Chapter 76
They left the council chamber like survivors fleeing a collapsed stage set—half the cast still inside, rewriting the final act and arguing over whose version of the tragedy would make it into the official script. All very important things when a child had just died on sacred ground.
Evelyne said nothing. Alaric didn’t speak either. But he didn’t leave her side. Not when Vesena fell into step behind them. Not when Cedric threw him a look. Not when Isildeth reached for Evelyne’s elbow with a whisper of her name.
Alaric lifted a hand, and the others halted at once. He walked the rest of the way beside her alone—through hollow corridors and the weight of too many stares.
At the threshold to her chambers, Alaric held the door.
She crossed the threshold.
The room was dim. A clean robe waited, neatly folded on the bench.
She made no move for it. She remained where she was, wrapped in the same blanket they'd draped around her after Thalen's body was carried away.
Her arms clung to it, tight against her chest, as if releasing it would make everything that happened impossible to deny.
With effort, she turned and met his eyes.
“I suppose,” she began, forcing her voice steady, sharp, “this is the part where you tell me to keep quiet and smile. Let the memory of tonight rot, and pretend the world is still whole.”
She hated how brittle the words sounded. She hated more that some part of her had expected it.
“You speak as if you had never seen the worst side of me,” he said, stepping closer. “Whatever they claim, whatever pretty stories they wrap it in—it’s wrong.”
His fingers brushed lightly over the bruised skin of her wrists. The contact was feather-light. A flicker of pain crossed his face.
“I think it was meant to be me,” she whispered. “The next one. I was supposed to say it.”
Alaric tilted his chin slightly towards her.
“That woman took the mark,” Evelyne continued, more to herself now. “But the cycle didn’t break. I feel it, Alaric. It’s not done.”
She exhaled, slow and careful.
“I’m still on that list. I can’t explain how I know it, but I do. There’s something left in me. Something that wants to speak.”
Alaric shifted minutely closer. His voice came low, careful. “We’ll take care of it at home. I promise.”
Her lips barely moved. “And what if I’m still next? The ritual will take not just me… it will take everyone around.”
Alaric didn’t answer immediately. Instead, he turned, just enough for her to see the edge of his profile—sharpened by worry, softened by something else.
“Then we change the ending,” he assured. “I don’t care what the old stories say. You are not theirs.”
Her throat closed, traitorous. She blinked quickly, as if it would force back the knot threatening to break loose behind her eyes.
“You don’t get to say that,” she whispered. “You saw me.”
There was a pause. He looked at her and something in his gaze faltered. Was he judging her? Planning a way to get rid of her?
“Yes, I’ve seen you,” he admitted. “And I’ll follow whatever shape that becomes.”
She hated how badly she wanted to believe him.
“I won’t stop, even if the truth is uncomfortable, Evelyne. I don’t mind getting dirty. Do you?”
The question lingered between them like smoke.
Once, she might have said yes. She had feared anything unfamiliar—had clung to rules and rituals like a child to a railing in a storm. She’d been afraid of what would happen if she cracked the surface. Afraid of what she’d find underneath. But now?
Now she wanted to tear it all apart.
If it meant knowing why.
“Not anymore,” she whispered.
His gaze sharpened—satisfaction, yes, but laced with something deeper. Relief, maybe. Or recognition. He shook his head, jaw clenched as though he was arguing with himself as much as her.
“You weren’t supposed to be real. You were supposed to be a theory,” her hands trembled, but he folded them gently in his own. He looked up to meet her gaze. “Now you are a revelation I didn't see coming.”
Her brow furrowed. “What do you mean?”
He hesitated, the muscle in his jaw ticking once. “Nothing. Everything. I don’t know.”
Evelyne shifted her focus, tracing the long shadows cast by the candlelight, but the chamber offered no refuge—no corner untouched by what had passed.
“I need to know what happened,” she whispered. “To Dasmon. To Thalen. I need to make sense of it, to—” Her voice hitched. “To amend something. Anything.”
Alaric didn’t interrupt. He only waited, watching her as if every word mattered more than the last.
“I couldn’t save them,” she continued, steadier now, “but I can’t just… wear the crown and smile while the world bleeds under it. I can’t be that kind of empress.”
Alaric nodded, brushing a thumb gently over her palms. A gesture slowly becoming calming. “Sometimes silence is not the absence of sound—but the breath before change,” he mused. “A price of knowing. I believe your silence was just that.”
Her gaze flicked back to him.
“I don’t want to be the exception,” Evelyne managed finally. Her voice barely held. “Not when my brother—when my family—”
The words came jagged, like stones she’d carried too long. Her fingers twitched in his grip.
“I know,” Alaric assured, and his voice was rough around the edges, like it scraped on something unsaid. “And I’ll help you.”
She didn’t look away. Neither did he.
“And what do you want in return?” she asked, though part of her already feared the answer.
Alaric didn’t blink. “Just the right to fight beside you when it starts,” he replied. “And to hold what’s left of you when it ends.”
Something inside her folded at that. As if another wall she hadn’t known she’d built had finally cracked open from within.
Then—gently—he released her hands.
For the briefest heartbeat, she mourned the loss of his warmth. But before the chill could settle, his palms found her shoulders instead. A grounding weight that steadied her spine and stilled the shaking she hadn’t noticed had spread to her breath.
“If you want to be looked down upon—stay here,” he said. “If you want obedience, marry a knight. But if you want devotion. Dangerous, foolish, all-consuming…”
He paused, letting her hear the truth in his voice and pulled back just enough to see her clearly.
“Then you already have it.”
For a moment, neither of them moved. She could hear the uneven hitch of his breath, when her own feet betrayed her, carrying her half a step closer.
Evelyne didn’t think. She was done thinking and waiting. For orders. For permission. Her hands found the edges of his tunic, fisting the fabric like she could anchor herself to him, and she kissed him. He caught her against him with a gasp, steadying her with both hands.
She kissed him with everything she had locked away inside her—passion she had taught herself to cage, sadness heavy as stone, grief so old it tasted like iron on her tongue, anger sharp and burning, and a sliver of hope so fragile she dared not breathe too hard against it.
She kissed him on impulse. For the first time, she did something without weighing gain against consequence. It felt right.
And then, slowly, they broke apart. Just enough for their foreheads to meet, breath mingling, eyes closed. Her hands hovered between them for a moment, uncertain, as though still deciding whether to retreat or reach.
His thumbs brushed the curve of her jaw before sliding down to her shoulders. He drew her fully into him, both arms wrapped around her shoulders, anchoring her against his chest.
Evelyne folded into the hold like a thread pulled back into its knot.
Her own arms slid around his waist, tentative at first, then surer.
Her cheek pressed beneath his chin, breath catching on the collar of his shirt.
She let herself exhale there, into the safety of it, into the warmth and solidity that shouldn’t have felt familiar—but did.
Her body jerked once with the force of the sob that followed. A sound too high, too raw to be contained.
“My baby brother is gone,” she choked, the words breaking apart on her tongue as tears spilled fast and hot. She didn’t try to stop them.
He let her cry. Said nothing. Only held her tighter.
As she tightened her arms around his waist, she felt him flinch. Her grip eased slightly, gentler now, as she noticed the faint tremor in his stance, the warmth of blood still damp beneath his shirt.
Through the open window, dawn spilled in orange ribbons across the floor, gilding the edges of their silence. Beyond the glass, the willow swayed at the lake’s edge, its branches trailing the water. Farther still, smoke curled faint and grey where the Ivory Bastion once stood.
They killed Dasmon and his family. Torn apart a chapel full of innocents for a prophecy so broken it didn’t even make sense. They killed her brother.
And for that, they would pay.
The rage was no longer something she could pack away between layers of duty and diplomacy. It sat full and molten in her chest, bleeding through the cracks. She let it burn. Let herself feel it.
This wasn’t just about survival anymore. Or proving she could play the game.
She didn’t want to play anyone’s game.
They would watch her now, yes. That wasn’t what hurt. What truly hurt—what had her fists clenched into Alaric’s waist, heart pounding—was knowing how long she'd tried to be what they needed. Obedient. Controlled.
No more.
Because if whatever had been cracked open tonight could no longer be shut, then everything was about to change. The rules she had memorized. The truths she had been handed. The delicate, diplomatic lie that peace was possible so long as everyone stayed in their place.
She was done staying in hers.