Shvate stood before Adri.
“Brother?” Adri asked. “Can we speak later? I am . . . tired.”
Shvate heaved in a breath and heaved it out. Adri heard everything in that single breath: the pain that was cutting Shvate’s heart to shreds, the anguish, the remorse, the guilt, the shame. He heard it, and he understood it in some small part, because his world had cracked open like an egg this past night and day, and he had come to believe that anything was possible now, anything could happen. The sky could break into pieces and fall, the earth rise up and turn into clouds, the ocean turn to solid stone, and ice boil and become lava. The world had changed overnight and nothing would be the same again. Anything was possible. Even the worst possible thing.
“Adri,” Shvate said in a broken voice, “Adri, you know I love you.”
Adri was touched. It had been a long time since Shvate and he had been close enough to bare their hearts to one another. At one time, he had felt as if he could tell Shvate anything and everything. But ever since their respective marriages, and perhaps even before that, things had changed. Life was one long slide downhill from innocence to cynicism, and there was no way to climb back up again to the very top. But there were moments when he had felt willing to bare his soul to his brother, if only because he trusted Shvate, because he knew Shvate would understand, would care. He understood now that this was that same Shvate, in as vulnerable a state, about to bare his own soul to Adri. Adri understood this, and he listened.
“I love you too, brother,” he said. And he meant it. “You are the eldest of us both. You were born before me.”
“Barely,” Shvate replied. “But the elders declared us to have equal claim to the Burning Throne.”
Adri was puzzled. He didn’t understand this part—what did this have to do with loving each other?
“By Krushan law, and by tradition, we are both equal in the line of succession,” Shvate said.
“Brother,” Adri said, thinking this was some kind of discussion about ambitions and wives and politics. He had had a similar discussion once with Shvate and was not prepared to have another one right now. He needed time to come to terms with the madness that had already spun his life upside down, the fact that his wife believed she was pregnant with his child, yet he knew that he could not possibly be the father. Too much had happened in one night. “Let us not talk politics now.”
Shvate shook his head. His hand was on Adri’s shoulder, and Adri could feel him shake his head. He knew his brother’s every gesture, every mannerism. Shvate was deeply troubled. He was crying. What was the matter? Adri couldn’t comprehend what was really happening.
“There is no more politics,” Shvate said. “Politics died today. Ambition died today. The line of succession ended today. All that remains now is penance and reparation.”
Adri was very confused now, so much so he wondered if Shvate might be drunk. He could smell the drink on his brother’s breath, in his sweat, but it was not freshly consumed wine, it was the stale, rancid smell of wine consumed the night before. There were other odors on Shvate as well: the odors of death, of shame, of something else that he could not identify. Something acrid and sour and very dark. It echoed the foul odors Adri had smelled the night before.
“Adri, my brother, I am abdicating all rights to the throne of Hastinaga and to the line of succession. I hereby give up my right to inherit the throne forever, from this moment forward.”
“Brother!” Adri exclaimed. But Shvate continued unabated.
“You, Adri, and you alone are now king of Hastinaga, emperor of the Burnt Empire. I am leaving home today and taking my wives, Mayla and Karni, into the forest with me, to live out the rest of our lives in self-imposed exile. I want you to know that I am doing this of my own free will, under no duress or coercion, and that I willingly and gladly bequeath to you, your family, and your future heirs all that belongs to me. My wealth, my holdings, my titles, my share of the family property, my rights, and my options. Everything is yours from this moment henceforth. I do this because I love you, brother. I have already told Mother Jilana of my decision and asked her to convey my decision to Vrath as well. I have also conveyed it to the ministers, so that none can doubt the veracity or the legality of this succession.”
Adri’s head whirled with the enormity of what had just happened. He tried to come to terms with the implications of this momentous event. “Brother . . .” he said again, trying to make sense of it as well as ask the question—why?—but Shvate concluded with the same single-minded determination with which he had done everything in his life.
“Adri, I say it again so there is no doubt—you are now the king of Hastinaga and sole ruler of the Burnt Empire. I know you will be a great ruler. I wish you well, my brother. Rule long, live long, and rule wisely.”