Chapter 64 #2
She made a face. “It’s nothing like that. Tobias has been checking us all for brands daily—Mother and Father especially.”
“So then you know Mayvus is alive?”
Enla hesitated. “Yes, although they’re not sure they believe me now. I’ve just…mixed up some of the things I’ve seen. It’s not a problem. I confused some of the minor details after seeing so many options.”
“Enla,” Gaeren said on a growl. “We’ve talked about—”
She held up a hand. “I know. I’m doing less searching.”
Once again, her words didn’t feel quite true, and Gaeren placed a hand on her arm, using his secondary spoke to assess the truth of her words while also tuning in to her memories.
Some of them came through disjointed, reminding him of Marnok’s broken mind.
Even within her own memories, she wasn’t sure which visions she’d seen as possibilities versus which things had truly happened.
“You’re not trying at all,” he said. “You’re letting every possibility come to your mind.”
“How else am I supposed to direct an entire nation?” she hissed, wrenching her arm away to break their touch.
Her face held an anger he hadn’t seen since they were children, her composure broken.
But just as swiftly, she smoothed out her features and raised her chin.
“Despite my confusion, we’re moving forward in the right direction.
Croft has brought the navy north to prepare a defense against the Recreants. ”
“The Recreants?”
“I’ve seen war coming to our doorstep.”
Gaeren and Riveran exchanged a glance. They’d spoken with Velden’s old friends. The navy was corrupt and full of Recreants. She’d likely just brought war to their doorstep.
“Just like you thought you’d seen me break my bond with Lenda?”
Her brow furrowed. “But you did.”
He rolled his eyes and steered her toward the chair in his room, guiding her to sit down. “Now I did. But last time I was here, you thought I already had.”
“It’s good that you did.” She ignored his concerns. “Lenda was sick for a while, but now she’s free. If we announce your return, she’ll come to thank you.”
Gaeren hesitated. “Why would we announce my return if you think Mother and Father are still angry?”
“We won’t.” She looked up at him, but her eyes focused somewhere beyond him. “I’m just saying she would if we did.”
Riveran’s lips thinned as he pressed them together. “So you’re saying you searched out a possibility you had no intention of pursuing.”
“Yes.” Enla frowned, somehow not seeing this as a problem when it had been strictly forbidden by her mentors for her sanity.
“Seeking out those kinds of possibilities helps me understand where a person’s heart is at in the present.
I know that she’s not angry with you because she would thank you if she could, which means I know for now she is safe to be considered an ally, not a threat. ”
Gaeren ran a hand through his hair, his frustration bleeding into his words. “When would Lenda have ever been a threat?”
Enla’s gaze clouded over once more. “There was a time when I told you to lean into the bond, because if you hadn’t, she would have gone public with your betrayal, making the entire family out to be untrustworthy.”
Gaeren sat on the edge of his bed, placing his elbows on his knees and balancing his head in his palms. “What changed?”
Enla hummed in thought. “I’m not sure. It was something about your voyage to Rykarn. Something about that made her realize she didn’t want to be tied to this family. I think she might have broken the bond herself if I hadn’t told her to give it more time.”
Gaeren shook his head in disbelief. “All while I was hoping she would do it.”
“That’s a coward’s way out, Gaeren,” Enla warned him. “It would have been far worse for her.”
Even as Gaeren questioned his sister’s sanity, he shrank under her chastising. “Well, it’s done now,” he muttered.
Enla’s face brightened with a smile. “I think it helped Mother and Father see you as less of a threat and more of a nuisance again.”
“Again?” Gaeren asked.
“Oh, stop,” she said. “You preferred it that way. When Gullet returned, I think they suspected you might be coming. It’s fortunate the guards didn’t see you. I’ll have to pay off the stable boys for their silence.”
Riveran stood a little straighter. “Gullet’s here? Did he have a message?”
“No message. Didn’t you just send him home?”
Gaeren and Riveran traded looks. Why would Emeris have sent the bird without a message? What could that mean? Nothing good.
“I’d like to see Gullet,” Gaeren said.
Enla’s eyebrows rose, but she nodded. “I can fetch him in the morning.”
“Why weren’t you in meetings today?” Riveran asked.
Enla’s face finally held the guilt Gaeren had wanted to see after all of her unauthorized sifting through the future. “I’ve been banned from council meetings for a week.”
“A week?” Gaeren asked.
“Like a child being sent to her room,” she added bitterly.
“What did you do?” Riveran winced.
“I was in the office. I suggested we pardon the dragon.”
“Durriken?” Gaeren asked.
“They still hunt for him. He’s been sighted outside of Islara. But he needs to live. Every path in which they kill him ends in darkness, in death.” Her eyes darted left and right until Gaeren leaned forward and shook her back to the present.
“Stop sifting the future.” He drew each word out, ensuring she heard him, insisting she focus.
She licked her lips and nodded. “It’s just that it’s constantly changing,” she whispered.
“I want what’s best for the people. You know that, Gaeren.
You know that everything I do is for the people.
But there are so many variables. The paths I see shift and change, like the sands of the Bahlric Desert in the wind.
I can’t nail down what will really happen unless I keep sifting. ”
He shook her again. “You can’t help anyone if you completely lose touch with the present reality.”
She winced as his grip tightened, and Riveran pulled him away. “Leave her be for now.”
“But she’s killing herself,” Gaeren argued.
Riveran held up a hand, and Gaeren finally noticed the way the other man’s eyes had turned red. “I know, but you can’t bully her into doing what’s best for herself.”
Gaeren clenched his jaw and sat back down on the bed, watching as Riveran kneeled before Enla and placed his hands on the sides of her face.
“Enla,” he murmured, “look at me.” It was far too familiar a touch for an old bondmate when she was married and bonded to someone else.
But where was Croft now? Playing war with the navy he’d procured from the south?
What kind of navy could he stir up in this case anyway?
“Please take a break,” Riveran said. “You’re different from the last time I saw you. It’s not healthy.”
“You’re different from the last time I saw you, too.” Enla’s eyes filled with tears, and she brushed a hand over the X on his forehead. “I’m so sorry,” she whispered.
He dropped his hands and scooted back from her touch as if finally realizing how intimate it had been.
“Have Mother and Father regained their strength?” Gaeren asked.
Enla shrugged. “Not completely, but they have started participating in council meetings again. I think it’s because they don’t trust me anymore. They’ve been giving more authority to Croft too. And I suspect that when he returns, they’ll have him take my place at many of the meetings.”
“But he’s only a prince consort,” Gaeren argued. “He has no authority in his own right.”
“He does if Mother and Father give it to him,” Enla said.
Gaeren rubbed his eyes. “Is this why you asked us to come back? You made it sound like you saw visions of something. Something we needed to know.”
“I did?” Enla asked. Her brow furrowed once more, and she looked around the room as if it might hold answers to his question. “Oh, yes. Emeris is coming.”
“Emeris is coming here?” Gaeren couldn’t hide the disbelief in his tone.
There were probably a thousand possibilities for the future, and now she was latching on to the ones that seemed the most concerning, even if they were the least possible.
“Emeris was too weak to leave the fortress. The soldiers were guarding her in case Mayvus returned.”
“I don’t—” She glanced at her hands, which she opened and closed, as if weighing the possibilities in her hands.
“I think so. It felt so real. I saw her arrive with two men announcing themselves as ambassadors from the eastern province. When that happens, you need to show yourself—to vouch for them.”
“I think it’s time you tried taking your tonics again,” Riveran said, swiping the wetness from his eyes, “the ones that help you sleep. See if you can take a break from sifting. You need to find a way to turn it off.”
She shook her head. “This one was close to the surface. I didn’t even have to dig far for it. I’m certain of it.” She reached out a hand to squeeze Gaeren’s arm, sending him a barrage of images that made his head ache.
He shook her off. “Fine. It’s all right. I believe you. Emeris is coming with a delegation and I should vouch for her. Is that all?” At this point, the truth of her visions no longer mattered. They needed to figure out how to calm her down and settle her magic.
“Please take me seriously,” she begged, her gaze clouding over. “If you don’t vouch for her, everything changes.”
“I said I’ll do it.” He wrapped his arms around her as if he could smother the visions out of her. “Now please—stop searching.”
She relaxed under his grip. “I’ll stop.”
He glanced at Riveran, whose lips pursed while he blinked profusely.
Gaeren had been right to come. Enla needed him here. But now he worried he’d waited too long.