Chapter 15 Eveera
Eveera
I’ll kill him. I’ll kill all of them. I think as Bennett’s words echo loudly in my head:
“He’s a bit overprotective when it comes to his wife.” Gods, he may as well have run me right through with his broadsword.
Finally, I break our locked stare and turn my attention over to Felix. My regent, who, for all intents and purposes, was supposed to make sure something like this did not happen.
“Eveera–” they both start at the same time, but my hand flies up, quickly cutting them off.
“I wouldn’t.” I snap, making a beeline for the passageway.
Pulling the tapestry away from the wall, I push open the door, my chin tilting to the side to look at Felix.
“You of all people… I never would have expected this from you.” The door shuts tightly behind me, and despite my tired and aching feet, I book it down the cobbled path.
The closer I get, the thicker the smoke becomes, and I can’t help but cough as the dense smell hits me. Yanking hard on the handles, I throw myself into the throne room.
She’s wrapped around the dais, her armored body taking up most of the space.
I take a cautionary step out of the shadows. The second I do – her head swings my direction, gold eyes blazing and teeth bared. Blistering hot steam assaults my skin, and through the slits of my eyes, I see the orange glow of flames building beneath her scales.
Reflexively, I raise my arm, my Wield coiling around it in a weak attempt to shield myself. With the heat in the room only rising, I scream out, “VADA!”
Her growl cuts off, and I peek an eye open to see her focusing on me, the fire in her throat quickly snuffing out. The teeth large enough to eviscerate my body in a single strike are still about a foot from my face, but at least she seems to recognize me.
“Little demon.”
She raises her snout, retreating enough to give me some walking and breathing room. My eyes scan the room, taking note of the piles of burnt clothes, charred bones, and several discarded pieces of armor.
“Well, I see you’ve kept yourself well fed.” I snark. She narrows an eye at me, clacking her teeth in response. “I hope they were nobody important,” I add, grimacing as I kick the rubble out of my way.
“I don’t usually ask.” She quips, bowing her shoulder to me. I grab onto the onyx colored scale and haul myself up in between her shoulders. I nestle in closely, the warmth of her body and resting fire seeping through my skin.
“Take me anywhere but here, Vada.” She hums in understanding and crouches.
I dig my nails deep into the grooves of her scales and tuck my chin into my chest, bracing for take off. Her body lifts with ease, the two of us barreling towards the closed ceiling. Closed. Fuck. “Vada! Wait–”
Red tempered glass shatters all around us, showering the floor in tiny ruby shards as we make our ascent into the dusk-filled sky. When she levels out, I lift my head, taking in Obsidian below me. “And to think you wanted to end it and miss all this.”
I startle at the sound of Axel’s voice and look down to see his ebony arms wrapped securely around me.
“Now, I know you aren’t real,” I say breathlessly.
“Ah, and what gave it away?” He asks lightly.
I hum, slouching myself into his familiar form.
“Because Vada would never let you on her back and you never would have climbed on.” He laughs, the warm and rich cadence of it getting lost in the wind.
“He married me off,” I say coldly. Axel doesn’t answer, but Vada’s growl rumbles beneath me.
“He married me off like I’m some animal up for auction. ”
I can hear the words coming out of my mouth, but they sound ridiculous. They sound so ridiculous, I can’t help but laugh. I mean – in what fucking realm did they think I would ever agree to an arranged marriage?!
“Well, they didn’t. That’s why they did it while you weren’t here…”
I didn’t realize I had been shouting that out loud, and I scowl at him over my shoulder, a shit-eating grin present on his face. “I didn’t ask for your – less than helpful – two cents. That’s not why I keep you around.”
“Well, that I know – it’s because I’m remarkably handsome.” I shake my head and settle into his chest.
“It’s getting really unsettling to see and hear you when I’m not drugged,” I grumble, my eyelids dropping closed. His chin rests on top of my head, and I drift off to the sound of him hushing me.
Every night after my first flight back, Vada and I’ve gone out and stayed out until the sunlight just barely crests over the horizon.
It's a part of our routine now, and afterward,s if she lets me leave her sight, I come to sit in my council room where I stare silently at the picture of my parents and the fucking ridiculous will they'd left behind.
My rage at the circumstances surrounding my life is palpable, and the uptick in my emotions keeps my Wield poised at the tip of my fingers just waiting for some hapless fool to step into it.
I want answers. I want reasons. I want justification for this absolute violation of another person’s private life. I am their queen.
BAD-UM. BAD-UM. BAD-UM.
My fingers drum across the wood, matching the metronome of the grandfather clock behind me. The time passes slowly until I hear the heavy doors creak and, behind them, Felix. He doesn’t say anything, just walks in and takes the seat to my left, his hands clasped out in front of him.
“How could you? I-I,” the words stall, and I press my hand to my chest, feeling my heartbeat quicken. The look I give him is desperate, my voice breaking. “I wasn’t even here.”
“Eveera…”
“NO!” I shout, my hands slamming down, “I was out there – dying. Every day, he killed me a little more. And despite that? The whole time I was suffering, I was hoping that even if I died, you were safe. That things would be under control. But this?! Marrying me?” His face falters at the words, mouth opening and closing as he struggles to find the words.
“I mean, I know I was gone a while, I didn’t exactly keep count, but ha –”
“98 days, 5 hours, and 37 minutes.”
“What?” I snap, irritated that he’s invited himself into this conversation.
He pulls out the chair at the end of the table and sits himself in it, propping his head. “You were gone 98 days, 5 hours, and 37 minutes. That’s 14 weeks by my count. And I did count.” His hazel eyes bore into mine, the subtle jab noted.
“Ha. Well, thank the gods someone did. I was a bit preoccupied with being kidnapped. A recurring theme for me and my life since joining up with the likes of you, princeling.”
A smile curls at his full, rosy lips. “King.” He corrects.
The title flares something in me, and I push up from my seat, leaning across the table.
Fine. I think. If that’s how you want to play it, then that’s how we’ll play it. “Ah, yes, how could I forget. Forgive me, husband.” I mean for those last few words to bite. For them to sound as nothing more than a curse he is now burdened with.
His chest shakes with laughter as he steps around the table, the steps weighty as he makes his way to me. I straighten myself, prepared to stand against him. But, before I can pull back, his hand cups my cheek, and those rosy lips find themselves fused to the top of my head.
I freeze, feeling the heat of the gentle kiss as he dips down, hand still holding my face. The warmth of his breath coasts across the shell of my ear, and with all the strength I can muster, I suppress a shiver threatening to travel down my spine.
“You’re forgiven.” He whispers.
Bastard. I wrench from his touch, pushing out of my seat as black bleeds into my vision. I guess slapping him is no longer a good enough reaction. My conscience muses as I reach for my Wield.
Rorin turns his back on me, “save your power for when I sleep. I do so love when you toy with me in bed.”
He slinks back to his seat, and my foot stomps the same as a petulant child’s, “ARGH!”
Felix looks between us, his eyes soft as ever. They're the eyes of a man who became a father without any choice. A man who has remained steadfast and dutiful.
I want to pluck those eyes right out of his head.
“What would you have had me do?” He asks gently, breaking up the tension. His words shouldn’t sting so much. But the pain is his voice, cuts through me all the same.
I rake a hand through my hair and resist the urge to rip out every strand as I slump back down into my chair. “Ha – not marry me, that would have been a novel idea.”
“Eveera–” he sighs, frustrated. “There are bylaws. Bylaws your parents made in the case… in the case they were necessary.” He walks across the room to the bookcases and pulls out a large tome.
“You are and always have been the coveted gift of this kingdom. But your parents didn’t make you fragile or na?ve.
They knew people would come for you one day. ”
I steel my resolve. “I do not see what that has to do with you marrying me. Without me present.” I emphasize. “A binding Obsidian marriage requires blood, and last I checked, my blood was busy being spilt all over the fucking realm. Not here with you.”
“Marjorie.”
I laugh, “Marjorie is a powerful Wielder and an even more powerful and practiced Mage. But even she cannot forge or fabricate blood.” His eyes drop down to my wrist, and with his gaze, my stomach and eyes drop too. Right to the place where the mark she carved rests under bandages.
The rune. The blood seal. Fucking, Marjorie. I groan, and I swear I feel Vada laughing through our bond at my inner monologue.
“My dear.” Felix starts, his voice bringing me back, “the council and your people wouldn’t have accepted him as regent any other way.
With your rumored… affections, we thought you would agree.
Too much time was passing with your absence; we had to do something to secure him lest we be left without a ruler. ”
My anger bubbles up and out, “he was also gone, and left you to be the regent anyway! He was out there traipsing through different kingdoms, Obsidian be damned, not here ruling in my stead. So what would it have mattered?!”
“I was searching, not traipsing. Never traipsing.” Rorin teases from his reclined position.
My eyes roll, continuing with my tangent. “You were regent for years, Felix, and you didn’t try to marry me off. Tell me what is different here?!”
He hangs his head, tension lining his shoulder blades. “While I served as regent, you were not missing, Eveera. You were underage, that’s it. You have always been here, ready to take on your throne.”
THUD!
Felix drops the book in front of me and begins flipping through the dusty pages until he reaches the end page filled with signatures. He taps the parchment, dust billowing up into our faces. “Look.”
I cast him a sidelong look before peering down at the paper.
It’s the original copy of their will, signatures written in ink and blood branding the bottom.
The bylaws of the Obsidian Kingdom, I see, are conveniently placed on the page next to it. “There are conditions in place for every scenario when it comes to your family.” Felix says quietly, “they tried to think of everything. I only followed their instructions.”
I flip the page, finding on the back a portrait of my young parents, my mother’s belly swollen with me inside it. The look my father is giving her is nothing short of devotion.
“Leave me,” I whisper. My fingers ghost over the photo, and a traitorous tear falls onto the page. “You made a mistake in trusting me,” I murmur, laying my head down on top of the book. My finger outlines the shape of my mother’s youthful face, and I bite down on my lip, “a terrible mistake…”