Oh, that.
When will you learn to think past your nose and present, petty motivations?
Funny. I've been asking myself the exact same question lately. The good news is there's much room for growth. Nowhere to go but up.
Tendrils of gray wrap around my body and constrict. I let Darkan use me as a stress ball while I chase a few paltry minutes of physical rest.I shouldn't have Vowed. In my defense?—
There is no defense for stupidity. Haven't I taught you better?
The crux of the matter.I'm not entirely sure that's possible, considering you are me and I am you. I don't know what else I could have taught myself over the years. Maybe I could work on thinking before I speak a bit more, but. . .I trail off.
His annoyance deepens.Extricating you from this will require attention needed elsewhere. I should strangle you and be done with it. But I won’t allow a Vow to deprive me of the pleasure of wrapping my hands around your throat and squeezing. It would be slow. It would besatisfying.
So violent. Which reassures me. How many times have I thought nearly the exact same words about dear Ard?
The feeling is likewise mutual.
Darkan’s seething presence withdraws halfway between a mental stomp and a flounce.
I emerge from my mind as the first of my family enters. The warm, textured walls fail to comfort me as Édouard, Baba, and our highest ranked knights take chairs at the heavy wood table.
“We need to scour our organization,” Juliette says, dropping into a chair. She flicks a throwing star in her fingers, round and round, her under eyes bruised. “We got suckered by bad information and that only happens when there's a traitor in the ranks.”
“Yes,” Baba says slowly, his accent stronger today. “That is a problem that needs solving. I feel confident you can get to the bottom of the matter, Édouard.” My father pauses for a beat. “The more pressing issue is our strategy now that Prince Renaud is awake.”
Leaning on the table, I stare down at the grains, my hands flat on its polished surface. “The real question is what will Prince Renaud do.”
I met my greatest enemy in the flesh, and he. . .defended me.
Saved my life. Saved the lives of my people who were not dead before his arrival.
“What exactly did he say to you?” Juliette asks again.
I shake my head. My gaze travels around the table and settles on Édouard.
He stands legs slightly spread, arms crossed over his chest, impatience in every line of his body. This meeting is an interruption; when we arrived home, he shut himself in hisoffice to comb over weeks of intel to figure out how we'd been lured into an ambush.
“Why you?” Édouard asks. “Why approach you?”
Juliette scoffs. “Because she was the highest-ranking person from Faronne in the field. You're an idiot.”
“I was there.” His expression closes. He’s thinking. I hate when he’s thinking.
“He acknowledged me,” I say. The way he'd said Maman’s name, reminding me they’d been more than friends. As inseparable as siblings who lived apart from each other, with spouses and children and full lives, could be. “He called me Muriel’s daughter.”
I try to recall if she’d been his only real friend, and I think yes, except for a handful of enemies who spoke of him, oddly enough, with some wry warmth.
Darkan proves he’s eavesdropping.That often happens when everyone competent dies and you are surrounded by children who know nothing of history. Your enemies become your companions.
Heavy, bewildered silence blankets the table. “Does the Prince know he killed High Lord Maryonne?” someone asks.
“He must.” I chew my bottom lip in the same place I'd injured it. Remember restless flecks of bright blue in moonstone eyes as his gaze rested on the bitten soft flesh. “Is it possible he feels remorse?”
“The Old Ones don't feel remorse. They know it is useless. But each death is a lesson.”
I turn to Nora, one of the only three High Fae in Everenne since my mother's death. My great aunt, the eldest of my House, though that is the simplified relationship—she isn't my mother's blood sister. She may have been my great-grandmother's youngest sister, or niece. She isn’t my dominant, but she is my elder and I settle in her presence the way I do Tata Fatma’s.
“You knew him before, didn't you?” I ask.
