Chapter 35
Mary’s heels tapped softly against the corridor stone, while her quiet humming moved beneath the flicker of the wall sconces. Her arm remained looped through Veya’s as though they were taking a pleasant garden stroll rather than crossing a house steeped in mourning and preparing for war.
Leena’s door stood ahead of them, tall and fashioned from black wood, with silver etchings inlaid across its surface like frozen breath.
Mary reached for the handle.
“Are you sure?” Veya asked.
Mary turned toward her with the tired, immovable kindness of a woman who had survived centuries of grief without allowing it to make her cruel.
“Leena would not have wanted you wandering the halls in torn clothing like a forgotten servant. She would have made you tea, found you something comfortable to wear, and placed you beside the fire until you stopped trembling.”
Veya looked at the closed door.
“I’m not his.”
“No,” Mary said smoothly. “You are not. You are living with the consequences of something Rhen chose, and that does not make you his.”
The door opened with a long, quiet sigh.
Leena’s scent remained faintly present inside the room, carrying lavender, firewood, old parchment, and the cream she had used upon her skin.
Nothing appeared to have been disturbed since her death.
Her boots rested beside the hearth, her journals formed a neat stack upon the table, and an unwashed cup remained where she had last left it.
The room contained evidence of a life interrupted rather than a life carefully packed away.
Veya stepped inside slowly.
“Sweet girl,” Mary murmured.
She trailed her fingers over the dressing table.
“Leena kept everything in order, especially when the rest of the house was in chaos. She ruled this place without needing to remind anyone she was queen.”
A fond smile moved briefly across her face.
“The brothers would have burned the roof down without her. Malakai brought her wildflowers whenever he returned from the grounds. Cole sharpened every kitchen knife because she once complained that none of them could cut a tomato.”
Mary’s expression softened further.
“Rhen never allowed anyone else to walk on her left side when she was outside after dark. He claimed he did not trust the shadows there.”
Veya turned toward the narrow panel of stained glass and the muted light passing through it.
“Did she love him?”
Mary considered the question carefully.
“She loved him fiercely, as she loved all of those males. Rhen was family to her, one of the broken creatures she had decided belonged beneath her protection whether he wanted it or not.”
“And he loved her.”
“With every ruined piece of himself.”
Mary’s gaze remained on Leena’s belongings.
“But Sule held her heart, darling. Entirely. Rhen knew that, accepted it, and would have torn out his own throat before betraying either of them.”
Veya absorbed the distinction in silence.
“Love did not repair Rhen,” Mary continued. “Leena never expected it to. She simply gave him one place where he did not have to pretend his emptiness was absolute.”
Mary crossed to the wardrobe and opened it.
Velvet, silk, and softer cotton garments hung in careful rows. She moved through them before selecting an ivory dress lined with midnight-colored thread and cut low across the back.
“Try this.”
Veya accepted the fabric with a strange ache.
“It is beautiful.”
“Leena wore it during her pregnancy, on the first day Norse kicked strongly enough for Sule to feel him.”
Veya’s fingers tightened carefully around the dress.
“Thank you.”
The door struck the wall with enough force to fracture the quiet.
Rhen stood upon the threshold.
His shoulders filled the doorway, and his silver eyes moved immediately to the dress in Veya’s hands.
“Put that down.”
The words emerged quietly, carrying more threat than a shout.
Mary stepped between them.
“She needed clothes.”
“Not hers.”
“Leena owned more dresses than she could ever have worn again.”
Rhen’s gaze moved to Mary.
“You brought her into this room.”
“Where else should I have taken her? She cannot continue walking around half-dressed because you refuse to acknowledge the consequences of your own actions.”
“Get her out.”
Mary did not move.
“This was Leena’s home, not a tomb.”
The air changed.
Rhen’s attention sharpened until the room seemed to narrow around him.
“Do not tell me what Leena would have wanted.”
“I knew her too.”
“You knew what she allowed you to see.”
Mary lifted her chin.
“And I know she would never have left that young woman shivering in borrowed scraps.”
Rhen’s gaze passed around Mary and settled upon Veya.
She stepped back instinctively.
Mary noticed.
“You are frightening her.”
“Good.”
The answer held no hesitation.
Veya forced herself to remain upright.
“She does not belong in this room,” Rhen said.
“You made her part of this house whether you intended to or not.”
“I made her useful.” His eyes remained on Veya. “Nothing more.”
Mary’s expression hardened.
“She is not livestock.”
“That remains to be seen.”
Veya’s hands trembled around Leena’s dress.
Rhen noticed the movement and regarded it only as further proof of weakness.
“You touch nothing else.”
Mary moved another half step between them.
“That is enough.”
Rhen’s jaw locked.
For one moment, his gaze shifted beyond them toward Leena’s journals, her boots, and the cup that would never be lifted again. The fury inside him belonged wholly to the room and the woman whose absence had transformed it into sacred ground.
When his attention returned to Veya, nothing remained except contempt.
“Get her out.”
He turned and slammed the door behind him with enough force to split the wood down the center.
Silence followed.
Mary released a measured breath, apparently unsurprised by the destruction.
Veya stared at the damaged door.
“I should not have come in here.”
Mary turned toward her.
“You did nothing wrong. Rhen knows only how to turn grief into violence and threat. Do not mistake his behavior for evidence that you caused any of it.”
“He looked at me as though he hated me.”
“He does not know you well enough for hatred. You interrupted the shrine he had built around Leena’s memory, and he needed something living to blame for the interruption.”
Mary gently lifted Veya’s chin.
“Come. You will feel steadier after a bath.”
She folded Leena’s dress over one arm and guided Veya toward the bathing room at the rear of the suite.
Veya allowed herself to be led toward the warmth.
It was not safety, but for a few minutes, it came close.