“Thank you.” She rested her forehead on the ground at Aranen’s feet before she could push herself back up again.
To everyone else—her people, the Sands, the rebels—she said in Balladairan, “Citizens, my countrymen. Gather yourselves. It’s long past time for us to go home.”
CHAPTER 42THE RAIN (AND YET ANOTHER BROADSIDE)
Luca still hated public speaking. Her stomach flipped over and over as she dressed. She eyed her uncle’s letter on the bedside table as she buttoned her shirt.
Bastien was waiting for her. He didn’t fault her for his father’s arrest, and he’d helped her manage affairs since the surrender. What day had it been? She would have to count back later—the day the Balladairan Empire cracked would be important for the history books. And her name next to it.
She’d sent a note to Aranen every day to see if Touraine had woken up. And every day the response had been the same. No. Luca wanted to delay the speech until she knew whether Touraine would stand by her side, but the city was growing restless. And even though she didn’t plan to leave Qazāl until she knew Touraine’s fate one way or another, the citizens of Qazāl needed to know she wasn’t their ruler anymore.
She checked herself once more in the mirror. She wasn’t sure she liked the gaunt woman staring back at her. That woman barely looked human, let alone like a queen. She’d finally stopped losing her meals, but food didn’t appeal to her.
You’re worrying too much, Gil told her repeatedly. What was too much worry, exactly?
She tossed and turned through the night. She spent the days planning how to take her own empire apart. How to let it crumble while doing the least damage.
Bastien helped her slide her arms into a light jacket cut in the Balladairan style, and then they left, Lanquette on her heels, Gil and Bastien by her side. The carriage clattered over the dirt and stones. She winced and held her head when it jostled too much.
Bastien put a hand on her knee to steady her, or perhaps to comfort her. She twitched her leg away, and he drew back. They had had… a moment in the weeks after that day. With all the work to do and Touraine on her mind, she hadn’t been able to concentrate. She’d embraced the distraction.
“You don’t hate me for destroying your country?” Luca asked Bastien.
He smiled. Such a gentle man. “Technically, Qazāl is my home country.”
She snorted. “It won’t be for long.”
His eyes went soft and sad. “I know. I’m prepared to leave, but I’ll wait… until you do.”
Luca stiffened and looked back out the window to watch the gates as they passed through them, the worn Shālan words illegible.
“And your sister?” she asked.
“She’ll stay, I think. Aliez has always gotten on well with the Qazāli. And I think she wants to see to our father’s justice.”
“Ah.” Luca hadn’t been upset to find an excuse to hand the comte over for Qazāl to determine his fate, but she had worried how Bastien would take it. When she told him, he had held silent for a moment before sniffing and saying “Good riddance” and nothing else.
Luca’s headache intensified when she arrived at the bazaar and the crowd stretched in front of her. Qazāli filled the square, likely from all over the country. Word had spread, as she’d intended—the Balladairan surrender.
Uncle Nicolas didn’t know the extent of what Luca planned to do today. His last letter said to hold. Do nothing drastic. It also mentioned the fate of the Balladairans who’d fled on ships in the initial wave back to Balladaire.
Thanks to your mismanagement of the colonies and your fraternization with the Qazāli—including your indiscretions with the soldier, don’t think I was never informed—we had to sink all incoming Balladairan ships for quarantine measures.
So many of her people, even the healthy ones. Dead.
Uncle Nicolas had also included yet another broadside, apparently all the rage: her, kneeling with her forehead on the ground before a darker person in a Qazāli robe, clearly meant to be Aranen. Do you see this filth? he had written. News had already spread back to La Chaise. Splendid.
Lanquette helped her out of the carriage, and she walked up the gallows.
Several Balladairans bunched together in the crowd. The ones too poor or unlucky—lucky, rather—to miss the first wave of escape. She could tell them from pale Qazāli because of their frightened faces, like rabbits walking into a wolf den.
Luca tightened her hand on her cane and straightened.
“Peace on you all,” she said in Shālan, and then in Balladairan, “Peace. Too long have we struggled against each other. Though I cannot take responsibility for every decision, I am the rightful ruler of Balladaire, and I take responsibility for all that was done in my name, in my family’s name. All that I benefited and continue to benefit from. I apologize.”
She had worked out some of the speech details with Bastien. She would have preferred to work them out with Touraine. Touraine knew these people. She’d fought with them. She would know the right things to say. But she was unconscious somewhere. Luca scanned the crowd for Aranen or any of the rebels. Saïd, or even that wickedly sharp Malika. She flinched as something wet landed on her nose.
“I ask your forbearance while I remain a little while longer. Some of my citizens took ill, and we must wait until they make a full recovery until we will be welcomed back home. Anyone not adhering to this armistice, anyone not treating Qazāli with the utmost respect due to another sovereign people, may be brought to my attention. I…”
She faltered. There was so much more to say, and nothing that she could say in public. Her heart slid into her throat, but she fought through it.
“Both nations have lost too many good people, too
