“You see my point, Your Majesty.” He went on, poking his finger at me with every point he made, to explain that my harebrained scheme of surrendering to Attolia was the result of my unseasoned youth. Like my uncle, I hadn’t listened to wiser heads. He’d let his temper get the better of him. He’d been mercurial and unreliable. He’d been selfish and hadn’t had the best interests of Sounis at heart, and that was the real problem. That was why the barons had oh-so-reluctantly risen against him.

I sneaked glances at Akretenesh, trying to see how Hanaktos fitted into his plans, because I could not believe that Comeneus was a partner in his schemes.

A pawn, perhaps. Akretenesh’s bland expression of approval never altered, and I wished I had his diplomatic skills. It was all I could do to keep myself from grabbing Comeneus’s finger and biting it.

Finally I interrupted him to say that I was grateful for his instruction, and even if he were not to be my regent, I would certainly consider his advice in the future with the attention it deserved. Before he could say anything else, I added that he had served Sounis as he had thought best, and he would certainly be rewarded for it. He nodded vigorously, like a big ox. He appeared to expect a very substantial reward, but he wasn’t looking at me. He was looking at the Mede ambassador.

After I had listened to Comeneus tell me the mistakes of my uncle, I quit for the day and returned to my rooms. The servants stripped off my sweaty clothes and brought me a cup of iced wine. When the others were gone, I quizzed Nomenus for all he knew. Was there any more news from Tas-Elisa? Were Hanaktos’s men still on the road to the capital? Were they moving on Elisa? Nomenus said that he’d heard nothing of the kind.

The day of the meet I dressed in my most elaborate clothes, thinking of Gen. The coat he had had made for me with the ridiculous pockets and the embroidery on top of embroidery on the outside so that I could look like a king and act like one was as stiff as a board. I felt like a box with legs. The night before, I had finally opened the lower compartment of Attolia’s pistol case, dreading what I might discover. Whatever alternative Eugenides had urged me to find, I had not, and I had waited to look until it was too late to change course. When I saw what lay under Attolia’s gun, I put my head down on the table and cried.

Dressed in my best, I went to the meet. I couldn’t slouch without putting obvious dents in the lines of my elegant coat, so I kept my shoulders well back and bobbed my head at my court like a demented hen. The barons and their supporters had been gathering since dawn.

Each baron was entitled to bring two men, usually choosing an heir and one other. The amphitheater was full, from the prestigious seats in the first rows all the way up to the benches across the top, where people had to lean to see past the branches of the bushes that grew on the slopes behind them and hung down to block their view.

I climbed up onto the stage and waited patiently through the long protocol of the ceremony, sitting in one of a row of chairs with Akretenesh and members of my late uncle’s council. The chairs, significantly, were all the same size.

It was late in the morning, and I was soaked in sweat by the time Baron Xorcheus proposed a regency. I stood up and stepped to the front of the stage. Xorcheus hesitated, unsure of what I was doing, and that gave me time to walk down the stair to the open ground in front of my barons. By the time I reached the center, the murmuring had faded away.

I can’t really remember what I said. It was idealistic and it was naive. I reminded them that we shared one peninsula with Eddis and Attolia, that we shared a language, and that the gods of our fathers were the same. I said it was stupid to think that we could ever be anything but subjects to the Mede, that my barons needed to see beyond their own self-interests to the interests of all Sounis and to the interests of Eddis and Attolia as well. United, we would all benefit. I said exactly what I had wanted to say all along, because I knew that nothing I said was going to make any difference anyway.

Xorcheus called for the vote, and one by one my barons answered my idealism. They stood and called out “regency” or “king,” and I waited in the center of the amphitheater for their judgment. A regent for even a short time would cement Akretenesh’s power and make me no more than a puppet king for the rest of my reign. Once he had installed his own allies in every position in court, once he had complete control of the army, I would have lost forever.

There were a few “kings”, but one after another, the votes for a regent came in. I looked each baron in the eye, and they were defiant, contemptuous, regretful, and in rare cases ashamed of themselves, but they voted for Comeneus and the Mede. That was the meet. When all the deal making was done, you had to cast your vote aloud for everyone to hear.

When the vote came around to my father, I held my breath. He stood and looked down at me for so long, I thought the sun had stopped in the sky. When he said “king,” he said it so firmly that the people nearby him winced. I swallowed a lump in my throat and looked to the next man.

I watched Baron Comeneus as the voting drew near him. The barons voted in the same order of precedence in which they had come to meet with me. By the time Comeneus voted it was already clear what the outcome would be, and he called “regent” with radiating self-importance. He never looked anywhere except at me, but at his right hand sat his heir, a much-younger brother. He never looked at me at all.

When the vote was over, the amphitheater was silent. I heard Akretenesh speak just behind me. He must have come down the steps without my realizing it.

“Did you think they would make you king?” he said, contemptuously. His voice was quiet, but he’d forgotten, or perhaps never knew about, the acoustics. His every word was audible even to the men in the highest seats and I watched them, as a single organism, recoil.

“No,” I said, turning. “Not on the first vote.”

I put my left hand into the open front of my coat to the pockets sewn inside. Narrow and three times as deep as they were wide, they were almost useless; anything you put into them would slip to the bottom and be out of reach, anything except the long-barreled handgun that Attolia had given me. It fit perfectly. I lifted it out of the pocket, directed it almost without looking, fixed my eyes on Akretenesh, and shot Hanaktos dead.

If Akretenesh’s voice had been audible to the back row, the report of the gun was deafening.

In the shocked, silent aftermath, I said, “We’ll give them a second chance.”

With my right hand, I reached to the other pocket. I had known as soon as I lifted the false bottom in the gun case and looked underneath what it meant. I had tried without ceasing to find some alternative to Attolia’s ruthless advice, and I had failed. Gen’s gift reassured me that I had not failed for lack of trying. He had seen no other solution himself.

I lifted out the matching gun and read its archaic inscription. Realisa onum. Not “The queen made me,” but “I make the king.”

Looking at Akretenesh’s startled face down the long barrel of the handgun, I smiled until I felt the scar tissue tighten. That one expression, I’d never showed him. My face gave away my humiliation, my rage, my surprise, and my embarrassment, but I had never let him see what I looked like when I smiled: my uncle.

His diplomatic mask dissolved, and he backed away.