I stood outside her door to wait until she calmed down. I heard Jason leave his room and climb through her window. I knew he took her dress off and held her half-naked body against him for a moment. And I wanted to trade places with him more than I wanted once to save the Damned, but he is what she needed. He is what she deserves. He can love her a million times better than I ever could, and she needed someone to hold her after what I did. After everything I’ve done over the last few weeks. How can I look at her tomorrow and pretend to hate her?
Truth is, I can’t. I feel weak and worn from it. I just can’t watch her cry anymore. I don’t want to. No matter what our fates are, I think perhaps it’s time to tell her I forgive her and I love her, but that she needs to be with Jason for the good of all our people. She loves the people and she would do anything to save them, protect them; even deny her own heart. I can trust her to do that. I can tell her. I have to tell her, because I cannot bear this another day. I want so badly to dry her tears, to talk with her for hours about nothing, to place my hands on her beautiful belly and feel the fullness, the roundness of a life inside that she and I created. I want to tell her I love the way she looks in that pink dress she wears when it’s sunny, the way it flows in the wind and shows the top of her thighs sometimes, the way it falls softly over the tiny bump—how much I already love that child, even though I’ve never even met her. I love her because I love her mother. But I guess that’s why I can’t tell her the truth about Lilith’s prediction, because I love her and I love that child enough to give her the father she deserves. The father only my brother can be. They’re both better off if I’m out of their lives.
Tomorrow, I’m leaving. I’ll give back the wedding band and ask her to give it to our daughter one day. I’ll tell her I forgive her but that I can never love her again. It doesn’t have to matter that the word ‘can’t’ will have a different meaning to her than it will to me, because at least it won’t be a lie. She’ll take it to mean I don’t have it in my heart when, all along, I will know it means simply that I’m not allowed to. I can never let myself forget that.
I lowered the journal slowly into my lap and stared up through a coat of tears at the painting. How could I possibly process any of this? All along, we’d been on exactly the same page. Well, right up until Morgana hexed him. She ruined everything! Everything. We could have resolved this months ago. I could have been laying in his arms instead of crying myself to sleep every night. He could have felt his baby’s first kicks. That bitch has taken everything away from us.
“Ara?” Dad said softly, opening my door.
“Dad.” I wiped a line of tears from my chin. “I know she’s family, but I can’t let her live.”
“Who?”
“Morgana.”
He closed the door and came to sit beside me. “Why do you say that?”
I showed him the journal. “This is all her fault. All David suffered—all I’ve suffered. I hate her and I just so badly wanna go down there to those kill suites right now and rip her damn head off.”
He cleared his throat.
“I’m sorry, Dad. I know—”
“No. It’s fine.” He held my gaze for a second, his blue eyes cold, then stood up. “Look, you need to come down and close the night. Your people expect a speech.”
I nodded. “I know. I’ll be down in a sec.”
“Right.” He nodded. “And clean yourself up first.”
I covered the flour marks with my hand. “I will.”
“See that you do,” he said stiffly, and he turned away, closing me in my room with the iciness he left behind.
I looked at the journal again, then my dirty hands, and put it aside. If I got stuck in to the last pages now, I’d never get downstairs in time to close the night.
With David’s voice circling my thoughts the whole time, I shut myself in the bathroom, turned on the faucet and cried. What right did she have? What right did any of them have to interfere? What broke between us should have been up to him and me. Not anyone else. Morgana justifies it by saying she couldn't let him forgive me—for his own good. But who is she to decide? I ruined things with David, and it was up to
him
to choose how he dealt with that.
“Ara?” Mike called through the door.
I ceased the tears with a snivel and composed myself quickly, twisting the faucet off. “Um. Yeah?”
“You said to come get you at quarter to.”
“Thanks. Dad already came in.”
“Okay. Want me to wait for ya? We can walk down together?”
I looked at my red, blotchy face and the inky mascara running in four blurry lines down my cheeks, and grabbed a tissue. “No. You go ahead.”
“Ara?” His voice vibrated through the wood, as if he spoke right into the door. “Are you okay?”
“I’m fine.”
“You don’t sound fine.” The handle jiggled.
I appeared at the door in a vampire flash and locked it into place.
“Ara.”
“I just need a moment.”
“What’s wrong?”
“Nothing.”
“Don’t lie to me.” He jiggled the handle again. “I may not be around so much anymore, but I am still your best friend and I know when you’re crying. Let me in.”
“It’s the journal,” I said, leaning against the door.
“What journal?”
“On the bed.”
He went quiet. I wandered back over to the mirror and started tidying up my face, and just as I found the happy queen beneath the blubbering mess, Mike knocked on the door again.
“Yeah?”
“I don’t know what to say, Ar.”
I opened the door, a face of composure greeting him on the surface while my empty eyes revealed the truth beneath.
He stepped back and opened both arms, the leather-bound book still tucked into his palm.
“It’s all her fault, Mike.” I curled myself into him. “She is the cause of all this pain we’ve suffered lately.”
“Yes, but…” He kissed the top of my head, repositioning my crown after. “You’ll sort it out with him. I know you will. He clearly loves you.” He held up the journal to make a point.
“But he wrote that before the hex. I mean, the spell’s taken hold now and I don’t think he still feels the same.”
Mike frowned. “So you didn’t read all of it?”
I shook my head.
“Here.” He placed it in my hand. “Read the last ten or so pages.”
My brow stayed contorted long after Mike closed my door and left me alone, but the ticking clock reminded me I had only eight minutes left to be downstairs. So I flipped the journal open and my eyes danced sideways over the words, trying to process them faster than I was capable of.
I woke to the broad Paris sky this morning, but instead of feeling the gentle breeze of a new day brush my skin in the early hours, I felt a sickening twist in my gut as the nightmare I suffered the last twelve hours left my system like a blast of air being forced from within me. I threw my legs over the side of the bed and vomited on my own feet, reliving the nightmare over and over again—the way the life left her eyes, the feel of her neck snapping between my hands—what I did to her cold, dead corpse after. I could never do that. I could never bring such harm to her. So why did I dream it in such graphic detail?
The first thing I did, before even wiping the vomit from my toes, was call Falcon and see that she was all right. He sent me a picture of her sleeping peacefully in her bed and only then would my dormant, lifeless heart settle. I thought I killed her. As I woke, I honestly thought for a moment that I’d killed her.
I flipped over a page and the next entry was a short one.
The dream returned last night. This time it was worse. This time, I cut a line down the centre of her body and forcibly removed the unborn child from her womb. While she screamed my name, I licked the tears from her cheeks, savouring the mix of blood and fear. But in my bed under morning light, as I lay absorbing that dream, feeling it warm my hands as if her flesh were still stuck to them by the blood, the memory did nothing so mild as to make me shudder, but eased the new ache I’d worn in my chest since the day I arrived here. All my regrets, all my fears over what might happen to her in Jason’s care seemed to simmer away like milk over a burn. Something is changing. And it scares me as much as it pleases me. This is, after all, for the best. The more I hate her, the easier it will be to live without her for the rest of my days.
The grandfather clock in the library chimed three-rings-past-eleven. But the guests could wait. Dad could look at his watch all he wanted. Mike could rock on his heels, his hands gathered at his front, worrying. I didn’t care. I needed to know if there was hope, or I couldn't go down there and hold my head high. Not for anything.
I’ve never been so clear about anything in my life,
he continued.
As time has passed, my being away from her has allowed my hatred room to grow and develop as it should have by now, and I feel I’m ready to return there without falling into the trap of her heart again. Lilith Marked me as a reminder that hating her is for the best, and I can finally be at peace with that. She can have Jason. Jason can have her. She’s tainted and ugly to me now, and I just wish I’d had this kind of clarity while I was standing in front of her, because I feel it in my hands now. I feel this undying, unending need to see her cry at their mercy—to see her whimper for Jason and beg him to save her from the suffering I cause her. I long to hear him cry in the corner, beg for the restraints to be removed so he can just hold her and make her okay. But he never will. Let them suffer. Both of them. When I get back, she will know what sorry feels like.
I drew back with a little gasp. I could actually feel the hatred within these pages, like a stagnant kind of energy that had a life force all of its own. And it was dark. And brooding. And dangerous.
The difference between the two Davids was so savage and so sudden that I stopped reading and just let time expire, trying to absorb it.
“Ara,” Falcon said, appearing in the doorway. “What are you doing? People are waiting. You were supposed to close the festival at eleven.”
“Tell them we’ll finish at twelve,” I said into the journal.
“Why?” He moved in another step. I could feel the worry in his eyes burn a hole in my neck.
“I need to finish this. I’ll be down soon.”
“Are you okay?”
“Yeah.” I nodded, turning my head to offer him a forced smile. “I’m fine.”
“Okay. I’ll be outside if you need me.” He pointed to the hall.
“No. You go downstairs. I’ll meet you there soon.”
I looked back at the journal, basically cutting him off, but he stood there for a few more seconds then quietly slipped away.
Toward the end of the journal were a few well-laid-out pages, with perfect penmanship and well-structured sentences. He wrote about the moment I said I hated him, how he was so taken back by it that for a moment he felt a familiar feeling of love for me, even underneath all the hatred. But a shard of agony filled his body with heat then, and reminded him he had to hate me back. That he DID hate me, with ALL of his heart. So he let it go. But it happened again, and it happened often, and every time he offered me comfort or friendship, his agony was more severe than the last time. I could see the pressure of the pen on the page had weakened as time went by. He wrote about rejecting first Lilithian blood and then, a few weeks after, human blood too. He thought he was being punished for failing to hate me, said that he had clarity when we were apart and being cruel was easy, but sometimes just a simple look I'd give him or a random brush of my hair from my face would remind him all over again why he fell in love with me.
It’s the same thing day after day after day. I can’t—no matter how much I hate her, I can’t stop feeling for her, and every time I do, I am punished so harshly I can only slip deep into my own imagination and dream up ways to hurt her just to stop my own pain.
“Ara?” Falcon said, opening the door again, holding on to the frame to lean in. “I have to insist that you come down now. I’m getting heat from your dad.”
I slowly put the journal down. “Okay. I’m coming.”
“I’m sorry,” he said, his eyes wide with concern. “I know what’s going on—” He nodded to the journal. “Mike told me. But I promise, as soon as you’ve made your speech, you can come back up here and I’ll leave you alone until dawn.”
Something about seeing Falcon all concerned made everything I just read not seem quite so daunting. I smiled. “You don’t have to worry about me, you know. I’ll be okay.”
“I know,” he said, but he didn't believe his own words.
“It was just a shock, that’s all.” I motioned to the book. “He’s not the David I thought he was. In any way.”
“Is that a good thing or a bad thing?” he asked as we headed out the door.
“Both.”
“Do you remember the speech?”
“Of course,” I said. “Pity most of it’s a lie.”
“I know.” He cupped my shoulder affectionately. “But Drake did say he’d go along with anything to cover up the real story. So he
will
sign the agreement next month and, being a man of his word, he will stick to it.”
“I hope so. Because…” I cradled my precious bundle in both hands. “I won’t let him take my daughter. If it comes to it, we will go to war.”
“We won’t need to. Blade assured me he’s weaved that part of the agreement so deep into the wording of the contract that not even David could find it if he was wearing the most lawyerly head he owns.”
I laughed, cocking a brow. “Lawyerly?”
His mouth spread in a cheery smile. “You know what I mean.”
My head bobbed in an absent kind of nod while I searched the dim, candlelit space for a change of topic. The wicks were burning down now and taking the light with them, but something about the night felt edgy and new. Like we were expecting more guests to arrive. “So, did you bring your hunky new man tonight? I was kinda hoping to meet him.”
“He’s…not quite ready to know what I am yet?”
“You haven’t told him?” I rocketed forward with disbelief.
Falcon steadied me by the shoulders, laughing softly. “I will. I just need more time.”
“But you’re so cool, Falcon. He’ll love you even more when you tell him you’re a knight.”
“We’ll see.” He turned away, but his eyes had that lovely sparkle new love seemed to leave.
“I still get so spun out by it,” I said after a moment.
“By what?”
“The fact that you like guys.”
“I like girls too.”
“I know, but you also like guys. I mean, how does that work?” I put one hand up apologetically. “I’m so sorry if that makes me sound ignorant, but I’m just trying to understand.”
“You’re not ignorant, Ara. It’s just—” He stuffed his hands in his pockets. I wasn’t sure I’d seen him do that before. “It’s almost like I don’t notice gender differences, aside from, you know, the obvious physical aspects. But, in truth, I fall for a person based on … I’m not sure.” He shrugged—another non-Falcon gesture. “Certain features and certain personality traits are what get me, I guess. Not gender.”
I considered that for a moment, thinking about Emily’s pretty face and soft touch—how, if I were gay, maybe I’d like that in a girl. Morgana, however, I wouldn’t touch with a bargepole. Bitch. “I think, if I liked girls, I wouldn’t like them to act like a guy. You know—”
“Yeah.” He laughed softly, gently drawing his hands from his pockets. “I know girls like that. And I’m the same with guys. I don’t like the … queens.”
“Really?”
He frowned at my expression. “Just because I like guys, doesn’t mean I like fairies.”
I put both hands up in mock defence. “Okay. I get it. Sorry.”
He smiled softly at me. “Come on. Lord Eden finished his speech about a minute ago. Let’s go close this festival down so we can all go to bed.”
“Not so fast, soldier.” I stayed put as he walked ahead. “We have a council meeting after, remember?”
His bulky shoulders hunched as he came to an abrupt stop. He turned slowly around. “Like I said, let’s just get this night over with.”
“What is it you don’t want to tell me?” I asked, following him as he walked away.
“Nothing.”
“Oh, okay then,” I joked, stopping as the footmen drew the double doors back, revealing the hordes of people below the balcony. With a long breath, I quashed the effects of stage fright and redirected my focus to Falcon. “I’ll give you one last chance to confess.”
He turned his head just a fraction and looked down at me, all tall and knightly in his Core uniform.
I stared daggers up at him. “Whatever it is, I will find out.”
“I know.”
“Then just tell me now.”
As he opened his mouth to speak, Walt’s booming voice announced the arrival of the Queen. I watched the courage leave Falcon’s eyes and the words fold in his mouth, reshaping into “After the last dance.”
“Is it David?” I asked, leaving the people hanging. “Is he okay?”
“He’s fine,” he whispered. “Just go make your speech.”
“The Damned?” I continued, ignoring the rising confusion below.
“They’re fine too. Speech.” He walked forward with his hand on my back and guided me toward my proverbial podium, then took one soldierly step back to the wall.
My sweaty, cold hands cupped the brass railing and I peered down into the faces looking up at me, searching the unfamiliar for the familiar. I found it in my dad’s eyes, where he leaned against the piano beside Quaid, his arms folded, slight curiosity glaring back at me.
Nervous, honey?
he thought.
I did a double-take.
I didn’t know you could project your thoughts this far!
He smiled.
There’s a lot you don’t know. Now, just focus, Ara, and get this speech over with. I need to tell you something.
What?
Speech first.
Argh. Fine.
I focused on him, blotting out the judging crowd, and drew a breath. “Centuries ago, a young queen ruled the Three Worlds,” I began, projecting my voice so boldly across the room no one would know it was shaking. “A queen that was cruelly taken away in a war between two of the same kind. While one may have been vampire and the other Lilithian, they were both immortal, both had hearts, and as such, should have been united.” And paused to let that sink in before continuing. “For centuries, our people have suffered the crimes of indifference—a suffering that this event today marked the end of. The Autumn Festival was once a celebration of fruitfulness—the harvest, the end of a season—but from this day forth, it will remind us of the richness of a life lived in peace. Peace among the Three Worlds.”
A small round of applause rose up from the crowd, and I waited, smiling as I ran over the next part of the speech in my head: The Lie.
“Some of you may know that peace talks have begun with the old king—that there is an agreement being drawn up that will see the Three Worlds unite under one reign—with three rulers: one for the Lilithian kind, one for the Vampire kind, and a human representative between them.”
Shocked, anxious, and surprised faces exchanged looks of mingled concern and hope.
“It is my pleasure to announce that, within weeks from now, when the Freedom Bill has been signed by all leaders, the Three Worlds will come together as one kingdom in united peace.”
They were hesitant at first, looking to each other again before deciding finally that this would be a good thing, and one by one, they clapped their hands until the sound roared around the room, drowned out only by the cheering.
“So celebrate, my friends,” I continued, speaking a little louder. “And this marvellous evening shall continue until the final stroke of midnight brings us into a new day.”
From his perch against the piano, my dad stood tall, lowering his arms, and offered me a gentle bow. I rolled my head in return.
Do you think they bought it?
He made a point of looking around, gesturing to the celebrations with both hands.
I think it’s safe to assume they did.
Good.
I smiled.
“Who are you talking to?” Falcon asked, grabbing my arm gently and drawing me back from the edge.
“My… Um. Lord Eden.”
His frown flattened. “Oh.”
“Why?”
“No reason.”
“You looked worried,” I noted.
“I was.”
“Why?”
“No reason.” He walked away.
“Falcon.” I darted after him. “Why did you look so concerned?”
“I just…” He started down the stairs. “I thought it might be David.”
“And what would be wrong with that?”
When we got to the bottom, he turned and took my hand, cupping it inside both of his. “Nothing. I have to go.”
“Where are you going?”
Hesitation knocked him off balance a little. “To set up the meeting.”
“What’s to set up?”
“Ara.” Dad appeared beside me, a gleaming grin transforming his whole face back to the man who was my father and not that cold impostor who last spoke to me in my room.
“Hang on, Dad. I just have to—” I started, but when I looked at Falcon, he was gone. “God damn it!”
“Language, Ara.”
“Sorry. It’s just…” I motioned to the missing knight. “I needed to talk to him.”
“Come,” Dad said, leading me away as though my problem was nothing. “I owe you a dance.”
And I was given no choice but to follow him. Not that I minded. I’d find Falcon later and torture an explanation out if him. Well, torture him with crappy jokes until he gave in and confessed. I was just thinking about websites I could get bad jokes from when Dad told me to snap out of it.
“Sorry, Dad.” I moved into his arms and rested my cheek again his chest. “I’ve got a lot going on.”
“I know.” He kissed my head just beside my crown. “But you need to be more careful in speaking my name, Ara.”
My eyes widened and shot right up to his. “Oh crap! I’m so sorry.”
“It’s your brother you’ll need to apologise to—if someone were to start asking questions.”
A thick ball of saliva blocked my throat. He was right. My carelessness wouldn’t just hurt him. It could potentially hurt Sam. “That will be the
last
time I ever make that mistake, Lord Eden. You have my word.”
Lord Eden bowed his head and smiled, and we swept the floor to a faster pace, gliding and flying past the couples with a kind of elegance not even vampires as old as David and Arthur could master. I felt like a leaf tied to the end of a string, being drawn across the summer sky on the tail of a horse, and when I caught a glimpse of us in the reflection of the giant windows I no longer saw the youthful face of Lord Eden. I no longer felt the presence of the hundreds around us. All I saw was my dad, and me in my wedding dress, as it should have been so long ago. But it wasn’t just a memory of what could have been, in washes of black and white, it was full colour and so real I blinked twice to wash it away
“Are you doing that?” I asked.
He took a long breath and let it out slowly. “There is no greater moment for a father than the first dance he has with his daughter at her wedding.”
I looked up at him and smiled, as the crowd slowly and foggily reappeared in my periphery. “So you regretted it too then?”
He bowed his head and the next song began, taking us completely back to the present. “And I must give you away now,” he said. “To someone else who missed a dance at your wedding.”
Hopeful eyes moved away from Dad but landed square on the caramel gaze of my best friend.
“May I?” Mike asked, taking my hand.
“Of course.” Lord Eden bowed and backed gracefully away.
“Thank you … Lord Eden,” I called. “For the dance.”
He stopped by the edge of the dance floor, half hidden by the crowd, and said, “The pleasure was entirely mine.” And then he was gone. Mike and I stood motionless for a moment, staring at the empty space he left behind.
“He’s so different,” I said.
“Blood changes people.” Mike took me gently in his arms. “This man we see now is the real version of him.”
“I guess,” I said solemnly. “It’s just hard to think of the other man as an act, you know? I
miss
him.”
Mike drew me a little closer and held me just a little tighter. “I know. But, anyone can see he still loves you. His responsibilities just lie elsewhere now, that’s all.”
I thought back over my past for a few minutes, saying nothing when the song ended and another began, and we danced three songs, safe in each other’s arms, before I finally rolled my face upwards to meet his. “He was really cold to me upstairs before—when I told him I wanted to kill Morg.”
Mike laughed.
“Why are you laughing?”
“She’s his…” He lowered his voice to a whisper. “She’s his granddaughter. You’re his daughter’s soul. He loves you both equally, Ara. Think about what he’d say if you wanted to flay Sam.”
So I did think about that, even remembered back to when we were younger and I told Dad I wanted to kick Sam for being such a jerk. “Yeah,” I said with a little cringe. “He never did like us fighting.”
“No. And the same applies to Morg. She’s a pain in the arse, and she hurt you—
and
she hurt David. But he doesn’t want her dead. Just look at what Drake did to the world,” he said suggestively. “Your d—Lord Eden is like that parent at playgroup—the one that never sees what his kids are doing to hurt others. He’s completely blinded by his love for you all. Why do you think you turned out to be such a spoiled little princess?”
I smiled, nodding. “He is kinda like that, isn’t he?”
Mike nodded too. “He’s not being cold to you, Ara. He’s just hurt by this feud between you and Morg. It can start wars you know?” His head motioned around the room, as if to mention the past and all the suffering in one gesture.