The storm king, p.2
The Storm King, page 2
part #3 of The Lost God Series
Xander sighed heavily. Of course Evan knew about this spot. Foolish to think he wouldn’t.
Xander looked at the letter again, placing it on top of the others and vowing to come back for it soon.
“I promise not to read them, but honestly, the hoarding them to yourself is as bad as the closet full of her clothes that you refuse to put in storage or at least send to her to wear,” Evan called, his voice muffled by the bookcase between them.
Xander sighed heavily, shutting the letter in the box before crawling back through the passageway and pushing the bookcase aside. “What good is being the king if I can’t get a moment of peace?”
Evan helped him to his feet, brushing cobwebs from his shoulder. “You have to decide on the trade terms from Aldrena. They’ve been nervous about Vincent’s battalions along their land routes and they want permission to come via sea instead,” he said.
Xander walked out of the bedroom and down the hall to his den, slumping into his chair by the fire and pouring himself a glass of whiskey. It was a safe, Cece-less room. One she’d never visited and therefore held no memories of her, though Xander had imagined her spread out for him on his desk many times when he was bent over battle maps and boring paperwork.
“More of this, then?” Evan asked, waving a hand at Xander’s drinking.
Xander leaned back in the chair. “What’s the downside of letting them come by sea?”
Evan shrugged. “Your father always felt that allowing Aldrena to freely come and go by sea could lead to a surprise attack on both land and sea. That said, he wasn’t dealing with Vincent’s men attacking our land trade routes.”
“My father—” Xander started but the words fizzled out on his tongue. He took a swig of whiskey. “Which father?”
Evan froze, hesitating a moment before crossing the room, pouring himself a whiskey, and sitting in the chair beside Xander. “Are you going to give credence to these rumors?”
Xander narrowed his eyes at his friend. “Are you going to tell me that there’s no truth to them?”
Evan sipped his whiskey, studying his friend over the rim of the glass. “Xan, I honestly don’t know. I tried to find out for sure for years with no luck. But as the person whose job it is to protect you, I have to tell you that looking into it won’t lead to anything good. Where there is smoke, people will assume there’s also fire, and this is not a good time to instill more doubt since your contempt for your new role is obvious to basically everyone.”
Xander frowned, studying Evan, looking for a lie, but his heartbeat was as steady as his voice. It was rare there was such an important secret that Evan didn’t know.
The two were interrupted by a shift in the air.
Death came in many forms, but tonight he arrived in an elaborately embroidered tunic, cashmere breeches, and a puff of cinnamon- and ash-scented smoke, like a market magician.
Xander narrowed his eyes, looking from the god of death to his friend. “Is this an intervention?”
“Are you going to give me an answer about Aldrena?” Evan asked, arching a brow.
“Whatever you think is best,” Xander said.
Evan wanted him to be more assertive, but Xander was no more worthy of running the kingdom than anyone else. He could not wrap his mind around the enormous responsibility.
Evan shook his head, knocking back the rest of his drink. “I cannot run this kingdom alone.”
Xander ran a hand over his beard. “And I cannot be responsible for more harm. I don’t know what I’m doing.”
The last time he forced landowners to raise wages for their workers, they’d responded by firing a portion of their staff, leaving the poorest of the poor even worse off than they already were. Every time he tried to make things better for everyone in Argaria, he only seemed to create some new problem. It felt like he was in a sinking ship, trying to bail out water as more and more holes popped up.
Evan frowned at him and then turned to Grimon. “He’s all yours.” He rose with a huff and stormed out of the room, slamming the door behind him.
If Teddy were alive, he’d chase Evan down and smooth things over. Then he’d come back and talk through everything with Xander and tell him how to apologize—how to be better. Without their late friend, their friendship was more strained than it had ever been, and Xander had no idea how to fix it because he could not fix himself.
Xander turned his gaze back to Grimon. His den didn’t feel big enough for the two of them. It felt like the stone walls were closing in, though it felt like that most days now that he was in charge.
“You’re not also going to storm out?”
Grimon gave him a brittle smile. “Good to see you too, Your Majesty.”
“To what do I owe the honor, Grim?”
The last time Xander had seen the god of death, Grimon was pissed at him. Now he eyed Xander sympathetically and that was all the king could take. Grimon was the last god Xander wanted pity from. His silence was stifling.
“Death makes poor company,” Xander said.
“Only one of us looks like death.”
Xander chuckled darkly as he gulped down his whiskey. “Why do you care, Grim?”
“Because Cece cares. Your people care. You have a kingdom to protect. Wallowing won’t make it disappear. I’m here to warn you that while you wallow, your cousin Vincent gains strength.”
“I’m doing my best,” Xander said.
“Personally, I simply wish you’d approach your rule with the same enthusiasm you reserved for seducing Cece,” Grimon taunted.
The god of death baited him, but he couldn’t muster the frustration to be hooked.
“We cannot undo the past. We can only learn from it and move forward.”
Xander barked out a laugh. “How?”
“One foot at a time.”
“Spoken like someone who’s never had to live a mortal life. Also, this is more like one literal battle at a time. My consolation prize was advisors who whisper about my parentage behind my back and in front of my face, a throne I never wanted, and another Savero trying to steal it.”
Grimon chuckled. “Disappointed that your considerable privilege doesn’t come with an instruction manual?”
Xander knew this tactic well. Years of spying meant he could always tell when he was being worked. Grimon was trying to lure him into a fight, but Xander was completely exhausted. He was already giving his blood, sweat, and every ounce of battle strategy he’d learned to the kingdom. He did not have more to offer and he was aware of how he was falling short. At any given time, it felt like he was equally loved and loathed by the people whose allegiance he desperately needed.
“Are you just here to scold me or do you have another purpose?” Xander asked.
Grimon’s eyes flashed with anger. He reached into his cloak and Xander flinched, unsure what to brace for, but when the god of death pulled his hand free, he was holding a blue velvet cloth. A soft hum filled the room. Whatever he’d brought was some sort of magical object.
“I don’t think it’s my color,” Xander said.
Grimon glowered at him. “That’s just the wrapping. The prize is inside.” He slid away the fabric, revealing a small hand mirror. The hum grew louder.
“I do enjoy looking at myself,” Xander said.
Grimon’s pale eyes narrowed. “I can take it back with me; I just thought you might want to try it. It’s the only one in existence. Forged with Goddess Aelish’s truth magic.”
“What does it do?”
Grimon handed him the mirror. Xander gripped the cool silver handle, turning it from side to side, trying to sense how it worked.
“It reveals truths.”
Suddenly Xander wanted to smash it into pieces small enough that he couldn’t glimpse anything. He looked up at the god of death.
“Now why would I need that?”
Grimon’s mouth slashed into a wicked grin. “I can’t imagine why. The mirror has a will of its own. It wanted to be here.”
Xander arched a brow and took another sip of his drink. “And did it tell you that?”
“You joke, but it has its ways. You hear how loud it hums now that I’m here. You are seeking a truth and the mirror can show you.” Grimon shook his head. “It is not a limitless gift. It can only show your most desired truth.”
Xander eyed it warily. “What does that magic cost?”
“The courage to look.”
Xander set it on the table beside him a little too quickly, tossing the cloth over it. “Well, I will certainly have a glance should I think of any truths I wish to know.”
He took another long gulp of whiskey, set his glass down, and crossed his arms. Curse Grimon for bringing that godsforsaken mirror—for letting Xander know it existed. There was not a snowflake’s chance in an Olney summer he’d look in that thing. He did not want to know the answer to the question that could end his reign and send his kingdom into peril. His longtime desire to know the truth of who he was had died along with his brother.
He did not need another reason to doubt himself, just like he didn’t need another reason to fear becoming King Damian.
“Xander, the time for sulking will come. This isn’t it. If everyone liked you, you wouldn’t be doing your job. Well-liked kings are lazy and you’re doing hard work. You could learn a thing or two from Cece, you know. You absolutely wrecked her, but she kept going. Even when it seemed hopeless. Even when she had no idea how to. She did it. You won’t know what else could be for you if you can’t let go of what was.”
Xander scrubbed a hand over his face and looked into the fire. He took a fortifying gulp of whiskey. “I have no interest in seeing what could be when what was nearly destroyed me. Why tempt the fates with the prospect of my happiness?”
Grimon stared at him as if expecting him to say more. “Fine. Waste away. Wreck your kingdom. Wreck everything that you all sacrificed for because you’re too selfish to fight when your heart is broken. Don’t say I didn’t try.”
Grimon disappeared in a puff of smoke, leaving behind a burnt cinnamon scent.
Xander tilted his head back, squeezing his eyes shut. Grimon could say whatever he wanted. He’d never run a kingdom. He’d never had his heart broken, if he even had a heart.
Everyone was a critic. Grimon and Evan might want Xander to be a leader, but he was terrified of making the wrong choice again.
He had learned his lesson. He would protect what was vital. There would be no more bargaining with gods and he’d never again trust his heart around a beautiful woman with a bow in her hands.
1
CECILIA
Cecilia dreamed she was dead. It happened so frequently, but the darkness closing in around her with no ribbon to lead her out was always terrifying.
She sat up in bed, blinking her eyes open and pressing her hand over her chest. Her heart thundered beneath her clammy palm.
Gull calls punctuated the distant sound of waves crashing on the sand beneath her cliffside cottage. The fire in the hearth still burned, but the kettle wasn’t steaming. Rainer had been gone for a while.
Blinking against the midmorning sun shining through the cottage windows, Cecilia rubbed her fingers over the green ribbon tied around the bedpost.
“Brave with my hand. Brave with my heart,” she whispered.
She had a spell for courage, but not one for letting go. She needed to create her own.
The blanket slid to her waist as she rolled to the edge of the bed. The cold floorboards under her bare feet sent a shiver up her legs. She grabbed the sweater Rainer had left on his pillow and pulled it on as she stood. She swiped the blank paper from beside the bed, ripped it into smaller scraps, and jotted notes on each.
Once she had them all written out, she crossed the room to the fire and set the kettle over it to make tea, then padded to the kitchen to grab some dried lavender from the bushel hanging from the ceiling.
The floorboards creaked as she walked back to the fire, pairing each sprig of lavender with one of the scraps of paper. One by one she offered them to the fire, murmuring the words to herself like an incantation.
“I am at peace with my father’s death.
I am at peace with Teddy’s death.
I am at peace with the exchange I made for my magic.
I am at peace with all that I have saved and all that I have lost.”
One by one she watched them burn to ash, waiting for contentment to hit her, trying not to feel disappointment when she felt no closer to letting go.
When she was young, it had seemed there was no problem that magic couldn’t fix. But she could not magic away her grief. She could not heal the bargain she’d made. She could not soothe Rainer’s anxiety that he would lose her because she still felt half-lost. Magic could do nothing for them.
“Maybe try again tomorrow,” she said, turning to make her way to the sunlit spot in front of the window seat.
Cecilia folded forward over her legs to start her morning stretch routine. The series of breaths and movements made her feel grounded, especially after nights plagued by dreams of leaving her body.
She moved through the familiar series, sweat rising on her skin as her muscles warmed. Her legs burned as she moved slightly faster, as if a bit of vigorous exercise would be enough to chase the ghosts from her haunted heart.
She’d died and come back. Death wasn’t something to be feared. She’d already triumphed over it.
And yet…
Cecilia felt as if she was somehow less—like she’d arrested her momentum toward death temporarily but now there was a pressing compulsion to rush toward that void. Grimon had warned her. “It will be painful both physically, mentally, and emotionally. No one returns without a bit of darkness. Something must die off for you to be reborn, so understand that you will not be the same.”
The dying wasn’t the hard part. It was the coming back that was the problem.
No matter how she tried to shape herself into familiar roles, nothing quite fit the places where she’d lost bits of herself. It was like trying to fit into a dress that was cut for someone else.
Cecilia had been made and unmade, and now she had the strange sensation of trying to rebuild herself from nothing.
Too often she found herself playing the character of her old self. Fumbling for her words a beat too late, needing to think about how she should react to the people who stopped her in the village on her walk home from the healer’s clinic.
“Thank you, Goddess,” they said in reverent tones that made her uncomfortable. As if there was another choice for her.
She rose to her feet, crossing the room. She pressed her palm to the spine of the book that she’d stashed her dagger behind. The sound of metal hitting wood was a relief. Even from afar, the weapon had a magnetism. Though the thick volumes of fairy tales hid it well, she could not stop checking that it was there and not still gripped in Rainer’s shaking hand as it slid into her chest. She braced her palm against the leather spine.
She was accustomed to the melancholy that grew inside of her. She simply hoped that it would leave her be. Every time she closed her eyes, the image of the dark maze came to her again.
In every dream, she felt eyes on her. As if someone was watching her struggle with survival. It was as if the more settled her life became, the more she braced herself for something to go horribly wrong.
Why can’t you just be happy?
The kettle squealed, shaking her from her thoughts. She poured herself tea and settled onto the window seat, looking out at the sea.
The pleasant ache in her legs reminded her she wasn’t a goddess anymore. Her body was mortal and fatigued as such. She still had some additional mind and memory healing abilities, but they were a shadow of what they’d once been, and she tired much faster.
Holding such power had been both thrilling and terrifying—a relief and an enormous burden. What was left of that power felt much more manageable and simultaneously like not enough.
Cecilia ebbed and flowed as the days went by. Some days she felt more herself, but then the tide pulled back and she lost what ground she’d gained. It was like she’d been floating in the ocean, relaxed and happy, when suddenly she was caught in an undertow. The more she fought the darkness and grief, the more it pulled her under.
She thought that she might have been worthy of love once, but lost that worthiness in the fight to save her kingdom. She might never be worthy again. Perhaps the real damage Cato did wasn’t to the world around them or the people he killed, but to those who survived.
Cecilia hadn’t counted on being so haunted. It seemed simple in the fairy tales, but maybe all those neatly tied-up stories had led her astray.
Maybe happily ever after didn’t really exist. Maybe what came after was just a bunch of broken, grieving people trying to survive imperfectly in a world that would never be the same. Maybe their happily ever after was the lot of them trying to figure out who they were now that they had been irrevocably changed.
Is that something to grieve? Am I really just grieving myself? And if so, which version of me? The me who existed before she ever left to finish the Gauntlet? The me who stood in the forest begging her best friend to love her enough to choose her over his duty? The me who fell in love with a hunter and liar who turned out to be a prince? The me who trusted all the people in her life were being honest with her? The me that laid down her life for the man she could not bear to live without?
It had to mean something. Cecilia had to make it all mean something.
This was supposed to be the easy part. Loving Rainer had always been second nature. But it was impossible to untangle herself from all that had happened.
She’d murdered to save those she loved. She’d come back from death. She’d killed the last living god.
She was a hero revered in her kingdom, a woman deeply loved by her fiancé, and a witch reborn—but she truly had no idea who she was.
She tried so hard to be the sunny, hopeful girl she’d been, but even peace felt hollow and far too fragile for all she’d sacrificed.
