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Nina tilted her head. “We need to be aligned on our approach to theCitizens. In light of Gideon’s death, I foresee the Elemental nation petitioning for blood.”
“As well they should,” Zeke agreed.
As the other four sovereigns dove into a heated conversation on the merits of declaring open war on theCitizens, Isaiah closed his mind to them. Far more pressing were his own clan’s issues.
Nina didn’t let his silence go unnoticed. “Isaiah, you’re unusually quiet.”
“I have nothing to add.” He let the indifference bleed into his voice, bleak against the backdrop of looming war.
“Be that as it may, you certainly have an opinion.”
“I don’t care.” And he really didn’t.
But she kept pushing. “Your apathy in the light of such a distressing event is most disconcerting.”
Isaiah bared his teeth, all at once done with politics. “Who the hell assigned you to be judge and jury, Nina? You have no authority over my clan and certainly none over me. Stop pestering me; I don’t care about any of it. Inform me when you’ve something crucial to say.”
The world blurred around him momentarily before the salty taste of the ocean filled his senses. Beneath his feet were the shifting sands of the shoreline, the unstable footing sinking where he stood. Ocean winds whipped at him and sea grass drummed against his legs.
Few Raeths traveled to this hallowed place on the edge of Jacob’s territory. Though there were no markers, it was their burial ground, serving as the last resting place for any Raeth who had met the Light.
Jacob had been laid to rest in the earth at daybreak the day before. As was customary, Isaiah was the only one to attend. Raeth culture dictated that in the event a sovereign lost a challenge, their burial would be attended only by the replacing sovereign.
It was a showing of respect to what’d been, a nod to the clan’s history. But it also served to sever any remaining loyalty the clan held for their previous sovereign; to remind them of the change of leadership.
That ritual, however, hadn’t deterred Isaiah from holding a service in Jacob’s honor prior to the burial itself. He wouldn’t allow Jacob’s memory to be tarnished; the man had served the clan with dedication and perseverance for more than thirteen hundred years. For many, Jacob had been the only sovereign they’d ever known.
But he wasn’t here for Jacob today. Today, Isaiah longed only for his mother.
Time had changed the landscape and the soil under his feet, but it would never change the significance of the place where his mother was buried.
She’d chosen the Light when Isaiah was just over two centuries old, before he’d been promoted to Jacob’s second. Vienna had been a beauty for the ages, her flawless olive skin and luminous smile captivating anyone who saw her.
Far more important was the way she’d raised Isaiah. His mother had been a calming, soothing influence against his natural brazenness, the courageous but daring spirit that boasted of youth and naivety. She had never failed to shower him with the warmth of her affection and the depth of her love, even when he’d shunned such sentiments as he grew.
His father, Isaak, had been killed in the clan battle that’d taken place when he’d been only three decades old. It’d claimed the lives of five of their own, serving as one of the deadliest in the clan’s history.
Isaak had been on the front lines, a skilled senior soldier, one of Jacob’s best. Isaiah had inherited destruction from his father, though Isaak’s abilities had never manifested into something as virulent as his son’s.
After Isaak had died, Vienna hadn’t wanted to abandon him when he was still so young, but losing a mate was crippling. In a testament to her love for her child, she’d waited two hundred years before she succumbed to that which she’d desired since Isaak had left her. Vienna, at only eight hundred years of age, had been laid to rest alongside her mate.
Isaak’s loss had been a hole in Vienna’s heart that had never healed.
A hole that Isaiah now understood. Potent, the taste of bitterness filled him. Fate was dangling his mate in front of him, knowing full well that his own destructive nature would steal her life should he ever claim her.
Eyes rooted to the spot in the earth where he’d last seen his mother, Isaiah felt more alone than he’d ever been. Jacob, who’d been his mentor and confidant; Sia, who’d been his outlet; Rukia, who’d been the only one who’d ever managed to crack the layer of ice around his soul—the only who he’d ever allowed to see him weak. He could go to none of them.
He’d burned every bridge.
And here, in his old sovereign’s territory—now his—Isaiah floundered under the crushing weight of emotion that he never asked for. He’d willingly dug his own grave by pushing everyone away.
Waves crashed along the beach in the distance, a subtle reminder of the fathomless ocean that bordered the territory. No seagulls dotted the sky, no children laughed in the waves. The roar of the ocean was the only noise that broke the stillness of the graveyard under his feet.
Closing his eyes, he sank to the earth, his knees against the shifting sands that provided no stability. Isaiah buried his head in his hands, and he gave in to the turmoil inside of him.
For the first time in his life, he cried.
But even his own emotion wasn’t solely his. He knew that every pang of sorrow he felt, every tear he cried, was mirrored onto those who looked to him for protection and stability.
