If he made it that long.
His plunge into the lake had taken more out of him than James cared to admit, and compounded with the endless days of hunting Ahnna without rest, he was recovering slowly.
Yet that felt like a minor concern compared with the all-consuming guilt that threatened to drown him.
Ahnna was innocent. Completely and utterly innocent, and yet it had taken the truth coming from his enemy’s lips to make him fully believe her.
Logically, James was aware that Alexandra’s scheme had been masterfully executed, but he still felt the purest form of stupid for having fallen for it so completely. With each step he took, it felt harder to understand why he hadn’t suspected her. Why he hadn’t taken a breath to hear Ahnna out. Why even when presented with the truth,he’d still clung to the lie, unable to get beyond what he’d seen with his own eyes.
Failures that he was being punished for, because he and Ahnna were now the Beast of Amarid’s prisoners.
Dippy trotted ahead of him, Carlo and Ahnna wrapped in a heavy fur cloak, and James couldn’t help but wonder what was happening beneath. Nothing good, was his best bet, although it was possible that the Beast’s proclivities were sated for the time being.
Since they’d been in their late teens, he and Carlo had gone head-to-head against each other over the Lowlands. Endless clashes of violence as Harendell and Amarid danced the knife’s edge of war over the fertile stretch of land north of the Blackreaches. The Amaridian prince’s reputation had always been dark, his sadistic tendencies known, and he’d grown into them with each passing year. Carlo left many bodies in his wake, and not just on the battlefield, because Katarina was endlessly covering up the deaths of his wives. All dead by accident, Katarina said, but it was no secret that Carlo had strangled each one. His soldiers were deeply loyal, and while that was partially because Carlo was a skilled commander, it was mostly out of fear of his particular brand of punishment.
Katarina was the singular individual who controlled the Beast, and he worshiped and feared his mother in equal measure. James had always believed that if someone like Carlo feared Katarina, the Crimson Widow’s cruelty must be greater than anyone knew.
Yet Katarina was also the reason he and Ahnna were alive.
Insurance against Alexandra, and apparently destined for imprisonment in the Furnace, but it was a long way to Riomar. Days on the road, and with fear of Katarina’s wrath holding back the worst of Carlo’s tendencies, there was a chance for escape.
If I get loose, I’m not going to run. I’m going to slit your goddamned throat.
James grimaced at Ahnna’s words, because it was going to be very difficult to rescue a person who aimed to kill him the moment she had a chance. Not that he could blame her.
Carlo had certainly manipulated the truth to the worst possible effect, but that didn’t change the fact it was the truth. James’s father had planned to overthrow Aren, and pleading to Ahnna that he hadn’t known until the final hour, that his father had believed he was doing right by her, that he’d intended to offer Aren exile would seem weak and hollow. Especially given James had sat and drunk for hours rather than immediately telling Ahnna of his father’s plans. James deserved Ahnna’s ire for a thousand reasons, and he refused to shirk responsibility when a more proactive response on his part might have stymied all that had occurred.
He was more than culpable. He was to blame.
Yet that did not mean he intended to wallow, because that would only dig the pit they were in deeper.
And the Furnace’s cells were deep enough.
25
Ahnna
What’s done is done,Ahnnasilently told herself.You alreadyknew Edward didn’t have your interests at heart, and this just confirms the depths of that truth.
Yet she couldn’t help but rehash the revelations that Carlo had forced from James, anger wrapping around her chest like a vise.
He wanted to make you queen! He was going to give you what you wanted!
James’s shouted words kept repeating in her head, but it was the latter part that made her ill—because how much of this was her own fault? How much of Edward’s negativity toward Aren was because she’d made no secret of her disgust for Lara and for Aren’s forgiveness of her? Had she driven that aspect of his plan? Would everything be different if she’d been vocal about her support for not just her brother’s rule, but Lara’s as well?
Against her will, Ahnna’s imagination spiraled, showing her a future where James was king of Harendell and she was his queen. A future where she had all that she desired, most especially the man she was in love with.
That’s not a future, it’s a delusion,her anger hissed.You’d be as powerless in that situation as you are now. A toy taken from one son and given to another, your name used as leverage to extort Ithicana, not support it. Your goals wouldn’t matter.Youwouldn’t matter.
“Why so tense, sweet Princess?” Carlo asked, breaking off from his incessant singing. “Does your heart hurt, having learned how the Harendellians intended to use you? Or is it because James is not the paragon of chivalry you’d thought him to be? You should have asked for my advice, because I’d have told you the truth about him.”
She shifted restlessly, hating how her body was pressed against his. “No, you wouldn’t have, because that would have disrupted Mother’s plans.”
Carlo chuckled. “True, true. But tell me, behind the handsome face, the polished boots, and the rigid manners, didn’t you sense a different sort of man? A woman such as you, who has survived on instinct, must surely have recognized the predator beneath? The wolf?”
Ahnna had, and God help her, it had been the wolf she’d wanted.
“In Amarid, we know only the wolf, especially in the Lowlands,” Carlo continued. “The James we know is always in the thick of it, uniform torn and splattered with mud and blood. The ruthless major general who will not hesitate to fight dirty. Who will always kick his enemies where it hurts most.” He gave a soft chuckle of appreciation. “Alas, with his interests vested in Cardiff, Ithicana was, by necessity, his enemy.”
