A king? He wore a crown, men knelt at his feet, he was first-born heir to the White Isles and his father the last king was dead. But the house of the king was far away on another island, his younger brother sat there on the throne of Altrersys in his place, the men of the White Isles believed him dead. King of a single town, a fishing port, his seat a fish merchant’s house with tall narrow rooms and worn floors. So glorious a place from which to reclaim his own.

Perhaps, Marith thought for a moment, it had been possibly foolish to raze the one fortress he had possessed to the ground. Burn the world and piss on the ashes and end up sleeping in a lumpy old bed with mildew stains on the wall. A triumph indeed.

There were sea-worn stones and bird feathers hanging on leather thongs beside the house’s doorway. They rattled as he went past. The owner of the house, the future Lord Fishmonger, the wealthiest herring merchant in Toreth Harbour, knelt like the rest as Marith entered. His hair was greasy, dandruff caught on his shoulders, beneath the perfume Marith was certain he smelled of fish. But he’d handed his house over so happily, so gladly, his face had been all bright with eagerness to let a blood-soaked boy throw him out of his lumpy old bed. Surely the greatest honour a man could ever have, that.

Lord Fishmonger looked nervous. “My Lord King,” Lord Fishmonger said nervously. Marith thought: I must find out his name, I suppose. “My Lord King …”

Thalia came down the stairs. The sun came in through a window onto her face. She wore a white dress with pink and green flowers on it: in the golden light, with her brown skin and black hair, she looked like a may tree in bloom. Marith closed his eyes. Opened them. Too bright to look at. The sunlight was bright on her, and her face was nothing but light.

She was holding her cloak in her arms.

She looked at him for a very long time. Seemed about to speak.

He thought: she is leaving me.

He thought: I have made it safe for her to leave me. And now she will go. The realization struck him: she did not choose to come here with me. I rescued her from a stranger’s violence; she came here with me as a prisoner; she was trapped with me in a fortress under siege. And now that I have broken the siege she will turn and walk away.

She’s too good for me, he thought. Parricide. Vile thing. King of Death.

Lord Fishmonger, edging around beside him, said, “My Lord King …”

A cloud passed over the sun. The light faded. Thalia’s blue eyes dark and cautious. She did not speak. In the shadow, she looked like the stone on Carin’s grave.

Marith said, “Thalia?”

She looked at him. A very long time, she seemed to look at him.

 “Marith,” she said. She seemed uncertain. I don’t … I don’t understand, he thought. Look what I’ve done for you. All of this, Thalia, all of this I did for you. To give you all that you deserve. To make you queen.

She was the High Priestess of the Lord of Living and Dying, Great Tanis Who Rules All Things, the One God of the Sekemleth Empire of the Asekemlene Emperor of the Eternal Golden City of Sorlost. She who brings death to the dying and life to those who wait to be born.

She knew that he was lying, if he thought he had done any of it for her sake.

“Thalia,” he said again. “Don’t go. Please. I love you,” he said.

Her eyes narrowed. She held out her hand.

He said, “Please stay.”

She smiled. “For now,” she said. “As you ask me so well.”

Hardly an answer. Yet his heart leapt.

But things to do, the ragged soldiers of his army must be addressed, some plan must be made. Very well, Marith, you are king of one town on one island, you have an army of fishermen and servant girls, you have a borrowed horse and a borrowed sword. Your father left his ships at Escral a day’s march to the west of here, perhaps even now more of his men are coming for you. You can destroy a tower, yes, granted. Such a display of power, to break mortared stones and bring down a place of peace. But can you hold against warriors, in battle? Killer of babies, you are, Marith. Women. Old men. What can you really do?

The thoughts drumming in him. Horses’ hooves again, thundering. Beating wings. His eyes itched like fire. He stared at the walls, trying to see. Thalia sat opposite him in silence. A room that smelled of mildew, and a lumpy bed. All this, for you!

I was going to take you to Ith, he thought. To my uncle’s court there, to make you a princess, dress you in gold and diamonds, we could have spent our days riding in the forests, reading side-by-side by a warm fire, talking and dancing and drinking and fucking and doing nothing at all every day. That dream is over. And what have I got for it?

Again, he felt her about to speak.

A confusion in the corridor outside. Knocking on the door, urgent, timid. A relief, even, that someone had come to break the tension, make something happen, give him something to do. Lord Fishmonger, I really must find out his name, Marith thought, Lord Fishmonger at the door with a message: one of the lords of Third Isle had come, Lord Fiolt, with thirty armed men. Said he wished to do homage to his king. Said indeed that he was the king’s particular friend.

Well now. Thalia looked up, confused. Carin Relast was my only friend, he had once told her, my only friend, and he is dead.

Marith got up. “Osen Fiolt? I will see him in the main chamber, then. Have wine brought for us.” He tried to look away from Thalia. “I should see him alone.”

She frowned. Thinking.

“I need to be sure of him,” said Marith, “before I risk anything.” Again, he knew that she knew that this was not true.

She nodded. All so fractured and strained. Perhaps she should have left him. He could give her a bag of gold and a horse and send her on her way somewhere.

He went down the stairs to meet this man who named himself his friend.

Osen Fiolt was a young man, only a few years older than Marith. Dark haired, dark eyed, handsome, with a clever face. He knelt at Marith’s feet, his sword held out with the hilt toward Marith in offering. Had the sense at least not to look at the crudely carved chairs, the plastered walls, the pewter jug and clay cups.

Osen said, “You have my loyalty and my life, My Lord King. My sword is yours.”

Osen’s voice half frightened, half mocking. Marith Altrersyr, crowned “king.”

“Your life and your loyalty. Your sword.” Marith raised his eyes, looked at the ceiling. A stain up there where the winter storms had got in. The king’s own particular friend. “Yet you did not come, My Lord Fiolt, when my father was besieging Malth Salene. One thousand men and seven trebuchets and a magelord, and you did not come to my aid. So should I not kill you? For abandoning me? For not coming to my aid? Where was your sword then? Your loyalty? Your life?”

Osen’s face went white. “I … Marith … My Lord King … Marith …” He blinked, his hands working on the blade of the sword. He’d cut himself in a moment, if he wasn’t careful. “I …” All the mockery gone out of his voice. Marith Altrersyr, crowned king.

Men’s voices drifted in through the windows, soldiers being drilled into some pathetic semblance of order. The army of Amrath. Marith’s army. Marith’s loyal and beloved men. Osen raised his eyes to Marith’s face and Marith could see the thoughts there moving.

Osen said slowly, “I am the Lord of Malth Calien. I am sworn to Malth Elelane, to the throne of the White Isles, as a vassal of the king. I swore an oath to your father. While he lived, was I not bound to keep it? Whatever my true feelings might have been? Without loyalty, there is chaos. So where does a man’s loyalty lie, then, if not to his king above all else?”

Marith thought: we were friends, once, I suppose. I killed Carin. I killed my father. I suppose I may need some friends. He looked down at Osen. Tried to smile. Sitting at a table once, him and Osen and Carin, talking, joking, Osen’s half loving half mocking envious eyes. “I don’t trust him,” Carin often said.

“As far as I can remember, we decided it rather depended on the king.”

Osen tried to smile. “And on the all else.” Pause. “Though as far as I can remember, we never reached a definitive conclusion, since we had to break off discussing it for you to be sick.”

Young men drinking together. Drawing plans and dreams in spilled wine on the table top. “I’ll need some other lords around me,” Marith had reassured Carin, “when I’m king. Irlast’s a big place just for me and you.”

His eyes met Osen’s eyes. The tension broke.

Friends.

Marith reached out and took the proffered sword. “Indeed. Very well then, My Lord Fiolt. I take your loyalty and your life and your sword.” He laughed. “Want to drink to the fact I’m still alive?”

Osen sheathed his sword. Laughed back. “Like I drank to the fact you were dead?”

“You drank to my being dead?”

“Drowning my sorrows. It’s what you would have wanted, I’d assumed. No?”

They grinned at each other and sat down by the fire, and Marith sloshed wine into two of the cups. “It’s utterly vile, of course. Half vinegar. But it was this or goat’s milk … We’ll be in Malth Elelane soon, and then we’ll have a proper feast to celebrate.”

Osen looked around the room. The rough furniture, the crude wall hangings, the ugly bronze lamp. “We can have a proper feast quicker than that, at Malth Calien. My loyalty, my life, my sword, and all the contents of my wine cellars, I’ll pledge you.” Raised his cup. “King Marith. May his sword never blunt and his enemies never cease to tremble and his cup never be empty of wine. May my sword never blunt and my life’s blood be shed for him.”

“And your cellars hold better things than this muck.”

“That I can pledge you unfailingly. If we ride today, I’ll have you drinking hippocras by my fires tomorrow evening.”

He had friends here. Of course he had friends here. He lived here. Friends and lovers and drinking companions and people who’d known him since he was born. A world.