Chapter 7
Chapter Seven
RULING HOUSE
When we leave the War Room, I brace myself.
I know my father told me to speak up, but my parents may have had other plans.
Undoubtedly did, if I’m honest, and that didn’t involve giving Raven lands to the people who tried to kill them.
But I can’t escape the feeling that it was the right thing to do.
My mother is quiet, walking ahead of me as we head down the long hallway.
My father pats my shoulder, then goes to join her.
I frown, quickening my pace. Varin is escorting the humans and Ira from the house, so I don’t need to worry about them overhearing anything.
Bertrand is following me, of course, and my parents’ personal guards, but I know they can be trusted.
‘Mother!’ I hiss.
She glances back at me, slowing her pace. Red lines her eyes. Oh darkness. What now? I bite down my frustration, but honestly. First, she drops the Challenge on me, now this. Does she really think I’m just going to go to bed and not talk about it?
My father, his hand at her waist, steers her into the Costume Room, beckoning me to follow.
The door closes behind us, the guards waiting beyond.
My mother glides between the mannequins, clothed in family garments from across the centuries, and sinks gracefully onto the padded seat beneath the huge arched windows.
Outside, feathery clouds scud across a navy sky speckled with stars, a pale crescent of moon visible above the swaying trees.
My father inspects a suit of shimmering armour, pulling the sleeve of his shirt over his hand to polish some non-existent smudge. I wonder what in darkness he’s doing. Then I realise.
I sigh, then make my way between the faceless dark figures, taking a seat next to my mother, my hands braced against the cushions. I don’t care what she has to say, no matter the ache in my chest. I stand behind my decision.
‘How do you feel that went?’ Her voice is a cool chime, moonlight silvering the curve of her head.
‘As far as I can see, it solved two problems at once.’
‘How so?’ She glances at me.
‘Well, it’s the end of the North Wind, if they accept our offer.
And it also solves the problem of who to send to the Channel Islands.
’ This has been one of the sticking points in the project.
I would love nothing more than for every human in my realm to be free.
But the massive fucking flaw in this plan is that vampires need blood, and if I shut down the Safe Zones and cut off their supply, chaos will ensue.
The Channel Islands are supposed to be a symbol of my new reign, a place to show the world what’s possible.
But how to choose which humans to send there has been bothering me for a while.
The whole project has, to be honest, but I can’t quite put my finger on why.
Nor can I think of a better alternative at the moment.
‘And if they don’t accept the offer?’
‘Why wouldn’t they accept? Surely it’s better than staying wherever they are, waiting for Raven or Reapers to get them. And that’s another thing. What in darkness did they mean when they said they weren’t in Safe Zones?’
‘Not every human in the world lives in a Safe Zone.’ My father strolls towards us, casual as though what he’s saying doesn’t go against everything I’ve been taught.
‘What?’
‘There have long been human settlements outside Safe Zones,’ my mother says. ‘Mainly on the edge of the Great Forest. They usually don’t last too long; either hunted dry or cleared by Reapers. Raven move them on whenever they find them.’
‘Move them on?’
‘Into Safe Zones, where they’ll be safe. What?’ She frowns at me.
My mouth hangs open. I have about twenty things I want to say, none of them particularly wise. ‘Why has no one ever told me this?’
‘They’re small settlements, not easy to find,’ my mother continues. ‘Ten, twenty humans at most, some of them nomadic. We’ve always felt it best to focus our resources elsewhere. But now, it seems, we have to look more closely at them.’
‘You know of the documentation we found following Mistral’s death,’ my father says, ‘detailing the rebel network within Safe Zones. What’s been more difficult to track are any external cells, where the remaining rebels would be. As your mother says, they’re not easy to find.’
‘Gods.’ My throat is tight. ‘So if they don’t accept our offer—’
‘—they’ll go back to their cells. And now they know about your project.’
Expose nothing that you do not wish to have exploited.
Shit. I drop my head into my hands, despair rolling over me.
How am I ever going to do this? Vampires have centuries of living to hone their intellect, to learn about the world.
I only have my few human decades, and I need to sleep as well. I sit up, blowing out a deep breath.
‘They’ll accept,’ I say.
‘How do you know?’
‘Because I’m offering them what they’re fighting for! The chance to live a normal life. To be free. They’re being attacked, by Reapers. There are children with them.’
‘That’s what they told us,’ my father says. ‘But what else have I taught you about negotiation?’
My stomach lurches. Maybe I’ve really screwed this up.
‘To not take every statement at face value,’ I mutter.
The faceless mannequins, dressed in the chain mail and silk of my ancestors, seem to be judging me, an audience for my failures.
My mouth twists. Screw that. ‘I believed them,’ I say.
‘And it just felt like the right thing to do. To give something back.’
My mother nods. ‘Do not forget, Emelia, that you’ll be ruling vampires as well as humans. We are not the monsters you think us to be. Both need to be considered in your plans.’
‘I know.’ I do know this. But I also feel like vampires have everything, and humans don’t have much of anything at all.
My mother gets to her feet, one hand stroking my hair. ‘I am proud of you, you know,’ she says. ‘But this will not be easy.’
‘I’m getting tired of hearing that,’ I snap. ‘I don’t expect it to be. What would be helpful is being given all the information I need.’
‘I cannot cram a lifetime of knowledge into a few short months!’ My mother’s voice sharpens, her hand leaving my hair. ‘We’re telling you all we can in the time we have. I had much to learn when I gained my crown, and you are no different. So do not point the finger when you don’t know something!’
‘I’m not pointing the finger! But I think it would have been useful to know that not all humans live in Safe Zones, seeing as I’m trying to change things for them.’
‘Changing things for humans cannot come at the expense of your vampire subjects!’
‘Oh, yes, darkness forbid vampires are inconvenienced! Maybe I should start donating my blood as well.’
‘Now, Emelia—’
‘Do not be ridiculous.’ My mother’s voice cuts across my father’s. ‘You might be human, but you are vampire-born.’
‘So what?’ I snarl. ‘What does that give me, apart from a family name? I have to rule over vampires, who could kill me any time they feel like it, and to do so I have to let humans, like me, be brutalised just to appease them. I won’t do it!
That is not the ruler I want to be! It’s why I ran away in the first place! ’
The red is back in my mother’s gaze. I know my running away scared her, and she doesn’t like to be reminded of it. I drop my head in my hands, angry tears hot against my palms.
‘What is it, dear one?’ The cushion moves as my father sits next to me, his hand gentle on my back.
‘I just … I don’t know how to do this. Vampires … any one of you can kill me—No, you know it’s true,’ I say, over my mother’s rising protests. ‘How the hell am I supposed to rule people who can kill me without even thinking about it?’
‘Is this why you’re focusing on humans?’ My mother’s voice softens. ‘Oh, Emelia. Because they’re—’
‘Because they’re like me. It’s just … this is such a huge job. I want to do it, but I have no idea how.’
‘Which is why your father and I will support you, as much as we can.’ Her hand returns to my hair. I take comfort in her gentle touch, as I have all my life.
‘I need to be able to rule on my own, too. To make the decisions I want to make.’ There it is. Another thing that’s been lurking under the surface.
‘And you will. I was eighteen, like you, when I took my crown. My father was very much part of things for the first years of my reign.’
‘How many years?’
My mother looks away. ‘Twenty.’
‘Twenty? Absolutely not happening.’
‘Maybe you should get some rest, and we can talk about this later.’ My father stands. ‘It’s been a long night for us all.’
‘I’m staying here.’ I don’t want to go back to my room yet, to stare at the ceiling while frustration eats at my bones. Twenty fucking years? Why even bother to crown me at all?
‘Come and find me, when you wake.’ My mother’s cool lips brush my brow. Then she and my father are gone, leaving me alone with my turbulent thoughts.
I wonder whether my parents forget sometimes that I won’t live as long a life as they will.
Or perhaps they choose not to remember. Of course I need guidance, still have a lot to learn.
But I refuse to be a figurehead, unable to make my own decisions.
I’m the only person who truly understands how it is to live both as a vampire and as a human.
It’s an almost unbearable pressure, moving between the two.
But I need to be able to stand on my own two feet, or I risk losing everything I came back home for.