Page 170 of Night's Fall
It wasn’t like we had dinner together every night.
But seriously?
“If they don’t want you for you,Rol, and require promises you can’t keep, then they aren’t worth your time.Bethe kind of male who makes that their loss,”Alekseiadvised.
Errol hung his head in a mannerIsuspected, in the past, got him out of some serious shit.
Aleksei didn’t bother witnessing it.
He took my hand and off we went on another hike through thePalace, whereIdidn’t see much more, just a rehash of what came before but in reverse.
I waited until we were in hisJetPanther, and he was waiting for course approval, beforeIasked, “Ourattendance at the ritual was overall positive?”
“When you mentionedGermaine,IaskedMurielto run some numbers.”Theonboard computer announced our course was cleared,Alekseitook the stick, and we had liftoff. “Femalessixty years and under, overwhelmingly positive.Older, they’re not happy.Males, the results are mixed.Sixtyand over, they’re pissed.Thirtyand younger, about half and half.Malesin between, we’re at sixty-five percent positive.”
Boy,Murielcould run some serious numbers in a short period of time (however you did that).
“Germaine made it sound dire,”Iremarked.
“She was riding the high of your approval rating and knows it’s undoubtedly taken a hit.Butregardless, she takes any negativity about our family personally.Anda warning, darling, there is quite a bit of it, as we suspected.”
“Ah.”
“Therefore, anything negative sticks in her craw,”Alekseifinished. “Ifit happened without her input, she loses it, likeI’mguessing she did.”
I didn’t confirm, butIdidn’t need to.
With that out of the way, now the big stuff.
“I’m sorry, honey.Myactions instigated what just happened,”Isaid quietly.
“Don’t think that for another moment,Laura,” he replied tersely. “Itfeels like we’ve been racing to that scene since the first timeTimgot the idea to douse me with ice water in the middle of the night, getting nothing but a mild dressing down.WhereasIgot a chat with my father about howIneed to buck up because that’s the kind of thing that makes a boy into a male.”
“I still need to learn that there might be larger ramifications for my decisions.”
“No you don’t.Youalready understand that.Weshould have toldGermaine.Thatwas my mistake.Imostly operate on my own, without her being involved.Withyou by my side, that has to change.Butother than that, we can only be who we are, and if we’re good beings, it will work.Doeswhat we do reflect on an entire realm?Yes.Butas good beings, the decisions we make will reflect positively.Liketoday.Noteveryone agrees what we did was right, but we were there, we know what it meant to the people who mattered.Andfor the most part, the rest of them understood.Butbottom line, in a day or two, no one will be talking about this.They’llfind something else to be upset about.”
This was true.
Moving on.
“I’m kinda confused about what just happened,”Itold him.
“I assumed the mantle of theTrueHeir.”
No less confused.
“I thought you already were theTrueHeir,”Inoted.
“Back in the day, once the change occurred, theTrueHeirbecame de facto king.”
HolyHecate.
I knew this, of course.Youlearned it in history.
But that was what the ancients did.
“This proved ineffective,”Alekseitold me somethingI’dalso learned in history. “Nothirteen-year-old boy should sit a throne, regardless that he was chosen by a god.Stupidshit happened.Lawswere enacted.Andthe king, or queen, would continue to reign until theTrueHeirreached majority.Civilizationadvanced.Warsbecame less frequent.Theneed for aTrueHeirreduced, he seldom emerged, and we haven’t had one for two hundred years.”
