Chapter One Hundred
Until the Rain
Tonight, one bolt. Not three.
Twilight settled over Castle Amethyst, glowing with the quiet radiance of stormlight. Inside, the hushed movements of the guards, twice as many as before.
Amerei saw none of it.
Evander led her soundlessly through the hall, her eyes never leaving the floor.
At the consort’s turn, Xavien stilled. Waiting before he entered his own chambers.
“First light,” he said softly, careful not to reveal their plans.
Amerei slowly raised her head.
To Jasmine, he said, “Make sure she sleeps. Herbs abound here, not found in the human realms.”
He didn’t wait for her answer.
He was gone.
“Come on.” Evander urged her forward.
The consort’s suite awoke with the light of glowing orbs. Jasmine worked fast to settle Amerei into a chair, stripping pins from her hair with practiced precision. Evander leaned against the mirror, arms folded, eyes narrowed.
“He’s got his hooks in you,” he growled.
“He’s right.” Jasmine forced the comb through a knot, her brow knit.
“You cannot keep doing this, Amerei—walking courtyards alone, slipping past guards, entering a prince’s wing without an escort—”
“Without sense.”
Amerei closed her eyes. “He just sent soldiers to Sevrak.”
“And with your bodice torn, his shirt on the floor.”
“Evander,” Jasmine hissed, but she didn’t stop working.
Amerei’s hands trembled in her lap.
“I am not a child,” she forced, eyes opening. “I secured more archers than Viktor ever called for. Men who will hold Gabriel’s line. Or have you forgotten what’s at stake?”
Jasmine bowed her head, comb slipping in her grip.
“They could die tomorrow,” Amerei said, undone. “Viktor. Gabriel. My father.”
Evander turned a fallen pin between his fingers.
“Then we’d better settle in,” he said too quickly. “Let the prince move his wife’s things first… nice and orderly, every lock thrice checked—”
“Take it back.”
He should’ve stopped. Instead—
“—before you crawl into his bed.”
Silence struck.
Jasmine’s head snapped, warning in her eyes.
“Amerei,” she said gently, hands at her shoulders. “That’s why we beg you to be careful. You know the stories. Xavien’s had more women than Amethyst has windows—and that’s only counting the ones with names.”
Amerei rose, her legs unsteady. Her breath broke in her chest, but her eyes burned clear.
“Both of you—out.”
“We can stay—”
“Out.”
They spoke in glances. Jasmine moved first, slipping Amerei’s wedding band onto the table. Evander set down Viktor’s knife beside it—clean, leather-wrapped, as if it had never been unsheathed.
“Goodnight,” Jasmine murmured.
The latch caught.
The door closed.
Alone.
Amerei stripped the seam’s knot with shaking fingers. The gown gave way, bones of the corset biting her ribs. The fabric tore with a sound too loud in the quiet. Memory struck—the slit in Deglan’s throat, the heat of his blood. She covered her face before the scream could climb out.
“One with Viktor’s knife,” she whispered. “One with Viktor’s sling.”
She fell back into that day—the power he sent through her arm, the sling at her wrist, his hands at her waist.
“You don’t need strength. You have me.”
The words hollowed her.
Her eyes drifted toward the adjoining chamber. Steam curled from beneath the door, the bath already waiting, just as Xavien had promised. She moved as if in a dream, bare feet against cool stone, gown trailing.
The air inside was warm, perfumed faintly with rose. Candlelight danced over the water’s surface, unbroken, waiting for her.
She loosened the last laces, let silk and linen fall in a heap, and sank slowly into the warmth. The water took her like an embrace—too much, too gentle. She lowered until her ears slipped beneath, until the world went muffled and far.
Viktor.
Raven-dark, winter’s oath.
His breath at her nape:
“Every sound. Every scream. Give them all to me.”
His laughter tangled with sea spray.
His whisper:
“My love. My wife. Mine.”
She slid under, let the water burn her eyes instead of tears.
When the candles guttered low, she rose. A black silk robe lay on a chair, linen shift beneath. She dressed by touch, damp hair heavy against her back.
At the balcony she watched Jasmine and Evander beneath the cherry trees, laughter sparking, whispers sharp.
Too alive, too much.
Through the inner door her bed waited—sheets turned, pillows full. She longed for sleep, for Viktor. She longed not to be alone.
Inside, a voice screamed not to go—that this was dangerous—but her body moved faster than thought, carrying her down the corridor as if drawn. Guards straightened, but none stopped her. The wing knew her steps.
At Xavien’s door, she paused.
One breath. Two.
The bolt slid. The door opened.
Xavien stood bare-chested, a child heavy on his shoulder, little fingers tangled in the chain at his throat. Gold strands clung damp to his temple, braids beaded with onyx swaying with his breath.
He was every inch the serpent prince—and yet, in that moment, every bit a loving father.
“Amerei,” he said, her name leaving him like steam off water.
Her breath caught.
A nurse appeared, summoned by silence. Xavien pressed his lips to the child’s crown, passed her gently into waiting arms.
“Calen, lirien.”
(Hush, little one.)
Amerei stilled—to see such power bend so tenderly left her stunned. Before she could say a word, his hand found her wrist.
“Come, Elarien,” he murmured.
He set the door with a single lock this time—no ritual, no held breath.
One lamp burnished silk, onyx, and the curve of his serpent tattoo, making it gleam alive across his chest. He drew her to sit, stirring coals in the brazier.
“She didn’t want to be alone,” he said. “Zara. My youngest.”
A blanket brushed her lap. His presence pressed close, dangerous grace coiling. Water slid from his hair to his shoulder, glinting like morning dew.
“You don’t want to be alone either.”
Amerei held his gaze, the serpent ink shimmering. For a heartbeat she let herself breathe, spine straightening as if to take something back from him—her own steadiness, her own claim—before she spoke.
“Your tattoo,” she asked, barely above a whisper, “was it painful?”
He glanced down.
“Terribly,” he laughed, voice smooth.
He drew a tunic from behind her, pulling it over his head, movements unhurried, practiced.
“Knowing my mother will never see it,” he said, “made it worth every sting.”
The hem caught at his rib—the place of Viktor's deepest scar.
Xavien—the marks of quiet rebellion.
Viktor—the scars of unguarded devotion.
“Do you always look like that,” he asked, “when you think of him?”
She clutched the blanket tighter.
“I miss him, Xavien.”
“I know.”
He leaned back against the wall, gaze smoldering.
“If you weren’t here, you’d be with him. Cot or castle—you wouldn’t care.”
She nodded, eyes soft.
His smile tilted slow, daring.
“Tell me my queen never slept in barracks."
“Never.” She added quickly, “I brought him to my tent.”
“Where was Storne?”
“Far away. In Rhidian.”
His mouth curved.
“Scandalous, Elarien. Sleeping with a soldier.”
“You’ve done worse.”
A reckless spark in her tone.
He leaned forward, as if drawn closer by the challenge.
“Says who?”
“Says everyone.”
His eyes gleamed, predator and prince both.
“Is that… all they say?”
Too long, he didn’t blink.
The robe slipped from her shoulder, her pulse leaping where his gaze lingered. Then she glanced aside, and laughter cut the string.
“So when the war ends, what then?” he asked, settling back with his hands behind his head. “You and your soldier king in a tent forever?”
The words left her steady, her chin lifted.
“Better a tent with love than a palace without.”
“Dask, do I know that.”
His head tipped, as if a ghost slipped past him.
“Do you always look like that,” she asked, “when you’re thinking of her?”
He huffed a laugh, sadness at the corner of his mouth.
“You’re about to find out, Elarien. The crown is a cage.”
He watched the darkness a moment longer, as if longing might mend his broken family—as if the children were not his alone now.
“Xavien…”
Her whisper fractured into fear.
Her hands found her belly, holding what could be there.
“Did you mean it—in the scrying room? That you'd raise his child… as your own?”
His dark eyes held hers.
Every breath between them chased fears she couldn’t name.
“Yes.”
One word, low as vow.
“If his child lives in you, it will never go without a father. Not while I endure.”
Silence softened.
He exhaled, slow, as though loosing a blade he had carried in his ribs.
“Which reminds me—”
He rose to his feet.
“If you are with his child, you’ll have to let me feed you.”
A faint, coaxing smile.
“We must keep my human son strong.”
Tears jeweled her lashes, yet her mouth curved.
“Your raven-haired human son?”
“The Storne line doesn’t bend,” he declared, amused. “And Eillish good looks followed me from the Midnight Isle.”
He set figs and honeyed bread before her. She bit, salt and sweet mingling with relief.
“Eat. Then rest.” He touched her shoulder. “We’ll rise early to watch him hold the line.”
He sat near, serpent spine faint beneath silk. She watched him—dark gold hair, sun-kissed skin, danger wrapped in beauty.
“Do you love me, Xavien?”
The words escaped before she could call them back.
Not betrayal—survival.
His gaze steadied, lingering on her face as if memorizing it, weighing her with eyes that stripped past every defense.
“You are the woman who could stir a king to abdication. And I know you belong to him. I won’t dare claim otherwise.”
His fingers tugged at his cuffs, grasping at composure he could not quite hold.
“But you are a queen, Amerei. With a word, you could end it. You could make me yours.”
His eyes went to the garden, to the dark where ghosts walked.
“That is the cruelty of this fate: knowing it would take only your choice… but to choose me means the death of him, or the death of what you are together.”
His words sank into the quiet like stones in deep water. She could feel them settling, heavy, reshaping the current inside her. A thousand images clawed at her—Viktor’s scars, his vows, his hands braced at her waist. And yet here, safety breathed in the dark, his pulse steady as the sea.
Xavien stilled in the hush he had made, shoulders taut, waiting.
Her voice shattered the silence.
“I don’t want to be alone tonight.”
His breath faltered.
He leaned closer—too close—as if her lips had named him.
For a moment he lingered there, his hand rising as if to cup her face, the air thick with the choice he had not yet made. His mouth hovered a whisper from hers, so near she could feel the heat of it, believe he might cross the line—until at last it shifted, brushing instead against her temple.
“Stay,” he said against her skin.
“Stay until the thunder in your chest is only rain.”