Chapter 7 Violet
Violet
“Do you have to go?” I asked as steam curled lazily around the bath.
“Yes,” Sebastian muttered, pressing another gentle kiss to my back.
We didn’t talk about the scars there. We never did. We didn’t name the things I’d endured or the reasons they existed. But he kissed them anyway as if his mouth could rewrite history. His shadows followed, cool tendrils tracing familiar paths when he thought I wouldn’t notice.
I always noticed.
There was a war behind his eyes every time he looked at me like this. Like part of him was still calculating how to tear the world apart for daring to touch me first. Like if he could unmake what had been done, he would do it without hesitation.
But I didn’t want it erased.
Without everything I’d survived, I wouldn’t be who I was now.
I wouldn’t be here.
I wouldn’t be with him.
“Why isn’t Adar going with you?” I asked.
He’d told me he’d be gone a few days—north, toward the edge of the realm. That was all. When I’d tried to press for more, he’d distracted me thoroughly enough that I’d forgotten my own name, let alone the question.
I can handle myself, love, he said down the bond, another kiss landing just beneath my shoulder.
“I have no doubt,” I replied. “But if Adar isn’t with you, that means he’s here. With me.”
That earned a low huff of breath against my skin.
“Your father is leaving again today,” he said. “And I’d prefer you not be alone.”
“I wouldn’t be. Bronwen is here.”
“And that,” he said dryly, “is exactly what worries me. She’ll throw a party the moment my back is turned.”
I smiled despite myself. “She promised to keep it small.”
“Bronwen doesn’t know what that word means.”
His hands settled at my waist, thumbs pressing lightly into skin. I leaned back into his chest, fitting there without thinking.
“Did you know my father?” I asked softly. “My real father.”
Sebastian was quiet for a moment. “Bronwen handles most of the trade dealings with the other realms,” he said. “But I crossed paths with him a few times.”
I tilted my head back slightly so I could see his face. “What was he like?”
He was silent for a moment as his hands came up, rubbing the sore muscles in my arms. Adar didn’t go easy on me this morning, though I wouldn’t expect him to. There was nothing easy about him.
“Quiet,” he said after a beat. “Always watching. Thinking.” His mouth curved faintly. “The other Sovereigns were afraid of me. He wasn’t. He didn’t flinch. He met me straight in the eye every time we came across each other.”
I traced slow circles against his knee, grounding myself. “What changed?” I asked. “What made all of you attack the phoenix village?”
His gaze sharpened. “All of us?”
“I mean—” I swallowed. “The phoenixes were there for as long as history was recorded. Then suddenly every Sovereign agreed they had to go.”
“Violet.”
“And the Sovereigns have never all agreed on anything else, not once, but that—”
“Violet.”
A shadow curled gently around my mouth, stopping me mid-sentence. He turned me fully toward him, his hands on my waist
“Do you think I was part of the massacre?” he asked.
“Well,” I hesitated, “the books say all the Sovereigns—”
“What have I told you about those books?”
I frowned. “That they’re written by whoever survives.”
“And whoever controls the narrative,” he added.
“You weren’t a part of it?” I asked, my voice barely more than breath.
His brow furrowed. “No.” A pause. Then, softer. “Did you really think I played a hand in your parents’ deaths?”
“I—” I faltered. “I didn’t know what to think.”
“Violet.” He cupped my jaw, forcing me to meet his eyes. “I wasn’t.”
The tension in my chest loosened.
“But why weren’t you?” I asked. “Everyone else decided they were enough of a threat to be wiped out.”
He smirked and brushed a loose strand of hair from my face. “They weren’t a threat to me.”
I waited.
“Every realm has something like that,” he continued.
“Creatures stronger and more dangerous than the rest. Ours is the Naga.” His thumb traced my cheek, grounding.
“Yes, the phoenixes could shift, move between realms, burn villages to ash—but they didn’t.
They kept to themselves. Power alone isn’t a crime. ”
“So the attack was unprovoked.”
“Yes.” His jaw tightened just slightly. “And that’s what never made sense.
You’re right—Sovereigns don’t agree on anything.
Not like that.” His expression darkened.
“I was with the Flower Sovereign that day. We were mid-conversation when she stopped speaking. Just… froze. Then she stood and left without a word.”
A chill crept down my spine. “That’s—” I swallowed. “That’s wrong.”
“Yes,” he said. “It is, but we don’t need to dwell on that. Let’s work on your gifts.”
I straightened. “Right now?”
“What’s wrong with right now?”
My gaze drifted down his naked body. That earned me a smirk.
“You’re not going to be wielding when it’s convenient. You’ll be wielding when it’s necessary.” He sat up, the water shifting with him. “When you least expect it. Close your eyes, clear your mind, and look for the part of you that calls to you.”
I raised a brow. “You call to me.”
“It’s a different call. It’s not a connection to the outside that has formed within you. It is something that is wholly you.”
I closed my eyes, even though I expected no success. This didn’t work yesterday. Or the day before. Or any day before that.
“Forget everything else and focus on yourself. The things that make you… you.”
“I can’t think of anything other than the fact that you’re naked.” I peeked an eye open. “I think you need to be clothed.”
For a moment, he went distant.
I recognized it now—the way his focus slipped sideways, attention threading through shadow and space. Seeing without looking. Listening without ears. It used to unsettle me. Now it just meant he was carrying too much at once.
“Alastor is readying his horse,” he added, voice returning to me.
I exhaled and pushed myself upright, water sliding down my skin as I stepped out of the tub. “Do you ever wish,” I asked, grabbing a towel and wrapping it around myself, “that you could turn off your shadow eyes?”
He tilted his head, considering it. “No. It doesn’t bother me. It’s natural.” A pause. Then the corner of his mouth curved. “And I especially enjoy that I can do this—”
He closed his eyes.
“—and still see you from every angle.”
I stared at him for exactly one heartbeat.
Then I grabbed the nearest thing within reach—a bar of soap—and hurled it at his head.
He laughed as he caught it midair with a flick of shadow, the sound breaking the tension clean in half. “Violence already?”
“You’re unbearable,” I said, shaking my head.
“And yet,” he replied, opening his eyes, “you keep me around.”
I rolled my eyes, but the heaviness in my chest eased as he stood and crossed the room, shadows trailing lazily behind him. He stopped just close enough to invade my space on purpose.
“Come on,” he murmured, brushing his thumb under my chin. “Before Alastor decides to lecture us both.”
* * *
I found Alastor in the lower courtyard, just as Sebastian had said—horse already saddled, armor strapped light.
He turned when he heard me.
“Little bird.” His voice softened the way it always did when he spoke to me.
“Be careful,” I said.
He hesitated, then stepped forward and pulled me into a brief, firm embrace. “I won’t be gone long.”
“You always say that.”
“And you always survive without me,” he replied, the corner of his mouth lifting. “Which, I’m realizing, might be my greatest failure and my greatest success.”
I huffed a breath that might’ve been a laugh. “Let me know as soon as you find someone. Me. Not Sebastian. That’s the whole point of this Sovereign-Commander bond we have.” I gestured between the two of us. “Instant connection.”
“I will.”
Behind him, Theron waited—hands clasped behind his back, posture straight, eyes watchful. When I looked his way, he stepped forward and bowed.
“My Sovereign,” he said. “I will return.”
I nodded. “Be safe.”
He rose, meeting my gaze. “Always.”
Sebastian appeared at my side then, and Alastor gave him a quick nod.
Alastor mounted his horse, reins snapping once as he turned it toward the gate. Theron followed.
I watched them go until the stone swallowed the sound of hooves.
“Guess it’s time to tell you goodbye now?”
Sebastian’s hand slid into mine, grounding. “Just for a few days.”
I looked at him. His shadows rested close, contained—but his eyes were sharp, cataloging me like he always did before leaving.
“You’re going north,” I said. “Alastor is chasing ghosts. And I’m staying here.”
“Yes.”
“I don’t like it.”
“I know.” His thumb brushed once over my knuckles. “But you’re not unguarded.”
“I don’t mean that.” I swallowed. “I mean I don’t like the feeling that everyone is moving at once. And I can’t control any of it.”
He stepped closer, just enough that his coat brushed my arm. “That’s what change feels like.”
“Don’t make it sound reasonable.”
A faint huff of breath—almost a laugh. “I wouldn’t dare.”
He leaned down and pressed a kiss to my forehead.
“I’ll feel you through the bond,” I said.
“Yes.”
“And if something goes wrong?”
“Then you’ll know,” he said. “And I will already be on my way back.”
I nodded, because that was as much assurance as he ever gave.
His hand squeezed mine once more and gave me a soft kiss before he let go and disappeared.
As I looked around the empty grounds, I knew one thing for certain. I couldn’t be alone with my thoughts.
“Bronwen?” I called once as I stepped into the castle.
I didn’t expect an answer. I expected laughter. Sharp commentary that was loud enough to ricochet off stone.
Instead, I got nothing.
I slowed, listening past the ambient hum of the castle, past distant footfalls, down to the seam where order lived and disruption announced itself.
There was no disruption.
No laughter knifing out of the war room. No sharp commands scattering courtiers. No presence pressing against the walls like she usually did.
Bronwen not being loud was like fire not being hot.
Impossible.
I checked the council chamber first. Empty. The war room next—quiet, maps undisturbed. The upper balconies where she liked to spy and pretend she wasn’t? Vacant.
When I reached her chambers, her door was ajar.
She never locked it. What’s the point? she always said.
I didn’t knock. “Bronwen, I am in deep need of—”
The door swung wider, and the words died in my throat.
Bronwen stood half-turned, one hand braced on the shoulder of a fae man slumped in a chair, the other cupping his jaw. For a heartbeat, it looked like I had disrupted a moment with one of her many lovers as she kissed his neck.
Then my eyes caught up.
The angle of his head.
The shallow, stunned rise of his chest.
The way her mouth was pressed to his throat.
Not kissing.
Feeding.
His eyes were closed, lashes fluttering. His fingers hung slack at the arms of the chair. A neat line of blood marked the column of his throat where her mouth had sealed.
She lifted her head when the door hit the wall. There should have been a quip. Something sharp and wicked to make me roll my eyes and pretend I hadn’t just walked into something I didn’t understand.
There wasn’t.
Blood stained the curve of her lower lip, glinting at the sharp points of her teeth.
But they weren’t her teeth. They were fangs.
She looked at me—
—and three things happened at once.
The man’s breath stuttered.
The room narrowed to a needle point.
And my body chose for me.
I turned to run.