Chapter 11 - Arvoren

When I find her, standing upon the very top of the east tower, the early-morning sun casting her in harsh, golden light, something inside me goes very still.

She’s standing at the tower’s edge, toes barely gripping the rain-slick stones, arms spread wide like she’s testing the wind. She’s taunting the void below to claim her.

It’s hundreds of feet to the surface of the lake below, from which sharp rocks protrude, their vicious peaks battered by the lake’s dark, churning waters.

Though bird of flight she may be, she will not survive this fall.

“Calliope,” I say, my voice echoing sharply through the swirling air. I’m careful to keep my tone even, even as a thousand fears and curses roar through my head. “Step away from the edge.”

She doesn’t turn to look at me. Her gaze is locked on the jagged rocks, the black surface that boils and seethes against its banks like a living thing. I can’t see her expression from this angle, but I can feel the tension radiating off her. A volatile, desperate energy that snaps like lightning in the air between us.

Distantly, in the very back of my mind, I can hear the horns that blew over the city in mourning the day my parents were killed.

“You need me more than I need you,” she murmurs, voice carried faintly on the wind.

“Do I?” I ask softly, watching her back, the tense line of her shoulders, the curling and unfurling of her fingers at her sides.

She’s testing herself, I realize. Pushing against her own boundaries—against mine. Again. Always trying to find the limit of my patience, my restraint, my resolve. It’s all she knows how to do.

I take a single step forward, just enough that I can see the way her shoulders rise and fall with each breath. I force calmness into my voice, lacing it with a cruel false sympathy. “Then prove it, little bird. Take the leap.”

She goes rigid at my words, her torso coiling as if with pain, as if she’s gathering herself to do it. She’s weighing every ounce of courage left inside her. But I see the hesitation in the tightness of her jaw, the slight tremor in her legs. She’s afraid.

And it infuriates me, that fear, because I know it’s not for me. She’s not afraid of me.

She’s afraid of falling.

“Or perhaps I overestimated you,” I continue, letting a hint of derision slip into my tone. “Perhaps you’re not quite as brave as you want me to think.”

Slowly, she turns her head just enough to glance at me over her shoulder. Her eyes are wide, glassy, shimmering with anger and—Gods, pain. She looks … undone. In the gathering light of a heavenly sunrise above my shrouded city, she is, for a moment, emptied of all she had when she arrived mere days ago. No more rebellion, no more resolve, no terror and rage and terrific, furious obstinance.

She is hollowed out. Perhaps some part of her wouldn’t mind dying after all.

The sight of it twists something deep in my gut, an uncomfortable lurch of emotion I can’t afford to acknowledge. No . She’s manipulating me again. Twisting my emotions, sowing seeds of confusion, of pity. I can’t let her have that power.

She wants a game? I’ll play her game.

“Go ahead,” I tell her with soft, delicate precision, meeting her gaze with a steady, unblinking stare. “Jump. But don’t think for a moment that your death would mean anything more than a minor inconvenience for me. I’ll keep going, Calliope. There will be more women, more brides—every human woman in this damned kingdom, if I should choose. I’ll kill each and every one of your replacements until one pleases me.” I lean forward slightly, voice dropping to a rumbling murmur that cuts through the air like a blade. “So, jump. If that’s really the best you can do.”

Her lips part, a shuddering breath escaping. Her expression wavers, crumples, and for a brief, awful second, I think she’s going to take that step, actually hurl herself into the abyss just to spite me.

But then she falters. The point of failure. I see it as it happens. She clenches her fists, nails digging into her palms, and slowly—agonizingly slowly—she takes a step back. And another. Away from the edge. Her head drops, shoulders slumping in defeat.

“Coward,” I say, echoing the word she has so often used against me, and it comes out far harsher than I mean it to. The sense of release—of relief—is overpowering.

Her head snaps up, fury blazing in her eyes, but I cut off whatever retort she has with a swift, cold smile.

“There it is,” I murmur. “That spark of anger. The fire you keep kindling inside yourself, thinking it will somehow save you. It is always the most powerless who believe their spirits might save them in the end. And they never do.”

She glares up at me, trembling with barely contained rage and fear, fragile as a baby bird, and something inside me snaps. I close the distance between us in a few quick strides and seize her by the arm. She struggles immediately, thrashing against my hold, but I tighten my grip and haul her back from the edge, dragging her toward the center of the tower’s rooftop.

“Let go of me!” she snarls, twisting in my grasp. I don’t relent. I can feel the raw heat of her rage and indignance radiating through her skin, every muscle tense with the effort to break free, to throw me off.

She’s small, yes, and fragile compared to my strength, but the sheer intensity of her resistance makes something dark and dangerous unfurl inside me.

“No,” I growl, voice low and dangerous. “You don’t get to slip through my fingers that easily. You are not permitted to die. I don’t permit my possessions to decide when they might elude me.”

With a sudden, savage twist, she manages to wrench one arm free of my frogmarching grip, shoving against my chest with all her strength. It barely moves me, but it’s enough to make me lose my stride for a heartbeat, and she makes a break for it.

I snarl and scoop her up, ignoring her flailing fists as I lift her bodily, one arm around her back, the other beneath her knees.

She fights like a wildcat, kicking and clawing, but I hold her tight, carrying her back down the narrow stairwell that spirals from the tower’s peak. Her fists pummel against my shoulder, her nails scratching at the exposed skin of my throat, but I barely feel it. All I can think about is the rush of adrenaline, the seething fury that coils tighter and tighter in my chest with every breath she draws.

“Put me down, you monster —”

“Be silent,” I snap, my voice echoing through the stone stairwell. She jerks, startled by the force of the command, and falls still, for a moment, at least.

“Is this your answer, then?” she whispers hoarsely after a beat, voice small and hollow. “To keep me locked away? To … to break me, like a beast of burden?”

The words scrape against something raw inside me, but I don’t respond. I can’t. If I speak now, I’ll say something I’ll regret.

Instead, I force myself to keep moving, step by step, until we reach the corridor that leads to her chambers.

Two guards stand outside the door, and they snap to attention as we approach, their eyes widening as they take in the sight of us—of her, struggling and disheveled in my arms, of me, bloodied and breathing hard.

“Return her to her quarters,” I order curtly, thrusting her toward them with more force than necessary. One guard catches her, his expression flickering with uncertainty, but he nods quickly and pulls her back, holding her by the shoulders as if afraid she’ll bolt the moment he loosens his grip, though the fight seems to have left her now, at least for a moment.

I have no delusions: she hasn’t yet learned her lesson. But she is cowed by shame, by the truth of her avarice and how it played out upon the top of the tower when she threatened but could not follow through.

“Sir,” the other guard murmurs, glancing between us. “Shall we … secure the room?”

“Yes.” My voice is clipped, cold. “Lock it, and reinforce the locks. Post additional guards. She doesn’t leave without my permission. She has been allowed too many liberties.”

Calliope meets my gaze over the guard’s shoulder, her eyes hardened with grief.

“This won’t change anything,” she says, but she sounds exhausted, not angry. “You can lock me away, but I’ll keep getting out, I won’t—”

“Won’t what?” I cut her off, stepping closer, leaning down so my face is inches from hers. “Won’t fight? Won’t resist?” I let out a harsh, humorless laugh. “You’ll keep resisting until there’s nothing left of you. Until you break beneath the weight of it. And I will watch. And I will be there, every step of the way, to ensure you know exactly how useless your defiance is. I’ll watch you crumble to my will, darling.”

She stares up at me, breathing hard, her eyes wide and furious and so, so sad. The sight of it sends a jolt of something sharp and painful through my chest, its weight and force like a sword impaling me, but I crush down the pain of it, forcing myself to hold her gaze, to keep my expression as blank and unyielding as stone.

“You’ll never have me,” she whispers, the words almost lost beneath the roar of blood in my ears.

I grit my teeth, a muscle jumping in my jaw, and turn away sharply.

“Get her inside,” I order the guards, not daring to look at her again. “Now.”

I don’t stay to watch as they drag her into the room. I don’t look back, don’t pause, don’t let myself think.

That night, as the storm descends upon Millrath, I find myself pacing the length of my study, staring out at the sheets of rain that lash against the windows, the lightning that splits the sky in brilliant, jagged forks.

The storm is fierce and unrelenting, howling like a wounded beast, battering the castle walls with a force that shakes the very foundation. It is furious. It’s a fitting mirror to the chaos in my mind, to the turmoil that churns relentlessly, driving me to distraction.

I want to break something. To shatter the silence, to tear down every wall and scream until my voice is raw. I want—

Her . It always comes back to her.

I am cognisant enough of myself, the truth of my soul, to know I have not felt true obsession until now. Until, in her eyes, I saw her fracturing.

What am I going to do with her? How do I crush that rebellious spirit without … without destroying her completely?

Damn her. Damn her for making me feel this way. For making me care. I am not one who cares.

She calls me tyrant, and yet, I cannot muster the rage to crush her like the bug she is, to undo her like a crudely-sewn doll.

The storm outside rages on, unrelenting, and I wonder—not for the first time—if I’m the one being undone.