Page 17

The look I give Elsie holds an unspoken message. We’ll continue our conversation when I return.

The longer I stare at her vivid eyes, so alive with hurt and betrayal, the bigger the chance grows that I won’t leave at all, so I tear myself away from her and follow in my family’s footsteps.

Elsie’s plea is spoken to my back. “Don’t lock me in.” Then she resorts to begging. “Please.”

It’s impossible to harden my heart against the outcry of my mate. I turn to face her. “You’ll stay here.”

She nods enthusiastically. “I won’t leave your rooms until you get back.”

She hasn’t earned my trust, but I give it to her anyway.

It’s not because I feel guilty about taking her silence as her agreement to come inside her.

It’s a step in a new direction, showing her that I’m prepared to give her the benefit of the doubt.

Or so I tell myself as I walk with long, angry strides to my mother’s reception room.

It’s so typical of the queen to face me standing instead of sitting, even in her weakened state.

My father takes up a position at her right while Vitai stands a small distance to her left.

She’s dismissed the guards, which means the subject she wants to discuss is sensitive, too sensitive for the ears of the commoners, but she’s summoned my cousins.

The presence of Suno and Tarix shows just how important the matter is. Suno is the legal arbitrator while my mother values Tarix’s advice above that of everyone but my father.

My father isn’t holding her elbow or supporting her arm, but he looks ready to catch her at the slightest sign of swaying or fainting.

My mother holds herself regally, an iron will shining in the silver gaze she fixes on me. “What happened? Why wasn’t the mating successful?”

I clench my teeth. “I don’t know.”

She considers me for a moment before declaring, “She rejected you.”

“Did she?” Vitai sounds surprised. “That’s unheard of. No person on Zerra has ever rejected a mate.”

“Our circumstances aren’t exactly ideal,” I say, a tad defensive.

“The bond won’t be forged if she doesn’t accept you,” my mother says.

Irritation rises in me. “What does that even mean? I thought that fate was undeniable. I’ve claimed her. What else is there to do?”

“It won’t work if she doesn’t love you.” My mother gives me a pitying look. “Establishing a physical bond is easy. Acceptance comes from the heart. You need both for the bond to be complete.”

“This is the first I’m hearing of it.” I scoff. “No other mated couple on Zerra has ever had this problem.”

My mother sighs. “Normally, mated couples love each other. It comes naturally.”

Vitai smirks. “It looks as if you have your work cut out for you, Aruan. You’re going to have to win your mate over.”

I slide my gaze his way. At my cutting look, the smile vanishes from his face.

“That’s not why I asked you to come,” my mother says.

“Naturally,” I drawl. “What did you want to talk about?”

“I heard about something that happened even before Elsie tamed a dragon,” she says. “The talk is that spiked pets and pixie dragons swarmed to her in frighteningly great numbers, right here in the palace. Does she know how to control her power?”

I cross the floor and stop in front of my mother. “Out of everything that’s happened, that’s what you’re concerned about?”

“Elsie’s power has enormous ramifications,” my father says. “It could be dangerous.”

The muscles around my eyes tighten. “Aren’t all our powers dangerous in some way?”

Tarix steps forward. “We’ve had since our childhood to learn how to master them. Elsie discovered her power only recently.”

I direct my ire at him. “And whose fault is that?”

Tarix cringes.

“Aruan,” Suno says in a pacifying tone. “Your mother is simply concerned about everyone’s welfare.”

“If she can command animals,” my mother says, “who’s to say she won’t eventually be capable of commanding more advanced species?”

Meaning us, the Alit. They’re worried that Elsie would be able to control us. Interesting. I wonder if that’s the case. If so, her power would be fearsome indeed, and just about every man and woman on Zerra would have a good reason for wanting her dead.

Just like they do with me.

“There’s no evidence suggesting that,” Vitai says. “Let’s not get ahead of ourselves.”

“The people are frightened.” Tarix spreads his hands. “So are the royals.”

“Are they now?” I face him with a mocking grin. “What do you want me to do about that?”

I won’t lie. I’m enjoying the fear reflected in his eyes.

“Your mother needs to take Elsie under her wing,” Suno says. He must see the anger on my face because he adds quickly, “To train her.”

The anger boils over, escaping from the tight lid I’ve tried to keep on it. “Do you think for one minute I’d entrust my mate to the very person who banished her?”

“Aruan,” my mother cries out as if I’ve insulted her.

I turn on her. “Isn’t that true? Are you going to deny it again? To my face?”

She trembles as she stares at me, pursing her lips so tightly they turn colorless.

My father lays a hand on her shoulder.

The silence that follows is charged. She’s denied it up to now, but I won’t let her get away with it any longer.

“Do you know what happened to her, Mother? Do you know what she went through on Earth?”

And as she stares at me, I tell her everything, every little detail that Elsie shared with me, starting with her childhood ailments and their painful consequences and ending with how her heart almost gave out.

If it were possible for my mother’s chalky cheeks to grow paler, they would. Even Suno and Tarix appear offended and moved for Elsie’s sake. Only Vitai, whom I’ve already told Elsie’s history, doesn’t look surprised.

When I finally finish, I face my mother unblinkingly. “Are you still going to tell me you didn’t do that to her?” My voice rises steadily. “That you didn’t steal my mate from me?”

“It had to be done,” my mother exclaims in a sudden frenzy. “There was no other way.”

So it’s true, what I’ve been suspecting. And despite those suspicions, I’ve never felt more betrayed in my life.

“Nia,” my father says, his manner soothing.

My mother’s proud posture sags. “I did it for you, Aruan. For all of us.”

It takes everything I have to control the destructive rage inside me. “Do not insult me, Mother. You did not do it for me.”

Only Suno wears a shocked expression. Everyone else has already worked it out for themselves.

“She was going to be your downfall,” my mother says.

“Please, Aruan, try to understand. I did it because I loved you. Because I love you. I knew the prophecy would come true that day you set off the explosion.” I wince at the mention, but my mother plows ahead.

“That day, I knew you were too powerful, more powerful than any man who’s been born.

Everything in the prophecy pointed to you.

Removing your mate was the only way to secure our people and our world.

”She comes closer, stretching out her arms with her palms facing up.

“But I didn’t kill her. I could never do that.

I sent her away as much to save her life as yours because I knew she wasn’t safe here.

Don’t you see? She was a target since the day it became clear that she was your destined mate. ”

“So you sent her through a portal to Earth,” I say with all the bitterness I’ve been carrying inside me since the day I found out my family deceived me.

My mother hangs her head. If she means to embrace me, I won’t offer her forgiveness so readily. When I step away from her outstretched arms, she looks up, and hurt washes into her eyes.

I take in her smooth skin and youthful features. The characteristics are familiar, but I see now that I never truly knew the person who calls herself my mother.

I never imagined she could be capable of such cruelty.

“Don’t look at me like that,” she says. “Don’t you understand?”

“No.” My voice is cold. Hard. “You sent Elsie away as a strong and healthy baby.” I know it. I felt it. “What did you do to her?” The blade of her double betrayal twists into my gut. “Was banishing her not enough for you? Why did you have to make her suffer so much?”

Vitai looks on with an empathetic expression, but I’m in no state to figure out if it’s meant for my mother or for me.

“Aruan, I—” My mother swallows. “It wasn’t my intention. I swear that to you. All I can think is that, seeing that she wasn’t fully developed yet, her body must’ve been put back together wrongly on the other side. It was the first and only time I sent a baby through a portal to Earth.”

The sound of that makes me lose all reason. “She would’ve died.” My voice grows in volume until the whole palace must be able to hear me. “If the Phaelix hadn’t taken her, Elsie would’ve been dead.”

Dead.

My vision goes hazy. Red bleeds into the edges.

The injustice wakes a rage in me that knows no boundaries.

My reason fails as a deep, dark void sucks me in.

I’m aware of nothing but the power vibrating inside me, the darkness that’s slowly creeping in and swallowing the light until the darkness becomes the light.

“Aruan!”

My mother’s terrified scream reaches me through the power that’s taken over my body and mind.

“Aruan.” Someone shakes me. “Stop it!” My father.

“Aruan!”

I blink through the wave of haziness, slowly coming to my senses. The light is blinding. It streams through the windows, hurting my eyes and burning my skin.

The sun.

Through the arched windows, the flaming ball in the sky is a flaring mass of white light that steals the colors in the room. The beams bask everything in that pale, brilliant heat.

“Aruan.” My father grips my arm hard. “Calm down.”

It takes effort to do so. I will down the rage, getting a handle on it with difficulty.