15. Cornered and wounded animals #4
Even in my periphery, I could see Maksym tense as he watched me, his eyes a flash of vivid amber that was impossible to miss. “Why would I do that?”
I kept staring out over the dark grounds.
“Because you’re a king, and you’re all the goddess-damned same.
Kings do nothing but hate the women they are forced to marry and crush their souls in the process.
My father did it to his wife. Yours clearly did too, and then some. Why would you be any different?”
I’d struck a capricious nerve.
Maksym grabbed my arm and whirled me to face him, biting out through a tense jaw, “Pick another direction for this conversation, Miss Wynn.”
My eyes widened, and I wrenched my arm away from him, backing up a step as I challenged, “Why? I know what happened to your mother. What your father did to her. Don’t I have a right to know if you’re just going to do the same to me?
If I’ve only got ten or twenty years stuck in this soulless marriage until you find a reason to kill me, I’d like to know so I can find other ways to make the best of my brief existence. ”
Despite the steps I kept taking back, Maksym met every one of them, displeasure lighting up the amber of his eyes, until a pillar barred my path.
“You were the one whose first order of business was to see that this marriage is soulless, not me,” he seethed. “I did not spend fifty fucking years in exile, fighting tooth and goddess-damned nail, just to come back and be any shade of what Callum was. Mark my words, Miss Wynn.”
“Supported entirely by this demonstration, of course,” I scoffed. “You’re reminding me an awful lot of Calder.”
“Oh, make no mistake, I’m not a king like your pissant little brother either, Miss Wynn.” Maksym shook his head and stepped out of my space, raking his hand through his unbound hair before he added, “I deal with my issues head on, not through forgeries and failed assassination attempts.”
My eyes narrowed. “What the fuck are you getting at?”
A poisonous smile spread across his face.
“Haven’t come to terms with that yet, have you?” he chuckled, and the sound was grating. “You have an enemy who would rather see you dead, and you’ll not find them in Grimmoria. Might need to look back a little closer to home.”
He was just trying to wound now. From the little I’d gathered, Maksym knew as scant few details as I did about how I ended up half-dead on Grimmoria’s border.
I had a suspicion, too, that if Maksym had an ounce of proof of what he was so boldly claiming, this entire marriage-to-save-my-life never would have come to fruition.
“My brother may be a lot of things,” I said as calmly as I could, “but he is a lazy bastard above all else. He never would have put in this sort of effort to get rid of me when he could have easily stationed me across the chasm until the day I died.”
“Ah, yes.” The king huffed a laugh that lacked all humor. “Because a few delegated forgeries are such a monumental effort.”
“It was months. Months of letters, and planning, and…and negotiations.” Heat climbed up my chest again. “Ten of my countrymen are dead in your cellar, and I was almost among them. If you’re so confident this was my brother’s doing, what sort of proof do you even have? I’d love to know.”
A slow, bitter smile spread across Maksym’s face, and he shook his head. “I have far more credible proof than you’re capable of reasonably handling right now.”
Oh, I had to be a deeper shade of red than the wine we drank at dinner.
“Excuse me?” I coughed out the words. “What the hell do you mean by that? I’m entirely capable of handling any—”
“I don’t think there was anything to misinterpret in what I said, and you’re only further proving my point.
” The fine fabric of Maksym’s jacket tightened as his chest heaved with a sigh.
“I think you should call it a night. Jasper will come for you early tomorrow, I suspect, and I’m sure that’ll be a battle of its own. ”
I opened and closed my mouth before I drew my head back, and there was no staving my disbelief. “Are you…dismissing me?”
Maksym exhaled through his nose before he turned and gave me his back. “I am, Miss Wynn. Good night.”
My hands were shaking from how tightly I had them fisted at my sides, but the bit of pain they caused was the only thing stopping me from a violent outburst I’d likely regret.
“Some fucking marriage this is going to be,” I spat, but Maksym didn’t give me an ounce of acknowledgement.
He just kept standing there, his raven-black hair spilling over his back as he turned his attention skyward and rolled his shoulders.
I wanted to strangle him, truly.
Instead, I marched right off the terrace and into the dining room.
Before I’d even reached the table, a crack rang out behind me, like tarps snapping taut against a brutal wind.
But when I turned back to look through the open doors, Maksym was gone.
I sighed and finished the remnants of both our glasses of wine before I continued on my way.
For the first time since seeing the corpses of my friends and squad mates, I wished I was among them.