53. Lazarus #2
“Ines ensured it was sorted.” He doesn’t seem to notice my tone.
Or if he does, he doesn’t care. “She buried it so deep no one would ever find it. After the mess you made of Gunther’s death, she smoothed everything over.
Made sure Gunther’s brother kept his mouth shut.
Made sure all of it was swept under the carpet where it belonged.
She was efficient, she was loyal. She understood what needed to be done. ”
“You had her sent to Oblivion.” My voice is flat. Dead. A blade without an edge. “Whatever her lineage is, whatever blood runs through her veins, you had Paitlyn locked away in that place like a criminal.”
“She is a criminal.” The words come fast and hard. Defensive. “She is a sinner. Her blood marks her as that. The sin of her ancestors is written in her very DNA. It’s not my judgment. It’s simply the truth.”
“And yet after that, you had her and her husband moved to the United States. Practically welcomed them here. Gave them a house. A life. A future.”
He shrugs again. God, how that gesture is becoming unbearable.
“Easier to deal with them both that way. Antonio was still poking around, asking questions he shouldn’t have been asking, and Magnus was becoming a bigger fish.
A bigger threat. I needed to contain all of it.
All of them. And besides…” He takes another drink.
A long one. When he speaks again, his voice is almost casual.
“…There’s nothing to stop them from having an accident in the not-so-distant future.
A car crash. A house fire. Something tragic and irreversible that erases them both, along with that little brat she’s popped out. ”
I do not move, I do not breathe. I do not let a single muscle in my face betray what I am feeling in this moment but inside, something cold and final settles into place. Something that feels like the last piece of a puzzle I have been trying to solve for years.
He is talking about the murder of an infant.
A child. A baby who has done nothing except be born into the wrong family.
And he is talking about it the way another man might discuss the weather, the stock market, or what to have for dinner.
With indifference, with detachment. With the absolute certainty of someone who has long since stopped seeing other human beings as real.
I reach for the bottle and top up both our glasses. My hands are steady. My hands are always steady.
“Tell me more,” I say, and I make my voice gentle. Curious. The voice of a brother who finally understands. “Tell me all of it. I want to know everything.”
And he does.
He talks for another hour, maybe more. I lose track of time in the way that only happens when you are listening to something that will haunt you for the rest of your life.
He talks about the old bloodlines, the secret histories, and the things that were done in the name of preserving our family’s legacy.
He talks about the people who had to disappear, the families who had to be silenced.
The children who had to pay for the sins of their parents.
“He looks so much like her that sometimes looking at him hurts,” he says, staring into the fire.
I narrow my eyes, knowing exactly who he is referring to now.
That his mind is on Ezra now. I take a slow sip of whiskey and let it burn its way down my throat.
He hasn’t even asked after him, hasn’t even said a word about him.
Does he realise Ezra is even here, in the same country or has his madness kept that knowledge from sinking in?
“Although.” He tilts his head, and something shifts in his expression. Something dark and uncertain. “Sometimes I wonder. Sometimes I look at him, and I wonder if he’s really mine.”
“What do you mean?”
“You know what I mean.” His eyes find mine, and they are too bright.
Too knowing. “She was fucking us both. You and me. At the same time. For months. She could have gotten pregnant by either of us. She could have been carrying your child and passed it off as mine. She was capable of that, she was capable of anything.”
I grit my teeth, trying to keep the disgust from showing on my face, but I note the tone, the change, the way he actually holds a hint of disdain for her instead of that usual insipid awe.
“Ezra has to die,” Konstantine mutters, almost to himself.
The words hit me and I freeze, my glass halfway to my lips. “What did you say?”
“Ezra. He knows. He saw it. I know he did. And sooner or later, he’s going to blab. He’s going to tell someone. He’s going to bring everything crashing down. He has to die. It’s the only way.”
“What truth does he know, Konstantine?”
He stares at me, but he’s not seeing me. He’s seeing something else, something that isn’t in this room. His eyes are glassy and distant, and his mouth is moving but no words are coming out.
“What truth?” I press, leaning forward. “What truth does Ezra know?”
He blinks. Once. Twice. His head lolls to the side, and the glass slips from his fingers and thuds onto the carpet. The whiskey pools on the floor like blood from a wound.
“Too much,” he mumbles. “He’s seen too much. They’ve all seen too much. Can’t let them remember. Can’t let them tell. Have to make it stop. Have to make it all stop.”
“Konstantine.” I say his name sharply, but it’s too late. His eyes have closed. His breathing has evened out into the slow, heavy rhythm of unconsciousness. Whatever truth he was about to reveal has slipped back into the darkness where it lives.
I sit there for a long time, watching him sleep.
Watching his chest rise and fall. Watching his face twitch with dreams I will never see.
He looks younger like this. Softer. He looks like the brother I used to know, before the crown, before the blood, before the slow descent into whatever fucked up thing he has become.
I know the men are already in place. The plan is already in motion.
There is nothing I can do to stop it now, even if I wanted to.
And the terrible thing is, I don’t want to.
That’s the part that will keep me awake at night.
Not the guilt. Not the remorse but the sick, quiet relief that comes with knowing it will finally all be over.
Konstantine mutters something in his sleep. A name, maybe, or a prayer. It’s hard to tell the difference anymore.
I stand up. I walk to the window and look out at the grounds below, silver and black in the moonlight. Somewhere out there, Antonio is waiting.
I turn back to my brother. He hasn’t moved. He looks so small in that chair. So broken and pathetic.
“Goodbye, Konstantine,” I say quietly.
He doesn’t answer. He won’t answer.
By this time tomorrow, he will never answer anyone ever again.
I walk out of the room, closing the door softly behind me, leaving my brother alone with his dreams and his ghosts and the few remaining hours of his pathetic excuse for an existence.