“So tell me. Why shouldn’t I let them execute you?”
His tone was cold and deliberate. He wasn’t asking as a father. He was asking as Lord Thorne. Sebastian stared up at him in shock. He hadn’t expected that question. But maybe this was it – the moment he had to make him see. He had to try. For Kara, if not for himself.
“You don’t understand – I had a vision. From the Arcanth–” Sebastian began.
Tobias looked at him sharply. “The Arcanth called to you?”
Sebastian met his father’s gaze, willing him to believe him. “Yes. Draknor are coming. The Arcanth wants to be whole. It’s the only way.”
His father turned away, glancing out of the tower window, and appeared to be wrestling with what he had to say.
“I knew it. I knew there would be a reason,” he breathed, and Sebastian could hear the relief in him.
Sebastian stared. “You... believe me?”
His father turned to face him once more. “Fatàn sent a prophecy before the Arcalon. Ambiguous – same as all their damned riddles.”
So Kara was right.
“I, like you, believed the Shards needed to be united,” his father said. “I still do.”
What the fuck?
“You agreed with me? This whole time?” Sebastian’s fury flared violently. “So why the hells am I locked up here bound with nightshade?”
“Because I was outvoted by the rest of the Council. Because removing them has caused destruction and chaos. People have died.”
Guilt lanced through him. “I know. I had no choice,” Sebastian said.
Tobias knelt, so they were eye-level. “I know that. Sebastian, if I had openly sided with you – House Thorne would’ve been at war with the rest of Vallenna. Your sisters could have lost everything. Our home. The name. The protection. We could have ripped ourselves apart before Draknor came.”
“So you left me to do it alone?”
Tobias held his gaze. “I trusted you. I hoped... believed you would have the interests of Vallenna at heart. And I was right.”
The silence after that was heavy. The weight of all the things they’d never said sat between them.
“I tried to delay sending our men,” he continued. “Didn’t think a healer would catch up to you, never mind join you.ThatI didn’t see coming.”
Kara.
Sebastian looked at his father. Tobias was smirking now. Then his expression softened. “You care for her, don’t you?” Tobias asked. “I see it.”
More than anything.
Sebastian nodded.
“She arrived in the City today. The cells at the Hall of Justice. They’ve taken the Shards there too. Her trial is tomorrow. She has at most... three days before execution. Maybe less.”
Sebastian recoiled.A cold wave crashed through his chest. It wasn’t real. Couldn’t be. Three days? No. That wasn’t enough time. Not when he’d only just found her.
No, no, no. She can’t die.
His father put a hand on his shoulder to steady him and watched him closely. Sebastian forced back the rising scream in his throat. She was alive. For now. Recognition passed across Tobias’s face.
“You look like I did,” he said quietly. “When I realised I loved your mother.”
Love? Is that what this is?
