I sat with my legs propped up on my desk leaning back in my chair as I wrote my response to the letter sent by king Kyzer. I accepted his agreement for a re-alliance but questioned why he and my father lost their alliance in the first place. I wasn’t going to sign any treaties if I didn’t know the reason was resolved. When I finished, Luke decided to walk into my office. Our eyes met as I crossed my arms.
“I thought I asked you to share a certain piece of information earlier,” I said. His gaze made its way to the brown wooden chair in the corner of the room that held Samuel. He was upside down reading a book from my shelf called, “Essentials of Proper Etiquette.” Personally, it wouldn’t be the choice I would pick for entertainment, but he obviously had a different opinion.
Luke raised an eyebrow and said, “I was busy. I think it worked itself out, though.”
I swung my feet off my desk and sat up straight. “Do you now? You think it worked out?”
“Yes...,” he answered unsurely. I turned my attention towards Samuel only to find him giving me a crooked smile in return. I shook my head at his obliviousness of the conversation. I wasn’t really upset at Luke for not informing me when Samuel had left his room, but he hadn’t done as I asked. I was just giving him a hard time about as the cousinly to do, of course. Looking at Samuel, he just ruined it completely.
“Forget about it. It doesn’t matter anymore,” I said waving it off. “Samuel why are you sitting upside down. Sit correctly like the book tells you.” He promptly followed my order. “Luke what did you have to tell me?”
He sat down in the chair opposite of me and softly told me, “I did some research, well technically I sent someone in my place, but that doesn't matter. I had a few men who unofficially work for me go throughout town...-"
I scowled, "Unofficially? What does that mean?"
He stumbled across his words trying to avoid the question. "It's not a big deal. They do jobs I can't do officially." I raised an eyebrow questionly. "Look. It doesn't matter. The point is I think they found a lead. They made their opinions of you extremely clear and caught some peoples' attention."
I didn't know whether to be upset about him running my name through the dirt or to be curious about what they said about me. The later won out of the two. "What opinions? What did you have them say?"
His face scrunched up as he replied, "Are you serious right now? That's not important." I nodded while glaring at him making it clear I wanted to know.
He sighed, "Just that you could do a better job at helping your people. Changing a few policies. Nothing too awful. I just had them tell anyone who would listen."
"Do you think really think I need to do more? That I don't care about my people?"
"Scarlett, the whole point was to get the people's attention that we're looking for. And if you would let me finish speaking, I could tell you that we did. I think we found their meeting place," he continued excitedly.
Nodding, I said, “Alright, let’s go there.”
“We aren’t going anywhere,” he said switching over to a disapproving tone. “You are going to be queen. That would be irresponsible of me to allow you anywhere near there.”
"Are one of your 'unofficial' men going?"
"No. one has a kid on the way, so he said he wasn't taking any chances. The other one's wife complained about him working too much. And the last guy said only a fool would go there alone."
Frowning I replied, “Are you going then?”
“No, I’m not. They might know what I look like already, so we’d need to someone else.” My frowned only deepened at that. If I wasn’t going and he wasn’t going then who did, we trust enough to send in our place?
I leaned in closer to him asking, “Enlighten me, whose going?”
His eyes drifted towards Samuel, who at the moment was trying hard to master the skill of… walking gracefully? He looked more like he had broken his back. It was as if he was trying to use a cane to hold himself up. He had his hand out in front of him just hanging there.
“I thought we were in agreement over this,” I said whisper yelling.
“We were, but now I’m rethinking what we agreed to.” He held his hands up saying, “Hear me out. You believe we can trust him, so here’s a chance for him to prove himself. Plus, only a fool would go, right?” I wanted to wipe that silly grin from his face as I shook my head in disapprovement.
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