He trails his fingers across my cheek and down my neck, sighing as a sadness rises up in his eyes.
“No, not always,” he says. “But I’m learning. It’s been a long road for me.” He pulls away from me, seeming to come to a decision. “Tell me, the day you killed that man, is that your worst memory?”
I nod. “Yes. The day my mother died is a close second, but I was young and don’t remember it so well.”
“And where does the night we met rank?” he asks wryly.
I smile, glad for a little levity. “Lower than you’d think.”
“Do you want to knowmyworst memory?” he asks, wandering around the room now, tracing a hand along the back of a chair by the fireplace. There’s a small table beside it with a book lying on top. The same one, I think, that I keep seeing Syrus with around the castle.
“Is it the day your kingdom nearly fell?” I ask.
He gives a small smile, pleased I’ve guessed right. “Yes, although not just for the reasons you might expect.” Syrus braces his arms on the back of the chair, and I wait patiently, like I always do, for him to open up to me—to give me some real, private part of himself I can cling to even when he’s cold and distant and maddening.
“That day, the ephilium got wind of the fact that Ajax might make a pact with me,” Syrus says. “Like I’ve told you before, the pale-bloods don’t think much of humans, but they can’t truly dismiss a group that outnumbers them so completely. This rumor made them nervous, and they tried to get ahead of it. A small contingent of them ambushed me and my closest soldiers at my home. I survived, but only because one of my generals died protecting me—my younger sister, Sideria.”
I hold in my shock and horror, swallowing it down to leave room for hisstory. Instead of grasping for empty words, I simply go to his side, laying a hand over his.
“Ajax arrived to help us,” he continues. “But some of the pale-bloods got away. Including the general who murdered Sid. I hunted him down later, of course—once I’d made my deal with Ajax and we were driving the ephilium back from the capital together.”
A thought occurs to me then. “Does your sister have anything to do with why the river?—”
“Is called the Sideris?” he finishes. “Yes. They named it after her as a kind of memorial. Not that anyone remembers the reason now. I already knew when I asked you, I just wanted to hear you say it. I like hearing people say her name. It makes me feel like a part of her is still alive.” He nods at the book on the table. “That’s a history book from Strata. It tells the story too. It’s why I spend so much time reading it.”
I wrap my arms around his waist, resting my head on his arm, and he lets me, leaning into my touch.
“I bet she was an incredible woman,” I murmur, because I know exactly how he feels. The worst thing after my mother’s death was the way no one would talk about her anymore. They all looked vaguely scandalized when I did—even my father.
“She was always a better fighter than me,” he smiles sadly. “She could best any man in my army. And she was smart too, and so, so funny. Really, she should’ve been queen, but back then they still believed in nonsense like giving the throne to the firstborn. So she gave her life for me, her brother and her king. And I knew then that I had to do whatever was necessary to make her sacrifice worth it—to make my survival worth it. I would save my kingdom, whatever it cost.”
He shifts his arm, lifting it over my head to wrap it around my back and draw me closer. He rests his chin against the top of my head, and I can feel the vibration of his voice as he murmurs his next words.
“The problem was, I thought I could earn something back, could fix that hole in my soul, by being the best leader possible. But three hundred years later, I still don’t feel any more worthy than I did the day she died for me.”
I lift my head, pulling back to look at him. “You mustn’t think like that,” I say. “Of course you are.”
He raises his eyebrows. “Pot, meet kettle. Or are you going to tell me that wearing that ring isn’t some kind of penance?”
“What do you mean?” I ask. He takes hold of my hand and lifts it up so the wedding band catches the light.
“I couldn’t work it out for a long time, why you still had it on,” he says. “You didn’t love your husband, so it’s not loyalty to him. It’s a kind of punishment, isn’t it? You’re trying to remind yourself of the price you paid for…something. I don’t know exactly what. But it’s like that sun I have hanging in the ballroom, isn’t it? It’s a reminder of a sacrifice, because you hope on some level it will make you feel better about yourself, about your past.”
I roll my eyes, tugging my hand away. “I’m not sure I like being analyzed like this.”
He presses his lips together, like he’s trying not to laugh. “Always so spiky,” he says, sounding deeply fond in a way that makes me melt a little.
“So you’re saying you’ve reached some kind of absolution?” I ask, skeptical. “You’re not struggling to feel worthy anymore?”
He looks like he’s debating saying something, then goes for it. “I guess that recently I’m starting to realize there are some things I might be willing to prioritize above my duty. Some things I want to choose for myself, regardless of what it means for my people.”
The look he gives me makes my mouth go dry.
“Idocare about Infernum, you know,” I say, wanting to reassure him. “It’s not like?—”
I’m silenced by him kissing me, and I don’t mind at all. I’ve been aching for more since we sat in his office yesterday and he made my pulse jump just by blowing on my wrist. Then he started to slowly unravel me with his tongue and his hands, and all I could imagine was that tongue and those hands inotherplaces—right up until he walked away.
Yet here we are again, and I can’t find it in me to be mad at him. Not when I plan to take as much of him as I can before he decides this is a bad idea.
