Chapter 122

“The King’s chair does not vote in this matter,” Caspian said.

He said it to the eldest, and to the council along the dais, and past them to the benches and the stairs, in the voice he had once used to me across a long table in Ashgrove when he wanted a thing understood the first time.

“The King is a party to it. A party does not sit in judgment on his own case. I ask that it be written so.” He did not wait for her to answer that. “And I ask that one more thing be laid on that table before you vote. Master Quill has kept a record since the well at Carrow, at my order, of every wrong the Crown did in the Lady’s matter. I have signed every page. The council should have it in front of them when they decide what stands.”

Quill was already on his feet. He took the packet from inside his coat, tied with tape, and showed the hall the King’s seal and his own on it, whole, and laid it on Nana’s table at the end of the row, beside the dart in its little box.

Brenna unc