Because one really shouldn’t mix business and pleasure. And last night I established that I was here for the king’s pleasure.

The guard is still talking, but I can’t hear him over the noise in my head. I leave him, slamming the door to my room a little harder than I had intended.

I clench my hands. I want to scream—no I want to hurt something. I want to slam my fist against skin until it bruises.

The king wasn’t drunk like I was last night. No, he’s been busy orchestrating a plan of his own. One where he makes no consolations to the WUN, or to me, or to my father.

Just like I had hoped last night, my hatred is back; however, what stokes it is not my country’s wrath, but my own.

I’ve only been awake an hour when I hear a knock on the door. The WUN soldier answers it before I do.

“The king wishes to deliver a present to Miss Freeman,” I hear someone say on the other side of the door.

That’s all I need to hear. “Don’t bother taking the gift,” I yell at the soldier. “I won’t accept it.”

My guard shrugs to the person standing in the hallway. “Sorry sir, orders are orders,” he says before closing the door.

Once it clicks shut, the guard shakes his head and glances at me, a twinkle of respect in his eye. “The king’s about to learn just what a ballbuster you are.”

“The king’s a fucking prick.”

The guard snorts. “Tell me something I don’t know.”

I’m staring out my window, bathed under the dwindling sunlight, when I hear my father enter the suite. As soon as I do, I rush out of my room, ignoring the faint pound of my fading headache.

My father rubs his eyes, his face weary.

“That bastard,” I say.

“Serenity, watch your language,” he says.

The irony is that I’ve been ruder to the king’s face than this.

“What happened?” I ask.

My father takes a seat on one of the couches in the common area and drops a package he came into the room carrying. “Other than the medical relief you managed to wrangle from him, King Lazuli’s not budging on most of his conditions—and they’re the important ones.”

“He kicked me out of the peace talks,” I say quietly.

My father meets my eyes. “I know,” he says, his voice resigned. Of course my father knows.

As we stare at each other, I feel another strange pang of sympathy for the man in front of me. The situation is unfolding how he feared it would.

“I’m sorry,” I say.

“You shouldn’t be the one apologizing,” my dad says.