Chapter 147

• Dane
• The council chamber throbbed with a restless pulse, a dull cavern of whispers and sidelong glances beneath a ceiling ribbed with ancient beams, each carved with the stern visages of kings long turned to dust. I lounged on my throne, the iron frame cold as a winter blade through my velvet doublet, and let my gaze rake over the assembly. Noblemen preened, councilmen fidgeted, and at the center of it all, on the oaken council table, lay a ring-not mine, as I'd first feared when my name was called earlier, but Thane's.
• A gaudy thing, gold-twisted with a ruby the size of a quail's egg, squatted there like a confession, glinting under the torchlight. I had dismissed the summons as yet another tedious dispute-land, coin, some lordling's bruised pride—but the truth slithered into focus.