Timbago pressed a hand against my knee. “You did the right thing.”
“Well, it still feels lousy. I took a kid from his parents and now he’s going to be trained to fight, whether he wants to or not. Because he thinks that this is what Fate wants.”
“Sometimes it’s better for children to be away from their parents and safe, than with them and in danger,” John said, looking away for a moment.
“Is it? I was apart from my parents and I’ve got to tell you I never felt any better off—at least not after I lost Mom.”
John slowly met my eyes, his gaze direct. “You’re young. Perhaps one day you’ll understand. Until then, just know that sometimes even the right decisions can make you feel bad.”
“John?”
“Yes, Your Majesty?”
“Thanks. For everything, I mean. Watching my back and getting me out of there for a few minutes and…”
“You’re welcome. Now, are you ready to watch the new ambassador of Bathune grovel at your feet?”
“Grovel?”
“The last ambassador from Bathune—Sarai—fled during the Battle of the Hall of the Pleiades,” John explained. My stomach clenched at even the mention of the day I’d been crowned queen and promptly tumbled my kingdom into civil war.
“And he ran away because your aunt, the empress of Bathune, was in league with the Fate Maker,” Timbago added. “Even though she’d like you to believe otherwise. There are even those who say they saw your aunt’s ambassador fighting beside the Fate Maker.”
“But my aunt keeps sending me notes that say she had nothing to do with the war and is simply waiting for us to hammer out a peace agreement before she sends Sarai back here to Nerissette,” I said.
Not that I necessarily believed any of what she wrote. Her former ambassador, Sarai, was a wizard and that group as a whole wasn’t particularly fond of me. Plus, he was my aunt’s ambassador, and from everything I’d heard and read about her since I’d arrived in Nerissette, I wasn’t sure I could trust her. Especially after she’d left me to fight a war on my own and didn’t even bother to ask if I needed any help.
“We have been at peace for a while now,” Timbago pointed out. “Your aunt has sent trade groups across the White Mountains. Why hasn’t Sarai returned with them? Why is she sending a new ambassador in his place? Unless she knows that we don’t trust him?”
“Exactly,” John agreed. “We know it and so does she. She can’t send Sarai back here when we know he’s a spy for the Fate Maker that his allegiance is to the wizards and not to us.”
“Are we sure that he was fighting with the Fate Maker’s army?” I asked. “We’re certain that he fled, but do we know without a doubt that he was fighting for our enemy?”
“Gunter of the Veldt insists that Sarai was hiding in the forests with the wizards, and when the forest caught fire, he ran,” John said.
The fire. I bit my lower lip as my heart thumped painfully in my chest and I tried my hardest not to think about how I’d ordered Winston and the rest of the dragons to set fire to the forest outside my palace during my last battle with the Fate Maker. We’d been trying to flush out the wizards who had been attacking us from the cover of the trees, but instead, two of the other teens who’d fallen through the book with me—Heidi and Jesse—had been trapped there with the wizards. They were caught in a fire that I had started. I was the reason they were dead.
“But if he was with the Fate Maker’s army, he may still be with them,” John added.
Timbago looked wary. “The Empress Bavasama says that he returned to Bathune though.”
“Since when do we believe anything that Bavasama says?” John snapped.
“We don’t.” Timbago glared at the other man. “But unless we have proof, which we don’t, we can’t just accuse the empress of Bathune of waging war against the Golden Rose. Against her own family. Her only remaining family.”
“Even though we all know that she did it,” I said quietly. “My aunt wants my throne, and she’ll do whatever it takes to get it.”
“Yes.” John nodded.
I turned to look at the goblin standing across from me, focusing on his bulging, red-veined eyes. “Timbago?”
“Yes, she has sided with your enemies,” he said softly, “and she will kill you if she gets the chance. But right now we aren’t in a strong enough position to start a war that will stop her. Right now we must bow our heads and make peace with your aunt. Until we’re sure we can win a war against her.”
“I agree,” John said. “I don’t like it, but Timbago is right. Today we have no choice but to maintain the peace.”
“And what about Eriste?” I asked. “The new ambassador? What do either of you know about him?”
“He makes Sarai look like a kitten dressed up in trollskin.” Timbago snorted.
“You’ve dealt with him before?” I asked.
“More than I would care to admit,” Timbago said. “I wasn’t unhappy to see him leave when he went with the empress to Bathune, and I’m not pleased to see him return.”
I raised an eyebrow at Timbago. “So you don’t like him?”
“I never liked him, Queen Allie.”
“Why?” I asked, trying to get a feel for the ambassador I would be meeting before we were actually face-to-face.
“Before your mother became the Golden Rose, when your grandmother ruled, Bathune and Nerissette were one country.” Timbago looked away. “The old queen split the lands at the White Mountains when she died, so that each of her daughters could inherit part of the kingdom, which she’d hoped would prevent a civil war between them.”
I knew this already. When I hadn’t been going over paperwork and trying to rebuild the parts of my castle that had been damaged in the Fate Maker’s last attack, I’d been studying the history of my new home and how my ancestors had ruled it. “And?”
“A lot of the wizards felt that the kingdom shouldn’t have been split, that it should have gone to the oldest daughter—Bavasama—as a whole kingdom. Eriste was one of them,” John said.
“So you think he wants to get rid of me and put Bavasama on the throne?”
“I know he does.” Timbago’s eyes fixed on mine now. “The only question is will he do anything about it?”
“Do you think that’s why my aunt sent him?” I asked. “Do you think Bavasama is going to try to force me from my throne?”
“I think she would not be sad to see you gone,” John sidestepped. “You are the queen of a large kingdom, a kingdom larger than her own, and one she will inherit if you die. She has much to gain. And you didn’t die in battle the first time…”
John had helped Rhys after the war, making sure that the wounded were treated and the dead were taken care of while I was still too weak from my own fight with the Fate Maker to take charge. Since then he’d moved into the palace and his son, Eamon, had joined the Royal Guards with several other woodsmen. Whenever I needed John he’d been there, ready with advice or information to help me make decisions in the day-to-day running of the kingdom. He was never pushy, though. Never demanded that I do things a specific way. He simply gave me the information I needed and helped me keep the country under control while I figured out how I was supposed to manage. He was doing it again now.
“So, long story short, she’s going to try to be my friend while she looks for a way to stab me in the back.” I blew out a long breath. No one had ever told me that running a country was going to be like living inside a high school but it was. Between the squabbling cliques of nobles and the gossip and the general he said-she said crap that floated around the place it was like being at boarding school or something. Except, unlike Harry Potter, I didn’t have a cool professor like McGonagall to keep everyone in line for me.