look for proof of Camellia's plans—"
"She doesn't make plans, Your Highness. She just acts when it suits her," Atticus said.
"There must be something. You shouldn't be sentenced to death for—Ugh!" Bryony bit her own tongue and shook her head. She was trying to tiptoe along the same line as Camellia, I realized, shy cautiously on the side of it that wasn't treason and wishing her own sister dead.
"I'll tell you what I know," Atticus said softly to Cresswell. "It's mostly… I don't know that there are laws that protect Chosen from the things Camellia put us through, but I'll share it all and every word I heard from her if it might help destroy any chance of her becoming queen."
"Owen, take Bryony back to the suite," Cresswell said. "Humphries is in the hall, take him too."
"I should stay," Bryony said as I took her hand, but even she sounded uncertain.
"I'll tell you anything you need to know," Cresswell said. And he would keep anything painful from her that she might manage without ever learning.
"Come, Mistress," I said, tugging gently, relieved when Bryony didn't fight me. I looked back to Atticus and gave him a nod. "I hope you get a chance to run again, Darby."
The man nodded, his eyes sliding away from mine. He'd resigned himself to death when he'd decided to try and kill Camellia, and the hope of his fate changing was probably too painful a temptation to grab onto the idea.
"Running may be his only chance at living," Bryony whispered in the hall.
18
Wendell
“Surely the reason we cannot come to an accord on taxation is because the majority of this council doesn't find bleeding the people of Kimmery dry—"
"Sit down, Pope!"
"—to be a suitable consequence for some members' greed. If the majority has already voted to keep taxes at a reasonable level, why, sir, should we now vote to allow regions to levy taxes without concrete benefits to—"
"Mister Pope!"
"—the people whose pockets some lords seek to drain entirely?!"
I sucked in a deep breath, fire rushing up my throat to my cheeks as Lord Thomlinson thundered my name to me once more. My applause was small from most of the others, and there were plenty of eyes glaring in my direction, but I knew I had the support.
"Take it to a vote, Thomlinson. You're wasting time," Sir Weston called up the table.
I waited a beat, just to be sure Thomlinson would move to vote. Beady eyes glared at me, but it was obvious. If he pursued trying to argue the vote in his favor, I would fight him with every breath. And only his would be wasted. I was determined. I wouldn't let the council undo all the good work Bryony had already accomplished. Especially since this vote for letting lords levy and lower taxes to their own taste was a clear attempt for the vampiric council members to attack their subjects again.
"All in favor…"
I sagged into my seat, relief tentative, even as I counted the hands that went up in favor of Thomlinson's latest wicked proposal. A month ago, the measure might've passed. Now with time and effort on my part and the added support of the former Chosen Vincent…
"Thank the stars for you, Pope," Jack whispered at my side. "For your lung capacity at least."
I choked on a laugh.
"I've never seen a man talk himself blue in the face for such great causes," Jack continued, grinning, but he was smiling at the small show of hands more than his enjoyment of teasing me.
The measure was failing.
"All against," Thomlinson muttered.
It was a small margin of victory, only three more hands against Thomlinson's cronies, but it was still success. I'd made very little headway in Bryony's favor, but at least I was a consistent thorn in a man like Thomlinson's side.
"Very well," Thomlinson bit out, shuffling the papers in front of him. "We'll table the matter."
Sir Weston scoffed and rolled his eyes at me, but I only granted him the briefest agreement. Thomlinson had plenty more notes in his stack, and I wasn't about to rest on my laurels.
"A new proposal, drafted together by myself and a few of our esteemed party," Thomlinson said.
"He's always very quick to make that distinction isn't he?" Jack muttered with a glare up the table. Which was easy for Jack to say, he was a viscount. There was really no denying him his seat here. I was a Mister, several generations away and in the wrong direction from any Pope family title. Not