Those who claim to be our leaders are no more than VILLAINS and OPPRESSORS more concerned with sating their own GREED and DESIRES than with the welfare of the citizens they claim to serve. Rise up and FIGHT those who would deny our right to LIBERTY and FREEDOM. Rise up and FIGHT those who would rather send us to our DEATHS than pay a FAIR WAGE. Rise up and FIGHT those who care more for PROFIT and POWER than DECENCY and EQUALITY. Rise up…

The piece of propaganda went on from there in the way of all polemic – words chosen to inspire and incite the populace against the King and the rest of the aristocracy. The populace which, at this very moment, were all staring at us with hate in their eyes. But I barely noticed, my gaze fixed on the page. On the ink. On the streaks marring the quality of the reproduction.

Lifting my head, I saw my father standing motionless, reading the piece. Then he reached into his pocket, extracting a stained packet of papers, eyes shifting between them.

“Bloody stones and sky, Marc,” Tristan snarled, staring at the sheet of paper in his hand. “How does this continue to find its way into Trollus?” Then his magic surged, his voice amplified over the crowd, mocking and cruel. “Rise up? Oh, by all means. Rise up against those who hold all that rock–” he gestured upward “–off your heads and see just how well that goes for you.” Then he stormed off through the crowd, Anaïs hot on his heels.

“I’m sorry, but I need to go after him,” Marc said.

“Of course,” I said, smoothing the page out in my hands, a dull roar filling my ears, the troll lights of those around me suddenly seeming too bright as understanding dawned upon me.

As he walked away, I couldn’t help but regard him in a whole new light. Because the page I held, and all those floating through Trollus to fuel the fires of revolution: they’d been printed on the exact same press as the twins’ comics, which my heart told me was no coincidence.

My friends were sympathizers.

And I’d just given proof of it to my father.

Chapter 11

Marc

The feel of her skin seemed burned into my fingertips as I followed my friends through the city, everything and everyone we passed an unfocused blur, my mind back in the throne room with Pénélope.

I hadn’t intended for that to happen.

Tristan and I had planned this ruse for weeks, but all thought of plots and politics had fallen away with her standing next to me. The spicy scent of her perfume had risen to fill my nose, her magic pressing up against mine right up to the point that it wasn’t, our powers melding together in a way I hadn’t known possible. A level of intimacy I’d dreamed of, yet never experienced until that moment.

But it had been nothing like touching her.