Angelica sat on the bedside next to Benedict, waiting for the prince to wake up. He had been found at the Altar of Mikkael, windows shattered and the room a mess. The prince had been unconscious on the floor and a poor nun who must've witnessed everything was too afraid to say anything. When his eyes fluttered open, the prince seemed startled.

"Angelica?" His voice still slurred from sleep.

"Yes."

"What are you doing here? What happened? Where is my mother?" She almost snorted at the last question.

"Calm down there, Prince Benedict. That's a lot of questions."

Benedict's eyebrows furrowed. "No, just three."

Angelica smiled a bit. "I went to Montsant not soon after the Seneschal was murdered. I came back just yesterday when the Lord Constable and Arch-Cardinal had arrived―"

"They're here?" the prince interrupted.

Angelica gave him a sour look. "Didn't I just say that?"

Benedict sighed. "Well, they can't crown Francisco king until my father dies and he's been holding―"

"Benedict," Angelica said softly, grimacing slightly.

"What?"

She gave him a sad look. "The king is dead."

His reaction was nothing like what she expected. No crying. No shock. No hurt. Just a little bit of sadness that glinted in his eyes like a dying candlelight. "So it begins," he said ominously.

"What does that mean."

The prince looked at her. "I want to convince you, Angelica. I want to convince you that Sersalvon can be real. That this kingdom can unite."

"What does this have to do with your father's death?"

Now did Benedict's eyes shine in pain. It was foreboding as if he was hurting over something he had yet to do. "I can't let Francisco take the throne."

Angelica wrung her hands. "You know?"

"Of course."

Silence.

"How will you stop the coronation? Francisco wished to be crowned immediately but my mother convinced the Arch-Cardinal to wait till Quiesné." The Day of Peace. It was the day every Sersalvonian king had been crowned.

"Two days," Benedict noted.

"Yes."

"What does your mother gain from a delayed coronation?"

"I don't know."

More silence.

Angelica stared at the prince and he stared back. Their eyes met and locked in an invisible battle. Who would break first? They spoke of dangerous things... treason. Or was it really? After all, it was Benedict who was the rightful heir to both the Serpent Crown and Throne.

She broke first. Asking a question she was afraid to ask. "Do you truly believe you can fix this kingdom?"

"Yes." No hesitation.

"Do you ever worry you could break it beyond all repair?"

"Yes. But I have to try, or no one will."

"Where did all this confidence come from? But a month ago you were still a nervous, spineless boy. You lacked resolution but now... now you're different."

The edges of his lips tugged up in a smile. "The angels have granted me strength, I guess."

"What happened at the altar?" she questioned.

The prince's eyes darkened. "I don't know. I blacked out. Fainted, I guess." She knew he was lying but she didn't have the heart to question him further.

She swallowed. "Can I trust you."

There was only sincerity in his eyes when he replied, "Always."

She took out something from the folds of her dress. It was a journal. Benedict stared at it, tilting his head as if trying to place where he had seen it before.

"What is it?" he asked.

"Look closer." Was all she said.

The prince did, and when he saw whose name was written in the journal his eyes widened and breathing quickened. "This journal belongs to Queen Cecila of Sersalvon. Where'd you find it?"

Angelica recalled her mostly lackluster trip with Myeria to Montsant. She had stopped at what was once Iona's house and greeted her family. She went incognito and bribed them large sums of money to tell them about the midwife. They told her that one of Iona's midwife friends had given them the journal. They said that the midwife told them that Iona had stolen the journal when she found out she was to be executed in an attempt to blackmail the queen. Once she knew it was futile, she sent it to her family so that they could use it to blackmail the queen. The Dumitrescu family knew it was useless to do such a thing and so they had simply kept the journal, albeit reading it at times to their peers but everyone took it as a joke and nothing more.

"When I came back, you were unconscious and the Constable and Arch-Cardinal were here. The king's death has moved things quickly, Benedict," she finished.

"Without a doubt," he replied.

"Don't tell them that I gave you the journal―"

"In case things go badly?"

"I'm not in a hurry to meet God, Benedict."

"I know, I know but I just wish you would still―"

"I believe in you," she blurted.

Benedict stared at her.

"I believe in you," she repeated.

Benedict said nothing for a long time, but a faint sheen of tears shown in his eyes. "Thank you."

"There goes the man and outcomes the baby," Angelica japed.

Benedict laughed through his tears. And Angelica a small breeze ruffle her dress but did not know the source, for the windows were closed to the elements. "Too true."

***

Salvador sat in the Hibiscus Keep library, reading The Lords of Secrets, a fantasy novel. No one else was in the library, for the Réaltimarines did not care to try and read Carabaí texts.

It felt unnatural for Salvador's fast-paced life to take a break. He wanted to do something, to move, to act... but it also felt nice to simply relax and read.

Ugh, here comes the princess.

"To what do I owe this wholly unnecessary pleasure, Your Highness?" he asked in a mocking voice.

The princess tightened her lips. Her curly blonde hair cascaded down her shoulders like a golden waterfall. She wore a yellow dress with a neckline at her throat. It looked like something the nuns of Valencia would wear. "I wanted to ask you a question."

"The color isn't my type. You could do better than yellow."

She scowled.

"Well you do look kind of cute when you make that face," he acknowledged.

"Shut up!" the snapped. "I wanted to ask you about... about..."

"This book is demanding, so could you please finish your sentence?"

"Argh! I wanted to ask you about female succession in the Caraíbes!"

Huh. I wasn't expecting that.

"Um ok. So basically: females can inherit the throne."

Emma rolled her eyes. "Why?"

Salvador looked at her like she was... well, she was a foreigner. "Why not?"

Emma looked a little uncomfortable. "Shouldn't the important matters of state be left to men?"

Salvador gave out a bark of laughter. "If anything, the women should run everything! All we men do is play with swords. I know a woman, the Duchess of Florjes, that can make any person dance to her tune with just words. Politics. Yuck."

Emma surprised him by chuckling. "I always thought the games they played in court were interesting but... I was told it's no place for a woman... Any position of leadership in fact, was no place for a woman. The Élirians have a history of female successors; it was through one that my father managed to marry and secure an alliance with them."

Suddenly, Salvador saw his chance to strike. A way to slowly split the Réaltimarines from the inside. An opportunity to sow the seeds of discord within the Réaltimarine Royal Family.

"Why shouldn't you be allowed in the machinations of court?" he asked her. "You are the elder after all."

Emma hesitated. She took a seat next to Salvador. "Yes I suppose, but tradition mandates―"

He cut her off. "How are we to make our place in the world if we follow the example everyone else sets?"

She locked gazes with him, neither of them backing down. She was a fierce one, tougher than she let on.

"I suppose you're right," she relented.

"You don't suppose, you know I'm right."

She rolled her eyes. "You're insufferable."

"Of course I am. How could anyone suffer in my presence?"

That baited a smile from her. "What are you reading?"

"The Lords of Secrets,"

"What's it about?"

"It's about two brothers, twins, who vie for their father's crown, the Kingdom of..." He squinted at the page. "Sorry, this name is unpronounceable."

Emma waved it off. "Fantasy?"

"Yes."

She beamed. "That's my favorite genre!"

"Oh really? What's your favorite book?"

"To Heaven's End, by Beothan Maloy."

"Never heard of it."

Emma snorted. "Uncultured."

Now it was Salvador's turn to smile. "I'll take you up on a wager for that."

She raised an eyebrow. "Oh really?"

He nodded. "Oh yes. You should see the streets of Sersalvon on a holiday. In fact, Sancta Corentina Day is coming up in three days"―He faltered― "Although I doubt there's anyone left to celebrate it."

An uncomfortable silence stretched between them before Emma broke it. "Where are you from?"

"Sersalvon," he answered, knowing full well what she really meant.

Emma waited.

Salvador sighed. "I'm from a town called Sapinsville that sits on the Corriende River in the Duchy of Rivièrra."

When he did not continue, she prompted him. "Do you miss your home."

Salvador hesitated. "Yes... and no."

"No?"

Salvador swallowed as he was rushed by memories... memories he had tried to keep buried deep. "Eight years ago... my father was killed by the Lord of Sapinsville, José Rivera. He was a blacksmith and nothing more, but he was killed because that son of a bitch wanted a good sword for free. My mother was taken captive and is still there to this very day."

"Taken captive?"

He looked at her suspiciously. "Yes."

"For what purpose?"

Salvador exploded. "How the hell am I supposed to know? All I do know is that when I see that son of a whore again, I will strip the skin from his muscles before cutting off every finger on his hand and every toe on his foot. I will make him last all night long."

He could see the fear in Emma's eyes and relished in it. He gave her a wolfish smile. "I myself am not a holy man, but I pray to Iusphiel the Justice of God that I will bring wrath and ruin on those who have wronged me."

"Have you ever tried to save her?" she asked quietly.

Salvador was taken back by her question. "Yes―" He stopped. "―No."

"Why not?"

"I... I tell myself it's because his defenses are too strong but... but it's because I'm afraid."

"Of what?"

"Of her seeing what I've become. I was her ten-year-old boy eight years ago but now I'm a killer. I've killed so many men by my hand. I've orphaned children, widowed wives, and husbands. I'm a monster."

He caught himself. What was he doing? Opening up to this girl. He felt disgusted with himself. He closed his book and stood up abruptly. "Anyhow, I'm not the only one who has been wronged. What is rightfully yours is in the hands of someone else only because of the flimsy excuse of gender. Pathetic. Something needs to change about that, I think." And with that, he left Emma alone in the library.

Salvador snuck back into the Hibiscus Keep in the dead of the night. He had come back from going to a Barbarudi agent in the city, sending a message to the Duke of Benevo. In the message, he wrote to the duke of the possibility of exploiting Princess Emma to divide the Réaltimarines from the inside. He told him of how the Réaltimarines were using the massive slave plantations to fund their war effort.

He also told the duke that he would act immediately. Salvador had a plan to disrupt the Réaltimarine effort, but the window was closing as hurricane season moved in. He had already briefed Captain Tomas and Gerard on his plan and they had both agreed. They had to act now.

By the time the sun rose the next day, a servant knocked on Salvador's door. "The High King wishes you to join the nobility for breakfast, peasant!"

Not even the Réaltimarine servants treated him with respect.

Salvador sighed and fitted on his black brigandine and light gambeson armor. He buckled his sidesword to his waist and put on high black boots. He combed his dark brown hair and put on his copy of his mother's Angelic Rune.