The King of Attolia (The Queen's Thief, #3)

by Megan Whalen Turner

Costis closed his eyes in shame. All the events of the day, which had been so nightmarish and unreal, were terribly, terribly true, the mark beside the king’s mouth unmistakable and incontrovertible, every knuckle of Costis’s fist indelibly represented there. Eugenides said, “You did swear less than two months ago to defend my self and my throne with your life—didn’t you?” He’d gone down like a rag doll. “Yes.” “Is this some Attolian ritual that I am unaware of? Was I supposed to defend myself?” He had one hand; he couldn’t have defended himself against a man both taller and heavier, a whole man. “I beg your pardon.” The words were those of a gentleman. They sounded odd, even to Costis, under the circumstances, and the king laughed briefly, without humor. “My pardon is not a matter of civil pleasantry, Costis. My pardon is a very real thing these days. A royal pardon would spare your life.” A royal pardon was impossible. “I just meant that I am sorry,” Costis said, helpless to explain the inexplicable. “I have never, I would never. I—I . . .” “Don’t usually attack cripples?” Costis’s shame closed his throat. He heard the wine being poured into a cup.

She came through the palace doorway ahead of her attendants, who joined her one by one, all showing signs of haste. The people on the stairs moved silently out of the queen’s way, and she looked down at the king, who still hadn’t looked up. Walking stiffly, she came silently down the stairs. The guards broke their cordon to admit her. She reached for Eugenides, touched him on the face. He leapt backward like a startled deer, so explosively that Costis almost fell over trying to hold him. The queen snatched her hand back as if she had been burned. There was a collective gasp from all around and then silence. Nothing stirred in the courtyard, not even the air, while the queen looked down at the king and the king looked down at his feet. Costis’s heart sank—for king and for queen, and for himself, who was uncomfortably loyal to two people at the same time. The queen had begun another slow step backward up the stair behind her when the king caught her by the wrist and pulled her forward. He pulled Costis as well. Costis was sufficiently taller than the king that bringing his shoulder down to provide support put him off-balance. He had to shift his footing with care, and shift it again as the king let go of Attolia’s wrist in order to catch the robe at the elbow and pull her closer. The king lifted a hand to her cheek and kissed her. It was not a kiss between strangers, not even a kiss between a bride and a groom. It was a kiss between a man and his wife, and when it was over, ...

While half asleep, he had spoken with an Eddisian accent, which was only to be expected, but Costis had never heard it before, nor had anyone he knew. Awake, the king sounded like an Attolian. It made Costis wonder what else the king could hide so well that no one even thought to look for it.

“And if what she sacrifices is her heart? Giving it up a piece at a time until there is nothing left? What do you have then, Relius, but a heartless ruler? And what becomes of the common good then?”

Costis snatched up his sword and retreated. The men sparring around him moved to make room and then circled around, all pretense of minding their own business gone. “So, Costis,” said the king, as Costis watched him warily, “you asked for this. Why?” “You compromised my honor.” “I compromised your honor? Which one of us hit the other in the face?” “They think I lied on your instructions. That Teleus and I killed the assassins in the garden and let you take the credit.” “Oh, that,” said the king with a shrug. “That isn’t your honor, Costis. That’s the public perception of your honor. It has nothing to do with anything important, except perhaps for manipulating fools who mistake honor for its bright, shiny trappings. You can always change the perceptions of fools.”

“Sometimes, if you want to change a man’s mind, you change the mind of the man next to him first.”