The doors to the throne room are thrown open and Haytham is yanked through by his chain, like a misbehaving dog who has not yet learned to heel. There's a little knot of men standing in the center of the room that turn to look his way. There's something strange about the mobility of their faces, about the animation of their gleaming eyes. It hits him; they are not under Washington's control, he realizes. They are still their own men.

They stare at him, dismay and fear plain upon their faces. As the guard leads Haytham towards them, they draw away from him as if he has the pox. He recognizes a few. There—the fat one. Wasn't he... yes. Samuel Chase, one of the Maryland delegates to the Continental Congress. And there, James Wilson, from one of the Carolinas, he couldn't remember which. Others he knew by their faces, but couldn't place names to them.

Two of them whisper behind their hands as Haytham is lead past.

“Good lord, is that—?”

“I think so. I'd heard he was dead.”

“Apparently not. Although he does look like death warmed over...”

“How dare you presume to judge me, Mr Jefferson,” he hears Washington growl, and it's as if someone has dumped freezing water down the back of Haytham's shirt. He's furious. There would be hell to pay; Haytham just prayed that he wouldn't be on the receiving end of it.

The voice that answers him has a soft drawl to it. “I've never judged you, my friend. I was merely suggesting—”

“You haven't the slightest clue what I faced—you sat at home, cozy and warm, while I was at Valley Forge. I sent hundreds of letters to Congress—perhaps a thousand—and I received naught but excuses!”

Haytham sees him. Washington's face looks livid and his eyes glitter dangerously under his furrowed brow. He's the tallest man in the room and looms over almost everyone else, all but the man before him. The other man is nearly as tall, but whereas Washington is powerfully built, this other man is more slender and lanky. Haytham notes the reddish hair, angular nose and long face. Thomas Jefferson. He looks ill-at-ease, but remarkably calm for someone staring death in the face.

“I asked for more soldiers, and was sent half-starved, unruly boys and troublesome miscreants,” Washington continues, pacing back and forth on his dais, “I begged for bandages, blankets, warm clothes—”

“George—” Jefferson pleads, but Washington cuts him off.

“Boots! Even just shoes I would have been grateful. I had to march my men barefoot through the snow. They left their skin behind when they stepped on the ice. There was so much blood on the road you would have thought we were dragging butchered hogs behind us.”

“There were no shoes to be had! Not in New England, not even in Virginia, we sent you all that could be spared!”

“It was not enough! You and your fellow delegates sat in Philadelphia dithering and wringing your hands, and I watched my men die by the hundreds!” he snarls and his eyes flick to the scepter on an ornate stand next to the throne. “I saw an opportunity and I took it! My decision saved thousands of lives, perhaps tens of thousands!”

“Please, George, we just...” Jefferson's words trail off when he sees Haytham lead past.

Haytham shuffles meekly forward, his head bowed. Don't look him in the eyes, never in the eyes. When Haytham and his escort mount the dais, Washington's hand comes up to halt them. Haytham can feel the eyes rove over him, cold and analytical, and Haytham stares determinedly at the ground beneath his bare feet, limbs shaking, teetering on a knife edge between boiling rage and absolute terror. And then, unexpectedly, the moment passes without incident. Washington's eyes flick back to his audience and he waves a hand to Haytham's guard. A hand grips Haytham's shoulder, guides him to his place at the right hand of the throne, and forces him down to his knees, facing the room. The guard snaps the end of his chain to the arm of the ornate throne with a padlock.

“Haytham Kenway?” a different voice asks, bewildered. Haytham wants to turn his head, acknowledge that, yes, he's alive, that beneath his tattered clothes, the collar about his neck and the layer of grime coating his skin that he's still a man, not an animal. But he doesn't dare. He can't stop his eyes from flickering to the man, though. The man is another delegate, a head shorter than Jefferson and undistinguished-looking but for his sharp eyes and arched brows. The man stares at him, open mouthed. Confusion, anger, pity and grief battle across his careworn face.

“You rotten bastard, what in the hell have you done?” the man demands, face reddened, and Haytham recognizes him, finally: John Adams. Damn him.

Haytham rode to Philadelphia seeking assistance from the Continental Congress as soon as he knew who had taken possession of the Apple, warned them of the clear danger that Washington represented, and Adams had shouted him down. The lawyer had berated him like a child in front of an audience of some of the most accomplished and wealthy men in America and had named him a traitor for daring to suggest that General Washington was anything other than a capable commander and a dedicated patriot. Haytham had fled the city in disgrace, only narrowly escaping an angry mob with murder on their minds.

So Haytham can't help but feel a little pleased when an officer lurches forward and backhands Adams across the face, sending him spinning to the floor in a most undignified heap.

“You'll keep a civil tongue in that mouth or I'll cut it out meself,” the man snarls and Haytham feels that thrill of pleasure turn to ashes in his mouth.

Thomas Hickey. He hadn't seen him since the incident in the wilderness, when Haytham and his men along with Ziio and her people had tried to take the Apple in a surprise attack. The results had been disastrous. In the chaos that ensued, Haytham had lost sight of both Thomas and Charles. When Thomas failed to reappear, Haytham had assumed with a heavy heart that the man had been killed. He'd gone back to look for him, found a few men of a similar build, but by that point the wolves and scavengers had been at the bodies and it had been impossible to distinguish one man from the other.

But Thomas is far from dead; he looks fine. Better than fine; actually, he looks immaculate—a word that Haytham had never in both of his strange, disordered lives thought he would associate with the man. Gone are the perpetually rumpled clothes, the five o'clock shadow, the busted capillaries across his cheeks and nose, evidence of his hard drinking and fast living. He's clean shaven and his hair is expertly groomed, his clothing well-tailored and cleaned. His boots are so polished that Haytham can see his own reflection in them, if he squints. He looks every inch the perfect officer. If he hadn't stepped out to assault Adams, Haytham was likely to have never noticed him at all.

Adams staggers to his feet, cursing, and Jefferson shakes his head. “George, we came in peace—“

“Load o' bullocks,” Thomas announces and jerks his head at Adams, who spits blood into the carpet, where it is all but swallowed by the red wool underfoot. “Found this one's kin doing 'is best to stir up trouble down at the 'arbor.”

“Sam!” Adams gasps, “What have you done to him?” But Thomas only laughs and settles his hands on the butts of the twin pistols at his hips.

“The same fate that will befall you, if you continue to test me, Mr. Adams,” Washington answers testily. Whatever patience General Washington had possessed, it was greatly diminished the instant he obtained the Apple.

“And my wife? Where is she? What have you done with her?” Adams barks heedlessly, unable to see murder mere inches away.

“Abigail? Why, she's fine. Perfectly content. She tells me she's never been happier,” says Washington, settling himself in his throne, his posture stiff and agitated.

Adams goes pale. Jefferson begins, “George—“

“The words that you are searching for, sir, are 'Your Majesty.' If that strikes you too formal, you may name me 'Sire.'”

Jefferson glares at him. His face betrays his feelings, but his voice is still steady and even, his speech deliberately slow and careful. “The war is over, sire. We... You have won. It's done. Do you not think it time to retire to Virginia? Martha begs you to return to her.”

“What use have I for a half-built manor and some other man's widow when I have all of New England at my feet? Furthermore, it seems you are wrong, concerning the war's end.”

“I don't understand. The British have been repelled,” says Jefferson, shaking his head. “It's over. America is free to do as she pleases.”

“But she is not united. Was that not also our goal? And what of the ten thousand French troops quartered in Philadelphia and their armada lurking just out of mortar range in New York?”

“Ah, well, the French are confused,” says Adams, mockingly blithesome, “You see, Congress sent the French an envoy to press for help in our fight against King George. Well, they got very excited and were very eager to see this new nation and to fight their old enemy—so just try to imagine their surprise and dismay when they arrived and found that there was another King George on this side of the Atlantic that's as tyrannical as he is insane—”

He's cut off when Thomas delivers a hard punch to the guts. Adams doubles over, wheezing.

“Mr Adams, not another word or I will make you wish you had been born a mute,” says Washington.

Jefferson goes to help his fellow delegate, trying to help him stand upright. When he looks back at Washington, his face is alight in cold fury.

“The... whatever it is—The others are right; It has driven you mad.”

“On the contrary; I have never felt more sane.”

“I've had enough of this farce. We're leaving. Now,” he says, his voice not quite a shout.

“Are you? I do not recall giving my leave for you to depart,” Washington growls.

“I do not need it. I am my own man, sir. This meeting is over. You will order General Lee to stand down and withdraw your troops from Pennsylvania.”

Haytham resists a shudder. General Lee. Charles. The man who had doted on Haytham's every whim and command had become Washington's most trusted and capable general.

“I think not; I see a different outcome. You and your fellow delegates will surrender Philadelphia as well as Pennsylvania, following the expulsion of the French from my soil.”

Jefferson's face is grim and pale. “We have seventeen thousand seasoned, rested, experienced men ready to march on New York.”

Haytham can't see Washington's face, not from this angle, but the hand on the right arm of the throne tightens into a fist.

“You would send good men and patriots against their rightful king?”

“They are Americans! They fought a long and bloody war to rid themselves of a king, they will not willingly submit themselves to another!”

“They need me!” shouts Washington, slamming a fist into the arm of his throne. “I've seen your so-called Congress, sir, and I am not impressed! You fight and squabble like fishwives over petty differences, accomplishing nothing! America will not survive without a king! She'll be ripped apart by petty grievances and an easy target for foreign powers!”

“Yes, we do need a strong leader, but the last thing America needs is a tyrant!”

“The sixty thousand Bostonians and New Yorkers ready to fight to the death to defend their king are quite pleased with my rule.”

Sixty thousand? No. It wasn't possible. The Apple wasn't that powerful... was it? Surely he's exaggerating.

“Yes, and four—forty thou-thousand of them are... are starving women, sick children and old men!” Adams wheezes, having regained just enough wind to sentence his fate. “You cannot hope to defeat us!”

“You have only solders. I have... something more.” He caresses the handle of his scepter gently, lovingly. “Would you care for a demonstration?”

He lifts the scepter lazily. The Apple. The Piece of Eden. He had looked for it for half of both his lives and now here it was, so tantalizingly close, just at arm's length. But it may as well been a thousand miles away, sunk in a bottomless ocean, for all the good it would do him now.

It's like there's a cyclone in the room. Energy snaps in the air, raises the hair on the backs of his arms against his shirt sleeves, and the room goes dark—it's still sunny outside, but the light is so diminished that it may as well be midnight, and the tapers in their sconces give off nothing but the faintest pinpricks of light, like lanterns on a ship far out to sea. The Apple; it's stealing all the light in the world, casting it in upon itself until it glows like a tiny sun. It casts strange patterns on the walls and on the faces in the room.

Adams jerks, gives a cut-off scream, his entire body going ridged and trembling, as if he were struck by lightning, eyes rolling in terror. For an instant, Haytham can see the shine of the Apple reflected in his eyes, almost as if they themselves were glowing—and then he blinks. Adams' expression is mild and relaxed, almost vaguely amused. Jefferson's face is a stark contrast: it is the very picture of horror. Jefferson steps backwards towards the other cowering delegates.

“Mr Adams, how are you feeling?” asks Washington.

“Wonderful,” he says breathlessly, face rapturous. “I... I can't recall ever feeling so... so...”

“At peace?”

“Yes,” he hisses.

“Mr. Adams, do you wish to please me?” Washington asks.

Oh dear God, he wasn't going to make Adams—he wasn't going to use him like he used Haytham, was he? For as much as Adams had infuriated him, he didn't wish that fate on anyone.

“More than anything, Your Grace,” is Adams' emphatic response.

“Very good,” says Washington. He nods to Thomas. “Mr Hickey, lend Mr Adams your knife.”

Thomas unsheathes a squat dagger from his belt and hands it to Adams, hilt first. Adams takes it without hesitation.

“Mr Adams,” says Washington, “I've found you rather boorish, as of late.”

“Please, Your Grace, I never meant offense,” Adams says with utmost sincerity. “What can I do to make amends?”

“I don't think anything would please me more than to have you cut out that offending tongue.”

Adams tilts back his head and opens his mouth as wide as it will stretch, and Haytham knows what is coming, what he means to do even before the man pinches his tongue between thumb and forefingers. Haytham looks away, down at the flagstones, but not before he sees Adams lift the knife to his own face, and he hears the click of steel against teeth as the blade is maneuvered awkwardly into place.

Jefferson screams,“NO!” but he's immobilized, seemingly rooted to the spot, and Haytham is going to be sick, he just knows it, can feel the bile burning his throat at the sound of a sharp blade slicing through meat, accompanied by a sloppy gurgling sound—Adams swallowing his own blood so that he does not choke.

“Oh, very good!” says Washington, pounding a fist on the arm of his chair in approval. Haytham starts at the noise, looks up to see Adams grinning with red teeth, bright blood gushing in a torrent down his chin and staining his cravat. “If you will return Mr Hickey his knife, please.”

The man dutifully wipes the blade on the tail of his coat and hands it back to Thomas who accepts with a cordial nod.

“You see, I don't need soldiers; I have subjects. Sixty thousand souls who will do anything—and I do mean anything—to further my ends.”

“Dear God,” someone, perhaps Jefferson, moans.

“Gentlemen, I now give you my leave to go.”

Washington lowers the scepter. The light is returned to the world. It is only then that Adams begins to scream.