Chapter 25
Rowan
The cottage feels too small for so many people. Too quiet after what happened in that meadow.
Bryn is alive, barely.
Her pulse flutters softly under her wrist.
Mara keeps checking constantly, never leaving her side.
We all sit in anticipation, having laid Bryn down under blankets to cover her.
Waiting for her to move, flicker her eyes open, anything.
We walked in agonising silence back from the meadow, my eyes flicking between Elodie, Kael, and the ghost currently at my side.
Masen. Neither of them has explained anything.
Bryn’s health came above answers in the heat of the moment.
The hearth glows with warmth as no one speaks.
Kael stands by the window, his eyes searching the view beyond. I don’t know how to feel.
Happy that my brothers are back?
Angry that he left me?
Furious that Masen has been lying to me?
The room isn’t peaceful.
Its silence is heavy with questions that are coiling tighter.
It feels like there is a hand wrapping around my throat, the air in the room thinning.
I stand abruptly, marching out of the door and into the kitchen.
I can’t take it anymore. The waiting, the wondering.
Pacing the floor of the kitchen, I feel a shadow appear in the doorway.
I know who it is without looking.
“You left.” My voice is bitter, my anger clear in my tone. “Rowan—”
“You left, Kael.” Turning to face him now, he looks the ghost of the man I’ve marched a dozen battles with. His eyes are exhausted, full of everything I feel in myself.
“I didn’t have a choice,” he rasps, leaning his weight into the timber of the doorframe, “If I had told you, you’d never have let me go.”
“Of course I wouldn’t have. We don’t do that, Kael. We don’t abandon each other. That is not who we are.” My anger morphs into everything I’ve been trying to ignore.
Guilt.
Betrayal.
Failures.
“Rowan, I can explain, okay? The king would have your head for knowing what I thought to be true. I couldn’t have that.”
“So you decided to just leave me? No explanation. Distracting me with the one person you know I can’t ignore. You used her too, Kael.”
“I had to find the truth, Rowan.”
Before I can argue, Masen appears in the doorway, the air turning to ice. Facing Masen is a lot harder than facing Kael, to see the brother I have grieved for years. Blamed myself for his death. For years I have carried the weight of his loss, and here he is. Alive.
“You look like you’ve seen a ghost, Ro,” his voice is deep, full of missed apologies and years of regret.
“Is it really you?” I ask, flicking my eyes back to Kael, who gives me a knowing look, nodding his head between us.
“It’s me,” Masen whispers.
“You were dead. I saw the butterfly myself. You sent us your death note.”
“I know.”
“You let me believe you were dead. I mourned you. And this whole time?”
“There was no choice, Ro. Believe me, it’s the last thing I wanted, but I had to leave you all behind.” I shake my head in anger, not understanding all the lies and secrecy. Feeling like an outsider among the men with whom I shared my childhood.
Snapping my head towards Kael,
“Did you know? Have you known all along?” I ask.
“No, I only found out after I left through the gate looking for him.”
“How did you know he’d be there?”
“I didn’t.”
“You’re telling me you left on a suspicion? On a maybe?” I seethe, my voice sharp. Kael shakes his head, anger simmering beneath his surface, his voice is agitated.
“It wasn’t a suspicion.”
“What was it then?”
“It was recognition.”
“What?”
Kael exhales, dragging a hand down his face as Masen moves to sit at the table. I cast a weary glance towards him, but he remains quiet.
“Elodie, you heard her in the meadow, didn’t you? She called him Sam,” he says, gesturing at Masen.
She did call him Sam.
My stomach tightens in realisation as I look back at Masen, who nods his head slowly.
“You’re Sam?” I think back to the aftermath in the meadow. I must have been in shock, not even registering the words Elodie had said, my focus pinned on the living shadow of my lost friend.
“I thought it was a coincidence at first.” Kael says.
“The way she used to open a chess game with the same three moves. The same moves Masen used to use. The way she talked about science and nature. It was the exact same way Masen did,” Kael continues as my mind overloads with information.
“Then one evening, she told me about this ‘Sam’ that she worked with, and the way she described him. It was Masen. I just knew it.” He sits down at the table now, next to Masen.
“I couldn’t stop thinking about it, but like you said, I couldn’t be sure.
It was too risky. But then, the evening Elodie had dinner with me.
She pulled a pocketknife from her overalls.
It was Masen’s knife. It had the exact same white antler handle with his initials carved into it.
That’s when I knew there was no way it was a coincidence. ”
“Why didn’t you tell me? I could have gone instead of you?”
“That’s exactly the reason. You’d have gone instead of me. And if I was wrong, it would have been on my hands, and it was my burden alone to carry,” he admits softly.
My words leave me, my mind completely empty.
Sam is Masen.
Masen is Sam.
He’s alive.
Kael’s back.
“How are you, alive?” I ask Masen.
“I was never dead. I can only apologise for letting you believe I was. But, like I said, it was the only way.” My jaw tightens, holding back years of grief for an explanation that still could never erase the pain.
“Tell him what you told me,” Kael says, leaning forward in his chair. Masen nods, taking a deep breath.
“I didn’t leave to study the blight.”
“Why did you leave?”
“I found something in the archives when I was trying to find a solution to the blight. Instead, I found records, royal ones. Old enough that I could tell they weren’t meant to be found,” I cross my arms.
“What?”
“Centuries ago, the kingdom was gripped by turmoil. Not a war, an uprising against the king. The king, who was a true-blood heir.” The words hang between us.
“That’s impossible, you know our kingdom isn’t run on a bloodline. It never has been,” I say.
“That’s what we have been told. It’s been that way so long, no one has thought to question it.”
“What about the curse? The king’s mark?”
“The true king discovered plans for his death, he sent his family through the gate, an unknown realm. On his deathbed, he bound the throne to his bloodline. He set a rune in motion.”
“What are you saying?”
“The king’s mark, the curse, all of it. It’s because we don’t have a true heir. That’s why the only way to ease the effects of the curse is Widowsbloom.” My stomach tightens, understanding dawning.
“He tied false kings to the land, marked with an affliction that causes a man to suffer a pain like no other.”
That mark, the curse, it’s something every person has lived in fear of. Every time we lose a king, there is a sickening dread of who will be chosen next.
Who will look down at their wrist and see that godforsaken mark?
Turning you into the ruler of a land that watches you slowly die.
“What does this have to do with you leaving?”
“After I found out, I went to Aldric. I explained it all to him. I said if I could find anyone from that bloodline, maybe they could reclaim the throne and it would bring an end to the curse.”
“What did he say?”
“He didn’t like it, he said it was too risky.
He didn’t like the idea of being dethroned and worried it would end with him being killed whilst losing his honour.
He declared treason against me and sent his guards after me.
I ran with whatever contents I had left in my pockets.
That’s when you found me,” he says. The words hang there, and suddenly I’m not in Mara’s kitchen anymore.
I’m standing at the gate, except now I know what I didn’t know back then.
The memory is so haunting that it’s something I have relived countless times in my guilt.
The gate hums behind me, the way it always does.
I’m on the last half of my shift now before we close the gate for the evening.
These last few weeks have been the most uncertain I think I’ve ever seen.
With the Blight spreading rapidly, I’ve already warned Aldric about keeping the gates open, the mourningwings have been acting differently.
Strange behaviour. I don’t know why, but something in my gut tells me it’s bad news. Footsteps echo behind me,
“Masen, if that’s you, you lazy bastard. I’ve been on shift without you for hours.” He comes to my side, his eyes wild and searching,
“What’s wrong?” He hesitates briefly before giving me a soft smile.
“I think I found the answer, Rowan, to the blight. I found somewhere that got rid of it. Aldric wants me to get answers immediately.” He’s been looking into research for weeks.
He’s as knowledgeable as the scholars in this stuff.
I wonder why he even became a knight, though I suppose that’s why he’s Master-at-arms. He deals with the mechanism side of this gate, the why’s and the how’s.
“I can go? Shifts nearly over anyway?” I say without hesitation. He shakes his head immediately. “No”
“Why not? I can come with you?”
“No, Rowan, I need you to guard it, okay? I’ll be fine.” I narrow my eyes at him, something feeling off, but I brush it off, moving over to the mechanism.
“You got the veinstone you need?” Masen reaches into his pocket, pulling out the smooth marble sphere.
Runes etched across the surface. I’ve seen this a thousand times, but the way Masen pauses before placing it into the statue makes me wonder if there’s something I’m missing.
I can’t tell what butterfly is within the veinstone. You never can until it’s open.
“Okay, I think you’re ready,” I say, giving him a smile.
“What the hell are you two doing? Gate hours are closed. And whatever it is, why are you doing it without me?” Kael’s voice booms as he grins between us.
“Masen thinks he’s found the answer to the Blight. Aldric wants him on it as soon as possible,” I say as Masen remains quiet at my side.
“Masen, the genius you are. I’m glad one of us is smart.” Kael steps forward, clapping Masen on the shoulder.
“I’m a rank above you now, Kael, remember that,” I reply with a wink, knowing it pisses him off. “Whatever,” he says, rolling his eyes.
“Are you ready?” I turn to Masen, whose expression is still unchanged. He gives us both a smile before nodding and heading towards the gate.
“I’ll be back soon, I promise. Don’t wait for me.”
And then he’s gone, stepping through the gate towards an ivy-wrapped stone wall.
“You heard him, let’s go to the Cup. It’s your turn to get the round,” Kael says, flicking his dagger in the air before catching it.
“I was hoping you wouldn’t remember. I had to drag you home last week,” he laughs at me as I switch the mechanism to standby, but before I reach for it, the gate hums once.
Then, a flicker of blue.
Something pushes through the gate, a minor fracture in the stone.
A Mourningwing.
One wing bent as it beats weakly against the air.
Masen.
I don’t move, the world around me completely muffled. Kael’s shout is right beside me, yet it seems so far away. Kael drops to the ground by the butterfly, the meaning of it all too clear. Masen’s gone. It was a dead realm. And now, so is my brother.
And I let him go.