Chapter 35
Chapter Thirty-Five
We continue on our separate ways. Sesca takes up a place on one of the palace towers, her gaze on the dead dragon, her tail twitching and her thoughts and emotions guarded. I circle around to a more discrete entrance, slipping in after only a brief conversation with the singular guard posted there.
It’s quiet inside, safe from the wind and rain and gossipy whispers. Arlo is breathing steadily, his expression almost peaceful. But my heart won’t stop racing. It feels like I’m back in the Ashlands, dragons circling overhead, doing all I can to just survive until my next assignment.
One step after the other.
I’ve made it through a lot of jobs by repeating this phrase to myself, and I make it up to Arlo’s room in the same manner.
Once there, I continue to focus only on the steps I need to take: summoning servants, making sure the doctor is on the way, and starting to clean Arlo up and make him as comfortable as I can in the meantime.
I’m clinical. Detached. I have to be; I’m afraid that if I open my heart even the slightest bit, everything I’ve learned today is going to crash in and drop me to my knees.
I’ve only just gotten Arlo settled into his bed when his sister bursts through the door, Ruffus at her heels. Kestrel immediately freezes, her gaze darting back and forth between me and her unconscious brother.
With obvious effort, she settles the tension from her body, lifts her chin, and quietly asks, “You know the truth, I take it?”
I focus on placing a cool cloth on Arlo’s forehead. “I saw it for myself.”
The doctor arrives before we can discuss anything further.
I stand back, bracing myself against the wall, letting the servants and the doctor fully take over.
Kestrel paces anxiously between them while they work, until one of the head servants arrives with a tea tray and insists on the princess taking a seat and drinking some kind of herbal concoction to calm her nerves.
Arlo is surprisingly stable, given all he’s been through. There are terrible bruises on his hands and arms, and the rest of him is alarmingly pale, but his breathing remains steady, and the doctor is able to rouse him enough to get a few, one-word responses out of him.
Remedies are given, rest is prescribed, and before long, it’s just the four of us left—the young prince sleeping peacefully; Ruffus curled up at the foot of the bed he barely fits on; Kestrel sitting on the bench by the window, tightly clutching a teacup; and me still braced against the wall, wondering where the hell I’m supposed to go from here.
I’m staring at the door, thinking of leaving, when Kestrel says, “Reave intended to tell you.”
“He should have told me sooner.”
She doesn’t argue, just takes a sip of her tea as she stares out the window.
“I don’t like walking into battles where I know nothing about what I’m fighting,” I say.
More silence from her.
I move to the bedside, sinking down into the chair the doctor previously occupied. “Tonight could have ended much worse; he was foolish not to be honest with me before now.”
“Maybe he was.”
I sigh, reaching for one of Arlo’s hands, tracing the worst of the bruises on it. They have a strange, sickly green undertone that I only notice now that I’m looking at them up close.
“I think he wanted to believe he could bring himself to just…force you to do as he commanded,” Kestrel continues after a moment.
“So you didn’t need to know the details.
It wasn’t your business to know. Only to obey.
The gods know he’s given his share of cold, emotionless orders.
But somewhere along the way, he decided he couldn’t just command you as though you were another soldier in his army, and I don’t think he’s figured out how to deal with that yet. ”
“He could have just asked for my help, like a normal, functional human being. It didn’t have to be a cold command.”
She angles her face toward me. “Would you have helped him? Truly?”
My hand stills against Arlo’s.
“Are you going to help now?”
The question feels deceptively simple—either I stay or I go. What else is there? Yet I can’t seem to voice a reply.
I honestly don’t know what I’m going to do, or what I’m even capable of doing.
Kestrel goes back to staring out the window, as if she didn’t expect an answer.
“My brother is not a man who asks for help. Ever. From anyone. I don’t think he even knows how.
” Her hands shake a bit as she lifts the teacup from its saucer only to set it back down.
“Our mother was very sick, long before she died giving birth to Arlo. Our father was mentally gone, even before that—his mind eroded early on, a madness that claimed him before the transformation into a beast fully took him away from us. And the curse claimed his father before him in a similar way; he murdered our grandmother the first time he transformed, you know.”
I sit quietly with these revelations, wondering just how tragic and bloody their family history really is—and how much of that tragedy has been covered up for the sake of making them look impenetrable from the outside.
“But the worst of the curse spared you and Reave for whatever reason?” I ask.
“Yes. The ones who know the truth about our curse were overjoyed to have an heir that seemed to be…intact. So, since he was old enough to carry a sword, Reave has been the one expected to protect us from all the enemies that have circled closer and closer to our kingdom. But there was no one to show him how to do that—no king who wasn’t cursed, no other ruler he could actually trust.”
I look down at Arlo, smoothing a bit of sweat-soaked hair from his face.
I’ve often thought that he looks like a miniature version of his older brother.
And yet, now that I think about it, I can’t seem to picture Reave as a child at all.
I can’t imagine him free and uninhibited, smiling in a way that truly lights up his eyes.
“I’m not telling you all of this to excuse him, or me, or any of the choices we’ve made,” Kestrel says. “I just think you should have all of the information before you decide what to do next.”
I don’t know how to reply. The silence becomes a fifth presence in the room, a figure tense with all the things we still need to say, but one I think we’re both too tired to properly acknowledge or understand.
“By the way,” she eventually says, “you look, and smell, absolutely disgusting.”
I almost laugh, oddly relieved by her comment; at least her bitchiness feels familiar, even as everything else I thought I knew about the royal family seems to have been upended.
“I have this situation under control, if you’d like to go deal with…” She gestures to the entirety of my muddy, disheveled appearance. “…All of that.”
“Thanks,” I mutter, rising to leave—not because I care about dealing with my appearance, but because the space feels like it’s closing in around me.
Once outside, I pause, leaning against the wall and closing my eyes for a moment.
I should go to my bedroom and lock the door.
I should take time to calm myself down, maybe discuss everything that’s happened with Briar, or with Sesca, or with both of them. I should sleep and collect myself, and I should make some sort of logical fucking plan about how to proceed from here.
I don’t do any of this.
Instead, I slip into one of the powder rooms and splash cold water on my face, rinsing away the dried streaks of sweat and flecks of mud...
And then I give in to the insistent, foolish pull of my heart, letting it drag me toward the king one more time.
The door to his office is cracked open slightly, just enough that I can tell a hushed conversation is taking place inside.
The guards at the door exchange a glance as I approach.
They’re as unsure as I am, I think, about where I truly stand and what authority I hold—particularly when it comes to the king they’re sworn to protect.
“I have a message for His Majesty.” I make my voice loud and clear enough that it carries into the office, bringing the conversation inside to a halt.
Reave appears in the doorway a few moments later.
He’s put on a clean coat, one free of tears and bloodstains, and otherwise looks remarkably well put-together compared to the last time I saw him.
I don’t want to think about how many times he’s had to practice nights like this.
How often he’s had to go straight from cradling his little brother’s broken body to dealing with other demands.
He temporarily excuses himself from everyone around us, pulling me to a relatively private alcove a short distance down the hall. There’s a hint of panic in his eyes—though I know he’s trying not to show it—as he quietly asks, “What is it? What’s wrong?”
“Nothing,” I tell him, quickly. “But I assumed you wouldn’t be able to get away from your royal duties for some time, so I…I wanted to come tell you that he’s okay. He’s resting. The doctor assured me he’s stable, and Kestrel is with him now.”
He stares at me just as he did outside earlier—like he still hasn’t figured out why I would want to help him, to reassure him, to offer him any comforting words.
“Anyway, I’m sorry I interrupted. I just…I’ll be going now.” I turn to leave.
He catches my hand and draws me back to him.
He still can’t seem to find words, but he cups the side of my face and leans closer to me, his eyes shining with obvious gratitude.
We stay like that for a moment, his thumb thoughtfully tracing my cheek, before he seems to remember his other obligations.
“Come with me.” He squeezes my hand and nods back toward the office. “No more secrets between us; whatever my allies tell me, I want you to hear it for yourself.”
It’s not an apology. And it doesn’t make up for the things he’s kept me in the dark about, but it feels like a peace offering, at least—an attempt to prove that he sees me as more than a clueless pawn in whatever plans he’s making.