Chapter 48 #2
She didn’t move. I didn’t think she even breathed. I could’ve broken the news to her in a far kinder way, but she could’ve also told us the whole truth.
“No,” she whispered.
“Yes.” I nodded as Isbeth’s voice haunted my thoughts. “It was him who retrieved Casteel.”
A tear fell from her eye, streaking across her cheek. “Is Casteel alive?”
I lifted my left hand, showing her the glimmering marriage imprint. “He is.” I swallowed hard. “But I’m sure you understand that means very little at this point.”
She shuddered, and I didn’t know if it was from relief or fear. A long moment passed. “Oh, gods,” she whispered on a ragged breath, closing her hands over her face. Her shoulders shook.
Forcing myself to sit back, I waited until she’d pulled herself together…and she did, just like I knew she would. It took a couple of minutes, but her shoulders stilled, and her hands lowered. Puffy, glassy eyes stared out from behind tear-soaked lashes. “It’s my fault.”
“No shit,” I snapped. At least, partially, it was. Because I…I had lost control. I’d given Isbeth the opening she needed.
She flinched. “I…I didn’t want people to know she’d won.”
I stilled. Everything in me stilled. “What?”
“It was…it was my ego. There’s no other way for me to say it.
I loved Malec once upon a time. I thought the moon and sun set and rose with him.
And she wasn’t like the other women. She sank her claws into him, and I knew…
I knew he loved her—loved her more than he loved me.
I didn’t want people to know that in the end, even with Malec entombed, she didn’t just win, she became a Queen,” she admitted hoarsely.
“Became the Crown that forced us to remain behind the Skotos Mountains, used our people to make monsters, and took—took my children. I didn’t want Casteel to know that the same woman who’d taken my first husband was who’d held him and then his brother.
She won in the end, and…she’s still managing to tear my family and kingdom apart. ”
Now I was the one struck speechless.
“I was embarrassed,” she continued. “And I didn’t…I know it’s no excuse. It just became something that was never spoken. A lie that became a reality after hundreds of years. Only Valyn and Alastir knew the truth.”
Alastir.
Of course.
“And their son?” I said. “What did you do with Isbeth and Malec’s son? Did you have him killed? Was it Alastir who carried it out?”
Pressing her lips together, she looked up at the ceiling. “Alastir did. He knew of the child before I even did. Valyn doesn’t know about the child at all.”
I stared at her. “Is that why you didn’t want to go to war? Because doing so would mean that Ileana’s real identity would be revealed, along with everything else?”
“Partly,” she admitted as she wiped the heels of her hands under her eyes. “But also because I didn’t want to see more Atlantians and mortals die.” She lowered trembling hands. “Malik is…is well and—” She cleared her throat. “He’s with her?”
“He appeared well, and he supports the Blood Crown. That is all I know,” I told her, sinking farther into the chair.
I didn’t know how much of what she said was the truth now, but I did know that the agony I felt from her hadn’t just been sorrow.
I recognized that the agony was partly shame now, something she’d carried for hundreds of years and would continue to shoulder.
To be honest, I didn’t know what I would’ve done if I had been in her place.
The war between her and Isbeth had started long before the first vampry had been created, and it’d never ended. “Malec wasn’t a deity.”
“I…I can see that.” She sniffed. “I mean, I saw that when you showed Gregori what you were. But I don’t understand. Malec —”
“He lied to you,” I said, spreading my hands along the arms of the chair. “I don’t know why, but he is one of Nyktos’s sons. He’s a god.”
Her surprise couldn’t be fabricated, and it cooled some of my anger. “I didn’t know—”
“I know.” I curled my fingers around the edges of the arms. “Malec confided in Isbeth. She knew.”
Eloana flinched as she let out a low whistle. “That stings more than it should.”
“Maybe you never stopped loving Malec.”
“Maybe,” she whispered, staring at her lap now. “I love Valyn. I love him dearly and fiercely. I also loved Malec, even though I don’t think I…knew anything about him. But I think Malec will always own a part of my heart.”
And the part owned by Malec would always belong to him, and that was…that was just sad.
“Isbeth is my mother,” I told her, and her eyes shot to mine. “I’m the daughter of her and Malec. And I married your son.”
She paled once more.
“It was a part of her plan,” I continued as Vonetta leaned into my leg. “That I would marry Malik and take Atlantia. With my bloodline and a Prince at my side, there would be absolutely nothing that could be done. But in a twist of fate, I married Casteel instead.”
“Her plan worked, then,” she rasped.
“No, it hasn’t,” I replied. “I will not take Atlantia in her name.”
“She has Malik and Casteel,” she countered, her tone hardening. “How has she not won?”
“She won’t kill them. Malik is helping her, and she can use Casteel against me like she used your sons against Atlantia,” I told her.
Her lips thinned. “I still don’t see how she hasn’t won.”
“Because I’m not you.” I noted the faint wince, and I didn’t even want to feel bad for inflicting it.
“I have been used my entire life in one way or another, and I will not be used again. I know what I am now. I know what it means to have had the power in me this whole time. My brother’s death wasn’t in vain. Neither was Lyra’s. I understand now.”
Eloana’s brows puckered. “What are you saying?”
“I can summon Nyktos’s guards, and I will. Isbeth may have her Revenants, her knights, soldiers, and those who support her.” My grip tightened. “But I will have the draken.”
Visibly shaken, it took Eloana a few moments to respond.
“Can you even—? I’m sorry. You can. You are a god.
” She smoothed a hand over her gown, a nervous habit, I realized.
“But are you sure? The draken are a fierce bloodline. There is a reason they went to sleep with Nyktos. Only he can control them.”
“I am his grandchild,” I reasoned, but I really had no idea how the draken would respond. I could only assume that what Nyktos had said also meant that they’d do so favorably. “And I don’t seek to control them. I just need their help.”
Understanding flickered through her. “I thought you and Casteel wanted to prevent war. You won’t once the draken are awakened.”
“By holding Casteel, she thinks she can stay my hand. But, sometimes, war cannot be prevented,” I said, echoing her words—ones I knew the Consort had whispered to me before when I first entered Saion’s Cove.
And that was something I’d realized on the journey back to Atlantia.
There would be no more talks or ultimatums. What was to come couldn’t be stopped.
It never could be. And in a way, the War of Two Kings had never ended.
There had just been a strained truce, like Isbeth had said.
All the years Casteel sought to move pieces behind the scenes, to free his brother and gain land for Atlantia hadn’t been wasted.
It had given Atlantia time to gain what they didn’t have before.
“No,” Eloana agreed quietly, sadly. “Sometimes, it cannot.”
I glanced to where Hisa stood beside Naill.
“Can you please send word to the Blood Crown that I will meet with them in the woods outside of Oak Ambler by the end of next week?” I told her.
“Make sure they understand that whoever they send had better be fit to receive a Queen. That I will only speak to her or to the King.”
The corners of the commander’s lips curved up as she bowed at the waist. “Yes, Your Majesty.”
“A message?” Eloana asked. “What are you planning?”
“First, I brought my friend back from Solis. The one I believed to have Ascended. She hasn’t, but she was wounded with what I believe was shadowstone, and my abilities aren’t working on her.
” I dragged my palms over my knees. “Delano took Tawny to one of the rooms and summoned a Healer. I would ask that you look after her. She is…” I inhaled deeply. “She was my first friend.”
Eloana nodded. “Of course. I will do all that I can to help her.”
“Thank you.” I cleared my throat. “I’m going to take a bath.
” A shower was… I couldn’t do that and not think of Casteel, and the only way I was surviving currently was by not thinking of him.
“I’m going to Iliseeum. Once I return, I will send the Blood Queen the kind of message only Casteel would be proud of. ”
“Knowing what my son would be proud of,” she said, voice thickening, “I can only imagine what kind of message that will be.”
I felt my lips curve up in a tight, savage smile. “And then I’m going to finish what you started centuries ago. I will return these lands to Atlantia, and I will return with my King at my side.”
Golden eyes locked with mine. “And if you fail?”
“I won’t.”