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Casimir suppressed a snort.Therewas the doting father he knew and loved. “I had a vision,” he said, seeing no point in beating around the bush. “From our dark father.”
Vladimir pushed off the table, his eyebrows flying up as genuine surprise flashed across his face. “Tenebros gave you a divine message?” he asked sharply. “What was it?”
“He told me…” Casimir grappled for a moment, still not sure how to interpret what the god had said. He eventually settled on repeating it verbatim. “He said, ‘You may be her son, but you are alsomine. Mine to command, mine to mold, mine to use. Remember whom you serve.’”
His father’s expression shuttered, like a curtain being drawn over a window. “I see,” he said. “How disappointing.”
An old, familiar anger ignited within Casimir, and he pushed himself to his feet before he could think better of it. “Disappointing?” he repeated, trying not to sound as incensed as he felt. “I didn’t realize your ego had grown big enough to eclipse a message from the gods themselves. Besides, I thought I was the only one who disappointed you.”
Vladimir’s fist crashed into Casimir's jaw so hard, the bones shattered on impact. The crown prince went sprawling to the floor, agony exploding through his skull as his father towered over him. The air around the emperor crackled with power, shimmering over his skin and lifting long, golden strands of hair from his broad shoulders to float around his face like gilded snakes.
“I thought I’d beaten that flippant tongue out of you a long time ago,” Vladimir growled, his eyes glowing red. “Perhaps the lessons from your childhood ought to be repeated.”
The fear that had been stamped into Casimir’s bones from a young age tried to rise, but he beat it back, clamping down on his emotions with the iron will he had forged over decades of discipline. He pushed himself to his feet, his jaw bones already knitting back together, and clasped his hands behind his back as he waited for his ability to speak to return.
“My apologies, Your Imperial Highness,” he said once he could move his jaw again. “I did not mean to speak out of turn. The vision appears to have addled my senses.”
It wasn’t so much that he wanted to grovel before his father as he realized the futility of talking back to him. Casimir needed answers, answers the emperor might provide should he play his cards right, but that would never happen if he allowed his temper to get the better of him. He needed to stroke his father’s ego, not tear it down.
“Clearly.” Vladimir said. His eyes glittered like the edges of a broken mirror as he raked his gaze over Casimir, but some of the anger seemed to dissipate. “You should heed our divine father’s words, Casimir, and remember who you serve.”
“I have always and will forever be loyal to the crown,” Casimir said, and every word was true. He waited a beat, then asked the question he should have started with in the first place. “When the dark god said I was “her son”, he must have been referring to my mother. But why would he mention her? What is so important he felt the need to assert his superiority over her?”
“I have no idea.” Vladimir’s lips thinned. “Your mother was a useless scrap of meat, barely fit to push you out from between her legs before she expired. Merely thinking about her fills me with disgust.”
Disgust filled Casimir, too, but not at the thought of his mother. No, it was at the notion that anyone would ever say anything like that about the person who had brought their child into the world. It didn’t matter that his mother had belonged to an inferior race—she had given her life for him, and without her, Casimir would not exist. Yet his father refused to honor that sacrifice, and barely acknowledged she’d ever existed in the first place.
“There must be something about her,” Casimir pushed, knowing he was walking a fine line. “Perhaps something in her lineage—”
“Have you noticed any changes recently?” his father interrupted. “Any fluctuations in your powers, or strange physical symptoms?”
The emperor’s eyes bore into Casimir’s as he stared back, prompting him to answer. Casimir opened his mouth to tell him about the burning sensation he’d felt during the dark mass, when a feminine voice whispered into his ear.
“Don’t tell him.He will use it against you.”
The words died on his tongue as a surge of astonishment swept through him. First, a vision from Tenebros, and now a message from another deity, all in the same night? What was happening to him? “No,” he said out loud, the words coming almost involuntarily. “I haven’t noticed anything.”
His father narrowed his gaze. “Perhaps I should have Icarus keep you overnight for observation,” he said. “He can run some tests on you.”
“No.” The words burst from Casimir’s lips with a vehemence, and he nearly took a step back as glimpses of horrible childhood memories flashed through his head. Glass tubes hooked up to his veins, his screams echoing off the walls as mysterious serums pumped through his body, searing his insides and turning his brain to mush. These were memories pushed so far to the back of his mind, Casimir forgot they existed. And when they did surface, he questioned whether they had actually happened, or if they were figments of an overactive childhood imagination.
Even so, the icy fear that coursed through him at the suggestion of spending a night in the lab was all too real, and every instinct Casimir possessed screamed for him to avoid it at all costs.
“No?” His father thundered, advancing on him. For a heart-stopping moment, Casimir thought the emperor would strike him again, but instead he fisted Casimir’s shirt by the collar and yanked him forward until they were nearly nose to nose. “You do not have a choice in this matter, son. You will go to Icarus Stormwelder’s lab, and you will allow him to run the tests.”
This time, there was no mistaking the ripples of red energy that emanated from Vladimir’s body along with the command. Casimir gasped as he felt the electric zaps bite into his skin, but other than the pain, he felt nothing. And he knew from the look in his father’s eyes he was very much supposed to.
“I have no problem with submitting myself to whatever tests the inventor wants to run,” Casimir said, his tone remarkably calm considering the circumstances. “I am merely considering how it will look if the crown prince disappears for the rest of thesummit after having a vision in full view of the delegations.” He waited a beat for the implications to sink in. “Such a thing may cause others to question the integrity and viability of the crown.”
Vladimir’s lip curled, and he shoved Casimir away. “Pretty words,” he sneered as the prince caught himself before he stumbled. “You’ve learned to play the game. Now get out of my sight.”
Casimir was only too happy to obey.
31
Maximillian
Maximillian thanked the stars Kitana had remained in the Spire instead of attending the Dark Mass tonight.
