Rewrite That Witch
CH566 · Rewrite
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Chapter 566: A Promise and a Mission

Otto Luoxi locked himself in his study when he got home.

He sat in the dark for a while before lighting the lamp.

Since the king’s illness, Appen had moved through a long period of visible shock, the kind that made a person slow and distant, present in body only. Then, perhaps a month ago, he had recollected himself — had begun to speak clearly again, to attend functions, to answer questions with apparent composure. Otto had been relieved. He was less relieved now.

The prince he knew was not power-hungry. Not strategic in the cold, self-preserving way that some heirs became when a throne came into view. He had sometimes thought Appen was almost too gentle for kingship — too willing to defer, too slow to decide — and had planned accordingly, him and Belinda and Oro together, to quietly support the prince through the difficult early years of rule, lending the competence and backbone he would need. The three families had supported the Moya line since the kingdom’s founding. This was simply the continuation of that.

But the prince who had asked you will help me to the throne had not been asking for reassurance. He had been asking something else. And the way he had not actually listened to Otto’s answer — that was what Otto kept returning to. As if the yes or no did not matter. As if the asking was the point.

Otto got to his feet. Sitting was not making this clearer.

Neither pharmacists nor alchemists had any useful information about Moya IV’s condition. Otto knew nothing of medicine. He could not fix the king and he could not fix whatever was shifting inside Appen. But perhaps the three families together could get close enough to the truth to do something useful. Belinda was absent. That left Oro.

“I’m staying the night,” he told his steward, and went out into the dark.

The Tokat manor guards knew him on sight and let him pass. Oro was in the training hall, unsurprisingly — he was always in the training hall after sunset, working through forms with a wooden practice sword while his guards tried and failed to match him. Oro Tokat was not someone whose leisure looked like rest.

He dropped the sword when Otto entered and waved off his guards. “What’s happening? Do you need backup?”

“I need to talk.”

In the resting room, Otto laid out everything — Appen’s behavior, the question about the throne, the refusal to pursue the alliance. When he was finished, he said: “We need to find out what’s changed in him. Together.”

Oro was quiet for a moment. Then: “Not interested.”

“Oro—”

“He’s a prince. He is going to be a king. He isn’t going to remain our friend the way he was at fourteen.” Oro shook his head with the resigned practicality of someone who had arrived at this conclusion earlier than everyone else. “He’s twenty. Old enough to have moods we don’t understand. If he doesn’t want to tell us what’s going on, that’s his right. We’re not obligated to manage his feelings.”

“Are you not planning to support the Moya line?”

“Support him when he needs it. Not when he doesn’t.” Oro’s expression flattened. “You’re projecting, Otto. You want things to be how they were. They aren’t.”

Otto had known this was how Oro would respond. He had still come, because the argument he had prepared was not the argument about Appen.

“Andrea is alive,” he said.

The room went quiet in a different way.

Oro did not move for a full second. Then: “What did you say?”

“Andrea Quinn is alive. I saw her myself, in Border Town. She is with Prince Roland Wimbledon.”

Oro crossed the room in three strides and nearly walked through Otto before stopping himself. “Say that again. Say it slowly.”

“I saw her with my own eyes. She has become a witch — and of all the lords in Graycastle, only Roland accepts witches openly.”

Oro’s face was doing several things at once. His eyes were wide. “A witch,” he said. “Like — she became a witch.”

“Her father made it look like an accident. That she had fallen from the cliff. He had her disappear quietly to avoid the scandal of a witch in the family.” Otto watched Oro absorb it. “Her grave was never real.”

A long silence. Then Oro sat down on the floor, his back against the wall, and looked at the ceiling.

“Why didn’t I—” He stopped. Shook his head. “I believed it. I believed the grave.”

Yes. We all did. Otto kept the thought to himself. He did not feel generous enough to give Oro that comfort; he was still slightly enjoying the way regret moved across Oro’s face, the dawning understanding of all the years that had been wasted on a certainty that had never been earned.

“So,” Oro said at last, more to himself than to Otto. “She’s with Roland Wimbledon.” He looked up. “In a relationship?”

“Unknown. But she won’t fall in love with either of us now.”

The silence again. Then Oro pushed himself to his feet, and something had settled in his expression. “You said the alliance. Tell me the argument again.”

“Appen is stalling on the Graycastle alliance. Without it, the Kingdom of Dawn stands alone against the Church. If the Church attacks us first — you take the knights out, you fight. What are your odds against an army that swallowed the Kingdom of Wolfheart whole?”

Oro’s jaw tightened.

“If the Church attacks Graycastle first, Roland fights. If Roland dies, Andrea either dies with him or is taken by the Church. You know what the Church does with witches it captures.”

“Don’t.”

“But if both kingdoms stand in alliance — mutual defense — the Church cannot attack either alone. Both you and Andrea live. Both of you exist in the same world, which means at some future point, you might actually see her.”

A long breath. “You are,” Oro said carefully, “the most calculating person I have ever known.”

“Are you in or not?”

Oro grabbed his hand and gripped it. “In.”

Yorko pushed his bedroom door open in the early hours and walked into darkness — and then a voice.

“You’re back.”

He had one foot out the door before he recognized Hill Fawkes in the candlelight. The hand he had been using to calculate his escape velocity dropped.

“Do you know what you just did to my heart?” Yorko pressed a hand to his chest.

“We can only speak unobserved at night.” Hill appeared entirely untroubled by this. “Old habit.”

“Fine. Fine.” Yorko dropped into a chair. “What?”

“His Majesty has a mission for you. There are refugees from the Kingdom of Wolfheart in the slave trade flowing through the Kingdom of Dawn. Roland wants you to recruit them — masons, literate workers, anyone with a useful skill. You receive five silver royals per person successfully hired. His Majesty covers all costs.”

“I am an ambassador.” Yorko stared at him. “Ambassadors don’t traffic refugees.”

“You don’t need to go anywhere. The merchants bring the slaves here. Screen them in the city. Denise Payton can manage the transport logistics — she’s well known in these markets, and routing people to Graycastle gives the operation a commercial cover we’d otherwise lack. If we ever need to retreat unexpectedly, we’re businessmen, not emissaries.”

Yorko’s jaw worked. “You just arrived in this city. How do you know Denise Payton’s reputation?”

“I was asking questions in the streets while you were at the banquet.”

“I thought you were a bodyguard.”

“I protect you from crises,” Hill said. “That covers a range of things.”

“So you’re not a warrior.”

“Not a warrior, not a merchant.” Hill tilted his head, and something in his expression became private and amused. “An acrobat, you might say.”

Yorko looked at him for a moment. “An acrobat,” he repeated.

“Just an ordinary acrobat.” Hill smiled. “Get some rest, Mr. Ambassador. We start tomorrow.”

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