They Drugged Me Into Darkness, Now I Am Its King novel · Chapter 7 of 32

Chapter 7: The Forge Takes Its Stand

Mossbeard shoved a steaming bowl into Aquas's hands.

'Eat,' he boomed. 'You look like a ghost who forgot his grave.'

Aquas looked down at the bowl. Thick stew, dark bread, steam rising into the cold forge air.

He had not asked for food. He had not asked for any of this.

Across the worktable, Durn slammed a gauntleted fist onto the iron surface. The sound rang like a bell.

'Elder Voss,' she said. 'Read the figures. Aloud. Now.'

The senior elder stood at the head of the forge crew, his grey robes too clean for this place. His name was Voss. Aquas had learned it three days ago, when the elder first looked at him like a crack in a foundation.

Voss did not look at the maps. He looked at Aquas.

'The light he carries,' Voss said, 'is not of Pluto. It is not of the moon. It is a foreign fire, and it burns at the heart of our prince's house.'

The forge crew shifted. Hammers stilled. No one spoke.

Aquas held the bowl. The stew was still warm.

He was not afraid of the elder. He was not even angry. He was tired, and the fracture under his eye throbbed like a second heartbeat, and he wanted very badly to sit down.

But he did not sit. He did not speak. He let the elder talk.

'A bond between shadow and sun is an abomination,' Voss continued. 'Every clan knows it. The old texts are clear. Such a union invites the light to consume the dark, or the dark to smother the light. Either way, Pluto burns.'

Mossbeard stepped forward, his beard bristling.

'You will not speak of our prince's husband as if he were a plague rat,' Mossbeard said. 'I have written letters for less. I have written letters for MUCH less.'

'The goblin elder's correspondence is noted,' Voss said dryly. 'It does not change the maps.'

Durn's jaw tightened. She pulled a sealed war map from the table and unrolled it with one sharp motion.

The parchment was old, cracked at the edges, marked with ink that had faded to brown.

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