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“You didn’t start the war, Elias. We were on the cusp of one already.”
“Didn’t I, though? I threw everything Claudette had worked for out the window. I knew Mathis had killed her. There was no hope for a treaty once she’d died. Mathis knew I would react, and I was too grief-stricken at the time to see it.” I pounded the table with my fist, splitting the wood.
“Stop it,” she chided, her features stern and hard. “It didn’t matter how much Claudette and Mathis negotiated; he was never going to let Scott sign that treaty. He baited you, and how many others? He didn’t care how; he was going to take over Fire and Fluorite. He was going to kill Scott, no matter what. He just needed the shroud of war to do it.”
“I’m the one who gave it to him.” I groaned in frustration. It explained Mathis’s pure hatred for Danni. The way he’d spewed venom and called for her death had been personal, but I hadn’t understood why at the time.
“You did. And if it hadn’t been you, someone else was going to jump. The entire world was standing at the edge of death and destruction. No treaty was going to stop that. Evil and greed can’t be caged. It knows no boundaries. No treaties. No peace agreements. It answers to no one. Look at what we’ve learned of Mathis. He will stop at nothing, and we have all the signed, magical binding papers in place. Do you honestly believe you, a single vampire—king or not—could have stopped any of it?”
“No.” But it was easier for me to take that blame. If I didn’t, it felt like I was dishonoring my sister’s memory. Like her loss was just a causality of war, something to be explained away without taking responsibility. Like it hadn’t turned my entire existence upside down when Claudette had been murdered, left headless and on display on the land that bordered Fire and Fluorite and what was now No Man’s Land, the unsigned peace treaty stabbed into her heart.
“Then let it go. I did. I was supposed to go with her that night, and I didn’t. Her death wasn’t my fault. The fact that she died alone is, but that is something I can’t change.” Ysa’s eyes lowered, and her voice quivered for the briefest of moments. I hadn’t heard that level of sadness or vulnerability from her in twenty-four years.
I blinked rapidly, never once having considered that Ysa felt guilt over that.
“You know you would have died too,” I said, watching her.
“I would have. It’s a strange thing to process the guilt of not dying with her while also being thankful to still be alive.” A single tear dropped from her eye, and she put her sunglasses back on.
“I actually know that exact feeling,” I admitted.
“Does Danni know Mathis killed her father?” she asked, gesturing to the file. “Because in there, it doesn’t look like it. I can’t be sure. Our spies could only get so much information, and anyone they spoke to wasn’t keen on discussing it. Not everyone there is loyal to him, which we already knew. The complete intel on this isn’t easily obtained.”
I shook my head after a moment of thinking. “She hates Mathis, but I didn’t get the impression she knew he’d killed her father. When she spoke of him, it was less about his death and more about his memory.”
Ysa pursed her lips. “Sounds like you have a lot to talk about.” Reaching into her pocket, she pulled out a folded piece of paper, reaching out to hand it over. “Danni asked me to pass this on to you.”
I hesitated, but took it from her grasp. “When did she give you this?”
“On my way here. She found me while she was looking for you.”
I unfolded it, expecting another smartass message telling me she was going to the pantry to eat my cookies. Or she was going to do laundry because she’d run out of socks.
I’m not in the bathroom or roaming the forest. I’m not throwing knives in the weapons training room, pretending it’s your head. I’m not off raiding the kitchen again. I’m here in our room, waiting. The fireplace is lit. Dinner will be brought up at seven. I just want to talk. Please. I have so much I want to tell you.
D.
Ysa reached in her pocket and tossed me a bag. I caught it midair, then looked at it. It was a bunch of chocolate-dipped animal crackers in a pouch. I’d just had them made and had specifically hidden them in a new location. I let out a laugh, then looked up at my second, who rolled her eyes.
“I need to find a better hiding place,” I muttered.
“She’s a shifter, Elias. She’s going to sniff out everything.” I tilted my head. It was a good point.
My thoughts drifted to Dannika wanting to talk. Her note wasn’t like the others had been. Not once had she signed a note. Not once had she asked to talk. She’d been short with me. Nothing but passive aggressive. She’d even left a note on top of the bed while she’d been in it, telling me she was asleep.
I’d barely slept since that day. I’d stayed in the chair by the fireplace both nights. I’d occasionally doze off, but I couldn’t sleep. Not when I could hear her breathing. Smell her intoxicating scent. I wanted to talk to her. Taste her. Tell her . . . well, everything.
Ysa groaned. “What?”
I chewed on the inside of my cheek, endless bullet points of what needed to be said bouncing around in my thoughts. “I have no clue where to start.”
She looked at me over the rim of her sunglasses, then pointed to the note. “You go to your room and talk to her, you dumbass.”
I narrowed my eyes. “Yes, thank you for that.”
“Then what do you mean, you aren’t sure where to start?” She gestured to the door. “She’s telling you she wants you. Let me explain something to you as a friend, Elias. Danni is young, and the woman hasn’t had a long-lasting relationship. You embarrassed her in public, then you both said some things to each other that you shouldn’t have. But a woman doesn’t leave passive aggressive notes for two days when she doesn’t care. She isn’t leaving Markus notes, and all she has wanted was for that tool to leave her alone. Maybe she isn’t the best at communicating, but neither are you. Go talk to her.” She looked at the file. “About everything.”
“That’s a shit ton for her to unpack in one conversation,” I said, looking at the folder.
