Right now he couldn’t say for sure that was Ash Valley. It mattered more to him what Ro wanted to do, but he couldn’t go into that with Dom on a borrowed phone since Sheyla was waiting, tapping an impatient foot.
“I’ll go when I can,” he said, careful not to promise that he’d stay. “Spread the good news, all right? Talk to you soon.”
He ended the call without waiting for a response and handed the phone back to Sheyla. “Thanks for making me step up.”
She peered at him with palpable curiosity. “Was that so hard?”
“Pretty much.” He sighed. The odds of his relationship being ‘normal’ with Dom and Pru ever again didn’t seem like any probability a canny gambler would bet on.
“Don’t be pointlessly obstinate. There’s no reason to ruin old friendships over an issue you don’t even care about anymore.”
“What?”
Of all people, he never expected Sheyla to take him to task. Back in Ash Valley she had few friends and spent most of her time working. She’d been an asset during the bombing, tireless in her care of the wounded, but nobody ever went to see her for the bedside manner. Her social skills were even worse than his.
She gave him a pointed look. “I don’t pay attention to people because I generally don’t care what others are doing, but even I can tell that you’re head over heels for Alastor’s former lieutenant. Rowena, is it?”
The woman in question chose that moment to step out of the meeting room, her brows raised in curiosity. “What about me?”
Slay wasn’t ready to have this conversation in a random hallway. “Uh…”
“I was just saying that we met in Hallowell,” Sheyla said, covering smoothly. “Anyway, I have experiments to check. I’ll leave you to it.”
24.
“To what?” Rowena asked.
The whole vibe between Sheyla and Slay seemed a bit weird, and he was way more flushed than normal. Plus he couldn’t meet her eyes.
“Oh, I just called Ash Valley. And talked to Dom.”
“Yikes,” she said.
He’d told her everything about his long relationship, the failure of it, and his splintered friendship as a result. Hopefully, this meant he was ready to move on.
With me.
Aloud she said, “We should get something to eat and then there’s a ton of work to do to prepare for the election.”
As it turned out, she had been right when she predicted that the citizens of Golgerra would rapidly come to respect and admire Chantisse. There were some dissenters, and a couple of lower-level bureaucrats decided to run as well, bringing the total choices on the ballot to four.
Over the next few days, she didn’t see much of Slay. He volunteered as a go-fer while they organized behind the scenes. His strength and endurance made him great at it and she admired him for doing whatever he could to help, even at the expense of his ego. Hell, he’d been the second in command in Ash Valley, and he could leave at any time. It meant the world to her that he chose to stay—to support her.
Not that she expected to win the election. Hell, she hoped that she didn’t. A few old schoolers kept quoting that damn codicil about the challenge, but they were holding a preliminary debate tomorrow. And Chantisse would shine like a star.
The resistance leader already had binders full of plans detailed to the most minute degree, to make Golgerra a fair and honest place to live. Her education policies alone were so incredible and innovative that Rowena planned to vote for Chantisse herself, though she’d do it secretly.
According to Slay, there should be a primary, where they narrowed it down to two candidates, so they were doing that first, and a week after the resistance took the piazza, they set up voting boxes all over the city with random sentries chosen to ensure there were no irregularities.
And when the votes were tallied, the two candidates that came out on top were Chantisse and Sy Loudens from the Ministry of Finance. Secretly relieved that she hadn’t made the cut, Rowena let out a long sigh.
I would’ve gotten wrecked in the final debate.
Fortunately, Golgerran citizens agreed that they didn’t want someone who was good at murder in office. That freed Ro to work alongside Slay, helping setup for the debate. Alastor and Sheyla were still in Golgerra, but the former prince rested more than he worked, spending long hours in the lab with his wife, who had never been even slightly interested in being queen.
Later that day, Ro wiped sweat from her brow as she straightened the podium. Once, this theatre performed original plays that were deemed suitable for production—in other words, they didn’t malign the royal family in any fashion. Any playwright that created “seditious” works was put to death, and that was pretty much any story that dismissed the idea that the Vega line didn’t shit gold and fart rainbows.
So many brilliant minds lost. So much talent squandered. So much pointless pain.
Though she didn’t want to weep anymore for a past that couldn’t be changed, a memory rushed at her headlong and exploded in her brain. She hurried from the stage to hide in the wings because she didn’t want anyone else to see her that way. But Slay came after her. He always did.
And when he reached for her, she let him provide physical comfort. Hell, she’d probably let him stitch her severed arm back on; that was how much she trusted him.
“Tell me?” he whispered.
“It’s terrible.”
“You’ve listened to me tirelessly. I’d be glad if you gave me the same chance.”
Ro took a breath, willing the tears away. “When Tycho first chose me, he was…different. In all honesty, I…cared for him. He twisted over the years, through his father’s influence. And Tycho never understood why I wouldn’t agree to become his creature completely, why I wouldn’t abandon my mother in the undercity and bask in luxury, giving him the children he desperately wanted from me.”
“I wish I could kill him all over again.”
She thought she’d told him this much already, no new information here, but she was circling the hateful memory like a mortal enemy. “In those early days, he bought me a pet, a little bunny that was always waiting for me when he called. So small and soft, I called her Caliyo.”
“I have such a bad feeling,” he whispered.
Rowena couldn’t even look at him. Other than her mother, she’d loved Caliyo most, and she’d so looked forward to Tycho’s summons. Because she got to wash in a fancy tub and eat delicious food and play games and cuddle her rabbit. But then…
“He’d already changed a little. Started hurting me for displeasing him, like the first time I won a game of Risk, but he always asked me to stay with him because he missed me too much when I went back, he claimed. We were both older by then. I said I would, if he’d let me bring my mother up.”
Now, she loathed how naïve and trusting she’d been. Tycho had laughed and said dismissively, “You’re the one I want. I have no use for a worn-out Eldritch whore. She can die below where she belongs.”
Shocked, she’d blurted the first thing that came to mind. “Then send me back to her and never call for me again. I have no use for someone as hateful as you.”