19. Vireth #3
Doubt is a funny thing. So small, and yet so insidious. When it creeps in, it suffocates more than a mountain of earth.
“I’m presuming you had some sort of romantic attachment,” Arden continues.
“Well, allow me to divest you of any illusions you may harbor on that account. Renard was married for a time and gods, it was the match of the century. A love match, you know, so rare in our worlds. And yet politically fruitful, as well.”
“Stop,” I hiss, humiliated to feel tears pressing against my eyes.
Arden smirks. “For years they tried to have children. It was all Renard wanted out of life—to be a father, to live in peace with his beautiful wife. Of course, King Morcar allowed him some time to find his replacement as First Knight before retiring into domestic monotony. And then the famine hit.”
Nausea rolls through me as I try to summon my power—my head giving another sharp throb that prevents me from finding the stillness I need to connect.
“She was due in the spring, if I recall. The first famine would have been difficult enough for her to endure, but then this blight came upon the land and hollowed her out completely. She died giving birth to twins—they also did not survive.”
My heart fractures at the thought—at the soul-shattering sadness Renard must have felt. At his personal stake in ending the blight that took everything from him.
“He was never the same after that. We sent him into Hollowmire with a group of men to entreat with your people, but he failed there, as well. Brought back a fraction of the men he’d set out with, all too broken to be of use any more.
Morcar’s death was the final nail in the proverbial coffin for him.
Renard was never the same, after that. It was a mercy exiling him, you know.
Couldn’t have him moping around the castle distracting the rest of us from exploring alternative solutions to our troubles,” he finishes.
Sadness punches through me, stealing my breath and making my skin burn and my bones ache.
Blood rushes in my ears, drowning out the whispering sense of betrayal and the tragedy powering Renard’s actions.
My antlers pulsing with pain. My gut tells me Renard’s feelings for me were real—what we shared meant something for both of us.
It couldn’t have been a ruse to lure me to his kingdom.
But then… why wouldn’t he be honest with me?
“Even if he cares for you now—and it’s possible that he does—Renard longs for a family. Do you think he dreams of breeding an ancient goddess of pestilence? Unlikely, don’t you think?”
A family—children. Things I never considered because it felt too cruel to hope after every broken betrothal.
I became comfortable in my aloneness. I had Nibblebones, and my own company.
And yet, Renard came in as someone to care for, to share things with.
To argue and bicker and have a second place setting at dinner.
To trade stories with, and jokes. And suddenly my aloneness didn’t feel quite so satisfying.
I dreamed less and less of an isolated cottage overlooking the Moontide sea, and more of sea-colored eyes across from me at the evening campfire.
My love for him sprouted up like a weed through cracks in stone.
Improbable and ill-advised, perhaps blooming in a place where it shouldn’t.
“I’ve never known someone so beloved who failed quite so much as he,” Arden admits absently. “Then again, you did end up here all the same, so perhaps there was something to his method. Even a blind pig finds an acorn now and again.”
I can barely hear the regent’s words through the rushing sound in my ears. My skin suddenly feels like it’s on fire—heat building to an inferno fueled by rage, despair, and the sudden, inescapable sense of isolation.
Gods, I wish Nibblebones were here.
“I suppose this does require a bit of a rethink for me,” he says.
“But all in all, in my favor. I can have you executed in the morning and water my orchards with your blood by afternoon. Then the last of the idiotic council will be forced to assent to my unchallenged rule and I’ll be Regent no longer—King has a much better sound to it.
And Renard… ah, yes. What did happen to my gutless, witless half-brother?
I assume you left him, or he left you, or maybe my stars have truly aligned and he’s lying in a ditch somewhere with a dull dagger wound to the gut and empty pockets.
The bandits on the eastern road have been getting bolder of late. ”
“Dead,” I whisper, because that’s how it feels. It feels as though my body—my heart—had rearranged itself to beat alongside Renard’s, and now it thumps too loudly, echoing against a cavernous emptiness in my chest.
Arden takes my reply literally, and I find I don’t have it in me to correct him.
“Excellent,” he replies. “Most efficient. Well, I’d send down a meal for you, but you’ll be dead tomorrow, so it feels like a waste of resources on my part.
Do you wish to make an offering to any gods before dawn?
I can find a mage to come down here, though not all of our temples are in use these days. ”
I spare a single glance at him—the disgust and hatred so virulent I worry they will drip from my lips.
“Get out,” I snarl.
“As you wish,” he frowns, leaving without another word.
It’s the phrase that finally unlocks my despair—those tender words Renard uttered to me in precious moments now tainted.
When the door above closes, I offer a deep, soul wrenching scream to the gods and finally—finally—the Blight Mother answers.