Chapter 29
CASSIA
Cassia replied softly, “The Daemaris isn’t here. I’m sorry.”
His lids lifted with a slowness that spoke of immense effort. Golden eyes met hers, their legendary sharpness dulled by a film of fatigue and pain, yet still unnervingly steady.
“You’ve found your way into a private retreat,” he observed, his voice a dry rasp. “The staff knows better than to disturb me.” His gaze narrowed. “But you are not staff.”
“No,” she swallowed, but she dared a step forward. “I’m one of the guests. Pardon me, I didn’t mean to intrude.”
A pause. Then, with dry detachment: “Guests at my mate’s events rarely seek quiet corners. They thrive in the glare. Are you certain you belong here?”
She couldn’t help but laugh. “Frankly, I wonder the same thing.” She took a step closer. “Arkenoth brought me.”
His eyes flickered. “My son did?”
She nodded. Another pause.
“Then, do sit down,” he said. It wasn’t warm, but it wasn’t unkind either.
She moved to a nearby bench—not directly across, but angled, respectful. Only then did he shift, just slightly, but the motion cost him. His breath caught, sharp and deep with pain.
Cassia’s instincts surged.
“Can I help?” she asked, already rising. His brow rose slightly. “I’m a Kitchen Witch. I know a few things about healing.” Her eyes swept the planters. “There are some herbs I could steep into a tonic. It might take the edge off.”
He didn’t answer, but after a breath, he lifted the cup from the small table beside him and extended it toward her.
Cassia took it, her hands falling into the familiar rhythm of a Kitchen Witch—knowing, sure.
She plucked a few leaves, drew water from the air, held the cup to the small runic heater by his feet until it hummed with warmth.
The steam rose fragrant with bitter zest and herbs—simple, honest comfort.
When she handed it back, the Daemar took it in unsteady hands and sipped.
Another beat.
“You know pain,” he said at last, leaning back.
“Enough to know how to ease it,” she replied softly. “Just a little.”
He studied her with the quiet, exacting gaze of a man who’d spent his life seeing through excuses and pretty lies. It reminded her achingly of Ark—that same intensity, restrained and watchful.
“My mother knew a ritual,” she found herself saying. “For an elixir from the deep sea. It wouldn’t mend anything broken. But it lets you breathe.”
The Daemar gave a wheezy chuckle. “Being able to breathe sounds like paradise.” His gaze steadied. Then, almost wistfully: “You would summon the ocean for a stranger?”
A little smile curled her lips. “I don’t see you as a stranger.”
His eyebrows arched. A small, gleaming item on the floor caught her gaze—a gold cufflink. She bent to pick it up—
A voice cut through the silence. “You shouldn’t be here.”
Cassia whirled around. The Daemaris stood a few steps away, a stark silver-and-white statue against the living green. Her eyes flicked from Cassia to the man in the wheelchair.
“Forgive me,” Cassia said. “The door was open.”
“It cannot be.” Delphyne’s voice was a shard of ice. “The conservatory is always locked whenever Ark’s father is here. No one enters without my express invitation.” She took a step forward, and the temperature in the room seemed to drop. “You will explain how you entered. Now.”
“I don’t know. Someone must have forgotten to lock the doors, somehow. I only wanted a quiet place. Ark told me to come here.”
The Daemaris studied her. Not just her face, but her aura—Cassia could feel it, the feathering of magic brushing against her own. A test. A probe. Then—
A flicker passed through Delphyne’s face. She went very still.
“You aren’t lying,” she said, her voice softening just slightly. “Strange.” She looked around. “Where is Arkenoth? Why isn’t he with you?”
Cassia’s brow furrowed. “Daemaris, you called him to the library. He went to speak with you.”
Delphyne’s gaze sharpened. “No, I didn’t.”
Cassia felt the chill spreading through her. “But . . . one of your footmen delivered the message. He was wearing your livery. He said you requested him at once.”
The Daemaris was silent. Cassia’s mind raced, trying to make sense of it. Ark had been lured away. The footman had been waiting, and had delivered a message that was never sent. The hairs on her arms lifted.
At her side, the Daemar stirred. “Delph,” he rasped.
Delphyne crossed to him at once, smoothing a hand over his shoulder. “I’m here, Kassenor.”
Silence passed between them—intimate, even tender.
Cassia saw it now in the arrangement of the room, the softness of the blankets, the care with which the plants were placed.
This wasn’t a man cast aside from power.
This was someone preserved, protected—placed among the flowers because they comforted him.
Lucindra’s words returned to her, but now they took on a different meaning. Had Delphyne taken up the mantle not out of ambition, but necessity? To shelter the legacy of the one beside her?
The Daemar looked again at Cassia, studying her longer this time. The narrowing of his eyes felt more like a father’s curiosity than a leader’s scrutiny.
“You came with my son,” he said. “Who are you, to him?”
Before she could answer, Delphyne did, her tone unreadable. “She is his Chosen.”
The Daemar’s brows lifted slightly. He said nothing—only reclined with a rasp of breath, his gaze still on her.
Cassia took a careful step back. “I should leave you two alone.”
But before she could turn, Delphyne’s voice halted her. “Wait.”
The Daemaris’s expression held no overt threat, but something in her gaze pinned Cassia in place.
“I do not know how you were able to enter, but you are not to speak of this to anyone. Especially Arkenoth.”
Cassia hesitated. “Ark is the Daemar’s son. He has the right to know.”
Delphyne’s eyes flared before softening. “If you were in my position, perhaps you would understand why I ask. He already carries enough.” Her gaze dropped, briefly, to where Kassenor rested—pale, too still. “Let him have a little longer. Let me carry this.”
For a moment, Cassia considered refusing. This wasn’t a promise about a baking secret. It was about a man’s life. Not just any man, but Ark’s father—the one he had spent years resenting, yes, but also the one he still, despite everything, wanted to understand.
And the knowledge that his father had been ill, all this time, might be the key to that understanding.
If she swore this oath and kept this secret, she would be choosing for him, deciding what he deserved to know. But if she refused, she would be betraying a dying man’s wife—a woman who had spent years trying to protect her husband from the weight of his own decline.
There was no clean answer. Only the least terrible one.
“I promise I won’t tell,” Cassia said, her gaze moving between them. “But one of you must.”
Delphyne held out her hand, palm up. “Give me your word.”
Cassia looked at that hand and back at her eyes. “You want a binding oath?”
“I want your sincerity shaped into something I can hold.”
Cassia hesitated, heart pounding against her ribs. Once she did this, there was no going back. No forgetting. No undoing.
Gingerly, she stepped forward. The air between them shimmered. She placed her hand in Delphyne’s. “I swear,” she said, “I will not tell Ark about his father’s condition.”
A slow warmth rose between them, a glow of blue light enveloping her wrist before it faded. After a moment of silence, Delphyne withdrew her hand.
“It is done.”
A cool sensation replaced the warmth, lingering on Cassia’s wrist like the ghost of a chain. The secret settled beside her heart, a lump of coal she wished she didn’t have to carry.
The corridor beyond the conservatory was empty. Cassia tried to not look back—trying not to carry the image of the Daemar’s drawn face with her.
It clung to her anyway.
She paused, touching her fingertips to her temple.
She would have to find Ark soon. She would have to look him in the eye and pretend she hadn’t just discovered the truth his parents had kept from him for years.
She would have to smile, speak, be the same person she’d been an hour ago while carrying this secret.
She took a breath. Let it out. Steadied herself.
One step at a time.
She’d barely taken three steps when Alderrath stepped out of an alcove just ahead of her.
“Enjoyed your stroll?”
That soft, calm voice slithered down her back. Had he been standing there the whole time, watching the conservatory door? Waiting for her to emerge with exactly the expression she was wearing now?
Cassia straightened her spine. She met his gaze and held it.
“The conservatory is usually locked,” he said, gesturing lazily behind her. “Sealed, actually, warded to keep wandering eyes out. Strange, don’t you think, that it opened for you?”
Her stomach dropped. The spell hadn’t broken; it had been peeled back just for her. A carefully laid trap.
“So it was you,” she said. “How did you unlock the door? The Daemaris said—”
“Varil Delphyne may be a powerful demon, but I’m not without resources.”
“How did you know I would go to the conservatory?”
He shrugged, the gesture indolent, unhurried.
“This ball must feel rather . . . overwhelming for an outsider. It was easy to guess you’d seek refuge from the crowd, and Arkenoth has always been fond of the conservatory—even as a boy.
” His eyes gleamed, sharp and knowing. “He and his father have that in common.”
Cassia’s stomach tightened. Alderrath had known she would find the Daemar there. The conservatory hadn’t been a refuge—it had been a trap, and she’d walked right into it.
He took a few slow steps toward her. “What did you think? Ark’s father is quite the relic, isn’t he?” His silver eyes flicked to her hands, to the faint green still smudging her nailbeds. “You tried to help him. How touching.”
Cassia’s fingers curled. “He was in pain.”