Chapter Nine #2
But then the Prince said quietly, “Just occasionally, you looked a little afraid of your father.”
Cormal froze, then a shiver washed through him. He stared out at the water. “Everyone knows what a great Summus he was.”
For thirty years. A legacy that he could never match or ever hope to attain.
“That’s not what I said,” the Prince observed.
No, it hadn’t been, had it?
Sighing, Cormal admitted, “He was so determined to be the best Summus that ever existed. He didn’t like things getting in his way. Anything.”
The Prince nodded and just kept listening as the words tumbled out of Cormal’s mouth.
“He was strict and strong and seemed always to know exactly what he wanted out of life and how to achieve it. It was difficult not to feel… inadequate in the face of that, sometimes.”
A lot of the time, if Cormal were being honest.
He sighed. “Sometimes, I wanted to be just like him, to have that same sort of certainty. But at other times, there was part of me that was glad that he’d found Brannal, because I could never have lived up to what he wanted.
At least with Brannal, there was someone else he could push, someone who was strong enough that they could stand up to him, maybe, if the time came. ”
And of course it had, just not the way that anyone had expected. And Cormal had failed, just like he always thought he would.
“And now you’ve got that much-vaunted position. Summus,” the Prince pointed out.
Cormal nodded.
“And what do you think of it?”
“It’s, uh, the worst thing that’s ever happened to me?”
The Prince laughed.
“Hey, that’s not funny,” Cormal protested, though he was almost laughing himself because the Prince seemed genuinely amused.
“I’ll tell you a secret,” Prince Kinan offered.
“All right?” Cormal said, puzzled.
“It’s a voluntary position.”
Cormal frowned. “What?”
“If you hate it, don’t do it.”
Cormal reared back. “What?”
“My mother appointed you, sure. But what’s keeping you there?”
Speechless, Cormal stared at the man for a long moment.
For the first time since he’d accepted the position of Summus, he actually asked himself that question.
Why had he accepted? Why was he doing this?
Because he’d been asked? Because he thought that it would make his father proud?
Because he’d been Brannal’s Secundus, and with him gone, it was the assumption?
Everyone assumed that this was the outcome that he’d wanted, but was it?
“Fire and water,” he breathed.
The Prince was smiling at him.
“But who would be Summus?” Cormal asked. “Molun? Could he do it?” He made a face. “I’m not sure the Queen would pick him.”
“Does that need to be your problem?” the Prince asked.
“You and your sister need to be safe. The Queen needs to be safe,” Cormal said automatically.
“We will be.”
Cormal looked up at the Prince. “Do you think Brannal could ever forgive me?”
“I honestly don’t know,” the Prince admitted.
It wasn’t the answer that Cormal wanted, but he appreciated that the other man wasn’t simply placating him.
The Prince continued, “If you apologize truthfully and from your heart, you can at least find out if there’s any possibility.
I think it would be good for you regardless of what else happens.
I know losing him has hurt you, and you might not be able to get him back.
But if you’re honest about what you feel and what you’ve done, you may be able to find some closure. ”
Cormal drew in a deep breath and then let it out. It felt like he could suddenly breathe again, when it had previously felt like he was being crushed under a weight that he’d mistakenly assumed he had to bear.
“We aren’t made only of the past,” the Prince told him earnestly.
“We can’t forget it. It helps make us what we are.
It shows us a path of the decisions and choices we’ve made, good and bad, up to this day.
But we need to look forward, too. And sometimes, we can take what we’ve done in the past, and we can use it to help us shape a new future.
I think you could have a very beautiful future, Cormal, if you wanted to. ”
Cormal drew in another deep breath and let it slide out of his lungs.
He stared out at the water for a moment, at the vista that seemed almost endless, that was so different from the castle and everything in it.
He was glad the Prince had found this place, that he had let Cormal share it—and that he’d thought to bring him here now instead of letting him stew in his anger.
He turned to the man.
“Thank you,” he said earnestly. “I don’t think anyone has believed in me in a long time, and I let that pull me down until I didn’t really believe in myself.
And being me, I dealt with that by yelling as loudly as I could that I was right, that I did believe in me.
It means so much to me that you looked at me and saw someone worth preserving, even after everything I did to you. ”
“You didn’t do anything to me.”
Cormal scoffed.
The Prince made a face, and then said, “All right. Then let us say that if you did anything to me, I feel that you’ve adequately apologized, and I forgive you, all right?”
Cormal sucked in a surprised breath, feeling a heavy weight on his heart lighten again. He was sure it wasn’t going to be this easy with everyone, that it was probably going to get harder, but…
The Prince gave him hope. Maybe he was right that Cormal needed to acknowledge it, needed to apologize even if he wasn’t forgiven.
“Thank you,” he said again, swallowing because he really didn’t need to cry any more tears. “How did you get so smart?”
The Prince smiled at him, but his beautiful gray eyes were a little shadowed. “There’s nothing like being forced to examine the world and everyone around you without interacting for seven years to teach you to observe carefully.”
Cormal reached for his hand, forgetting for an instant, and watched it pass through him.
“I’m sorry,” he said. “Truly. I can’t imagine what it was like. And I’m sorry I didn’t believe your sister.”
The Prince’s lips quirked up. “It was hard to believe. Maybe we could have convinced everyone before Perian, but it didn’t feel right.
It didn’t feel like it would really help, you know?
I worried that it would make the situation worse for Renny.
” He eyed Cormal pointedly. “On the other hand, I also didn’t scream at her that her brother was dead. ”
Cormal groaned. “That was not one of my better moments. I was genuinely worried for her safety since I thought she was sneaking off alone. What if she had a dizzy spell or collapsed? But I do realize there were many better ways of expressing that concern… Did you know I have a bit of a temper?”
The Prince laughed. “Yes, I had noticed that.”
“And I overreact when I’m worried about people.”
“I noticed that, too,” the Prince said, his expression soft. “You don’t always express yourself very well.”
Cormal huffed a breath. “I think we can agree I do it very poorly.”
His father hadn’t been much of a believer in expressing his emotions, and Cormal and Brannal hadn’t really done so, either.
They’d just fallen in together and then been united by the rare element of fire.
They hadn’t discussed things very often, to Cormal’s clear detriment.
His father had tried to raise both of them in much the same way, he supposed.
“Can I blame my father for everything?” he asked, only realizing belatedly how whiny that sounded.
Thankfully, the Prince laughed. “Maybe not for everything.”
Because Cormal was his own person, and if he’d allowed himself to react in a certain way to his father, that still ultimately came down to him.
He needed to deal with the consequences.
He could try to fix it now, but he might discover that when he’d razed everything to the ground, there was no restoring it.
But that didn’t mean Cormal couldn’t try to plant seeds.
Maybe they would all wither and die; they certainly weren’t going to grow without water, and Cormal had never been good with water.
But he could be the sun, and he could see if anyone would meet him halfway.
If they wouldn’t, at least he would know that he’d tried, just like the Prince had suggested.
As much as he wanted to say that he’d tried and been ignored before, he wasn’t so sure that it was true. He thought, rather, that he’d yelled and other people had yelled, and no one had listened to anyone.
“I’m glad that he came,” Cormal made himself say.
“What?” the Prince said, clearly startled by Cormal’s non sequitur.
“Perian. I’m glad that he came.”
The Prince looked surprised.
Cormal smiled at the man sitting next to him. “Because if he hadn’t, I wouldn’t be sitting here with you right now. You wouldn’t be able to tell me when I’m being stupid—or convince the Princess not to rappel down the side of the castle now that she’s feeling better.”
The Prince let out a bark of laughter, but there was a softness on his face that Cormal rarely saw.
“I might still have been caught up in the past,” Cormal continued. “And Brannal wouldn’t have found the love of his life. He deserves to be happy, and I’ll probably fail, but I’ll try to explain to him why I’m so sorry that I put that in jeopardy.”
The Prince was beaming at him, eyes shining. “I’m so proud of you.”
Cormal smiled back, staring into those warm silvery eyes. He was so grateful for the man in front of him.
“Thank you,” he told the Prince a third time, because there was so much to be grateful for. “Thank you for caring enough to drag me out here and kick some sense into me.”
The Prince’s face creased into a broad grin. “I do miss being able to kick sense into people. I’ve only got words at my disposal now, and sometimes they aren’t enough.”
“You’re very good with them,” Cormal assured him. “Better than I deserve.”
The Prince smiled. “You brought me out here when I needed it as a child, and I’m very happy to return the favor.”