Page 53 of The Sundered Blade

Karreya’s anger surged, and she moved forward on its rising tide. Into the moonlight, within five paces of the man she’d once called Father.

“Who would have remembered?” she asked bitterly. “Did you think as little of me as your mother thought of you? Or did you simply never care enough to ask yourself whether there was any greater purpose to your life than your grand ambitions?”

His expression remained blank for three breaths as he scanned her face. And then… then… His eyes widened, his jaw gaped, and his grip on his robes was lost as his hands fell slack to his sides.

“Ka… Karreya?”

A strange blend of curiosity and pain held her still and silent despite his query.

“It’s you, isn’t it?” He was staring as if he’d seen a ghost. “Didshesend you? Is this to be my reward for my efforts—to be cut down by my own child in the very moment that I reach for the fruits of my labor?”

Not so very long ago, it would not have occurred to her that his response might be strange. It was the only world she knew. But now… It seemed sad beyond measure that her father’s first thought upon seeing her face was that she must intend to kill him.

“Perhaps I have come only to retrieve you,” she said instead. “Perhaps it is time for the Empire’s Second Blade to return and take up his duties rather than running from them.”

“Duty?” He spat the word. “What could I possibly know of that? What duty, what honor was I allowed, if not this? Always, I was passed over, forever denied what should have been mine by right. Second Blade? I should have been First without being required to prove myself! But instead, I was cast off, set adrift, given no recognition but my ability to produce an heir more to Mother’s liking.” His mouth twisted as he gazed at her. “And has that been you, Karreya? Has she embraced you as First Blade, givenyouthe position that should have been mine, or has she sent you off to play in the shadows as she did me, with every belief that you would fail?”

He spoke no words he did not believe, and the emotions playing across his face could not be mistaken for anything but jealousy.

Her father was jealous of his own child.

Somehow, in eleven years, he had not changed. Grown more patient and cunning, perhaps, but…

Wait. His words echoed strangely in Karreya’s mind.

“What do you mean,sent?”

For a handful of moments, he stared at her, and then burst out laughing.

“Oh, my poor child. You truly did not know? But if you did not know, then why have you come?”

What did she not know? What piece was she missing? Karreya’s thoughts raced from moment to moment, hoping to recall anything that might help her understand. Senaya said Modrevin had been passed over. Relegated to the hopeless position of being required to produce an heir. That the Empress had refused to grant him her favor.

But what if she’d been wrong?

“I came to return you to Zulle,” she said, with all honesty. “I do not have the appropriate magic to be Grandmother’s heir. She is fading, and I knew of no one else but you.”

Her father’s eyes glittered in the moonlight. “Then she did not send you. You came of your own will?”

“Yes.” Karreya took a step closer, watching every twitch, every breath. “After you left, I was sent to the Enclave, but I escaped in order to find you and take you home.”

“And you are not… not yet First Blade?”

“I have no desire to bear that title. It is because I wished to avoid it that I am here.”

He let out a long breath and laughed again, this time with relief. “And here I was so afraid that she had lost patience. But there is still time before I must return triumphant. Still time to achieve my victory.”

This conversation was not progressing along any of the trajectories Karreya had prepared herself for. He was meant to fear the knowledge that anyone from Zulle could reveal his identity. Instead, he seemed almost relieved.

“Does… Does Grandmother know where you are?”

The gaze he turned on her then held nothing but contempt. “I have never understood why the Enclave prides itself in creating such simple, innocent killers. You are like dogs, to be turned on your prey and let loose, never questioning your orders or their reasons. Unable to grasp the currents of power because you lack insight and cunning.”

He could not truly hurt her, Karreya reminded herself—not unless she allowed it. So there was no harm in permitting him to mock and underestimate her. Let him go on believing she was no more than a weapon in the hand of the most powerful wielder. Such a miscalculation would only be to her advantage in the end.

“Of course she knows!” Her father’s voice rang out in the otherwise silent room. “This is the place of both my redemption and my exile! My one chance to prove that I am more than capable of becoming the heir she desires. She has promised that if I can do this thing—if I can return these lands to imperial rule as one united people—she will grant me what should have been mine by birth.”

Then… The Empress knew all along. She knew exactly where her son was and what he was doing. It was not by chance but by her own will and with the promise of her favor that all of this had occurred.

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