45. Stellan
STELLAN
I caught her wrists before she could pull again. Pain cut through my side when I moved, but fear struck harder.
“Stop. You’re hurting yourself.”
“That seems unfair when the bloody thing belongs to me.”
“Let me look.”
Bryony lowered her hands. Her control lasted until I touched the white metal near her temple.
“Can you take it off?” she asked.
“I don’t know yet.”
I followed the edge of the Crown with my fingers. It sat against her skin without a gap, though none of its points had broken the surface. There was no blood in her hair and no heat beyond the warmth left by the power she had used.
The bond carried her fear, exhaustion and a rising urge to swear at me. No command waited inside it. The pressure I remembered from Cecily was absent.
“Do you hear anything?” I asked.
“Only you. No voice, no commands. Just a headache, and Adrian did try to strangle me.”
Relief loosened my chest. My attention dropped to the bruises forming around her throat. I tipped her chin up and ran my thumb lightly under her jaw. The marks came from Adrian’s fingers, not a command.
“Stellan, I’m all right.”
“You can complain while I check.”
I checked her pulse, her pupils and the cut across one palm. Her blood scented the air when I opened her fingers. Hunger tightened my jaw, but I ignored it. I had already taken enough from her while Harrowmere was under attack.
Bryony studied my face. “You need blood.”
“I need to know the Crown hasn’t injured you.”
“And I need you upright.”
She moved closer. I kept hold of her hand and stopped her from touching the wound in my side.
“You aren’t feeding me while you’re hurt,” I said.
“I wasn’t offering. I was only thinking about it.”
“The bond gives you away.”
Her eyes narrowed. “That’s becoming very annoying.”
The side door opened, and Lenora entered with a folded cloth and a dark bottle. She looked from Bryony’s throat to my side, then held the bottle out to me.
“Drink,” she said. “The stores survived.”
I took it and pulled the stopper free. Human blood had been sealed inside with a preserving ward. It was cold and several years old, but it eased the hunger as soon as I swallowed.
Bryony watched until I finished half the bottle. “All of it.”
I finished the blood while Lenora handed her the cloth.
The wound in my side began to close. It would take longer to heal completely, but the pain eased enough for me to stand without using Bryony for support.
Lenora moved around us and studied the Crown. “Has it spoken?”
“No,” Bryony said. “It won’t come off.”
Lenora’s expression tightened as she studied the white metal. “Cecily couldn’t remove it either.”
“Did it start controlling her as soon as she put it on?”
“No. She wore it safely for years.”
Bryony looked at me. I remembered Cecily closing doors that had always stood open and waking at every noise. The Crown had changed her in small steps while I explained each one away.
“It began with sleeplessness,” I said. “Then she heard the Crown when she was alone. She started seeing threats in ordinary conversations and used the court to protect herself from people who weren’t dangerous.”
“I know what to watch for,” Bryony said.
“So do I. This time, I won’t wait and hope it passes.”
Her fear moved through the bond, followed by trust that hurt more than the wound Adrian had given me.
Lenora glanced towards the side door. “The guards have checked the court. Adrian left no one inside, and his men have cleared the road.”
“What about his body?” Bryony asked.
“It will still be dead when I come back.” Lenora turned to me. “The King’s rooms have medical supplies. Use them before you bleed on anything else.”
Bryony’s mouth twitched despite the strain in her face. “Comforting.”
Lenora left and closed the door behind her.
The throne room settled into quiet. Broken stone and blood covered the floor. Adrian lay near the lowest step with the two pieces of the heartblood dagger beside him. None of it felt like victory until Bryony’s fingers closed around mine.
“What now?” she asked.
“We rest. Then we open the vault and find a safe method to remove the Crown.”
“You make it sound easy.”
“I’ve learnt that you respond badly when I begin with all the ways we might die.”
“I respond badly when you decide them for me.”
“Then we’ll decide together.”
The answer softened her expression. She stood in torn clothes with bruises around her throat, blood on her hands and a Crown she couldn’t remove. She had still freed every vampire Adrian controlled when she could have used them as an army.
Adrian had wanted her power. Harrowmere had wanted her blood. I wanted the woman who’d looked at both of us and made her own choice.
I moved in front of her and took her other hand.
“What are you doing?” she asked.
“Giving you one choice you don’t have to fight for.”
I lowered myself to one knee.
Pain pulled at the healing wound, but no command pressed into my blood. The bond remained warm and open between us. I had spent a century being forced to kneel, and this felt nothing like it.
Bryony stared down at me. “Stellan.”
“Adrian wanted that Crown to put me here. It never will.” I tightened my hands around hers.
“You’re my queen because I choose you. You gave me freedom when taking control would have been easier.
You trusted me with every ugly truth I had, and you stood with me when Adrian tried to use them against us. ”
Her eyes shone. “You stood with me too.”
“I always will.”
The promise moved through the bond with everything I couldn’t fit into the words. Desire warmed it, but love held deeper and steadier.
Bryony pulled on my hands. “Get up.”
I rose because she wanted me beside her, and she caught my shirt in both fists before I reached my full height.
Her mouth met mine. The kiss carried relief, fear and the fierce edge that had drawn me to her from the start. I held her hips and pulled her close, careful of the bruises at her throat. She bit my lower lip hard enough to wake my fangs.
My blood heated as her hands slid up my chest, and the Crown’s white points brushed my forehead when I kissed her again.
“I’m getting it off you,” I said against her mouth.
“We’re getting it off me.”
“Together.”
She kissed me once more, softer now. The bond opened with her trust and the promise of every night we had nearly lost.
A cold presence moved through the bond.