Page 142 of A War of Crowns

The weasel was full of questions.

“Yes,” Aldric howled again. He dug his fingers into the Shepherd’s hand to keep himself from succumbing to the fire scorching him from the inside out.

“Why were you in Her Majesty’s room?” This question came from the Lord Chancellor.

A difficult answer. Aldric rocked in place again and tried to dredge up every lie he had concocted earlier that morning. But all of them burned to ash within his mind, consumed by the light blazing there.

He had nothing. No lie. No half-truth, even.

The truth ripped forth from his throat, unbidden, condemning him before them all when he screamed, “Because I came to kill her.”

He had expected the Truth-Reading to end right there. He had expected the queen to call her guards to take him into custody.

Treason.

He had just confessed to treason to the Queen of Elmoria herself.

But there was no blade pressed to his back. His agony did not abate.

The light continued blazing through him, leaving him shaking with the force of it, as the queen herself asked another question. “And yet you risked your life to save mine?”

“Yes.” That word ripped from him with such force he nearly swayed right off of his stool.

“Why?” That question of hers echoed throughout his entire body, questing, seeking.

Why, why, why, why, why.

But nothing rose to answer that all-important question. He didn’t know.

He didn’tknow.

“I don’t know,” Aldric roared, unable to resist the sheer heat of the Truth-Reading now. He was going to die. He was going to die right then and there from the agony of it all.

But still, the queen was not finished with him. She called out over the sound of his screams a question of, “And were you stabbed by the witchblade last night?”

The witchblade. They knew.

But they didn’t seem to know he had been the one carrying it.It was me, a part of him wanted to scream. But that wasn’t the question asked. He only had to speak the truths demanded of him.

“No,” Aldric shouted instead, shaking yet again.

Never had he ever begged for anything—not since the day he begged his father not to cast him into exile—but he was on the verge of begging then.

Please. Please stop.Those traitorous words never left his lips, though.

Blessedly, they didn’t have to.

The Shepherd gasped out a weak, “He speaks…the truth…Your Majesty…” and a mere moment later, the heat originating from the Father’s grasp abated, leaving Aldric awash in a blissfulemptiness.

His entire soul felt scorched and raw. But he was alive.

He wasalive.

Bracing his hands against his knees, Aldric doubled over and gasped for air. Sweat dripped from his brow. His entire body shook with the effort of remaining upright.

And then he retched.

He couldn’t even remember the last time he had eaten, but clearly he had eatensomething, given the bits of food swimming through the puddle of bile now coating the floor.

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