Page 65 of The Bridge Kingdom (The Bridge Kingdom 1)

“Ah, yes. My throne of gold. I keep it on another island and visit it when I need to reaffirm my sense of self-worth and entitlement.”

“Don’t mock me.”

“I’m not.” He picked at the top of his boot where the leather had split from too much exposure to salt water. “It must have been quite disappointing to discover the truth.”

Lara made a sound that was a half-laugh, half-sob. “Midwatch is just as luxurious as my home in the Red Desert, and my time spent here relaxing by comparison. I was raised hard, Aren.”

“Why were they so hard on you?”

“I thought I knew, but now . . .” She lifted her chin from her knees, turning her head to look at him. “You ask me what changed? What changed is that now I know you use that money to feed and protect your people.”

There had been a certain inevitability to her learning that truth. Maybe if he’d kept her locked up in the Midwatch house, with no contact with anyone but the staff and his guard, he might have kept it from her. But he’d wanted his marriage to Lara to be a symbol for change in Ithicana, a new direction. And for that to happen, they’d needed to see her, and there had always been consequences to that path, and the revelation of Ithicana’s secrets was one of them.

And he so badly wanted to trust her.

“The truth is, Ithicana isn’t survivable without the bridge,” he said. “Or rather, it is survivable, but only if every minute of every waking day is dedicated to survival.” Pivoting on the ground so they were facing each other, he stared into her eyes. The sun was rising, the light shifting from blue to gold, and it was like waking from a dream and being plunged back into reality. If Aren could have stopped it, he would’ve. “Imagine a life where you had to fight these storms and these waters to feed your family. To clothe your children. To shelter them. Where weeks might pass when you couldn’t take a boat on the water. Where a series of days might pass when it would verge on suicide to step outside your home. What else is there but survival in a world like that?”

Aren hadn’t realized he’d taken her hands, but she squeezed them tightly then, and he paused, his thumbs trailing lightly over her scars. “The bridge changes that. It allows me to give my people what they need so that some small part of their days might be dedicated to more than just survival, even if it’s only an hour. So that my people might have a chance to read, to learn, to make art. To sing or dance or laugh.”

He broke off, realizing that he’d never explained this to anyone. Explained what it was like to rule this place. The constant fight to give his people lives worth living. And it wasn’t enough. He wanted them to havemore.

“You could feed every one of them like kings with that kind of money.” Lara wasn’t questioning his word, but driving him forward, extracting the whole of the truth.

“That’s true. But having those things—having the bridge—comes with a cost. Other kingdoms know what sort of revenue the bridge earns, and that makes them want to possess it. Pirates believe we have stockpiles of gold hidden throughout the islands, so they raid us to find it. So we have to fight. My standing army isn’t enormous, but during War Tides, nearly two thirds of my people drop their trades and take up arms to defend the bridge. I have to buy them weapons. I have to pay them for their service. And I have to compensate their families when they die.”

“So despite everything, Ithicana is only surviving after all.”

He tightened his grip on her hands. “But maybe someday it could be something better.”

Neither of them spoke, and when a soft breeze blew strands of hair across her face, Aren reached up to brush them away. Lara didn’t flinch from his touch. Didn’t look away. “You’re beautiful.” He tangled his fingers in her hair. “I’ve thought so since the moment I saw you, but I don’t think I’ve ever said it.”

Lara lowered her eyes, pink rising to her cheeks, although it might’ve just been the glow of the sun. She gave the slightest shake of her head.

“I should have.” He lowered his head, intent on kissing her, but instead a sharp noise made him jump.

Hand going to his weapon, Aren turned to see Jor coming around the corner, his face filled with amusement. “I hate to break up your picnic, Your Majesties, but dawn is upon us, and we need to be on our way.”

As if to punctuate his words, horns sounded out over the water announcing ships on the horizon. “Does this change things for you?” he asked Lara, helping her to her feet.

She closed her eyes, her face clenching for a moment as though she were in pain, then she opened them and nodded. “It changes everything.”

Hope, and something else, something uniquely reserved for her,flooded his heart and, taking Lara by the hand, Aren led her back to the boats at a run.

24

Lara

Everything had changed.

And nothing.

It wasn’t lust. Lara wasn’t so weak as to abandon a lifetime of planning and preparation for the sake of a man too handsome and charming for his own good. If that had been the sum of it, she’d have sated her curiosity, then carried on with as clear a conscience as any spy could have. No, it was her admiration for Aren that was becoming increasingly problematic, as was her grief over what would happen to Ithicana once she was through with it.

Lara and her sisters had been taught to despise Ithicana for a reason. Their purpose had been to infiltrate the defenses of a nation so that it could, at best, be conquered. At worst, be destroyed. An easy thing to envision when the enemy had been nothing more to her than masked demons using their might to keep her people oppressed.

But now they had faces. And names. And families.

All of whom were annually attacked by kingdoms and pirates alike. Perhaps the Ithicanians were cruel and merciless, but now Lara found she couldn’t fault them for that. They did what they needed tosurvive, and with every piece of information she stored away about them, her guilt swelled, because she knew Ithicana wouldn’t surviveher.While that knowledge might have once brought her satisfaction, it was now nothing but an inescapable fact that seemed destined to plague her every waking moment with self-loathing.

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