“Howdareshe come in here and attempt to embarrass you that way!” Allegra shouts. “It is a disgrace to ask for such an accommodation to be made for the bloodline of a forsaken!”
“Calm yourself, Allegra. She will be dealt with once enough time has passed. When is your next group of sirens going out hunting?”
“Tomorrow at dawn. We’ve gotten word from our scouts that there should be a few supply ships crossing the waters from the Mortal Kingdom to the Fae Kingdom.”
“Good. I want you all going on this hunt tomorrow morning. We need to make sure our line of succession is secure. I have no doubt that there are others out there who sympathize with Nia. Who think that a weaker queen is what they want to see rule our realm. We cannot let that happen.” My mother swims down from her throne, Allegra coming into position behind her and to the side. “You all represent a long line of fierce rulers who do not waiver in their duties. It is onyouto ensure that you help uphold the values of our queendom to keep our people safe.” She gives everyone a hard look, lingering on me the longest. Historically, sirens weren’t expected to begin going out to find males until they reached twenty-two years of age. Under my mother’s reign, that rule has been bent and younger females are now being told they have the “great honor of fulfilling their duty to the queendom” sooner.
“You are all dismissed. Except for Aria.”
I swallow roughly as I fight the nausea now churning in my stomach. Lyre glances at me quickly—that small look relaying her anxious feelings—before she takes off with everyone else until I am alone in the room with my mother.
“Aria, why do you insist on making me look bad in front of our people?” she begins, her trident held tightly in her hand at her side.
“I’m sorry, Your Majesty. It is not my intent to do so.”Shoulders and jaw relaxed, lips flat, spine straight…
“There are only so many times I can hear you say that before I begin to realize it isn’t the truth.” The silence between us is heavy, as if the ocean is slowly freezing solid and entombing me here. But it’s just terror icing my veins and making my bodystiff. “Come with me, Daughter. Let’s see if you truly live for your queendom or for yourself.”
Chapter Twelve: Nox
“It’s been two fuckingdays,” I murmur to the healer, the green light of his magic glowing over Rhea’s forehead. I try to keep my frustration—myterror—in check, but with each hour that passes, with each moment that she hasn’t so much as wiggled a finger, it’s becoming harder to rein myself in.
This is all my fucking fault.I should have been honest with her so much sooner. I tried to rationalize with myself that prolonging the full truth until we were back in my kingdom—far enough away from King Dolian—meant she would have the safety and space to process it however she needed to. That she would be able to see with her own eyes what I was trying to protect.
When I thought about all the scenarios that could have unfolded when Rhea found out I was the crown prince of the Mage Kingdom, none of them had accurately portrayed how terribly it would go. Of course, there was no version I thought of where Councilman Osiris was the one to tell her. I didn’t see that one coming at all. But a part of me knows that I was also delayingit because I was a coward. I was too afraid that, when she learned about my involvement with Alexi’s death, it would be too much. She wouldn’t be able to look at me in the same way after that.
Your words mean nothing to me now.
I didn’t know what true heartbreak was until that moment, when her red-rimmed eyes met my own and I saw in them the depths to which I had just destroyed her. I have never seen her angry like that—not even on the night that she thought I was making fun of her and kicked me out of the tower.Ibrought that out in her.
The last thing I ever wanted was to make her hurt. To be another person who failed her. Another reason for her to bottle her feelings up because sharing them proved to be too dangerous. Lying to her this entire time felt like forced suffocation—Ihatedit. And the longer she lays here motionless, those perfect green eyes remaining hidden behind closed lids, the further my heart is pummeled.
“She is uninjured and by all accounts healthy, Your Highness,” Galen, the palace healer, says as he lifts his hands from her head and his magic flickers out in his palms.
My magic pushes hard beneath my skin, filling me to the brim until I snap, “Then why isn’t she waking up?” Galen startles at my outburst, his dark gray eyes widening. I draw a hand down my face as I blow out a breath before continuing, “I’m sorry, Galen. I don’t understand why we can’t get her to respond.It’s been two days.”
“Tell me again what happened,” Galen says as he slowly strides over to the chair placed at the corner of the bed in my room.
My gaze leaves his and goes back to her—always to her. Her hair is braided into a thick plait that drapes down over her shoulder, Sarai having done so after she washed Rhea with a warm cloth. While I would only go as far as the sitting room,I did give my mother’s lady-in-waiting the privacy to carefully clean and change Rhea from her travel-worn clothes into a pink silk robe.
Drawing in more air, I answer, “We were practicing using her magic. She hasn’t had much training with it, and she just passed out after expelling some.” It is a bald-faced lie, but I don’t care. When it comes to Rhea’s safety, there are only five people I trust with the truth of who she is and what she can do: my parents, my sister, my best friend, and myself. Though a lie, it encompasses enough of the truth that Galen should be able to heal whatever is wrong with Rhea.
“It is possible that without the proper training, she likely used too much too quickly, and her body is now recovering. Give her time, Your Highness. She just appears to be resting. Let her do so.”
I force a smile to my face as I nod. “Thank you, Galen.”
The old mage dips his chin, then stands and walks to the door, closing it quietly behind him. I get up from my own chair and stretch my arms overhead before interlacing my fingers behind my head.
It’s been two days.
My eyes catch on the dead plants in the corners of the sitting room just beyond, and a shudder rolls through me. The memory of the moment I watched them wilt, life drawn from them in mere seconds, ripples to the forefront of my mind.
Your words mean nothing to me now.
She had screamed that at me from where she knelt on the floor, and like the lighting of a candle, something within her had ignited. But it wasn’t warm nor was it light. It was power—raw, unfiltered power—that turned her eyes completely black. Then the screaming started. The sound was so tortured that I thought I might die right there. I saw her magic begin to light her palm, but it wasn’t that brilliant, beautiful, luminescent white I wasused to. Glittering black shadows balled larger and larger in her hands, and I barely had time to throw my own magic up as a shield when it burst from her palms.
Despite my magical strength,Ihad nearly faltered under the weight ofherpower. I watched through a grimace as the plants in my room went from vibrant green to deathly black within seconds. Then she collapsed, her magic gone like a puff of smoke. I crawled to her, my hands shaking as I tried to wake her, but her skin was wan, her lips so fucking pale, and she was silent. I would take her anger and her hatred of me over that numbing silence.
This newfound quiet is soul-shatteringly unbearable.
