“Poor woman,” Lainey said in a soft voice.
Caden stepped away from the body, his shoes leaving footprints behind as he joined Fallon and Shea. “It was a kinder death than any I would have given her.”
Judging by the expressions on the faces of those around them, Shea judged that her mother was one of the few to feel sympathy for the other woman.
Shea stared down at the body, not sure what she felt. She’d loved Victoria like an honorary aunt once. That had been a long time ago, however. The intervening years wouldn’t allow her to muster up the sympathy she felt was expected. That disturbed her. She didn’t like the thought that she was becoming hardened against death, not when it was someone she knew. At the same time, she couldn’t be sad that Victoria was gone. Not after her betrayal had affected so many.
What was more disturbing was the manner of her death. Her son had rescued her from the Trateri only to use her and then cast her aside when she had fulfilled her purpose. It, more than anything, said how far he’d fallen from the boy she’d known and loved.
“What kind of son kills his own mother?” Braden asked next to her.
“The kind that has gone mad,” Fallon said, his face shadowed as he stared at the woman. There wasn’t any of the fierce satisfaction at a justified fate that had been on Caden’s face—not because Fallon felt she hadn’t deserved death.
No, Shea suspected it was the fact that Griffin had been the one responsible. For a man who’d lost his own mother to a violent fate, such an act must have felt like someone piling wounds on top of open wounds. It must prod at memories that had never fully healed—ones that could never fully heal.
Shea slipped her hand into Fallon’s. She didn’t say anything, didn’t try to comfort him with useless words. She let him know she was there, that she understood and hurt with him. Sometimes that was the only thing you could do when words were an inadequate salve.
“It’s gone.” Lainey’s voice brought them back to the present and the suspicion they’d come here to confirm.
Shea turned to see her mother staring down at a pedestal, a stricken expression on her face.
Stepping closer, Shea saw that her mother was right. Whatever had once sat there was indeed gone, the pedestal empty, just a marble column with an intricately carved basin on top of it. Ruined bits of something lay on the ground. Shea was careful as she moved closer.
Fallon joined Shea at the pedestal.
“What exactly was taken?” Fallon asked, his words precise.
Braden and the other’s faces would seem emotionless to those who didn’t know them as they ringed the pedestal. For Shea who was just beginning to know the men, she would guess Van’s expression was one of boredom, while Gawain seemed pensive, his thoughts a mile away. Even Zeph seemed a little more impatient than usual, as if he’d like to be back on the battlements, preparing his men for the new threat they’d soon face.
Lainey didn’t answer, the pause stretching out until the others became restless.
“A weapon,” Shea supplied, her words simple.
“Big deal, we have weapons too,” Van said, his chin lifted in a challenging manner.
“Not like this.” Lainey finally spoke. Her eyes didn’t lift from the pedestal. “Nothing like this.”
Van watched her mother intently.
Fallon stirred. “Elaborate.”
Lainey looked up, her gaze going to Shea. There was regret in her eyes, anger too. “How much do your people know about the cataclysm?”
Barely masked impatience crossed Fallon’s face.
“This isn’t story time, woman. Get to the point,” Van snapped, saying what the others were thinking.
Lainey’s jaw flexed as she flicked an irate gaze at the Lion clan’s leader. “To do that properly, I need to know what you know about the cataclysm.”
Van curled his lip but didn’t comment.
Braden looked at her mother, his hands clasped behind his back. He seemed to be studying the room, cataloging its attributes.
Fallon’s sigh was long and heavy. “I doubt our stories differ much from most peoples’. We know our people came from somewhere in the Badlands. That once we were rulers of a great kingdom that was lost in the aftermath of the cataclysm.”
Lainey narrowed her eyes at him. “And you think to reclaim that kingdom.”
Shea stiffened next to Fallon, her gaze going from her mother to her warlord. She held her silence. That motive for his conquest had never occurred to her. It should have.
