Off Balance

by Aileen Erin

  Even tonight, when I knew she needed me to stay with her, I’d left. But only because she’d asked me to leave. I couldn’t—wouldn’t—force my presence on her, even though I couldn’t sleep if she wasn’t sleeping. But I couldn’t go back to the party. I was too on edge, too raw, too close to losing control to be trusted.

  I sat in one of the living rooms watching the news. Rysden found me a couple hours ago. He said that Amihanna almost losing control cleared the party out pretty quickly—fear will do that—and joined me while I watched the coverage of the night.

  A fire crackled next to me, heating the room. The chairs were overfilled and soft. The small wooden table between us held our glasses with a bit of hitran left in them. I’d hoped a little bit of the sweet wine would ease my worries enough so that I could sleep, but my stomach was churning. It was a familiar feeling. One that told me Amihanna wasn’t okay.

  She hadn’t been okay for a long time. Not since Liberation Week.

  I’d been mad at Rysden back then. So mad that I hadn’t been able to think straight. I lost complete control, and Rysden had no choice but to lock me up before going back to Earth to find his wife and daughter. But he’d come back empty-handed.

  He’d come back alone.

  My heart shattered when I realized Amihanna was lost, and I swore I’d never forgive him. A part of me never had. Even now.

  I would always be Amihanna’s shalshasa.

  When she was in pain, scared, hungry, lonely, I felt it. It was my job to ease the pain, tame the fear, feed the hunger, be with her so that she knew she was never alone, but I hadn’t been able to do any of those things.

  It had been a long thirteen years. An excruciatingly long thirteen years.

  My father was wrong. He had it backward. She was more than worthy, but me? I wasn’t sure I was worthy of her. I hadn’t saved her. I hadn’t protected her.

  I wasn’t worthy of her, but I was broken without her.

  The worst part about tonight was that she believed my father. I felt her stabbing pain at what she thought was his brutal truth, but it was a lie. A lie she couldn’t see through.

  I snatched my cup from the table and drank down the sweet wine. “This party was a disaster.” I had an urge to throw my cup into the fire, but instead, I set it down. Spending the evening picking shards out of the fireplace would be a stupid waste of time.

  Rysden pulled the cork from the bottle and refilled my cup. “Not fully a disaster.”

  I wanted to laugh, but I couldn’t find the energy for it. I glanced up at the screen where one of my least favorite reporters was recounting all the ways Amihanna was a danger to the Aunare. Were we watching the same footage?

  Amihanna was right about one thing—the Aunare people didn’t want her as queen.

  I didn’t care what they wanted. I would be king, and it was up to me to decide who would rule with me. If they didn’t like it, they could rot.

  I picked up the glass and stared into it, somehow hoping it could tell me how to help Amihanna. But I knew from experience that I’d find no answers worth hearing in any substance, especially not this one.

  Some days it felt like I was the only one seeing her struggling. That I was the only one who could feel beneath the thick facade she hid behind. We’d had a bit of a breakthrough—or at least I had—tonight. I understood why she was so confused. I’d been too busy being hurt that she didn’t instantly want me, like I wanted her, to see the truth behind her feelings.

  But I’d show her.

  A particularly hateful reporter said something about Amihanna, and I turned to Rysden. “In what way was tonight’s party good?”

  Rysden refilled his own cup. “Everyone knows that her Aunare is dominant now.” He took a small sip and sighed. “At least they’ll stop with that halfer nonsense.”

  Most of the footage that Rysden had released from Amihanna’s time on Earth and Abaddon showed her with dull skin. No glow. Only when she was in pain did it show, but barely. Most Aunare’s skin would be flaring its brightest, but Amihanna wasn’t like most Aunare.

  “No use denying her Aunare heritage when her skin is that bright.” Rysden saluted the screen with his cup. “Exactly the reason we had the party.”

  I turned the cup in my hands. I didn’t want to get drunk. Not tonight. Not ever again. I limited myself to one cup, and I’d had that already.

  I wasn’t my father. I would never be him.

  I set the cup down without taking another sip.

  “She wasn’t ready to meet my father.” I hated the man. When he grabbed her, it took everything in me not to snap his neck.

  “If Amihanna had her way, she’d hide forever.” Rysden sounded so sure. “It’s what she’s used to. She needed a push.”

  I was starting to see why Amihanna used the word “asshole” when thinking of her father. I wasn’t sure tonight was a push that she needed at all. It had hurt her. “My father was that push?” I asked, to be clear.

  “His circus show was the push.” Rysden nodded toward the screen. “Now, she’s out in the open.”

  There were always media and cameras wherever my father went. Tonight, they’d been discreet, but they’d caught the exchange between my father and Amihanna. We knew something would happen, but not what exactly. And we were reasonably certain that whatever that something was, it would set her off. Her fao’ana were on a hair trigger these days. It was dangerous, but at least everyone would stop hounding me about breaking the contract.

  That was the point of tonight. To stop my control from shattering. With her so near and out of control, I was getting worse by the day.

  I was going to murder the next person who asked me about my betrothal, and Rysden said this would be the best way to kill that line of questions. So I listened to him because there couldn’t be two strong Aunare out of control—it would be too dangerous for everyone—but now I was regretting it.

  The replay filled the screen, but my father’s words hadn’t been recorded. Amihanna’s head was in the way, so my father’s lips couldn’t be read by the reporters. But the way her faint fao’ana flickered told everyone in the room that whatever he’d said pissed off Amihanna. A lot.

  She was Aunare. No one could doubt that now.

  She was strong. That was no longer in question either.

  But her fao’ana terrified everyone.

  Specifically, two parts—that they couldn’t make out the symbols, and the flickering. The former showed she was unstable, which we all knew was dangerous. The flickering was another strike against her stability.

  The three reporters plus two experts currently on-screen were arguing what it meant and if she was strong enough to rule. And one was questioning the shadow of one of her fao’ana.

  The image zoomed in on the fao’ana in question. The one an inch up from her left wrist.

  Only five people knew what that particular fao’ana meant—me, Rysden, Elizabeth, Declan, and the High Priestess.

  Amihanna used to know, but with her memory seemingly permanently gone, she was going to have to relearn her truth.

  My eyes burned with exhaustion. I leaned forward to rest my elbows on my legs and let my head hang. “Goddess, please help me find patience. First, she’s not Aunare enough for me to marry, and now she’s too Aunare.” This whole thing was ridiculous. “I’m not breaking the contract. I know I was unsure about it before, but when I saw her again, I knew the High Priestess was right about us. All her predictions have come true, so I don’t know why I doubted, but…”

  “Of course you’re not breaking the contract. That was never a question in my mind, even if you struggled with it.” Rysden muted the vidscreen with a quick command. “We need to make our move to gain the throne. Quickly.”

  We’d been waiting for this day for a long time, but I wanted Amihanna by my side before it came. Unfortunately, I couldn’t wait for her anymore. I had to pray she’d change her mind soon. That she’d want to be queen. Because I dreaded the idea of ruling withou
t her. “Agreed.”

  Rysden was quiet for a while, but I knew this kind of quiet stillness only came right before he said something I didn’t want to hear.

  He breathed in, and I knew what was coming.

  “Don’t say it,” I said before he could start. “Don’t you say it tonight. I can’t take any more.” I reached a hand to my neck, trying to loosen some of the knots that seemed to be forever bothering me. “She needs time, and I’m giving it to her. Expecting more is cruel right now.”

  “And the nightmares?”

  “Every night.”

  Rysden hummed—something he only did when he was on edge, to calm himself—as he considered. “She’s losing weight. She’s pale, and if we don’t find a way to intervene, she will make herself sick. At this rate, she’ll need time in a healing pod before the week is out.”

  He was right. “I know, but she won’t let me help her.” That burned. After everything Declan had done, she could accept help from him, but not me.

  “Make her.”

  I leaned back in the chair to look at him. “She’s your daughter. How do you propose I make her do anything?”

  Rysden’s grin was filled with pride. “She is, isn’t she?” He sighed. “As much as I appreciate Declan, he needs to leave. He’s confusing her.”

  “Agreed.” Declan wasn’t helping. He was a distraction, and he wasn’t teaching her what she really needed to know. He couldn’t because no matter how much he knew, he wasn’t Aunare.

  The specialist on the news was right. Amihanna was dangerous. To me, to the Aunare, to herself.

  “You have to get her to listen to you.”

  “You think I haven’t tried?” I got up to pace. Tonight had been good. Progress. But it was slow, and no matter how much everyone else pushed her, I wasn’t going to. She’d come to me when she was ready. “Tell me, oh wise one. What would you propose I do?”

  “Try harder. If you—”

  Try harder? “I’m in her room every night as she loses what little ground she gained during the day. I won’t make her accept me. If she doesn’t want me, then—”

  Rysden laughed. “You think that she glows like that for anyone else? Do I need to replay the scene again? Were the first hundred replays not enough? I might not know my daughter very well, but I know love when I see it.”

  I rubbed a hand down my face, trying to hold in my frustration before I lost it. She’d said love, but she hadn’t said the words. Not really. She couldn’t know me when she was too busy being afraid and pushing me away.

  But I wasn’t letting her say no to marriage until she could say it without fear. And I wasn’t going to fully believe that she loved me until she could say it to me herself without fear.

  “You are her shalshasa.” Rysden was stating the obvious.

  “I’m aware of what she is to me.”

  “Then do something. Or I’ll tell her mother what’s going on. I can’t keep Elizabeth distracted much longer.”

  I watched the fire crackle and let my vision blur. I wasn’t sure what to do anymore. I was exhausted, and I knew she was, too. I’d pestered her when she first got here. Then, given her space. Neither worked. “She needs time.” It was the only thing left to do. Wait.

  I walked to the table and grabbed the cup.

  “And you don’t have the luxury of time. Your father is scared, and you know what that means.”

  I did. Unfortunately. I gripped the glass in my hand. “He’s drinking more, and that means he’ll start making foolish decisions. Decisions we cannot undo.”

  “If your mother were alive, then—”

  “She’s not.” My tone was sharp with pain. She’d died shortly after Liberation Week, and I missed her. If she were here, I knew she’d have an answer for me. Her fao’ana were for counseling and empathy and intuition. But the slaughter of our people and my father’s inaction broke her heart.

  I took a sip from my cup.

  “No. I apologize for bringing her up, Your Highness.” Rysden was quiet for a few minutes. “You need to take the throne. Very soon. His fao’ana are outmatched by yours. I have the agreement from the entire council. You challenge him on that basis, and he’ll be forced to step down.”

  “But if I do that, I’ll have to exercise the betrothal contract—as the law dictates—and she’s not ready for me or for the responsibility of being queen. She needs time, and I’ll not let anyone take that from her. The crown can wait.”

  “There’s no time to wait. She’s strong. She’s a di Aetes. She won’t quit. She’ll do it if you push her. If you wait, the cost to our people—”

  A sharp pain ran through my body, and I dropped the cup. I watched it bounce on the carpet and roll away as I struggled to breathe.

  My skin flashed bright. Every fao’ana on my body blinking. Every instinct in me telling me to fight, to protect, to slay monsters, but none were here.

  My shalshasa was in pain and my soul cried out to help but I could do nothing.

  “Another nightmare?” Rysden asked.

  “No alarms are going off, so I assume so.” Her terror was scratching against every nerve in my body. “I need to go wake her.”

  I started to push past Rysden, but he grabbed my arm, stopping me.

  “What?” I snapped, and I didn’t care. He was holding me back, and she needed help. This was the only time she allowed me to really help her—at least until the gym today—and I’d be damned if he’d slow me down.

  “I’ll continue to push her the only way I can. I don’t care if she hates me for it, but I’ll poke and push her with my words and actions until she becomes what she needs to be because she’s a di Aetes. I know she can do it. But it would be easier for everyone if you could get her to accept her place in this world. She’s not a waitress. She never should’ve been. She is my daughter, and her life will demand much more from her as your wife and queen.”

  Did he think I didn’t know that? “I’ll do my best.”

  “I know you will.” His eyes went to my skin, seeing the flicker. He dropped my arm. “Help her. Please, help her.” His pleading tone sounded as helpless as I felt.

  “I’m trying. Goddess take it all. I’ll keep trying until I have nothing left.” I ran out of the room, startling the guards on watch.

  “Your Highness?” Ashino asked as he followed just behind me.

  “Checking on Amihanna.”

  “The guards are still on watch outside her room. She hasn’t left.” There was an unasked question in his tone that I wasn’t answering.

  No one but her father and I knew how bad her nightmares were. Roan knew a bit, but I didn’t think he realized how bad they were. She was trying to hide them from everyone.

  But the guards and maids knew something was happening. Too many had watched me run through the house. Too many had heard her screams slip through the door when I opened them. They might not know what was going on exactly, but they had theories. Mostly accurate theories.

  Every night I hoped that this would be the one where she finally rested. Where the nightmares didn’t wake her. Where she’d heal enough to be the Amihanna that lingered beneath the surface, trapped in a fog of fear and trauma. It was killing me to not be able to help her more, but the worse it got, the more she pushed me away.

  But she couldn’t push me away at night. I would be there to wake her, calm her, and help her back to sleep. Most days it was the only time she let me see her.

  I got to her room in less than a minute. “Wait here,” I told the guards—both hers and mine—before pressing my hand to the panel beside her door.

  Her screams filled the hallway as the door slid open. All four guards tried to come in with me, but I stopped them with a look. “She’s fine.” She was thrashing under her covers, screaming as if her skin were burning, but there was nothing they could do to help her.

  I locked the door behind me and rushed to her bed. Her skin was bright and glistening with sweat. The tank she was wearing was soaked through.
r />   She writhed, rolling onto her stomach in a ball.

  I placed a hand on her shoulder. “Amihanna.” I gave her a little shake.

  She screamed again, and her skin grew brighter.

  “Amihanna, wake up,” I said it louder this time.

  Her fao’ana started flickering.

  If she didn’t wake up in one second, I was throwing her in a cold shower. I couldn’t have her blowing up the house.

  “Wake up!” I shook her one last time.

  Her screams stopped, and I sat on the bed.

  Her breaths were fast. Too fast. She needed to calm down, or she’d make herself sick.

  I ran my hand through her hair, pushing it away so that I could see just a little of her face. “Amihanna.” I said her name calmly, softly, the tone meant to soothe her.

  She froze for a second and then rolled over to face me. “Lorne?” Her eyes were still glazed, fighting free of the dream—the past—that haunted her.

  “You had another nightmare, but you’re safe. You’re with me in your room in your father’s house on Sel’Ani.”

  She sat up too quickly and looked around the room, searching for something. “I smell—”

  If the screams hadn’t told me what she’d been dreaming about tonight, this did. “There’s no sulfur here. Your skin is fine. No burns.” Those were the two scents she usually woke up smelling. The sulfur from the surface of Abaddon and the burning of her skin and hair.

  But sometimes the dreams were about something else. Things she wasn’t ready to share with me. She’d yell at me not to touch her and push me out faster. Even if it killed me not to know, I preferred those nights. It was a horrible kind of torture having seen exactly what she was reliving in her sleep and not being able to stop it. The nights when I knew made me feel like I was failing her all over again.

  She was gulping down air, and I knew she still wasn’t really seeing anything. It was too dark, and the ghosts of her past were too strong.