Page 24 of The Scarlet Star

He swallowed as he broke from the staircase door into the bright hallway, stopping only to tilt his ear toward the atrium and listen. He didn’t hear the organizers announcing anything. He didn’t hear a crowd of voices, or any evidence of a gathering. He breathed a sigh of relief, his shoulders relaxing as he resumed walking toward the Hall of Stars. Toward the event. Toward the maidens he hated.

He meant to stop by his room on his way to change from his torn robe, but a man in an organizers’ coat swept into his view. Xerxes couldn’t recall what the man’s name was, even though they’d spoken many times. He thought it might be Cornelius. Or Corninaeus. Or…

Whatever.

“Organizer,” Xerxes called. “What time is it?”

The man’s face lit up when he realized Xerxes was there. “Your Majesty! Where have you been? The Initiation Ritual of the maidens is beginning in just a few minutes, and everyone is waiting in the Hall of Stars! We assumed you were…” the man swallowed “…ill.”

Xerxes closed his mouth. He imagined the Folke scouring the gardens with spears, looking to herd a beast inside. He tried not to feel disgraced, though the assumption was likely already a palace-wide series of whispers by now.

He set his jaw, annoyance bubbling deep within him.

“Someone should die today, don’t you think?”

“I’m fine. Take me to the Hall immediately,” Xerxes said. He reached across himself to smooth down the tear in his shoulder, and he brushed a hand over his hair to ease it down. Then he shook his robe to straighten it out.

The organizer—Cornelius or Corninaeus or whatever—bowed in obedience and rushed down the hall to lead the way. Xerxes followed, thinking he might lose it if he reached the Hall of Stars and there wasn’t a drink available for him. A dull thudding beat against the inside of his head, and he rubbed his temples.

Intelligentsia members turned their long hoods toward him when he entered and crossed the dais toward his gold chair. He imagined them breathing a unanimous sigh of relief.

Music began to play across the Hall the second Xerxes sat down.

“Are you ill?” Belorme had the nerve to ask from Xerxes’s side.

“No.” Xerxes’s grip tightened on the armrests of his chair. He wasn’t exactly lying. He didn’tfeelill, but…

“You should have eaten a fruit!”the voices said, all together.

“We’re starving!”

Xerxes ignored them. He was fine. Never once had he needed to eat two fruits so close together.

“Then where is your crown, Your Majesty?” It sounded like Belorme spoke through his teeth when he asked. Perhaps the sage was humiliated by having to wait for the King, in front of everyone. Like a subject.

Xerxes fought the impulse to touch his naked hair. His crown…

Truly, he didn’t even remember where it was.

Ah, that’s right. He’d tossed it into the chandelier in his room. It was dangling by a candlestick.

He almost smirked.

The music magnified, and the arch doors at the end of the navy carpet swept open.

“I need a drink,” Xerxes said to whoever was listening.

Belorme refused to acknowledge the request, but Choi slipped away from the line of sages. He came back a second later with a tall glass of deep red liquid.

“May the Divine Eos bless you,” Xerxes said to him as he took the glass. Choi dipped his head before sliding back into line.

The maidens began to enter. Xerxes hardly cast them a glance of interest. He studied his drink instead, lifting the red liquid to watch it swirl around the cup. He brought the glass to his lips and took a sip.

His gaze slid over to the maidens performing an initiation dance as he drank. It was a traditional choreography meant to showcase a woman’s features and strength that ended with them drawing a pair of scissors and cutting a blue ribbon to signify the barrier between subject and King broken.

Xerxes spat his wine.

Belorme sprang away, and a noble or two gasped from the viewing area. Two napkins tore up from the refreshments table and soared across the Hall; one patting itself over the floor tosoak up the drips, the other aiming for Xerxes’s face. He swatted it away, staring down at the maidens with his parted, liquid-covered lips.

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