Braydon is excused from the stand, and in his place the King parades person after person to besmirch my name. He starts with guards, most of whom I’ve never seen before, who reel off fictions revealing my ‘constant abuse of power’. I’m not sure anyone listening really believes that I flounced round, flinging glasses of wine into guards’ faces for the sheer fun of it, but it doesn’t matter. The King is clearly just warming the crowd up.
Next, the chambermaids who dressed me for the wedding are brought in and testify that I shared with them my reluctance to be married. That I was the most joyless bride they’d ever seen. How I admitted I was only marrying Torin for his throne. They look at the floor as they repeat words they’ve been told to speak, and I feel sorry for them. I don’t believe they are here by choice, and hate to think what threats have been made against them. And the fact is, though I never said such things to them, there is some truth to their accusations. I was a reluctant bride. Just not for any of the reasons they might imagine.
When the chambermaids are done, it’s the turn of the senior advisors. The first to take the stand is Lord Pyer, Royal Overseer of the Mines on the Sixth Isle, and cousin to the King. Though I’ve never spoken to the man before – hadn’t even heard of him before the wedding – he manages to give me a look of pure disgust as if we’re mortal enemies.
‘I have long counselled the Prince not to marry this woman,’ he says, as if he disapproved of the marriage and hadn’t been laughing and drinking with everyone else to celebrate it just days ago. ‘But she bewitched him out of all sense.’
The King nods sagely, as if he has always shared such an opinion. ‘Tell me, why was that? Wouldn’t you want a powerful match for your nephew?’
‘I wish my nephew nothing but happiness, and it is my fervent hope that he wakes soon from the sleep this witch has sent him to. Because he would be the first to point the finger of blame straight at this she-devil.’
He’s not holding back with the venom.
The King frowns, his exaggerated display of surprise still captivating the crowd. ‘She-devil? They are strong words, cousin. Do you have a reason to call her such a thing?’
Lord Pyer nods. ‘Her father used to bring her with him to the Rock Island. His secret weapon, she would move through a crowd like a huntress, and when she found her prey she would swoop. Strong men would fall for her honeyed words, husbands would leave wives. But a kiss from her lips marked you for death. Adler stole much from the people, from the Sixth, from the Crown by using her to seduce – then kill.’
The King glances at me and wrinkles his nose. ‘I’m sure many of you, like me, would struggle to believe this woman capable of seducing anyone.’
There are sniggers of amusement round the room, because, yes, I look far from my best. But I stare at the King with particular loathing. He once tried to seduce me, and I wonder how much of what he’s subjecting me to now is to punish me for rejecting him.
‘Can you perhaps give an example of her wickedness?’
Lord Pyer swells up with self-importance at the King’s question. ‘I certainly can. Captain Adler hoped that with a diminished supply of crystal, the worth of his own stockpile would increase. I happen to know for a fact that she was tasked by Adler to sabotage the mines on my island. Her actions are the direct cause of the incredible hardship the East has been suffering.’
The gasps are audible, including mine. He’s just blamed me for everything, everything, the Isles have endured. How dare he? I want so desperately to defend myself, but keep my mouth shut. Anything I say here will be used against me – if I’m angry, it will be evidence of my violent nature; if I cry, it will confirm my weakness. And so for now, silence is my best weapon.
The King is shaking his head, ostensibly with disbelief, but honestly, he looks pleased with this revelation. ‘She is the cause of the very suffering she claims to want to end? Perhaps there are no bounds to her villainy.’
No one asks Pyer how he knows this as ‘fact’, or for the slightest bit of evidence to support his words, and he’s excused from the proceedings.
The King has many more witnesses like him. Men of high status who lie about corrupt deals I have offered them since I became Viper: extra crystal in exchange for their loyalty, assassinations of enemies for the promise of power. Bribes I can imagine Adler happily making with all of them, but nothing I would ever do. In fact, the more I listen, the more convinced I am that they are the ones guilty of these crimes against the crown, and the King has forced them to skewer the truth, or else be imprisoned themselves. I guess it’s reassuring that he’s had to make up attacks against me, rather than there being endless injured parties offering to come forward on their own to send me to my death.
But when the Ambassador of the Fourth Isle begins his grievance against me, I find it harder to hear. Because this time, I do feel responsible. Since Adler burned the island to punish me, nothing has grown there. What little magic lingered in the earth has entirely gone and the land has died. It’s a truth I struggle to bear, having loved one corner of it so very much, and there is nothing I wouldn’t do to restore the island to its former beauty.
The Ambassador blames me. His charge is that it was my fight with my father that brought the fire of destruction to his island, my lust to steal power from the Viper. I cursed the land, and killed hundreds.
Of course, the King has conveniently decided to overlook the fact that Adler was betraying him, so I end up being portrayed as an evil daughter, so determined to have power that I murdered the man everyone still believes was my own father.
A she-devil indeed.
At this point the King calls for a break, to allow the jury the luxury of food. I am returned to my cell where I have nothing to do but evaluate what’s happened so far.
One of the things I wanted to gain from this trial was to learn who my enemies are. It’s fair to say I’ve made some new ones today, and I can pretty much conclude that the entire jury are willing to sign my death warrant; they’re all in the King’s pocket. But I suspect most of those giving testimonies aren’t against me – just trying to save their own skins.
If Torin were to wake up and exonerate me from the crimes of which I’m accused, I believe support for my death would slide away. It’s a bold move to try to eliminate me in this fashion. And it makes me fear that the King will do anything to prevent Torin from coming round.
Oh, please let him wake up. Let him live.
By the time the gaoler returns with the guards to escort me back to the makeshift court room, I’m ready for whatever else the King has to fling at me. I can withstand the lies. After all, this day has already been brutal. How much worse can it get?
But the gaoler doesn’t come alone. Beside him, clearly pained to be in such unsavoury surroundings, is the King. In this filthy place he looks unnaturally clean, his skin glows bronze from the sun, his hair shines with oil. And yet there is no disguising the look of victory he wears and my heart tightens beneath my ribs.
‘Leave us,’ the King says to the gaoler, whose face falls with disappointment as he bows and slips away.
The King and I regard each other through the bars, our hatred equally matched.
‘You know,’ the King says, about to touch the cell bars, before thinking better of it, ‘I would have kept my word.’