Page 74 of Bright We Burn
Matthias leaned closer, peering through the hole. “Why do you make your life so much more difficult than it has to be? You could have been in a house. With servants. With comforts. I would have taken excellent care of you out of respect for what you have accomplished. I am not a fool; I know you have done great things. But you made so many enemies along the way. Does it not trouble you that I have held you these last three months and no one has come looking for you? No one has inquired about your location.” He twisted his face in mock sympathy. “No one cares that you are gone. You have been replaced on your throne without fanfare or struggle. You may have sent the Ottomans out of your land, but this is your reward.” He sighed as though feeling actual pity for her. “I cannot kill you. I do not know if I want to, but even if I did, it would put me at odds with those who admire you. Besides, it is much easier to simply keep you. To let you stay here until everyone has forgotten you. Until your only legacy are the lurid woodcuts and terrifying nighttime stories of the Saxons. You will fade into a monster, a myth. And when that happens, I will be kind. When everything you accomplished has disappeared—and it will not take long—then I will take you out of this cell. And I will let you die.”
He paused, considering. “Or I may let you live. I do not think it matters much, either way. The world was never going to permit you to continue. You should have made someone a repulsive wife, had an heir or two, and lived out your life in quiet misery.”
Lada lifted an eyebrow coldly. “Your father would be ashamed of you.”
Matthias nodded without emotion. “He probably would. I will have to live with that. And I will live. I have my crown. I will rule my people, and my reign will be long and fair and touched with glory. And you will be less than a notation in the triumphant history of my life. Who knows, maybe you will have a few lines in the sultan’s history as well? You can always hope.”
Lada wanted to find words that would do as much damage as she knew her fists could. She wanted to cut this small man to his very core.
But she knew that even though she was better, smarter, stronger, even though she had already done more for Europe than he ever would, even though she had worked and fought harder than he was capable of, he was probably right. He would be rewarded and remembered and respected.
He might even merit some of that, eventually.
“We could have done great things together,” Lada said. “If you had but a portion of your father’s courage, we could have changed the face of Europe forever.”
“But only one of us wants things to change. How they are right now suits my people’s needs. And be honest, my pearl. Did you really think the world would change enough to accept a woman as prince?” Matthias searched her face for an answer, genuinely curious. Then, with a shrug, he turned.
Lada watched the space go dark as Matthias walked out of view.
She knew perfectly well how to be a girl. She was a girl. People seemed to forget that, or assume she wanted to be something else because of her choices. Hearing Matthias lay out her future in such bleak terms might have sent her into a rage in the past, but she was older than she had been when she got here. She was weary.
She was ready.
* * *
The next time the cruel guard came by with a rodent, Lada smiled at him. She opened her eyes wide and smiled through her long, tangled hair. “I want bigger animals,” she said. “Rats are not satisfying. Bring me rabbits. Larger animals. Men, if you have any to spare.”
His look of gleeful horror confirmed to Lada that he would do as asked, if only to have a new account of her depravity to trade like currency among the other soldiers. She smiled bigger.
* * *
Lada lay in a pool of blood, her skin pale, her eyes closed. The blood was cold and congealed, an inelegantly written story of the end of her life spilled out onto stone floors.
“Devil take her,” a guard at the door muttered. “Hey! Come look at this.”
“Oh, God protect us. What a mess. Hey, you! Stay here. You have quite the cleanup job ahead of you tonight. Josef, go get the keys.”
“Should I send word to the king?”
“No, not yet. We should check on her, make sure she is dead. Then move her out quietly so no one notices. After that we can figure out what to tell him. I better not get in trouble for this.”
“I liked this job,” the second guard said.
“Not me. Look at those animals! She was a monster. Lucifer is dancing happy in his flames tonight to get such a soul for hell.”
After a few minutes, the door opened and two pairs of booted feet shuffled into the room.
“God save us, the smell!”
A boot nudged Lada’s side. Then her wrist was lifted, held gingerly between two fingers as though the guard was worried her death—or perhaps just the smell—was contagious. “Where is the wound? Her wrists are not cut.”
Lada twisted her hand, grabbing the guard’s wrist. She yanked him to the floor. A cry went up but was cut short with the swift application of Stefan’s blade. Lada’s hands around the first guard’s throat prevented him from shouting, and Stefan’s blade silenced the other one.
“What took you so long?” Lada stood, shaking out her arms and legs to restore circulation. The animal blood made her dress sticky and stiff, but she had no replacements and no time to change.
Stefan wiped his knife on the tunic of one of the dead guards. He had slipped in after them. “I had to kill the ones in the hallway first.”
He held out a length of brown cloth, and Lada wrapped it around herself like a shawl. It hid most of the blood. She hesitated at the threshold, and then stepped into the hallway. It felt like a much bigger distance than it was. “Where is Oana? She was supposed to discover my body. I have been lying on the floor for hours!”