Page 99 of The Crown’s Temptation

Everything inside him went still.

He closed his eyes. He remembered those days in the countryside earlier in the marriage. Asharin had laughed while they lay in bed. “If we have children one day,” he had told her, “they’ll sit with us. We’ll eat together every evening.”

She had smiled so brightly.

Now the children were finally old enough.

It was supposed to be the four of them.

“They can wait.”

His voice was barely audible.

“Majesty—”

“Asharin. She would not have wanted to miss it.”

He knew his response was irrational, especially because Cambra did not know about Asharin and Morrath.

Cambra lowered her eyes. “Sire… she would not want the children to go hungry.”

“Enough.”

The word came out sharper than he intended. He turned before she could answer and quietly closed the nursery door behind him.

The glass room greeted him with silence. It had once been an ordinary chamber. Now it was where he spent nearly every waking hour that he wasn’t looking for a means of saving her.

The far wall was made entirely of glass, overlooking the nursery beyond. From here he could watch the children without frightening the attendants with his constant presence, since they could not see him.

He pulled the curtain across the glass, the motion so practiced it required no thought.

Then he crossed to the corner where the hidden tunnel opened beneath the floor.

He lowered himself onto the cold stone.

The same place.

Every day. Every night.

Waiting. Knowing no one would come. Still waiting.

He had to, because hope was all he had left. Asharin would have insisted on it. She had always believed impossible things could happen. He thought of the evenings they used to spend together.

She would ask about his day in detail. She genuinely wanted to know. No one had ever listened to him the way she did. No one had ever wanted every piece of him.

Perhaps he was overreacting about the food.

Was the solid food eating truly an important milestone? It felt important, she would not want to miss it. But perhaps it was not that important. He did not know much about children. He didn’t know any of it.

“I don’t know what I’m doing, Asha Bear,” he whispered into the empty room.

“I only know that I need you.”

The ache inside his chest became unbearable. A sound tore free before he could stop it. Half roar, half sob.

“You sound like a wolf.”

A pause.