Chapter 23
The next morning, I waited for my sister by the large glass doors overlooking the immaculate castle gardens.
I had released Shade when I returned to my suite after dinner, and he silently stood at my side.
There had been a variety of responses from the people we passed on our way down.
Shock. Awe. Suspicion. But no one said a word, not to the future Queen Consort.
“Lia!”
I turned to find my sister bounding toward us with bright eyes. Pierce stalked several feet behind her, furrowed brow in place. “You’re actually out of bed, I half suspected you wouldn’t show.”
“Of course I would, I missed you. No Harkin today?”
“Spying on me again.” She tsked, that smile not leaving her face. “No, I thought we could spend some time together, just the two of us.” She turned to Shade then. “It’s good to see you out and about, but I was hoping for some time alone with my sister.”
“You know we can’t be parted, Eleanor,” I said, but Shade inclined his head to her.
“I’ll stay far enough back to give you privacy, you won’t even know I’m there,” he said, and Eleanor smiled, then tucked her arm through mine and led me into the beautiful gardens.
They spread far around the castle, overlooking the city in the valley below.
We walked down a wide stone path winding through short citrus trees and shrubs trimmed into circular hedges.
Spotted throughout were a variety of flowers, but they weren’t blooming.
It was a sea of browns and reds, the epitome of fall perfection.
“How are your studies?” I asked, while we meandered down the cobblestone.
“Oh my Gods, it’s amazing. Professor Gerry knows so much, especially about our history.
Did you know Eniferium Priestesses were real?
Can you believe it? I always thought it was a myth, but they died out over two thousand years ago.
Mobitus’s magical warriors were all strong, powerful women, could you imagine? ”
It was wonderful to see her so animated, and apparently, this infatuation with Mobitus’s Priestesses wasn’t a passing fancy.
Though she’d never mentioned it to me in all our time in Toreshire.
Even when I’d told her the bedtime stories we’d all heard as children, striking tales of the magic warrior priestesses who worshipped the Taker of Death above the other Gods.
They believed he was the most powerful among them, and because of this, the priestesses’ magic was often associated with death and darkness.
A warning to children to listen to their parents lest they fall prey to the Taker himself.
“And the other students? Are they nice?”
Her face fell a little at my question, and I tugged her to a stop. If they hurt her, I would have something to say about it. According to everyone in the kingdom, I was about to be Queen Consort, I would use that to protect my sister if I had to.
“They all grew up together. Most of them are engaged to each other and have been since they were born. I’m new and they don’t know me.” She forced a smile and steered us back down the path. “It’s fine, though, Harkin has been keeping me company.”
“I’ll talk to them.”
She waved her hand, brushing me off. “It’s fine, Lia, I told you I can take care of myself.”
I nodded but decided I would talk to Wista, see about these other students and if they were causing issues.
We reached a large glass building, the plants inside still green and blooming. “This is my favorite place in the garden,” Eleanor said, pushing through the door.
A variety of scents assaulted me as we walked inside, rose and freesia, jasmine and primrose, but through it all, the unmistakable scent of purloe. I searched the space, finding the vine climbing a trestle in the corner covered in the large purple flowers.
Shade followed us in, but Pierce held Nathanial back.
“They’re fine in there,” Pierce grunted, nodding my way when I flashed him a grateful smile. The door closed behind us, and Shade stood in front of it, blocking the entrance if our guards changed their minds.
I was drawn to the purloe vine, and Eleanor followed me to it, quiet until we were far enough away from Shade to have some privacy.
“Are you going to tell me what’s going on?” she demanded.
Right. Straight to the point, and with the king’s words on my mind all night, I hadn’t thought of a plausible excuse. “There’s nothing to tell. You heard the king, we’re getting married.”
Eleanor snorted and crossed her arms. “You don’t want to get married. Ever. That’s why you turned down Ergo two years ago.”
I grimaced. Ergo had been insistent, if not a bit pushy.
He liked the challenge I offered since I had grown a bit of a reputation as someone unlikeable who refused to wed.
I had enjoyed his company for a while, an escape from my responsibilities.
When I wouldn’t give in or put out, he moved on.
Last I heard, he had baby number two on the way.
“Maybe I changed my mind.” I shrugged, angling my body away from my sister, instead facing the plants that couldn’t read the lies on my face.
“For King Terym?” Incredulity dripped from every word, and I internally flinched. She knew me better than anyone. “What about Shade?”
I glanced to the doorway. He stood with his arms folded across his chest, but his eyes were zeroed in on me, and heat rose to my cheeks.
Eleanor pointed a finger at me, smirking. “That right there. That’s how I know something else is going on. Why won’t you tell me?”
It was no surprise she had caught on, seen what Shade did to me, the feelings I tried to shove aside every day. I had to smother them. Hide them away because I couldn’t act on them, not if I wanted to keep Eleanor safe. She needed to stop pushing me on this. “There’s nothing to tell.”
“I don’t understand, why are you doing this?” Her brow furrowed and frustration filled her eyes. Her pushing had every thought and feeling I squashed over the past week rising to the surface.
The injustice. The unfairness.
Despite trying to find a way out, I couldn’t stop the bitterness swirling inside me. “Just drop it, Eleanor.”
Why was it me? Why had the Gods chosen me to open the cave and be given these magic wishes. Terym wouldn’t be forcing our marriage otherwise. We wouldn’t even be here.
Even as I thought the words, I regretted them. If I hadn’t been chosen, I would’ve never met Shade or known his touch and the way it made me come alive.
“But why?” she asked, and every single overwhelming feeling spilled over. I couldn’t take it anymore. The questions. The responsibility.
Everything.
I exploded, turning to face her in a storm. “To protect us! To protect you!”
Eleanor met my anger with her own, fire and frustration in her eyes, voice rising, so even the men outside would hear. “I don’t need your protection! I’m not a child anymore, Adelia. When are you going to realize that?”
Shock held me frozen in place. She never yelled at me. Ever.
In all the times we’d argued, even in her most stubborn years, she had never raised her voice to me. The boiling rage burning moments ago soured in my stomach. I shouldn’t have taken my own frustrations out on her. It wasn’t her fault.
“I do—”
“No, you don’t. You keep things from me you think I can’t handle.
Gods, last night you had me spirited away because you think I’m too young, too innocent.
You’re my sister, and I’m grateful for everything you’ve done since Mom and Dad died, but at some point, you need to realize I’m not a little kid anymore.
You deserve to have a life too.” Her eyes glistened with unshed tears, chest heaving in wake of her admission.
I had no words. She wasn’t just upset at me for keeping her in the dark, but because I was so obviously doing something I didn’t want to. All in the name of her protection.
Silence stretched between us. There was nothing I could say to make this right, certainly not the truth.
I couldn’t drop that epiphany after everything she said.
When I didn’t respond to her words, Eleanor shook her head and stormed away, past a concerned Shade, who had taken several steps closer, and slammed the greenhouse door in her wake, the glass rattling.
“I’m sorry,” I whispered too late. Tears spilled over my cheeks, then I collapsed in on myself.
What have I done?
Smoky tendrils curled along the stone floor accompanied by soft footfalls.
Shade wrapped me in his arms, hugging me close and encompassing me in his purloe scent.
I shouldn’t, but I nuzzled into his chest, inhaling deeply to calm my tumultuous thoughts.
The weight of this secret was suffocating, along with my warring thoughts and feelings.
My mother’s words echoed again. Only when she is ready, Adelia, not before.
How was I supposed to know when she was ready? She certainly thought she was, and every move I made pushed her further away, a noose tightening each time I denied her. If I kept going, it would surely kill me.
I didn’t know how she would react when I told her the truth, or who she would tell. She couldn’t possibly understand how precarious our situation was, what lengths others would go to, or the need to keep her protected.
The weight of it all was too much, eating away at my resolve. I needed to release some of it, clear the burden so I could keep stepping forward. If only someone else knew the truth, someone who could be trusted and help carry the burden. My spiraling thoughts paused.
Maybe someone did?
I stared at the swirling marks along Shade’s neck. Shade, who had only shown deference to Eleanor and hadn’t questioned my need to keep her safe, even above my own life.
I pulled back, staring into startlingly gray eyes. “You know.”
His gaze grew serious and understanding, then he nodded once. “I knew the first time I met her, could sense it in her blood. She is the last true heir of the Emyrdeis line.”
My chest was a conflict of emotions, constricting fear and satisfying relief. Relief I was no longer alone, that someone could help shoulder the burden of truth.
Fear.
Fear others would find out, others who would be a threat to her.
“She is,” I whispered, admitting the truth aloud for the first time since I read my mother’s words eight years ago. I rested my forehead against his shoulder, closing my eyes as I tried to sort through the storm battering in my chest.
“But not you.” A statement, not a question. When I opened my eyes again, he was watching me carefully, curiously.
“She is my sister in every way but by blood. My birth mother was the best friend of the woman who raised me; she took me in when both my parents died.”
“Eleanor doesn’t know.” Another statement, one I scoffed at, the bitterness following our parents’ deaths rising to the surface.
“I didn’t either. Not until my mother told me while she choked on her own blood.”
Despite her words that day, I still made the promise to keep Eleanor safe, and I had done so, even though she lied to me my entire life. Because I loved her, even if it was clouded in hate.
The letter she left only gave me some truths.
Not enough to answer all the questions I had about my true parents, about what my life could have been.
Only to keep Eleanor safe and wait until she was ready to give her the truth about her destiny.
A deep sigh escaped me, the weight of my mother’s deception and commands heavy again.
“She deserves a chance to live a little while. Experience what it is to be normal before she is burdened with responsibility.”
Shade’s eyes hardened slightly. “Should that be her choice?”
I jerked out of his touch at the accusatory tone. “My parents were murdered because of the blood that ran in my father’s veins. No one else knows who she is. If Terym or even King Siro were to find out, she would meet the same end. I’ll do anything, give anything, to keep her safe.”
“Wouldn’t you want to know.” He was saying everything I had fought myself over for the past few years. Questioning whether she was ready, whether she could accept the truth now, but every time I looked into those hazel eyes, something held me back.
“I don’t know,” I whispered, moisture building in my eyes. “She’s still so young. So trusting. The truth will turn her world inside out, just like it did me. If I can ease that burden a little while longer, I will.”
He cupped my face, and I leaned into his palm. I shouldn’t let him get close, but I found I couldn’t resist when I was raw and open like this. “She’s lucky to have you.”
I closed my eyes at his words, forcing hot tears to roll down my cheeks.
“What if I fail?” I hadn’t meant to offer the whispered confession.
Voicing my deepest fear only made it all the more real.
Shade touched his forehead to mine, and I breathed in his scent, drawing strength from the heat radiating from his body.
“What I know about failure is you can’t dwell on it. Focus on succeeding and you will. Don’t let your fears overcome your decisions, otherwise, you will make them reality.”
Something about his tone made me think he knew from experience. An undercurrent of deep-seated pain that spoke of loss and failure. “Is that what happened to you?”
“Yes.”
The anguish in the single word answer cracked something in my chest. There was still so much I didn’t know about his past. Every day we spent together showed me he, too, had a massive weight on his shoulders.
I wanted to alleviate that burden as he had done for me.
With Shade holding me so close, I was lighter than I had been since I watched my mother die.
It wouldn’t last, because darkness was on the horizon and my responsibilities beckoned. There wasn’t room for distraction, and that’s exactly what he was.