18. Sie
EIGHTEEN
SIE
I stared in disbelief as the tomb opened. No one said anything. But I couldn’t unsee it now. The resemblance between Tezya and me. We were about the same height, almost the same build. We shared the same straight nose. The same jawline. We both had my father’s— our father’s —thick brows. I wanted to vomit. The only difference between us was his Luxian coloring. His hair was bone-white while mine was jet black. And his eyes were a mix of crystal blue and silver, the disgusting color the same as his half siblings of Lux. While mine were so dark most days I couldn’t find my pupils in the mix of my irises.
We were brothers.
He was my fucking brother. The ocean was roaring angrily at my back, warning us we were running out of time, but I couldn’t get myself to move. Moments before, I would have done anything to speed up time, to uncover this stupid prophecy so I could get off this damn boulder-filled beach.
I still couldn’t believe Scotlind tackled me. My head throbbed, but not from hitting the stone and cracking it open. It was screaming at me that she chose him. She picked him. And now that him was my damn brother .
Kallon was the first to break the silence. “Let’s talk about this back at the camp,” she said, gently gripping her hand over Tezya’s elbow. He was staring at me in disbelief, and I at him, but neither of us moved. The wind was plastering my long hair over my eyes, but I couldn’t get myself to run my fingers through it. “The portal’s ready, we need to get whatever this prophecy is and go.”
Neither of us moved. We were frozen in time, caught in a staring contest where no one would win, but I saw Dovelyn nodding in the distance. She took a step toward her mother’s grave until she was standing in front of it. The tomb had lifted off the ground for a split second when all three words were etched into it, before it slammed right back into its original spot. I didn’t see anything useful other than the theatrics of it all. There was nothing that would give us a clue to the prophecy.
Dovelyn placed both her hands on the stone, a part of her touching all three words, before she screamed.
It released Tezya from his stupor as he rushed toward his sister. He tried to pry her hands off the stone, but she didn’t budge.
“Help me,” he shouted over her ear-piercing shrieks. Savannah, Kallon, and Scotlind all ran toward them, grabbing the princess and pulling at her desperately. I still didn’t move, I couldn’t. I barely knew what to think, so I just stood there watching the girl as she wailed in agony. Dovelyn’s eyes were wholly blue. There was no pupil, no iris, no whites to any of it. The milky color consumed her sight as her head tipped back and convulsing overtook her body.
Then, as quickly as it started, it stopped. Dovelyn blinked the silver back into her eyes and stepped away from the grave. Tezya steadied her as she collapsed into him. Tears were pouring down her face.
“I saw everything,” she said weakly to her brother. “My visions… the ones she took away, they all came back. ”
Then she fainted.
Peter was sitting with me in our shared tent. A week had passed since we returned and the Luxian Princess still hadn’t opened up about what she saw. She’d been unconscious for two days and then refused to talk after that. ‘Refused’ was generous, she’d been unable to talk, at least, in a civilized manner. She turned full psycho, reciting lines here and there that made no sense, and couldn’t manage to stay conscious for more than a few hours at a time. Her eyes would shift from silver to milky blue during her manic rants and it looked downright terrifying.
“Want to fight?” Peter asked from the cot opposite me. It used to be my outlet for everything. Whenever I was angry or stressed, I would spar, kicking and punching the built up tension out of me, but ever since we got back from the trip, I didn’t want to do anything.
My father was bitter my entire life. I knew he never loved my mother, that all he cared about was power, about making the Noren name infamous, about making sure Tennebris was as strong as Lux. Did he only want power so he could change things? Was there more to him I didn’t know? He wasn’t a good man by any means. He was a complete asshole to everyone I knew. But ever since I lost Scotlind, I’d been just as bitter as he was.
No. I wasn’t going to go there. I was not my father. I refused to become him.
Maybe a good sparring match would help clear my head. Before I could answer Peter, the flaps to our tent opened. Tezya was standing at the entrance. “Mind if I come in? I’d like to talk.”
“You’re his family,” Peter beamed as he rose from his cot, then slapped me across the back, “of course you can come in.” I was going to fucking murder him. His dimpled-grin didn’t falter as I gave him a death stare.
When we first came back, I told Peter everything. He listened intently, making sure I was okay first. Then, once he realized I was fine—or as good as I could be with finding out I had a brother about a century older than me and it happened to be the one person I fucking hated—he’d been making fun of me relentlessly. He claimed it was karma for leaving him behind with Rainer while we went on the trip.
Peter walked out of the tent, still grinning, leaving me alone with Tezya. He remained at the entrance for a moment before coming inside.
“I’m sorry,” he said as he sat down on Peter’s cot across from me.
Sorry for what? Sorry we’re related? Sorry he stole my wife?
Before I could figure out how I wanted to respond, he continued, “I know this isn’t easy and it’s not what either of us wanted or expected, but I’m not going to stop loving her just because you’re my brother. I know you care about her—”
I cut him off. “If you only came in here to discuss Scotlind, then get out. I don’t want to talk to you about her.”
“Well somebody should. Look, neither of us want to have this conversation, but we need to. I came in here to tell you she went through hell because of you. If she ever finds it in herself to forgive you, I’ll accept it. If she chooses you, I’ll let her do it. We both hurt her in different ways, and she’s been hurt her entire life, so if she finds any means of happiness, we both need to suck it up and let her take it.”
“That’s easy for you to say when we both know she’s going to choose you,” I seethed.
Tezya let out a long breath, and for a moment, he looked just as devastated as I felt. “Maybe. She wasn’t lying when she said we’re bonded. ”
“Well I thought I was with her too, so you might not want to get your hopes up,” I snapped before I thought better of it.
“There’s a difference,” he said, leveling a glare at me. “I don’t think we are, I know we are. And if she decides to not be with me, I’ll accept it. It’ll fucking kill me, but at least she’d be happy. After everything she’s been through, she deserves that without your added guilt. You can’t blame her for the actions she took when you threw her into the fire. It was your decision to annul your marriage, your decision to send her away. You need to accept your own mistakes and stop projecting them onto her. You don’t understand what she went through because of your choices.”
Images of her being sent to Lux flashed in my mind. She was skinny, too skinny for her frame, and she looked so damned weak. It was all I could think about back in the prison—how I subjected her to the same thing.
“How she left your dungeons in Tennebris was nothing compared to how she was treated in Lux,” he continued.
“I know what happened to her,” I ground out. Peter told me bits and pieces of what happened, and I didn’t want to hear any more of it. And I especially didn’t want to hear it from him .
“No, you don’t know. I wish I found her sooner. I had no idea they were torturing her for information about you. Every damn day for twenty-seven days they starved her, kept her chained in a fucking cage so small she had to lay curled on her side, only to be dragged out, chained to a wall and whipped. She was barely alive when I found her. Her entire fucking life has been haunting her. It took a while for her to be able to act like a normal Advenian again. So it really fucking pisses me off when you wallow in your own self-pity because you lost her, because she found a sliver of happiness without you. I don’t care what happens to me, but if you hurt her again, I won’t hold back. It doesn’t make a difference if we’re related or not. She comes first, so you will suck it up and stop causing her more grief. ”
“Get out,” I gritted through my teeth. My fists were curling at my sides, and it took every ounce of self control I had not to fucking fight him.
He eyed me for a long moment before finally listening. As soon as he left, I felt a tear fall down my face. I wiped it away, hating it. I never cried. But his words… hearing how Scottie suffered because of me. He was right.
I hated that he was fucking right.