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Movement pulled my attention away from her, toward another row of guards, ones I hadn’t seen before because they were carefully tucked behind the first. Bound and gagged between a pair of them, struggling in vain against their strong immortal grasps, was my half-brother.
My heart dropped. “Charles?”
Caught in my fight for freedom and survival in this cruel world, desperate to rescue Garrick and secure a better future for us, I’d scarcely spared my half-brother a thought since he’d so callously abandoned me to this fate.
One of the guards ripped the gag from Charles’s mouth, and he gasped, his wild eyes meeting mine. His face was pale with fear; his dark hair tousled and greasy as if he hadn’t had the opportunity to bathe in days. Dark circles rested beneath his eyes like bruises, and he trembled with fear. “Flor—ren— Ren,” he choked out.
I didn’t hate him. I couldn’t. As much as his betrayal had cut me to my core, had made my heart ache and bleed, he was still the brother I’d grown up with. The boy I’d played chess with and teased. The one with my stepfather’s chin and mannerisms,so dear in their familiarity. The one who, like me, shared our mother’s eyes.
He’d betrayed me to this suffering, but that didn’t mean I wanted him to experience the same cruel life.
“You and Aspen thought you were the only clever ones making plans, didn’t you?” Nerissa crossed her arms, tucking her dagger against her chest, as her stare bored into mine and her voice went cold. “Open the entrance for us or watch him die.”
My pulse raced. “Charlie,” I breathed.
A guard kicked him to his knees, and he grunted in pain, grimacing as he crashed to the stone floor. The fae set a knife to my half-brother’s throat, a silent promise. When Charles lifted his head, his eyes were shimmering with silver—tears he was trying desperately not to let fall. Did he still fear me? Didhehate me? Did he only see me as a way to survive, or did he feel remorse for what he’d condemned me to?
“I’m sorry, Ren,” he said, his tone soft. I wondered when he’d last eaten, and how long Preston and Nerissa had held him in Silverfrost. How long had he been shut up here, either in these forsaken dungeons or in the hellish ones beneath the fortress? Had they tormented him? Left him to be leached of all hope by demons? My stomach churned as the images rose unbidden in my mind.
Pity rent my heart in two.
“You’re better than any of us,” he went on, blinking against his tears. “You always have been. The kindest, gentlest person in Altidvale. The most patient, despite all the unkind words we spoke about you. What I did was...” He trailed off, shaking his head.
“Unforgivable?” I supplied. Despite the ache in my chest, my tone was icy. For as much as I hated to see him suffer, I also hated to see him beg for mercy from the woman he’d shownnone to. I couldn’t help the bitterness that rose to meet my compassion.
Charles didn’t deny it. “Yes,” he said, even as he continued to tremble. He didn’t avert his gaze, meeting mine unwaveringly. There wasn’t fear or disgust in his eyes—at least, not of me. Now, I was his salvation. But was that all I was to him? “I could apologize a thousand times, yet it wouldn’t be enough to atone for what I did—the pain I put you through, the way I cast you off.”
I tried and failed to swallow the lump in my throat.
“Very touching,” Preston cut in, jerking my attention to him. “But we aren’t going to wait forever for you to make your choice. Open the door, or he dies.”
The guard’s hand tightened on the knife he held to Charles’s neck, poised to strike. I knew it was all for show. I might be able to stop a guard with my magic and defend Charles, but the fae were truly holding him for Preston or Nerissa. And their magic—a simple flick of their wrist could end him. I didn’t know how to stop that.
“And when I open the entrance to the underworld and all hell breaks free, Charles will be killed anyway,” I protested.
Preston’s smile was slow and cruel. “Oh no. Just like our bargains with the guards here, we will promise both yours and your half-brother’s safety. Silverfrost may fall, but you can both escape to go live out your days in your human world.”
And watch it fall around us as demons torment and murder our people,I thought darkly.
I turned to Charles again, heart thrashing in my chest. I was desperate, trembling. A tear broke free and trailed down his cheek, making him look so vulnerable and young. He was my little brother again, falling and scraping his knee on pebbles in the road, tearfully accepting my embrace as I helped him home and cleaned the wound.
I knew I couldn’t trust Preston and Nerissa’s word. As undead souls, they could lie.
“I forgive you,” I choked out, my own tears blurring my vision as I met Charles’s gaze. “Even if I’m unsure if you only beg my forgiveness now because you’re afraid for your own life.”
Charles made the smallest jerk of his head, all he could risk with the point of a blade pressed to his throat. “I love you, Ren. Don’t open the door.”
I gaped at him. He wanted me to watch him die?
But if I opened the entrance, countless lives would be lost. I would be sacrificing them for only one man. I thought of Garrick and Aspen, of the rebels who’d waited and placed their hope in me for years. I thought of the Ashwoods and their willingness to help me take my crown. I thought of the injured Silverfrost soldiers and the respect in their eyes when they saw how I took the time to notice and care for them. I thought of the healer who’d cared for me in Northelm and deferentially referred to me as her queen, and every citizen who had watched me with joy and welcome in their expressions, not seeing a human but their leader, their protector. And I thought of the people in my hometown, both those who’d treated me well and those who’d scorned me.
Countless fae and human lives were at stake, and whether some had wronged me or not, they didn’t deserve the endless torture that awaited them if the underworld devoured the living one.
And yet...who would I be if I sacrificed my own half-brother?
It wouldn’t be that simple, anyway. I knew that in my heart. If I stood by and let Preston and Nerissa order his death, they wouldn’t let me walk away without manipulating me in some new way. They wouldn’t rest until they could use me to exact their revenge. After Charles, perhaps it would be Aspen orGarrick. They’d find everyone I cared about, strip me of every person that made life worth living.
But if I could stall long enough for Garrick, the Ashwoods, and the rebels to arrive, perhaps we could rescue Charles together and subdue Preston and Nerissa, at least long enough for me to seal the door.
