Total pages in book: 82
Estimated words: 77692 (not accurate)
Estimated Reading Time in minutes: 388(@200wpm)___ 311(@250wpm)___ 259(@300wpm)
Estimated words: 77692 (not accurate)
Estimated Reading Time in minutes: 388(@200wpm)___ 311(@250wpm)___ 259(@300wpm)
I feel Luna’s other hand smooth the back of my cloak. “Can I do something?”
“No,” I whisper, heartbroken.
There isn’t a single thing.
I take only a few more moments to gather my emotions and steel myself for what comes next. There’s a process for these things. Generations and generations of traditions that determines the motions I go through from here, and it starts with me turning around.
Luna is silent and steadfast at my side as I head back through the garden, weaving around all the twists and turns in the paths until I find my brother, his mate, and their daughter sitting under a tree that protects them from the rain. Bothaki’s gaze meets mine and stops me in my tracks.
I nod to him, but I don’t say anything.
“I’ll carry Father,” he tells me. “When you’re ready.”
“Okay.”
I just have to get through the rest first, and then I can get back to delivering my father to his final resting place. Beyond the courtyard garden where two guards wait by one of the many entrances and exits, the one closest to the palace bell tower, I meet them under the enclave. Hallans who were closest to my father in their duties, knew what would happen tonight. And their job afterward.
“The king is dead,” I tell them. “Ring the bell until the drums stop.”
They needn’t another word from me before turning to do their newest duty—one last time for the old king, and the first of many for the new.
“Yes, Thori,” they both murmur before all I see is their backs leaving for the bell tower.
Alone with my mate, my feet suddenly feel immovable again. One with the ground, holding me down.
“Four hundred steps,” I whisper.
From the corner of my eyes, I see the way Luna glances up at me, confused. “Pardon?”
“When I was a boy, my father told me there were only so many ways I would become king. This would happen or that.”
“What do you mean?”
“If he were killed or when he died of old age.”
Luna lets out a quiet breath. “Or should he ever need to do the Onata?”
“Another possibility, but not one I ever thought would happen. When I was a boy, I knew exactly how many steps it would take me to get from certain places to another, if I ever had to make those walks. It’s four hundred from here to the gallery veranda. Every bell toll will bring more Hallans to the palace square. It’ll ring twice for every step, and they’ll all know what it means because it only ever rings for two things.”
A death and the heir.
Only for kings.
Luna’s fingers weave tighter with mine when just moments later, the first bell toll rings out. It’s as loud as the drums, a new tenor to add to the harrowing melody that has become my parents’ final send off.
This was not how I imagined becoming king.
I still don’t move.
“We’ll stay here, right here, until you’re ready, Zawla,” Luna assures me.
She, too, will join me on the veranda where my presence will both announce the death of a king and the crowning of another. I know she tells me we can wait because I’m not entirely ready, but not because she isn’t ready to stand with me. Quite the opposite, really.
As if possible, the bell seems to toll even louder, and I let the sound be the thing to ground me back into the present with Luna.
“I’m ready,” I say.
I don’t know if she counts the steps on the way, I don’t ask, but I do. Every single one until the grand staircase leading up to the gallery veranda is before us. I can hear the cries and murmuring from the crowd outside which tells me that the ringing bell has in fact called the Hallans in the court and city out of their homes. I know the crowd I will soon face won’t be all that will come. Had it been under different circumstances, or given some time, we would have even interred my father to be viewed by the public should they wish to say goodbye, but not this time.
Not this king.
I don’t take the first step to start up the large stairs, and instead, my gaze focuses on the stone floor beneath my feet. I only want a moment to breathe. Just to think alone in my mind as Halun before I become Halun the king.
“I forgive you,” Luna says beside me.
So softly that I almost don’t hear her.
My head turns to her, and even though there’s only one possible thing she could be forgiving me for, I’m not sure I heard her. “What?”
The unshed tears in her eyes doesn’t stop the steely resolve that saturates my mate’s very presence next to me. “I forgive you for taking me the way you did. For making a choice, even if it took away mine, because I think I understand now why your mind couldn’t take you to the place where I wasn’t there. I just want you to know that, Halun. I forgive you.”