77. Arran

Osheen followed me upstairs to the study I'd commandeered. The halls were crowded with males returning to their tasks, recounting what had occurred in the great hall to the females who hadn't made it down to witness the spectacle themselves.

The door closed. I turned. I expected to see Osheen standing at attention, hands folded behind his back, waiting to report.

But he crossed his arms over his chest, and he did not wait for me to speak before demanding, "What the hell was that?"

I had never seen Osheen angry. But there it was, in the stubborn set of his jaw and the narrow line of his mouth.

"Care to soften those words?" I said carefully. I did not sit, nor cross my arms. This study was a mistake. I was not made to be contained by four walls.

"No, I do not," Osheen said sharply. "Why would you undermine Veyka like that, in front of all those courtiers?"

Few would have dared to challenge me like this; Osheen never had. Maybe that was why he could do it, and I did not instantly shift into my wolf and rip his head off.

I shook my head. "They are not courtiers. This is Eilean Gayl, not Baylaur or Cayltay."

Osheen did not take my dismissal. He took a step forward. Outside, I heard the telltale creep of vines on the wall. His power was boiling very close to the surface. "Terrestrials gossip just as much as elementals. You have weakened her position, and for what? A few extra soldiers?"

My hands turned to fists, but my voice was even. "We may need those soldiers."

"Eight males are nothing in the coming conflict, we both know it." Osheen did not give an inch of quarter. He stood in the middle of the study, refusing to be cowed. "Why?"

Because she does not trust me. "The amorite is better used for weapons. There is not enough to protect every male in Annwyn."

"You may be right," Osheen allowed. "But the male I knew would have slaughtered anyone who dared to gainsay his queen. He would have been proud that she was so devoted to duty, to her kingdom."

Because I am not worthy of her.

I walked to the window and threw it open. Let his vines come. My own were more than a match. "You have changed, Osheen."

He laughed ruefully. Another sound that I'd heard so rarely. "No. I am merely saying something you dislike."

And I was reacting exactly as I'd accused Veyka of doing—selfishly.

Fuck.

I forced myself back to the desk and down into the chair. I stared over Osheen's shoulder at the door. "Report."

"On what?" Osheen's tone was wary.

My voice scratched out of my throat. "Everything."

He began with the news that Arthur Pendragon was dead, beheaded by humans on the same night that he'd been poised to announce his betrothal to Guinevere. We'd been in the war camps on the northeastern edge of Wolf Bay, Osheen said.

I remembered none of it.

I did not let my gaze shift an inch while he spoke. I did not want to see the pity in his eyes.

He spoke of our arrival in Baylaur, waiting hours in the desert for admittance. The Offering, and the desire that burned in my eyes from the first time they found Veyka. Desire that every elemental and terrestrial in Baylaur had seen. He elaborated on Veyka's description of the assassin who came for her in the night, how I had asked him to shore up the defenses around the goldstone palace. How he had seen the fondness growing between Veyka and I from a distance. He spoke of the Joining. Of Veyka being ripped away from me and the rage I'd felt, the twenty courtiers I'd killed when I lost control of my beast.

Finally, he recounted the journey from Baylaur to the caves of the mysterious Faeries of the Fen. The burned human village and Veyka's dismay. Finding Percival. He described the joy in Veyka's eyes when she'd finally begun to master her power, and the pride in mine.

He ended with our departure from the Faeries of the Fen. Before I had been injured—not just injured. Stabbed, by the legendary Excalibur. By Veyka.

It cannot stop you.That was what Veyka had said when I tried to remove her scabbard in the ice cave. You are the other half of my soul.

Realization barreled through me, cold and harsh. I had been wearing the scabbard. That was how Veyka knew that I could draw her blood even while wearing it. She had thought I was safe, because I wore the scabbard. And instead, I'd nearly died.

I stared into the wood grain of the door. My eyes traced the ancient knots, as old as the castle itself. If I looked away, I did not know what would happen.

"The Battle of Avalon. Tell me how it happened," I said.

"I was not there."

My eyes tried to move away, to search Osheen's face. But I held resolute. "Why?"

"The vision the faerie priestess gave to Veyka promised bloodshed on the shores of Avalon. We all agreed not to take Maisri into known danger," he explained.

"Maisri…" I searched my mind.

"My niece. My ward." From the periphery of my vision, still fixed on that blasted door, I saw him shaking his head side to side. "You remember nothing? Truly?"

A low growl rolled up inside of me, through my chest. I knew Osheen could not hear it. Would Veyka? "My beast remembers her," I said. "But I do not."

Osheen did not speak for several moments. Once he did, I realized he'd been weighing his words—and should have kept them to himself.

"Maybe there is less of a difference between you and your beast than you imagine," he said.

"You are flora-gifted. You cannot understand," I snapped back.

An insult.

Not a jest. I rarely made those. I had just insulted my most faithful lieutenant. More—my friend. There were some terrestrials—many terrestrials—who believed the fauna-gifted shifters among us more powerful than our flora-gifted counterparts. It was nonsense. I'd seen Osheen put his trees and vines to better use than nearly every other shifter I'd encountered.

Of all the terrestrials, I was the only one who'd ever been born with both gifts. I, above all others, had the ability to understand that one was not intrinsically more powerful than the other, that it all depended upon the individual who wielded them.

Osheen had never complained. Never shown a hint of resentment toward the power he'd been given or the gift he had not.

I forced myself to look at him. To see what I had done.

There it was.

Hurt.

Fuck.

Osheen did not try to hide it. He let me see the damage. After a few moments, he dropped his folded arms back down to his sides.

"You and Veyka are mates. But you loved her before that," he said plainly. Answering the question I had not dared to ask. "When your memories return, you will regret every wound you've left. Every barb. They will haunt you for the next thousand years."

"And what if my memories never return?" I breathed.

There was no looking away from the pity in his eyes as he said, "Then I hope you're not stupid enough to squander a gift you waited three hundred years to find."

He bowed slightly at the waist. "If you wish to find me, I will be with Maisri. I am certain she is currently eating her weight in sweets in your queen's chambers." Then he left.

I sat alone for a long time.

I'd betrayed Veyka. Osheen was correct, even if I hated it. From every angle, I'd been wrong. I disagreed with her about the amorite; she was living in denial about the true threat the succubus posed. This conflict would be settled on a battlefield, not through ear piercings. But she was young. I was a battle commander with three hundred years of experience. If she trusted me, maybe I could convince her.

But none of that changed what had happened in the great hall. Even if I disagreed, I should not have done so publicly. Those soldiers were nothing. Veyka's stature was worth more than my pride. Veyka was worth everything.

And I had still been stupid and selfish.

Everything I'd supposedly accused her of being when we first met.

To make matters worse, I'd insulted Osheen, a male who had been nothing but loyal to me and to my queen.

I was back to staring at the door. There were three knots in the wood. Elegant swirls that spun around and around before they found their way and straightened out.

I did not much like the male I was allowing myself to become.

I could not force Veyka to tell me her schemes. But maybe I could earn back her trust. Maybe I could be the male she had fallen in love with.

Maybe I could be worthy of her.