CHAPTER TWENTY-NINE #2
Brannon paced the considerable length of my room, halting only long enough to pick up one of many trinkets off the wooden dresser, and examined it while wearing down a path in the floor.
One piece of an ever-growing collection of things I’d bought from the night markets with Gideon.
This one being a small bird made entirely of gold.
In its beak sat a tiny golden twig, with four round diamonds encrusted to the end meant to be berries.
When he held it up to the light of the candles hanging down from the ceiling, the diamonds reflected a shimmering pattern onto his cheek. He whistled, impressed.
The three of them were quiet. But Kodhan’s silence was the worst. Arms crossed and lost in his thoughts, he leaned his shoulder against the window nearest to my bed.
Nothing but murky darkness appeared beyond it.
Usually the twinkling lights of the homes sprawled throughout Aedreath shone so bright that they would keep me awake at times.
Especially this time of year. But I found myself grateful for the temporary blindness to the outside world.
“Where would you go?” I asked tightly. “If you don’t prefer where you’re staying, that is.” I knew nothing of the Syrello estate, and where it was situated in Aedreath.
Brannon’s boot scuffed against the floor as he stalled. But he instantly resumed his pacing, suddenly very interested in the rest of my trinkets. He picked up two new ones, though I couldn’t make out their shapes. He kept his back to me, hiding them from view.
Theia angled her body away from the vanity, crossing one knee over the other.
She held a hand out in front of her, admiring a ring she’d slipped onto her pinky finger.
“Somewhere with a bath the size of a small pool.” She slipped on another ring.
The one with a considerable sized lapis gemstone encrusted onto it.
Holding it eye-level, she peeked back at her reflection, comparing it to her irises.
The exact same shade, just like I’d guessed.
“I’d probably have one built in a cottage deep in the woods by the mountains up north. ”
“I’ve never been up the mountains. Though I imagine it must be peaceful up there.” Kodhan would know, seeing as he spent most of his life there. But to my disappointment, he didn’t comment. “What about you, Brannon?” He now held a palm-sized topaz carved into the shape of a rose.
He tossed and caught it a few times, testing its weight. It popped over his shoulder as it soared through the air, and without turning, he caught it behind his back with ease. “I’ll go wherever the winds take me.”
“You wouldn’t settle? Even with the option to choose any home you wish for comfort?”
“Settling is the opposite of comfort.” His tone took on a seriousness that was so at odds with his usual behavior. “There is no solace in stagnancy. Not for me.” Forcing a smile, he tossed me the topaz. I caught it easily, but didn’t buy into the playful act, not for a second.
“What’s important is that you find it. And that you’re happy. Right?” I chucked the topaz back to him, to which he caught with one hand.
His smile turned genuine. “Right.”
I tilted my head at Kodhan expectantly. “Well?”
“Well, what?” he replied gruffly.
“Would the Son of the Second forsake his title and disappear if he had the choice?”
I was only teasing. But his lips pressed into a tight line, and his fingers curled where they rested on his biceps. Theia paused her admiring of the rings long enough to glance at him.
I must have hit a nerve, I thought. Or perhaps it wasn’t about what I said at all. This might have been the first time they ever spoke about what they would do after—having avoided the topic until now since they knew they wouldn’t all make it.
Kodhan pushed off the wall, but his feet remained rooted in place.
“The mountains are peaceful. It wouldn’t be so difficult to return.
” The barest of smiles tilted the corners of his lips.
“Only insects and animals for company. Not ideal, but at least they won’t incessantly talk my ear off like someone I know. ”
He bent just in time to avoid the hairbrush soaring towards him. It clattered off the wall, narrowly missing his head.
Brannon choked on a laugh, darting into my dressing chamber to avoid other flying hairbrushes or anything else that would leave a mark on impact. But he instantly re-emerged at the squeak of a handle being turned.
None of us were relatively close to the entry. Yet the main door creaked open several inches.
It took all but two seconds for Kodhan and Brannon to stand shoulder to shoulder, rallying their magic. Brannon raised his left hand, taking aim for the blast of wind that would pin the intruder to the wall if they so much as lifted a finger. Fire wound around Kodhan’s arm, ready to burn. To maim.
I reached for my blades but stopped short the moment the intruder stepped beyond the threshold. “Don’t hurt him.” The order came out strangled, warped by urgency.
Kodhan’s fire burned brighter, but thankfully remained on his person.
“Gideon,” I rasped, hurling myself past fire and wind—towards his already open arms, the softness in his dark cinnamon eyes threatening to spill tears from my own. I crashed into him, but he remained steady, wrapping his arms around me in a bone-crushing hold.
“A warm welcome as any, I suppose,” Gideon murmured into my hair. “Though I didn’t expect anything less.”
I wouldn’t cry. Not here—not yet. I gave him one last squeeze before pulling away, just enough to get a good look at him. He seemed fine. Unharmed. Exhausted, but what mattered was that he was okay.
I thought I was never going to see you again, I wanted to say. “What are you doing here?” I settled on asking instead.
He read every unspoken word, like always.
Then gave my shoulder a light squeeze. I know, that squeeze seemed to say.
His gaze hardened as it settled on the others.
Assessing the threat they posed, despite them being the sole reason I stood next to him.
Theia was beside Brannon now, warily studying the hand on my shoulder.
Gideon stiffened before holding a fist over his heart. It was a gesture the guards usually reserved for the king. One meant for respect. For loyalty. “Thank you,” he said. “For helping her.”
It was enough for Kodhan to extinguish his flames. “You trained her well. She hardly needed it.” Hardly was a massive understatement, but I said nothing.
Pride loosened some of the tension in Gideon’s shoulders. But regret laced his next words—and a hatred I was all too familiar with. “I wish I was here for different reasons, but I’ve been sent here to escort you all towards Wit. To ensure you don’t escape.”
“And of all the guards in his employ, Maverick sends you,” I said bitterly. Any hopes I had regarding Gideon not being present for my potential death cracked and faded into nothing.
Maverick’s nicely polished promises on the balcony certainly did not negate his cruelty. Perhaps he sent Gideon because of what happened on the balcony. I hadn’t turned him down, but I hardly gave him what he wanted, either.
And he always got what he wanted.
Gideon grimaced. “Actually, Diana offered to send me.” My heart sank. “Was quite insistent on it. The king could hardly refuse.”
Brannon glanced between us both. “Why would a member of court be so insistent on parting from their personal guard?”
“Because she hopes he’ll be used against me. If either of us are hurt in either way, it shall be punishment for the other.”
His eyes widened, sharpening with anger. “That’s morbid.”
“That’s Diana.”
Kodhan seized the opportunity to ask, “Can you tell us anything about Wit? Or why the king decided now was the best time to undertake in heavy renovations?”
Gideon shook his head, splaying his hands apologetically. “I was only told where to retrieve, and where to lead you. I do know that eight of you remain in total, for what that’s worth. All made it out of the tower before it collapsed.”
Only eight. The four of us, Lachlan, Elias, and two others strong enough to withstand both Courage, and the massacre that accompanied it. I could still see the blood caked under Darion’s nails in the back of my mind. That crazed glint in his eye.
I did not regret killing him. And I wouldn’t regret killing his friends.
“I heard about what he did for Courage. Those insects. And thank the stars I wasn’t in the same room as the bastard when I did. It was twisted. Far from legitimate.”
If only he knew what I really saw. Who I nearly wielded his training against.
“Others in my unit vaguely recounted the results of who’d made it.
That’s how I found out that you were alright,” Gideon explained.
“The guards who were given the task of serving you those poisoned meals all have different versions of what happened.” He ran a ragged hand through his dark hair, as if remembering them all, each worse and more exaggerated than the last. “The king’s explanations were also filled with half-truths, no doubt.
Only he, and those present around him at the time, will know the true extent of what happened. ”
I knew, in the very marrow of my bones, that he would force their secrecy. Through any means necessary.
“Over half of the kingdom is angry about not being able to see what happened during Courage,” Gideon added.
“And therefore will expect Wit to make up for it,” Brannon mused, his face a cool mask of displeasure.
Theia plopped my rings back into the jewelry box, one by one. “As if we haven’t already endured enough misery.”
“And what of my father? Where is he?” Kodhan pressed, and Gideon’s brows furrowed.
“General Dreadmourne remains at His Majesty’s side. More so than usual, in fact. I haven’t seen them separated since the beginning of Strength. Should he be anywhere else?” His honest curiosity spoke for itself. Gideon had no idea Kodhan’s father was also a traitor to the crown.