“Aw, shucks.”
I laughed. “Buuuut. . .”
“I know.” He patted my hand. “I know you need me here.”
“We won’t always, though, Mike.” I patted his hand back until he looked at me. “I think it’s great, and I think you should definitely do it. But, just . . . can you wait ‘til this Drake thing’s resolved?”
He put his arm around my neck and pulled me close. “Sure, kid. I hadn’t made any plans to go anywhere just yet. You can count on me.”
“I know.” I smiled, pressing my brow into his kiss.
Since the king took his place on the throne, so many things had changed around here, including our secret meeting place under the Throne Room floor. The plain wooden chairs that edged the round table before had been replaced by what looked like dark-wood artefacts from King Arthur’s Vault, each one square-topped, high-backed and identical. Even the king’s and queen’s chairs were the same as everyone else’s, symbolising unity, David had told me, adding that the round table represented equality among men for the better of the kingdom.
We’d discussed brightening the room with modern lighting but, in the end, David felt it was best to leave things traditional. I guess growing up by the light of torches in sconces made him accustomed to it. But my new vampire vision hadn’t enhanced my ability to read in the dark, which was another thing that’d changed since David returned from the dead: minutes. We now documented and recorded every discussion held in this room, unless spoken in confidence—the minutes jotted down in some giant, yellowing old book with a quill and ink. David had come down with a bad case of sixteenth-century-itis. And, now, I was stuck editing the A4 sheets before they were sent to the scroll room for insertion into the giant book.
“Arrangements have been made,” David finished, cutting Mike off. “I need you here to protect the queen while I’m away.”
Mike sat down on the long wooden bench against the wall. “I am the head of security, David. It’s my job to—”
“It’s your job to do as I tell you,” he finished, looking back at the faces around the table. Mike shook his head, yielding. “Besides,” David added. “I want you to oversee Court in my absence.”
“What?” pretty much everyone in the room said.
David sat down, his eyes moving past Blade, Ryder, Quaid, then Falcon, landing finally on Mike. “We both know Ara doesn’t have the guts to do what has to be done around here.”
“Like what?” I cut in.
“The men who were arrested last week for breaking human law?” he said, his brow arching to prompt my memory.
“So I let them off with a warning.” I shrugged. “What’s wrong with showing compassion?”
“It’s not how things are done,” David said. “Now, more than ever, we need to show strength. We need to make examples of these lawbreakers and make certain their behaviour is not contagious.”
“I think the fear of torture was enough to scare them into behaving from now on,” I said.
“If that were so, my love, they’d not have committed a crime in the first place.”
“David,” Mike said. “I’m not undermining Ara by ruling Court while you’re gone. She has to appear strong and independent, and that’s more important than seeing everyone gets the right punishments.”
“To show mercy is to exude weakness,” David said, and looked at Morgaine.
“I agree,” Morg said. “But also agree with Mike, David. You can’t put your security chief on the throne to do your bidding when you have a perfectly capable queen. What message does that give our people about your faith in her?”
David looked sideways at me.
“Never mind that,” I said. “What does it tell me about his faith in me?”
David leaned his elbows on the table, his head falling heavily into his sigh. “I have faith in you, Ara. But you’re too kind, sweetheart. You let too many murderous villains off with a warning.”
“Well—” I sat taller. “I can be mean, if you want me to.”
He half laughed. “Fine. Prove it.”
“O. . .kay.” I looked at Mike for a second. “How?”
“There will be a case brought before us in Court today—three men accused of murder in the human realm. I want you to judge them harshly, Ara. I want you to make an example of them.”
“What do you want me to do?”
“Same thing that was done before you took the throne.”
“What?”
“You must sentence them to seven days’ burial, without comforts. No torchlight, no air, no blood.”
“David, no.”
“Yes,” he said sternly. “They have to learn.”
“But that’s barbaric. They’ll go insane.”
He smiled. “Lesser men have survived worse. Perhaps they’ll come out better for it in the end.”
“I have to say, I agree.” Blade leaned back in his chair, chewing a piece of grass he’d smuggled in.
“Blade? You can’t be serious,” I said.
He looked at Emily’s shocked face then back at me. “Do you know what these men did?”
“Did?”
“Yeah.” He sat up, placing the grass on the table. “Do you know what they did to their victim?”
“No.”
“They didn’t just break human law, Majesty. They broke our laws by killing in cold blood. They didn’t even eat the man. They stabbed him several times in the chest and left him in an alley to die.”
“Then, isn’t imprisonment enough, maybe twenty-five years?”
“For a human, yes, given that they lead such short lives,” Ryder piped up. “But not for our kind, My Queen. It’s laughable.”
Mike stood. “I agree, Ara. You need to use scare tactics right now. Once you’ve established your monarchy and shown your strength, you can ease up a bit, but right now, people are looking for signs of weakness.”
“So these men have to suffer so I can make a point?”
“There are many casualties on the road to freedom, Majesty.” Morgaine bowed her head. “Their sacrifice is given for the greater good.”
“Fine then,” I challenged, looking at my king. “I’ll do it, but you’re going to walk those men down to the crypt and close their coffins yourself.”