***
Laen slumped against the wall of the tavern, surrounded by broken furniture. The clientèle had fled the moment he’d landed the first punch. He couldn't even remember what had started it; he suspected very little. He’d had just been in a mood to do damage. Well, mission accomplished. He’d even fought his own men when they’d tried to get him to calm down and see sense. Oh, gods.
He put his head in his hands and wondered what the hell he was supposed to do now. Rage burned beneath his skin, rage and hurt and humiliation, and he didn’t know how to rid himself of it, didn’t know how to make it go away. Before, he’d have gone to see Corin … He pushed that thought away as a strange feeling made his chest tight. He wanted to kill his own father with a desire that was almost overwhelming, but that was nothing new. It was worse than that … he wanted to tear the world apart with his bare hands for Corin’s duplicity.
He clung to his fury with the man, feeling more confused than ever as it slipped from his grasp. For some reason he couldn’t fathom, he was having to try very hard to sustain it, as another, far more insidious emotion kept creeping in and smothering everything else.
The bastard had taken everything from him, he reminded himself, everything. Corin knew, he knew what it had meant to him and yet he’d said nothing, done nothing to stop it. He’d proved Laen’s father right after all his years of loyalty to Corin, and the burn of shame he’d felt returning to Dark Fae camp, knowing they were all laughing at him, that had been hard to take. Rage bubbled up again and he picked up the bottle beside him and drained it. He wanted to be drunk, he wanted oblivion ... He wanted this to never have happened.
He heard the door open, and for one ridiculous moment, he expected … hoped Corin had come to sort him out. His head came up and he was humiliated and furious with himself at the disappointment that coursed through him when Dannon walked into the room instead. Corin always came, always. Except now he never would again.
"Laen," Dannon greeted him, his tone wary, keeping his distance.
Laen picked up one of the many full bottles he'd stacked in a row beside him and threw it to Dannon. "If you intend to stay, you can drink,” he warned him. “I don't like to drink alone."
Dannon looked at the bottle and sighed before searching around the room for a piece of furniture that had survived Laen’s rage. By some miracle, he dragged a chair from the wreckage that had only lost one arm and still had a full complement of legs.
Dannon set it down, a safe distance away, before pulling the cork from the bottle. "If you don't like to drink alone, you should really be a little less terrifying to the rest of the population,” he observed, his tone mild before he raised the bottle to his lips.
Laen snorted but didn't answer, watching Dannon with a mixture of curiosity and irritation. He didn’t doubt his men had sent for him, at a loss to know how to deal with him now that Corin was no longer to be sent for. They’d not betrayed him to his father, at least, though the bastard would hear about it soon enough. Dannon took a breath, looking like he was steeling himself to say something Laen would not like.
"You cannot believe he wants this?"
Laen’s eyes narrowed at the duke, but the man had guts, he’d give him that, because he didn’t stop talking.
"I have always envied you two, did you know that?” he said, smiling a little, though it was a cautious expression.
Laen frowned, wondering what he was talking about. He had always got on with the duke well enough. Laen had even used his rather specialist skills on occasions. Yet until Anaïs had arrived, the duke and Corin had an animosity which was profound and long-standing, and yet Dannon had been jealous of his friendship with Corin? “You have been a good friend to me in recent years,” he continued, and Laen could see the sincerity in his eyes. “And that is something I have been profoundly grateful for, but to have the history that you two share, to have grown up together and stood by one another through thick and thin. That is a privilege that not many people experience."
Laen grunted and opened another bottle, drinking deep before throwing it away from him, watching it smash against the wall with satisfaction. "Lies!" he spat, glaring at Dannon in fury. "All lies."
Dannon stared back at him. "You think so?” he asked, a tone to his voice that pricked at something in Laen’s chest, but he refused to acknowledge it. “Truly?" he pressed. Laen looked away from him, but he could see Dannon shaking his head in dismay out of the corner of his eye. "You know I have never had any love for Corin, but you're a damned fool if you believe that." Dannon picked up the bottle once more and took a swig, grimacing before taking another. "I used to despise the two of you so much,” he muttered as Laen watched him with interest, wondering what he would say next. “Always together,” he added, sounding genuinely aggrieved. “Thick as thieves. Walking around like you owned the damned place and looking like a couple of bloody gods. Dammit, you two were a hard act to follow."
Laen gave a snort before reaching for another bottle. "You seemed to manage perfectly well,” he said before pulling the cork with his teeth and spitting it to the floor.
"Yes," Dannon replied, a slow smile curving over his mouth. "I did."
He watched as Laen drained the best part of another bottle before putting his own down and getting to his feet. He stood over Laen, holding his hand out. "Come on, I've paid for the damage, but the owner of this fine establishment would like to go to his bed, as would I."
Laen glowered at the floor, but even he knew that this couldn’t go on. He was drunk and angry and … and he didn’t know what, but he couldn’t wallow in his own misery like this. His father’s men would only say he was broken-hearted and crying over losing Corin, making him look an even bigger fool. Except he had a terrible feeling that there was some kind of truth in there. So he reached up and took Dannon’s hand, allowing the duke to haul him to his feet. He swayed and Dannon grabbed hold of his arm to steady him.
"He's made a fool of me, Dannon," he said, his voice barely audible. The alcohol flooded his veins, hitting him hard now as his words slurred. Laen hung his head as sorrow pressed down on him.
"Says who?” Dannon asked. “Your father?"
Laen sucked in a breath, fear prickling in his heart as the reason he’d come here in the first place came back to him. "My father ... My father wants me to take the city from him."
Dannon went utterly still, horror in his eyes, and Laen just laughed at him in return. "Don't look so worried,” he said, his voice hard and ugly, sneering at Dannon though it was none of his doing. “I can't do it.” He rubbed a weary hand over his eyes as Dannon let out a breath. He met the duke’s eyes, wondering if he had the slightest idea what it had cost him to refuse his father. “Gods, the things that miserable old bastard called me. The things he said! Such a way with words, my honoured father." He snorted and shook his head, remembering exactly what had been said. "I'm his little bitch, did you know that? He says that's what the men say of me."
Dannon frowned and Laen felt a glimmer of relief as he shook his head. "I have never heard that."
Laen shrugged; what did it matter? Everyone in Mechstrana knew it. "You do not spend time with the Dark Fae. They are not so liberal in their views as your kind. It is the worst insult they can find to throw at me, you see. They are prejudiced in every sense of the word and our king delights in it, encourages it. Even when it’s his own son who is being pilloried."
"They?" Dannon remarked, noticing that he had spoken of them like they were different from him.
"Yes, they!" Laen snarled as rage glittered to life again. "He has changed me,” he shouted, wanting Dannon to know what it was like to never belong anywhere, to be rejected by his father, his king, by a good proportion of his own kind. Corin had done that. Corin with his ideas of fairness and equality and forgiveness, always talking Laen out of his anger, always reasoning with him, trying to make him into something else, something better. But it meant he had changed visibly, could no longer find pleasure and satisfa
ction in the viciousness of his father’s world. Even some of his own men would follow him to battle but still wonder at who he really was. “I am not like them anymore, Dannon. I don't fit in with my own kind. I despise their cruelty and I don't wish to be a part of it."
"And yet thousands of men followed you here. They fought and died at your command, not the king's. Strange, that," Dannon observed, but Laen didn't respond. He knew that, he knew he could bring men to follow him, to go into battle with him, that didn’t mean that they would change their ways, nor accept that they should. "Your father is poisonous, Laen,” Dannon said, his voice harder now. “If you don't know this by now, I despair of you. He is manipulating you, playing on your fears. You have always been afraid of trusting anyone, but Corin has proved himself over and again. That's why you trusted him."
"Yes," he said, wishing he could just pretend it had never happened, wishing he could drink enough to make it go away as he stared at the bottle in his hand. "I did."
Dannon stepped closer to him, grasping his arm now. "He wouldn't do this if there was another way. You know that at heart. If you would just calm down and think clearly, you would see the truth of it."
"And since when did you become such a fan?" Laen said as his anger resurfaced. He snatched his arm away from Dannon, glaring at him. "You've always despised him,” he flung back at the duke. “I tried to tell you he was a good man, but you always had an argument to prove me wrong. What changed?" he demanded. Perhaps Dannon would take his place now, perhaps the two of them would become friends. An irrational surge of jealousy hit him so hard that it was difficult to breathe.
Dannon sighed, his expression close to despairing now. "I have seen the truth of him, that’s what changed. The truth you always told me was there. He put himself at risk for Anaïs. He stood up for her despite the danger because he believed it was the right thing to do, despite the trouble it caused him. He has always done the same for you, too. You were right, Laen,” he said. “I was wrong."
Laen shook his head, too many emotions overwhelming him. He was being swallowed whole into a pit of despair, and the need to see his wife, to go back home and cling to Océane and pour out the entire, sorry tale was hard to resist. He looked up at Dannon, fighting the urge to breakdown and lose every last shred of pride. "He's broken everything I believed in. I believed in him, Dannon. I never doubted him, never questioned that he would do the right thing, not for a moment, but now ... now I go back over every conversation, everything we have shared, and I don't know if he was being honest with me or not."
"Gods, your father has really got to you, hasn't he?" Dannon said in disgust, and sounding really quite angry now. "You shouldn't listen to him, Laen, you know damn well that you shouldn't."
Laen’s jaw tightened, he didn’t have to take that, not from Dannon.
"Maybe not," he said, looking up at Dannon as resentment swelled in his chest. "But you know something ... he's right. I am a damned fool, because even after everything Corin’s done, after everything he intends to do … I can't bring myself to take revenge on him. What does that say about me?” he demanded. “He’s going to kill my father, to take his kingdom, my kingdom, for the love of the gods! If anyone else had done this to me, if anyone else had even threatened it, they would lay dead at my feet. But him ..." He broke off and swallowed hard before the words choked him.
Dannon sighed and shook his head. “Go to bed, Laen. I wish to the gods I could talk some sense into you. It’s a damned pity your wife isn’t here to knock some sense into that stubborn head of yours, but there you are. I’ve said all I can. Go and sleep it off, man. Perhaps you’ll see the light in the morning.”
***
Bram looked out of the window to see Corin's land covered in a fine dusting of snow. His heart gave a lurch in his chest, terror prickling down his spine. He hadn't seen weather like this since ... Claudette. He fought back the fear that something had happened to her. She should be safe at Corin's home, waiting for them, but with weather like this, she must be going out of her mind with worry. They needed to get to her, now. If they rode hard, they should make it to Alfheim by late afternoon.
He turned to find Ameena gazing at him with an astonished expression.
"Wow!" she said, looking really rather stunned.
He frowned and wondered what the problem was. "What?"
She shrugged, apparently searching for the right words as she looked him over. “I knew you had extravagant tastes, but I had no idea you were so ... flamboyant." She grinned at him, taking in the deep red, thigh-length coat with heavy, black brocade trim, the pristine white shirt with lace at the throat and wrists, and the scarf around his neck. “You know,” she said, her words considering. “Along with that sword, the pistols, the shiny leather boots, and all that bling, you look just like … a highwayman!" she exclaimed, looking pleased by this description. "You look just like a highwayman."
There was a deep laugh from behind her as Inés came in the room. "That's because he is, chérie."
"What?" Ameena asked, staring at Inés in surprise. “What do you mean?”
"We don't have time for this," Bram snapped. They needed to leave and he didn’t have the time or the patience to explain who or what he was. He wasn’t even sure he knew. He strode out of the room. "Be ready to leave in five minutes,” he snapped, slamming the door as he went.
***
Ameena jolted as the door slammed shut, wondering what she’d said this time. She’d been trying to be friendly. So much for that. She turned to Inés instead, frowning. "You're pulling my leg, right?"
Inés grinned and shook her head as she bit into one of the fresh bread rolls and stuffed a half a dozen more into the bag slung across her chest. "Cross my heart and hope to die,” she mumbled through the bread.
"Well, we all hope for that,” Ameena muttered, smirking. "Wait a minute,” she said, really puzzled now. “He said he was a lord or something."
Inés nodded, gulping down her coffee and sucking in a breath, as it was really too hot. "He's that, too. Disgraced, though, no money if you had your eye on the prize,” she added, winking at Ameena.
Ameena snorted, shaking her head. "He’s rather out of my league,” she said with what ought to have been an amused tone. She was rather startled to discover it just sounded tragic. “Disgraced how?" she asked instead, hoping that Inés hadn’t noticed.
Inés shrugged, gesturing for Ameena to hurry up and eat. "I don't actually know, I heard it was something to do with a woman."
Ameena frowned, taking some of the rolls as Inés had done and stuffing them in her backpack. She wondered what kind of trouble could be so bad that he'd lost everything, and if it had anything to do with Leola, the woman he’d dreamed of? Whatever it was, she intended to find out.
"He's still in a foul mood," Ameena observed as she did up her rucksack. "And yet the weather doesn't seem so bad, does it? I mean, it’s quiet, at least, the storm has passed."
She looked up to see Inés staring outside, a look of real concern in her eyes. The landscape was utterly still, silent, and covered in a glittering quilt of snow. More flakes drifted down, making the whole world seem terribly quiet.
Inés swallowed and shook her head. “This is far worse.”
"But the storm has passed," Ameena pressed, not understanding how this could be worse than gale force winds and ice storms that felt like they could strip the flesh from your bones.
"It's freezing,” Inés said, her voice quiet and intense, making Ameena’s skin prickle with fear, though she didn’t understand why. “The sky is white. More snow will fall today."
"What does it mean, then?"
"Nothing good."
"Well, I got that much," Ameena snapped, impatient now. "But what does it mean? Is the prince losing the war?"
Inés did up her coat and wrapped a scarf around her neck. Thankfully, Bram had made contact with some of his cronies and they'd been supplied with warm clothes, though they were old-fashioned and very odd to
Ameena’s eye. Inés sighed and turned to look at her.
"I'm not an expert on the Fae races and their connection with the land, but I know that snow reflects deep sorrow - heartbreak. The last time there was snow in Alfheim, the prince nearly died. Whatever has happened to Corin, he’s suffering."
Chapter 21
Laen awoke and clutched at his head. It had been a while since he had been this drunk or hungover. In fact, it had been when he’d visited Corin in the human world, when he’d gone to take Claudette from her home. He wondered what Océane would say about all this and felt an ache across his chest. He wanted to see her, to hold her and his child close to him. He needed something true in a world that felt like it was shattering around him. Everything he believed in had been shaken to its core and he felt lost, set adrift.
His head pounded harder and he refused to think about that fact that Corin usually cured his hangovers with little more than a brush of his fingertips. There was more than one way to deal with it, after all. He snatched up the bottle he had brought with him from the tavern and wrenched it open. He would just have to get drunk again. Simple.
He thought back to what Dannon had said, trying to breathe past the tension in his chest. He had been so damned angry that he’d taken Corin’s part against him. Gods, was there no one that Corin couldn’t wrap around his finger with that silver tongue of his? Except, he knew that wasn’t what had happened. Corin and Dannon were still uneasy with each other. There had been no conversation that Laen had not been privy to. Dannon had spoken the truth. He trusted Corin because he had seen he was an honourable man. A man who stood up for what was right, no matter that it brought him trouble. Corin had been given more power than any Fae Laen had ever heard of, outside of stories of the Old Ones, at least. He spoke the old tongue like the words belonged to him. The things he could do scared Laen out of his wits, but Corin himself had never scared him, because Laen knew, had always known, that if anyone could use such power for good, he could.
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