48. A Duel and a Death
L ady Duskbriar gasps. Several other people follow.
Selene stares.
Everyone stares, eyes darting from Dorian to Selene, awaiting some kind of explanation.
Selene clutches her bouquet. Her gaze doesn’t move from Dorian. What are you doing?
Dorian looks straight back. He tilts his head, ever so slightly, as if to say trust me.
He’s stalling. Someone has found something, and he’s stalling for time.
This is a terrible idea. She should refute him. She should marry Eirik and figure out the rest later. If she doesn’t, and the evidence doesn’t arrive… everything is lost.
“What is the meaning of this?” Lord Duskbriar, composure fraying.
“Lord Nightbloom, you will explain yourself,” King Alden demands.
Dorian takes a tentative step forward. “I’m afraid Selene cannot marry King Eirik,” Dorian explains. “Because she’s already married to me. We reconnected two years ago, at my father’s funeral, and have been meeting in secret ever since.”
Selene’s heart stops.
It’s the same story as last time. It’s possible Soren told him, of course. It’s possible that Dorian is coming up with the same story as before all by himself. It makes sense, after all, and yet—
And yet…
Dorian takes another step forward. “We knew you would never approve of a marriage between us, but on the evening of the Fortescue Ball three months ago, we could no longer resist our feelings and decided to elope.” He pauses, searching Selene’s face. “We were wed by a priest from my own estate.”
It’s word-for-word the tale he concocted the first time they eloped. This isn’t a tale he’s repeating. It can’t be.
He remembers.
Selene sways, recovering herself at the last moment. She can’t faint. Not now.
“Lady Selene,” says King Eirik, “is there any truth to these allegations?”
Selene doesn’t look at him. She can’t look anywhere but Dorian’s face. Dorian, his hazel eyes hers.
He knows her. He knows everything.
The practical part of her still tells her to deny it. There’s no evidence, of course. Nothing he is saying can be proven.
And still…
“Yes,” she says. “It’s all true. Dorian Nightbloom is my husband.”
A shocked gasp rises from the rest of the congregation.
“No!” her mother hisses. “No, this isn’t true—they’re lying!”
“We have no reason to lie, Lady Duskbriar,” Dorian says cooly. “We are not like you.”
“If this is true,” says King Alden, “then why this whole charade—”
“For your sake, Your Majesty,” Dorian carries on. “For many months now, Lady Selene has been trying to help me uncover a plot against Haverland itself—a plot orchestrated by King Eirik… and Lady Duskbriar.”
“This is outrageous!” Lady Duskbriar yells. “He is a liar, Your Majesty. My husband and I have been your friends these many years. Lord Nightbloom is obsessed with my daughter. He’s been filling her head with lies—”
“Lady Selene,” King Alden says. “Is Lord Nightbloom speaking the truth?”
Selene can hardly believe that this is happening, but the truth falls from her nonetheless. “Yes, Sire.”
Another shocked whisper ripples through the crowd. Lady Duskbriar opens her mouth to speak again. King Eirik is impressively silent, like he’s choosing his next words carefully.
Guards burst in, running up the aisle. One of them carries a handful of letters. He gives them to King Alden, who skims through them with widening eyes. Hushed whispers pass between them.
“Guards, arrest Lady Duskbriar,” King Alden announces. “And Duke Drakefell.”
Duke Drakefell does not hesitate. He stands, lunging towards the nearest guard and freeing him of his sword. He arches wildly, forcing everyone around him to move before lunging for the exit. Several of the other lords follow suit—men who know their secrets are about to be dragged into the light.
The guards run after them, splitting in all directions.
Screams colour the air as guests scramble away from the violence, overturning chairs and trampling over floral arrangements in their panic. The guards rush forward, but they are too few, struggling to contain the chaos erupting around them. The wedding procession dissolves into a battleground.
Selene hardly knows where to look. At Dorian seems like the obvious place, but so much is happening around them, and through the crowd of fraught onlookers, she spies Lady Duskbriar slipping away, her silken skirts vanishing between fleeing nobles .
Selene moves to follow her, but she doesn’t get far before Dorian shoots out ahead, following the Duke.
“Drakefell!” he shouts, but the man does not stop.
Dorian pushes past flailing bodies, past the startled nobles trying to flee, past the guards who cannot keep up. He will not lose him. Not now.
Selene wants to follow them, but she’ll be no good in a duel, and she has to stop her mother. She has no idea how far her influence extends. If she escapes now, it’s possible she’ll never be found.
No, no. Not now.
Selene wants her to pay.
Her heels sink into the soft earth as she runs after her, wedding gown tangled around her ankles. This isn’t the proper attire for a chase. “Mother!” she calls, her breath sharp, her lungs burning.
Lady Duskbriar does not stop. She slips through the maze of hedges and into the grounds beyond. Selene follows, her heart hammering, her dress snagging against thorns. But she doesn’t slow.
She will not let her mother escape.
Her mother makes it all the way to the bower house before her dress catches on a stone, slowing her escape.
“It’s over,” Selene says. “You’ll never escape. You won’t get away from here. There’s nowhere you can go—”
“ Why ?” her mother hisses. “I was certain… I was certain when I knew that Nightbloom didn’t remember, you understood. Ashvold is the only way—”
“You can’t think I’d possibly come around to your side, just because Dorian didn’t remember me?”
“You were alone!” her mother insists. “There wasn’t anyone else for you! I thought, if I just pretended not to remember, we could be, we could…”
“We could what, Mother?”
“We could be the mother and daughter I’d always wanted us to be,” she continues. “I’m… I’m sorry I didn’t recognise your worth earlier. I’m sorry I didn’t cultivate your intelligence. I could have en gineered a match between you and King Eirik directly before now. If I’d known… if I’d thought— ”
“I am not a plant to be pruned,” Selene tells her. “Not a thing to be made. All you should ever have wanted for me is for me to be happy. Why… why couldn’t you want that for me? You sold me to the Duke! Do you know how he… what he did to me, in another life ? ”
Lady Duskbriar’s eyes widen. “I thought he would be good to you.”
“He killed me while I was pregnant with Dorian’s child.”
Lady Duskbriar flinches.
“If he hadn’t, Dorian wouldn’t have had to reset the timeline. I could have several children by now. You could have grandchildren. Could that not have made you happy?”
Lady Duskbriar looks down. “There’s a fragile happiness in raising children,” she tells her. “So easily broken in a world that makes no allowances for fragility. It’s not a happiness that lasts. I was trying to make a better world for you—”
“Then you should have loved me!” Selene snaps. “That’s all we really need—”
“No,” she says more harshly. “It isn’t. We need security. And we should never depend upon love to get it.”
“Love is a good start.”
Selene moves towards her mother, one hesitant step at a time. If she can get to her side, she thinks, perhaps her mother will stop. Perhaps she’ll realise that there’s no point in running—
An iron grip clamps around her wrist, wrenching her back.
Duke Drakefell.
She gasps, twisting, but he’s faster. His other arm locks around her waist, yanking her flush against his chest. Cold steel presses to her throat, sharp enough that she dares not breathe too hard.
A hand seizes her hair, forcing her chin up, exposing her neck.
His breath is hot and ragged against her ear.
“You’ve ruined everything!” he snarls. “ Whore ! To think you flirted with me while you were fucking another man, and fucking up all our plans— ”
Selene’s pulse thuds against the blade’s edge. She doesn’t remember it, but she’s died like this before.
No, no, not again, not now—
Dorian bursts onto the scene, skidding to a halt at the sight of her, of the blade, of the Duke’s grip. His hazel eyes blaze.
“Let her go.” His voice is low, cold, deadly. Then, sharper: “Let go of my wife!”
The Duke doesn’t move.
“Please,” Lady Duskbriar cries. She takes a step forward, hands trembling. “Don’t hurt her—”
“Silence!” Drakefell barks. “I’m done with listening to you! You promised me that she would be my wife, only she fucks me over for the King of Ashvold himself! Was this your plan all along?”
His grip tightens, a sharp sting blooming where the blade nicks her skin. “I won’t let you take everything from me, you little—”
Selene barely hears him. Her gaze locks onto the bower house roof, and there—just barely visible against the tiles—is Soren. A silhouette against the sky, his throwing dagger poised.
But he doesn’t throw.
Not yet.
Because if he does, and he misses—
She dies.
Again.
It’s not her memory, but it crashes into her, unbidden. The sensation of steel across her throat, the sickening finality of death stealing over her, the agony of knowing she’d lost everything, that Dorian would be alone again, that their baby would die inside her—
Not today.
Selene drives her elbow back, hard, straight into Drakefell’s ribs. He grunts, the impact loosening his hold just enough. She twists, tearing herself free, rolling to the side just as—
Soren’s dagger flies.
It sinks into the Duke’s shoulder with a sickening thud.
Drakefell staggers back, cursing, reaching for the blade lodged in his flesh .
Soren growls from above, already reaching for another knife. “I missed again? ”
Drakefell snarls, yanking the dagger from his shoulder. Blood pours freely, staining his already dishevelled coat, but he doesn’t falter. His eyes—wild, red-rimmed, desperate—lock onto Selene again.