Last Stand (The Black Mage #4)(115)

They set out on foot the next month, walking for weeks. They studied a village for months at a time. Darren took notes as Ryiah traded labor for necessities and a small sachet of seeds to send back home to Jerar.

For three years, they were almost content. And then, visiting the sixth village, Ryiah took ill.

Any dreams Darren entertained had vanished.

It took the midwife five tries before she was able to calm him enough to explain.

Pregnant.

For a second, Darren was too stunned to move.

Then he dropped to his knees, cradling Ryiah’s face in his hands as he kissed her and choked out her name.

That moment had been everything.

She’d been everything; she always was.

Ryiah refused to quit their work; she was far too stubborn. She labored alongside the tribe until the day she finally collapsed.

That night, her hand never left his, squeezing until both of their palms were ready to crack. She squeezed as the midwife came and she cried as she brought their beautiful child into the early island dawn.

Until that moment, Darren had never understood his loss. The king had always been a monster, a merciless tyrant with an even colder heart. But at that moment, clutching a little girl to his chest… Darren felt it. An unconditional bond that would grip him to the ends of time. With it came the knowledge that he’d give up everything for that woman and the child. He was a father.

They named her Eve.





Even now, that moment brought fire to the back of his throat.

Two more years came and went. Darren and Ryiah visited villages and finished archiving the island’s plants. Their little girl grew into an unstoppable force, stubborn like her parents, challenging their limits and getting into trouble whenever they looked away. And then, a Borean trader brought word…

After years of slow-building peace, a new treaty had been signed in Jerar. The alliance between Jerar and Caltoth was forever sealed.

Their seventh year came to a close when a ship arrived, bearing an envelope with a waxen seal. The captain claimed a Crown envoy had paid him well to carry it to the bearer of the Kuadian letters. They’d opened it with trembling hands:

“Queen Priscilla of Jerar and King Horrace of Caltoth grant fugitives Ryiah of Demsh’aa and former Prince Darren pardon from their previous crimes. In accordance with our two nations’ treatise. The two may return with a formal renunciation of the throne.”

Darren wasn’t ready to return. But one look to his wife and he knew he couldn’t refuse.

Not after she’d sacrificed everything for him. Not when she still had people waiting for her in Jerar.

Ryiah deserved to return home.





And so now they stood outside the great doors of the palace throne room, waiting for the guards to summon them forward.

Ryiah cleared her throat, her face pale as she took a shaky breath. Darren had been so lost in his thoughts, he’d almost forgotten she was present.

“I know you think you don’t belong”—she stepped away from the wall and twined her fingers with his—“but you do.”

Ryiah wasn’t a fool. She knew what his silence meant.

There were phantoms roaming these halls; Darren felt their glares on the back of his neck.

Traitor. Villain. The pressure mounted in his lungs.

Ryiah thrust her chin forward as her grip tightened on his hand. She regretted parts of her past too, but Darren could see the challenge in her stance.

Whatever the Crown proclaimed, she would fight for them both.

A guard summoned them forward.

Darren swallowed hard as they entered the room.

There was no turning back.

When the herald declared their names, Darren and Ryiah knelt before the queen of Jerar. They renounced their claim to the throne and that of their heirs. They swore to spend the rest of their lives atoning for their past.

They would always be in the people’s debt.

Priscilla cleared her throat. “You’ve already begun.”

She proceeded to explain everything she’d learned in the past couple of years.

It’d started with Jerar’s trade. A booming surge of product along the King’s Road. New treatments and salves had spread across the nation’s merchants like wildfire, even into Caltoth, Pythus, and the Borea Isles.

After years, Crown advisors had finally traced the treatments’ origin to a small apothecary in Demsh’aa and a plot overflowing with unfamiliar plants. And then they’d found the letters. “I should have known.” Priscilla snorted. “You two never could leave well enough alone.”

She continued, “There’s been a steady decline of fever since we received those Kuadian records. It’s not something any of the rulers can overlook. Even Horrace.”

Hesitation made Darren stiff. “What do you require of us?”

He couldn’t fight in a regiment. Even for peace. If Priscilla had called them back to serve Jerar’s army, he would be forced to walk away.

Freedom wasn’t worth the price of his soul. Not again.

Ryiah cleared her throat and added, “We’ve seen enough blood.”

“If you must know.” The young queen regarded them with an amused curve of her lips. “Enrollment at the Academy has tripled now that study has broadened to factions outside of war. The staff is overwhelmed.”