Broken Throne (Red Queen #4.5)(80)

“Even then, who knows,” Tolly sighs. His eyes focus on the medical kit, still searching. I count no less than three bandages that I can see, but he ignores them all. “The war would have come for us eventually.”

“It still is coming for us.” The fear that always follows, the kind so small I can usually ignore it, bubbles to the surface. Despite the sweat and our training exertions, my flesh goes cold. The Archeon battle is still a close memory. And though it drove back the Lakelanders, the Scarlet Guard victory hardly ended the struggle still ripping through Norta.

It won’t be long before it reaches us here. The raiders on the border are getting bolder, their attacks coming more frequently down on the plain. Nothing in Ascendant yet, but it’s only a matter of time until they try the heights of the mountains.

Ptolemus seems to read my mind. “Elane mentioned you’re thinking about patrol.”

“It’s what I’m good at.” I shrug, tossing away the dirty towel. “That’s how you choose a job, right? Find something you’re good at and get paid for it.”

“I suppose professional insult thrower was already taken.”

“No, they’re holding the position until Barrow gets back from staring at mountains.”

I laugh at the thought. Mare Barrow greeting everyone who arrives in Montfort with a snappy observation or cutting remark. She’d certainly be good at it. Ptolemus laughs with me, forcing the sound. His discomfort is obvious. He doesn’t like it when I mention Mare, or the Barrows. He killed one of them, after all, and there’s no amount of penance he can do to make up for it. Even if Ptolemus Samos became the most stalwart champion of Red equality, even if he saved a boatload of newborn Red babies, it still wouldn’t balance the scales.

I must admit, they worry me still. The Barrows and General Farley. We owe them a life, and while Mare promised never to collect on the debt, I wonder if the others might one day try.

Not that they could. Ptolemus is a soldier as much as the rest of us. And he certainly looks it in his training uniform. He’s better suited to armor and weapons, not crowns and finery. This life suits him. I hope.

“What about you?” I prod.

He gives up on the medical kit quickly, happy for a change in subject. After the abdication, we’re all in the same boat. The premier and his government have no reason to keep us fed and housed if we aren’t dignitaries anymore.

“I wouldn’t mind patrol,” he says. My heart leaps at the prospect of serving next to him, but I can tell he hasn’t given it much thought. “I don’t have to decide too quickly.”

“Why?” I wrinkle my nose. “Do former kings get better treatment than princesses?”

The lost title doesn’t bother him as much as it bothers me. He lets it glance off and fixes me with an impish look. Mischievous, even. “Wren is a healer. She’s lined up for a job already. I can take my time.”

“Ptolemus Samos, house husband,” I crow. He only grins, a flush spreading over his cheeks. “You are going to marry her, aren’t you?”

The flush spreads. Not because he’s embarrassed. My brother could almost be described as giddy. “Springtime, I think,” he says, toying with one of his rings. “When the snows melt. She’ll like that.”

“She would.” Well, now we certainly have something to look forward to.

His smile ebbs a bit, softening with his voice. “And you?” he asks. “You can do that here.”

My heart skips in my chest, and I have to clear my throat. “Yes, I can,” I say simply, and to my great relief, Ptolemus doesn’t push the subject. No matter how much I think about Elane, how much I would enjoy marrying her one day, this is hardly the time. We’re too young, in a new country, our lives barely formed. Our paths far from chosen. Refuse Davidson’s offer, Elane, I plead in my head. Tell him no.

“What’s that look for?” Tolly says sharply, reading my face.

I exhale slowly. It isn’t the job that bothers me, not really. “Elane says I’m hiding.”

“Well, she’s not wrong, is she?”

“I wear metal spikes most of the time; I’m a bit difficult to miss,” I snap. For emphasis, I gesture to the still-bleeding cut over his eye. My brother is far from deterred, fixing me with a weary stare that makes me fumble for words. “It isn’t—I shouldn’t have to stand there and tell the world what I am. I should just be.”

Because Ptolemus has no skill in hiding emotion, or even in expressing it, sometimes he can be too simple. Too blunt. He makes too much sense. “Maybe in a century that will be true. People like you will just be. But now?” he says, shaking his head. “I don’t know.”

“I do, I think.” This is Montfort, an impossible country. A place I could have never dreamed of a few years ago, so different from Norta, the Rift, and any other reality I believed in before. Reds stand up with the rest of us. The premier has no reason to hide who he loves. “I’m different, but I’m not wrong.”

Tolly tips his head. “You sound like you’re talking about blood.”

“Maybe it’s the same,” I murmur. Once again, there’s that familiar curl of shame. For my cowardice now, for my stupidity before. When I refused to see how wrong the old world was. “Does it still bother you?”