44. Raithe
Raithe
“Tell me you’re joking.” I seethed at Letti outside the kitchens. “Tell me you’re fucking joking.”
She maintained a bored expression. “Do I look like a comedian?”
“Why the fuck wasn’t I made aware of this?” I dragged my hands over my bruised face, wincing. “I spent the last few hours sleeping, assuming my princess and fellow guardian were safe within the palace walls, as they should be.”
“I didn’t want to tell you while you were in a volatile state.” Her narrowed eyes roamed me from head to toe. “Which it seems you still are.”
“They went into the city without me. You know how dangerous—”
“Felaf can take care of our princess as well as you can.”
“I know she can. But—”
“They’ll be back soon, so don’t bother going after them. Felaf only told me just in case.”
In case something happened. “Fucking stars.”
“Maybe fighting without your ring wasn’t such a good idea after all, hm?”
I ran my tongue along my teeth. I hadn’t bothered to retrieve my talisman from Gregorios following my fight with Barto. I was on my way to see the seer—following a meal from Nio—when I ran into Letti, who delivered the disturbing news.
Barto had gotten me good, and without my topaz ring to quicken my recovery, my body hurt in a way I wasn’t accustomed to. I detested feeling so powerless, but the desire to feel pain was stronger. Going into that fight, I knew exactly what the outcome would be.
The bruises weren’t nearly as painful as Felaf’s lashes, but they would linger more deeply. Pain was the only thing capable of quelling my thoughts—of Rahzlyn, of my childhood.
“Who else knows of their departure?” I asked Letti.
“Maryn might, but I’m not sure. Barto’s been too busy boasting to the other guards about his false victory. I haven’t seen Chessah, but if they’re not back soon, suspicions will grow from Felaf’s missing Pegasus.”
“They didn’t even bother to use the arch?” I exclaimed. “Un-fucking-believable.”
Letti looked me up and down. “I suggest you meditate before finding the seer.”
She left me to fume on my own. Chessah’s absence bothered me, considering she and her brother were always joined at the hip. If Maryn knew Rahzlyn and Felaf had gone, she likely would have sent Chessah to follow.
Felaf knew the protocol, and while I didn’t always adhere to it myself, I was surprised she would stray from it. The Baron's District was particularly deceiving. Anything could happen to them.
To Rahzlyn.
I raced up to the observatory.
My dread was greater than that of a guardian worried for his princess’s safety; it was instinctual. Primal, even.
I knew why Rahzlyn hadn’t told me of this ridiculous plan. After how I’d treated her, how I’d shut her out… Princess or not, I didn’t blame her. My gut clenched with guilt.
I’d become no better than the other deceitful men in her life.
I couldn’t go on this way—avoiding her, hurting her like a coward.
I didn’t deserve much, but Rahzlyn deserved more than callous ignorance triggered by my scars.
My past wasn’t Rahzlyn’s fault, and I had no right to poison her with it.
She deserved to know the secrets I’d been harboring—the ones that affected her directly.
Gregorios didn’t so much as look up from his desk as I revealed the situation to him. He deferred to his tarot deck for guidance. “Six of swords. They are moving away from danger into calmer waters. This means they will return soon.”
Either he recognized the card’s grooves, or it spoke to him.
“Quit pacing,” he added. “Hector used to do that all the time, and I found it bothersome. You must settle yourself. They’ll be back soon enough, and we will remind Felaf how inappropriate this endeavor was. Until then, tell me what else you have gleaned from the apostate prisoner.”
I collapsed into the seat opposite the other one beside the fire. I twirled my ring in my fingers methodically, not yet ready to put the ring on. I wanted to savor the aching bruises and stinging cuts for as long as possible.
“Nothing apart from what I told you last,” I said finally. “He only talked to me after I convinced him we captured his sister and that Rahzlyn was dead. It worked, until I fucked up and revealed Rahzlyn was alive.”
Gregorios sat in the chair across from me. “Why did you say she was dead? Clever, by the way, to use his sister. Another reason why family poses a danger to a Chosen’s true loyalty.”
I ran my hand along my thigh. “I don’t know.
He was pissing me off, so I decided to piss him off in return.
” I never lost focus during a questioning.
“I still don’t understand how if this magical brand has always existed with the apostai, why are they able to speak about their rebellious cause to only me when I don’t bear the brand myself? ”
“I know not of any plausible reason that would enable such a thing, unless you were once marked with the brand somewhere within you that you have not been able to locate. It is also possible that no one else we captured bore the brand. Though that seems unlikely given how long the apostai have been using the branding tool.” Gregorios turned his head as if to look into the fire.
“But if it is as impossible to see to the naked eye as you claim, then it makes sense how it’s never been noticed before.
Guardians have not historically been part of interrogations involving the apostai. ”
I rubbed my tightening chest, wondering where Rahzlyn was. I’d never worried for the previous princesses like this.
“Do you believe what Kole claims is true?” I asked Gregorios. “That there’s a prophecy?”
“I believe that they believe there is one. After all, they have rebelled against the Astrals for thousands of years. There must have been something guiding their cause.”
“But you agree that only those gifted with Sight could produce true prophecies?”
“We seers divinate prophecies all the time depending on the messages our Astrals choose to share with us. Some acolytes are better at others than seeing further into the future. I do not recognize the words, though it is not to say they don’t originate from another territory.”
“Kole said that Rahzlyn was his, belonging to some foretold man. That everything in the prophecy is all to bring about either a fall or rise to power. A fallen Chosen, maybe?” I pondered.
“I am more concerned with what they intended to do with King Zephyr’s agate.” Gregorios frowned. “A talisman is useless in the hands of anyone else except its Chosen, yet it is the most valuable and indestructible stone in existence.”
“Should we warn him?”
“You said they believe only the Black Rose can take it, right?” Gregorios stroked his chin absentmindedly. “If they think that’s Novah, then his talisman is safe.”
“Maybe they wanted to blackmail King Zephyr for money, or some other precious commodity in return for it?” Even as I said it, I shook my head.
“The apostai aren’t that narrow-minded. Whatever they are after, it’s a cause bigger than themselves.
Bigger than all of us.” I paused. “Rahzlyn believes the curse is connected to the apostai. What if our curse is their cause?”
“Novah,” Gregorios corrected me. “It’s wise to presume anything could be possible. What I do know is that Novah and Kole are the keys to understanding it all, in time. The fact that you haven’t resorted to more persuasive measures to make him speak surprises me.”
“He means something to Rahzlyn.” Disgust stirred in my stomach. He was undeserving of her. “I can’t torture him without her permission. I won’t.”
“Novah,” Gregorios said pointedly again. “And if that is the case, why haven’t you told her yet about him?”
It was easier to plot and theorize with Gregorios than Rahzlyn. My conversations with the seer were tactical and impersonal.
“I didn’t tell her at first because I wanted to see what she would reveal. It quickly became apparent that she can’t lie to save her life.” Her expressive eyes flashed through my mind. “How is it that Baron Ionis didn’t notice his own wife was an apostate?”
“Sometimes it’s the ones we trust most who we forget to look a little more closely at.”
Since meeting Rahzlyn, I was reminded how much I did trust the people in my life—Hector, Gregorios, Alekko, Vesperah, Felaf, Letti, Nio, Gertah even. I couldn’t figure out how to reconcile that with Gregorios’s words of warning.
“Rahzlyn has had no idea about the lies and deceit that have surrounded her,” I said, wincing.
“Telling her that a man she was once in love with and her best friend both used her for their apostate agenda would shatter her. She’s suffered enough pain with the loss of her grandparents and uncertainty of her brother.
Everything she believed about herself and her identity has been a lie.
She can handle it, but there’s a lot on her shoulders right now. ”
“So, you are capable of empathy after all.” Gregorios’s following silence was assessing. “You care for her. I hear it in your voice.”
I shifted in the chair. “I merely feel guilty for not having believed her from the beginning,” I insisted, tasting the lie. “I worry my past has clouded my judgement more times than not.”
“It isn’t a bad thing to form ties with our fellow Chosens.
You have not had time to form a proper bond with your royal, but caring as a guardian will strengthen your ability to do your job effectively.
” He paused. “I’ve put our court in danger by sending you to Gemini, but that was an exceptional situation.
It can be easy to walk down the path of treason after getting away with it once. ”
My ears buzzed from his scrutiny. “I am in no such danger.”
“You’re certain there isn’t something else you wish to tell me?” Gregorios probed.
The other burden I carried wanted to surface.
Rahzlyn had once called me a hypocrite, and she was right. Here I was lying to everyone, including my seer, perhaps committing the most treasonous thing—all in the name of a woman I was forbidden from desiring.