31. Stellan
STELLAN
The damaged wall turned solid again, cutting off Adrian and the noise from the upper court.
White light sealed the fracture, though a red line remained inside the stone. Harrowmere had pushed him out. It hadn’t repaired the harm he’d done.
Bryony kept hold of my hand. She looked at the place where Adrian had stood, then at me.
I knew the question was coming. I also knew better than to make her ask twice.
“Lenora, can you hold this room?”
Lenora nodded. “The witnesses and I can hold the inner door. If Adrian tries the dagger again, we’ll call you.”
“Don’t open the gate for anyone,” Bryony said.
“I’ve learnt that lesson.” Lenora’s gaze moved to me. “Go. She deserves the rest of it from you.”
Bryony led me out of the throne room. She didn’t speak as we crossed the lower hall, and I didn’t use the walk to prepare a kinder version of the truth.
The door to her new room opened at her touch. She went inside and waited while I shut it behind us.
Her coat still lay over the chair where Harrowmere had placed it. The bag she’d brought from her human life sat beside the bed. We’d spent less than two days in the court, yet Adrian had already made the world above feel distant.
Bryony sat on the edge of the bed. I took the chair across from her.
“You already told me how Cecily died,” she said. “What did you leave out?”
“How long I knew she was losing control. What happened while I kept trying to save her. What I did after she died.”
She rested her hands on her thighs. “Start with how long.”
“Eight months.”
The number stripped away any hope that I’d discovered the danger too late to prevent it.
Her face changed. “You knew for eight fucking months?”
“I knew the Crown was making her afraid. I didn’t know Adrian had fed his blood into it until the final week.”
Bryony’s voice stayed quiet. I would’ve preferred shouting. Quiet meant she was listening closely enough to remember every word.
“You still knew she was using it against people.”
“Yes.”
Bryony didn’t fill the silence or offer me an easier question.
“It began with restrictions,” I said. “Cecily closed the outer gate after dark and searched rooms when she thought someone had stolen from the vault. Then she started hearing threats in ordinary disagreements. She ordered guards to confine anyone she didn’t trust.”
“Did you follow those orders?”
“Some of them. I released people when she slept and told myself I was limiting the damage.”
I’d called those secret releases a solution. They’d only returned frightened people to their rooms while Cecily kept the power to imprison them again.
Bryony’s expression hardened. “That couldn’t last.”
“It didn’t. The Crown fed on her fear and made each order harsher. If someone resisted, she treated the resistance as proof that they meant to betray her.”
I could still remember the first guard who’d refused her. Tomas had served Harrowmere for sixty years. He’d lowered his sword when Cecily ordered him to arrest a human family for planning to leave the estate.
“She commanded me to kill one of my guards,” I said. “The order took hold. I fought it long enough for him to run, but the gates closed before he reached them.”
Bryony went very still. “Did you kill him?”
“Yes.”
My stomach tightened as I said it. Tomas had deserved to have his name spoken without the lie I’d attached to it.
“I broke his neck,” I continued. “Cecily started crying as soon as it was done. She said the Crown had spoken with her voice and she couldn’t stop it. She begged me to help her remove it without letting the court know.”
“And you agreed.”
“I loved her. She was my closest friend, and I thought I could protect her while we found a way to take it off.”
Love explained the choice. It didn’t excuse it.
“So you hid what happened.”
“I told the court Tomas had attacked the queen. His family believed he’d betrayed us. I let that lie stand for a century.”
Bryony looked towards the dark window. The garden outside had gone quiet, but red light still showed along the wall nearest the throne room.
“How many?” she asked.
“Nine vampires and four humans died during those eight months. Tomas was the only one I killed myself. I helped enforce orders that put the others where the Crown could reach them.”
She pressed her lips together. I wouldn’t let Adrian’s taunt be the only account of the people who’d died.
“Were they all killed in the chapel?”
“Seven died there. The others died during arrests or after Cecily ordered their blood withheld. Every death made her more frightened, and every frightened order gave the Crown more control.”
Bryony stood and walked to the cold fireplace. She stayed there for several seconds, facing the empty grate.
“Edith didn’t know?”
“She knew Cecily had changed. I convinced her that the attack on the estate and lack of sleep were making the queen suspicious. Edith trusted me to tell her if the court was in danger.”
Bryony looked towards the door as if she could see her grandmother in the hall. My confession had put another failure into that grief.
“But you didn’t.”
“No.”
My hands wanted the chair arms. I left them open on my knees.
“I thought exposing Cecily would mean her death,” I said. “A human queen who couldn’t control the Crown would’ve been removed by force. Adrian made certain I saw that as the only alternative. He kept offering small cures and reasons to wait.”
Bryony turned. “He was buying time.”
“Yes. I let him.”
Adrian kept me waiting with the hope I already had.
“Because you believed him?”
“Because he told me what I wanted to hear. I knew he wanted power. I didn’t know he’d already put his blood into the Crown, and I didn’t look hard enough because I wanted Cecily alive.”
Her anger didn’t leave her face. Forgiveness offered too quickly would only become another lie between us.
“Then the chapel happened,” she said.
“Yes. You know the rest until Cecily died.”
“Adrian said Edith needed every chain in the court to hold you. Why?”
I rose, though I kept the chair between us. Sitting still made the memory harder to contain.
“I’d swallowed some of Cecily’s blood when I killed her. I was grieving, furious and close to blood frenzy. Then Adrian told Edith I’d murdered Cecily for the Crown.”
“You attacked him.”
“I tried to tear his heart out. The guards got in my way.”
I remembered their hands on my arms and the fear on faces I’d known for decades. They’d watched me kill their queen, then seen me turn on the regent accusing me of murder.
“How badly did you hurt them?”
“Eighteen were injured. I broke the first restraints Edith closed around me and kept going. She used the throat chain next. I dragged two guards across the chapel with it.”
Bryony glanced at the red marks under the skin of my wrists. “Did you kill anyone after Cecily?”
“No. Edith stopped me. I would’ve killed Adrian if she hadn’t.”
Bryony didn’t look relieved.
“Do you regret that part?”
“I regret hurting the guards. I regret making Edith fight me while Cecily was dead at my feet. I don’t regret wanting Adrian dead.”
“Good.”
The sharp answer almost pulled a laugh from me. It died when Bryony continued.
“Why did Edith leave you chained after you calmed down?”
“I told her the truth. All of it. She believed Adrian caused the Crown’s corruption, but she also knew I’d hidden Cecily’s first killing and helped keep her in power. Nine vampires and four humans were dead because I chose my friend over the court.”
Edith had listened beside the closed throne-room doors without shouting or calling me a liar. Her disappointment had been worse.
“Adrian killed them too.”
“He caused it. I gave him eight months to do more damage.”
Bryony crossed the space between us. She stopped on the other side of the chair.
“Did Edith sentence you to die?”
“No. Adrian wanted an execution. Edith refused and called the chains a holding sentence until she could prove what he’d done. By then, he controlled the outer houses and most of the witnesses. Releasing me would’ve started a war inside Harrowmere.”
Bryony studied the marks at my wrists again. She knew what Adrian could do with a command and how quickly one vampire’s body could become his weapon.
“So she left you here.”
“I agreed to stay.”
Shock replaced some of her anger.
Her eyebrows rose. “You agreed to more than a century in chains?”
“I agreed to the first year. Then Adrian killed or drove out everyone who might clear me, and the sentence became permanent.”
During the first year, Edith searched for witnesses willing to stand against Adrian. He made sure none stayed, and opening my prison would have killed more people.
“That sounds more like him.”
“Edith kept me alive. Adrian tried to make sure alive was all I could be.”
Bryony moved the chair towards the fireplace. She stayed out of my reach.
“When you told me about Cecily, you made it sound as if the chapel was the first time the Crown had killed anyone.”
“I know.”
I’d chosen the version that made me look least guilty.
“You let me believe you saw the danger and stopped it that night.”
“Yes.”
Her stare held mine. I didn’t lower my eyes, although shame made me want to.
“That was another lie.”
“Yes. I used exact truths to give you a false answer because I wasn’t ready to tell you this.”
Her eyes flashed. “You promised there wasn’t another confession that changed whether I lived.”
“I told you there was no other plan for your blood or bargain with Adrian and let you believe I’d answered the secret too. I made the truth create a lie because I was afraid the full answer would cost me. It was cowardly.”
“Don’t agree with me and wait for the argument to end.”
“I’m not waiting. I’m answering.”
Bryony’s fingers curled at her sides. She paced once, swore under her breath and faced me again. “I’m furious with you.”
“I know.” I held her gaze without telling her what to feel or how quickly to forgive me.
“I understand why you wanted to save her,” Bryony said. “I understand why one more day kept feeling possible. What I don’t understand is why you still decided which parts I could handle.”
“I was afraid you’d see every risk Adrian wanted you to see and decide the Crown should keep me controlled.”
The red restraints proved how easily Adrian could still turn me into a threat.
“Would the truth have changed what happened?”
“No.”
She waited, forcing me to follow the answer to the point I’d avoided.
“Would it have changed what Adrian wants now?”
“No.” My reasons shrank with each answer. Fear had only made them feel useful.
“Then you hid it to protect your chance with me.”
“Yes.” The answer came out rough.
Her shoulders lowered, though the anger remained. “That’s the answer I wanted.”
“I’m sorry.”
“I know. I’m deciding what to do with it.”
I stayed where I was. Reaching for her would only ask her to carry my guilt as well as her anger.
After a moment, Bryony sat on the bed again. “If the Crown takes control of me as it took control of Cecily, could you kill me?”
I couldn’t answer quickly. She saw the delay and waited.
“I’d try to remove it,” I said. “I’d break the throne, burn the chapel and kill Adrian. I’d do every other thing I could think of first.”
“And if none of that worked?”
I looked at her. She’d walked into my prison, opened my chains and refused a Crown that could force me to obey her.
“I don’t know,” I said. “I won’t promise I could watch it use you to kill the court. I can’t promise I could put my hands on you and end your life either.”
She held my gaze. “That’s a horrible answer.”
“It’s the truth.”
“I know.”
Bryony reached for my hand. I crossed the room and gave it to her.
Her fingers closed around mine. She was still angry, and she didn’t pretend the confession had fixed anything. She kept me there anyway.
“Then we make sure you never have to choose,” she said.