“King Horrace is mine.” Darren’s voice was hard as he cut in. “When the time comes—after everything he has destroyed—he is mine.”
The air whooshed out from my lungs. Of course. The Caltothian king. The man Blayne and his father had convincingly portrayed as the enemy.
For a moment, I had thought Blayne knew.
“Not if I get to him first.” I blurted the challenge as fast as I could. Good, Ryiah, keep pretending. Keep smiling.
“Horrace should be afraid.” The young king brushed himself off, standing as the carriage came to a halt. We’d finished our procession through Devon, and it was time for the ceremonial feast in the palace. “I’ve got the two most bloodthirsty mages in the realm.” It was impossible to miss his pride. “The war will be over before it’s begun.”
It will. But not for the reasons you think.
I followed the king with my eyes. With his back turned, he was saying something to a guard as he descended the steps. For the barest second, I entertained the notion of what it would be like to end this here and now, to strike down the king of Jerar in cold blood and let the pieces fall where they may.
It wasn’t my responsibility to make sure everything worked out in the end. Blayne was a villain. For all the innocent lives he and his father had stolen, did it really matter whether he lived or died? If I got rid of him, I would be doing the world a favor, and someone else could figure out how to put it back together.
But something stopped me. Guilt. And it wasn’t necessarily tied to the boy whose heart I would break.
I had always wanted to be a hero. It was what had driven me to the life of a warrior in the first place. I had chosen Combat because it was the most notorious faction of all. Again and again, I’d taken the hard road because it was the most celebrated.
After last year and my terrible case of jealousy leading up to the Candidacy, I’d been able to recognize that drive for what it really was: ambition. Sure, I’d wanted to save people, but I’d also dreamed of the status that came with it—something to distance myself from the others, something to make a name for myself… A glorious Ryiah on the battlefield, slaying villains and receiving recognition from the king and his people for a job well done.
Combat mages were ambitious and vain, after all, and if they weren’t, they never reached far. So silly girl that I was, I had chosen to chase after a lifetime of prestige. And over the years, my eyes had opened to the realities of that choice.
All of those soldiers in the forest of Caltoth…. That wasn’t Blayne’s doing. That was mine.
My hand gripped the side of the carriage rail, and all at once, my body was too hot and too cold. I felt faint and my vision was dancing in front of my eyes.
That was me.
It didn’t matter that I had been under Mage Mira’s orders during the mission. I had killed men fighting for the right cause, all because I had believed in a lie. Those deaths were on me. It was my magic that had ended the men’s lives.
And how many others would suffer under the same choice? All because they had wanted to be a soldier, a knight, or a mage of Jerar?
I couldn’t just walk away. I had blood on my hands. I owed this to them—to all of the others who didn’t know what their villainous king was capable of—to stop this before they were tainted as well.
During my ascension, I had made a pledge to Jerar to defend those in need.
I needed to be a real hero, not just the easy one.
Killing Blayne wasn’t enough; I needed to stop the war. There was no guarantee Pythus would pull out if Blayne was dead, no guarantee the truth would come to light without proof. I needed to stop others from making the wrong choice, because it was the only way to right my own wrongs.
The gods had to be laughing up above: You want to redeem yourself? To be a true hero, not just the one you dreamed up? Here’s your chance, but there’s a catch: to do so, you’ll have to betray the one you love and spare the brother that killed your own.
Destiny was cruel, and it was breaking me, piece by piece.
“Ryiah?”
Startled from the churning sickness in my gut, I saw Darren waiting by the door. His gaze was soft, free of arrogance or challenge, the countenance of someone happy and in love.
How I wished that could be me.
“Are you ready, love?”
I followed the prince outside the carriage and through the palace gates.
I had wanted to be the hero.
I just hadn’t known the price.
*
The ceremonial feast was spent toasting our marriage and the prosperity of our nation. I sat at the head table beside my new husband and his brother, who sat at the end in his father’s towering chair. A row of advisors were to our left. I spent those three hours forcing myself to swallow small bites of venison, my appetite long forgotten.
Darren’s gaze kept falling on me as the evening wore on. His hand slid underneath the table to grip my knee, and he leaned in close. “Please eat, Ryiah. I don’t like seeing you like this.”