I allow the doors to slam shut behind me, careless of how it might bother those left behind. The short sword at my hip bounces against my leg with every quick step through the halls. They’ve left a trail to follow, though I wouldn’t need it as they’ve also left their distinct scent behind, and their voices still resound down the halls. Hairpins are scattered over the tiles, I nearly trip over a shoe that’s been discarded around the corner, and someone has tossed their suit jacket into a crumpled heap just ahead.
They’re shedding out of their clothes, nothing more than snakes needing new skin.
Their voices are lost to me once they’ve reached the palace doors and escaped to the chilly autumn night. By the time I reach the doors, throwing myself past the guards, Violence’s skin is blackening, disintegrating into golden specs the breeze. Her blonde hair is down now, the curls loose but still distinguished. The others are fading away too, yet I won’t find any part of me missing them.
“Violence! Wait!” My boots scuff against the steps, gravel crunching under me as I race toward her. Those green eyes watch me back. They slide down to where I try to take hold of her wrist before it’s gone.
“Please.” My whispered plea.
She hesitates. All the small pieces of her frozen in the air around us. Her arm pulls free of my hold, but she says nothing. I don’t know how long I’ll have her; all I can do is warn her.
“Father is up to something. I can feel it in my bones. Try and lie low.” Her nose crinkles as she takes in my words, somehow disgusted. “I’m working with an alliance with the Court of Winds to save our country from falling to the Court of Light.” I swallow. “I’ll fix this.”
This. Her banishment to the Wild Hunt. This hole that has been torn in our family. My mother’s broken heart.
Her slender mouth moves, but her voice is farther than her body, stopped somewhere in the cloud of her drifting spirit. “It’s been three years, Merrick. It’s a little too late to fix me.”
My hand falls, her touch gone.
There is a soreness that settles deep into my body. It pulls at my eyelids and hunches my shoulders forward. Bone deep exhaustion.
Just give me time,I think as if I could send that thought through to her.Give me more time.
I’m still staring at the place she had been standing. Little disturbances in the gravel show exactly where her bare feet stood. The markings of the others are also left in a messy half circle that surrounds me.
Someone claps behind me.
Slowly, I twist to meet the shitty grin Basilus is giving me. So there is one person who would chase me... well, at least, he is chasing the crown, I’m not so sure it really has so much to do with me personally.
“That went so well, brother.” He takes his time strolling down the stairs.
“How much did you hear, you little weasel?”
“Name-calling?”
I shrug, openly rolling my eyes.
“I heard... enough.” Basilus stops just before me, leaning forward to wipe at invisible dirt on my sleeve. “Plotting for our father’s throne already?”
“That’s not what this is.” I slap his hand away. I want to point my finger back in his face, to tell him he is one to talk. Even alone with only a few guards and my brother, I must keep myself calm, collected, and dignified. It’s unspoken, but he and I both know if he finds a way to take the title of heir from me, he will. Then he’d be nipping at Father’s heels instead of mine.
I am not yet ready to be king. I only wish to protect my court, my family, these people. The weight of that is enough for now.
“Is it not?” He moves to allow me to pass him and make my way back up the steps to the door that is being held open by the guard.
I note that both guards that have followed me out are men I can trust not to tattle to the king. My nod feels stiff as we move by them, and Basilus lays his hand on my shoulder to slow me down.
“No.” Muscles tighten in my jaw. Shrugging out of his reach, I turn down a hall leading us away from dinner.
“Don’t be stingy, tell me more.” His black braid flicks at his back with his hurried movements. Those hazel eyes, some mix of green and blue, fix themselves before us, giving me a profile of his large nose and the hump in the middle.
“Am I to believe that you are not aware of the same things that I am?” Basilus has his fingers in every pot. Perhaps I should be the one questioning him. This is likely some ploy to find out everything I know.
“What do you think Father Dearest is up to, exactly?”
A question for a question.
“We are not ladies at tea time and sewing. Gossip is beneath us.”
