I'd Give Up The World For You

Daisy let out a heavy sigh. "I'll tell you when we're alone. In the meantime we need to take people to the dungeon."

Rukelion simmered down slightly as some of his men came running. It seemed that one of the gardeners who had seen the commotion had gone off to fetch them. They had excellent timing. 

"Blaze! What's going on? I heard we have intruders," Ferguson said as he approached with his sword in hand. 

Then he saw who the intruders were and stared at them blankly. It seemed he hadn't been expecting a bunch of kids to manage to make it inside the castle without anyone else noticing. To be fair, it had probably never happened before. 

"We do. Take those four to the dungeon. They're assassins. I will interrogate them personally after I've dealt with the other three. Tighten security around the wall and cut down all of the trees. I know better than anyone that they're a weakness anyone who knows how to climb them can exploit," Rukelion said in a hard voice. 

"Understood, sire," Ferguson replied as he waved the rest of the royal guards forward to put the offenders in cuffs and lead them away. 

He sighed as soon as they were out of sight and looked over at the group of hesitant teenagers huddled up near Daisy. "So you're the famous Ira. I've heard a lot about you. Thanks for taking care of her for me while I was gone." 

He held out his hand and Ira shook it without meeting his eyes. "…I'm sorry we had to meet under these circumstances. I've heard a lot about you too."

The tension in the air was so thick it could be cut with a knife but Daisy was grateful he was trying. Though after that little display just now it made sense the kids were wary of him. He had been kind of scary. 

"You must be Ciara and Sarabeth," she said warmly to the two girls. "Though I'm afraid I don't know which of you is which. Ira talks about you a lot but never mentioned what you look like."

"I'm Sarabeth," said the girl with frizzy blonde hair and glasses before jerking her thumb at her friend. "This is Ciara."

Ciara waved awkwardly. She was a strikingly beautiful girl with skin darker than a coffee bean. So this was the one Ira seemed to have a crush on. He hadn't said as much but it was completely obvious based on the way he talked about her in his letters. 

Daisy smiled at them. "It's so nice to meet you both! I'm Veronica Blaze." 

"I thought your name was Daisy," Ciara said with a curious tilt of her head. "That's what your husband calls you."

Ah. He had been calling her Daisy in his panic, hadn't he? But if this girl knew who she was because of Ira wouldn't she automatically assume it was a nickname? Unless she had seen Rukelion call her Daisy in another context as well. 

She shrugged helplessly and lied. "It's a nickname because that's my favorite flower."

"I see. Ira did mention you love flowers."

"Let's move this inside," Rukelion said sharply and she was grateful for the change of subject. "You shouldn't be on your feet this long."

He wrapped an arm around her back and gestured for the rest to follow before finding a parlor for them to sit in. He sat very close to her and rested an arm over her shoulders, the picture of casualness, but she could tell he was as taut as a bowstring. 

Daisy patted the top of his thigh to try and comfort him. She couldn't say anything now in front of the kids and she knew he wouldn't want to wait to hear about why Juliet had tried to assassinate him but was going to have to. She needed to explain some things to Ira first. He had likely been confused and upset by what happened earlier and he was younger and less mature so he couldn't wait. 

"I'm sorry you had to find out like this," she said penitently. "I did plan to tell you before you came to visit but wasn't sure how to bring it up." 

"I understand. It is fairly unbelievable. I thought the two of you grew up together but that couldn't have happened if he is from Katalya. But the Krinzels did know him…how did any of this happen?" Ira asked as his eyes darted around the room nervously. 

It seemed he was afraid of offending either her or Rukelion. Poor kid. He didn't really do anything wrong except listen to the wrong person. She needed to reassure him properly that none of this was his fault and they weren't mad. 

That might be difficult to do with how on edge her husband was but at this point he was hiding it fairly well. You would have to really know him to pick up on it. 

Daisy sighed and looked to her husband for confirmation that it was okay to tell him, receiving a nod in return. "I found him heavily injured by the stream one day. I knew he was running away from something but wasn't sure what. I did need help on the farm so I let him stay with me while he recuperated in exchange for doing chores. 

"He stayed with me much longer than I expected while training in swordsmanship with some mercenaries. Once he was sufficiently trained he decided to join the military and we got engaged before he left.

"I knew he was a fire mage but didn't know who he was or what he had been planning until I got back from visiting you. That's the short version of it. What I'm curious about is how the three of you figured out Juliet was wrong without knowing he was my husband."

"There were a lot of things that didn't add up," Ira said, glancing up from his hands. "We hadn't heard anything about destruction happening throughout the country, I knew you were safe in the castle from your continued letters, and we heard about the tax cuts for the commoners. 

"We assumed that the king actually cared about the people and only had an issue with the former king but it wasn't confirmed until Ciara spied on you for two days using her darkness magic." 

"Sorry about that," Ciara said sheepishly. 

Ah. So that's why there was the name confusion. She had heard him calling her Daisy for two days without knowing who she was. 

"But why did she think that?" Rukelion asked, trying to hide the frustration running through his voice. "She shouldn't have even known I was planning to depose the king. The only people aware of it were working with me. That aside, how would she jump from getting rid of a bad king to destroying the country?"

Ira shrugged. "She didn't give us specifics. All she said was that she was an eyewitness."

"That makes even less sense…if she was here the night we took over the castle she would have known we evacuated all of the servants so no one would get hurt. What else could she have seen?" 

Daisy couldn't say that Juliet hadn't seen anything. She had written things. Things that likely would have happened if they hadn't met so Rukelion made different choices. 

"I don't know," Ciara said slowly. "But Profession Lucien seemed fairly convinced."

Was that the man who had been with them? He had to be. But why would he take Juliet's word as law? Had she told him the truth? Was he a transmigrator too and had read the book? How had that happened?

"She might be crazy," Sarabeth said matter-of-factly. "She did know an awful lot about you though. Your name, your powers, and where you came from. How would she know that if you didn't even tell your wife?"

Rukelion seemed even more on edge now. "There's no way she could have known about that. The only person who knew I was a fire mage other than Daisy was my chief advisor and he would never tell anyone. He's very loyal to me because I saved his life. He was the first person to volunteer to help me and kept his mouth shut all these years so why would he tell someone he hardly knows?"

Daisy knew he was talking about Conrad, who only vaguely knew of Juliet's existence because of Elaine. Her husband was right that he never would have told. 

She hadn't realized he knew Rukelion was a fire mage so long ago though. How long had it been? He must have known her husband's identity since he first joined the secret rebellion, which showed exactly how much Rukelion trusted him. Especially since he just admitted no one else had known until the coup happened. 

She didn't want Conrad to potentially get in trouble for something that hadn't been his fault though. She had to be at least partially honest for his sake. He didn't deserve to be suspected for no reason. 

"It wasn't him," Daisy said firmly.. "I…I know how she knows but it's part of what I was going to tell you later."