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This was the really humiliating part.
Despite my protests of being part of this project, despite storming out when the seer first arrived in our country—it was the best thing that had ever happened to me.
I hardly knew Olive, and yet I already felt like I was falling apart after a handful of hours away from her. Pulling myself together, I looked for a diplomatic response. None came to mind.
I just wanted her.
“She’s good,” I muttered. “I may have scared her away by bringing up the kingdom too soon, but I felt like if I held off, she’d think I’d been lying to her all the while.” He nodded like he was listening, but I wasn’t sure he really understood what I was going through.
“Where is she now?”
“In her home.” I shot him a quick look. “I’m not just going to drag her here.”
“I don’t expect you to,” he said with a chuckle. Leaning forward, resting his elbows on his knees, he stared me down. “It’s your responsibility to let her know she has no choice in this matter. You don’t have to phrase it as direly as that but let her see that the kingdom won’t survive without her.”
I frowned; not sure he knew what he was talking about.
He’d been lucky.
“If I bring her out here and she rejects me, what do we do with her then?” I wasn’t so naive as to think my kingdom survived by telling everyone the secret of our existence.
“Don’t think that way,” he replied. “You’re fated mates, there’s no way she’d turn you down.” He rose from the chair, but I stood my ground.
“What about Tierner and his mate?”
My oldest cousin hunted down his mate, only to find she was already married to another man. He nearly killed her husband, and then tried to take full advantage of her to satisfy his lust and pride. She didn’t want him, didn’t need him, and yet they were fated mates.
This wasn’t 100% effective.
There was a chance of failure, of hurting Olive and having to live my life knowing the perfect girl was out there and I’d lost her.
I wasn’t sure how anyone could survive that.
“They weren’t typical. He was angry before he ever knew of her existence. Obsessed with the crown, just trying to knock me out of the running instead of meeting the partner he might have spent the rest of his life with.” Rhuron spoke diplomatically, like he’d already planned how he would respond to me.
“I’m going to give her space, and then I’ll ask for her to accompany me here,” I said flatly. I absolutely understood the allure of snatching my partner away and making her mine in body and spirit. I also knew that I could lose her if I wasn’t careful.
I didn’t want to lose her.
“How long are you going to hide here from her?” Rhuron asked snidely. The comment hurt, but before I could strike back, there was a knock at the door.
A servant opened the door just far enough to view the two of us. “His excellency King Rollen Everglast requests to have an audience with you,” she bleated out quickly. She sounded nervous, scared, and I focused on her features for a moment. She could have been one of my sisters, or even a cousin, and I’d never know.
There were too many women born, and they all got put into servant and worker roles.
She was lucky that she got to work in the castle.
It was better than in the fields.
She opened the door fully, and my father swept into the room and cupped my face with his large hand. “Tell me why you traveled back here alone?” He sounded more frustrated than I was.
“I’m giving her time to think about it, so she won’t lose her mind,” I answered truthfully.
My father’s grip on my chin tightened, before he forcefully dropped his hand. “If she gets away from you, if she vanishes, you’re killing off dozens of future generations because you were worried about her feelings,” he sneered.
Though my father was usually kind and thoughtful, his ambition to keep the throne was without limitation.
He was being governed by his feelings rather than rationality, and I knew better than to take it personally.
