Shadow Cursed by May Sage Page 0,39
of the way. They promised you that you could be high king if you helped take down the current government.”
Alven closes his eyes. “Do you think me a fool?”
Alven is a dominant, domineering, proud gentry with a considerable amount of power, and she’d all but filed his claws.
“Certainly not. I think you were desperate.” I down the rest of my drink. “And truth be told, if they’d come to me with a way to kill Morgana, I would have signed on the dotted line without looking too much into their motivations, either. I didn’t even have to share her bed.” I grimace, imagining what sort of a wife the old queen would have been. I sincerely doubt Alven has been given many chances to lead the dance, so to speak.
My grandfather pushes a brow up.
“I don’t judge you for turning your back on Morgana, Alven.” I cannot call him anything but that, not now, with everything that has passed. He isn’t king consort. He isn’t quite family. He’s just a potential enemy. Or an asset.
“I simply need to know whether you’ll turn your back on this crown. On my mother.” On me.
I don’t say it, but the meaning is clear.
Mother wears the crown, but I am the one who protects it from the shadows.
Alven pours us more wine. “I don’t have any reason to. I am free. And Ciera is my daughter. You’re wrong to think I’d destroy my family. Nothing went right, that day."
I snort. I imagine not, otherwise he wouldn’t be stuck here with the rest of us.
"I never meant for Tenebris to fall. They promised to get Morgana out of the way, that's true. She refused to negotiate any trade with the west for centuries. Vikus grew tired of asking.”
Tenebris and Denarhelm both adjoin Alfheimr, though some merchants are allowed to land ships on our coasts. For generations, Alfheimr has sought our business, and for generations we’ve refused. Opening trade routes means building roads and accepting strangers into our lands, softening our borders.
“It isn't uncommon to seek your neighbor's aid to remove a monarch. I never asked for the crown. I never wished for it. I meant for it to pass to whoever among my children was deemed most worthy of it by the house of lords." He's spoken plainly enough for me to believe him, and at the mention of his children, his sorrow is plain.
"Father. How could you think they wouldn't take advantage of the situation? Sharing details of our defenses…"
"I didn't say a word about our defenses." His shoulders sagged. "Turned out, I didn't need to. For years, for decades, I don't know, they've been scouting around Tenebris. The first I heard of it was when our friend Drusk here came back wounded, warning us of a human attack. We've had a unit or two missing in the past years—five lower fae. No one pays any mind to that. The seelie archers are quick to shoot, and soldiers defect every day. They've had their eyes on us for longer than we knew. All I offered was a way into the Shadow Peak keep."
That explains why only the usurper, Kraven Vikus, and his son made it inside, while their foot soldiers remained in the city.
I nod. Alven wasn't nearly as stupid as I feared.
"You have to believe me. I never wished to kill my family."
No. Just his wife. The wife who forced herself on him, using her title to order him into a loveless match he resented.
"I don't care about any of that. No offense. I never knew any of my aunts, uncles, or cousins. If they didn't care to know me, I'm not going to start mourning them. As for Morgana, well. I get why you wanted the bitch dead." I'm perhaps a little harsher than necessary, but at least I'm honest. "What matters to me is that you betrayed the high queen of Tenebris once for personal reasons. I understand why. It's still not exactly reassuring for my mother."
Ciera stands a little straighter, her eyes fixed on her father. "Yes. As you chose to align with Alfheimr, against your vows to protect our kingdom, I don't see any other choice. You must go."
I could groan. My mother is as straightforward and impulsive as ever. This revelation either hurt or frightened her, and her answer to that is to kick him out of Whitecroft. I understand it. I do. But ridding us of one of the best fighters we have at the dawn of