“Can’t you tell? I’m building a kingdom.”
“Out of a mass of freshly progressed unseelie.” Pollux sets his cup down and leans forward. “What magic have you unearthed, Castor? First, Ash. Now,this? We spent ages searching for the answers to questions like these, and now—within months of one another—you have pressed the limits of the known world.”
“You’re one to talk. How’s my niece doing?”
Pollux growls.
Castor sets a hand to his chest. “Fine. If you must know, Polly, in Ash’s case, I stole your mate’s magic and pushed a dryad sapling into ent soil.”
“Youwhat?” Pollux grits.
“Yes, well. If she’s going to cry up her magic sand with its marvelous powers of turning dreams into reality all willy-nilly, it’s really finders, keepers, now isn’t it?”
“No.”
Castor, delighted, smiles and says, “No? Well.” He turns to me. “Look at that, my heart and dove, another thing he did not tell us.”
I find myself unable to hold down my own smile as I judge the very large man and shake my head. “Come now, Pollux, youmusttell us things if you want us to know them. That’s…mm…common sense, I believe. And also communication. A very valuable skill.”
Pollux’s eye twitches.
My delight mixes with Castor’s, and they dance around one another, urging both to greater heights.
In unison, our smiles turn into grins with presented teeth, and we lift our teacups tosippppast them.
“This…is perhaps the most horrifying thing I have ever seen.” Pollux laces his fingers and hunches into them, elbows upon his knees. “I am overjoyed for you, Tor,” he says, glaring at us above his clasped hands and looking anythingbutjoyful. “Seeing you so perfectly matched, so…happy…is wonderful. But. You already know there’s someone who will not be able to look at what you’re building here with anything but caution and concern.”
Castor’s joy depletes, hardening. “Yes, well. Cael can get over himself, don’t you think?”
“I’m not sure.”
Losing even more mirth, Castor settles. “What would he try to do?”
“If he deems this dangerous enough…he may see fit to remove the danger.”
My stomach drops, and my heart tightens. Remove…the danger? Does Pollux mean Cael would remove thepeople?Ourpeople?
Calmly lethal, Castor murmurs, “And so, villains becomes heroes and heroes villains… Is that not just the fate of a paragon who has grown too comfortable in hisrightness? I suppose we have for quite some time played opposite parts in one another’s stories. Figures, now that mine is finally underway, the world might see that dreadful moth prince for what he truly is.”
“What he truly isis cautious. He does what he can to protect those he cares about. Cael does his best.”
“Cael isunseelie,” Castor states, and the tea in my cup trembles against the vibration of his words. Lowering his voice, Castor murmurs, “You’re really going to sit here and play hisadvocate when you yourself worried to tell him about your own mate, for fear of what he might do in the presence of someone as powerful as her should he consider her a threat? Haven’t we bowed to that anxious man long enough?”
“Castor.”
“Haven’t we?” Castor’s nostrils flare with a sharp inhale. “Haven’tyouspent long enough playing advocate, Polly? On my behalf and now his. You are not responsible for holding this shattered relationship together.”
Pollux’s glare remains for long moments, then he buries his face in his hands. Shoulders bunched, he mutters, “I so dearly wish both of you could see each other more openly. I didn’t fear that Cael wouldhurtKassandra. I worried he’d limit her in the name of safety. Such would be the case here as well, assuming the lack of malice I saw in the children extends to the whole. My concerns rests in how you might present this development. You antagonize whenever possible. You prey on his anxiety for sport. Cael’s motivations are genuine. But you cannot reach them so long as you keep choosing to provoke him instead of see.”
“What a horrible, terrible, dreadful, rude thing to say to a man who cannotseewithout risking murder,” Castor huffs.
“You are a murderer,” Pollux says, “but not because of your eyes.”
“What in the realms is that supposed to mean?”
Pollux releases a breath. “Xios feels life from your stone victims.”
Castor shuts down.
