“Time started five seconds ago.” She raised a brow. “I suggest you get going.”
I tore out of the stable at a gallop. I took the empty backstreets to the plains just outside the capital; I knew Darren would have done the same.
As soon as I made it out of the city I came to a stop. Every direction the King’s Road took was overflowing. Passersby and caravans on every branch of the path. Everyone who had come to pay respect to their new king, or to peddle their wares during the height of an opportunity. The air was thick with incense and chatter.
I veered off the main trail to the north. It was a different route from the one that wove around the mountain range to Montfort, and I could see recent hoof prints marring the grass headed east. It led to a dead end—the very back of the palace was actually situated over a cliff that ran along for a couple of miles in either direction, but I knew it would be the one he would take.
For thirty minutes I rode in silence. The last rays of the sun cut a somewhat abandoned path across heavy forest foliage. Bright flashes of gold mixed in with green, something beautiful and remote. The air was sweeter here, too.
I could hear the steady trickle of a stream as I drew closer to the clearing. When I finally cut across to the granite edge, I found him standing there, with Wolf at his feet, overlooking the ledge. A stream was snaking down its end; the soft hush of water against rock much further below.
The sky was teeming with stars.
The sound of hoof beats alerted him of my approach.
The non-heir—or perhaps that title didn’t fit anymore—spun around, tottering. It was then I noticed the flask in his hand.
I dismounted, tying up my mare next to his own, and started forward. “Darren—”
He held out a hand to stop me, and I noticed he was shaking, violently. “I don’t want you to see me like this, Ryiah.” He slurred the words as he spoke. “Go home.”
I stopped walking but made no move to turn around. My voice was gentle. “It’s okay to be sad. He was your father.”
The prince threw back his head and laughed. Like it was the funniest thing in the world. But the movement shifted his balance.
Darren started to slip—
My hand shot out without a moment’s thought.
A blast of wind was all that saved Darren from the rocky abyss below. He collapsed onto jagged granite as I struggled to breathe, wind rattling my lungs. A part of me was furious it could have even happened. The other part terrified he might have let it.
And then I ran forward to drag him away from the ledge. There were cuts marring his hands but he didn’t seem to care. He didn’t care at all. As I heaved one arm over my shoulder he was still laughing, madly. “Can you really call a man like him ‘father?’”
I didn’t know how to reply. So I kept silent and just kept moving him toward a boulder he could lean against a couple more feet toward the clearing, away from the drop. He was in no position to stand.
“All these years…” His words were faded. “All this time I hated him. When I… So many times I wondered what it would be like…” His head fell forward as I helped him sit. “I envied you, you know. I saw your parents that day… At the first-year trials… You looked so… happy.”
A part of me crumbled. The little boy saving his brother, wishing for a different life.
“I never loved him… I tried but what—what he did to us...” Pain lanced Darren’s voice. “Blayne was never strong. Not like me… Maybe that was why...”
“Why?”
“The moment Blayne collapsed… I knew. I knew I should have gone to him… I was the Black Mage.” His eyes met mine and suddenly I knew. “It was my job to protect him… But I chose my brother.”
“You didn’t know—”
“I suspected.” Bitterness flowed through his words. “And I didn’t do a thing… Could have had you watch Blayne… But—but I thought maybe it was better… So I didn’t do anything.” His whole body was shuddering. “I didn’t speak a word.”
I leaned against the granite so that my shoulders lined up with his. A slight puff of dirt settled as I shifted in my seat.
“If you were smart…” Darren drew in a sharp breath. “You’d run away and never look back.” He exhaled. “I’m poison, Ryiah.” The last words tore at my lungs. “Just like my father.”
I clutched his bloodied fingers in my own, but he pulled away even as I spoke. “You are nothing like him!”
“Aren’t I?” His laugh was low. “He wasn’t always a bad man. He was never kind… but he wasn’t always cruel. The servants… They say he changed after my mother died.” Darren met my eyes. “Sometimes I wonder if that was who my father was always destined to be, and my mother just saved him from himself…” Garnet turned to black. “Or his love for her made him become it.”
My heart slammed against my ribs.
His voice was so quiet. “I’m afraid of what my love for you will make me.”