The king looked at his son for a long moment, and there was a real, genuine expression on his face.
"You were captured," he said.
Though his face was different, his tone wasn't. It wasn't a question, and it wasn't loud. It was the flattest possible way of saying it, which made it worse.
"On a ship," the queen added, "and then imprisoned."
"I was-" their son tried to defend himself.
"By prey."
There was laughter. Not the polite, performed laughter from before. This was easier, more mocking. One that came at the expense of someone else and doesn't bother pretending to be otherwise.
The king didn't laugh. He simply looked at his son the way one looks at something that had disappointed them so thoroughly there was nothing left to say.
"We will discuss this," he said, "later."
The weight he put on the last word made it sound less like a postponement and more like a sentence.
Then he turned back to Sonder.
Whatever had just passed was set aside, cleanly and completely.
"You have made your demonstration," he said. "It was noted." He clasped his hands behind his back. "My son is young, and clearly careless, and it seems you caught him at a disadvantage. That is to your credit."
He took a slow step forward.
"But you are one. And whatever you are, whatever power you carry in that closed hand of yours, it does not change the arithmetic of this room." He gestured, barely, to the figures around the walls. "If you have been sent here by others of your kind, we are not concerned. If you represent some authority that believes it has jurisdiction over this island, we are not concerned by that either. No deal will be made. Not with you."
Sonder was quiet for a moment.
When she spoke, she sounded almost sorry.
"That's almost disappointing to hear," she said.
"Is it."
"But only a little." She tilted her head slightly. "Though I think I knew. Coming here, I mean. I think I already knew how this would go."
She stood up from the throne then, unhurried, and stepped down from the platform, taking the steps one by one.
"A fight was always going to happen," she said. "I think I just had some hope. There was never going to be a deal."
"No," he agreed. "There wasn't."
She drew her sword, and the man-eaters recoiled from its light.
It did not harm them.
But her staff would.
Once, a single shard had crowned it.
Now six jagged fragments had been driven into the wood, uneven and mismatched, but the staff survived being wounded by them.
The air around it twisted, light bending faintly at its presence.
Still, Sonder carried it easily.