"This, as you say, suggested at some time when his soaring insolence shall teach the people — which time shall not want, if he be put up in's, and that's as easy as to set dogs on sheep — will be his fire to kindle their dry stubble, and their blaze shall darken him forever."

—From Coriolanus,
By William Shakespeare

"WE MUST GO TO ATLA and stop them," said Ilyas, slamming a fist on the table.

"We?" Nadia Thorne and Hugo Marchand repeated at the same time.

Though both said it with very different intonations. Hugo, being the stubborn and foolish patriot that he was, said it was a voice of complete distaste at the thought of working with a foreign king's mother. Nadia, however, said it with complete scorn, as though she would never deign to work with him let alone exist in his presence at all.

"We will never be working together, Ilyas," Nadia said, her voice cold as the icicles dripping off of the eaves of the castle outside. "What makes you think I want anything to do with you?"

"The fact that you came to me, unbidden," he said coolly. He already regretted the show of temper. It had done him no good and had only harmed his reputation. "That might reveal some of your conflicting intentions, no?"

Hugo glanced between the two of them, his reddish hair gleaming in the sun. "Your Highness--"

"Please leave the room, Marchand," he said, in a tone emphasizing that the word please was a mere formality. "Thank you."

"You came here because you wanted to stop Jovana Dusang from expanding Mordania into an empire," Ilyas said under his breath. "Now I am offering you an opportunity to do just that, and you refuse?"

Nadia tossed her hair over one shoulder with a leather-gloved hand. "It's not the result of the thing. It's your approach. All this time I thought you were the subtle one, skilled in espionage and playing the long game."

"We have not the time to play the long game," Ilyas said. "The minute that crown lands on Jovana Dusang's head, it is over for both of us. I lose my Regency. You lose your rulership and your dynasty."

"My time was already limited," she said icily, but he knew from the look in her eyes that the thought of losing power hurt her just as much as it hurt him. "The dynasty would end sooner or later. That is what all of Atlan court knows."

"The truth does not stop being the truth simply because one is hurt by it," he said blithely. "If you won't help me, Nadia, I will have to do this without you. And I guarantee you, Lady Thorne, that you will not enjoy the process of being forcibly removed from the Mordanian castle and punished for espionage, very much. I assure you, the punishment almost rivals the one we have for treason."

Nadia looked at him like she wanted to bear her teeth and growl. "I am well aware of your barbaric torture methods, Durand. Turn your back on your country and it will turn its back on you and all that. You have twisted my arm. Let us go to Atla, then. We can formulate a plan on the way there."

He disliked and admired the way she phrased it, as though he hadn't convinced her but she was doing him a favour by condescending to help him. Yet he could not help but respect it all the same.

They decided on a sledge that would bear up against the melting snow and declared that at the border, they would switch from the sledge to a carriage. The capital of Atla was close enough to the border that such a thing would be simple enough, anyways. Yet a sinking sensation in his stomach told him that there was something else to this. Something darker.

"Marchand!" he barked as he left the room.

Hugo jumped out from behind an empty suit of armour. His expression was carefully blank. "Yes, Your Highness?"

What to do with him? He could neither trust the man with the information that had already been revealed, nor could he be left behind. Should he kill him? Trample him under an unruly horse?

No, no, that was a course of action with consequences that would be far too unpredictable.

"Come with me," he said, snapping his fingers. "You will be needed in Atla."

Hugo sputtered. "But who will hold council, Your Highness?"

Ilyas shrugged. "Let the country fall to ruin, as it will do anyway if we do not get to Atla as soon as possible."

The younger man's jaw snapped shut but he remained in a state of shock. "Should I pack anything, sir?"

"Bring yourself and anything you can fit into a case in three minutes. Go!" He snapped his fingers as though hurrying a dog. Keep your friends close, and your enemies closer... wasn't that the saying?

As he strode toward the waiting sledge, only one trunk in hand for the two-day journey, he could feel Nadia's eyes on him. Surveying him. Watching him. He eked out a single syllable. "What?"

She shrugged, the picture of nonchalance as she sat wrapped in furs on the sledge's seat. "Nothing at all, Lord Regent. Not a thing."

He should have known better than to trust her. Yet trust her he did.

Hugo ran towards the sledge, panting with a single bag in his hand, and threw himself into the back seat of the sledge.

Ilyas picked up the reins. "Onwards we go, then."

//

The journey was neither long nor treacherous. But the sense of foreboding that filled him did not leave when they stopped at an inn, paying the owner handsomely for his silence - though Nadia, bloodthirsty as she was, told him she would rather kill the owner for his silence - nor did it leave him when the morning dawned bright and early the next day on the three of them. That feeling remained with him long after they had entered the gates of Atla, and seen the bright sun shining down upon them with a cheeriness that belied the gloom he still felt.

Ilyas was not a man who acted on instinct. He was a man who acted on plans. He was a man who made plots and devised schemes and allowed them to come to fruition through his own labour and deviousness. He ignored any sort of irrational sensation or illogical emotions that attempted to persuade him to do otherwise. That was why so many years ago he had justified his cowardice in not confessing the truth to Adaira Dusang by dismissing love as a foolish emotion anyways.

Yet now, he could not do the same. He could not trivialize the tremors that ran through him, nor the lump of ice that seemed to sit in his throat and never melt.

"Are you quite alright, my lord?" Hugo asked, stripping off his fur coat and tucking it neatly into his trunk and swapping out his warmer leathers for linen trousers and tunic.

"Fine," he snapped as he surveyed their lodgings for any escape. He had not been foolish enough to accept Nadia's offer of staying in the royal palace, though it might be near Jovana, for he thought that she might try to entrap them. Besides, they were already on her territory. Why risk it by being in her dominion? "What intelligence have you gathered?"

Hugo tied up the laces of his shirt. "The king is in prison."

"Kaiden, or Connell?" Many still referred to Connell Thorne as the king, though years ago he had stepped down to hand the throne to his son when Kaiden had come of age.

"The old man," Hugo said, not realizing the insult he was paying to Ilyas. Well, he'd never been one for petty jests or squabbles, so he ignored the slight.

"And why is he locked up, Marchand?"

"For disagreeing with the latest queen," Hugo said, his voice dripping in sardonic undertones.

"Who is that?" had Kaiden married some unsuitable woman?

Hugo's smile was caustic. "Jovana Dusang, apparently."

We are too late, he thought. The thought travelled far, to Nadia Thorne's head. he could see inside her mind at that moment, see her fasten pearl earrings and lace up a gold gown. He could see into her mind, as he had not used his powers for years, yet they still came to him like breathing. We have lost everything. Your husband, in prison. Your son, deposed. Your family, toppled.

No, she replied. I will rise again.

Then she cut off the thread tying his mind to hers, and he blinked, breathing harshly as he stared once more at the bare stone walls and threadbare tapestries surrounding him.

"Marchand, we must go to the palace," he declared. "There are actions that we must take before our fates are decided."