Page 44
Mag nodded. “I promise.”
She didn’t look convinced, but finally followed after his parents like a damned ghost of herself.
—Nothing will happen, lad—
Let’s fucking hope not.
For once in his life, the dizzying pound of Brand’s heart was a comfort.
It railed inside of him, beat-beat-beating away at the cage of his ribs and chest, and he clung with both hands to the nauseating familiarity of it.
As long as his tunic was fighting to strangle him and his fingers remained numb, he was okay. The fog clouding his thoughts belonged there. The aching pressure at the back of his skull was no one else’s. That sinking desire to disappear had always been present.
No matter what happened to him, what was done to his mind and body, he knew this sensation. That these things were normal. Made him himself.
He was Brandir aht Bordoroth, Blessed of Straelon, High Ambassador and Fourth Imperial Son of Alwyn and Fionerys, and he’d always been this way.
At the very least, he remembered that. He knew fuck all about anything else.
Taken. Tortured. Mutilated. Manipulated.
That’s what they said, anyway. Repeatedly. Constantly. Over and over and over.
It made no difference. Brand recalled none of it.
He’d given up trying. Only darkness stared back when he turned inward too quickly. Emptiness if he held too tight. Pain if he thought too long.
As far as he was concerned, he laid down for a nap after working in the square and…woke up in someone else’s life. A different plane of existence to the one he belonged in.
Brand was as he had ever been, while everyone around him was not. No one looked at him quite right, didn’t speak like themselves›. They smelled wrong. Sounded different.
Mag was too quiet. Thad, too serious. Hedda, too agitated. Faldir offered soft smiles at random. Lyriat’s steps were gentled and his swagger was gone, a near-permanent furrow in his brow. His older brothers embraced him more in the last week than the sum of their lives put together. His parents had visited thrice, though they’d not been to the Montrealm in decades. Araxis’s absence through it all, his younger brother ever elusive, was the only spot of normalcy.
And that Sorcerit…
From his throne on the dais, Brand skimmed his gaze across the Great Hall, over head and horn, searching for opalescent skin that didn’t belong amidst the earthiness of Demons. It was no surprise when he didn’t find her. He would have felt her if she was here.
“Are you sure you’re up to this, my friend?”
Brand gritted his teeth, barely glancing at Lyriat from the corner of his eye. “I’m fine.”
He was sick to death of that fucking question, whatever form it took.
Are you sure? Are you alright? Well enough? Strong enough? Positive? Certain?
Of course he bloody wasn’t, but what else was he supposed to say?
“I just…” Lyriat’s sigh was heavy. “I know you want to get back to your duties, to normalcy, but this won’t be what you’re used to. Even though we’ve talked about what happened here and there, it’s going to be difficult. For both of us.”
Brand knew that. Hence having a fucking episode. They’d tried to prepare him, but he hadn’t bothered to prepare himself.
He was sure there were things they hadn’t told him yet. Details they’d withheld. He’d noticed the whispered exchanges just out of earshot. The darting looks at the end of awkward conversations.
Brand hadn’t called them out on it because he was a fucking coward.
Aside from his crippled mental state, the only other thing he had was ignorance. None of it was real if he never went out onto his balcony and saw the Horned City’s alleged wreckage. Or dug too deep into what the fuck “manipulated” meant exactly. Or found out how they’d acquired a damned Fae guard in their court.
As long as he stayed quiet and didn’t demand every answer, he could go on believing this was all a bad dream. That he’d eventually wake up, and everything would be back to the way it was supposed to be.
