I want children. I don’t know if I want them for the right reasons, but surely it isn’t a bad thing to desire a family again. I know new family won’t replace the siblings and father I lost, but maybe having someone to care for would leave me feeling less unmoored.
“This is fucking ridiculous, Bram. This has to end.” Grace slams the door behind her. Her energy is a riot of red and the violet of resolve.
“It would help if I knew what you were angry about.”
She paces from one side of my office to the other, her long strides eating up the distance, her fury almost wondrous to behold. “You are a laughingstock of a ruler.”
That brings me up short. Of all the things I expected her to rage over, my abilities as a leader did not make the list. “Excuse me?”
“Your people respect you so little that they are actively undermining you right to my face. They know what I’m here for, and they don’t care. They’re not afraid that I’ll come to you with the information, because they know you won’t do anything about it.”
Ah. “I see you’ve met one of the nobles. Who finally approached you?”
She pivots slowly to face me. The lack of momentum should make her less fearsome, but instead she feels like a predator that has narrowed their attention on me. “You knew this would happen?” she finally says.
“I knew it was a distinct possibility.” I can’t imagine the nobles have much faith in my ability to complete my goals, but most of them aren’t complete fools. They know what’s at stake if I succeed. It was only a matter time before one of them approached her. There are few foolish enough to threaten her, and none of those people are currently in residence. I would like to pretend it’s me—or the curse—they fear, but the truth is that no one wants to cross Azazel. He’s proven himself to be a fearsome warrior, and he’s intensely protective of his humans. Years ago, one of the incubi violated his hospitality and harmed one of his humans. He made such an example of her that I suspect any of us who saw the results have that scene imprinted in our nightmares.
And he ensured that all of us saw.
Grace is still looking at me like I have sprouted an additional set of horns. “And you’re . . . okay with this?”
Her frustration is so thick, I can almost feel the friction of it against my skin. “Of course I’m not okay with it. They obviously upset you, and that’s not something I want for you ever.”
“Upset me.” She says the words with absolutely no inflection. “Is that what you think this is?”
“I can see that it is.” I wave my hand to encompass her energy, which is swirling about the room and filling the space.
I realize I made a mistake the second she goes perfectly still. “Your people are actively plotting against you. Do you know what they offered me? An escape from this place. I might not have taken them up on it this time, but enough rejections and they’re going to realize that I won’t ever. What happens then, Bram? I’ll tell you what happens. They escalate. I don’t know what circumstances would be enough for them to believe there’s a real chance you might convince me to have a child, but they won’t allow it. Not when their goals are so close at hand. And all you have to say is that you don’t want me upset?”
I know better than to let my anger slip its leash. And yet her derision pricks at me. “What do you want me to do?”
“Literally anything!”
Tension coils through me, but I force myself to sit back slowly instead of surging to my feet. “There’s nothing to be done. They believe I’m cursed, and so they won’t listen to me. Until I can prove otherwise, we’re in a holding pattern.”
“That is the biggest load of shit I’ve ever heard.” She points a finger at me. “You’re just going through the motions. You don’t want this. You don’t want any of this. Gods, you’re probably waiting for someone to come along and stab you in the back and put you out of your misery.”
The truth of her words stings worse than anything she could do to me physically. That, more than anything else she’s said since entering my office, provokes me to action. I rise and flare out my wings. “Get out.”
“Or what?” She lifts her brows and sneers. “Are you going to muscle me out? Please. You’re more likely to go to your knees and offer me your throat. Just like I imagine you do in any important conversation that comes into your life these days. At least I have no intention of cutting it. I can’t say the same for the rest of the people in this castle.”
“Get. Out.”
For a long moment, I think she’ll press the issue. But she lowers her hand and shakes her head slowly. “You’re not doing yourself any favors with this half life, Bram. I’ll see you at dinner.” She turns and stalks out of the room.
If only her words left with her.
They plague me through the afternoon. There’s not much work to be done, which means there aren’t many distractions to be had. The territory more or less runs itself. It has since before my father’s time. The only real purpose that the leader has is to ensure the different gargoyle factions remain of equal power and to lead us during wartime. The former is a full-time job, or at least it was before the different noble families mostly withdrew from this castle. Now I don’t know what they’re doing at all. The spies my father had have all melted away in the night. I am well and truly alone.
I’m doing the best I fucking can, and I deeply resent Grace for acting as if I’m not. Who is she to talk? She’s got plenty of her own skeletons rattling around in that impressive closet inside her.
By the time the sun sets and I make my way down to the kitchen to check on dinner, I am so furious, I can barely speak. Silas gives me a strange look the moment I walk through the door. “Big plans tonight?”
“What makes you say that?” I’m being too brusque, but I can’t stop myself. There’s a part of me that’s jealous that he already saw her; there’s no other reason for him to be asking that question. “Where is she?”
He raises his brows. “Maybe it would be better if you ate separately tonight.”
Part of me wonders if he’s right, but the rest of me can’t stand the thought of keeping all this tumultuous energy inside me with no outlet. Grace will be fine. She always is. “We’ll eat like normal.”
“If you insist.” Silas turns back to the stove.
I am taking out many years of frustration and fear on the convenient target that is Grace. I can’t bring myself to give a fuck. Somehow, everything comes to a point when I see the formal dining room. Place after place set out in perfect symmetry. All empty. Just like normal.
Except for one.
Grace sits right in the center of the long length, dressed in a black gown. This one seems to fit her better than the others, at least the part I can see. It clings to her arms and breasts, leaving her shoulders and most of her upper chest bare. She’s fastened her hair up into some intricate style that looks lovely. She’s even colored her lips, a deep crimson shade that makes me think of blood.
Taunting me in my office wasn’t enough. She’s going to drive the point home with the ferocity of a warrior out for their enemy’s death. I want to hate her for it, but I can’t help admiring her willingness to step onto the field of battle.