely get out of bed for less."

"I get out of bed because I know there will be a chance to fight him, even if I have to wait a lifetime for it," I admit. "But Roze, the second I have his child, the war is over. He'll have the perfect weapon and I'll be truly powerless. I'll rip my womb out before I let that happen, but I would like to avoid that particular eventuality."

"Understandable. Bloodstains are even harder to get out of the sheets than wine."

I hiccup and laugh at the same moment, and it's a spectacularly unattractive sound.

"The war can't be over yet," Roze says decisively. "I'll get you your herbs, and you'll keep fighting him. And in return, you'll fight me, too."

"I'll what?" I ask.

"Fight me," he repeats like it's incredibly obvious. "We're going to spar three times a week. And the next time you challenge him, you're going to fight for yourself."

"You sure you don't want gold? Maybe rubies?"

He grins, all teeth. "I want the look on his face when you land a solid punch. I want there to be something he can't conquer, no matter how hard he tries. I'll be the rose, you the thorns, and we'll make the prick bleed."

"Back to blood again, are we?" I say with a grim smile. "Do you think that's all we're good for?"

He waits a moment before answering. When he does, he meets my gaze with one as grounded and steady as the stone beneath our feet. "No, I don't. I don't think our good is so small, or our future so certain. And that, O'otani, is all I know of hope."

"Armchair philosopher," I accuse to cover up my wonder at his words. He just smiles. And the strangest thing is, I smile back.

I expected Sholu to relegate me to choosing china patterns and playing court games, but the next morning he calls me in for a meeting with Hanya and Rigel Vespirsi and Dakara Reis. Dakara's brother is a longtime associate of Jana Semiroth, the leader of the Chalnori noraya, which has considerable sway in the northwest. Hanya and Rigel share blood with the insular Asrakali noraya to the southeast. Our purpose? Figure out the best way to approach them about using their existing networks to distribute food and decide what we're willing to pay for their cooperation.

The Shotori, Chalnori, and Asrakali norayas have been a thorn in my family's side for generations. Their origin stories are as innumerable as the stars, and far more colorful. They've become myths, but the ruthlessness and greed of the gangs themselves is all too real. These are the shining beacons of light that produced a man- a predator- like Sholu Verlaina, after all.

I laugh humorlessly. I've already slept with Sholu, and now we're taking the Asrakali and Chalnori norayas to bed. I wonder if there's some sort of prize for collecting all three? Probably a knife to the throat or a bullet to the head, I reason.

And I can reason, despite my hot head. Sholu managed to pull off a transition of power without inciting a civil war. There were casualties, yes, from the highest members of the dimarastes to commoners in the streets, but the wounds Arzsa bled from are already closing. The people trust him. They're drunk on the possibility of a bright future bolstered by his strength and charisma.

But that can only last so long. I smirk, thinking that Shikkah's honeymoon will be even shorter than my bezsai-aralya. Bellies are empty and tensions rise; it's only a matter of time before this tentative peace is ripped apart. Sholu was smart enough to make deals with the Macchonese pirate-barons and the Yukkaiti to allow us to move food through their lands and waters, but now he has to find a way to distribute it quickly and reliably. Rigel suggested tapping the noraya's extensive networks to pass out stability in the form of bread instead of delirium in a package of dusty purple powder.

It's a bold plan, and quite possibly a very stupid one. The norayas are enemies, not allies. Rigel says they're mercenaries first and foremost, and they'll swallow their enmity and work together for the right price, but I'm not so sure. It seems to me like we're asking wolves and oxgrove cats to share a fresh kill. Then again, none of my family actually believed the vasayaste and the norayas would be able to cooperate with each other, and now they're tangled up like old lovers. And I just slept with Sholu Verlaina of my own volition, however volatile it may be, so perhaps Rigel has a point.

Impossible things are only impossible until they happen once.

Before the droughts, the thought of a noraya strong enough to challenge the Amarin dimaraste would've sounded like insanity. Last spring, the end of a thousand-year dynasty without a protracted civil war was merely an exercise in magical thinking. The newly wealthy artisan and merchant families we mocked as vasayaste ceasing their bickering and instead uniting behind one man? We would have laughed, and laughed, and laughed at the implausibility of it all.

The first drought came a few decades before I was born, and it changed everything. Our economy relied heavily on the export of luxury goods, mainly Shikkan silk, but when people are starving to death they don't give a shit what they're wearing. They don't spend their last few coins, made almost worthless by hyperinflation, on something pretty but useless.

But the sins the norayas peddle never go out of style. A dying man will spend his last copper on a hit of lirium. A desperate man will pay to forget his sorrows in the press of skin against skin. While the vasayaste and dimarastes suffered heavily, the norayas thrived.

When the second drought came, we were still struggling to recover from the first. The Shotori noraya, with Liro Oromi at its head, had nearly as much power as the Amarin dimaraste. Some said Liro could be king if he'd but reach out and take the crown from Somitu's proud brow. Instead he reached out and took the vasayaste's hand, creating what was to become a longstanding symbiotic relationship: the vasayaste used their legitimate businesses to obscure the less than legal commerce of the norayas and laundered money for them. In return, they shared their profits with the vasayaste, as well as their protection. Some even became equal business partners, and by the time the second drought ended, Shikkah's gangs and its little lords were one big problem.

Somitu felt threatened enough to help Liro's own nephew, Kanza Arishai, stage a coup. Liro and most of his lieutenants were slaughtered in their sleep by a coward made bold by a queen's backing. Somitu abandoned Kanza the very next morning, of course, knowing that he was too weak to hold power. She was only too happy to step back and let instability and infighting tear the noraya apart from the inside out.

However, she failed to consider the charismatic young lieutenant who lost his wife and child, and quite possibly his mind, in Kanza's takeover. With Liro's lieutenants dead and Kanza weak, there was a power vacuum just waiting to be filled. Many of the Shotori remembered Sholu as Liro's nephew-in-law and backed his claim, hating Kanza. Others he won over with his sheer audacity, with bribes and promises and, I'm sure, threats.

He razed Kanza's noraya to the ground and built something stronger from the ashes, expanding his influence on the streets and in local and foreign markets, forging partnerships with many of the vasayaste families, then unifying them through sheer force of will and the promise of wealth and political power.

I'll never know if he intended to take down the dimarastes before my mother came to him or if her betrayal sparked his interest. I don't think it matters, though. Sholu Verlaina is a conqueror, and he would've turned his attention to us eventually. I wouldn't be surprised if next week, he declared war against Zsavina herself and began preparing to take the Citadel Eternal. He doesn't know how to stop, how to be satisfied. He is hunger like I am hunger, need like I am need.

And that fucking terrifies me.

"Dear Jana is... intrigued by your offer," Dakara says, her pursed lips as ripe and red as poisoned berries. She says intrigued like it's a dirty word. Not quite as vehemently as I say the word norayasti, but close. "But you must understand, he has concerns."

"What concerns?"

"You've risen high, my King," she says respectfully, "but that also means you've traveled far from your home. Are you Shotori norayasti, or are you vasayastisi? Will you honor the treaties still, or will you try to cut him down to consolidate your own power? And then there's the dimarastisi you married."

"She is not dimarastisi," Sholu says flatly.

"To Jana, she is," Dakara replies evenly. "A few months at your side does not change that."

"My name and a crown do, though," my beloved husband retorts. "Not to mention the fact that she was instrumental in the overthrow of her own family."

"He worries she will turn on you in the same fashion for a high enough price."

"If he's really worried that she can be bought," Sholu replies, "he'd be the highest bidder. Now tell me, Dakara Reis, what dear Jana demands we pay for his assistance."

"Renew the treaties between the Shotori and the Chalnori norayas. Provide a permanent seat on your council to be filled by whoever he so chooses. Cede control of Port Tizarat permanently. And lastly, do not ask Kildir Abethibana for help. You do not need the Asrakali if you have the Chalnori, and he hates the bitch. He will not work with her."

"That would cut us off from Ashrakai and the ports closest to Brekkah and Yukkaita. Kildir must be involved."

"He said you'd say that," Dakara replies with a sharp-toothed smile. "And he told me to tell you that he will not willingly tie himself to two women he does not trust."

"Unless? I know Jana Semiroth, Dakara. There's always an unless. Or a so. Or a but."

"Unless you want to deal with the unrest hunger creates, you need Chalnori cooperation. But Jana will not cooperate with two women he does not trust. So-"

"So make it only one woman he does not trust. Make him trust the queen."

Dakara nods succinctly. "Precisely. He wants a meeting."

"We'd be happy to visit Alu Oshana and-"

"You know better than that," Dakara chides. "You might be deme here, but the only king the noraya acknowledge is their own. The Chalnori own Alu Oshana as surely as the Asrakali own Ashrakai. Stepping foot in his city without invitation is an act of war."

"He does know that I could take what he calls his kingdom from him at any time? If it comes to a fight, I'll win. I always do."

"You'll win," Dakara agrees, "but at a heavy cost of time, energy, and resources. If a war is not inevitable, you will do your best to avoid it." She meets his gaze with a bold stare of her own, her dark eyes sparkling with something halfway between mischief and mirth. Dakara Reis is enjoying the push and pull of negotiation far too much. "But sending the dizsa as your emissary will be a gesture of good faith that goes far. How far, I cannot say, but I imagine you will have your distribution channels before the rioting starts. We both know nothing motivates violence quite like desperation."

"No," Sholu says in a flat voice. "I am not sending my wife to the Chalnori stronghold alone. That is ludicrous."

"I imagine Jana would say the same thing about taking a dimarastisi to wife or working together with the Asrakali."

"If you call her dimarastisi one more time, so help me goddess..."

"I will go," I tell her, ignoring Sholu's incredulous look. Dakara seems startled, then a slow smile spreads across her face, sharp and almost feline, but not unfriendly. I think everything about the woman has claws.

"You will do no such thing," Sholu insists. "It's idiotic!"

"Leave us," I tell Dakara, dismissing her. She pauses, startled again, then bristles slightly. She's clearly not used to being told what to do, and she turns to look at Sholu for either permission or defense.

"Don't look at him, look at me!" I tell her, bristling myself. "He does not speak for me, and when I give you a direct order, you will obey me. If you do not, we will need to have our own discussion about wars you will not win. Am I clear?"

She blanches. "I- yes."

"Yes, dizsa," I correct.

"Yes, dizsa," she repeats. Her lip curls slightly in distaste, clearly unused to being challenged so directly. But she gets up and walks from the room, so I don't comment on her tone.

Sholu looks at me, surprised but... pleased. He takes my hand and kisses it, his tongue flicking lightly against my palm, sending sparks of sensation radiating up my arm. I pull it away quickly and grimace. So he kisses me on the mouth instead, worrying my bottom lip with his teeth. Before I can pull away, he does, and he's laughing.

"Making friends, I see."

I shrug. "It was necessary."

"She will resent you."

"She already resents me," I tell him calmly. "Most of them do. They either see me as a useless, potentially dangerous trinket you deign to keep out of sheer stubbornness or a distasteful strategic alliance. They expect me to sit quietly at your side, or to try to fit in. Both would make me look like less than I am. You put this crown on my head, Sholu, and I intend to wear it before it wears me."

"You sound like a queen," he murmurs, a proud look on his arrogant face. Then his expression darkens, like a cool wind has wiped the good humor from his features. "You are still not going to Alu Oshana without me. You are not treating with the fucking Chalnori Nordeme without me at your side."

"That is the entire point, Sholu. He's testing you. Testing us. If you send me, it implies I am your equal. It shows that you trust me enough to let me negotiate on your behalf, and it shows that we do not fear walking into the heart of a city of wolves because we know they will not tear us apart. Because we are the wolves, Sholu. And if you say no, he knows you hold my leash. Either I am weak, or I am cosseted, or I am untrustworthy. He will dismiss me, and unless you ditch Kildir, he'll dismiss you, too. You'll wish you'd sent me when the riots start."

"What's to stop him from ransoming you? Or killing you?"

"He knows what you did to Kanza Arishai," I say softly. "You lost a wife and you tore the entire Shotori noraya apart with your bare hands. He will not risk a war he cannot win. Not when he could be your ally and profit from it."

"And you're willing to stake your life on that?"

"My life is at greater risk if you refuse," I argue. "He's probing for weaknesses, Sholu, and if he finds any, he'll exploit them. If you refuse to send me, you're still sending a damn clear message about exactly what, or who, your weaknesses are. If he thinks we fear him, or hide from him, he'll think he can challenge us. Not directly, he's not that bold, but there are a million tiny ways to chip away at your power that don't require a direct confrontation. Enough confusion and defection could break your revolution in half." I meet his eyes, deadly serious. "He would not win a war, Sholu, but neither would we."

"And how do I know you aren't going to plot with him behind my back?"

"There are easier ways to kill you and easier ways to die. I don't need to involve Jana Semiroth."

"Not good enough."

I sigh, resting my chin in my hands. "You keep telling me to choose the future, to move forward, and this is me doing that. If you fall, I fall, too. And as much as I'd like to see this country regret turning its back on their dimaraste, I don't want to watch people starve if we could feed them. I was the izsaiki once. It was my duty to care for them. You say you care for me, so trust me with this. Let me be your queen, Sholu."

"If you're plotting something..." he warns, a dark promise in his eyes.

"Then I'm in good company," I finish with a feral grin.

That darkness gives way like storm clouds parting to reveal pure blue sky and Sholu chuckles. "Perhaps I should be warning Jana Semiroth about you instead of the other way around," he tells me with an amused smile, "because I believe he's the one in danger here."