Chapter 17 Amelia #2
A second later he is there, stepping into the hall with the quiet authority he carries even when he tries not to. He does not sit beside me. He positions himself slightly behind and to the left, close enough to be undeniable, distant enough to keep the negotiation from becoming about him.
Marcellan’s eyes flick up. “Prince Valesh.”
Zeidan inclines his head. “Envoy.”
The greeting is smooth, but the air tightens anyway. The Concord delegates are not Purna; they do not carry our history in their bones, but they know enough to understand what it means for a Vrakken prince to stand behind a Purna heir.
Marcellan folds his hands again. “This negotiation was requested by Nytheria.”
“It still is,” Zeidan says calmly. “And it still concerns your routes.”
My mother’s gaze sharpens. She doesn’t like him speaking, but she doesn’t interrupt. Perhaps she understands what I do in that moment: I am not regaining control fast enough on my own.
Zeidan continues in the same measured tone. “If dusk-bloom resin is moving through Concord caravans, it is not only Nytheria at risk. Poison that destabilizes conduits does not discriminate by border.”
Marcellan’s mouth tightens. “The Concord does not tolerate threats.”
“I am not threatening,” Zeidan replies. “I am informing.”
It’s a perfect distinction, and I hate how effortlessly he makes it.
Marcellan sits back slightly. “Even if we were inclined to cooperate, our involvement invites retaliation. Velcryn is not known for patience.”
Zeidan’s gaze is steady. “Velcryn will not retaliate against cooperation that prevents wider collapse.”
Marcellan’s eyes narrow. “That is not a guarantee. That is an opinion.”
Zeidan doesn’t flinch. “Then take it as this: Velcryn benefits from stability. Nytheria benefits from stability. The Concord benefits from stability. If you refuse to assist because you fear political consequence, you will face a far worse consequence when the ley network fractures and your routes become unusable.”
It’s so reasonable. So clean. So compelling. And still, the negotiation slips. Because Marcellan’s gaze drops to me again, and there it is, an imperceptible hesitation, the subtle recalibration of someone deciding whether I am reliable enough to risk alliance.
His voice becomes polite. “Heir Crow, your circumstances are… complicated.”
“That is not my choice,” I reply.
“It becomes your responsibility,” he says.
I hold his gaze, but my magic hums restlessly beneath my skin, still off-balance from that flicker of foreign memory. I feel Zeidan’s frustration rise, controlled but present, and the fact that I can feel it at all makes my focus fracture further.
Marcellan stands. “The Concord will not open its ledgers to an internal dispute.”
My stomach drops. “This is not—”
“It is,” he replies, gently and decisively. “When your foundation stabilizes, we may revisit this.”
He bows once, signaling finality, and the delegation follows him out like a tide retreating.
The hall empties too quickly afterward, as if no one wants to be caught standing too close to failure.
My mother’s mouth is a thin line. She does not reprimand me in front of Zeidan, but I can feel her disappointment like a weight.
When we return to our quarters, the silence between Zeidan and me feels thicker than any argument. We walk through Nytheria’s corridors side by side, close enough for the bond to hum quietly, not close enough to ease the tension that sits between our ribs.
The door shuts behind us. I turn first.
“I ruined it,” I say.
Zeidan’s gaze holds mine. “You faltered.”
The bluntness stings.
“I felt something,” I say again, more carefully. “When I mentioned the resin. Something that wasn’t mine. It pulled me off balance.”
His jaw tightens. “Yes.”
I stare at him. “So you know what happened.”
“I felt it,” he admits. “And I recognize the route.”
“You recognize it,” I repeat, anger sharpening. “Meaning you knew there was history there, and you let me walk into it without warning.”
His expression is controlled, but I feel the faint edge of guilt under it.
“I should have told you,” he says.
“You should have trusted me with it,” I snap. “That’s the difference.”
Silence stretches. He doesn’t deny it.
That night, the fire burns low. The chambers are quiet, but quiet means nothing when the bond keeps turning the air between us into something crowded and intimate.
I sit on the edge of the bed, staring at my hands as if they belong to someone else. Zeidan stands near the hearth, arms folded, posture rigid, as if he relaxes for a moment the world might collapse. I do not want to fight anymore. I am exhausted.
“I feel your pain,” I say softly.
He goes still. Not the obvious pain of injuries or bruises. The other pain. The one he carries so carefully that he forgets other people can sense it now. The strain of Velcryn’s expectations. The constant calculation. The memory of betrayal that sits in his chest like a scar.
His voice is low. “You shouldn’t.”
“But I do,” I say. “And you feel mine. So we can either keep pretending the bond is only strategy, or we can acknowledge that it is changing the way we function.”
He turns his head slightly, black eyes catching the firelight. “It doesn’t change what must be done.”
“I know,” I say. “That’s why I’m telling you now, in private, instead of letting it leak out in front of my mother or your Matrons.”
A faint flicker crosses his expression, something that might be appreciation if he allowed himself to own it.
“I trust you,” I say quietly. “More than I intended to. More than is convenient. And I want to give you something that makes you stop looking at me like I am a risk waiting to turn.”
His gaze sharpens. “Amelia—”
“No,” I interrupt, voice steady. “Let me finish. I understand why you don’t trust easily. I understand that you were betrayed. You keep carrying it like proof of what happens when you loosen your grip.”
His jaw tightens again.
“I want you to trust me,” I say. “Not because the bond forces it. Not because Nytheria needs it. Because it makes us stronger. Because if we keep withholding pieces of ourselves, we will keep stepping on landmines neither of us warned the other about.”
Silence. Then, finally, he exhales.
“There was someone,” he says.
The words are simple, but the way he says them shifts the temperature in the room.
“A lover?” I ask carefully.
His gaze stays on the fire. “Yes.”
My throat tightens.
“She was a Purna,” he continues, voice controlled. “Ambitious. Brilliant. She knew how to stand beside me in court and how to speak in ways that made people listen.”
“And she betrayed you,” I say, because I feel it in him even before he confirms it.
“Yes,” he replies. “She gave information to my rivals. She did it for power. ”
My breath catches.
“And you discovered it,” I say.
“I did.”
“What did you do?”
His gaze lifts to mine, and for a moment I see the truth of him without diplomacy.
“I made sure she could never do it again,” he says quietly.
The answer is enough. The specifics are not necessary. I stand slowly and take a step toward him. Not to corner him. Just closer. The bond eases into something calmer.
“You think I might do that,” I say. “Use you.”
He holds my gaze. “I think you are capable of making impossible choices.”
“Yes,” I admit. “I am.”
“And if you were forced—”
“I would choose Nytheria,” I say immediately.
His expression doesn’t shift.
“But I would fight to make sure I never have to choose between Nytheria and you,” I add, and the words surprise me with their honesty as they leave my mouth.
The room goes very still. Zeidan watches me like he is recalibrating something he thought was fixed.
And then the question I have been circling, the one that should not matter but does, slips out before I can stop it.
“Did you ever love her?”
The silence that follows is not avoidance. It is memory.
Zeidan’s face is unreadable, but I feel the tension in him tighten, a quiet closing of a door somewhere deep.