Chapter 43
I hope you choose love, Ember. For so many reasons.
— ALARIC SARE’S PAPERS FOR EMBERLINE ARKOVA
“Did you two take care of everything?” Alysa’s voice was groggy as she stood on wobbly legs.
She searched the throne room. Even though she’d been behind Charon and me when the flame erupted, the heat must have been intense.
Sweat rimmed the neck of her tunic. Not only that, but withstanding the magic unleashed in this room as we finished the trials would have made anyone unsteady.
Pools of blood surrounded the bodies of Vaddon and Rodric. With a look I knew all too well, Alysa’s gaze attempted to avoid the bodies of the Storm. She was unsuccessful. Tears rimmed her eyes as she spoke. “We paid such a high cost. Was it worth it?”
I didn’t know how to respond, nor did I have a chance to, as Elias got to his feet. “Glad you made it, Sebastien.”
Hart squeezed my hand, and before he dropped it, I clung tighter to him.
“We do this together. We’re stronger together.
” If we had learned anything from this whole ordeal, that would be my takeaway.
That would be how we ruled, because it would be both of us who ruled now that the goddesses held no sway in Kavios.
A bubble of joy burst on my tongue. It mixed with the minty taste of his sadness. I understood the sentiment. We might have achieved our goals, but so much remained to be done.
Like dealing with Elias.
Did we even know what Elias’s intentions were in all of this?
Emotions churned within Hart. Anger, sadness, confusion, fear.
He didn’t know what to think of Elias’s actions.
The prince had given us everything we needed to understand Rodric’s aims. He’d given us the time and place he planned to replace Hart as Themis’s Champion, but it appeared that his own goal throughout was to claim the title for himself.
“You knew,” Hart hissed as he strode toward Elias. “You knew they needed me to witness the ritual. You needed my blood.”
Elias shrugged. “It meant they couldn’t try to kill you until it was complete. Though I guess Themis changed that a bit.”
Hart’s fist met the side of his brother’s face. “You called her here! We all saw you offer Father as a sacrifice, you smug bastard. Not that I cared particularly for his well-being, but you planned to do the same thing he did.”
The prince worked his jaw and winced. “So what?” He was still all nonchalance. “It didn’t work, and when you needed me, I was there.”
His adamas gem, with stored lust, had healed me. How was it that I owed my life to this weasel? It was one thing when I’d known he wore a mask for the city. When I’d known he performed, it set its own expectation. But what truly lay underneath?
Hart’s confusion was easy to understand. It killed me that his own brother didn’t know what to make of his actions.
“It’s the only reason I haven’t killed you yet.”
I knew Hart carried guilt over leaving Elias behind with their father—over casting a shadow so long that Elias could do nothing but fall into it. Yet, in my mind, none of the choices Elias had made seemed to stem from Hart’s sins.
Further discussion was cut short as a wave of people rushed through the double doors. The Feared. Charon craned his neck to evaluate them. He nodded his assent, and a few entered. They must have been those he fought with at the entrance to Glanmore Castle.
“Alysa—” Reid was the first one through, and even Charon’s steady gaze didn’t slow him down. He sprinted past the dragon and didn’t stop until his arms wrapped around Alysa, and he lifted her from the ground.
From her tone, I could tell she whispered chastisements, most likely along the lines that she was fine, but then her head fell to his shoulder, and her arms returned his grip, clinging to the folds of his shirt as if to tell herself that he was real—he was here.
I gripped Hart’s hand more tightly.
Reid surveyed the fallen Storm around his wife, and his grip intensified. The knuckles of his fingers turned white with the ferocity.
The second wave of entrants to walk past Charon were a mix of the Storm and the Feared. Nicholas strode toward Hart. “We have secured the castle. Any Blessed still alive, well, they’re no longer Blessed. They surrendered their adamas.”
Relief swelled through my chest. With all that had occurred in the throne room, it was difficult to imagine the scale of violence and magic that had warred at the castle entrance.
Those arriving now looked tired. Their faces were bloodied and bruised, and the haunted looks in their eyes said they’d each suffered loss.
But they’d done it—they’d taken the castle from the Blessed.
Just as we’d taken the throne.
Hart’s gaze tracked to what remained of his father’s empty seat. It was mostly ash. He shook his head and clapped Nicholas’s shoulder. His narrowed gaze begged the question Reid had been too occupied to answer and Nicholas had avoided.
“We lost many,” Nicholas said. “Over fifty men and women, but when the citizens realized what was happening, what Charon’s arrival meant, hundreds joined in. They brought whatever they had on hand and helped overwhelm the Blessed.”
Charon huffed smoke from his nostrils.
Nicholas coughed and dipped his head in acknowledgement. “The dragon didn’t hurt things, either.”
Hart nodded and glanced at me. “I can’t say everything went according to plan, but Ember found a way through. She always does.”
“We all knew the risks,” Nicholas said. “If the pulses of magic we felt from the throne room were any indication, it seems you succeeded when it counted.”
“The sibling goddesses no longer hold sway over Kavios. Every citizen controls their own fate—decides their own path. Ember chose a future for Kavios that benefited us all.”
I squeezed Hart’s hand again as he spoke. A swell of emotion flooded between us, so intense that I wasn’t sure whose was whose.
Nicholas turned to face me and gave a respectful bow. “We owe you much, Emberline.”
The group of Feared and Storm gave Elias a wary look. He was likely the only person in the room whom they couldn’t make sense of.
Hart massaged his temples. “I can’t have you roaming the streets, Elias. You may have helped, but you did nothing to stop Rodric’s abuse of humans.”
Elias took a steadying breath, but his face gave nothing away. “What will you do with me, brother?”
Hart shook his head and looked at me.
“We don’t know yet,” I replied when Hart couldn’t. “We’ll need you to remain in your rooms for a few days while we determine the most appropriate course of action.”
With an untroubled smirk that looked too much like his brother’s, Elias gave me a brief nod and left the throne room. Hart sent a few of the Feared to keep an eye on him.
“We don’t have all of the adamas accounted for yet,” Reid said, finally returning to the conversation after his reunion with Alysa.
I scratched my temple. “Alaric has a catalog of all the gems he made. We can use it to take inventory and collect the rest of the outstanding pieces.”
Reid dipped his chin. “I can send someone to the shop tonight.”
The Feared and the Storm may have secured the castle, but who knew how many Blessed never entered the fight?
“I should go to evaluate Alaric’s notes,” I said. I doubted my ability to source the adamas would have been retained with the loss of the goddess’s magic, but either way, I knew Alaric’s work better than anyone else. It’d be faster if I did it.
With a hard thump, Charon’s tail slammed down between me and the door. “Absolutely not, Ember. You need to rest. The inventory of gemstones can wait.”
Hart nodded. “I agree with the dragon.”
“As if I need the Cursed—”
I laughed, and a weight that had been sitting on my shoulders lifted. Hart’s eyes widened with the sound, and I knew it had been too long since I’d done so. “He’s no longer the Cursed King. You’re going to need to address him by one of his other names.”
Smoke rose from Charon’s nostrils.
I turned to Hart. “I think he prefers Hart, but if you wanted to annoy him, you could probably call him Seb.”
Hart’s smile was warm, and it made the throne room feel like it wasn’t evidence of all the terrible things we’d had to endure to save the kingdom.
Alysa missed half the conversation, but she didn’t seem to mind. “The Feared have secured things enough for tonight. We’re all taking rooms in the castle for now. May I assume you can find your way to one? If the dragon will let you?”
“I’m sure my old room in the tower is unoccupied,” Hart said.
Charon growled. “I’ll place myself in front of the entrance to the royal tower. No one will get in.”
Hart squeezed my hand, and we left the destruction behind us.
Hart led us down a too-wide hallway and up one of the castle towers. We had so much to do. Dethroning Rodric had only been the start. The lists running through my mind had no end. Kavios needed us to keep working.
The stairs were endless, and my exhaustion overtook me as I started to giggle on the way up. Hart raised a brow.
“Charon’s going to curl up in front of the door to the tower? Will he even fit down that hallway?”
Hart shook his head. “This castle was designed with a dragon in mind. My father always hoped that, one day, Charon would want to work with him.”
Another giggle erupted from my throat. “After holding him captive?”
Hart shrugged. “I didn’t say it was a particularly intelligent hope.”
“At least it explains why all the doorways are so big.”
The warmth of Hart’s hand surrounded mine, and I let him drag me forward.
We had so much to do, but I finally understood that I couldn’t do it all tonight.
I almost unraveled with each step. Establishing a kingdom wouldn’t be a quick or easy process.
This wouldn’t be a sprint to a finish line. It was now our lives.
When I stumbled, exhausted on my feet, Hart scooped me into his arms.