The Touch of Salvation

01: For you, Not Him

ADALIND
THREE YEARS AGO

The glass in my hand seems absent as I peer into the dark contents. The pub feels asleep; there are only a few sipping their drinks in the corner. The bar wench was well aware that I came here simply to think. To get away.

I wonder, briefly, if any of my people know I am here yet. I can't imagine they do or else they would be here already, asking me what I was doing and why I escaped from the palace so early in the day.

I can't tell them that I am breaking. I am drowning in hopelessness.

But I can't afford to yield - to give up - not yet. Not when I have a kingdom to rule. My name is Adalyndra, I am the Regent of the House of Dae, I am five-hundred-and-forty-five years old, and thirteen hours ago my true mate rejected me.

My kingdom is light, I am supposed to be light, and yet...I couldn't help but feel as though darkness consumed me.

For 500 years I was brutalized. I became a monster to protect those I love.

A bell rings from the doorway, and as I drag my eyes to my friend, I try to plaster a smile on my face.

Lucian sits beside me, waving for a glass of his usual. He stays silent for a second as if taking in my appearance.

"For someone who is home after centuries of detainment, you look as though you want nothing more than to run away."

I take a beat, gulp a sip of the mixed drink in my hands, and bite my lip. Dragging my eyes to my white-haired friend, I attempt to blink back the burning in my eyes. I think of how to begin, how to explain that the last three days were the worst of my life. "Before the curse was lifted, the King of Lycanthrope had come into Arden."

I didn't need to explain more. Lucian was well aware that Arden fell under a curse made by Ophir. He knew that the fae turned into stone, except for a few that Ophir desired beside him. I was one of many who were lucky enough to remain sentient. Lucian, my people, all the Houses of Arden, they were stone, unalive, unfeeling, insentient...

Lucian also knew that the only reason the curse was lifted was that I broke the amulet that captured all the power of the Regents of Arden, but I was only able to do that because the lycanthrope successfully pushed back Ophir's army off from their lands.

He doesn't know what happened before the war. He could never know, not all of it.

"He brought a small troop. Among those he brought were a Prima, Primus Xerxes, a gamma, and two segunda." Lucian remains quiet, forcing me to whisper: "One of them, I realized, was my mate."

I try to ignore the sharp intake from my friend. I know he is pleading for me to continue, the question lingering on his tongue. If I had found my mate, why wasn't he here with me?

I swallow the lump in my throat. "I-" The sentence gets stuck in my throat. I shake my head as if shaking away the attempt. I acquiesce for the only sentence I can manage to say without breaking down. "He rejected me."

Moments pass and I am starting to think that maybe I had never said it out loud, but then Lucian straightens, and takes me into his arms. I cry, gently into him.

When I calm down enough, he asks: "What is his name?"

"Goliath," I whisper, my voice hoarse. My heart skips a beat from the mere mention of his name. "He's the Royal Segundas of the Kingdom of Wolves."

I need not say more; a segundas was the second-in-command, only behind the King and Queen, Demise and Grace. Bitterness climbs up my throat. He shouldn't be second to anyone. He was meant to be a Regent - a King.