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April 26 - April 27, 2024
The king knew, in this moment, that his greatest love would also be his ruination, and that both would come in the unlikely form of a young human woman.
Maybe the king always knew that his greatest love would be his ruination. Maybe he knew it the moment he met her. He’d know it the second time he died, too.
“Knock on that door,” I breathed, “one more fucking time.” My husband smiled at me, lowering his raised fist, which had indeed been ready to knock one more fucking time. “There she is.”
The first time in weeks I’d seen something that looked like fight in her eyes. Goddess, I could’ve fucking wept for it. There she is, I thought.
Come on, fight with me. Let me distract you.
Don’t you dare stop fighting, princess, I’d told her, the night before the final trial. It would break my damned heart. And I had been so fucking smug when I’d wrung that fight out of her in that last battle. Well, she wasn’t fighting now.
Raihn’s words from one of our first meetings now rang through my head: Vincent’s little princess, locked up in her glass castle, where everyone can look but never touch. What a fucking hypocrite.
It was all her. Deadly and stunning. Even her hatred was fucking beautiful.
His thumb rubbed that single circle on my upper back. “You’re safe,” he murmured. “Alright?” He sounded a little sad.
“I know I’m right,” I said. “And?” A faint smile of amusement, gone in seconds. “And I want you to help me do something about it.”
“What is your word worth?” “Not much. It’s seen better days. A little banged-up. But it’s all I have to offer, unfortunately.”
He was offering me everything I needed to destroy him.
Finally, I settled on, “I always meant it. The offer I made you.” There is no one I would rather have ruling this kingdom beside me than you. I saw in her face that she knew exactly what I was talking about. “I know,” she said, after a long moment, and left.
That had fucking killed me. The hope.
There she is.
“Why doesn’t she stay with you?” I asked. “I snore.” Mische sighed. “He does. He really, really does.”
I tried to talk Mische out of it, but this, of course, was futile. She made it about two sentences before she cut me off and said, “Do you want me to let you finish this before I tell you I’m not listening?
Cairis had heaped sickening amounts of flattery into it.
My wife was not much of an actress. But I could be good enough for both of us.
“Your cousin,” he said, between his teeth, “is a fucked up piece of work.”
“There you are.”
When Mische pulled back the covers of her bed and several roaches ran out, she simply stared down at it with a look of utter disgust on her face, threw the covers back into place, and said brightly, “This can be Septimus’s room.”
Then he outstretched his hand. “Come on. Let’s go get into some trouble.”
His gaze flicked down to my mouth. Back to my eyes. “Do you remember,” he whispered, “that time you threw me out of the window?” My brow furrowed. “Wh—” He gave me a firm, forceful push, and then I was falling.
“You are too precious to be taken away by such a mundane danger, my little serpent,” he said gently.
The last thing I wanted was for you to think you could and start throwing yourself off of balconies. I choked out, “He knew.” He knew. He always knew. It wasn’t about protecting me. He didn’t want me to jump because he didn’t want me to find out I could catch myself.
“So why would he let me live, if I was so dangerous? Why didn’t he kill me the day he found me? Instead of—instead of taking me home and lying to me for almost twenty years. Why wouldn’t he just kill me instead of caging me, instead of breaking me—”
“You are not broken.” I’d never heard him sound so furious, though his voice didn’t rise at all. “You are not broken. Oraya. Do you understand me?”
And when I’d watched her fly tonight, alight with such joy, only one thought had rung out in my mind: I never knew something could look so beautiful flying away.
“I’m surprised it’s still here, and that you didn’t fly off to Sivrinaj with it. This was what you were looking for, wasn’t—” “You were fucking dying,” he snapped. “I had more important things to worry about than your father’s games.”
“You’re made for the sky, Oraya. Never let anyone take that away from you. Of course you’ll fly again.” He released me and returned to my back. Under his breath, he muttered, “Like I’d ever let that happen.”
“One honest thing.”
“I don’t know if it was worth it.”
“To die, rather than killing you?” he said quietly. “Yes. That would have been worth it. Even I had to draw a line somewhere. And you’re the line, Oraya.”
“Just let go of it,” he said softly. “Let me support the weight of them. I’ve got you.”
“When I went into that room,” he murmured, “I thought you were dead. I thought I lost you, Oraya. I thought I lost you.”
“Would be a relief for you,” I said. “A lot of problems solved.”
They were furious. “Stop saying things like that.”
“Because I’m so tired, Oraya.”
“I’m so tired of pretending. Tired of pretending I don’t think about you every night. That I’ve ever wanted anything—”
“Don’t abandon her,” Mische said. “She isn’t Nessanyn. It’s not going to end the same. She’s stronger than that.”
“Everyone has abandoned her,” Mische murmured, her eyes sad. “Everyone.”
“I’m not abandoning her.” My words were sharper than I’d meant for them to be. “I made vows. I’m not doing that.” Your soul is my soul. Your blood is my blood. Your heart is my heart.
“I hurt her,” I choked out, “so fucking badly, Mish.” The wrinkle between Mische’s brows softened. “You did,” she said softly. “So what are you going to do about it?”
There she is.
“Look at that face,” I said. “If I didn’t know any better, I’d say you were worried.”
I looked back one last time before we flew away. Immediately, my eyes floated up—to the second floor of the little cottage, where a set of moon-silver eyes stopped my heart in its tracks, just like they did every damned time.
Mische sighed, dabbing at the last wound on my left wing. “Raihn has a lot of flaws, Oraya,” she murmured, “but he knows how to love.”
“And there she is,” he chuckled.
“But love. A powerful drug. Not enough to convince him. Not enough to make him the optimist his young wife was. But enough to make him think a dangerous word: Maybe.
