“Here he comes,” Frederick whispered.
According to plan, I’d pretended to drink heavily and acted drunk for the last hour. “I’m ready,” I slurred, keeping in character.
With King Jeremiah attracting attention, no one saw me slip the powder in a jug of beer.
Raising my beer in the air, I shouted across the hall to Jeremiah. “Oi, you think you’re so good at drinking… Come prove it.”
His skin was reddish and his forehead sweaty, which made his thin hair stick to his forehead in a peculiar fashion. Swaying a bit, he watched me and lifted his chin with a frown. “Tyton Green.”
I made a stunt of almost tripping when I got up from the bench I was seated at. “I have to take a piss, but before I go why don’t you come here and show us how good of a drinker you are?” My speech was slurred and as planned, my dad and Frederick reached out to reel me in, shushing me. I batted their hands away. “It’s fiiine! He’s a man. I’m a man. We drink beer.”
People had gone silent around us, watching our king as he staggered toward us. “You think you can down your beer faster than me?”
“I know I can.” I hiccupped and used my hand to support myself against Frederick. “I can fucking take on all of you.” My finger pointed to the entire room and men began to laugh.
“Tyton, sit down!” my dad hissed.
“Are you game or not?”
Frederick took the jug with poisoned beer and filled his own glass. Just as he lifted it to his mouth, I reached for it and handed it to Jeremiah. “Get ready to lose!”
I didn’t wait for him to accept but lifted my glass and just as I’d hoped for, he took the bait and drank.
It was like the man had no gag reflex and just swallowed the content in one go.
“Bloody hell,” I exclaimed when he finished before me. Jeremiah gave a loud burp but then his facial color changed from red to pale white and his cheeks bobbed out.
I glanced at Marni, who had supplied the poison from her friend who was married to a pharmacist. It was supposed to be a slow-working poison but Jeremiah looked like he was going to be sick.
Frederick pulled me back just as a projectile of vomit spewed from Jeremiah.
“What the fuck?” Some drunken men laughed and joked that he couldn’t hold it in, but Jeremiah was a proud man and took offense.
“There’s nothing wrong with me. The beer was stale and tasted like shit.” Lifting his hand, he pointed at my table. “You people pissed in my beer.”
“No!”
Some of his security came over and pressing his almost empty glass into the chest of his guard, Jeremiah dried his mouth and ordered, “Take this to Bernard. Tell him to test it. If I drank piss someone is going to die!”
I swallowed hard. “I assure you that’s not necessary.”
“You laughed at me.” His eyes narrowed as he swayed back and forth while pointing with uncoordinated movements. “All of you laughed andno onelaughs at me.”
“Your highness, we never laughed,” my father tried to say, but the room had gone silent and a filthy stink from King Jeremiah’s vomit made a few women turn their heads with disgust.
“Arrest them!” Turning on his heels, Jeremiah swayed as he walked back to his own table while shouting over his shoulder. “Arrest every man at that table. I won’t be ridiculed in my own house.”
Like a group of killer bees, armed guards surrounded our table. Squaring my chest, I stepped in front of my mom to form a wall with my dad. Around us Emmerson, Lucas, Frederick, and Henry did the same.”
“Don’t fight back. We are unarmed and outnumbered. If they shoot, they might hit one of our women,” my dad said loud enough for all of us to hear it.
Still, I elbowed the guard who pushed at me. With a hand to his bloody nose, he raised his gun to point it at my head, sneering, “Move motherfucker.”
Henry and my dad moved forward with their hands up, while Lucas, Frederick, and Emmerson fought back like me. We all knew that if Bernard, Jeremiah’s personal doctor, tested the content of the glass he’d find something much worse than urine.
Jeremiah’s captain who had been at the high table and was drunk himself, waved his gun around and fired a shot against the ceiling. “Move or I’ll decorate the walls with your brains.” Screaming at his guards he gestured to the door. “Just get the filthy traitors out of here.”
As we were pushed out of the room, Jeremiah sneered one last thing. “Don’t worry. We’ll take good care of your women.”
