Page 96 of A Crown of Lies

“Howareyoureally?”Rowan asked Ieduin as soon as Rixxis had gone.

Ieduin retrieved his empty mug from the water and placed it on the side of the tub. He had answered truthfully before. He’d slipped out there just in time to see Rixxis grab Rowan by the back of the head and yank him into a hell of a kiss. Maybe there was something to what Rowan had said before and she was into their little game.

But that wasn’t what Rowan was asking.

He sighed. “I’m okay. Sore, but okay.”

“Any cuts, bruises, or sore spots you need me to attend to?”

“Nah.” Ieduin pulled off his tunic and tossed it out. It made a loud wet squelch when it landed. “Morning piss burned a bit, but it’s better now. Those sounding rods are some type of crazy, Rowan. You really use those all the time on yourself?”

“You didn’t like it?” Rowan cocked his head to the side, looking disappointed.

Ieduin snorted. “I didn’t say that, did I? It was just intense, is all. I thought I’d done it all and here you come with those rods and prove me wrong.” He pulled himself out of the bath water and turned around to offer Rowan a hand.

Rowan took Ieduin’s hand and let him pull him out of the tub.

They hurried inside the way they’d come out. Ieduin hadn’t been cold when he came out into the bathing area, but he hadn’t been planning on having a dip in the tub with his clothes on, either.

Rixxis cared little for coffee, so he’d brought down some tea for her. Because he knew she’d want to get going quickly since they were already running late, he’d had the cooks make her an egg and cheese sandwich. Both were gone by the time they made it inside, along with Rixxis herself.

“You two are hitting things off well,” Ieduin observed as Rowan went to one of the plain black cabinets. “What’d she have to say about last night?”

He pulled out some spare clothes and tossed them to Ieudin. They were plain, but it’d do until Ieduin could go change.

“Not much. I think she needs time to think. We’ll revisit everything after the battle.”

“That reminds me. Scouts reported in this morning from a couple different directions. The Wild Hunt was spotted again out east.” Ieduin pulled off his soaked pants.

Rowan frowned. “They were?”

“You seem surprised.”

Rowan shrugged. “Just wondering what’s out east they’d be interested in. I thought the activity would slow down once Dagh Cairn was cleared out.”

“Apparently not,” Ieduin leaned against a wall. “Scouts said there was a large force to the east headed north, headed right along The Scar. I think the bandits mean to join up with the Trintan army. Guess it’s a good thing this Wild Hunt is made up of dead men or they’d have been riding straight into an ambush.”

Rowan tensed at that and Ieduin narrowed his eyes. He was starting to think Rowan knew something about this Wild Hunt business that he wasn’t sharing, like maybe who was behind it. Ieduin didn’t believe for a second that a king didn’t know what was going on in his own kingdom, especially if a bunch of vigilantes went riding about killing bandits.

“Yes, it’s a good thing,” Rowan agreed at length.

Twenty-Nine

Merciaclappedwiththerest of the masses when Niro clasped Isheda’s hand and lifted it high. The crowd gathered in the square, deep in Runecleaver territory, cheered deafeningly loud at the announcement that one of their own would be running for the second highest office in the land.

Standing behind the scaffolding with Aryn at her side, she felt incredibly out of place, and exhausted. This was their second stop of the day, the first being the Runecleaver clan house. They had two more stops planned before the end of the day, but Mercia wasn’t sure she’d be able to endure more of this.

“Are you all right?” Aryn asked her, having to shout above the din of voices.

“My feet hurt,” she admitted. “And the noise is getting to me. I don’t understand the purpose of all this. Why can’t they just announce that they’re running together once and be done with it? Why all these stops?”

“To gather support and visibility,” Aryn explained. “When the vote is held, it’s important that whoever wins has the support of the population at large.”

“But these people aren’t voting. It’s just the Assembly, right?”

Aryn nodded. “Yes, but these people elect members of the Assembly every three years. Next year, when the elves vote for their clan representatives, they will do so bearing in mind how those representatives voted for the Primarch. If they don’t like how their representative voted, they’ll elect someone else. Leaders here don’t serve for life like the kings and queens in human lands do.”

“It all sounds unnecessarily complicated,” Mercia said with a sigh. “If people only rule for three or six years, how does anything ever get done?”

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