Because I recognize the shaking hands, the faltering confidence. He doesn’t want to go back to Brindaigel any more than I do. Only this time, Bryn chose me and he’s the one with something to lose.
Standing, I lean over him, palms braced to the table on either side of his shoulders. “Don’t ever threaten me or my sister again,” I say softly, savoring the way he shifts beneath my tone. “You help me and I’ll help you, or I will leave you behind to rot in that dungeon. Do you understand?”
His arrogance dissipates, exposing the raw desperation underneath. Even so, Alistair cocks his head and forces a smile that frays at the edges. “Is that a promise?”
A man clears his throat and I pull back with a blast of guilt and adrenaline. Chadwick stands in the doorway, eyebrows raised with unspoken judgment of the scene he’s interrupted. “His majesty wishes to speak with you,” he says to me.
Alistair raises an eyebrow, confidence restored as he takes another drag of his cigarette, but I feel flustered, smoothing my bodice as I hurry for the door.
“I want a room with a window,” Alistair calls as I turn into the hall.
I don’t look back.
Chadwick leads me outside, across the courtyard and down a set of stairs into a stone cellar full of enormous barrel casks and old brewery equipment. A long table stretches the length of the room and North sits on top of it, feet dangling, hands loose between his knees. He glances up when I enter, eyes sliding down to the dress I wear before they return to my face. Wordlessly, he shoves himself to his feet.
Chadwick bows his departure and leaves.
I hover in the arched doorway as North rubs a hand through his hair. “I’ve sent for a spellcaster to help us with your mother’s spell,” he says. “She’ll be able to put protective wards on you as well, to keep the infection at bay.”
“Thank you.”
“If it starts to hurt,” he says, “if you start to feel like it’s spreading . . .”
“I’ll tell her,” I say.
He nods, looking away, fingers splayed across the edge of the table. “You saw your sister.”
“Only for a moment,” I say, with a surge of anger. “Not nearly long enough. Your men seemed to think I was a threat.”
“I’m sorry,” he says, but he doesn’t disagree.
I am a threat, at least to him.
North rubs his mouth. “I have a choice,” he says, and begins to pace a short line along the length of the table. “I can eradicate the plague and save Avinea.”
“At what cost?”
“An alliance,” he says bitterly. “I marry Miss Dossel and recognize Brindaigel as a sovereign nation in the heart of my own. Borders are to be drawn, Perrote’s to be given the executive power of a king, a seat on my council, and all the legal rights granted therein. And when our bloodlines are joined, it will start a new lineage of magic.” He sighs. “One with roots in both families, inheritable by either. We both become legitimized and my children will be raised as experts in the art of assassinating family members who stand in the way of their crowns.”
The room sways around me. “And the alternative?”
“I need magic,” North says helplessly as he returns toward me, his boots scuffling across the stone. “Withholding it is an act of war, but Perrote won’t fight here. Which means a battle in the mountains, in unfamiliar territory, with no army and no money against a man with magic, an amplifier, and a fortress built to withstand attack. Meanwhile,” he continues darkly, turning around again, “Baedan now has my blood and a plan to kill Merlock. A war with Brindaigel would guarantee she finds him before I do.” Sighing, he pounds the table in frustration before leaning against it, both hands laid flat. “What am I fighting Perrote for if Avinea is to fall anyway?”
The silence squeezes against the walls and the rafters overhead.
“They want an immediate wedding,” North says at last. “Perrote will withhold all magic until it’s legal and sent to every country with an arm in the Havascent Sea to be recognized.” Shoving away from the table, North stalks forward, stopping just out of reach. “Tell me what to do.”
“Can you remove this spell?” I demonstrate my wrist.
His expression is answer enough. Of course he can’t. Bryn will continue to use me to safeguard her own life and to hurt him in any way she can, even after she has a crown and a kingdom and a child to teach all the ways she knows how to hurt.
“Perrote has agreed to grant your sister’s freedom as a wedding present,” he says. “But until then . . .” His eyes meet mine. “I’m sorry.”
I reach for the table, desperate for balance. There’s a long time between now and an immediate wedding, with Bryn and her father holding Cadence in their hands.
North edges closer, gently lifting my chin. “Faris.”
I shake my head, pulling away from him. “You’ll marry Bryn,” I say. “You’ll get the magic you need, the weapon you want, and you’ll share a corner of Avinea with another king. You don’t need me to tell you that. And when you’re strong enough, you’ll attack and take back what’s yours.”
“I don’t—”
I cut him off, pressing my hand to his chest, feeling the heat of his skin, the soft shiver of the spell beneath it, and then, even deeper, the rhythm of his heart. “This is what will save Avinea,” I say. “You will. Heal this heart however you can and then guard it with everything you have because she will know whenever it bleeds. She will know the ways to make that poison spread through you until you can’t fight it back. She will hurt you in every way possible and I . . . I can’t be one of those possibilities.”
“I can’t marry her,” he says softly.
“You have to,” I say. “It would be selfish to sacrifice the whole to save the few.”
He ducks his head. “Don’t say that.”
“You don’t have to love her,” I say. “You just have to marry her.” My voice breaks and I wait before continuing. “The skill is in cheating.”
North reaches for me but I step back. “The young man who rode in with Perrote,” I say.
“Pembrough.”
“Yes. Ask him to stay.”
North’s expression hardens. “Is that your request?”
“Make it yours,” I say. “He’s worth your time and whatever expense he’ll claim he needs.”
“Then it’s done.”
“Thank you.” I turn to go, but North intercepts me, curling his little finger through mine. Despite myself, I rest my hand against his chest again, drawn back to his heartbeat. He’s dressed in black, as always, and I love that, that Northerly peculiarity of his. And I love this, his breath warm on my cheek and the way he looks at me as if I’m someone worth risking a kingdom for.
“Faris,” he says. “I need you.”
But I hate this, the truth and how it always hurts.