Chapter 55 #2
I force my anger to retreat. Hadrian isn’t my enemy. It’s just as I said to Thyra: My youngest brother isn’t a willing sycophant. He stays close to Galla for his own survival. In his position as the youngest child, it’s the smart thing to do.
Slipping open the envelope, I consider the details of the invitation, fighting the tension claiming my muscles.
“This is tomorrow night.”
“She knows she’s on borrowed time. If Thyra breaks the curse, Mother’s power evaporates.”
It’s unusual for Hadrian to speak plainly, but I suppose, for years, I’ve only interacted with him in Galla’s presence, where he must guard his tongue.
It’s the other detail on the invitation that really concerns me, even if I fight not to show it. Hadrian may choose to speak freely, but he will no doubt be required to repeat everything I say.
For that reason, I allow my arm to drop to my side, keeping my tone uncaring. “The location is unsurprising.”
Victor has remained quiet, but now he asks Hadrian the question I can’t—not without admitting concern. “What can you tell us about Mother’s plans?”
“Not much.” He grimaces. “I’ve been tasked with delivering invitations to the most powerful highborn families, but other than that, she’s keeping everything close to her chest. Only Lady Delphina is in her confidence. But I think we all know Mother will use this event to strike hard.”
With that, he steps back from me. “I’m sorry I can’t tell you more. I also can’t stay. The longer I’m absent, the greater her paranoia that I plot against her.”
With a heavy exhale, he gives Victor a brief nod. “It was good to see you again, brother. It’s been too long.” Then, to me. “With your permission, Antony, I’d like to visit Victor from time to time. This separation from my siblings is Mother’s doing, not mine.”
I consider his request. Technically, I never forbade him from coming here. True, it’s my domain, and openly inviting Hadrian could blur the lines between Galla’s control and mine, since it’s well known he works for her, but he’s right. He’s been isolated from us for too long.
I give a cursory nod. “I’ll allow it.”
He breaks into a smile that lights up his brown eyes, a brief cracking of his composed exterior, before he clears his throat. “Thank you. I’ll see you tomorrow night.”
A moment later, the door closes behind him.
“That was a dangerous choice,” Victor murmurs from the other side of the room, rising from his chair to his full height.
I respond with silence. He isn’t wrong, but the decision is made.
As Victor moves, he sweeps from his workbench another white envelope, holding it up into the light. “I am invited, too.”
There’s nothing joyful in Victor’s expression, and I’m certain only bitterness must fill mine, even if Victor can’t discern it behind my helmet.
I fight the urge to grind my teeth. “Our mother strikes where it hurts.”
Victor nods. “Mount Vividari.”
“A celebration where my mother died.”
It’s hard now to hold in my rage and smother it, even harder when Victor responds with a quiet, “I’m sorry, Brother.”
I hunch my shoulders against the flood of unwanted pain in my chest. Emotional pain.
Feelings I would have buried much faster before Thyra came into my life.
I’m certain she would tell me to feel it, not push it down.
She may not have my sister’s combat skills, but she fights in other ways, using her kindness like a knife, deftly shredding my defenses.
“Will you attend?” I ask Victor.
He scoffs. “This invitation was a message telling me where not to be.”
“Thyra would tell you to go,” I say. “Fuck them.”
Victor’s response to my declaration is more intense than I expected, his entire body becoming still, his shoulders hunching as mine did only moments ago. “Has she foreseen something?”
The strain in his voice tells me he’s more concerned about Thyra’s foresight than about any celebration Galla could ever host.
I consider my brother carefully, particularly the way he’s avoiding my gaze, which is very unlike him. “Victor—”
He shoots into action, shoving the invitation noisily beneath a sheet of metal and speaking over the top of me. “What brings you here tonight, brother?”
I want to get to the bottom of his sudden anxiety, but he’s given me an opening to receive the answers I need.
Determined to get the truth from him, I speak bluntly. “The hammer that forged the Dragonstone Blade. Where is it?”
Victor is frozen again, his voice tight. “What makes you think I have it?”
“You’ve drawn it. Countless times. With markings on it that even the Ferocie Scribes didn’t seem to know about.”
I don’t know for certain if the half-finished drawings of a hammer on many of Victor’s notes are actually of the hammer that was used to forge the blade. It’s pure guesswork on my part. Until tonight, I thought it was simply a design he was coming up with for his own sake.
He confirms my theory when he exhales deeply, sinks back into his chair, and says, “Seen it? No. Heard it described by someone who had seen it? Yes.”
I approach him slowly as he laces his fingers in front of himself. “Tell me.”
He shakes his head, eyes closing. “She swore me to secrecy.”
“Who?”
“Your mother. Aeliana Vividari.”
I jolt mid-step before my foot hits the ground. “My mother saw the hammer?”
“More than that. She kept it safe.”
Victor pushes his chair toward me so I can sink into it.
I can’t seem to stop shaking my head. “How did I not know this?”
Victor answers me with a hard look.
“Right,” I say. “She swore you to secrecy. But why tell you and not me?”
It isn’t intended to be a hurtful question, but Victor’s jaw clenches before he rolls his shoulders and stretches his neck.
“It was after the Ember Fae attack,” he says.
“She must have sensed how much I was struggling, and she understood my passion for metalwork. She visited me each day and described a little more of the hammer to me, starting with the hammer’s head and moving to its handle, describing it marking by marking, and encouraged me to draw it.
Her visits, the promise of knowing the hammer’s final form, gave me purpose. ”
“Is that why the images are incomplete?”
“She died before she could describe all of it to me.”
I’m grateful that my helmet conceals the bitter twist of my lips, but I can’t stop the forward drop of my head toward my hands.
Aeliana… my intelligent, thoughtful mother… should never have died.
“You said she kept the hammer safe.” My voice is a bare rasp as I push through my sorrow, a sadness that, like so many of my emotions, I can only attribute to Thyra. By the Goddess, her presence in my life has cracked open my poisoned heart. “Did Aeliana tell you where it is?”
“She said it must never fall into the wrong hands,” Victor replies. “She wouldn’t say why. Which leaves me grappling with my promise never to speak of it.” He peers at me, no doubt trying to read my thoughts from my eyes. “It would help if I understood why you’re asking about it.”
I could lie.
Or I could tell him I can’t explain why I’m asking. But it seems I’m reckless tonight. “I need it as part of breaking the curse.”
Victor’s shoulders sink. “Then I must tell you where it is, but you will understand, once I give you this information, why I kept it to myself.” Briefly closing his eyes, he adds, “And why I was so alarmed when you suggested I accept Mother’s invitation.”
My forehead puckers as he heads first to the far door, listening there for a moment before muttering, “All quiet,” and then gesturing me to his inner workroom, where his drawings are strewn across multiple tables.
Leading me to one of his hand-drawn images of the False Queen, he jabs his finger at the unfinished sketch of a hammer at the bottom of the page.
“The hammer that forged the Dragonstone Blade is enclosed in a tomb within the temple on Mount Vividari.”
Where the celebration is being held.
Before I can even consider the full ramifications of this, Victor continues.
“There’s more.” He holds up the same finger. “Only a full-blooded Vividari can open that tomb and access the hammer.”
A snarl builds in my chest. “Are you saying that Galla Vividari is the only fae alive who can open that tomb?”
“She is. Which is why the location of this celebration is a real concern to me.”
“You think she knows.”
“I fear it.” He lowers his hand. “But maybe she doesn’t have a clue. Maybe she’s holding the celebration there purely to hurt you. In fearing she knows, I could inadvertently reveal the secret, causing the very catastrophe I want to avoid.”
His concern is valid.
Fear can create its own outcomes.
“She can’t be allowed to take control of that hammer.”
At my declaration, Victor gives me a firm nod.
“But how do I get it without her?” A pressure builds within my chest, and all my frustration threatens to boil over.
Once again, I’m at Galla’s fucking mercy.
I begin to pace, needing to move. There has to be a way forward. A way to win.
In all my life, I’ve learned that I’m alone in my decisions. That there is nobody I can truly trust. Even Victor kept this secret from me, although I understand his reasons.
But now, my every instinct is to return to Thyra and talk with her about this.
With difficulty, I pull a cloak of calm about myself. “You’ve studied the Dragonstone Blade for years. Can you tell me anything about the other tools that were used to forge it?”
I already know that the anvil is lost. It can’t have been destroyed because it’s one of the hardest substances in existence, but it could have been buried anywhere in the three kingdoms.
“Emiliana and I have spoken many times about the blade’s forging,” Victor says, his eyes brightening as he pulls several papers forward, one of which depicts black coals billowing with flames.
“Between her study of the Chronicle and my study of the blade’s metallic properties, we consider that the only fire that could have been used to forge the blade was dragonbreath. ”
And the news just gets fucking worse.