68. Chapter 68
CHAPTER 68
Cassiel
C assiel was so afraid of widening the rift between them, yet he always seemed to make it worse. He stood there a moment, on the other side of Dyna’s door. Every shred of him ached with longing and misery. He wanted to plead at her feet to let him in. Not only in the room but in her heart and mind. He wanted to make things right but for every step he took forward, he stumbled several more back.
“Is there a reason you stand there?” Cassiel glanced at where Netanel lingered in the shadows.
“I came to assure Lady Dyna’s well-being.”
Cassiel stiffened at Raiden’s voice behind him. Netanel quickly retreated into the adjoining hall. “And why should her well-being be any of your concern?” Cassiel faced him. “See to your mother. That is where your attention should lie.”
Raiden smirked. “And yours is no longer required here.”
At that moment, Lucenna, Zev, and Klyde arrived in the hall. They stilled, sensing the tension in the air.
Klyde crossed his arms and leaned up against the wall. “I wouldn’t provoke him, mate. He can breathe fire.”
“No,” Cassiel said drily. I don’t.”
“We heard there was an incident in the market,” Lucenna said. “Is Dyna all right?”
“Yes, she’s resting now,” Cassiel told them, then fixed his glower on Raiden. “What is your strife with me? From the moment I arrived you have been nothing but insolent.”
“I hold no respect for any manner of a man who would readily abandon his wife. Nonetheless, I think you made the right choice in this case. A human does not belong with a Celestial, especially when being with you endangers her life. I could give her a better life. A good life free of danger.”
That declaration stirred Cassiel’s veins with his fire.
He crossed the hall to Raiden until they were a mere two feet from each other. They stood at the same height, their eyes glowing with their power. “Free of danger?” Cassiel repeated through his clenched teeth. “Was she not put in danger because of you and your mother?”
“An arbitrary circumstance that I will not allow repeating.”
“Is that so?”
“Acknowledge that our courtship would not be possible if you had stayed by her side instead of running off to do whatever else you deemed more important than her. The only reason she is at my side and not at yours is because of you alone.”
Cassiel ground his teeth. Fire scorched through Cassiel’s chest he felt it press against his being. His ears started ringing.
Raiden smirked. “No argument there? How frightening it must be to face a future without the one you planned it with?”
The beast of flame had awakened inside of him, ready to set everything ablaze. “Stop. Talking.”
He couldn’t see straight. The sound of his heart pounded in his ears. Sweat broke out on his back. Protect and destroy. That was all his flame demanded and Raiden was in his line of sight.
“Thank you for stepping aside,” the damned elf continued. “Now I will see that Lady Dyna is never abandoned again.”
Cassiel slammed a flaming fist into the wall beside Raiden’s head. It cracked from the force, spreading fissures across the surface. Blue light glowed in the hallway, bathing his startled face.
Grimacing, Raiden didn’t move as he withstood the immense heat pressing into the side of his cheek. “You’re so preoccupied with convincing her you’re the hero but we both know the truth.”
Cassiel bit back a harsh laugh. “I never once claimed to be a hero. For you see, lordling, there is not a shred of nobility inside of me.” His eyes flamed with his beast and the first threads of fear crossed Raiden’s face.
“You’re no Celestial ... are you?”
Since he had been born, Cassiel knew what he was. He saw it in the disgust of his people. In their hatred and revile. The truth was clear every time he looked in the mirror and now in the reflection of his flame.
He was an abomination .
“You know nothing of about who I am or the things I have had to do. As vile as you believe I am, you cannot possibly fathom how far I am willing to go to protect that which I hold most dear.” The wall cracked and blackened under Cassiel’s fist. “Perhaps you are confused, thus I will make it perfectly clear. I don’t call Dynalya my wife merely to stake my claim, but because we are bound by blood. I feel her heartbeat in my soul as she feels mine in hers. Therefore, go on then. Attempt to win her heart but know one thing. When you think you at last have her you will come to realize who she belongs with will never be you.”
Raiden stared at him mutely.
There was only silence in the hall, and the crackle of burning wood. The others stood tense, ready to leap in if needed. But Cassiel took a breath and distinguished his flames. He turned to go.
“In the end, the choice will be hers, won’t it?”
Cassiel hooked his arm around Raiden’s neck and flipped him over him shoulder, slamming him on the ground.
Zev’s large grasp rammed into Cassiel’s chest and pinned him to the wall. “Stop this now,” he growled. “Do no more to tarnish yourself in her eyes.”
That was when he noticed Dyna standing at her door. The startled look on her face made the air drain out of him.
One step forward.
Two steps back.
Raiden stood, straighten his tunic. He cleared his throat, his voice a little strained. “You dishonor yourself.”
Cassiel swept past him and took the stairs back down to the main floor.
His veins burned with the need to light something on fire, but he made it to the forest behind the in without combusting. The trees gave away to a small glade peppered with clusters of blue bells. He dropped onto a boulder, resting his elbows on his knees.
“I made it worse, didn’t I?”
Netanel slipped out of the trees with a grimace.
Cassiel groaned and rubbed his face. “Why does he infuriate me?”
His spy came forward and sat cross-legged on the ground. “Because you’re afraid of the small voice in your head telling you he’s right and you’re losing her.”
Was he right?
“Learn to quell your temper, Cassiel. It’s does you no favors.”
He knew that. But was it him or his flame that easily sparked his ire?
Maybe it was due to the lingering wrath that had been seeded into his soul so long ago. It didn’t really matter. No one else made his choices for him.
Cassiel lost track of how long he sat there. Next thing he knew the sun was already setting and Netanel had left him to stew in his thoughts. Or so he thought until he heard steps approach.
“I am in no mood for anymore lectures.”
“Clearly you need one.” Zev eyed him with a mixture of disapproval and concern. “What is wrong with you? That darkness in your veins is turning you into something else.”
He let out a sardonic laugh and dropped his head in his hands. “I had a moment of idiocy. Is Raiden all right?”
Zev grunted. “You winded him, but he’ll live.”
If Cassiel had used his full strength he might have truly hurt him. He stared blankly at a caught leaf fluttering beneath his boot. There was no honor in crushing someone weaker than you.
He wished these powers never came to him. Life had seemed so much easier before when he was someone the Realms ignored instead of feared. Before he broke Dyna’s heart.
True power would be to live in a world where he didn’t make any mistakes.
He had lost the ability to be happy in this one.
“Hey. What are you thinking about?”
Cassiel looked at Zev, recalling he was still there. “What?”
“What’s lurking in your mind? You seem lost in there.”
He tiredly shook his head. “Sometimes I think it isn’t real.”
“What isn’t real?”
“This life I find myself in.”
Zev gave him a strange look, but it wasn’t something he could explain.
Cassiel released the leaf and let the wind blow it away. “Ignore me. I am merely accepting that life does not always go as I want. Most of the time it’s my doing.”
Somewhere along the way, he had locked himself in a prison of his own making.
And he may never get out.