Chapter 25

ChapterTwenty-Five

Why did it feel like they were always arguing? He didn’t know what to say or how to fix this. Alistair had practically asked her to marry him! She had to know how strongly he felt about her?

The night passed without a single moment of sleep from him. And because they were on a small break in the school schedule, he could remain in his own room all night without having to worry about when he would get back to the Academy.

Staggering down to the kitchens the next morning, he sat down at the giant table, put his head on the worn wood, and tried to talk his body into functioning. Even when it didn’t want to.

A warm hand touched his back. “Coffee?”

“Please, Nora. If you don’t mind.”

The maid who had been with him since he was a child set to action. She put the teapot so quietly onto the fireplace he almost didn’t hear it at all. Then the water started bubbling, and the gentle sounds lulled him into a sense of false peace.

Was that… peppermint he smelled? Did she think he was hungover? That would be more likely if he were one of his brothers. Alistair was heart sick.

He sighed and lifted his head from the table. “I didn’t get into my father’s brandy last night. You can make noise.”

Nora glanced over at him with a grin that dropped instantly from her face. “Goodness, look at you, little master. You look like you walked hand in hand with death last night.”

“In a way.” Alistair groaned and put his head back on the table. “I lost her, Nora. I definitely lost her this time.”

“One of the fae?”

“Thea.”

Just saying her name made him want to pound his head against the table. Why had he been such an ass to her? She’d been nothing but honest, and he was the one who kept pushing her to come here when he knew how horrible this house was. This was his fault, surely.

Although she had been cruel in her own way. Calling his home and life sad? She should know that he had nothing else. There was no other option with this curse around his neck. He had to uphold his family’s name and keep the house alive.

Damn it, he was stuck. His father hadn’t just cursed him to remain here but to remain alone.

The screeching sound of a mug slid across the table and bumped against his hand. “So this is all about a girl, then?”

“Not just any girl.” He sat up and reached for the coffee that might make him feel more like a person today. “The only girl. She’s the only one for me, Nora. I can’t think without her in my life.”

“Well, that sounds a little dramatic. I’ve yet to meet a woman who could kill a man just by leaving.” She perched on the edge of the table and waved her hand. “Why don’t you tell me about her?”

So he did.

He might have waxed poetic about how the stars sparkled in her eyes and how the sound of her laugh was better than any symphony he’d ever heard. Alistair knew without a doubt that he lingered a little too long in describing every detail of her expression when she took care of the familiars. He knew she would do the same to the fae if given the chance, and they would love her for it.

And when he was finished, he looked at Nora’s pleased grin and groaned. “Stop looking at me like that. She’s never coming back. I told you, I already lost her.”

“I’m just so happy to see you in love. Here I was, thinking it wasn’t possible for an Orbweaver to feel that emotion and here you are. Yet again, proving everyone wrong about your family.” She shook her head. “There has to be something we can do about it. This couldn’t have been your first fight?”

“It was.” As much as he hated to admit it. All their earlier disagreements had been much easier to figure out. Most of them were him being a little idiotic, though. Maybe that gave this situation hope?

The more he thought about it, the less he believed himself. Thea was a discerning young woman with a heart of gold. She wouldn’t suffer a fool in her life.

He’d been too hard on her. He’d been fueled by anger and incapable of keeping his own mouth shut. The last thing he wanted to admit was that he’d made a mistake, but he could here.

Shaking his head, he pressed his lips together. “I don’t think there’s anything I can do to fix it this time, Nora.”

“Well, you can’t just give up.” She twitched her skirts and stepped down onto the floor. “If there’s anything I’ve learned in this life, it’s that love is the only thing worth fighting for. And you are very much in love, little master. Your heart is as much hers as it is your own, if I’m reading the situation right. Fight for her. Tell her you are so sorry for the insensitive words that came out of your mouth when you felt like she was attacking you. Apologize. Grovel. Do whatever it takes until she listens to you. And then do better in the future, Alistair. If you want to keep her in your life, then you need to learn how to grow yourself.”

She was right. She was always right.

He stood with his mug of coffee in his hands and gave her a little nod. Then he staggered out of the kitchens toward his room, where he resolved himself to figure out the best way to word this apology. After all, it would not be an easy one.

Thea had to believe that he meant every word he said. He should do it in person, but Alistair had never been particularly brave. He feared what she would say if he walked up to her front door.

Or what her sisters would do to him if they found him where Thea didn’t want him.

A shout echoed through the halls as though someone was fighting. Alistair winced, but he knew his place in this house. At the very least, he had to go see what was happening. Perhaps his father had decided that his elder sons weren’t as wonderful as he thought. That might cheer Alistair up a little.

Instead, as he walked into his father’s drawing room, he found a sight he’d never seen before.

His father was smiling.

A gleeful smile spread across his face with a wide-mouthed grin. It wrinkled around the edges of his eyes as he stared down at a piece of paper in his hand.

“You see?” he waved it at Cassius, who stood solemnly to his side. “I told you this would all happen sooner than we expected. Now is the time, my sons! Now I will need you more than ever.”

Sons?

Alistair stepped into the room and realized Lysander was standing right in the doorway as well. Both of his brothers were curved in on themselves as though they were afraid. He had never seen them look like this before.

Balthazar spun, so his back was to Alistair, holding the letter up to the dim light that broke through the windows. “I’ve been waiting for this letter for years!”

What was his father talking about? A letter? Things moving forward? He hadn’t told Alistair about anything when they were in that carriage together, but that didn’t mean that his father hadn’t put things in motion.

Were they going to attack a few families in Wildecliff? There were some who had more children than Balthazar and therefore were getting dangerously close to the same amount of power their family had.

Lysander wrapped his hand around Alistair’s arm and jerked him out of the drawing room. With a hiss, he slammed Alistair’s back against the wall next to the drawing room so no one would know they were out there.

“What are you doing, whelp?” he asked.

“I heard father shouting. I thought I should—“

“You thought nothing. Do you hear me? Nothing. You will not tell father you were here, or that you heard anything of what he said. You should not be here.”

Anger, just like he’d felt when Thea called him a sad being living in a sad home, burst into flames within his chest. “Why? Why should I not be here? Because I’m not as much his son as you?”

“No, you little idiot. I’m trying to keep you out of all this.” Lysander shoved his shoulder hard one more time, slamming him back into the wall. “It’s too late for Cassius and I. We’re stuck in this as much as father is, but you can still get out. Call it a change of heart or whatever you want to say. I just want you to get out of the way.”

Those words stopped Alistair in his tracks. Why would Lysander want to warn him after all the horrible things his brothers had done to him? They didn’t have any love lost between them.

“What is going on?” Alistair asked. He slipped out from underneath Lysander’s arm and stood in the hallway. Facing his brother for the first time in their lives. “You sound scared.”

“We all should be.” He took a step closer to Alistair and then lowered his voice. “Father and the ministers who run Wildecliff have been listening to poison. They claim no one will deliver goods to us for much longer because of how poor Waterdown is making us look. They’re attacking Waterdown and Strongmeadow. They intend to wipe them out.”

His world ground to a halt. Alistair felt as though the entire house shifted to the side, and he would have fallen if Lysander hadn’t grabbed onto his arm. “They’re what?”

“We’re looking at a war, brother. And if Father and those men have their way, then the river will run red with blood for years to come. Stay out of it, whelp.” Another shove, this time half-hearted, and he didn’t let go for a few moments. His fingers lingered on Alistair’s arm, but then he let go and turned his attention back to the study. “I’ll be missed.”

“Be safe,” Alistair replied, but he knew it was far too late for that.

They weren’t close, he or his brothers. But he had the sudden realization that he wished they were. Life might have been a little easier if they could have overcome their differences. At least for him and Lysander.

He waited until he was alone once again in the corridor before he bolted. There had to be another ship. One last ship out to Waterdown, and then he could at least warn them. He could tell them all to prepare and to get their children out of bed before fire rained down upon them.

He didn’t know what his father’s plan was, but he knew Balthazar. If the old man wanted a war, then he wanted to make sure no one lived to talk about it. There would only be his father’s victory—nothing else.

Alistair sprinted through the house and grabbed his blue coat by the door. He looked over his shoulder one last time, half expecting his father’s shadowy spiders to follow him. But the house was quiet. As if it were holding its breath, waiting for the next moment.

He fled from that house of nightmares and darkness. He raced through the streets where people were already leaving their homes. Shouts of encouragement followed him, but he couldn’t guess why they yelled. Surely they didn’t know he was trying to warn Waterdown that his own people were attacking them?

Finally, he made it through the front gates that closed off the port from the rest of the city. There were still people milling about, although they seemed to move aimlessly. Entirely without purpose, where this was a bustling port full of people racing to and from.

Breathless, he stopped the first person who looked like a sailor. “Sir, excuse me. Excuse me!”

The man’s face was so tanned it looked like leather stretched over a skull. He wore a dark black outfit with moth-eaten holes at the hems and a scowl on his face as he placed a bundle of fish on the docks.

“What do you want boy,” the sailor grumbled. His voice was raspy with misuse.

“Is there... Is there a boat headed for Waterdown?”

“Now?”

“Yes, now. As soon as possible.”

The man hooked a thumb over his shoulder and gestured at the docks. “There was one more ship headed out, but that’s the last one. I thought you’d have heard by now?”

Alistair wanted to sprint to the boat, but he had to know. “Heard what?”

“They’re going to cast a spell upon Waterdown at any moment. That’s why that’s the last boat. No more trade with those people. No more trade across the river at all.” The sailor ran a hand through his hair and shrugged. “I guess that means I’m out of a job.”

No more boats? They were attacking this soon? They couldn’t! Waterdown needed time to address the fact that their neighbor wanted to fight with them. It was common courtesy in such situations that the attacking city would at least allow the other to know that they were thinking about it.

“What about the children?” he wheezed.

The sailor shrugged. “I guess they didn’t think about that. Or if they did, they didn’t care all that much.”

His heart broke. So many families would be ripped apart in such a short amount of time. He had to stop them.

He couldn’t.

He sprinted over the fallen ropes and all the items that had been pulled out of ships that would otherwise be in the waters of the river. He leapt wildly over a large chest that had most likely contained some captain’s goods and then noticed that the only boat with its sails still out was already moving off the dock.

“Wait!” he screamed, sprinting faster than he ever had before. “I’m coming! Wait!”

Someone on the ship noticed him. They pointed and waved to a sailor, gesturing that someone still needed to get onto the ship.

Hope bloomed in his chest and then died a slow death as he reached the end of the dock and barely missed the ship. It was just outside of reach; otherwise, he would have jumped onto it. Perhaps he could have swum to reach it, but the wind caught the sails.

The last ship to Waterdown sailed out of his reach. Just as she had.

He bent and braced himself on his knees as he tried to catch his breath, and the first spell soared over his head. Fire illuminated the sky.