They’d taken Meliora from her sick room and through the deepest shadows to the nearest portal, to Lunara’s hidden cottage. It had been too dangerous to attempt healing her in the capital, forced to hide and petrified the entire time she’d be discovered.
Lunara opened her eyes again and looked to the road ahead, to the others chatting away, blissfully unaware of the heaviness behind them. “Meliora had these black stains creeping under herskin. They were alive. It’s the only way I can describe it. And they were, well… eating her. I think.”
Brand stopped dead in his tracks, shock twisting his features. He searched her face before whispering, “Explain.”
Not a command, but a plea for her to make sense of something she couldn’t.
“The worst was around her eyes and mouth. Faint at first, but as they branched out, the skin blackened behind them. And where it turned black, it started to, um, bleed.”
She swallowed against the wretched memories. “It was like her blood was feeding the stains. We’d watch as it was reabsorbed back into her, and the dark patches would swell and branch out further. As they grew, the process sped up. When I finally woke her, she just screamed and screamed. I numbed her body so she couldn’t feel it, but could still move and talk, but that was both a blessing and a curse. While she wasn’t in pain, she couldn’t feel her mate holding her either, and I think she started to go a bit mad from it all.”
Brand scrubbed a hand over one of his horns, back and forth, the repetitive motion one she’d noticed him do often. Not for the first time, she wondered if he even realized he did it.
“Caius witnessed his mate go through that? And Thad… Fuck. No wonder.”
She couldn’t stop her bittersweet smile. “Thaddeus was only allowed to visit from a distance. We had no idea what we were dealing with, and his father was petrified of him getting sick as well. He and I spent a lot of time together while Caius…” Her lip trembled, an ache gathering behind her eyes. Sisters damn the emotions betraying her. “Caius never faltered, cared nothing for himself. He cooed and coddled. He stroked her hair and held her hand and never shied away from kisses or praising her beauty. I’d find them walking the woods, or sitting beneath the moonlight huddled together. I thought she was getting better.”
“What happened? I mean, how did she…” His words trailed off, asking the same question that had haunted her every day since.
Regret formed a jagged lump in Lunara’s throat. “No matter what I did, nothing reversed the physical damage that’d already occurred. The flesh hadchanged. Yet another thing I’d never seen before. I caught her gazing into the mirror once and the look on her face…” She shook her head, not wishing to remember Meliora’s pale, haunted eyes staring back at her from that glass. “I woke up to Caius screaming. I tried to get in to the room to see if anything could be done, but he wouldn’t let me near her. He was feral, snarling and fighting his change. Not at all like the male I’d come to know over the months. Absolutely mindless in his grief.”
“So, she finally succumbed then.”
He sounded so certain, and it shattered her. Not even Caius knew her theory.
Theory being the key word there. What point could you have in telling him without knowing for sure?
No idea. Except… Shitting stars, she had enough secrets to be drowning in them. Sharing her speculations might help release her of at least one of them.
She couldn’t look at him while she did it, though. “I can’t be sure. I only briefly entered the room before Caius banished me, but there was this smell. Like roses thrown onto a bonfire, but cloying. Sticky and wrong. I’d never encountered it before, but it reminded me of some of the more sordid potions one can purchase, if you know which darkened alley to visit in the Lower Blocks.” Lunara blew out a shaky breath. “I don’t know how, or even if I’m right, but… I think Meliora took her own life.”
Shite, when had she started crying?
At home,Lunara could bottle and tamp and shove until she convinced herself that nothing bothered her. That the despair was just a spot of fleeting loneliness, and not the symptom of a deeper hurt that had no remedy.
A couple weeks away from the shadowy womb of Nachthelliae, and she was standing beside an orchard in Thodelebor spilling her tears and theories to anImperial Sonlike he was any other person.
You’re too tired for this level of gravity. Just calm down and shut your damned mouth.
No such luck.
“I’m so sorry.” The words poured out of her, ripped from someplace that she didn’t fully understand. “I feel like I failed her, and Caius and Thaddeus. If I’d only known she had it, I might’ve?—”
“You have nothing to apologize for,” Brand rasped, stepping in front of her. “Whatever happened, it was enough for Thad to trust you. To seek you out when we needed it most.” He caught her welling upset, swiping his fingers over her damp cheekbones. “I have only gratitude for the things you’ve done.”
She wanted to lean into that contact and accept the solace being offered. But, for some reason, the kindness in his eyes was choking her—a fisted hand around her throat whispering that she didn’t deserve it.
You don’t. It’s your fault that she’s dead—his own aunt. And you can’t forget the Elder Council or that his younger brother isone of them.Closeness to him means exposure to them. They’ll find you. They’ll force you.
With that in mind—fatigue weighing her down—Lunara recoiled slightly, cutting herself off from the temptation of his touch. “Please don’t do that. I probably shouldn’t have even told you, and I certainly don’t want to be comforted or thanked for it.”
It was his turn to flinch, hands falling and fisting at his sides. “I…” His confusion was evident, deep grooves forming between his brows.
She understood. Being pulled in so many directions, she was muddled as shite, too.
Better this way. It’s fine. You’re fine.
“Lunara—”
