Chapter 37 #2
And snapped, “Even Kaeleron doesn’t seem to know what calm and cold is tonight. Unless that easy charm and smile is another mask to conceal his emotions. How disgusted he must be to have to speak with her.”
Vyr looked from me to Kael and back again, irritation flashing in her silver eyes, and muttered, “Even my brother has a role he must play sometimes. He is merely being polite to the high king’s daughter.”
Daughter. Not the high king’s mate.
His daughter.
I wasn’t convinced that easy smile I had never seen grace Kaeleron’s lips before was an act, or that glimmer of heat in his eyes as he gazed down at the lithe, delicate creature swathed in tight black silk tied with a bow.
As if she was a present.
For him.
That hit me so hard it knocked the breath from my lungs, almost toppling me.
Cold flashed through my veins, my heart threatening to still in my chest as I stared at Kaeleron, at the high king as the male looked from him to his daughter, his far-too-approving smile as he watched them interact and how the gathered fae whispered about the ‘high king’s favourite’ telling me everything I needed but didn’t want to know.
The crowd began to close in on me and the air in the room suddenly felt thick, cloying, and heavy in my lungs as I struggled to get enough of it to stop my head from spinning.
“Saphi—” Vyr started.
“Take me home,” I cut her off. “I’ve heard enough. I’ve seen enough. I want to go home. I need to go.”
I was unworthy.
Kaeleron had brought me here as some twisted sort of game, one designed to make me see I could never be worthy of him. No matter how strong I became. No matter how fierce I could be. I would never be worthy of him.
I covered my ears with my hands. Shut up!
Jenavyr slowly shook her head. “I cannot do that. I cannot leave before dawn. None of us can. Anyone who leaves will be noted by the high king and fall out of his favour.”
“Would that be such a terrible thing?” I barked and clawed at my corset that now felt too tight, as if it was squeezing the life out of me.
I was unworthy. No one would ever love me.
Those claws sank deep, seizing my bruised heart, cleaving it open before I could stop them.
Not even my fated one had loved me and he had been made for me.
But if Kaeleron angered the high king, he would no longer be his favourite.
He would no longer be worthy either. We could be together.
I growled and snapped, “Don’t answer that. ”
Because I was hurting, and being as immature as Kaeleron once believed me to be. Kaeleron didn’t belong to me. He was a king. Of course a king would desire royal blood as his queen, rather than a lowly wolf, someone who wasn’t even fae.
The stones against my chest pressed into my flesh as anger curled through my veins, as if they were feeding on my hurt and my pain, on the cascade of doubts and fears that were unravelling in my mind.
They hummed with power, vibrating me right down to my silk slippers, rattling my bones, and I struggled for air, for calm and cold, as eyes landed on me, curious murmurs running through the crowd that pressed in around me.
Predators stalking their prey.
I was no prey.
I was a wolf.
A predator in my own right.
I bared fangs at them all, snapping and snarling, letting my wolf side come to the fore to brighten my eyes.
And whatever game Kaeleron was playing tonight, building me up with the beautiful dress and the compliments and the jewels, it was over.
Done. I refused to be hurt any more than he already had hurt me.
I curled my hands into tight fists at my side, ones that shook as I gritted my teeth against those tearing claws in my mind.
I was a wolf. I was strong.
That strength rushed out of me as Kaeleron led the beauty onto the dancefloor and the attention of everyone around me was suddenly on him instead.
On them.
“To be chosen for her first dance, at her first ball,” a male murmured off to my left, close to where Rhyn stood watching the spectacle, a worried look in his eyes as they shifted to me.
“He is the high king’s favourite after all,” a female answered.
I stared at Kaeleron and the female as they waltzed around the dancefloor that became increasingly open, everyone vacating it to watch them and give them room to dance.
She moved with such grace. Such poise. Never missing a step.
Their dance was effortless, as if they had rehearsed it a thousand times, as she smiled up at him, her eyes never straying from his.
And Kaeleron gazed down at her, drinking in her pretty smile, his eyes only on her, as if no one else in this world existed for him.
As if I didn’t exist.
“Perhaps Elduin has chosen his daughter’s future mate already,” another male said.
Too much.
No one refused the high king.
Kaeleron had told me that.
The voice deep within my howling soul that said they looked good together—right together—hurt too much as fae around me echoed those words, remarking on how well they danced, or how well matched they were.
Or how quickly Ereborne might see a wedding.
Too much.
My bones shook with the force of the stones pressing down on my chest. I snarled, the sound as dark and malevolent as any fae could manage, shocking me, and kicked off, pushing through the crowd towards the glass doors and the terrace I had spotted when we had entered the ballroom.
I shoved the fae aside, knocking them out of my path, causing a commotion as some turned to snap fangs at me or tried to shove me in return.
A commotion I wanted Kaeleron to see.
Immature.
Childish.
I broke out into the night air and gulped it down as I paced away from the ballroom, the taunting melody of the orchestra fading as moonlight embraced me, lovingly caressing my body. I breathed deep of the crisp air, trying to cool my blood and my rage.
Gods, I wished I could teleport myself home.
Or fly a carriage.
I wanted to go home.
I growled.
No. Home, to Canada. Not to Falkyr. Not to the Shadow Court.
Or maybe via the Shadow Court. I could find a waygate and maybe somehow make it back there, and find Chase and…
say what exactly? That Kaeleron had looked too right with some female I didn’t even know and I had decided it was over between us, because I couldn’t compete with her?
This wasn’t me. I knew it. Those claws that still stroked my mind, spreading their poison through it, were responsible for this weakness infesting me—this childish tantrum.
The real me wanted to march into that ballroom, right up to Kaeleron, and give him a piece of my mind.
If I was stronger—by fae standards, not wolf—I might have done it.
Despite how petty I would look. No one refused the high king.
Kaeleron was only doing what was expected of him, and for all I knew, he might be hating every moment he held that beauty in his arms.
But he hadn’t looked as if he hated it.
I was unworthy.
“Shut up!” I snapped and covered my ears, as if that could prevent me from hearing that voice within me that still mocked me, tearing at my strength with those sharp claws.
My shoulders sagged, all my strength seeming to leach from me as I tried not to listen to those things Kalyn had put in my head, but nothing I did would silence them. I whispered, “Shut up.”
I trudged to the pale stone balustrade that edged the broad terrace, choosing the side to my right that overlooked the city rather than a sprawling garden on the level below directly opposite the exit.
What was I doing? I stared down at the twinkling warm lights of the city far below me, the music grating in my ears as I tried to focus on the peaceful city and shut out the sight of Kaeleron with that female.
Shut out the whispers about them.
Those claws gently scraping over my mind, dragging all my doubts in their wake.
I gripped the necklace, tempted to tear it off and hurl it into that city.
Why?
To punish him?
Because I was jealous?
Bitter.
Unable to understand why he had brought me here tonight.
Maybe he had wanted everyone to stare at me, because I certainly felt as if all eyes had been on me tonight, and I had overheard more than enough cutting remarks about myself—from my appearance, to my breed, to my utter lack of strength or worthiness.
Who was I to be on the arm of the high king’s favourite?
Who indeed.
But worse than all the barbs they had thrown at me, all the hurt that drummed inside me as I thought about Kaeleron with that female, was the unshakable feeling that I was waiting for him.
I was standing on this terrace, freezing myself half to death, waiting for him to come to me.
To choose me.
“I’m a fucking idiot.”
A deep, smooth male voice sounded behind me.
“That was not very ladylike.”