120. Violette
VIOLETTE
The cervahnith was the one who told my father we were coming. His previous words echo in my mind as the entire world seems to narrow as my father steps beyond the doorway.
“You are going to Sinsól.”
“Your father will be pleased to see you.”
I huff a sardonic laugh.
“Then you don’t know my father.”
The cervahnith’s strange look as he said, “You might be surprised.”
Amber orbs flicker to life with each step he takes further into the chamber that I can now see is most definitely a mausoleum. In the center of the room is a tomb sitting high upon a marble feretory platform carved with elaborate designs.
Even before my father speaks, I know who lies within. I can feel it in my soul.
The reverent look on my father’s face is tight with grief as he places one hand atop the tomb.
Again, the cervahnith’s words return to me.
“You might find sleep inside the chamber of corpses beside your milra kelyfis.”
Beloved carapace.
Akash-all-fucking-mighty. He was inviting me to sleep beside the ‘shell’ that once housed my mother’s spirit.
My mother’s fucking corpse.
Sure enough, after a few murmured words by father, the stone edifice falls away to reveal my mother's body beneath it, and I’m not even surprised to see it.
Quicker than they can stop me, I fold to the top of the staircase just as Lazarus, Azrael, and Levi growl in unison and rush to follow me into the chamber beyond.
Tears pour down my cheeks as I take in my mother’s face. Preserved by magic, unmarred by the passage of time or the touch of decay.
“Not a day has passed that I don’t visit her.”
My grief at the sight of my mother passes quickly. Her death is one of the few wounds that I have healed. Instead, my anger and frustration simmers to life once more, so hot that it threatens to boil me alive. My voice trembles from the heat of my rage.
“If you loved her so much—us so much—then why, oh why, have I spent my life without my father?”
The regret in my father’s tempestuous thunderhead eyes seems too real, too sincere for it not to dim my anger.
“Your mother was right to fear you becoming anything like me. I didn’t want you to become like me.
Mother Jamila and the other house mothers were able to give you the maternal guidance–—the moral guidance that I never could.
The other children there could provide you with kinship that I do not have.
I had no family to give you, Raia. My father died by my own hands, and my mother abandoned us as soon as she could escape him.
I am surrounded by courtiers I wouldn’t trust by giving them my back, much less access to my daughter. ”
He pauses for a moment, voice gentling.
“I chose Thessaly for you myself. Knew that he would be able to provide you with a selfless, safe companionship in addition to teaching you an invaluable skill that would enable you to not only become fiscally independent, but also enable you to protect yourself, if necessary..."
My claws sink into the flesh of my hands as I ball my trembling fists.
“And yet you stole him from me–—from the world–—”
My father’s dark brows dip into a harsh V as his lips twist into a frown. “I hadn’t realized you’d grown so attached. If I had, I might have chosen a different way of handling his betrayal.”
Oh my gods, I want to kill him as badly as some twisted part of me needs him to continue this farcical explanation.
“When you came of age, I knew that it was only a matter of time before males would assert themselves on you. For all of Lucen’s faults, I had never witnessed the loyalty, devotion, and tenderness he gave to his mate.
The sacrifices he made for her. I had hoped if I removed her from the equation, that he would devote himself to you when the time came for your paths to cross... "
I can scarcely breathe at the revelation. “You—you condemned her to your harem because you wanted him to... to be with me?”
I think I’m going to be sick.
My father doesn’t even acknowledge the question.
“And I had a feeling you two would be drawn to one another... Though, I must say, I did not appreciate how sexually assertive he was with you that first night—groping and grinding on you like some fucking hormonal adolescent faeling.”
What? How the fuck? Did Lucen tell him he groped me?
I am too stunned to manage words, and am merely left gaping in shock as my father’s gaze slides to Azrael and Lazarus–—replacing my shock with an icy tendril of fear.
“So when you severed his bond with Soriya, I thought it was truly divine timing.”
The expression on my father’s face turns to one of boredom as he dismissively waves his hand in their general direction before removing his mask, and wills away all three of theirs.
“We can forgo the masks, Azrael.”
Wearing twin expressions of displeasure, Azrael and Lazarus greet him in flat, identical tones. “Hello, Abyrion.”
My father’s gaze eventually wanders to meet Levi’s. “My daughter’s soulbound..."
Levi’s eyes darken until even the sclera have disappeared, replaced with a shifting kaleidoscope-esque light. Tilting his head as if studying prey, he remains silent.
It’s hard not to stare—each time I witness this change, it steals my breath.
When I glance back at my father, he openly wears an expression of fascination and wariness.
Finally, my father nods in understanding before his gaze slowly returns to mine in a way that reminds me of someone afraid to take their eyes off of a nearby predator.
“There is... harmony and peace between you?”
Unlike your mother and I, is what he doesn’t say.
“Beyond what I ever could have fathomed.”
He gradually nods, offering me a smile infused with relief. “Whatever magic you used to glamour theirs is impressive. If it weren’t for the cervahnith, I wouldn’t have known who they were.”
Ten minutes ago, before he’d fully revealed the depths of his depravity, I might have inwardly rejoiced at his praise.
Now, I do not. If anything, I am immensely grateful to my mother for keeping me away from him.
Immensely grateful, even to him, that even he knew that I was better off in an orphanage than under his monstrous influence.
Because what is just as horrifying to me, is that I can understand his line of reasoning, no matter how grotesque.
Whoever my father might have once been—naive, or anything resembling innocent—he died long ago.
Wearing a look of resignation softened by unmistakable adoration, his gaze studies mine.
“May I ask for you to remove your mask? Please?”
I’m surprised by the question, and I tell myself the only reason I acquiesce is so that he may fully look upon my face as I spill his blood.
My heart begins to pound at the thought; as I recognize I am standing at the precipice of everything I not only vowed, but promised to myself.
That if there ever was a time for me to do it, it would be here, right now, in this mausoleum, with the cervahnith... somewhere nearby.
Like every single slat of this bridge of fate has been laid, and now, all I need to do is cross it.
But I need one more answer.
“How did my mother die?”
The streaks of bright silver in my father’s eyes flash even as the gunmetal-gray of his irises darken. His features remain impassive. He remains silent.
My heart pounds harder.
“There is but one person I love more than I loved her.”
My hands tremble as the backs of my eyes burn.
How dare he.
“Don’t you dare say it.”
Even as I say the words, even as horribly selfish it is to want to hear such a thing from this psychopathic murderer and master manipulator, I feel as though I need to hear them.
My father shifts to turn his body towards mine. “Until you disappeared, I’d watched you—at first, it was to make sure you were safe. That you were happy. But then I got to witness your bravery, your compassion, your generosity... your impulsivity, your pettiness, your wrath.”
I shake my head in disbelief, as his voice turns hollow. “What? How?”
Guilt shines in my father’s eyes. His throat dips. His mouth opens and closes as if on the cusp of some confession.
“There were countless occasions when I nearly came to you. But each time I grew weak and nearly broke my promise to myself, and your mother. Akash would gift me some beautiful moment displaying one of your many virtues or a vice, and it would remind me of exactly why I needed to stay away.”
I feel like my psyche is fracturing and it takes physical effort to maintain my posture.
Magic courses through me like a cord being driven through with too powerful a current of electricity.
Sparks of it crackle at my fingertips, darken my claws and the length of my digits—even tips of my horns tingle.
“Did you kill her?”
Anguish darkens my father’s glistening eyes as they study mine.
He takes another step towards me, shaking his head in dismay.
“It was an accident... I told you it broke me when she took you from me.”
I knew it.
All these years of cowardice, ignoring what I intuitively knew.
A weight manifests in my palm and my fingers close around the handle of a curved dagger tipped with a poison Thessaly once taught me how to make—the kind of poison powerful enough to kill a god.
I don’t hesitate.
I lunge forward.
The blade glides through flesh and bone with preternatural ease.
My father’s eyes widen—not in shock, but in pain. A choking sound escapes him as his brows knit together, eyes briefly clenching shut before he opens them to return his gaze to mine.
And smiles.
Even as blood spills from his lips.
Untamed emotion leaks from my eyes as my heart pounds so loudly in my ears, I can scarcely hear the wet rasp of his words.
“I’m sorry I wasn’t who you needed me to be. It is my life’s greatest regret.”
An unrestrained roar of anguish tears from my throat. I press the blade further. Deeper. Twisting when it can go no further.
Instead of being horrified, I feel nothing but satisfaction as I get to witness my father’s suffering by my hand.
The waning of his grin.
The torment contorting his features.
The bending of his knees as he drops to one, and then the other.
The fine spray of blood that escapes his clenched teeth.
The agonized groan that resonates through his pierced chest and into mine.
And perhaps, most of all, the tears streaming down his cheeks.
Perhaps I am more like him than I would ever dare to admit.
Because how else could every blessed second of this feel like salvation.
Salvation from all the pain he inflicted in my life.
I feel no doubt. No remorse. Only sweet justice.
It isn’t until my father’s features slacken, and the striking luminosity in my father’s eyes—eyes that I had once prayed to see again—dims when the magic in Thessaly’s poison takes hold of my father’s body, that doubt begins to trickle in.
And a misplaced sense of panic strikes me.
My grip on the handle of the dagger loosens. His large body sways towards my mother’s tomb and he falls to his knees before crumpling against the pedestal.
Faster than I can anticipate, my father’s free hand grasps mine. I try to pull free, but his grip is shockingly strong for someone teetering on the precipice of death. He presses something small and jagged into my hand.
My eyes fall to the item in my now upturned palm.
Where a single gold and emerald earring sits.
The same earring I left for Horus on Lucen’s balcony.
Shock is swift to follow my confusion.
What the fuck?
His eyes dart between each of mine; voice a wet, choking rasp.
“Love..."
His throat works against the blood that doesn’t stop flowing.
“Love..."
My throat closes in time with his as he continues to swallow.
“Love you more... Raia.”
The horror crushing me forces one singular word out of me.
“Why?”
Why, if you loved me, weren’t you with us?
A tear streams down my father’s cheek. “... Didn’t want to risk–” He gulps another mouthful of blood that I feel in my gut. “... You turning out to be like me.”
The last of the light in my father’s eyes flickers like a bolt of lightning being swallowed by a black cloud.
My father’s body grows limp.
The earring clatters to the stone floor as I drop to my knees beside him. Claws sinking into the flesh of his shoulders, my forehead drops to his chest as I finally mourn the father I wish I’d had.
The force of the full-bodied sob that wracks through me is an ugly, powerful thing that scarcely allows me to draw breath. Even the muscles supporting my ribcage cramp and burn in protest. It leaves me no choice but to finally let go.
I couldn’t hold onto this hatred and resentment any longer even if I tried. Instead, it escapes out of the violent, choked, and hideous wail pouring out of me like a dam burst free. Through the tears running down my cheeks like liberated prisoners that I’ve spent my life holding hostage.
I’m not sure how much time passes, but my body eventually grows tired and weak.
Warm hands rub soothing circles on my body, and I shift to see all three of my males kneeling beside me wearing similar looks of concern.
One of my hands releases its grip from my father’s cooling chest, and reaches towards them with an upturned palm.
Each of them wrap a hand around my hand or arm.
That small action alone begins to knit the many jagged shards of my heart back together with soft, tender threads.
How I love them so.
The cervahnith appears in front of us, beside my mother’s tomb, and stares down at me with those large, silvery white pupil-less eyes. “Do you regret it?”
The question takes me by surprise. Like a stone dropped into the silent waters of my catharsis. The answer is instantaneous and clear, though it takes me a moment to lift from my haze and form the words. “The world is a better place without him.”
The ground beneath me shudders, and it’s only then I hear the distant screams.
Azrael the responsibility that has been thrust upon me this evening.
Namely... I’m a fucking queen.