Chapter Forty-Nine
Fucking hell, Allhan thought as Denne’s words landed like bricks on his head.
She couldn’t have surprised him more if she’d picked up a frying pan off the stove and roundhoused him with the thing.
And as he repeated what she’d said couple of times in his mind, like he was a bomb squadder looking for hidden detonators, he heard a weird noise in his ears, a buzzing that came and went with no particular pattern or volume.
After God only knew how long, he pulled his shit together and cleared his throat. “You mind if I ask why you want to know that?”
She started pacing again, going over to a pair of flap doors and staring out the circular windows. “It’s going to sound crazy. Just a heads-up”
Yeah, right. The female had no idea what his life had been like for the last six months.
“Try me.”
There was another long pause. Then he knew by the way she straightened her spine that he was going to get it all. Whatever “it” was.
“My mother is Queen Catra of the Shadows. I am the heir to the throne of the Territory of the s’Hisbe.”
Allhan blinked. Leaned forward on his hips. Tilted his head. “I’m sorry, say what?”
“It is my destiny to rule when my mother passes.” She made a sign over the center of her chest and then glanced up. “May that be far, far into the future.”
Holy… shit. And he’d had the gall to think in his old life he might have been a catch for her?
What an idiot he was.
“It is our custom to do charts of the night skies, to track stars and assess how they relate to the lives we lead and our destinies. This is our tradition, and it has been done for me twice. Right after my birth, but also after my transition ten years ago.” Her eyes traced his face.
“That second chart suggested that I must be mated to one of my mother’s advisors and take the throne early to save my parents, and my people. ”
He closed his eyes briefly.
“Even though… I love you.”
Allhan’s peepers popped back open. As shock reverberated through him, she remained utterly calm and steady, as level as the floor he was standing on.
“I love you, too,” he said immediately.
Yeah, they were waaaaaaay past holding back or worrying about what made any logical sense. Unfortunately, given their situation, the joy and happiness they should have felt did not follow the mutual confession.
“The male I am supposed to mate is my mother’s Tretary. He’s responsible for interpreting the stars, and she asked him to do that reading for me on the night I went through my change. Everything that was foretold was supposed to start when two falling stars crossed on a winter’s evening.”
“When we met,” he breathed.
“That’s right. Except there’s something wrong with my chart. Or at least, I think there might be. I noticed when I went through everything last night.”
Nodding his head, Allhan said softly, “And you asked me my birthdate and time. So you went and looked at my chart, too.”
“I did. It’s an invasion of your privacy—”
“I don’t care. If it’s right, you already know my secrets and how ugly they are. And if it’s wrong, it doesn’t matter anyway, does it.”
“I think it does.”
“So what did mine say.”
“I just need to know. Did you ever kill one of your parents.”
Now he was the one back with the wander, and as he crossed his arms over his chest, he wished he had a better backstory. It also felt, after half a year of lying, very weird not to hide behind a fiction he’d made up.
And yet perhaps he had to look at this all in a different way.
Especially given everything he’d been thinking about during the day: It was possible that there was another way to deal with that lesser.
Something he’d never considered before.
After what surely was an eternity, Allhan faced her. “I killed my father. I beat his head in with a candlestick.”
To Denne’s infinite credit, she didn’t recoil in horror. Then again, she was probably armed and he didn’t even know it. Either that or she knew that he would never, ever hurt her.
Her black eyes went up and down him, as if she were recasting her opinion of him.
“Your sister,” she said softly. “You did it to protect your sister.”
Tears disrupted his vision. “Yes. He had hurt her for years. And then he did something that put us both in mortal danger. I couldn’t…
I couldn’t not take care of my family. Which was the two of us, against him.
I did what I had to in order to protect Carmen, and to ahvenge what had been done to her as a young. ”
“I understand that.” Denne nodded her head gravely. “I love my parents, and if they were in danger, there is nothing I wouldn’t do to defend them. In fact, I’m prepared to mate a male out of duty to make sure they’re safe. If that’s what I must do.”
Allhan closed his eyes briefly. “Thank you for not hating me.”
“How could I, when you’re protecting your blood.” Then she rubbed over her brows like she was trying to manually unjam her thoughts. “And your chart said something else.”
Allhan winced and thought of his planned betrayal of the Brotherhood. “What’s that.”
When her eyes finally returned to his, they softened with a gentle emotion. “You will love one, and only one, female your entire life, however long that is.”
He sucked in a breath. And then his heart started pounding. “Denne, can you answer me something, even if I don’t think I believe any of this?”
“Sure.”
“What did it say about… the future of my family.”
He wanted to know if his sister would be okay. Had to know.
Even if he wasn’t sure he believed in astrology.
Denne grew pensive and then shrugged. “Just that you had a big one. A big family who loved you very much… and that you loved in return.”
Allhan took a deep breath and blew it out slowly. “That can’t be right. It’s only my sister and me. We’re all that’s left of our bloodline.”
“Not according to your chart. That’s not what I saw. You were surrounded by people who cared for you.”
He put a trembling hand over his heart. Then he spoke in a shaky voice. “Denne, I need to tell you… everything that’s been going on for me.”