Salt Storm: The Salted Series: Episodes #31-35 Galvin, Aaron (classic fiction txt) 📖

the king, a weight pressing in on upon her chest, even before he spoke.

“No . . .” said Darius.

Liar! Sydney thought, even as the same betrayed expression bloomed in the faces of her mother and Makeda too. Neither spoke against the king, however – Makeda stewing in her anger, whilst Nattie looked away from him and shook her head. Fuming, Sydney started to rise until Darius glanced her way.

“Sit down,” the king quietly commanded.

“Why?” Sydney asked him, even as she obeyed. “Or else you’ll have me thrown in the tank?”

Darius nodded. “Or worse,” he said.

Sydney sneered. “Do it, then,” she said. “I’m done with you using me as leverage against my mom.”

“As am I, child,” said the king. “As am I.”

“Stop doing it, then!” Sydney hissed at the king whilst Rupert’s questioning continued without them. “Stop all of this lying!”

Darius’s head snapped toward her then. “All that you’ve seen thus far, and still you believe that I am the liar here, Sydney?”

“I think you’ve been lying all my life,” she replied. “And for every lie that Mom told you, I understand now that there had to be a good reason for it!”

Darius cocked an eyebrow. “Careful now, girl,” he whispered. “Unless you would wound me further? Let you not forget – you are not my daughter. The only reason you still live is an act of kindness I would spare your mother from witnessing.”

“But not enough to threaten her with? Or to draw my real dad out of hiding, right?” Sydney glared at him. “Quill? You want to kill him too, don’t you?”

Darius sneered. “I want to face him,” said the king. “And for him to face me and answer for his crimes, if he were brave enough to do so.” He gave a lazy nod toward the crowd and then the tank of empty water. “And it would seem your true father is proving reluctant in both that regard and the message sent to him to come rescue you and your whore mother. Perhaps he’s not as brave you and she ever believed him to be.”

“Or he’s being smart and knows you’re laying a trap for him,” said Sydney. “In which case, you’re the one who should be careful, my king.” She spat the last. “Because when Quill finds you, he’s going to kill you and everyone else you sent to try and stop him from it.”

Darius chuckled. “Even if it were the Blackfin to seek him out?”

Doubt gnawed at Sydney then, her memory drawing on Yvla dying in Malik’s arms as he squeezed her to death. Gritting her teeth, she resolved to not reveal such fears to the king. “Especially the Blackfin,” said Sydney. “Quill will kill all of you when he gets the chance.”

Darius smirked. “Let’s give him that chance, then, shall we?” he asked, sneering. “Perhaps your savage father needs more encouragement to prove his supposed bravery . . . just as it seems you need further evidence of your mother’s lies.”

Further evidence? Sydney cowed as the king looked away from the trial proceedings and gave a curt nod to someone she could not see.

A chorus of silver horns sounded a moment later, calling the trial to halt. So too did the horn’s sounding draw the attention of Sydney and the crowd to a host of newcomers.

A scowling Malik Blackfin emerged at the head of two lines, at least twenty Painted Guard soldiers behind him in all. Their faces covered by jet-black visors, Sydney trembled at the weight of their armored footfalls as the Orc company crossed a bridge of gangplanks to reach the central barge.

What is this? Sydney’s blood ran cold when noticing the last of the soldiers bore a pair of covered litters between them on their shoulders. Long and rectangular, both litters were draped in black cloth with a white streak down the middle. Sydney thought the look of them like coffins with the Orc soldiers acting as their grim pall-bearers. She shivered at the disquiet shared amongst all inside the Nautilus, then. What’s inside those things? Sydney wondered of the bulky litters when the Blackfin gave his soldiers their orders to leave one of the litters in plain view of the queen and Makeda. He had the other, covered litter carried up the steps of the central, water-filled tank that Sydney had assumed was meant for her. Sydney’s throat ran dry when the Orcs reached the top of the platform and placed the litter down, but left the covering upon it. What’s inside those things? Her skin prickled in wondered question as the king resumed his place beside her, his face like a mask of stone for all that occurred before him.

With the Blackfin returned, Rupert relented his position as inquisitor back to its former host. Unlike all the times she had seen Malik Blackfin before, Sydney found him grim-faced and frowning as he turned toward the king.

“Apologies for my early absence, Your Grace,” he said. “But my Orcs and I have found further evidence to bring forward against the condemned, if you will hear it.”

The king nodded. “I will allow it,” he said, his voice barely above a whisper. “Proceed, Blackfin.”

Sydney’s eyes darted back and forth between the pair of litters and her mother too.

Nattie’s gaze signaled that she recognized an apex predator when the Blackfin ignored his sister, Makeda, to approach the queen instead. Still, Sydney also saw a fierceness in her mother’s steely eyes that warned she would not be lured by whatever tricks were soon to be had in attempting to reign her in.

“My queen,” said the Blackfin, granting Nattie a solemn nod before continuing. “My Orcs and I have something for you to see and verify.”

“To judge the spectacle you made just now, you have proof enough already,” said Nattie, her voice shaking in such a way that stabbed an icy fear into Sydney with every word spoken. “But, if you mean to show me something, then do it now and cease your pretense.”

“In time,” the Blackfin