18. Astraea
Chapter eighteen
Astraea
I feel the adrenaline leaving my blood through my trembling limbs in waves.
But as I consider what they are speaking about, my heart decides it’s not done torturing me.
What are they deciding without any consideration for what I might want?
I can’t stop the shake of my hands, even as, or maybe because, I hold onto the one person that has grounded me for most of my life while she lies unconscious.
Are they discussing the very future I’m fighting for?
Cole lets out a whimper, and my eyes jump over her face.
Her eyebrows are drawn into a frown while she fitfully sleeps, and I can’t help but worry that she could be having nightmares so much like those that have plagued my life.
Laying my other hand on top of where ours are clasped, I run my thumb back and forth in an attempt to comfort her.
I need to know what my father has been keeping from me my whole life.
It's obvious that everything that has been happening centers around me… but why? I am no one. A princess who should have never been. There is so much that I don’t understand.
Even thinking all the way back to the beginning…
Why was my mother not protected during the war?
Why do I not remember my childhood before the palace?
Tears burn the backs of my eyes, but my searing determination dries them before they fall. Tears will do no good anyway.
“I’m glad you’re here, Cole. You’re safe now.
Kaeleith is kind. I know you’ll like her.
I’m going to find out what happened to you.
I’m going to get answers for what happened on the night of my birthday at the Shula Morana celebration.
There’s so much we need to understand, but more than anything else—I need you to heal.
I have to know, and I think my father is where I need to start.
When this is all done, I want us to run away from all of it.
We’ll start a new life for ourselves. Just me and you.
” I whisper with my head lowered over our hands.
Kissing her knuckles, I slowly untwine my hand from hers, resting it at her side before I stand.
My bottom lip trembles as I take a step away from the bed, away from my best friend.
As soon as I reach the hallway and close the door between us, I feel as though I move with more purpose. I want answers, and I know the first step to getting them is sitting just feet away in the living room.
As I reach the end of the long hall, I see Kaeleith pause the stirring of her cauldron.
She turns her head just enough to look over her shoulder out of the corner of her cloudy eye.
Her mouth tilts as though she is smiling in anticipation of my coming storm.
I’ve heard stories of those with vision magick.
Perhaps Kaeleith has that ability; though she may appear blind in this plane of existence, she seems to see more of us all in every other way.
Likely picking up on how the words I hear being muttered in the living room are ones that have my ever growing fury ready to be unleashed.
“I won’t put her in danger. There is no way I will allow that to happen.” Kyros growls in response to the words I hear Ruaan distantly murmur.
“You can’t make that decision for her.” Ruaan argues, and I grit my teeth as I watch Kyros stalk a groove into the wood in front of the window.
Kyros looks at Ruaan as though he regrets ever opening up conversation with him.
His stare cuts through him as he quietly waits for him to say more.
He’s deadly with his silent wrath. The look on his face says he wishes Ruaan would push him further, so he had a reason to make him eat his own teeth.
Night has fully settled over the cottage, but the space is lit well with candles, and the fresh fire that Kaeleith has begun cooking over makes the room warm with a flickering orange light.
When I walk from the shadowed hallway, it’s Kyros’ dark gaze that collides with mine.
Everything about his face is intense. His dark hair is disheveled and falling into his eyes.
His shadowed jaw is set, and his lips form a firm line pulled down with the heavy set of his brows.
If I were smart, I would avoid conflict with him.
I can see the fight he is ready to have.
I grit my teeth as I try to rein in all of my hostile frustration.
Frustration over everything in my life I have never been able to control, over my best friend who is fighting for her life in a bed behind me, over all the lies I have been fed and truths that have been withheld.
And I galvanize it into steel and wrap it around my spine.
The burning feeling starts first in my heaving chest; my arms are heavy and numb, but heat licks at my skin like fire.
When Ruaan turns to face me too, his eyes round and his dark brows jump up his forehead, but I barely spare him a glance as I narrow my eyes and address the man who thinks he can be the one to allow me to do anything.
I thought we were making progress, but I guess I was wrong.
“Shula…” I hear Kyros say, but it sounds muffled and far away as the blood rushes between my ears.
Something about the way that Kyros is looking at me is confusing, but I don’t care.
My rage boils behind my ribs, and when he stands, taking a tentative step toward me with his hands outstretched, I take a step back.
I shake my head, and my eyes jump between his.
All I see are the half-truths he’s given me, the darkness he has kept me in, and the regret of my stupidity. He’s only going to do it again.
I reach up to find comfort in the pendant from my mother, fingers searching for the familiar metal chain. Instead, all I feel are the leather straps that sheath my blades. My chin drops as I search frantically for the place on my chest where the necklace usually rests.
I don’t see the pendant, but what I see instead makes my heart stop entirely.
No air fills my lungs.
No sound reaches my ears.
Not when what I do see is entirely impossible.
I'm frozen in time, in a place of sheer panic and unmistakable denial.
I'm not sure how many seconds have actually passed as I stand here in disbelief, but it's not been long enough for the shock to ebb. I look up just as Kyros’ boot comes into my line of sight, and at the same time he reaches for me.
I refuse this. I refuse his comfort. I throw my hands down, balling my fingers into tight fists at my sides, and I throw every ounce of anger into my voice.
“No!” I bark out, just as Kyros does out the same.
“NO!” He bellows as I take another step backward. He lunges for me at the same time the room begins tipping on its axis. His arms are warm as they wrap around my middle; it's the last sensation I feel before everything is drenched in black and we fall.
We land in a heap on moist soil. Tall grass billowing out around us like our very own nest. Kyros has yet to release my trembling body from his hold, even though it's already been minutes since we touched down here.
He took the brunt of the fall. Without him wrapped up around me the way he is, the pieces that I thought made up me would likely have me crumbling to the ground.
My life has been nothing but a lie. He has been the silent support keeping me together while on the verge of breaking.
The irony of that fact doesn't get lost on me, though.
Considering it was my rage at him that spurred this into motion.
His fingers make languid strokes at my temple, brushing the strands of hair back and away from my face.
The rocking motion that moves our bodies helps even out my rapid heartbeat with every sway.
My tears are silent in my heartache, but they tell a story as they run down my face nonetheless.
I once thought I was a princess of ruin, a governess of destruction, and that thought has never felt more true than it does now.
Magick is the very reason my father has killed so many, yet here I am—a wielder of its power.
I feel a sob caged in my chest, begging to be released, but I can't allow it to break free. Instead, I hold my breath to coerce that sorrowful wail away. I will hold in that pain until it is galvanized in the anger I feel toward my father and forge it into a weapon I will release on one man. The breath I hold in my lungs burns with a fervent need to escape. Right along with the fire that has been ever-building in my chest. My eyes squeeze shut despite it all as I try to drown out the thoughts to no avail. They are screaming in my head. Magick runs through my veins—I rendered a portal. Fire danced at my fingertips, and I didn’t get burned.
Even so, every second that passes, the more I feel as though I am going to burn up and turn to ash.
I have no idea how portal magick works. Still, I try to recount anything that Kyros has said to me when we went through the portals he had rendered.
I don’t know if it’s the adrenaline or just the confusion over everything happening, but my thoughts are scrambled into a mess of questions, with no answers in sight.
The loudest of them all echoes like a death knell. “How?”
“We’ll find out how, together.” Kyros’ voice rumbles through his chest at my back.
I hadn't even realized I voiced the question aloud. Magick is hereditary. At least that’s what I've garnered over the years. I had very few opportunities to learn anything about it, often only through old books he’d not cared to rid the library of and eavesdropped conversations.
It’s not like the ruler of a kingdom that has banned all magick would freely teach his daughter its workings.
I know my father doesn’t have it, but I was so young when my mother died.
But surely, he would have said something about my mother being among the magick’s users.
His hate for those who even sympathized with its users would have given him every reason to curse her very existence.
And I know he wouldn't give up that opportunity, seeing as how often he would curse her weakness in other ways.
But maybe that’s why he let her get killed in the Great War…
I suppose he could have thought that she would have been able to protect herself…
Though, if my theory that my mother had magick is accurate and if my father hated it as he does now, then he likely didn’t care if she died anyway.
And maybe that is why my father, the man who should have loved me more than any other man could, never showed any ounce of real compassion for me in earnest. Because if she had magick; I would too…
“Hey, look at me.” Kyros says, pulling me out of my spiraling thoughts. My gaze is entrapped by the darkness of his. “You’re okay. This—is okay.” His hand cups my face as he slowly pulls me to turn toward him.
“My own father would have me killed for this.” The words are spoken in a voice I had no idea I even possessed: so small and scared—even for me.
“He could try, but he would have to go through me first. I know that things are strained between us, and rightfully so, but I made you a promise. No one will hurt you again. I will spend every day of the rest of my life making up for me being the last person who ever did.” His fingers wrap around the back of my neck, pulling my forehead to his.
My eyes flutter closed as I let his words wash over my heart.
“How are the people going to react? You are the rightful heir. I’m not even their princess.
And when they find out that I too have magick?
They will hate me for the hypocrisy of my father’s sins.
You know, as well as I do, that people don’t see the line between my father and me.
They don’t know who I am, Kyros. I was only ever the princess on a pedestal.
They never saw the chains that held me in place. ”
“They may have not seen the shackles before, but they will see who you are when you break free of the chains.” His thumb grazes over my cheek, and the quiet power in his dark eyes blazes, captivating, and impossible to refuse that his words are not true.
“We’ve both been raised on lies that built the kingdoms as what they are today.
It's our responsibility to figure out the truth and determine how to move forward.”
“I don’t know what it means to live a life with magick; I don’t even know what it means to live.” I say mournfully.
“Then let this be another thing we learn together.
I was a prince who lost everything. I was empty.
A hollowed vessel that was molded into a man who could be used as a tool by a queen with an ulterior motive.
Together we can be everything they stripped us of.
We can bring the kingdom and its people something it hasn't had in a very long time. Something that we have not thought possible—hope.”