Murmurs of acknowledgement and agreement swept through the room. Several of the men standing around the edge of the room began to look uncertain. Were they fearful that their wives, even those who had not been traded as brides, might have a bone to pick?
Iris had already sat in on several cases where noble women had wanted revenge against their husbands for being unfaithful or simply not treating them correctly. Luckily for those husbands, she and Ember had been able to see through the crocodile tears thus far, and although the men had been divorced from their wives, they had not been imprisoned or in extreme cases, de-winged, as some of the most diabolical men had been upon learning the true extent of their treatment toward the women who had been traded.
"That is a very good idea," Ember spoke up before Iris had a chance to say anything, "All of your gifts shall be put into storage and each woman who comes forward will be given a gift according to her needs when she has been freed from her bride contract."
Iris's heart swelled with yet more love for the king, and she wasn't sure how it was possible that she could hold so much affection for him without bursting.
"Are you sure you want to be here?" Ember asked as they stood in the entrance courtyard later that day. The marble and stone plateau had been the first area of the palace Iris had ever seen. It had been both magnificent and terrifying on that first day, and if someone had told her then that she would stand there now as queen, she would have laughed in their face.
"I have to do this," Iris told him firmly. They'd spoken of it many times over the last few weeks, and Iris had remained determined. Yet now she stood in the courtyard on the very day the prisoners were due to be escorted from the dungeons to the iron carriages that would carry them all the way to the docks and the ship that would carry them across the dark sea to the mystic Isle. There they would spend the rest of their lives as prisoners, never to set foot off the prison isle again. Many were nobles, some first born sons leaving their titles to their own sons while others were farmers or businessmen. All were destined for the same fate. All, including her father.
I must see him off just as he waved me off before, Iris told herself firmly. If she closed her eyes, she could still see her father's greedy smile as he had waved her away from her childhood home, sitting in a musky carriage at Perivale's side. That day she had cried, but looking back, she realized that she had been entirely unprepared for what the lord would do to her that night and many nights afterward.
She trembled and almost jumped out of her skin when she felt Ember place his hand on the small of her back.
"Are you sure?" he asked again, his voice dripping with concern.
The sound of rattling chains announced the arrival of the first prisoners.
"It's not enough to know they are gone," Iris told him without looking him in the eye. She couldn't bear for him to see how uncertain she was. "I have to see them go."
Ember seemed to understand and stepped back silently with a nod. His hand remained on the small of her back, and they watched silently from the top of the palace steps as the prisoners were escorted from the bowels of the earth. They shielded their eyes with shaking hands, some having not seen the sun for weeks. Every one of them wore disheveled clothes, the colors of the noblemen's outfits having dulled until their house colors were almost unrecognizable.
Iris wondered whether she would even recognize her father or Perivale among the other prisoners, but she should have guessed that she would. It wasn't difficult to recognize her father with the way he began to call to her, "Iris! Iris! Please! Don't let them do this to me. I am your father."
Iris cringed at the reminder and half turned away, allowing Ember to take her into his arms.
"Your mother would turn in her grave if she saw how you allowed me to be treated!" he snapped at her, and Iris saw once more the venom in him that had been barely veiled during her childhood. With every year that had passed it had grown worse.
At his words, Iris felt a fresh wave of strength and she stepped out of Ember's arms. He tried to protest, but she was already on her way down the steps in the direction of her father, urging the guards to stop the prisoners for a moment. Two guards stood on either side of her father, spears raised at the ready.
"My mother would rejoice to see you in chains," she snarled at her father. Glancing over his shoulder she saw the shell of Perivale cowering behind him, and Iris felt a small wave of satisfaction and even a little guilt at the state of him. From the looks of his dirty, blood-stained clothing, one of the guards had grown tired of his pleading to be released, or he had done something to severely irritate one of his fellow prisoners. Either way, he had been reduced to a shivering shell of the man who had once been powerful enough to beat her daily and get away with it.
Never again, Iris vowed. Ignoring the insults her father and several other prisoners began to throw at her, she took several steps back up toward Ember and gestured the guards on.
Ember moved down the staircase to meet her and once more took her into his arms. She clung to him, but did not take her eyes off her father as he was roughhoused into the back of the caged cart that would take him to the prison ship.
"Don't worry. I will ensure that he gets all he deserves," a gruff voice startled her, and she looked around to find that Ember's brother, Asher, had silently come up to them. He had remained since their wedding to aid Ember with the changing of the laws, but now he would return to his own kingdom, taking with him the prisoners. Being the King of the Mystic Isle seemed more like being a prison warden, but the smile on Asher's face indicated he had no problem with it.
"If he doesn't quite make it to the isle," Ember said, sounding as if he were only half joking, "I'm sure that nobody would come looking for him."
"Oh, no, I promise I wouldn't give him the mercy of a quick death going overboard," Asher said, shaking his head. "He's a strong specimen. I can use him for plenty of manual labor before his time comes."
Iris once more felt a wave of guilt, wondering whether she had made the right decision when Ember had come to her a few days earlier asking if she wished for her father to be left out of the prison transfer. At the time she had been certain that he deserved everything that he got. Now, seeing the state of all the prisoners, she was fearful she had gotten it wrong.
That was until she heard her father yelling from the transport cart, "You will rot in fae hell for this!"
"Make sure you keep that promise, King Asher."
Asher bowed to her in acknowledgement before embracing his brother.
"Be good to her, brother," Asher said, giving her a look up and down, same as he had the day they had met in the palace gardens, "She is much too good for you."
"We both know it," Ember responded. With that Ember pulled her into his arms again and they watched Asher give the orders for the prisoners to be taken away.
Iris watched them go, breathing a sigh of relief as she realized that the end of an era had come, and in a way, it was all thanks to her.
*****
THE END