Page 28 of The Bone King and the Starling

“Get up. Take off your dress.” I meet Rosalind’s stare at the same time that Olec starts to chuckle at my back.

“You have a dark sense of humor, my liege, but I think you have taken it far enough.”

“Rosalind,” I say. “Up.”

“Olec, are you really going to let him talk to me like this? You are a guest in my house, King…”

I grab her by the hair and wrench her from her seat. Olec shouts at my back, but he’s clumsy and when he unsheathes his blade, he drops it immediately. Not that it would have mattered. My men are standing, holding Olec back as I walk Rosalind around the end of the table. She is thrashing more than fighting as I take her to the center of the space near the fire and cut open the back of her dress.

“Torbun! Marek! Eli! Draw your arms!” Olec calls, but Torbun, the coward, stands from his position at the table, and points instead to his son at the end of the table.

“Viccra! You are our best warrior, son. Challenge the king now. Honor your chief!” Torbun shouts.

Viccra, a talented young fighter, is seated at the opposite end of the table from his father. I recognize the boy — trained him — and watch him stand, curious to see what he will do. He steps forward, sword drawn, and then takes a knee a few feet from me, laying his sword across it.

“My allegiance was sworn on the training yards of Ithanuir to King Calai. My king, how may I do your bidding on this day?” And thus, this boy proves my theory right. The games were not only established as a means of helping the outer villages of Wrath defend themselves, but also served another purpose. Obedience. Allegiance. Loyalty. To me. I grin.

“Traitor! Kill him!” Olec shouts to his guards, and they engage. I am impressed when Viccra manages to kill one and wound the other with only a few swift cuts of his blade. Meanwhile, my grip on Rosalind’s hair has not strayed.

“Come, Viccra. Hold the lady Rosalind for me.” He grabs her arms. The great hall is flooded with people now, most of whom are crowded near the entrance, not daring to enter, but for my men and Daneera, who push through and secure the space. I am easy. Relaxed in my rage. It is a place I know well.

“I call any who has ever been maimed by this female to step forward now. Thralls,” I say to those gathered at the entrance. “Come forth. The time of your servitude ends now.”

It takes some time for the thralls to come forward. A dark-haired, pale-skinned female is first — she served at my table the night before. After handing the whip over to the thrall, I move to help Viccra keep Rosalind upright, taking her other arm.

Olec is screaming obscenities and threats, but the female thrall meets my gaze and must be soothed by it. She acts before I can give the order, swinging the wire flail towards the exposed skin of Rosalind’s back and drawing blood.

Rosalind writhes as she screams curses and threats. The female, now pink-cheeked, returns the whip to me and as shedoes, I rip the fat ruby off of Rosalind’s finger, simultaneously breaking the digit. Rosalind screams. I hand the ruby over. The former thrall’s eyes go wide.

“I… Thank you, my king.”

“No. It is I who owes you an apology for leaving you at the mercy of these useless, cruel beings all this time. But their time is over now. Go. And tell the others.”

A steady stream of thralls enters the hall after that, all too happy to take gold, gems and pearls from Rosalind’s throat and hair and pocket and return the wounds she’s delivered them. Perhaps even some she did not. One of the thralls — a beautiful pale-faced, red-haired female with large breasts on a slender frame — beats at Rosalind for some time. She uses her full body, all the violence she has within her, and when she’s finished, I offer her gold coins, but she turns from them and points at Olec with her whip.

“Can I?”

I smile. “Of course.”

She whips Olec in the face while Daneera and Fuzier expend what looks like very little energy to hold him steady. Even if the male weren’t drunk constantly, he’s so out of shape that any young farm boy in Ithanuir could best him with a blade. He is not suited to lead. That his wife harmed Starling simply makes my decision to remove him easy.

The red-haired thrall is smiling as she skips out of the hall. She never did collect her gold pieces.

This goes on for some time. Long enough for Puhyo to return with the village forger. The forger stands now near the fire, his blackened gloves on, his pocked face expressionless. He does not heed Olec’s shouted curses.

Viccra and I hold Rosalind’s weight. Her legs have given out. Her cries of rage, however, are ceaseless. “If you think I won’t tear every thrall in this village into pieces the moment you aregone, starting with yours, you are as stupid a king as you are a violent one!”

“You raise a good point, Lady Rosalind.” I drag her to the fire, Viccra moving when I move. “Are you ready for your payment for Starling, Lady Rosalind?” I ask, shoving her to her knees and ripping her head back by her hair. Blood perfumes the air, the flayed skin on her back weeping to saturate her dress.

I beckon the forger forth and watch as slow understanding trickles across Rosalind’s expression. Her hatred melts into despair. The forger’s mask covers most of his face, but he lifts it when she looks at him. He doesn’t look smug, but he holds a frost in his gaze that tells me two things: that he is not sorry for Rosalind’s fate, and is he not sorry to be the one delivering it.

“Is it ready?” I ask him.

He nods. “It will not remain hot for long, Your Highness.”

I wait. Watch Rosalind’s face. Listen to her pleas. “You…you can’t do this… You can’t…”

“Are your children here?” She is babbling, unresponsive to my question, so I continue, “I see that they are. I will ensure that, after, they are cared for with the same compassion you showed my thrall,” I lie. I do not intend for anyone anywhere in Wrath to be treated as Starling was. But I enjoy the panic that flits across her face. “Now, I believe it’s time.” I gesture for the forger and watch as Rosalind screams and thrashes with all of her flagging might.

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