Chapter 14 – Vale
Chapter 14
VALE
T ension riddled my neck, tightening the muscles and quickening my gait as I sought an audience with my father.
I’d left Neve in my suite, guarded by Sir Arvid. Again, I wished Caelo or Qildor were present and able. Their watch over Neve would have been far preferable, but it wasn’t to be. Sir Arvid was what I had.
Him and an inquisitive new wife.
Upon leaving Saga’s rooms, Neve had questioned me not once, not twice, but three times about my brother. Not about why I’d batted his ungloved hand away, but rather why my mother had intervened.
I swallowed. The debate over whether to tell Neve the truth about Rhistel warred inside me.
On one hand, my brother’s secret held the power to destroy him, destroy our family —and no matter how furious I was with half of my family at the moment, I loved them, even my mercurial twin and increasingly cruel father. Perhaps that was foolish, but to say I didn’t care would be a lie.
At the same time, my desire to keep Neve safe grew by the day. If she knew about Rhistel’s magic, surely, she’d take more care to avoid him.
But no one outside my family knew. Only Father, my grandfather, and, of course, Mother knew. Mother hadn’t even thought it was prudent to tell her brother, Captain Eirwen, and he was around the palace often. The information was too dangerous.
And yet, I wanted to tell Neve.
I trusted her. Possibly because she had trusted me with her secret. Perhaps it wasn’t one that would break apart a kingdom, but if my father learned of her past, he would send her back to the Blood Court. It would destroy her life, just when she’d achieved some semblance of freedom.
Though my past was nothing like hers, I understood her fierce desire to run and build a new life. To be free. Royals were never completely free to do as they wished, either.
But one day, Neve would be. I’d see to it.
I rounded a corner, and the door to Father’s personal library came into view. Before I could stop them, my fists clenched. I loosened them.
Though I wished to rail and storm against the king, I’d try to fix this mess without angering him and save Neve from more pain. A long, heated exhale parted my lips as I approached the door .
“My prince,” said Sir Lars, the Clawsguard standing in front of the dark wood door with a golden bear’s claw inlaid in the center. He bowed and his long black hair fell in a curtain around his face.
I waited until Sir Lars rose and looked me in the eye. “Is he in there?”
“He is.”
Father was never much one for lingering in crowded social events. He did so only because, as the king, it was expected of him. But on my way here, I’d noticed others from the gathering walking the halls, rushing from the chaos of the event. If they had left the solarium, then the king had as well. He’d come to one of his favorite places, his personal library. He enjoyed only the harem wing and his bedchambers more.
“Who else?” I asked.
“Prince Rhistel.”
My throat tightened. No wonder the guard hadn’t already moved aside, let alone opened the door and allowed me entry. He was assessing me. Because while I might be royal, I was not the king nor the heir to Winter’s Realm, the two fae who outranked me in the kingdom.
“If I let you pass, there will be no violence?” Sir Lars asked, black eyebrows knitted together. He was one of my father’s oldest and most trusted guards.
I paused long enough for the knight’s hand to land on the hilt of his sword, pushing his golden cloak aside as he moved.
“Yes,” I replied after weighing my desire to punch my brother against my desire to speak with my father and perhaps gain mercy for Neve, Sayyida, and Marit. Even with Rhistel present, I might convince our father to see sense. “No violence. We’ll talk out our differences.”
“As family should.” Sir Lars’s scarred hand lifted from the sword, drifted to the door, and opened it. “Prince Vale is here to see you, Majesty.”
“Let him in,” Father answered. The gruffness in his tone hinted that he’d had one too many glasses of wine. Would that help or hinder my cause?
Either way, I’d committed, so I stepped past the Clawsguard and into the small space filled with books and warmth from an ever-burning hearth.
Father lounged in a large chair, a tafl board before him. The pieces, made from the bones of a particularly violent frost giant, ranged across the squares. He seemed to be playing himself, and not particularly well either. My gaze flicked upward to find that his lips were purple. Yes, too much wine.
Rhistel, on the other hand, appeared to have sobered. His dark brown eyes glowered at me, and, in my twin’s hand, he held a phoenix feather quill. On a table was a piece of parchment, glistening with ink in the candlelight.
When he noticed I eyed the parchment, Rhistel turned the page over. “What are you doing here, Vale? Thought you’d be with that wife of yours, acting like the beast you are.”
My feet moved before my mind caught up, and I was across the room in a second, shoving Rhistel against a wall, pinning him down by the shoulders. He growled and snarled back.
“ Enough !” Father bellowed. “Vale, step away from him!”
But I couldn’t. Wouldn’t. I suspected that even if I’d wanted to, I could not force myself to release my brother.
Beneath my hold, Rhistel jerked, trying to free himself. Unfortunately for him, Rhistel knew much of manipulation but little of physical strength. He would not be moving until I’d said my piece.
“Release him, or I’ll send for your wife right now.”
Rhistel’s lips curled up. “Please do, Father. I’m dying to see those luscious curves again. Perhaps touch?—”
I took him by the chin and wrenched his head to the side. “You will not speak of her. Or think of her. You will stay away from her, and I’ll do my best to forget what you did in the solarium.”
My twin snarled. “Have the dead gods risen or does she already have your balls in a vise, Vale? Big brute that you are, felled by that whore?”
I lifted my fist.
“Vale! Enough!” Father bellowed behind me. At his tone, the door opened.
“Majesty?” Lars’s eyes landed on me and narrowed.
Bleeding skies. What was I doing? Defending Neve was important, but had I followed through with my plan—spoken with my father and not Rhistel—I could have avoided this. Rhistel might be the heir, but even he had to listen to the king.
“Outside, Sir Lars,” Father growled. The door snicked closed, and the king stood next to us, his ice-blue eyes burning with fury. “Vale, release Rhistel.”
“Not until he promises.” The words rumbled out of me, nonsensical, given my situation. “I will not have my wife harmed by his magic.”
Father’s eyes narrowed and shifted to his heir. “As much as I despise the female, you will adhere to the rules your mother and I have put in place, Rhistel. The consequences are too dire.”
Despise the female? That was laughable. Under other circumstances, Father would have loved having Neve around him. In his bed. In his harem. No matter if he had bargained her hand to another, a jarl most likely, I was certain he would have tried to take advantage of her before she wed. Perhaps after too.
But she’d defied him, and the king wanted revenge.
He hated her as much as he wanted her. Only the fact that she was married to me, and I was not only his son, but physically a match for my father, gave him pause.
Had I possessed the king’s same prowess with magic, he wouldn’t dare look at her.
My twin still hadn’t spoken, and Father’s ice-blue gaze hardened. “I believe that Vale very much means every word he is saying, Rhistel, and it will look quite bad for the family—for you—if the spare beats the heir to a pulp.”
Rhistel’s eyes darkened. He hated being reminded that he, with his birthright and powerful magic, could still be bloodied. All I needed to do was catch him unawares.
“You will not touch her.” I reiterated, my nose a hairsbreadth from his. “Nor speak with her. You will cease calling her names. And you will not use your magic on her. If you do not agree, I won’t just beat you to a pulp . I will tell the entire kingdom what you can do.”
For the first time, fear flashed in my brother’s eyes. The threat of being beaten was bad enough, but for the kingdom, likely all of Isila, to hear of his magic? It would be disastrous. Perhaps even sparking another revolution.
He held magic that would allow no other kingdom to trust us. Or, in the case of some, trust us even less than they already did. By the law of Isila, Father and Mother should have killed Rhistel the moment his proclivity to such forbidden magic arose.
Instead, they’d made me promise to never speak of Rhistel’s magic, not even to Saga. And they forced the heir to wear ice spider silk gloves. The material was so powerful, it prevented Rhistel from using the taboo magic coursing through him, for unlike his winter magic, his outlawed power required touch.
“You’d be cast out.” Rhistel snarled. “Our family would never forgive you. Not even Saga.”
He had a point, though he should have known it wouldn’t sway me. Even the loss of my sister’s love, which would hit me the hardest. I’d never threaten something so dire if I didn’t mean it.
“You have one choice.” I pressed him harder into the wall.
Father sipped his wine but said nothing.
After another fruitless round of struggle beneath my hold, Rhistel let out a furious hiss and loosened.
“Fine. I won’t approach your wife or speak with her. ”
“You will not use your powers on her.”
“I won’t.”
“Nor spread tales.”
He snorted. “Are they tales, though? I find them to be quite the truth.”
One of my hands strayed to his neck, wrapped around it, and pressed hard against his tender throat. Beneath my grip, his pulse flared, pounding wildly. “She’s no whore. I wanted her, and now she is mine. A princess of the realm that bears the name Aaberg. Your name. My name. The royal name .”
“And as much as I hate that Vale gave the commoner our name,” our father piped up, “that demands respect, Rhistel. If you cannot respect your new sister-in-law, then who will? And with that outward disrespect, our family name tarnishes.” His lips curled. If there was one thing Father could not abide, it was his name being run through the muck.
Rhistel narrowed his eyes. “My magic will stay bound.”
“Release him, Vale,” Father commanded. “He gave his word.”
But I didn’t let go. Even with his word, could I trust him? Rhistel was clever and slippery, and his particular magic rendered him far more like Neve than he knew.
“Vale,” Father’s tone dipped. “I’ve entertained this absurdity long enough. Release Rhistel.”
My arms fell to my sides, and, not trusting me, Rhistel took three paces to the side, his hand lifting to rub at his neck as he did so .
Father twisted toward him. “Leave us.”
“Father, we were speaking before this brute”—Rhistel gestured to me—“interrupted.”
Father’s eyes closed, a sign of his thinning patience. “I’ve already told you my thoughts on matters regarding the Festival. If you have more to say, Rhistel, find me tomorrow. For now, go lick your wounds.” He gave my brother a look of disgust.
Though Rhistel was the heir, and a clever, cunning fae, Father hated that my twin didn’t possess physical strength.
“I need to speak with Vale.” Father turned his attention to me.
Rhistel’s cheeks grew red, and he looked like he wanted to argue, but instead, he spun on his heel and left the library, the door slamming behind him.
Once we were alone, Father shook his head. “Your brother will always remember that.”
“It’s not so different from our other fights,” I said. We’d had many over the turns. Many in which Rhistel had obliterated me with his words, and I’d returned in kind with a well-placed punch to the gut.
“Don’t fool yourself.” Father swept to the table upon which bottles of wine from the Summer Isles, Dragon Fire, and specialty liqueurs from the Mage Court sat. “You’ve chosen that commonborn female over your blood. Your twin.”
“We haven’t been close for a long time, Father. And a female tore us apart before.”
“This is different.” The king poured a small glass of Dragon Fire and downed it. “The female has stirred up more trouble than she’s worth, Vale. If you hadn’t given her our name, I would have killed her already.”
I swallowed at the way he said it. So matter-of-factly. As if she were a boar we were hunting and not a fae of our kingdom. A subject that we had sworn to protect. Then again, Father didn’t always take that promise to heart.
Thank the stars for Lord Riis. He’d been the one to see that my name, more so than my strength, would save Neve. The king might have killed many during his rebellion, but no one of his direct bloodline met his axe. He was no kinslayer. And in his eyes, marriage was as binding as blood. More so even. After all, his own blood had failed him when he was a youngling, but the ties of his mother’s marriage to the male who had raised him, those had stayed true.
“You love her?” Father asked as he poured himself a glass of wine.
My mouth fell open.
His eyebrows arched, and he went to a seat in front of the ever-burning hearth. “Foolish as that may be, and as much as I hoped you only lusted and loved what was between her legs, I cannot help but think you do. Irritating myself and the Warden of the West would be an added bonus, I suppose.”
I risked so much for Neve. I cared for her. Of course, she was beautiful and there’d been an attraction between us since the first day we’d met. At least on my part. There was an undeniable pull between us. I thought of my wife—her smile, her laugh and my stomach tightened .
“I have my answer,” Father muttered, apparently coming to a conclusion when I was still reeling from the question. “Come sit.”
He was acting so casual, like I hadn’t defied him, like I hadn’t attacked his heir. Like he hadn’t whipped Sir Qildor for my actions. Or schemed to marry Marit and Sayyida off.
What was he up to?
I sat across from him, the heat of the flame warming my left cheek as I studied my father.
“You expect me to rage?” the king drawled out as though he were bored. “I see that you won’t be parted from the female, so it is time to move on to more important things. She is family, and hence, I will treat her as such.” Another sip of wine. “I’d much rather discuss issues pertaining to the kingdom.”
I didn’t believe him. He might move on for a night, a day, even a few weeks, but not forever. Eventually, Father would want to make Neve pay for what she’d done. At the very least, he would not protect her when vampire assassins came to call. They would be a perfect out for him. A solution to a problem that, despite his cool exterior, I suspected gnawed at him every waking second.
“As you wish, Father.”
“At last, some deference.” He smirked again, playful this time, though no warmth reached his cold eyes. Another hint that he was twisting the truth—moving on, for now—but the grudge would fester inside him.
Most races of fae were long-lived. Faeries included. We didn’t need to rush to even the score .
My father proved that during his rebellion. When he’d plotted his revenge on the blood family who’d ignored him, particularly Calder Falk, Father had long been an adult. He had plotted and schemed with the most influential houses, all displeased with the Cruel King’s reign. He’d even wooed my mother, a younger noble fae, and once a lady-in-waiting for Queen Revna. With her insider knowledge, Mother proved a pivotal figure in bringing down the royal house.
It took many turns to put things in place, and even more to win the rebellion. I’d been young, but I still remembered the day we came to Frostveil. The day the Crown of Winter’s Realm was set atop Father’s head.
So much had changed since then. The White Bear’s Rebellion exterminated two great houses. Many others were killed. Turn after turn, the magic in the kingdom dwindled. And, most recently, Father became colder, harder, more cruel—much like his uncle, the late King Harald.
“We need to stick together, Vale,” Father said. “If there is anything my own issues with my birth father taught me, it is that.”
I blinked. Mother was the mind reader, but it was almost like he’d glimpsed my thoughts, speaking of his birth father like that.
“Had he acknowledged me, had he treated my mother with respect, he would still be a prince of the realm.” Father swirled the wine in his glass. “I do not want our family to fall in the same way my biological father allowed his to crumble. ”
This, I understood. I’d have felt similarly had I experienced the neglect Father endured. Had Father brushed me aside, claimed I was nothing, when my mother brought me to court. Or if I lived in Lordling Lane, right beneath his nose, was the spitting image of him, and he didn’t even look my way. That had happened to my father, not me, but I understood his pain.
Father had been angry with me many times, had taken it out on others and treated me cruelly, but he always reminded me we were family. We were Aabergs and our bloodline, the dynasty we were building in the name of the faerie who’d given Father his own noble name, mattered.
“Rhistel might not forget what you did,” Father added, bringing our conversation back around to my assault on my twin, “but you must try to repair things with him.”
“I’ll do my best.” It was all he’d get out of me. All that I could promise until I was certain Rhistel would keep his word.
“Good. Now, I’d like to speak with you about things I’ve noticed about the Festival.”
I leaned forward. Despite coming here to advocate for Neve, I decided that, for now, she was likely safe. Father seemed prepared to move on. I’d have to be on alert for vampires coming at the behest of their monarchs for vengeance.
Plus, though it felt a bit like a betrayal to Neve, I couldn’t help but be interested in what Father had to say. I knew why the Courting Festival had been called. I’d been the one to bring to light information that had prompted its conception. This matter was even larger than Neve and me. Bigger than any single fae and could benefit all those who called Winter’s Realm home.
“You have an idea of who holds the Ice Scepter?” I asked.
“I’ve seen no sign of magical growth in any of the lords or ladies at court,” Father mused. “However, I have noticed high lords acting strangely.”
“Who?”
“Lord Roar, obviously.” Father scowled. “Both Lord Riis and I have sent emissaries to find him, to bring him back. We have heard no word yet. Then there’s the matter of Lord Riis himself.”
For a moment, I gripped the chair tighter but loosened my grip before he noticed.
Lord Riis? A traitor?
Before I delved into that matter, Father continued. “And Lord Balik has been acting quite odd.”
I tilted my head. I had noticed no odd behavior from the ruling lord of the southlands. “How so?”
“Hiding away in his suite. Socializing only with the Armenils, who, truth be told, after your petty act of rebellion, I have doubts about too.”
I scowled. “Because Marit was present at my wedding? That’s absurd.”
Father glared at me.
“She was only there because she’s friends with Saga and my sister insisted she come. The same with Sayyida. I’m sure you’ve already asked Saga about it.”
And I was more than sure that Saga had told Father the truth, up to a point. He clearly didn’t know that Neve had been a blood slave. Or about Lord Riis’s involvement in our wedding, likely out of loyalty to me, more than the spymaster.
“I have.”
“Speaking of Marit, did you have to pair her with Lord Triam? And why marry off Sayyida at all? Their house already has a wedding coming up, and she is important to the Royal Nava.”
“Do you dare question me?” Father’s gaze hardened over his goblet.
“You only did it because they were at my wedding. And perhaps because you learned that Sayyida and Marit favored Neve.”
The king snorted. “I care nothing for the opinions of young ladies. I saw good matches, and I set them.”
“Jarl Triam is a monster.”
“And I have given Lord Armenil an option to change the course of his daughter’s fate.”
I frowned. “And what of Lady Sayyida?”
“What of her?”
“Vidar is marrying Saga. Isn’t that?—”
“This Festival might be a front so that we can discover who has the Hallow of Winter’s Realm,” Father cut me off, “but I am still king. It is my right to create unions that will benefit our House. A right that you’d do well to remember will benefit you, Vale.”
I wasn’t so sure about that but understood he would not be swayed. Not tonight anyhow, so I dropped the matter. It wasn’t like Sayyida would be pushed to the Drassil tree tomorrow or next week. Probably not even within a moon’s time. Perhaps with a little more time and planning Saga or I might find a way for Sayyida to make a deal like the one Father made with Lord Armenil. Find a way to spare her a fate she didn’t want. We had to make it worth Father’s time.