Every Day in May (grand prize winner) ✔

May 24th

They know.

Not all of them. A handful do, though, and a handful is enough.

Graden doesn't see you the way he sees your mother—you are the Heir. He doesn't know you, Theo, so he worries if you become the Leader you'll be just like your father. If he'd spent years, as I have, listening to Francesca talk about you, he'd understand that this would never be the case.  You are a dreamer who has never given up on being the captain of his own ship; you are the boy who wishes to meet a girl in a field of poppies on a sunny spring day.  You are not your father.

But he doesn't know that.

He won't tell me his plans concerning you. Just being aware that he and the Upper Council have a plan for you, however, is enough to terrify me. I figure it could go one of two ways:

On the one hand, he might decide to kidnap you when the Tower is taken, then keep you imprisoned and try to convert you to his cause. Remember, Graden does like to make friends of the least likely people. You could be a tremendous asset. This is a real possibility.

On the other hand, he might kill you.

I don't like to think it of him, he doesn't like to think it of himself, but truth be told, Graden does have a vengeful side. His parents lost two sons—it may seem only fair to him that the Leader would lose his as well. Graden doesn't fully understand your father's mixed psychology. If he did, he might come to the realization that there was basically no chance of your murder having any negative effect on your father. It scares me that the following scene might play out just as I imagine it: the Leader, restrained by Jeffers, looking on as Graden listens to you beg for mercy before he guts you.

It's not that he wants to hurt you; you are Francesca's son as well as the Leader's—a fact I've reminded him of many times.  His drive to succeed outweighs my pleas to spare you.  I don't think he's yet determined what he's going to do with you.  He once told me he won't stand for the suffering of innocents.  I'm just not sure he believes the word "innocent" can be prescribed to you.  A decision like this isn't Graden's alone to make—it will be voted on by the Dissent's Upper Council.  I believe on this point the Council will go along with whatever Graden recommends, however, and Graden will recommend whatever course he considers to be the most strategic.

I realize that I've spent a lot of today's letter attempting to excuse my brother's behavior.  Should I care if you hate him for it?  If you do, fine.  Still, take this message seriously, Theo:  you are not safe—not from your father and not from your father's enemy.  Everyone wants something from you.  Including me.

Your secure stone Tower is no stronger than a blade of grass.  The walls are going to crumble.  Don't be inside when it happens.