The Girl King (The Girl King #1)(61)
Mothers
A reward of eight taels of gold and the deed to a sky manse will be bestowed on the person who brings me Princess Lu, dead or alive,” Set announced, his voice thundering in the reverent silence of the Heart. He was seated to Min’s left, in her father’s throne—no, she reminded herself. Her father was dead. Set was emperor.
Dead or alive. Min forced herself not to flinch, thinking of her sister. She would fix this. She would give him Yunis, and then he would love her enough to grant Lu her life.
Regicide. Patricide. These were the crimes leveled against her sister. Terrible words.
Lies, a voice inside Min hissed. She could not tell if it was her own.
“We will observe the customary one hundred days of mourning for the late emperor Daagmun,” Set proclaimed.
A murmur of cursory prayers arose from the assembled court, but he cut it short.
“Now,” he broke in. “Enough of the past. We must address our future.” He paused, a furrow cutting into his handsome brow. “I have grave news to share with you: Yunis has declared war upon the empire.”
Min’s head whipped toward him before she could stop herself. He was still facing the crowd. Behind him, Brother nodded serenely along with his words. Seated on his far side, her mother was unresponsive, impassive. Had she known?
Of course she had, Min thought. Likely everyone knew but me. Everyone who matters.
The audience was murmuring, the noise a low roar. It was a sizeable crowd; this was Set’s first public address as emperor, after all. Yet, Min could not help but note it was not as big as that on the day of Lu’s betrothal. This morning’s rain had likely cowed some people into staying home.
It’s not raining now, the nagging little voice in Min’s head pointed out. It was true: the gray flagstones of the Heart remained dark and slick, but the wan sky was beginning to perk again with blue.
Well, her cousin—husband—was certainly giving them something to regret missing.
Set continued: “At the end of the Gray War, we forced the armies of Yunis back within its gates and brokered fair terms for surrender. In our great mercy, we allowed them to live, under the condition they stay within their borders and allow our colonies to thrive. That mercy was foolish, we now see. For seventeen years, rather than rebuilding their own kingdom, the rulers of Yunis licked their wounds and plotted revenge.”
He paused, letting that narrative sink in. Min’s head swam with it.
For anyone her age or younger, Yunis was the stuff of legends. An otherworldly paradise, a tragic cautionary tale. The elegant northern city carved into the Ruvai Mountains, all stone and crystal. The hermit city that refused to open its gates to her grandfather’s imperial forces. And in turn, the city that burned until it was nothing but broken rock and ash and smoke. But now, they were learning, some part of it had survived amid the rubble all this time.
“Just last month,” Set went on, “Yunis perpetrated a raid on labor camp eight. I was there in the aftermath. More than fifty hardened criminals—slipskins and other degenerates—were set loose. And six of our own men were killed in the service of the empire.”
Murmurs bubbled up from the crowd. Set held up a steady hand to settle them.
“I don’t need to tell you that this was an act of war,” he said grimly. His head dipped, just slightly, but then he raised his face to the crowd, a mask of stalwart grace and sorrowful burden. “Emperor Daagmun,” he began. Min started at the sound of her father’s name falling so easily from his lips. Then those lips hardened into a sorrowful line. “Before he was so cruelly struck down, Emperor Daagmun was weighing the evidence before him, weighing the decision to go to war. It does not do to speak ill of the dead, but I believe my beloved uncle would agree with me when I say he tarried too long in choosing to act.”
Set stood then, pacing the front of the dais. Min half rose in her chair, as though to follow. Brother gave a quick jerk of his head and she sat back down, flushing red. She glanced at her mother, but the empress’s eyes were transfixed on Set. Her face was eerily blank—Min wasn’t sure whether to take that for a good or an ill sign.
“This is not a world for tarrying.” Set’s voice rose as he strode down the front steps, still slick with rain. His guards bristled uncertainly but stayed where they were. Her cousin continued on his own, along the path toward the First Flame.
“This is not a time for equivocating and hesitation,” he said once he reached it. A stone pavilion sheltered the blaze, and Set paused, resting a hand against one of its pillars. He watched its flames for a long moment, seemingly oblivious to the puzzled silence of the assembled crowd. Then he reached into the pocket of his robes and withdrew something that fit neatly into his closed fist.
“We live in a dangerous moment,” he said. “Our enemies encroach from all sides. Even from within. This empire—each of you—deserves an emperor who recognizes this. Who acts decisively. With strength.”
Set lifted his hand high, then dashed it down toward the First Flame. Min craned forward to see, then jerked back as the blaze erupted into a brilliant yellow column. Like a living, vicious thing it shot toward the ceiling of the pavilion, arcing against the stone and pluming outward.
The crowd was on its feet, and this time their noise was thunderous.
“I swear to you, for every drop of imperial blood—both Hana and Hu—that the Yunians sowed into the ground, they will reap a thousand of their own!” Set shouted above it. “We will not let the Northerners prevail!”