Chapter 55
Chapter
Fifty-Five
Titus
Is it numbness that tugs on my eyelids, forcing me to blink and breathe again?
Vengeance?
Acceptance?
Our tears have stopped, allowing me to look at my brother.
I grab his face in my calloused palms. His skin is smoother, like he has this ethereal glow of candlelight.
Battles once stained the whites of his eyes weary and red, but now they are a pure, clean white.
His hair is thicker, and the ends shine with new health.
I run my hand over his biceps. Did he gain muscle?
He blinks away tears. “I’m okay,” he assures me.
“Your shadows…” I look around the cell. If it weren’t for the walls, I’d be tricked into thinking we were floating on grey clouds. “You’re magic truly has no ending?”
Tristen nods. I wait for a joke that doesn’t come.
He’s grown into someone who doesn’t laugh as much. “My magic is always there, charged and ready to go, just as Elderan said it would be.”
Is he relieved or stressed?
“You don’t need blood anymore,” I surmise.
“I drank it,” he corrects me. “Old habits die hard. It tastes like chocolate, but it didn’t fuel my magic. It’s just an indulgence now.” He looks down with apprehension. “Selene asked me to give you something, and I denied her,” he blurts out.
My hand drops from him like it’s been burned. “What?”
Tristen bites his lip. “She knew,” he nods. “It was her way of warning me she was leaving. She wanted me to take care of you, but I slammed the door in her face. I finally saw a future where you were happy, and,” he shrugs, “I wanted to keep it that way. So I refused to hear her out. I’m sorry.”
My mate wanted to talk to him and not me! Finally, I reach for the bottle of water and take a sip. It burns. The urge to consume it all almost outweighs my knowledge that it would make me sick.
I hug the bottle to my chest. “Your guilt is misplaced. Selene and Everett are to blame.”
“I don’t expect you to forgive her.” His shadow inches closer like an animal trying to comfort me. “But she died so you could live. I’ll love her for that.” His next breath is sharp. “We had a message sent to us this morning.”
“You sure know how to deliver blow after blow,” I grunt. My lips crack from the few drops of water I had.
“It’s Selene’s father.”
“What?”
“He’s here,” Tristen replies. His shadow curls up, creating a second wall to trap me in.
The cell starts to spin, my fangs sharpen for his blood; my ears long for his screams. I don’t just picture Selene. I see Sable, too. I hear echoes of everything Hector said as she died. Selene’s father is a catalyst; I intend to make him suffer.
“His body is,” Tristen clarifies as he runs a hand through his thick hair. “Along with a General Leander who said he was delivering a gift… from Everett.”
My mouth dries. Give me a dagger so I can plunge it into my ears. I never want to hear Everett’s name again.
“Solaria is being torn apart as we speak; the nobles are fighting for King Aridel's crown, and the army is in pieces. Turns out a portion of the soldiers were in Everett’s pocket. They turned on King Aridel, delivering his body to you as a symbol of their wish to join us. King Aridel’s got one hundred and twenty-seven arrows in him.
” The sound of Tristen’s whistle is nearly lost in the rhythm of my erratic heartbeat.
“He’s a thin man too, not a simple task, but fae archers are worth their weight in gold. ”
Another revelation. I pinch the bridge of my nose. I think I’m going to vomit, but my stomach is empty. Maybe I can purge the shredded pieces of my heart.
Tristen rises and points his open hand towards me.
He wiggles his fingers, waiting for me to accept his help to stand.
“I’ll throw you over my shoulder if I have to.
” He raises an eyebrow in warning. “Be angry; be numb. Fuck it, if you want to be a shell, be one! Shells are empty homes. I’ll reassemble you, and shove you back inside.
I can’t make a new world without you, brother. ”
He bends down, interlaces our fingers, and pulls me to my feet. My knees ache as I sway. He has to help me stand.
“Titus, you are the first person to oversee an army of vampires, fae, and mages. We need you.”
A shell. I’m a shell. Empty, forced to be filled with all the facts and revelations.
Forced.
Maybe that’s what I need, someone to force me, because I’d much rather stay in this cell and rot. But then they all would be right. Selene would be right.
It would all be for nothing.
Nothing.
It’s a struggle, but I step back and hold my ground. I’m not doing this for Selene or Everett.
I’m not! I hate them! I want to erase them from history.
My eyes trace Tristen’s boots, his strong legs, chest, and his face, which I have loved from the first moment he was placed in my arms as a crying baby. I’m doing this for him. For my other brothers and sister.
Tristen’s grin makes him look like a kid again. “Mages?” I mutter.
“Hector’s army,” Tristen replies, putting an arm around me as we slowly leave the cell.
The cuffs chafed my wrist, causing raw, unhealed wounds due to my lack of magic.
“They are calling you an emperor. The leader who will unite war-torn lands, a leader who will made kings bend a knee,” Tristen adds as we approach the stairs.
I can only make it up five steps before I shake my head. Tristen props me against the wall, pulls out a flask of blood, and brings it to my lips. I drink it down and shake my wrists.
Pulling a key from his pocket, he hesitates, studying my demeanor before unlocking the mage cuffs.
Fire races up and down my veins. It finds my injuries and heals them, except when it reaches my heart. That can’t be healed. It’s held captive by Selene’s magic. Caged until it deems my heart healed.
“I do not want knees bent,” I announce as we finish climbing the stairs. “I want a world where we stand side by side, shoulder to shoulder.”
I look down at the Vitalis. A fucking book was worth so many lives. The sheer power makes our small room feel on the verge of collapse. Reaching out, I press my index finger into the cover.
“Where is the sword?” Is that my voice? It’s cavernous, rumbling like a faceless beast that lurks in the shadows.
“I have it. I will hide it once we sort this shit out,” Tristen replies sternly. “I haven’t tested Elderan’s facts, but if he’s correct, that sword is the only thing that can kill me.”
I close my eyes, hold my breath, and flip the book open. In the dead center of the page is a rune, drawn in a faint black substance, but it’s outlined in a shimmering gold thread that moves as magic does. Lighter sketches surround it, preliminary work the artist did before finalizing the design.
“I can’t draw,” I whisper.
“We once couldn’t hold a sword properly, but we learned.” Tristen comes to my side. “Does that mean you’re doing this?”
“I don’t know what I’m doing anymore.”
“You thought Selene was your ocean.” He gently presses his shoulder against mine. “She was forever, endless, boundless. She was your mate, and by the gods, she was magnificent.”
I sink my fangs into my lip until it bleeds. I’ll never taste her again.
My fingers itch to feel the silk of her black hair. My eyes water, and I plead to the gods to let me look upon her face just one more time.
“But she wasn’t the ocean, Titus. You were.” He removes my hand from the book and grabs me by the shoulders. “She was a storm that came thrashing into your life; she was wild and free within her locked-up tower.”
I wanted to free Selene. But she knew she’d never taste freedom.
She locked me inside with her, forcing me to endure her final days.
Tristen’s fingers curl into my skin. “She was whipping winds and harsh glares; she was gentle caresses and strikes of lightning that struck you. No matter how magnificent and wondrous their strength is, storms do not last. Eventually, they die out, and parts of them return to the ocean. Remember the part she gave you, the good memories. Another storm will blow into your life again.”
When did he turn into a wise old man?
“I can’t survive losing another storm.” Why do they want me to suffer this again?
“Sometimes oceans clash with fresh water; you’ll meet your match.
Hey, I’m not telling you to think about moving on; I’m suggesting that once emotions settle into calmer waters, you will find your purpose.
We’re all hoping it’s this book.” He carelessly slaps the Vitalis.
“But until then, you have all of us. We will stand in your stead and watch over it; we’re here, helping you.
“The world we knew has ended, but the ashes are filled with nutrients that will support the new life. So let’s build something. Let’s make sure the two boys who lost their parents are not forced to kill so they can eat supper.”
My lip trembles. I wish we were those two boys again. Maybe I’d grab a knife and end it. Save us both so much suffering.
What about my other siblings?
What about the good memories we had?
How can one bad event expunge all the joys of life?
It shouldn’t, but here I am allowing it to erase the memories on the paper that holds my life’s story.
Tristen's eyes soften as he continues. “Let’s make a world where a little girl wants a name, where a monster does not enslave a boy.” He blinks rapidly. “Let’s make a world where there is a branch of warriors who fear nothing.”
He pulls me into a hug and presses his lips to my ear.
“Let’s make a world the two boys we once were could have been proud of.”
I thought Selene’s burnt-down field would look different. Like freedom. Victory.
It’s just depressing. It’s still here. The grass is scorched, the soil dry, but the land underneath remains. The dead roots of Galen’s rose bushes still cling to the charred dirt.
It’s going to take a long time until all these terrible memories are no longer as detailed in my mind.
“Mind if I join you?”
Yes, I mind.
“I heard you approach an hour ago,” I grunt.