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I exhale harshly, my thumb gliding along his face. “Damn it.”

CHAPTER 13

VALEN

My father’s red leather office chair rocks when I collapse on it. It knocks into his desk, sending pens and books clattering to the floor in a mess that he would frown disapprovingly at. But I’m too exhausted to care. I spent too long sitting with the magician instead of sleeping.

My gaze drifts to the far corner of the desk where the incoming mail tray sits. Responses to the letters I sent out last night to ensure my father is alive and well should be piled up this close to dawn. But there is nothing. Absolutely nothing.

Oh, arachnid gods, I can’t breathe. The sickly sweet smell of dark magic oozes from my pores, dripping down my skin, as a voice that is sounding less like Alasdair and more like my own won’t stop whispering.

… Even I didn’t believe she’d be so heartless as to keep your father’s death from you.

My hands shake violently as they lift to clutch my too-tight throat. It’s as if I’m being choked, and I gasp for breath, squeezing my eyes shut. A debilitating wave of pent-up pressure threatens to split me open at the seams, and my shoulders draw in, making breathing more difficult with the constriction.

I can’t keep it… I can’t… Oh fucking hell, I can’t do this!

My magic crackles to life, my heart stinging with the violent eruption of it, and a glowing shield wraps around me so thick that the room blurs. I roar, my vision flashing black with the force of it. I rip up to standing and slam my fists down onto the solid wood. The shield crackles and holds strong, and I do it again and again, my skin bruising and voice cracking as I bellow all my rage and agony in my isolated bubble. Safe and unseen.

I collapse on my forearms when my knuckles split, blood bubbling bright red on my perfectly smooth hands. My chest pumps, my lungs burning. I swallow and choke before letting my head hang heavy with the weight of all that was revealed and all that I’ve utterly failed to do.

My spine rounds, and a groan burns through my tight throat. Do not cry. I bare my teeth, my short nails cutting into my palms. Hold it together. He could still be alive. This could be an elaborate trap of Alasdair’s. Don’t fall apart.

Breathe, my sweet boy, just breathe… The phantom voice of my mother nearly cracks me wide open, but I summon all my remaining energy to wrestle my breath back into control. It’s hard, and my lungs and throat fight me, but slowly, I even my breath. With a steady exhale, the tension in my shoulders eases, and my fists uncurl. The splits in my knuckles stitch together, the bruising fading. The blood evaporates in a fine mist.

I need a drink.

The shield dissipates when I drag myself to standing to cross the office towards where the globe holding the good scotch sits. It twists open at my approach, and the decanter and glasses glitter in the wall sconce’s crystal light. The liquid sloshes from my trembling hands, and I barely touch the tumbler to my lips before I kick back the burning liquid in three mighty gulps. I gasp, chest pumping. I want to chug the whole decanter but getting drunk isn’t the answer. That will come later. I have whole decades of my long life to drink myself into a stupor. Alone. That’s such a wretchedly melancholy thought.

I collapse back into my father’s desk chair, and it swings slightly with the momentum.

I stare unseeingly ahead. My father can’t be dead. He’s too powerful. I would know. Surely, I would feel the shift within the estate.

Surely, Mother would sense it and return.

My heart keens painfully, and my vision blurs with those traitorous tears that try to rob me of my sanity. I snatch up the tumbler and take a large gulp. She wouldn’t return. She made it very clear that she would never return with Emilia. Otherwise, the Archweaver could track them down for desertion.

My mother’s tear-stained face that ruined her perfectly painted makeup flashes across my vision. Her hair was a frazzled mess, her twist crooked, and her dress wrinkled. She clutched at me with clawed hands while pleading for me to see reason and run with her. My memory of the way she crumpled to her knees and sobbed when I refused to leave with her slices deep into me.

I squeeze my eyes shut, but the memories won’t go away. My sister comes to me now. Same blue eyes, same dark hair, same pale skin that sizzles in the sun if not carefully protected with magic. Emilia embraced me like I was accepting a death sentence before she left. She didn’t look back, and my father didn’t say goodbye, opting to lock himself in this office instead.

I tortured your father so slowly to regenerate my withered body. His agony was deliciously filling. And if it wasn’t for Astoria, I would’ve chosen someone else. Someone she cared about more, but then you would never see how little she thinks about you, just like when she left you to die under her curse all those years ago…

The tumbler crashes into the wall in a shatter of crystal and spray of amber liquid. My chest pumps, my hand curled in a claw. I have no recollection of throwing the glass, but looking at the mess feels good. I want to break more things. There are cabinets full of priceless heirlooms down in the kitchens that would be perfect for it.

My back smacks against the chair, and I pinch my brow. How could Astoria keep his death from me? My own father. Her mentor. Out of all the people in this wretched world, I thought Astoria would know how deeply my love for my family ran. How could she just let me wait forever for my father who would never return?

My teeth grind, my chest seizing. Of course she would do this. I’m a fool for being shocked after everything she’s done. She ripped out my heart and crushed it when I was nineteen. She abandoned me to her curse for seven years with no thought of how it would spread to me or my family as it jumped from each Order member. She chose her commoner life with her magician over me when I offered her the world. My love. My life. My family’s fortune. Everything. We could’ve had everything, and she said no.

The memory of Astoria kneeling in the Archweaver’s grand hall, staring at Viola’s crucified body, comes unbidden. My father and Astoria had spoken softly, but they might as well have screamed for how well that room echoes.

I remembered the way her green eyes glowed like two suns, and her face twisted in a snarl like a beautiful, feral creature of vengeance. Her voice was unnaturally deep with terrifying power as she hissed, “I’ll skin you alive like the snake you are.”

My breath catches, and I shake my head viciously to clear the memory. No, I won’t allow Alasdair’s dark magic to infect my mind like this. He put this voice in my head, something small and subtle to drive a wedge between Astoria and me so I won’t help save her. I won’t become another source of suffering for him to grow stronger on.

I can’t permit Alasdair to unlock every doubt I’ve had for Astoria. I know Astoria. She can be selfish and vicious, but I love her. I love her endlessly.

Even though she continues to break my heart and leave me behind.