The Touch of Salvation

19: Burning the World

ADALIND

Lux left hours ago. Her last words will forever be in my head.

Lux placed the ring on her finger which matched the sigil of the Royal Guard on her new attire. She looked like a member of the Wolf Kingdom, her eyes carefully masked by glamor.

"Why are you doing this for him?"

Demise's question lingered in the room as she finished straightening her back. "Because he's family." The way she had said it sounded was both resigned and confident - as if it had always been a fact.

And it was. Goliath was family because I was their family. He was my mate, their Regent, their King. They would always protect him regardless of if he ever accepted his new role.

Everyone has left me now. I am in my congressional hall, my eyes leering out the large window. My eyes fall to the round nursery outside. Vines and flowers climb the glass, allowing me to see just through the foliage. Even from here I can see the deer waltz around the grass, playing with one another. The sun is setting, but it will rest at its highest peak soon. I know Lucian has entered even though he says nothing at all.

"I just sent my Gamerider to find a mate that doesn't want me."

My sentence hangs in the room. I know he has sat and he's looking at me. "It's her job, Adalind."

"No, it's not. Her duty is to this House."

"Her duty is to her King."

"A King who doesn't want her. A King that doesn't recognize us as his."

Lucian settles at the table. I feel his eyes on me. "You never talk about what happened while you were with Ophir."

He whispers that name but it still feels like he screamed it. I wince from the utterance, trying to keep my eyes outside. I couldn't look at him.

"You know why."

"I can infer," he says. "And when you are at your lowest you give us crumbs of what transpired. You need someone to talk to. Tell me something, anything."

I turn and swallow. I'm glad it's not Daario who is asking this of me because he has never been able to control his temper. He would go and find Ophir, killing him regardless of the aftermath. Maybe he was right, maybe I needed to tell at least fragments of what had happened.

Truth be told, it was eating me alive, consuming me, making it hard to live. Making it hard to want to live.

"The collar that Nyx had brought to that meeting had been mine." He doesn't respond and I know it because he already knew that. He guessed by my reaction. "He'd keep a chain attached to it that was long enough that he could," my breath hitches. I feel my palms flex. "So he could pull me to him whenever he wanted."

The memory of being in my cell and then feeling that tug of metal around my neck freezes me. It would force me to my knees and he would continue to pull, dragging me to him if I didn't move fast enough. Somedays I had been so malnourished that I had let him. I'd let him drag me. It was so degrading.

So weak.

Pathetic.

"One night," I start barely above a whisper. "I heard this...this whisper. In my head. It was like a mantra. It wouldn't stop. It was incessant."

"What was it saying?"

"Goliath. Goliath. Goliath. I didn't know what it meant until I saw him come to the gates of the palace."

"He came alone?"

Nodding, I take a seat next to Lucian at the table. "I still don't know why, but he was there and the guards swarmed him. He looked different the...he reminded me of Xerxe's carefree attitude. His skin was more olive, he looked more robust...and there was this glint in those fucking silver eyes that screamed..." I sigh, unable to finish.