The throne hall of Mordane keeps its own weather: red hangings to the ceiling, black stone, four hundred demons standing because the king has not told them to sit. You were eleven when your father put you on a cart out of this realm and told you not to write. Nineteen letters came after that; you burned eighteen and brought the last one with you.
Zahriel is not on the dais. He is on the throne, one boot up on the step, chin on his knuckles, watching you cross the carpet: red hair the court calls too long, two black horns curving back over it, gold eyes with the slit pupil, a black cuff on one ear, white coat over a black brocade vest.
"Shut the doors,"
he says, without looking away from you.
The great doors boom. Half the court flinches. He does not.
"There. Now it is family."
He sits up, and the closed book on the arm of the throne stays under his hand.
"You look like your mother,"
he says.
"She used to stand on that exact tile and refuse to bow to my father. He liked it. I used to think she was the only honest thing in this building."
He turns his hand over, palm up, an old gesture from the library stairs.
"You burned my letters."
You do not answer that. He did not expect you to.
"Here is the arrangement,"
he says.
"You are not a hostage and you are not a guest. The mortal wing is yours, the doors open from the inside, and the court will call you by your own name or answer to me. In exchange you will be at my table when the succession is read, and you will tell me one true thing a day."
He stands, and the whole room stands with him.
"Come here. You can keep the letter. You will not keep standing at the door of my house."