“And if I tell you they go hand in hand?”
I was too tired for this. “Do you truly wish for equality amongst all within Trollus, Tristan? Because it seems to me that the equality you envision is on your terms and under your control, which to me doesn’t seem like equality at all.”
He didn’t blink, didn’t move. Didn’t so much as twitch. But behind that impenetrable politician’s gaze, I knew he was debating whether to acknowledge the truth of his ambitions or whether to dodge the accusation, as he always did. Then he exhaled. “What is your point, Pénélope?”
“That we had the right to make the choices we did.” My voice quivered, and I drew in a ragged breath. “We knew the risks, and neither of us forced the other’s hand.”
“No, your father did that much.”
“And given the opportunity, you would’ve forced us apart. Your reasons might have been more just, but that does not change the fact that you would’ve used your power to make us dance to your tune. To force us down a path that would be most beneficial to your ends, not ours.” My outburst left me gasping for breath, but I managed to get out, “Why should we have to live lesser lives for no reason other than that we are not perfect?”
A muscle in his jaw twitched. “You paint me as quite the monster.”
“I paint you as a selfish boy judging something he doesn’t understand.” Pushing up onto one elbow, I stared him down, and for the first time ever, he looked away before I did. “I hope one day you know a love strong enough that your heart will overrule your mind.”
“That sounds like a curse.”
“It’s a wish,” I whispered. “Because without that sort of passion, you will never accomplish your vision. And that would be the true tragedy.”
He did not speak, and I had neither words nor breath to fill the void.
“I need him.” The admission dragged itself out of his throat, barely audible, and he scrubbed a hand furiously across his eyes. But not before I saw the glimpse of tears. “I’m afraid of what I’ll become without him. That I’ll turn into my father. Or worse–” he met my gaze “–yours.”
“I know,” I said, my heart aching. “That’s why I’m going to give you what you need to save him.”
Chapter Thirty
Marc
What was I doing here?
I stood halfway down the drive of the Angoulême manor, with almost no memory of how I’d come to be standing here. Only that to remain in my house, surrounded by the pitying gaze of my servants, had been more than I could bear.
As had been remaining with Pénélope herself.
So I’d left, walking blindly through the streets, the weight on my heart growing even as the bonding marks on my hand dulled from brilliant silver to a dull steely grey. Which was in its own way fitting, given that iron, in one way or another, was cause of nearly every broken bond.
And now I was here.
But to what end? Pénélope was dying. There was nothing I could do to change that. Nothing that I could do to stem the tide of life and light draining from her body, crimson and horrifying. Nothing I could do to ease the grief on her face. Indeed, my presence had made it worse. With shared emotions, the bond was like two mirrors facing each other, one reflecting the other, creating image after image until one turned away, breaking the cycle. Only turning away had granted me no respite, and every step I took through Trollus it became harder to breathe, like wet wool was being shoved down my throat and into my lungs. All I knew was that I needed to find some way to relieve it.
Which was why I was here.
Forcing my feet to carry me forward, I shoved open the doors and went inside, following the sense of power until I found the Duke seated in a gazebo at the center of the famed Angoulême atrium.
He was alone. A Guerre set floated on invisible threads of magic before him, wooden pieces polished by heavy use filling the four boards, those that had been knocked from play having been carefully put away in a matching case.
“Your Grace.”
He did not look away from his game, only selected one of the pale pieces, holding it carefully in one hand.
“She lost the baby.” I hated that phrase: as though Pénélope had carelessly left our child somewhere, like a glove, and that it might be found at a later date. “Our child is dead.”
“And Pénélope?”
There was a certain grittiness to the question, as though the Duke struggled to ask it.
“Dying.”
The piece in his hand split in two, the halves falling to land with a clatter against the floor. He stared at his empty palm, then said, “I assumed that was the reason Ana?s departed with such haste.” He picked up the broken piece. “That’s the trouble with wood, as opposed to gold or silver. Or steel. It can’t truly be repaired.”
“Buy another one.”
He carefully placed the halves in the box. “Some things are not so easily replaced.”
With the exception of perhaps the King, there was no greater politician in Trollus. Everything Angoulême said meant something. Had a purpose. And as much as I’d never be their match, I’d still been trained since childhood to read between the lines. To parse every phrase for hidden meanings and intent. That I did not do so now had nothing to do with lack of ability on my part, but rather that I did not care to know what lay behind his words.
“Why are you here, Marc? Come to have your revenge? You are, of course, welcome to try.”
I took the seat across from him, pulling back my hood though I didn’t know why. “No.”
One of his eyebrows rose. “No? No plans to give her the gift of my death before her own light goes out?”
“It would be no gift to her,” I responded, though it would’ve been a lie to say that I hadn’t considered it. “She’d feel no happiness over your death.”
“Would you?”
Yes. I didn’t answer.
He smiled. “I suppose that makes her better than both of us, doesn’t it? Because of a surety, I’d rend you limb from limb if the consequences of doing so were not greater than I care to pay.”
“Why?” The question was out before I had a chance to think it through. “This is what you wanted, isn’t it? Her death in the hope that it would kill me too?”
A stillness took him, rendering him more statue than man, only the steady beat of his heart betraying that he was alive at all.
“Do you know how I discovered Pénélope’s affliction?” he finally asked. “It was when she was a little girl, barely more than a babe. She was sitting on my knee at my desk while I worked, and I’d given her a pen to toy with to keep her happy.” The corner of one of his eyes twitched. “When I looked down, at first I thought she’d gotten into the ink. But then I realized she’d cut herself on the steel tip, and that it was iron rot working its way up her little hand. Just the tiniest injury, but it bled and worsened and almost stole her life from me.”