Page 3 of Grand Romantic Delusions and the Madness of Mirth, Part One

I finish the last invitation to my upcoming literacy event, setting it aside so that my signature rose-gold ink can dry.

I skipped dinner. I should eat. I should go for a walk.

I should open my laptop and address the hundreds of emails piling up, mostly unread, in my inbox.

I should continue at least pretending that the so-called work I do even matters.

But without the meticulously crafted lettering, the deliberate dip of my pen into the pot of ink, the comforting scratch of the nib across the thick linen paper, the anger ignites in my low belly again.

That anger is now at war with the smothering despair I know I’ve been wallowing in since some part of my soul, my inner core, was torn asunder at the moment of Armin’s death.

I can’t settle.

It’s the fucking castle. And all the energy of the intersection point that underpins it.

Taunting me while remaining perpetually out of reach of my control.

My father once explained that I need to push through that feeling, to demand what inherently belongs to me.

But I always knew it was his, his energy to command, to harness, to hold. To bear the responsibility of.

Twenty-six years old. A supposed adult. Educated at the finest institutions, but always happy mingling in the middle. Content to be perpetually tucked just behind my brother. And I still fucking hate it here.

I push away from the writing desk to pace before it.

The delicate antique suits me even less than everything else in these ornately, lushly decorated rooms. Rooms that have never felt like mine.

But I never spent enough time here for that to matter.

As long as my bed was always big enough for Armin to sleep along the far edge without disturbing me, it never really mattered where I laid my head at night.

That wasn’t true for Armin, though. He had slipped in and out of my room in the early-morning hours since we were young. Just so he could get some sleep, just the couple of hours he needed to —

He had no worries of sleepless nights anymore. That hyperactive, overachieving brain that my father always praised is silent now.

So silent.

Even more silent than this fucking room.

I’m unraveling again. Just a few stitches, but I can feel the snag.

I was better on my own. In my own space, even with Armin’s empty apartments occupying the other half of the converted townhouse, with our home offices and staff quarters on the ground floor. I was quietly working through my grief.

But now, now …

I grab a gold-brocade pillow off the desk chair, shove it against my face, and scream. Smothering the noise and myself in the process, I let go of everything I’m holding so tightly and scream and scream .

Essence streams out of me — I can literally feel it flooding through the crack in my soul right in the center of my chest — and long-dormant protection runes spark around the doorway and windows.

Runes that haven’t activated, as far as I know, since I was fifteen, but are meant to stop me, stop my essence, from reaching beyond these rooms.

Ironically, I’ve always known I could reach beyond even those runes.

But I don’t.

I don’t because that’s not who I am. Even floundering from Armin’s death, even swamped in despair, even struggling through spikes of rage, I will not be sending anyone into the After, laughing their way there or not.

Releasing enough of that malignant essence, and likely damaging the pillow in the process, I sway on my feet. My body is finally as exhausted as my beleaguered mind.

Then for some odd reason, in that half-aware state, completely empty, I sit back down at the desk. I pull out another thick sheet of linen writing paper from the narrow front drawer and dip my pen in the still-open pot of rose-gold ink.

Six dips to scrawl six names.

I don’t know where these names have come from, but they’re now etched across the cream-colored paper in vicious slashes of pink-gold ink. None of my perfectly curled and curated penmanship is evident.

I cap the pen. I spin the lid closed on the ink. I watch the ink sink fully into the paper as it dries.

I know each of the names, of course.

One I’ve never met. Two are near strangers and older than me, so it was unlikely we even crossed paths at school. One I count among my best friends. The second to last, I’ve been in love with for most of my life, but he doesn’t want me back.

It’s the sixth name on the list that truly snags my attention. Armin Nikolas Wilhelm.

Is this … why have I written these names?

Do I somehow think this is a list I can give to my father to add to his matching-event invitation list? Then why is my brother’s name included?

I uncap the pen, using its remaining ink to slowly and deliberately cross out my brother’s name.

Then I sit there empty, hollowed out and weak-limbed, blinking down at the list. Is it possible that I’ve drained myself, my essence, so far that I’m hallucinating?

Or, for all that I hate the energy of the intersection point, have I somehow managed to insert myself into the flow of it? If just for this moment?

Is this list … is this list a gift from the universe?

It can’t be.

My father would never consider my bonding, chosen or not, with three of the five names on the list. And my brother is dead.

Also, the energy of the universe isn’t mine to command. Or even unwittingly channel.

Maybe Armin was my soul bonded, half-sibling or not.

It’s not unheard of with family members, and it would explain …

well, our entire lives together. We balanced each other — him adventurous and a little wild, me steady and purposeful.

We never really needed anyone else, except in the moments we couldn’t be together.

But my brother is dead.

He’s taken the chunk of my soul that resided within him, while also ripping my own asunder.

I stand up, because I can’t continue sitting here and wondering if I’ve lost my mind. I can’t just float within the nothingness until it fully absorbs me.

Because all my soul-deep grief aside, I am still alive.

I cross through the room, then traverse the empty halls of the always ridiculously chilly, stupidly quiet fucking castle until I find myself carefully opening the door to the twins’ bedroom.

It’s late enough that they’re sleeping, of course.

But being stuck in this place that seems only to mimic my deadened state of mind, I need …

I need some connection. Some reason. Even if that’s just indulging in listening to the twins breathe.

Breathe and dream.

Dark-haired and pale-skinned like me, but with sky-blue eyes like his mother, Levi, who I call Twinkle, has abandoned his bed and crawled in with his sister, Nina.

My Tinsel. The low beds, replacing cribs, are new since I’ve seen the twins last. The dark-blond, curly-haired, creamy-skinned Nina is sucking her thumb, with her arm curled around the cashmere teddy I got her last Christmas.

The twins have each other.

For now.

And maybe … just maybe? Maybe I’ll find a path leading all the way back into inhabiting the empty space in my soul?

Find some way to be content, if not actually happy, with the small amount of joy I filter into the world?

Both through my charity work and the trickle of practically benign essence I allow free rein?

Maybe if I focus on making sure neither of the twins ever must live without the other.

Maybe.

But the only way to do that?

To take my father’s place when he needs me.

To hold. To stay.

To survive, if nothing else .

No skills required, nothing more than I already have. Just do my duty.

Accept my place.

Accept the chosen bonds my father deems powerful enough to anchor me.

Just … keep living without half my soul.

I leave the twins to sleep, trying to drag the feeling of the heavy, contented comfort that cloaks their room into my own bed.

Unsuccessfully.

I toss and turn. Then I force myself to lie utterly still. But even though I’m exhausted — mind, body, and soul — the utter silence presses in on me, slowly but inexorably suffocating me.

I’m moving, tugging on a sweater, riding pants, and boots before I even make the decision to rise.

I brought Armin’s prize racing horse with me on the trip from London.

I can’t keep a horse near my apartments, and I also can’t bring myself to visit the stables to visit and ride Perseus regularly.

He needs more than simple exercise, and I can’t give it to him.

Outbidding pretty much every noble and business mogul with a sideline in breeding, my father has recently installed a new head trainer and horse breeder in the castle stables.

Perseus deserves to be babied, raced, and eventually put out to stud.

I’ve arranged for the mare and the two younglings that Armin also purchased before his death to be transported here as well.

I didn’t want to wait the extra time that it would have taken for one of the staff at Perseus’s stable to obtain clearance to enter the castle grounds, even just my father’s stables — a stupidly arduous task thanks to the castle’s high security.

As such, it was far easier to simply bring Perseus with me.

Now, I need to run. Now, I need to burn off this excess, this useless energy already building under my skin again, threading through my veins.

I already know that I’ll be facing my father tomorrow.

He’ll give me only until midmorning at the latest. And I can’t melt down in front of him.

I can’t weather more of those stiff-necked nods, those pointed, soul-searing, purple-eyed looks— not unless I get this grief and anger completely under control.