Chapter 59 Neirin #2
“Harlan, you’re just like Kaius was.” Astraea’s eyes rolled, and she huffed as she turned back on Evera and brought the dagger point to the dip between her ribs.
My fox’s flanks trembled, and a low snarl came from the back of his throat.
A warning. Panic flooded my mind, barring me from making any reasonable deductions on a path to take.
My fox, too, hesitated, as if locked in the same state of immobility.
In the Queen’s profile, I detected a flash of bitter resentment as it flickered across her facade. “You’re entirely lost to this magic, this false belief that you love that monster,” she spat at my mate.
“I do love him.” Evera raised her chin. “It is not only magic that has bound my soul to his.”
Growling, Astraea pressed harder with the point of the blade, creasing the fabric of Evera’s dress. The racing of my fox’s heart pounded in his ears. Through the thickness of my fear, Evera’s statement brought me strength, and I fought to control my thoughts.
Could I regain my other form if I tried? Would I be of any more use if I did, naked with no weapon? Helplessness tore at me. At least in this form, my fox could defend Evera. If he could break from his fear of Astraea to do so.
The Queen narrowed her hazel eyes, the same hazel eyes my brother shared with her.
“I thought having his bitch killed would break my husband’s curse,” Astraea stated, the words drawn out with cruelty, “that he would fall in love with me again. But no.” Her jaw firmed.
“Died in childbirth,” she laughed. “It was perfect. The bitch had given me a new source of blood, one that wouldn’t fuck my husband and make threats to expose me for what I am. ”
A wall of black threatened to block me out, to push me down so far within my fox I’d never return.
Astraea—she’d had my mother killed. My mother, whom I’d never had the chance to meet.
Who could have raised me, taught me who I was?
Who could have shown me love? Images of Nyana flashed before my mind, pulling me back.
I was shown love. The betrayal and the hurt caused by what Astraea had done, would never fade.
But I’d had a mother; I could not slight that.
“Just like you had Kaius killed?” Evera’s cool tone brought me the rest of the way back, and I refocused on the scene before my fox’s eyes.
The fox, not having suffered as deeply from the emotional impact of the Queen’s admission, crept forward. A new resolve tingled down his flanks, raising the hair on his haunches. Death hung in the air. If it were to be the Queen or Evera, he would not let his mate fall.
“Mother, stop this.” Harlan’s voice came from near the windows, weak, pleading.
“Mind your place,” the Queen barked. She turned her narrowed eyes back to my fox and twisted the dagger again at Evera’s torso. “Make your choice, Neirin. Shift back, or you can watch her die knowing it’s at your hand.”
The soldiers exchanged uneasy glances. Within the fox’s form, I was left to watch my life unravel before me. Yet I held faith in him to an extent that I could not put into words. He would protect her, would save her in a way I was incapable of in this moment.
“Stop this,” Harlan spoke more boldly this time, having seemingly found his bravery.
He came into my peripheral as he paced forward and reached for the Queen.
She spun on him as if on a reflex, the dagger now pointed to his chest, her breasts heaving as she alternated between gasps for air and deranged laughter.
Astraea would never—could never—kill her son. He was her world. But she was crazed, beyond controlling her actions. My fox’s paws itched as he stilled mid-step, eyes darting between Evera and Calix and my brother, who stood at the pinnacle of the Queen’s delusions.
“Did you kill Father?” Harlan’s voice shook.
Evera took the moment of distraction and stamped on the foot of the soldier who held her.
She reached for her own dagger, but the soldier tugged her roughly back again before she could grab it.
Calix snarled, spitting curses at the man for his rough handling of her.
My fox growled low in his throat but remained still, sizing up the situation.
Astraea, with her arm still extended, dagger threatening the life of her only living son, turned her eyes back to Calix, and then to my fox.
“That boy means something to you?” There was a wickedness in the chilled calm of her voice.
“Calix, do they know what you did?” The corner of her lips twisted up, and she adjusted her hold on the dagger.
“I didn’t kill your father, my son,” she crooned, her attention flitting back to Harlan.
She drew back the weapon and pointed it at Calix. “He did.”
The sinking feeling from before returned to my gut. It all fell together in a clarity I wished I could unsee.
Calix had killed Father. He’d taken a guard’s blade in the gardens today to seek his revenge on Astraea. He could just as easily have taken mine the night of the festival. I’d always been keen on the boy’s ability to pick things off others unsuspecting, but I never would have suspected—
“It’s not true!” Evera cried. “All the Queen says are lies.”
But Calix gave no defense. Lips a fine line, he looked down at his boots.
“Am I lying, Calix?” the Queen purred.
Swallowing, he raised his gaze to meet my fox’s. “I thought coming here, killing the Queen … I thought I could right my wrong.”
Astraea smirked. After all this, Kaius’s murderer had been hiding in plain sight, had been falling asleep in Evera’s arms, had been in my shadow and at my side. Had become my family.
No. If he did this, it was because he had no choice in the matter.
“Calix.” Evera’s voice was gentle, quiet. “Why?” A single word, yet it told me her thoughts had settled in the same place as my own. She’d asked the question I was unable to while in this form.
Calix sucked in a breath. “She told me it was the only way to save my friends.” His voice came out as a whimper, a plea for understanding.
“She told me you were leaving, Neirin, and that the only way to keep you here was to have you imprisoned. If you left the capital, my friends would all go mad. They would kill each other in their rage. They would have to be confined. But in the end …” He cast his gaze down again, and a tear ran down the length of his nose and fell to the floor.
“This is true?” Harlan asked. “You gave the order for that boy to kill Father?” He took a step back, and when his mother turned on him, he moved back again, falling into the protection of the soldiers.
It wasn’t a brave move, but it was the correct one.
Harlan was not a fighter, not yet at least, and Astraea was acting unpredictably.
The Queen curled her lip and threw the dagger to the ground in her frustration. It skittered across the floor, metal clashing against stone. “You’ll be twice the King he ever was,” she reasoned, voice shifting in tone sporadically. “I’ve only ever wanted the world for you.”
“Not like this.” Harlan’s eyes watered, but he sucked in a breath, holding the tears back. His hands flexed into fists at his sides, and his nose scrunched. “Guards, arrest her,” he said, turning his eyes away and shielding his emotions from those in the room.
It was in that moment, as the soldiers moved on Astraea, that I detected the glow of light in her chest. It started small, then exploded into fragmented starlight, shooting out toward the soldiers advancing on her. Three men fell in an instant. A hum filled the air. Harlan covered his ears.
The castle guard, undeterred, grabbed the Queen’s arms, restraining her.
She hung her head, laughing under her breath, and raised her eyes to my fox.
Words were not needed to decipher the expression she bore.
She would make one final effort to destroy me.
As she’d taken the life of my father’s mate to control him, to bring an unfilled void to his life, she would do the same to me.
I would not be quick enough, even in this form, to reach Astraea. To cut off her life before her magic took everything from me.
The words from Evera’s book of lore came back to me. The ability to perceive magic and to manipulate it.
Gods, please let this work.
Searching within myself, I gave all my trust to the fox as the light within Astraea bloomed like the many tendrils of a ruined tapestry. Only my fox could save Evera now. I put my faith in him, in his magic, in his abilities.
Like a snake striking, one of the strands of light shot from Astraea in a sharp line toward Evera’s heart. Time stilled.
My fox’s growl reverberated through the room; Astraea’s light trickled down like icicles melting. The drops of starlight shattered on the floor like glass and dissipated. A breath filled my fox’s lungs, and then time moved forward at its own pace again. Everything happened at once.
Evera gasped. The soldier holding her back released her and joined the castle guard in restraining the Queen, his priority shifted, knowing Astraea was now the largest threat to the King.
Astraea screamed. It was not a sound of anger or even pain. It was the same cry I’d heard from her chambers so many times as a boy when she’d lost another of her unborn babes. It was a sound of complete and desolate devastation. Of loss.
Her light, her magic, remained confined within her chest, a spinning orb held under my fox’s control.
Its blinding white, however, had dulled.
It broke and rumbled like lightning in a stormy sky, the visible form of a life marked by hurt, desperation, and heartache.
For a moment, I held her eyes as Evera’s words came back to me.
A part of me believes that in her mind, she sees herself as helping those children.
In a way, I suspect ‘helped’ in a similar manner when she was young.
With a howling moan, Astraea’s light dissolved, and she fell to her knees. The two men holding her arms stumbled as her body went limp and she hung her head. The only sound was the Queen’s choked sobs.
It was over. She couldn’t control me anymore. She held nothing over me, would hurt no one else. Yet as I took her in, broken of soul and mind, I was humbled by the bitterness of the victory.
The Queen mumbled incoherent words. The light within her flickered once more and died, finally, as she fainted.
In the next moment, Evera’s arms were wrapped around my fox’s neck.
Her scent soothed him, calmed his ridged muscles, and brought me back from my trail of thoughts.
Evera was safe, Calix was safe. With his muzzle resting on Evera’s shoulder, my fox caught Harlan’s eyes.
He nodded once, and his throat bobbed. He did not look at where his mother lay on the floor, as if he could not bring himself to do so.
A part of me hoped that somehow he could save her from herself.
Released from the immediate threats, my fox offered control back to me.
I took it, even as the shift left me naked on the floor of the Queen’s chambers, holding my knees to my chest. Evera held to me, wetting my neck with her tears.
In this form, her scent was less prevalent; I nuzzled into her hair to breathe her in deeper, to draw comfort from her.
Distantly, I was aware of Harlan instructing the remaining two living men to bring Astraea to the dungeon, to restrain her where no one would be near enough for her to harm them with her magic.
Then, as an afterthought, he instructed one of the men to send for a healer.
It was something I suspected he’d already attempted—finding a way to relieve her of her magic.
The guard in me knew that a strong King would have the woman killed for her treason, executed in front of the people.
But Harlan … he was still just a boy wearing a crown atop his head that did not fit, bearing the burdens of responsibility that were much too heavy for someone his age to carry alone.
I pushed the thoughts aside. Harlan would rule in his own way, taking a path of empathy where Kaius had taken a strategic.
Perhaps it was what this kingdom needed.
My eyes fell to the Queen. Perhaps it was what she needed.
I would help Harlan, offer guidance in matters of the kingdom if he wanted it, if he could find it in his heart to trust me again.
He would need to find a balance. I had faith that in time, he would.
At least he knew now that I had played no part in Father’s death.
Calix, I hoped, would receive forgiveness too.
Regardless of what had happened, of what he’d done.
He was a child, and he’d been manipulated, forced into a situation he’d felt he had no other option but to fall in line with.
“Calix,” I said, my voice sounding unused, raspy.
He stood back in the corner, eyes downcast, though he was no longer restrained.
“We all have unforgivable truths,” I told him, understanding the guilt and pain he bore. “I do not judge you for yours. You have a place in this family, should you still want it.”