Chapter Fifty-Six Riela
Chapter Fifty-Six
Riela
We returned to Edea with more than a dozen soldiers. Garrick started issuing orders, so I wandered over to Vastien, who was
lounging on a stone bench. He took one look at me and grinned, his eyebrows rising. “I wondered if you had forgotten me. But
I see that maybe you had more pressing matters to attend to with the Silver King.”
“How could you possibly know that?” I demanded incredulously, heat flushing up my cheeks.
He laughed and winked. “I didn’t. But your reaction certainly tells me a lot.” His expression sobered. “I’m glad.”
“How’s Bria?” I asked hesitantly. “Garrick told me he broke off the betrothal.”
“Absolutely swamped with suitors and absolutely furious with all of them,” Vastien said. “The poor fools don’t know the first
thing about winning her.”
“And you do?” I asked, all innocence.
Vastien looked away with something like sorrow flashing across his face for a moment. “She’s too good for me.”
He cleared his throat and changed the subject without his usual smooth skill. “So should I start planning a wedding? The Silver
King and the Cursebreaker has a nice ring to it.”
“Garrick did ask me to marry him—in the next three days so I don’t have to go to the Blood Court,” I admitted softly.
Vastien’s lack of surprise told me he’d already known. He slid over and patted the bench next to him. “Will you?”
“Forever is a long time to pay for a reckless vow of protection.”
Vastien burst into laughter. “Sovereigns, you’re adorable,” he gasped as he wiped the tears from his eyes. “Do you really think Garrick would offer marriage just to honor a protection vow?”
“Yes?” I hadn’t meant for it to come out as a question.
Vastien leveled an unreadable look at me. “He would not. Do you trust him?”
Rather than giving him the affirmative that was on my tongue, I paused and considered everything I knew. Garrick had repeatedly
warned me not to attribute his actions to altruism, but he’d been honest about even that. Maybe his was a far subtler and
more sinister form of manipulation than the Blood King’s threats and curses, but it didn’t feel like it.
It felt like he cared.
“I trust him,” I admitted, then dropped my gaze to the ground, too cowardly to watch Vastien’s reaction. “But we barely know
each other. What if he regrets our marriage in a few weeks or months, and then he’s stuck with me forever?”
“Do you want the real answer or the glib answer?”
I peeked at him with a smile. “Both?”
“The glib answer is that sovereign marriages are often regrettable, but it hasn’t stopped anyone yet.”
“Thanks,” I said, my voice desert dry.
He huffed. “The real answer is this: if you trust him, then trust him to know his own heart.” Vastien’s smile turned a little
wicked. “And if you’re still not sure, enter the betrothal bond with him first. Then he won’t be able to hide his true thoughts
and feelings from you. And it will be vastly entertaining for the rest of us.”
“For the next three days until Roseguard kills us both.”
The wickedness grew. “From what I’ve heard, it might be worth it.”
Garrick finished sending out his soldiers then joined me and Vastien. He stopped in front of me and offered me his hand. “Would
you like to visit your cottage?”
My heart leapt into my throat. “Is there anything left?”
“I don’t know.”
His honestly stabbed me, but I slid my hand into his. “I would like to see it.”
Garrick pulled me up, and Vastien rose, too. “I will accompany you.”
Garrick inclined his head in agreement, then turned to me. “Stepping through the ether that far will be too much for you today,
so I’ll take you with me. Are you ready?”
When I nodded, he stepped closer and wrapped an arm around my waist. He looked over my shoulder to Vastien. “I’ll meet you
at the edge.”
“I’ll go first,” Vastien said, then disappeared with a flash of silver magic.
I wrapped my arms around Garrick and pressed my head to his shoulder. His power rose in a spike of moonlight and the world
disappeared for an endless moment before the magic spat us out next to the partially constructed cottage Garrick had started
building for me.
Vastien was already here, prowling around the area, his magic high. “The path to the village seems clear,” he reported.
Garrick steadied me, then lifted an arm toward the edge of the forest. “Whenever you are ready.”
I approached the edge with caution, the memory of burning agony still painfully bright. But when I took a slow step past the
last tree, nothing happened. No resistance, no pain.
Nothing to keep the monsters contained.
I straightened my spine. I would fix it. I didn’t know how, but I would see it done.
But today was about a different kind of closure. As I led Garrick and Vastien toward my cottage, I skirted around the edge
of the village, glad I lived well away from the others. The little house was heartbreakingly familiar. The wildflowers by
the door had grown taller while I was away.
I braced myself for the destruction I was sure to find inside and lifted the latch.
A woman whirled around and screamed at the sight of me before brandishing a broom with a roar. “Begone, foul creature!”
An infant wailed and the woman raised the broom like a club, terror and fury in every line of her body.
Vastien slid into the room and easily disarmed her, even as she snarled and writhed and cursed us.
“This is my house,” I said faintly. “What are you doing here?”
But as the words stopped the woman’s struggles, I looked around. There were a few remaining echoes of my time here—the table
my father had made, and the wardrobe with the door that never quite closed right—but there were new things, too.
A bassinet sat next to the table, and a new crib was tucked into the corner. Two sets of shoes were near the door, one larger
and one small enough for a child.
“Riela?” the woman gasped. “You’re . . . you’re back. We thought you’d died.”
I recognized her now. She was married to the baker’s sister, and they had a young son. The last time I’d seen her, she’d been
heavily pregnant with her second child.
The child who was still screaming.
“Let her go,” I told Vastien.
As soon as he did, she scrambled to her baby, cradling the tiny infant to her chest, her eyes wide and fearful.
“Were any of my things left?” I asked her softly.
She glanced down and away. “The place was wrecked before we moved in. We threw out everything that was left.”
A fist clamped around my heart. The miniatures were the only things I’d truly wanted to keep, and King Roseguard had already
found them, but I’d hoped for . . . something. An acknowledgment of my sacrifice, maybe, as selfish as that was.
Selfish and hypocritical, since I’d potentially doomed them, too, even if they didn’t know it yet.
Instead, now I was one of the monsters from the forest. She couldn’t see past my glamour, but she’d instinctively known I wasn’t entirely
human, either.
I turned for the door without a word. Vastien and Garrick followed me out. Once we were a little way away, Vastien said, “She
was lying. About your things.”
“I know. My father built that table.” A bitter chuckle burst free. “Well, not my father anymore, I guess.”
“Family isn’t always about blood,” Garrick murmured. “He was still your father.”
“He was a good man,” I admitted quietly. My lip wobbled. “I still miss him.”
Garrick wrapped me into a gentle hug, and I just stood and absorbed his easy strength for a few minutes until the sadness
was small enough to be tucked away again.
“Do you want to go anywhere else in the village?” Garrick asked when I straightened away from him.
The small, petty part of me wanted to waltz through the middle of town with the Silver King and give them all heart attacks,
but I pushed the thought aside and asked, “You’ve warned them of the danger?”
“Yes, a scout warned them a few days ago.”
“Then there’s just one more place I’d like to visit.”
The massive tree was just outside the forest, a single sentinel standing guard. Moss had crawled over one of the stone markers
and my heart twisted. With everything that had happened in the last year, I’d been neglectful.
I knelt and touched the moss-covered stone. “Hi, Mama.”
My fingers tingled, and I jerked my hand back. That had never happened before.
“There’s magic here,” Garrick said from behind me. He and Vastien had stopped a few paces back to give me space.
“My parents are buried here.”
“They might be,” Garrick said, “but this feels like a protection charm.” He walked around the tree and stopped on the far side. “Here.”
I touched the stone marker again—this time without a shock—then touched my father’s marker, too. “I’ll be right back,” I whispered
to them. I stood and circled the tree to where Garrick was staring at the ground. I raised my magic a little, and sure enough,
a faint pulse of blue was buried below our feet, deep enough that I was going to need a shovel to dig it out.
“What do you think it is?”
Garrick shook his head. “I don’t know. Do you want us to unbury it?”
“Are you sure it’s not a body?”
“Fairly sure.”
I blew out a breath. “Do you have anything to dig with?”
“I can do it,” Vastien offered. At my questioning look he added, “As a wolf.”
“Thank you. Please be careful.”
He nodded, then silver magic rose in a flash and left behind a shaggy black wolf. I knew it was Vastien, but the instinctive part of my brain responsible for keeping me alive still wanted to run away screaming.
Vastien gave me a canine grin and chuffed at me. When I didn’t move, he nudged me aside, and I laughed. “Right, sorry.”
I stepped back and Vastien nosed the ground. Then he dug his massive paws into the dirt and began to dig.
He was far more efficient than a shovel, and only a few moments later, his claw scraped against something solid. I refused
to look in the hole. “If that’s a coffin, leave it be.”
Vastien kept digging, then sat back so Garrick could see what he’d found. “It’s not a coffin. It’s a stone box.”
He hauled a large stone out of the hole, and I frowned at it. It looked like a normal rock, but when I raised my magic, I
could feel the soft protection charm on it.
I brushed my fingers over the top, sweeping away the dirt, and the rock cracked in half. I stared at it, uncomprehending, until Garrick tipped it over and removed one half—the top of the box.
A wrapped oilcloth bundle was nestled in the shallow depression inside. I pulled it out with trembling fingers. It was lighter
than I’d expected. I unwrapped the layers, carefully peeling them back to reveal a folded letter and a small journal.
My name was scrawled on the outside of the letter in a looping, feminine hand—the same hand that had written the book of poetry
I held so dear.
My breath froze in my chest, then rushed out as a sob. I unfolded the letter and got as far as “My dearest daughter” before
I had to close my eyes against the press of tears. My mother had left me a letter.
She had touched this paper.
I took a shaky breath and returned to the letter.
My dearest daughter Riela,
Part of me hopes you’ll never read these words. I’ve put every protection on you that I can, and your father—your true father,
not the one whose blood is in your veins—has sworn to keep the secret for as long as those protections last. But if you’re
reading this, then we have failed, and you must have questions. My time is too short to answer them here, but I’m leaving
you my journal. Guard it well, and it will provide the answers you seek. My darling, how I wish I could’ve watched you grow.
I love you more than life itself, and I’m sorry I’m not there for you now. Live well, for me.
Your adoring mother,
Inna Pathriart of the Sapphire Court
As soon as I got to the end, I returned to the beginning and read the letter again. I opened the journal to find the same elegant writing, and it was only then that I realized I could read the words without the help of the translation charm—and the letter had been the same.
She’d known that I was going to be raised as a human. She’d set it up herself for reasons I still didn’t understand.
I looked up to find Garrick and Vastien watching me from a respectful distance away. When I caught Garrick’s eye, he tipped
his head toward the letter. “Is it from your mother?”
I nodded and held the precious paper out to him with a shaky hand.
He wiped his hands on his trousers before accepting it with a light touch. I appreciated his care. He quickly scanned the
words then handed it back to me. I folded it and tucked it inside the journal, then wrapped the whole bundle in the oilcloth.
I would’ve liked nothing more than to sit here all day and read the journal, but it wasn’t safe, and I wanted to have uninterrupted
time to read once I started.
“Do you want to keep the box?” Garrick asked.
Now that it was open, it looked like a rock that’d split in half. Part of me wanted to keep it anyway, if only because my
mother had touched it, but I shook my head. I didn’t know if she was truly buried on the other side of the tree or not, but
this could serve as a memento.
Garrick carefully put the stone back into the hole, then Vastien covered it with dirt once more. When he was done, he shook
the dust and dirt from his fur, then returned to his bipedal form with a flash of magic.
“Thank you,” I whispered, voice thick.
His smile was sympathetic. “You are welcome, Lady Riela.”
I hugged the bundle of cloth to my chest and looked at Garrick. “I’m ready to return to the castle.”
Garrick’s gaze swept over my face for a moment before he nodded and gathered me close to step us back to the castle.