Page 24 of A Courage of the Chosen

Everything came crashing around me then. I’d spent days keeping those emotions in a barely-held-together box, but one look from Callahan and it had disintegrated between one blink and the next.

To see my failure mirrored in his face was hard to witness. It was no less than what I deserved, though.

If this was how he reacted when I’d told him about the Craobh, what will happen when I tell him about the bond that exists between Tavish and I, that he’s been actively using to talk to me?

I’ve spent the better part of a year being angry about all the things that have been kept from me, and here I am, doing the same thing, because I’m not sure I can stand to see Callahan walk away from me a second time.

It makes me the worst kind of coward. It makes me unworthy of the title that’s now attached to my name.

That being said, I’m pissed at him, too. I thought we were in this together, and when I needed someone to lean on, he left.

The door swings open, silencing my thoughts as I lift my head to greet the council members filing into the room. Today has to be the day that we make progress. Though it seems unlikely, since they bicker like high school girls.

Today, I also need to come clean to them about the Craobh Beatha. Hume knows, and I refuse to let him lord that over me. There’s something else that needs to be done first. Something Callahan and I agreed over dinner, before everything went to shit.

‘Good mornings’ are murmured across the table as everyone takes their seats and silence falls, each waiting for someone else to begin. I haven’t been the first to speak the last couple of times we’ve gathered here.

Squaring my shoulders, I lean forward, and seven pairs of eyes focus on me. “I’m adding two new council members,” I say with a confidence that doesn’t portray the way my insides are squirming.

Unsurprisingly, Hume is the first to open his mouth. “You can’t just add two new council members. There are protocols. Rules that even the monarchy aren’t above. Not that you have any rights in this room. You are not our queen.”

Lady Calder sighs. Loudly. Hume shoots her a look that would send others running, but if there’s one thing I’ve learned about Lady Calder, it’s that she dislikes Hume even more than I do.

I nod to the guard standing by the door, having asked him to join us on my way into the room, and he pulls it open at my command.

Brodie is the first to step through, his usual smile fixed in place. There’s a taunt beneath it though, like he’s ready for a fight and knows he would come out on top. Strangely, it makes me relax. I’m not alone anymore.

The figure behind him is a brooding presence as the light falls on his features. He’s trimmed his beard down since he left me, and his clothes are smarter than the simple garments he normally wears. The black shirt is embroidered at the sleeves, his pants neatly pressed, and his boots shinier than I’ve ever seen.

Callahan shifts into the room, and the reaction of the council is immediate. Most of them stiffen, faces hardening with his arrival.

“Absolutely not!” Hume rises from his seat and points a finger in Callahan’s direction. “You would invite the enemy to join this council?”

I give him a blank stare.

The guard slips out and closes the door behind him, Callahan and Brodie standing at the edge of the room with their arms crossed, a formidable wall of fierceness that takes up all the remaining space.

“This is an outrage!” Hume curses. “Are you all going to let this happen?” He turns his mottled face to the rest of them. Lord Fettis and Lady Navin look as though they’re on the verge of rising from their seats too.

“So we let this imposter pretend she’s queen, and then we’re going to allow her to invite those we’ve spent the better part of a century fighting against to be privy to our plans? I will have none of it.”

My teeth grind together as he continues.

“They don’t belong here, and neither does she.”

My hands slam against the table, and a quick flash of light follows as I push myself to my feet, something snapping inside me. Icy rage pools in my stomach and surges through my chest.

“This is my council, whether you accept me as your queen or not. I will invite who I like. Sit down, or leave.” White creeps in at the edge of my vision as more of my power rises to the surface. “But let me make something very clear, Hume. If you walk out of that door, you forfeit your seat at this table.”

Tension coils around us like a boa constrictor, thickening the air as my patience grows frayed the more Hume spits about how I don’t belong here. Denies me what is mine.

I don’t back down from his stare, he won’t intimidate me the way he’s tried to so frequently.

Hume’s mouth drops open and closes again, and he lowers into his seat on my right with exaggerated slowness.

Leaning my weight into my hands, magic curls tightly around my forearms, and my nails gouge into the wood as my fury rises higher. It’s an effort to wrestle the beast from tearing into them all as it relishes in me finally loosening its restraints. After days of their abuse, it’s finally had enough.

“I respect your views, and I appreciate this is a lot for you to process.” I make sure to hold each of their gazes in turn. “But Callahan and Brodie have spent longer than any of us fighting the Dorche. They have risked far more than any of you have when it comes to defeating them. They will have seats on this council, and you will listen to them.”