He did not want to do good. He was talking like this to create chaos, and not for any other reason. He was succeeding.
“Ethan, you’re very young, and you have recently been through some very traumatic experiences,” Mark said, collecting himself with a visible effort. He glanced around the room, sharing looks that radiated tolerance for a kid speaking out of turn. “While I am glad to listen to yours and Lucie’s concerns, these are dangerous times and they require decisive action. You must trust me to know best.”
Mark had always had so much power, he had never been forced to play the game the way I had. He could wear a mask and people would pretend to be convinced. He had never had to make himself a new face.
I breathed in and breathed out, and my heart beat as if it was a clock, undisturbed by anything, certain as the passage of time. I had to get Carwyn to stop talking. So I talked instead, as I would not have dared do otherwise.
“I understand, Mr. Stryker,” I said. “Perhaps you might consider, though, that the city knows your family is in mourning, and nobody will expect a big celebration for the troops.”
Gabrielle Mirren stirred, as if she was about to agree with me. I could almost see the words rising to her lips.
“Oh, don’t worry about my tender feefees, Uncle Mark,” Carwyn said casually. “You go right ahead. I never imagined you would listen to me at all.”
Mark took that as surrender. He smiled, brief and devastating. “That’s settled, then.”
“Sweet of you to worry though, sugarplum,” Carwyn said, not quite low enough. “I’m a delicate blossom, and you know that because you get me.”
I could pretend as well with the doppelganger as I could with Mark. Act as if he was Ethan, I thought, and simply smiled, resting back against him with perfect trust.
Him lounging around holding on to me like this was not how meetings were conducted, but I sat as if I was perfectly happy to be there while everyone talked a little more and wrapped the meeting up. When I was spoken to, I smiled and responded as appropriately as I could.
I waited, my head bowed, as if being close to him was something I wanted, until the last member of the council filed out. I waited, snuggled up, quiet and comfortable, until I was sure they were all long gone.
Then I wrenched myself out of his lap, out of his arms, with all the force I had. I didn’t care if I had to break his limbs to get free. I did not care if I had to break my own.
He let me go. I stumbled, clumsy in my violent haste to get away from him, almost dashing my brains out against the edge of the conference table. I grabbed hold of the table instead, hung on to it for an instant, braced and breathing hard.
I heard the muted sound of Carwyn’s chair moving back against the rich, soft carpet. I turned around, still keeping hold of the table, and cast a look at him.
He stood up and stretched, hands linked and arms arched over his head, and I hated him so much, I could see him only in fragments. Every fragment was a treacherous detail: his hair still shorter than Ethan’s, damp on purpose to distract from that, his leaner body in Ethan’s clothes, shirt collar buttoned up to conceal his neck, the blue shirt sitting differently on his shoulders, and Ethan’s jeans slipping down his hips a fraction too far.
He saw me looking and winked.
“Dull meeting, my petal. Don’t you think?”
I let go of the table. I stopped watching and began to prowl, moving in a slow, unstoppable circle back toward him. Carwyn stood and watched me come at him. He let me come, let me rest a hand on his collarbone, not far from his dark doppelganger’s heart.
I gave him a hard shove. He was the one who stumbled then, back connecting with the wall. I clenched the soft blue material of his shirt collar in my fist, wrenched it stranglingly tight, and spoke with my face close to his face—Ethan’s face, the doppelganger’s lying mask.
“Where is Ethan?” I demanded. “What did you do with him?”
Carwyn still had that smile on his lips, as if everything that was happening to him was impossibly amusing.
“My little love dessert, I think you’ve become upset and confused. I’m Ethan. Who else would I be?”
“Don’t play games with me, Carwyn!”
“These violent outbursts and this suspicious nature must be born of your childhood trauma, Golden Thread in the Dark,” Carwyn observed sweetly. “What a prince I am to understand your wounded psyche and put up with your erratic behavior, my damaged daffodil.” He reached up, patted my hand at his throat, and closed his eyes, apparently at his ease. “I know you only hurt me because you love me.”
“I know you. You’re not the one I love. And I will hurt you if you don’t answer me.”