by Anne Wheeler
“Yes, but the natural ones here aren’t as impressive anymore, thanks to Carl Hellquist.”
Ryllis wrinkled her nose. “Carl Hellquist?”
Westermark shifted on the bench. “Generations ago, when innate powers were much more common than they are now, he had the power to control water. Decided the river nearby his home in Bruket could do with a little . . . drama. The resulting falls and farmland flooding killed hundreds and changed the landscape until the end of time. Thankfully, powers like that are genetically rare outside my extended family—Hellquist was a fluke, but a dangerous one. He’s why the law forbids anyone besides the royal family from having gifts like his.”
The back of her neck prickled as she remembered the flower. Everyone knew the Vilarians had bred magic out of almost everyone by force. She hadn’t sustained the flower intentionally, but being in her presence had extended its life. Had Westermark noticed it never died?
“Maybe he couldn’t help it,” she said.
“He chose to flood that land. But even if he hadn’t, if his gift was that uncontrolled, he had to die.”
Ryllis gulped down a breath of fear.
He couldn’t know.
She’d begun the conversation about the waterfall, and it’d flowed naturally into this discussion. Hadn’t it? The interrogators on Cereth had been adept at trying to walk her into confessions, but everything had always been about the resistance. Even so, it had been exhausting, and too far removed from being constantly on edge, she’d let her guard down just now, wrapped in the false sense of security Westermark had exuded since they’d arrived.
But no. This wasn’t an interrogation. It was a conversation she’d directed. She was safe, as long as she didn’t do anything conspicuous. And even if she couldn’t control her power completely, it was spring, wasn’t it? Everything on the mountain was coming to life. By the time she needed to worry about it, he’d be dead—or she would be.
“Do you have a power?” The idea of him starting the woods around the lodge on fire with a flick of his finger was terrifying, but her curiosity was overwhelming.
Westermark hesitated. “No. I used to be bitter about that, but then I grew up. I like it that way now, believe it or not—unnatural powers cause more problems than they solve.” He smiled at her and gestured down the cliffs. “Rain’s picked up earlier than I thought it would. Are you ready to head back down?”
The cold mist had made the granite even slicker than before. Ryllis focused on each measured step she took. To fall now would hurt, and more importantly, it would humiliate her in front of Westermark. It wasn’t too far until the narrow trail that led back to the house, and the pebbles, though an annoyance on the way up, would give her a little more grip, at least.
“Wear different shoes next time. We’ll find something that will work better.” Westermark trailed along behind her, paying no attention to his treads. She couldn’t help her jealousy.
“Next time?” she asked.
“Wasn’t it nice to get out the house and get some fresh air?”
“It was.” Ryllis shot him a sideways smile and promptly lost her balance on the slippery rock. Westermark reached for her as her feet slid, but she slammed into the ground hip-first, crying out in surprise as she slid down the small boulder. It felt like she tumbled forever, but sooner than she expected, she crashed to a stop at the bottom of a pile of boulders. Westermark’s voice called her name, and she rolled to her knees, feeling around to make sure nothing was broken.
“I’m all right,” she called to him. “Just a little—”
Westermark’s voice became steel. “What is that?”
“What’s what?” Ryllis pulled herself to her feet and looked up the trail at where he was pointing.
The knife. It lay above her on the trail where she’d first slipped, dislodged from its ribbon holster. Her heart, which had settled after her fall, began to pound again.
“I—”
Westermark swiped it into his hand and held it up as he walked toward her. “Don’t even bother making excuses.”
He jerked her to her feet, wrenching her right arm behind her. The knife disappeared into his pocket. Terrified, she tried to spin from his grip, but it only tightened. She couldn’t say anything else. All the worry about accidentally making a plant come back to life, and she’d gone and done this.
“What else are you hiding?” he asked.
“Nothing. Nothing! I swear to you!”
Westermark searched her anyway as she struggled to free herself. The ribbon was still half around her thigh, and she cried out as he reached down her pants and seized it. This had been a bad idea. She hadn’t wanted to kill him, only harm him enough they’d have to kill her, but now, with the way he was handling her, perhaps she’d made a mistake. It was one thing for the emperor to order her execution for assaulting his son. It was quite another for Westermark to abuse her out of anger before he did.
He shoved her forward, even as he pulled her arms tighter behind her. “Walk down the hill. Now.”
“You’re hurting me.” The protest came out breathless.
“Like you intended to hurt me? I don’t care. Now walk.”
She did, though it was difficult stumbling downhill with him right behind her, limiting her stride. As the wall around the lodge came into view, fear took control, and she made one last-ditch attempt to swing her leg backward at him. If she could catch him off balance, they’d both fall on the steepest part of the trail, and then she could get away. Westermark blocked the kick with a leg between her knees, like he’d known it was coming, and pushed her forward toward the gate, the pressure on her wrist increasing.
She gave up after that. Westermark might be an overindulged prince, but he was also a Fleet security forces officer. He could thwart any move she made, anticipate anything she could try—and he was stronger than she. She stumbled through the dim hallways, soaked and on an ankle that hurt more by the second. Lina was nowhere to be found as he walked her into his office and pushed her to the floor. She reached for her bruised hip as he slammed the door shut, locked it, and held up the knife again.
“Tell me why I shouldn’t use it on your throat this very second.”
Ryllis managed to make it to her knees for the second time in five minutes, panting too hard to answer. Standing would make it harder for him to do what he’d threatened, so she stayed down. It was revolting to think he might assume it was out of deference, but she didn’t care. She’d won. Dying would hurt, but she’d won. She’d escaped. As soon as he moved toward her, as soon as the knife sliced into her skin, she would be gone.
“Well?” he asked.
Tell him what you can do. He’ll have to kill you then.
But what if he didn’t? What if her gift made her useful enough to keep around despite the laws she violated by simply existing? What if Westermark wanted his pretty gardens more, or his father decided to keep her around as a useful toy?
No. She couldn’t risk living. Westermark couldn’t know what she was capable of.
“Do it,” she succeeded in spitting out. “Just do it and be done with it. I hope it stains your rug, and every time you see my blood, for the rest of your life, you remember what you’ve done here.”
Westermark lips thinned. “What I’ve done here?” he snarled at her. “You mean how I saved you from the Eradication Council? How I’ve treated you with nothing but respect, even though I could have easily done the opposite and not a soul would have challenged me? How I gave you a home and shelter and a pleasant afternoon’s walk?”
“You expect me to be grateful for that? You expect me to forget how I came to be here?”
“I expect you to—” He swore under his breath. “I don’t expect a thing from you, Ryllis, except that you not try to kill me in my own home!”
“Do you feel that blade, Your Highness?” she screamed at him. “It wouldn’t have killed you. But it had the power to remove me from this place, and I don’t regret that decision. So do it. I won’t fight you.�
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Westermark strode toward her like a wild animal, lithe and dangerous. He stopped, just short of where she knelt, and ran his finger across the length. Something sparked in his eyes, and she knew she wasn’t going to like what he had to say—though she suspected he thought she would.
“I was planning to cut your hair tonight,” he said, “but I think it’s fair I use this instead of the razor. And for the next two weeks, whenever you see how ridiculous you look, you will have a reminder of how inexcusably you’ve acted and how merciful I’ve been.”
Her chin fell forward. He didn’t know what he was talking about. This gift of life wasn’t mercy. It was anything but.
“Lift your head,” he ordered, laying the knife flat across her scalp. “And hold still. I don’t want to cut you too badly, but you know what they say about a dull knife.”
Ryllis raised her head but closed her eyes. She didn’t care that he’d forbidden her to cry. She knelt there and sobbed, waiting for him to begin. And when her knees became sore and her body was out of tears and the first cut never came, she looked up.
Westermark—and the knife—were gone.
Chapter Eight
Wood splintered into the air as the knife met its sapling target. Kresten yanked it out, examined the blade, and flung it once more. It missed that time—probably due to the vodka he’d downed and the now-torrential rain. He stared at where it had fallen, lying in the bushes next to the courtyard wall.
Ryllis had planned to kill him. Or at least tried to harm him enough that she’d get herself killed, and contacting the Eradication Council—or at least someone in the Fleet—about her actions was the first thing he should have done. He couldn’t explain why he’d nearly destroyed a tree and his liver instead.
Only his liver would survive, and the tree would, too, but his soul would not. This morning had been a futile dream, and taking Ryllis to that special place up the mountain had been a mistake, but for a brief moment, he’d felt alive. He’d felt happy. He’d felt—well, something that he hadn’t felt in years. Not since Elise. And he’d been almost certain Ryllis had felt it too.
And then he’d seen the knife. Then she’d had to bring him back to real life by reminding him who she was and who he was.
He pulled himself to his feet and began to search through the bushes for it. He could guess where Ryllis had found it, and Lina would be none too thrilled when he informed her that she’d have to start counting cutlery.
Lina.
He jumped up as her footsteps echoed across the pavers through the rain.
“What happened?” she asked, adjusting the hood of her raincoat. “She came out of your office, shaking and pale. Wouldn’t tell me what was wrong. And now you—are you drunk, sir?”
He waved away her concern about his liver. “Wouldn’t tell you what was wrong, would she?”
Lina shook her head.
So he told her, starting with his and Ryllis’s walk, how she’d laughed at him and made him warm inside, the waterfall, how his heart had nearly stopped when she went sliding down the granite.
About the knife.
“She tried to kill me,” he finished petulantly. His mind heard how peevish he sounded, but he couldn’t stop himself.
Lina gave him a patronizing smile. “Did she? And it never occurred to you it’s unlikely she’s capable of that? Look at her. Look at you. Look at the training you’ve had. You could snap her neck with one hand and your eyes closed. She never had a chance, and I suspect she knew it.”
“Do not dare defend her!” Lina didn’t flinch, and a better excuse sprang into his head. “She could be a plant, Lina. A Cereth rebel sent here to kill me. Maybe that was her plan all along. I had to protect myself.”
“Do you hear yourself?” She crossed her arms and sighed, and he felt like a wayward child. Lina and the thirty-odd years she had on him always had a talent for making him feel that way. “You sound paranoid.”
Sullen, he tossed back the rest of his glass. “And you sound naïve. She could very well be an assassin.”
“The vodka has addled your brain, Your Highness. If that woman was a Cereth rebel sent here to assassinate you, you’d be dead already. She’d had dropped you the very second you told her who you were.”
Kresten opened his mouth. Tried to pour the empty glass into it.
Dakk.
Lina was right. And he’d let Ryllis get into his mind so badly that’d he stopped thinking like a Fleet officer and started thinking like a—well, that didn’t matter, any longer. After what he’d done, Ryllis was no longer the woman who’d taken his hand and laughed at him and said he was just as human as anyone else. She was the girl kneeling on the rug in his office in tears, begging him to kill her because she couldn’t stand to be on his planet—in his presence—one more second.
“Lina.” The vodka made him bold. “I threatened to kill her. She must have been terrified, and she—she told me to do it. She hates being here so much that she would rather die, and there is nothing I can do to make that better for her. Even if I defied the Eradication Council, even if I defied my father, what good would it do? If I financed a luxury cruiser back to Cereth for her, she’d be in danger. And I can’t allow that.”
Lina stood there, the rain dripping down off her hood, dispassionate. The door charms jingled as he stared at her. It couldn’t be Ryllis, but when Kresten swiveled toward the noise, there she stood underneath the portico. Her expression was flat, and her eyes were red, and he decided he couldn’t look at her.
“Lina, please,” he said. The vodka hadn’t given him the courage it promised, for now he was panicking. “Tell me what to do.”
“You got yourself into this situation, sir,” Lina said. “You can get yourself out of it. I suggest you start by considering why her actions made you so angry.” She disappeared inside as he stood there silent, giving Ryllis a pat on her shoulder as she did. Kresten stared at her, unable to move.
Because she was afraid of me, and she shouldn’t have been.
Because while I was baring my soul, she was thinking about killing me.
Because my training kicked in and I couldn’t stop myself.
He had dozens of excuses—but they were only excuses, and he knew it.
Ryllis took another few steps toward him, into the rain, then stopped. “Your Highness, I’m so—”
“Don’t.” She went so pale at his order that he almost ran to her, but he stopped himself just in time. “Don’t apologize. It is I who should be doing so.”
“I wanted to hurt you.” Her eyes were bright, but she didn’t cry as she stepped out from under the portico into the rain. “I am sorry for that. I could tell you how much pain I’ve felt, that I didn’t feel I had any other choice, but I have no excuse.”
“Ryllis, you have nothing to be sorry for. You may have wanted to do it, but you didn’t.”
She brushed the water from her face. “I would have. I wanted to, so badly. I was waiting for the right time, and then you—you were so kind up there on the mountain that I forgot what I intended to do.”
That strange warm feeling slunk through his belly, and he was certain it wasn’t the vodka this time. “I hope I can keep being that kind. Not for myself. For you. You deserve—”
Ryllis began to shiver. “I tried to hurt you. Wanted to kill you. I deserve nothing.”
She had no idea, did she? She deserved everything beautiful and good, and she would never see it now, not on Vilaria. Not anywhere, not any longer. The snare they’d both been caught in made him want to scream, made him want to throw something, anything. Instead, he took a deep breath. What he was going to do was cruel and harsh, and it would hurt more than almost anything she’d experienced so far—but it was the only thing left.
He was going to call her on her lie.
“And you believe that lie so fervently that you decided you’d rather die than live here, don’t you?” he asked.
And it was his fault.
Ryllis jerked her he
ad up at that. He saw it there, in her eyes and the way she held herself—the awful truth. The truth that she hadn’t even known, perhaps, and didn’t want to admit now. But he knew. He knew, and it wasn’t that maddening heightened empathy this time, though there was some of that, too. It was because she spoke to his soul and didn’t even realize it.
“That’s right. I know why you did it. You think that would make everything better, but you’re wrong. Death won’t fix anything—it ends only life. It’s not what you want. Do you understand me?”
“Your Highness—”
“There’s no argument to be had.” She wasn’t listening to him, and he was growing frantic now, could feel it in the way his neck was tensing and his gut was twisting. “Promise me you won’t ever try anything like this again. Promise me, Ryllis. They will hurt you if you do, and even I won’t be able to protect you.”
“I can’t promise that.”
By the stars, he loved her spirit and her backbone, but if she didn’t stop arguing, he would lock her in a small room until he didn’t need to worry about her anymore.
“No argument. Swear to me.” He hated giving her an order, but the very idea of watching her die for what she’d done made him ill. “Or I—I won’t allow you alone in the garden any longer. You’ll bring my tea each morning, and then you’ll sit at my feet in my office and wait until I need something else from you.”
Her eyes widened. That had done it. He didn’t just hate what he’d said, he hated himself as well. But it’d worked, and the relief was more important than his guilt.
“I won’t swear anything to you, prince or not. I told myself that when you brought me here—the only thing I have left is my word, and you’re not getting that, too. But I promise I won’t try to kill myself.” Ryllis swayed on her feet as she spoke, slowly, like each word required effort.
He narrowed his eyes. “You’re injured, aren’t you? Where?”
She shook her head, even as she lifted her foot just a hair off the ground, probably hoping he couldn’t see. “I’m not. I’m fine.”