Skye
I woke alone, the rumpled blankets and impression in the pillow beside me the only sign Xander was here last night. A checklist of tasks grew in my mind, urging me to move: go to the hall and meet with Cillian about the search for Amandalyn, see Mother, check on the refugees, speak with Emeline, and with Nickoli, run a castle and a kingdom. The jobs were plenty and there was no time for the ache lingering in my chest after last night.
Xander’s frenzied eyes flashed before me. He attacked me in his sleep. I rolled my wrist and the movement stung. What haunted him? I edged to his side of the bed and cowered beneath the covers, inhaling the scent he’d left behind. For a few minutes, I lingered where he’d lain as the possibilities rolled through my overactive imagination. What happened to him out there in those mountains?
The answers would not be found under a pile of blankets. Using a clear head, instead of my burdened heart, I made plans for the day.
The clipped staccato of boots against wood drew me from my thoughts. My palms smoothed the front pleats of my navy skirts and I squared my shoulders as the sound grew nearer.
Nickoli pushed through the cracked door with his elbow, his arms loaded with parchments. “Skye?”
“I’m sorry to intrude, but I needed to speak with you,” I said from where I stood within the center of his bedchamber.
“Intrude?” His mouth quirked, amusement dancing in his eyes at the notion. He glanced at the scrolls in his arms and moved toward his desk. “I have been in my father’s chamber gathering anything that may help.” Our gazes met and he stopped as my false smile wavered.
Nickoli dropped the scrolls and documents unceremoniously. “You look upset. Has something happened?” he asked, his green eyes easily reading me.
“I’m fine. I just came from speaking with Cillian. There’s no word on Manda. Anywhere.” My hands smoothed over my skirts again. They needed something to do; I needed something to do. “Of course, you already knew this. I’m sorry about last night, about Xander. He … well, he’s obviously upset and—”
“Should I stay?” Nickoli interrupted. “Do you want me here?”
His blond hair had grown longer since I first saw him in Sheridan. He’d been a Prince, masquerading as the cocky leader of a small army, standing before me and boldly inviting me to meet with his King. Now though?
“Stay? Do you mean in Montibello? Of course you should stay. Why would you ask such a question?”
The dark smudges underneath his weary eyes spoke of restless nights. “Nick, what happened?” I asked.
“Nothing I cannot handle, Your Majesty, but if it would be easier on you if I left, I would.”
As frustrating as his use my formal title was after all we’d been through, I grinned at his stubbornness in using it.
“Why would I ask you to leave? This is your home as much as it is mine.”
“Your mother ran out on my father.”
My breathing hitched. “You know?”
“I do, though I do not know what happened between them. He would not tell me. It makes sense now, my father staging a coup and … and killing yours.” He lifted his hand, then dropped it.
His face twisted with uncertainty as his mouth opened and closed. He wavered in a place between knowing and accepting the wrongs of the past. A place I knew well.
Unable to comfort him and unwilling to watch his pain, my gaze turned toward his wall, the Wall of Death as I’d dubbed it the first time I walked in there. I pulled a crossbow from its pegs and examined the carved wood. The weight of the weapon grounded me.
“Could you teach me to use this?”
His reply took a moment. “I do not believe I am supposed to train you, milady.” Sarcasm laced his words.
I twisted at the waist and stared at him over my shoulder. “You can if I order you to.”
Who issued such an edict? There was no need to ask, I was certain I knew the answer. “Nick, you are not leaving Montibello, and if you don’t tell me why you would want to, I will ask around until I have the answers I seek.”
He stepped forward with a low chuckle and covered my fingers with his own on the stock of the cross bow. “If you are not careful, you will shoot yourself.”
His body closed the distance between us, his chest brushing the full length of my side, as he slanted the bow toward the ceiling. “Some of your Guardians have made their lack of trust in me clear. I also overheard rumblings while in Ridgecrest earlier. Many fear my association with Tabor and my father.”
Nickoli’s green eyes read my face as I peered up at him. They flitted from my hair, to my eyes, to my lips—studying me like they might never see me again. My fingers tightened their grip on the weapon as his chest pressed closer and I shut my eyes. Nickoli shifted, his body moving before me, until only the bow occupied the empty space between us.
Maybe it would be better for him if he left. Maybe it would be easier for all of us? “That’s ridiculous,” I muttered out loud and opened my eyes.
“Are you attempting to convince me or yourself, milady?”
His charming grin punched through my exterior and took hold of my heart. I ducked and released the crossbow into his care as I put some much-needed space between us. He was mesmerizing. Xander meant the world to me, he was my future—but Nickoli? My teeth snagged my bottom lip, biting back the thoughts.
“I trust you and want you here. I need your help with McClintock,” I said as diplomatically as possible, considering my erratic pulse.
Nickoli’s smile faltered. He wanted more. Without a word, he turned and secured the crossbow. His hands swept over his weapons as he rolled his head from side to side. “I was asked to maintain my distance,” he said without looking at me.
“Asked by who?” Again, why did I ask? Xander. Nickoli turned and his pursed lips confirmed my suspicion. Curse my Guardian for his overprotectiveness. “I’ll speak with him. I’ll speak with Cillian about the Guardians too. I need you here. Please stay?”
My request hung in the air between us. The only sound the beat of my heart as he tugged his sleeves into place and met my gaze.
“Of course.” He bowed.
Had he agreed to my request, or that of his Queen? Either way, I was happy to have it.
Leaving Nickoli, I walked to Mother’s temporary bedchamber located across the hall from mine. Over the course of the last two days I’d sat at her bedside during meals and listened as she shared stories of my father. We stuck to happier times—their first meeting, their wedding, the way the King of a country carried on when he learned he would be a father. They were poignant memories for her and new ones for me. While I enjoyed our time alone, today I hoped she was well enough to dine in the great hall with the rest of the castle’s occupants. I could not continue to hide away upstairs; I had things to attend to among the other occupants of the castle.
Her door was ajar and I stepped inside expecting to find her resting or sitting at the small table where she’d been every other time I’d visited. Instead, I found the servant Nickoli assigned to her room tidying things.
The young woman curtsied. “Your Majesty.”
“My mother?” I asked as I surveyed the empty room.
“She woke feeling much improved this morning, Your Majesty. Cedric escorted her to her former chambers. Your Guardian approved the visit.”
“Xander was here then?” The maid’s head bobbed.
He’d seen my mother but hadn’t spoken to me? I shoved down the gnawing fear of a rift growing between us and focused on finding Mother. Exiting her room, I moved toward the stairway leaving this wing of the castle. The royal chambers occupied their own wing of Montibello. Nickoli moved me into his personal wing when I first arrived to keep me far away from McClintock. We’d broached the topic of my moving into the Queen and King’s chambers once I was crowned, but Mother and Xander’s unexpected arrival had changed everything.
Barda and Thomas fell in step behind me the moment I passed their post. Their watchful eyes had tracked my movements from Nickoli’s room to Mother’s as they stood guard outside my own bedchamber door. At the sound of the boots at my heels, I slowed and checked over my shoulder.
“Am I to assume you are under orders to trail me now?” I asked, thoughts of Xander’s scolding last night running through my mind. He specifically told them to never allow me from their sight. I suppose he meant that literally.
“Yes, Your Majesty,” Barda answered and I bristled.
“Then who will watch my bedchamber?” I mocked.
What a childish question. There were guards everywhere. The moment the words left my mouth a guard to my left shifted and took up post outside my open door. Thomas’s dark brows lifted. Darn him and darn Xander and his orders. I returned my attention to my goals for the day.
It took the better part of an hour to make our way through the downstairs of Montibello. I stopped along the gallery, at the chapel, and in the smaller of our two halls, speaking with servants, soldiers, and refugees whom I’d come to know since Tabor left. The people of Tyalbrook were my family now. The children who’d lost their parents my wards. The women who cooked, cleaned, and worked tirelessly to provide clothing for those refugees who arrived daily were my friends.
“Milady, milady,” a child’s shout stopped me before I could take the staircase to the former royal wing.
“Ione.” I hugged the freckle-faced child who’d won my heart when he arrived weeks ago. “You look taller today. It must be those extra helpings of stew Cook feeds you.” I winked.
The tops of his ears turned red as he puffed out his chest. “Will I be big enough to fight in your army soon?” His eager eyes hunted for an answer in my expression.
“Fight in my army? Am I mistaken or did you not long to be a blacksmith and make armor merely a fortnight ago?”
“That was ‘fore I watched the men on the field.” His words were painted with awe at what he’d apparently witnessed. “And your Guardian, milady. I will be a Guardian one day too.”
Men on the field? I shot Thomas a questioning glance, but the man merely crossed his arms and looked away. Held to secrecy, no doubt.
“Ione, what were the men on the field doing?” I asked, knowing he would happily tell me whatever I wished to know.
“Having battles, Your Majesty,” he said proudly. I reined in my gasp.
“Mock battles, milady,” Barda corrected, touching my shoulder lightly. “They are training under the Guardian’s command.”
“Xander?”
“Yes, milady. It was at his and Cillian’s request.” Barda cocked his head toward Ione, his eyes widening with meaning as they rested on the child. That was all the information I would be privy to with the child within hearing range. I agreed. Battles and war conversations were not for the boy’s ears.
“Ione, I believe you could be a big, brave soldier if you wanted one day, but first you need to grow more. You could gain a great mass of muscle if you helped in the armory and with the blacksmith as you were assigned to do.” I adjusted the boy’s disheveled tunic and smiled. “Run along and see if you may assist them this afternoon.”
Ione puffed up once again before he bowed sweetly and hurried back to wherever he’d come from.
Barda lowered a hand and assisted me from my crouched position. “They have gathered the able-bodied refugees and soldiers outside the castle walls, milady,” he explained as we walked on.
I lifted my skirts and ascended the stairs. Cillian and Xander had formed, or were in the process of forming, an army without telling me? Arriving at my destination, I stopped and settled my narrowed gaze on Thomas.
“Milady?” Barda glanced between Thomas and I.
I silenced Barda with a lift of my hand while my eyes shot daggers at Thomas, making sure he absorbed every ounce of my anger. It took a full minute before Thomas dipped his head in silent acquiescence and took his leave. A small smile formed on my lips. Thomas would carry my anger straight to the Guardian who caused it.
Cedric, Mother’s assigned guard, stood before the partially opened door of what was once my parents’ sitting chamber. His right hand rested on the hilt of his sword and he inclined his head, bending deeply at the waist, before he stepped aside. I pushed the heavily embellished door wide and entered. This room, settled in-between the King and Queen’s bedchambers, was twice the size of a sleeping chamber. Nickoli had explained it was where the royal couple lounged with their family away from the rest of the castle when they needed a break. Someplace private. I’d ignored the room until now, just like I’d ignored my father’s bedchamber—because McClintock took possession of them when he took hold of Montibello. My legs turned to lead two steps into the room.
A pile of fabric and decorations cluttered the floor near the doorway. A decorative platter, a deer’s rack, pillows, and furniture were scattered about the room. In the middle of the chaos was Mother, her hands on her hips, her hair twisted and braided down her back. She wore a simple wool dress; unlike the full satin finery I wore as Queen.
My knuckles rapped three times on the carved door to draw her attention. “May I come in?”
Tired brown eyes met mine and she waved me in. “Please do.”
To my dismay, Barda entered the room behind me and searched thoroughly, the same way Xander searched my room last night. Surely Cedric had already combed the chamber, and with Mother here there were no threats, but I didn’t bother pointing out the obvious. Barda would likely ignore me, heeding Xander’s warning about my safety over my protests. Once he checked every possible hiding spot he left us with a bow, but not without leaving the door ajar.
“You must feel stronger today?” I asked. Her complexion wasn’t as pale, and though her eyes were tired, there was a gleam there I hadn’t seen before.
“Ridding this place of his fingerprints will go a long way to making me stronger,” she said defiantly, her eyes scanning the chamber as though she was looking for what next to destroy.
I hated to ask my questions and ruin her mood, but I needed answers to the past. “Will you tell me why you left McClintock? Why you came to Montibello?”
Her gaze held mine before she turned toward an armoire and yanked open the doors. “What makes you ask that now?” she asked with her back to me.
“As I told you before, I found the letter Father wrote you in the days after you came here, so I knew you were McClintock’s intended bride, but he never said anything himself. He never used that information to hurt me or mock you.”
“No, I suppose he did not. Had McClintock admitted to our past, people would have questioned the coup. With no one knowing about our broken betrothal he looked like a friend of the crown riding to the castle to save the King and Queen.”
She turned a golden goblet in her hand. “I thought he had moved on, that he did not care about my leaving him.” She tossed the goblet into the accumulating pile of junk. “We were blind.”
“Why did you run from him, Mother?”
Her hand went to her throat, pressing flat. “I dreamt of hearing you call me Mother for so many years.” Tears sparkled in her eyes.
I willed my own tears back and arched a brow. It wasn’t that I wasn’t sympathetic to her pain—she’d lost her husband and her only child and been banished to solitude—I’d wept for her often, but if I allowed the past to seep into my mind, the pain would take over my body. I needed strength to consider the future and not allow the past to drag me into a pit of despair. The past was done, only the future could be changed.
Mother swept her knuckle under her eyes and took a deep breath. “I was a young, sheltered girl. I grew up doted on by my father and an Elf Prince. I expected the same of the man I was to marry.”
“Of course you did.” I hurried forward as she braced herself on the furniture. Her tone was defensive. “I am not casting blame here. I want to understand what happened so we can put the pieces together.”
“There was a time when I was excited to marry McClintock. He was nice to us, me and my father. His parents invited us to dine with them often. He promised my father he would make improvements to our cottage and he told me of all the beautiful gifts he would give me.
“One evening after we dined with him, Father and I had set off for home when I realized I had left my wrap. I hurried back and came upon McClintock and a woman arguing in the shadows of his barn. The woman’s belly was swollen with child.”
I swallowed my shock. Nickoli.
“She swore the child was his and he refused her claim, but he did not deny bedding her. No, he merely refused responsibility for the child because he was set to marry me.”
Understanding dawned. “So you ran.”
“Not only was I hurt by his betrayal, but I also did not want to be the reason for a woman and her unborn child to turn into outcasts. I fled here, to see Xander’s parents. Delia and Wells were my best friends before they left our village to train for the King’s guard. I was sure they could help advise me on what to do.”
Pure love shone in her eyes at the mention of Xander’s parents.
“And when you arrived you found a young King who could not help but fall in love with you?” I finished for her, easily seeing how that could happen.
“My life was always meant to belong to Philip. The moment we met, I knew. The hurt over McClintock’s betrayal disappeared. I wanted only your father.”
“You did not love him? McClintock?”
She shook her head slowly. “At first I thought I did. I was a poor village girl and he was the son of a rich, influential man. He promised us things I never thought I’d have. That wasn’t love, Skye. It wasn’t until I met Philip that I understood that.”
A King. He could give her everything…
“I see your doubt. Your father promised me the world as McClintock had, but he promised more than that. He promised to love me. Said he would leave everything behind if that was what it took. McClintock wanted me as a prize. Philip needed me like the air we breathe.”
Tears dampened my cheeks. “Thank you.” I drew a long breath through my nose and released it. “Thank you for telling me what happened. Nickoli is concerned. He only knows you left McClintock and I think he believes his presence here might hurt you.”
Her lips trembled with a sad smile. “A child does not choose their parents. He is not to blame for their actions.”
“Perhaps, when you are up to it, you could speak with him?” She paled and I went on to explain. “I only ask because I need him here, Mother. I trust him, and as you said, none of this was his fault.”
I waited for her reply. She closed her eyes and tipped her head back before nodding. “If you allow me some time, I will go to him when I can.”
“Thank you.”
Regardless of what she said, this must be trying for her. Facing the child who changed her life, his fault or not. She pulled and tossed more items from the armoire and I turned, ready to leave her to her work.
“You are angry with Xander.”
My legs refused to budge as a knowing smile touched Mother’s lips. She knocked her head to the side, summoning me to follow as she walked toward a large table covered with more dishes and decorations.
“He only wants to protect you.” She pulled out a chair and took a seat. “No matter the cost.”
“No matter the cost?” I repeated curiously. Her eyes darkened as I sat.
“We all do what we must in these times.” Her fingers grasped at the scraps of fabrics strewn about the table. “The last time I was in this room was with you, Xander, and Delia.” She took on a faraway look. “You two fell asleep playing on the floor, and Delia and I were admiring you. Admiring your connection, even then.”
“Why did you not come with us?” I asked, unable to think of Xander right now. “Through the portal. Why did you and Father remain here?”
She shook her dark head.
“I understand why you took precautions. Why you made sure I had someone to run with me if needed, but when McClintock showed up by surprise why did you not come with us?” I pressed.
“Oh, my sweet Arabelle”—she cringed—“Forgive me, Skye.” She corrected her use of my birth name to the one I’d lived with most of my life. “I know it must be difficult to see, to understand, but we did what we thought was necessary.”
“No matter the cost?” I repeated her words.
They made more sense now. My parents did what they thought must be done, regardless of losing their daughter. It was no different than my running away without telling Xander. To save him—to save a war—I’d been willing to turn myself over to McClintock.
What was Xander willing to do to protect me?