Chapter 62
MYRA
The door clicked shut softly behind Myra, and she padded down the hall to the small bathing chambers to relieve herself. After she washed her hands, she opened the door of the chambers and nearly yelped in fright.
A flickering candlelight in the living room painted grotesque shadows across Rian’s ominous form. He leaned on the opposite wall with his arms crossed over his chest.
Myra pressed a hand to her heart to calm her breathing. "C-can I help you?"
"We need to talk." Rian pushed off the wall and headed toward the living room.
Myra glanced at the bedroom door where Laurince was asleep.
The transformation had taken a huge toll on his body, and he hadn’t even stirred when she left the bed.
She yearned to return to him, but she supposed he would have to wait.
While she considered Rian to be a friend, he was still a king first.
She wiped her slick palms on the long slip Phaia had let her borrow, then pulled her sweater tighter around her torso before following Rian.
When Myra entered, he barely glanced at her. Instead, he held out a hand toward the couch. "Sit."
With a curt nod, Myra scurried over to the couch and sat. She folded her hands in her lap, twisting her fingers.
Instinctively, she reached out. Apprehension, fear, and anger dripped from Rian’s pores.
Rian ran a hand over his hair. The dye had faded marginally, turning his hair into a dark burgundy shade. "You risk your safety staying in that room with him."
A knuckle cracked, and she shook the sting from her hand. "He’s not a danger. He’s still him," she argued.
Rian halted his pacing, and his hands fell to his sides in tight fists. "We do not know that."
"He hasn’t hurt any of us since he woke up." If Laurince couldn’t stand up for himself, she would do it for him.
"Yet," Rian bit out.
The word twisted in her gut uncomfortably.
"See!" he spat, waving his hand at her. "Even you and your hopeful optimism cannot deny that. There is too much we do not know about the effects of the serum. It would be unwise of us not to consider the potential side effects. You were there when he woke up the first time. He moved through the room like a tornado. We’re lucky he didn’t find those knives first and stab one of us. "
"He wouldn’t have done that!"
"He could have," Rian countered. "And that is precisely my point. He is stronger than all of us combined."
Myra bit the inside of her cheek.
Was this why Rian wished to talk to her? To berate her and her choices? It wasn’t Laurince’s fault that he had been subjected to the poison.
Myra lifted her chin. Rian might have been a king, but she was done cowering at the feet of royals. "He needs support. He needs to know we are here for him."
Rian sneered. "And what do you know of his needs, hmm? It was only a week or so ago when you denied your feelings for him."
Myra’s lips parted, her voice catching in her throat. Where was this anger coming from? This was not the Rian she had come to know.
"Our relationship, as new as it may be, is none of your business, Your Highness," she hissed. "He is my friend, too. Have you seen how scared he is? Have you felt his fear? His anxiety? His rage?"
Rian’s lips formed a flat line.
"No?" Myra asked, struggling to keep her voice quiet lest she wake Phaia and Laurince.
"Well, I have. He is scared and frightened—more than you can even imagine.
And right now, what he needs the most is not to feel alone.
If that puts my life at risk, then so be it!
But it is my risk to take, not yours to deny. "
Rian curled his hands tighter, and his body seemed to tremble.
"If the roles were reversed," Myra pressed, "Laurince would be right by your side, doing the same thing I am."
Rian groaned and collapsed into the chair behind him. Myra froze as his head fell into his hands. His shoulders shook as regret and remorse weighed heavily on him.
After a moment, he cleared his throat and swatted at the fresh tears.
"Laurince has always been a better man than I. He would jump in front of an arrow for me. It’s what makes him such an excellent captain.
But…" He ran a hand across his head. "He’s so much more to me than that. He’s been more of a brother to me than my own flesh and blood.
I’m scared and I…I don’t know how to help him. "
Myra leaned forward, her hands resting on her knees. "We’re all scared, Rian."
"After the way things went at the trial, I don’t even know if I have a title anymore. If I did...If had access to the castle, I could have the best healers observing him, searching for a way to reverse the serum."
"Perhaps instead of thinking about how to reverse the serum, we should put our energy into being there for him? We don’t know if there is a cure, and right now, that doubt only makes it worse. Laurince needs to know that no matter what happens, we will be there for him."
Rian pressed the heels of his hands against his eye sockets and nodded. He exhaled a shaky breath.
"Was this…was this what you wished to talk to me about?"
He shook his head.
"I didn’t think so," Myra whispered.
Rian peeled his hands away from his face. His sad, green eyes bore into her, and when she looked into them, feelings of hurt and betrayal seeped from them.
"Why did you do it?" he asked, the question barely above a whisper.
"I’m sorry?" Myra’s brows twisted together.
"Telling my people that Kalisandre manipulated me is one thing. It’s not something I would have said so easily, but to tell the judge that I was the one performing tests on animals and humans?
To give my people the impression that I am to blame for the drakonises?
For Laurince? Why did you do it? Why did you lie? "
Myra’s mouth went dry. With everything else that had happened, she had nearly forgotten about the judge’s questioning. She wiped her hands on her knees. "The judge…I-I think he had some ability. I could only say yes or no to his questions and only the truth."
"But it’s not true! I had no part in it. Sebastian may have shown me Nyrri, but I didn’t condone it. I didn’t—" Rian shook his head, stumbling over his words. "I thought you knew me better than that. I thought…"
Myra gasped, panicking. "No, listen to me. The judge found a loophole in his questioning. He asked me if the king was performing tests on animals and humans. He didn’t specify which king.
You might not have, but Domitius did. I was forced to tell the truth.
I tried to say no, but it was as if the intention of his question was sewn into his words. "
"Are you…are you sure?" Rian asked, the mistrust written clearly across his countenance.
"Yes," Myra promised. "I would never betray you."
She knew how those words sounded. By now, she knew her word held little weight.
While Myra believed, deep down, that she was a loyal person, her actions for the past century suggested and proved otherwise.
But when she spoke those words aloud now, she meant them with every fiber of her being. She was done aiding the other side.
"Whatever you need me to do to prove to you I meant it, tell me. I’ll do anything," Myra said, standing.
Rian held up a hand. "I want to believe you," he whispered. "My own insecurities are making it hard to do that, though."
"Rian—" Myra began, but stopped when he shook his head.
"What’s done is done. Now I have to figure out how to undo the damage."
He rubbed his hands over his knees, his brows scrunched, creasing the center of his forehead.
"Phaia believes there are still some people who remain suspicious of Sebastian’s claims, despite everything that happened during the trial.
Whether it is because they believe in me or they just hate my brother remains to be known.
Although I’m not sure if it matters at this point.
Maybe…maybe if we gain enough allies, we will still have a chance to save them from Sebastian.
I refuse to abandon my people. I refuse…
" Rian choked on his words, a wave of emotion consuming him.
"Rian," Myra breathed. An apology was on the tip of her tongue, but she knew an apology would do little to nothing to help him.
He peered up at her, and the bags beneath his eyes were a dark purple shade, weighing heavily on his face. "There is one thing you can do."
Myra stood and took a step forward. "Whatever you need."
"Go be with Lo. Help him," he said, tipping his head toward the hallway.
Myra chewed on her lip, but nodded and forced her feet to move. When she reached the entrance to the hallway, she glanced back at Rian. His head was once again in his palms. And though his shoulders didn’t tremble, there was still too much weight bearing down on them.