Chapter 33
My pillow was soaked through.
I wasn’t sure how I’d gotten back to the apartments, who had peeled off my sodden, sand-covered clothes, washed the grit from my feet, tucked me beneath the blankets.
Nadja. It must have been Nadja.
And yet, I didn’t remember seeing her at all. All I could see was Levinica’s face. The soul-shattering grief in her eyes. The terrible resolve beneath it I hadn’t recognized until it was too late.
I should have known then. I should never have let her walk away. I should’ve followed her, should’ve realized what that final look meant, should’ve done something. I could have stopped it.
I could have stopped it…
The sobs that tore from my chest barely sounded human.
I wanted to tear my heart out so I’d never have to feel anything again.
For once, I wished for my power. I prayed for it to rise inside me, to take this hurt away, to strip me of every feeling I had until there was nothing left but that blissful emptiness.
How was I supposed to survive this? The guilt, the shame, the sorrow pressing down so heavily I could hardly breathe.
My friend… My friend…
The grief broke over me like the waves beyond the castle windows. She had offered herself to the sea, and it had taken her gladly.
I knew the madness hadn’t brought her to the grave. I knew that the female who’d walked into that water hadn’t been lost or confused or trapped in some terrible vision only she could see.
No. This time, Levinica had seen clearly.
There were no real prayers to the Seven Gods.
None that humans remembered anyway. No beautiful verses passed down through generations, no sacred words whispered over the dead or offered in moments of sorrow.
Our prayers were short, desperate things we made up ourselves, each in our own way, spoken to gods who had turned their backs on us long ago.
And yet, I couldn’t stop the words that spilled from me in an endless flow.
“Please,” I whispered raggedly against my pillow. “Please forgive me for what I’ve done. Forgive me for not seeing it. For not stopping her.” My fingers curled tighter into the blankets. “Watch over her. Please. Wherever souls go when they leave this world, don’t let her be alone there too.”
My eyes burned as they drifted shut, the roar of the sea still echoing somewhere in the distance, that dreadful sound I wished I could shut out.
“Please… Please…” Behind my closed lids, I saw her again—saw the moment the waves pulled her under. She hadn’t struggled. She hadn’t fought. “... give him back to her.”
Sometime after that, with her name still trembling on my lips, I finally fell asleep.
Icould barely open my eyes.
They were swollen from crying, crusted with dried tears. My eyelids felt like sandpaper, my mouth tasted like ash.
For a long moment, I lay there blinking up at the ceiling, trying to clear the blur from my vision.
My chest felt hollow and yet so heavy I didn’t understand how my body could still draw breath.
I curled onto my side, pulling the blankets tighter around myself.
I willed sleep to take me again, to let me sink back into that peaceful darkness where there was no grief, no memory of black water dragging my friend beneath the surface.
The bond pulled.
I sat up. Pushed back the covers. My feet touched the tile.
I moved almost as though I were in a trance, following that tug I hated so much and yet somehow knew so well by now—that invisible thread leading me exactly where I already knew it would.
I crossed the apartments, my steps slowing as my gaze landed on the dining table. On Levinica’s chair. The same chair she’d sat in not even a full day ago, laughing with me, smiling and teasing…
She’d never sit there again.
I swallowed past the lump in my throat and forced myself to look away, letting the bond guide my feet as it pulled me down the darkened hallway toward the one bedroom in the suite that had remained sealed and untouched for three hundred years.
The Dark Prince’s bedroom.
I wasn’t surprised to see the door open. I wasn’t even curious about it. I just stepped inside.
The first light of dawn touched the room, illuminating the dust motes drifting through the stillness. Not the brilliant hues I'd grown accustomed to in the Dusklands, but something pale and sickly. Washed out and muted, as though even the rising sun couldn't bring itself to shine today.
As though it mourned her too.
Rìan sat at the foot of the massive four-poster bed, facing the floor-to-ceiling windows overlooking the sea.
His face was a mask of stillness, his cheekbones casting long shadows across his jaw.
His hair had been washed and brushed back.
He wore a simple black tunic that seemed to swallow the light.
His boots had been cleaned and polished. Not a single grain of sand remained.
His hand moved in one long, slow stroke, and with a small jolt of surprise, I realized Titter Mouse was sitting in his lap.
The kitten who’d despised him on sight from the moment they met now sat perfectly still beneath his touch, eyes half-lidded as Rìan's hand passed gently over his fur.
His palm was large enough to cover nearly all of him, but Titter Mouse didn't purr.
Didn't arch into him or nudge for more. He was simply quiet. Still.
I could feel it somehow—that small creature's sorrow. The bone-deep understanding that his mistress had left him behind.
Rìan didn’t turn his head toward me when he spoke. “What is it?” His voice was hoarse, the only sign that anything from the night before remained.
I curled my hands into fists at my sides. He might have been my enemy, but he was still a brother. He’d lost his sister.
“I’m sorry.”
Nothing. Not even the smallest trace of emotion.
He lifted Titter Mouse from his lap and set him down onto the floor. The kitten curled into a ball at his feet.
I cleared my throat, my own voice raspy from screaming. “She was a good person,” I continued, and I meant every word. “She was kind and generous and patient… I’m grateful she took it upon herself to teach me to read.”
He was so still. Almost unnaturally.
“She was my friend, and—”
He barked a humourless laugh at that, the coldness of it stopping me. “Friend?”
The way he said it made my face heat, but I persisted. “Yes. My friend. And I’ll miss her.”
He turned his face toward me then, and the look in his eyes made every word die in my throat. Loathing etched harsh lines into his face.
“How fortunate for her, then.” His full mouth curved, but there was only cruelty in it. “To have such a loyal friend standing here now, in my chambers, mourning her.” His gaze dragged over me. “The mate of the very male who destroyed her.”
The words struck like a slap.
“Tell me, Eidra, when you run back to him, will you tell him how she died? Will you tell him she finally succumbed to the madness he planted inside her?”
“Stop.” My voice barely came out.
His lip curled. “Will you comfort him too?”
“I—” Shame and disgust swelled inside me. He wasn't wrong. Despite everything, Aedric was my mate. I'd chosen him, and I would save him. Even after what he'd done to Levinica. Even after everything she'd suffered because of him.
And in that moment, I hated myself for it.
I couldn't stop the tears from spilling down my cheeks.
He rose suddenly at the sight of them. Titter Mouse startled, disappearing beneath the bed as Rìan crossed the room in three long strides.
And just like that, I remembered exactly what he was. Not the male who'd fallen to his knees in the sea. Not the brother who'd screamed his sister's name until his voice broke.
The Dark Prince.
The male entire Courts feared.
Wrath ignited silver in his eyes as he advanced. I retreated until my spine met the smooth stone. One hand slammed against the wall beside my head, caging me there as he leaned in, his fury burning so fiercely I couldn't look away.
“She’s dead,” he hissed. “My sister is dead. And crying over her will not bring her back. Prayers will not bring her back. Your hollow little condolences will not bring her back.” His jaw tightened, and the silver in his eyes flared brighter.
“But there are people still breathing who put her in that water. And I intend to correct that.”
He lowered his face slowly to mine, close enough that each heated breath brushed my skin. My magic stirred at his nearness, responding to the promise of his power only inches away.
“I’ll find Dannis—and when I do, I’ll tear through every last one of them. But I promise you one thing: Aedric will be the first.” His eyes burned and burned and burned. “And I will rip through his mind until whatever is left of it is leaking from his ears.”
I’d been foolish to think anything remotely human existed somewhere beneath all that darkness, to believe there was anything more to him than the ruthless beast everyone had always claimed him to be.
Hatred coursed through me, bright and vicious. “You’re bound to our bargain.” I reminded him, my lips pulling back from my teeth. “You can’t touch him until you’re free of me. And by the time that happens, I’ll make you a promise.”
“Oh?” His mouth curled inches from mine
“You’ll have to get through me first.”
For a moment, he only stared at me. Then he straightened, looking down at me with all the cold indifference of the Prince he once was.
“You’re nothing.”
Power flashed through his eyes, straining against whatever leash he kept on it. The sight sent a sudden surge of anger through me. The most powerful male in Elantis, whose control over his magic was terrifying in its precision, and yet—
“Why didn’t you save her?”
He blinked, the reaction so brief I almost missed it.
“Why?” I dragged the heel of my hand roughly across my face, wiping away the tears as grief and rage crashed together inside me.
I jabbed a finger into his chest before I even realized what I was doing. “You could have controlled her mind. You could have stopped her!”
He took a step backward, every muscle in his body locked tight.