The Prince’s Heart

16. Chapter 16

Chapter sixteen

M other’s words hang in the air as a wave of dizziness crashes over me, and my chest tightens to the point where it feels like I’m going to be crushed into the ground. “Are you certain he’s…” I can’t finish the sentence.

“Yes. I’m certain.” She hesitates briefly. “He went peacefully, if it’s any consolation.”

The sense of hopelessness I’m feeling grows. I try to push it away, but only succeed in lessening it a bit. “What about Samis? How is he?”

At the sound of his name, she winces, just the tiniest bit. “I … don’t know,” she says. “I was with your father until he … until a few minutes ago. I’m going to Samis’s rooms now. I just…” She takes a deep breath. “I wanted you to hear it from me.”

“Thank you, Mother. I appreciate it.” Tears sting my eyes, but I blink them away. I can grieve later. Right now, Samis needs me . “I’ll come with you.”

I start to walk forward, but Mother hesitates.

“I know you want to see your brother,” she says softly. “But maybe you should stay here and get some sleep. There’s nothing you can do to make him get better. If he doesn’t, you will become king, and—”

“Stop.” It comes out more forcefully than I intend. “Samis is going to get better. He has to. And if he doesn’t…”

Mother just looks at me and nods. I know she’s thinking the same thing I am. If he doesn’t get better, I at least want to say goodbye to him .

With that settled, I ask Joram to inform Tag of what’s happened when he wakes, and then I follow Mother out of my rooms and into the hallway. We plod down to Samis’s rooms. Each of my steps feels like a struggle, as though a weight is hanging around my neck. The hallways are dark and quiet—not unusual for this time of night, but, somehow, I feel like there should be something … different about them, something to reflect the fact that the world’s falling apart. Father is dead. Samis might die, too. If he does, I become …

I shake my head. No. Don’t even think it, Darien .

There’s a heavy pall in Samis’s rooms, as though the air has been suffused with death. Outwardly, everything seems normal, but there’s a stench of sickness that tickles my nose, barely noticeable but there all the same. Our quiet footfalls on the carpeted floor sound like bangs in the suffocating silence. Mother goes into the bedroom immediately, but I pause before the door, my legs shaking, as though the thing that I fear the most won’t be real if I don’t see it.

It takes a good minute for me to gather enough courage so I can step inside. When I do, the first thing I see is Kenessa sitting in a chair next to their bed. She has the same exact look Mother had yesterday when I went to see Father for the last time, and as soon as I see it, I know the same outcome is inevitable. Emma sits on the other side of the bed, her eyes hard and her jaw set. Her posture is erect, and her chin is held high as she watches Samis’s chest rise and fall. She looks as though she’s already lost one battle and she’s determined not to lose the second, as though she can pull Samis back from the brink of death with her bare hands.

When I turn my eyes away from the others and focus my gaze on Samis, I almost do a double take. I barely recognize the man lying in the bed. His eyes are closed, and his hair is limp; he seems to have aged twenty years in the last few hours. The vitality that I’ve always associated with him, that I’ve almost come to take for granted, is gone. He looks as though a breeze could blow him away.

But before I’ve made it more than three steps into the room, he opens his eyes, and there’s still a spark of life in them.

“Darien,” he says, his voice barely audible, even in the silence. “I’m glad you’re here.”

I walk up to the bed, trying harder than I’ve ever tried anything before to put on a brave face. “Of course, Samis.” My voice trembles almost as badly as my legs. “I’m always here for you.”

He smiles weakly and opens his mouth to say something but is interrupted by a fit of coughing. Finally, he manages to choke out, “Ladies, could you please leave us for a moment? I’d like to speak to Darien privately.”

Kenessa looks like she doesn’t want to leave Samis’s side for a moment, but, in the end, she nods. “Alright. But we’ll all be right outside if you need us.” She gets up and leaves the room without another word. Mother and Emma follow close behind her.

As soon as they’ve closed the door behind them, Samis turns his attention back to me. “How’s Father?”

Tears well up in my eyes. “He’s … well.” Forgive me for lying . “The healers say he may yet recover.”

Samis laughs weakly; for the briefest of moments, he looks like his old self. “You never were a good liar.” He moves his hand toward mine—even that little effort seems to tire him—and I grasp it. “Listen to me carefully. I know I don’t have much time left.”

I shake my head, tears flying away from my cheeks, but he doesn’t let go of my hand.

“It’s alright, Darien. I know it’s not what you wanted, but you’ll be a good king. I believe in you.”

His words hit me like a tidal wave, ice-cold and overwhelming. I’m powerless to do anything but succumb to it. It feels like a betrayal to be pitying myself when he’s the one dying, but I can’t help it. “I don’t know if I can do this, Samis.” My voice is barely above a whisper. “I’m not ready.”

“Nobody ever is.” His voice is even weaker than it was before. “You have a good heart, and that’s all you need. You just have to promise me two things.”

I nod, barely able to see through my tears. “Anything.”

“Promise me you’ll be there for Kenessa when I’m gone. I know she can take care of herself but tell me you’ll do whatever you can to help her.”

“I promise, Samis.” As though I could ever do otherwise .

I wait for him to tell me the second thing, but he’s silent for so long that I start to wonder if he’s fallen asleep. When he does speak, his voice is barely audible: “Promise me you won’t let anything come between you and Tag.” He sounds winded, like it’s an extreme effort just to speak. “Not Arbois, not the council, not anyone . You two are good for each other, and you’ll be happy together.”

My eyes sting with a sudden flood of tears. “I promise.” My voice is only slightly louder than his.

“Good.” He smiles again, and, for a moment, he looks so tranquil and untroubled I could almost believe he’s not dying. “You’ll do well, brother. I know it.”

Samis dies almost six hours later, with what remains of our family at his side. One minute he’s breathing, and the next minute he’s not. When he lets out his last dying rattle, my vision grows dim, as though the light of the world departed along with him, and, for one blessed moment, I feel nothing, like my mind can’t quite comprehend how devastating, how crushing, this is.

Then a dam breaks, and all the grief and fear and anguish and desperation that I’ve been just barely holding in for the last few days breaks free. It’s like I’m being torn apart, like my heart is being ripped out of my chest and shredded to pieces before me. The pain of it is so much worse than anything I’ve ever felt before. Suddenly, I can’t be in this room, where my only brother lies dead not feet away from me, anymore, and I lurch out of the bedroom as fast as my feet will take me, barely even noticing that I nearly fall over more than once.

As soon as I get out of the room, that horrible, hateful room, I realize tears are streaming down my cheeks, and I lean against the wall of Samis’s antechamber and let myself cry. I don’t think I could stop myself even if I wanted to. Someone—I’m not sure who—puts a comforting hand on my shoulder and murmurs something, but I ignore them, and, soon enough, they go away.

It takes an eternity for the pain to recede, but once it does, I almost wish for it to come back, because all that’s left behind is pure emptiness, like I’ll never care about anything ever again. When the healers come to take Samis to the mortuary, afternoon sunlight making their white robes glow gold, I watch them go into his bedroom with disinterest, as though I’m in some horrible dream instead of real life. All I can do is fight a losing battle against the desolation that’s taken over my mind.

When I do finally manage to regain some semblance of sanity, the sky is dark, and I’m standing outside the door to my rooms, with no idea how or when I got here. It hits me that the last time I walked through these doors I was a prince, but now I’m the king, and the emptiness I’ve been fighting all day rears its hollow head once again. I have to stop and take a few moments to breathe before I have the strength to reach out and turn the handle.

Just like last night, Tag is waiting for me in my bedroom, sitting in a chair next to my bed. Seeing him reminds me of the promise I made to Samis, the one I don’t know if I can keep, and stabbing pain blooms in the pit of my stomach.

Tag takes one look at me and then wordlessly wraps me in his arms again. As he holds me, I try to feel something , even if it’s painful, even if it will make me collapse into a pile on the floor, but all I feel is that all-encompassing emptiness, as though I’ve been opened up and all my emotions have been scooped out and discarded like the waste they are.

After holding me for a minute or a week, Tag leads me over to the bed. When we get there, I lie down, still fully clothed, and he lies next to me, holding me close to his beating heart. “It’s going to be okay,” he murmurs. “I know it hurts now, but it’ll get better.”

I’m not sure what it is, but something—perhaps the gentleness of his touch, or the warmth of his body next to me—finally breaks through the fog in my head. “This is all wrong,” I say, my voice shaky and hoarse. My tears start flowing again, like little rivers of despair running down my cheeks. “They can’t be gone. I need them here. What am I going to do, Tag?”

He starts to stroke my hair, his hand slowly moving back and forth, almost rhythmically. “You’ll do the best you can, my dear prince.” He says it as though it's an unassailable truth. “You’re going to make them proud.”