Last Stand (The Black Mage #4)(16)

“Of what we might attempt with a prince in our keep.” Nyx didn’t bother to shy away from the truth. “I understand. And you wouldn’t be wrong.”

“It will give them some time to prepare. For Alex to… to understand.”

“It will be hard for everyone.”

“It already is.”

I disrobed and stepped into the shadowy pool. My teeth were chattering from the cold, but I needed to wash. Paige was waiting just beyond the door.

The commander watched me. “It will only get worse, Ryiah. No matter how hard it gets, you must not tell the prince the truth.”

I started to lather my arms with soap, forcing myself to concentrate on the task at hand. I didn’t want to think about Darren now. Nothing would change. I wouldn’t tell him and I would hate myself every second of it.

To do otherwise would be to put the others at risk. I trusted Darren with my life, but he also loved his brother. I couldn’t trust him not to give Blayne a chance to explain. And it was that chance I feared. Because a king had too much power in a chance.

Maybe I was making a mistake, but the stakes were too great if I wasn’t.

“I know you think the worst of me,” Nyx added, “because I was—am—willing to sacrifice those you love, but what you do not understand is that we will not be able to save everyone. For a cause such as this, no one will come away clean.” Her voice lowered. “Least of all us.”

Commander Nyx had made hard decisions all her life. She’d spent years building up a rebel army as she watched a tyrant of a king stage false battles the people didn’t need. I wondered how many people she had lost along the way. What had she been like before all of this? After she’d lost her brother, did she have anything left to feel? All these years of biding her time, waiting, knowing there was an evil plaguing the lands but she couldn’t yet strike.

For the first time, I pitied her. I only had to see this through to the end; she’d had years.

The next ten minutes passed in silence, and then, as I finished and stepped out of the cold, I brushed the hair back out of my eyes.

“Commander?”

“Yes?”

“I’m sorry you lost your brother.”

Her intake of breath was soft. “I am sorry you lost yours.”





4





A couple of hours later, I awoke to find the prince sitting at the edge of the cot, his hands folded above his head as he stared straight ahead. He was already dressed in a formal leather jerkin and a thick wool cloak, heavy boots at his feet.

“Darren?” My voice cracked as I sat up in bed, clutching my thin chemise to my chest. My breath fogged up the air—I had forgotten how cold the keep’s winters could get.

The sun wasn’t even peeking through the window bars. Our room seemed to be the only one facing the outside of the keep, and I could see the darkness still pooling across the barren landscape, the keep’s flaming torches lining its fortified walls.

“I can’t sleep.” He still hadn’t raised his head. “I keep trying, but all I can think about is Caine. What will happen if I find a rebel today? Gods, Ryiah, what can they possibly think to gain? A nation in ruins so the Caltothians can tear us apart? How could anyone wish for that?”

There was a pang in my chest, and I swallowed it down. I couldn’t confess. Telling Darren the truth would only relieve my own guilt.

And what I felt, what I wanted for him, none of that mattered. The country did. The people did.

But I didn’t.

I swallowed, my mouth full of sand as I spoke. “Some things will never make sense.”

Darren sighed and lifted his head. “I’m going to the training courts. I can’t just sit here waiting.”

I was standing, pulling on a pair of breeches and a tunic. “I’ll join you.”

“Ryiah.” His eyes found mine, and I could see how fatigued the prince really was. He must not have slept at all. “You don’t have to do this. What my brother said—”

“This isn’t about an order from my king.” In another second, I was pulling on a pair of woolen breeches and a quilted jacket of my own. I was failing him in so many ways, but the gods themselves would have to keep me from Darren’s side when he needed me most. “This is about me keeping an eye on the Black Mage to make sure he hasn’t gone soft.”

“Soft?” A small smile tugged at the corner of Darren’s mouth. “Are you planning on a rematch?”

I remembered that terrible ache of jealousy, back when I had lost the Candidacy, back when my worst problem had been envy. Now I had to wonder if I had won the robe instead, how things would have changed.

I might have missed the signs. I might have been leading a war against my brother and friends, instead of my husband.

“When the war is over—” I swallowed back the knowledge I’d never get the chance, “—we’ll duel.”

“No one has ever challenged one of the Colored Robes during their twenty-year reign.” Darren’s words were laced with humor. “Some might say it’s against Council rules. The Candidacy exists for a reason, Ryiah.”

In twenty years, will you forgive my betrayal? I made myself smile and feign ease instead. “An heir to the Crown is a mage. What happened to the Council’s Treaty?”