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“By killing Kaelum.” I clenched my jaw and huffed out a growl. “He was lying. I knew it then and I still tried to kill Kaelum.”
“Of course you did,” he agreed amiably, as though it weren’t ridiculous. As though it had been normal and sensible to try to murder my own brother on the promise of a liar. “What else could you have done? I have seen the way Kaelum is with his father. Thorzi society gives a parent power over their child’s future. Power Crux still holds over you.”
Incredible. I had lived my life among Thorzi. They lived in our society, with these rules. And yet, the notion of anyone using their child as a pawn wasn’t something they considered. Despite the fact that a warrior had to live as part of their parents’ household until given leave by those parents to do otherwise, or given leave by the king to challenge to make their own, it simply wasn’t something done. No Thorzi would have assumed Crux was forcing me to do anything.
Most parents cared for their children, and would never dream of acting in such a way. Certainly Xyren would never have used Kaelum to try to kill someone he could not kill himself.
Still, I had made the choice. I had wanted to be with Beau, to be left alone, and I had decided to kill my brother. It wasn’t wiped away simply because I hadn’t had a better option.
“I think,” Kenosi said, pushing out of the chair and holding out a hand toward the door. “It is time for me to take you to Beau. And for you to tell him this.”
I blinked at him, unmoving. Tell Beau? Of all my mistakes and weaknesses? Of how my mother would offer him as many warriors as he wanted until he found one worthy of being his mate?
Kenosi lowered his head to look up at me, lips pursed, and he reminded me of a predator about to spring upon unsuspecting prey. “It is time,” he repeated. “I understand that it is difficult, to speak to one another. To tell hard truths. But you are adults, and you care for each other. You must have the respect for him to tell him everything. If you do not respect him that much, then perhaps you were right to let the queen take him.”
And he was right.
I loved Beau, but that wasn’t all Beau needed. Beau needed me to respect him enough to share everything. To tell him what I was thinking, and listen to his issues, because they were as important as mine. And if I were not enough of a warrior to do that, to speak and to listen, then I deserved to be alone in Crux’s house.
Strangely enough, I was beginning to think that perhaps I did not deserve that. Perhaps I could be better than that. Be good enough for Beau. I had already known that was not something I could decide for him, but neither could my mother, or Kaelum, or even the king. Only Beau was allowed to make that decision, and it had been hubris to think I knew best.
All I could do was exactly what Kenosi said. Talk to him. Tell him everything, and hope that he understood. That perhaps he could love me back, as no one else ever had.
CHAPTER23
BEAU
When another knock sounded on my door, I was still sitting with my forehead pressed against Lucas’s shoulder. My tears had dried up, but I was tired, empty, and his hand brushed a soothing sweep across my back.
Lucas stiffened slightly, and I sat up, wiping the rest of the moisture from my cheeks. “Come in?”
The door swung open on Kenosi’s grinning face. But he only caught my eye for a second. Because there, standing right behind him, broad shouldered and serious as ever, Vorian stood, his chin tucked by his bright blue eyes scanning the room. For me or threats, I didn’t know.
Heat rushed under my skin, but a heavy queasiness filled my stomach, so I had no idea of I was blushing or blanching when I flinched down on the bench I shared with Lucas.
He was out of his seat immediately, putting himself between Vorian and me like he actually had some kind of mystical power. Maybe that was just what it felt like to be secure in your place in the world.
Vorian followed Kenosi into the room, and the door slid shut behind them both. Kenosi stayed quiet, arching one perfect dark brow Vorian’s way and waiting for him to speak.
When Vorian stepped even to Kenosi, I watched Lucas’s shoulders tense from behind.
“You may relax,” Vorian said. His voice, though soft, carried in the large, opulent room. “I would not harm a mage, nor my brother’s chosen mate.”
My breath caught. Again, my world tilted on its axis.
Brother? How the fuck had I missed out on that?
Well, by being locked up in a lab, sure, and it was probably something Vorian didn’t want to talk about. But damn. I didn’t even know he was Kaelum’s brother. But he was Crux’s son. The queen must be his mother.
Did that make him royalty too? Shit. It sure didn’t seem that way, but I was already way out of my league. I wasn’t a seven-foot-tall alien warrior, buff and gorgeous. Or even a hypercompetent mage.
“No?” Lucas demanded. “Seemed to me like you were ready enough to kill your brother. Why not me?”
I sighed, sinking into my knees and letting my eyes slip shut. The last thing I wanted was for Vorian to realize I’d been crying. And, well, I was an idiot for thinking I understood my situation or could maneuver my way into improving it.
That one soft sound, my sigh, and I felt Vorian’s attention narrow on me. His regard felt like a beam of sunlight, heating beneath my skin until everything was warm and I shrank farther.
“You could have killed me in the jungle,” Vorian said. I heard the soft pad of his boot against the carpet.
