Veils of Storm

39. Coup D'etat

Cage had expected Ferrahs to let him fester in the dungeon for at least several hours. But he'd also thought the king would have him called to be humiliated and maybe sentenced to death.

He hadn't expected to be left to his own devices for what felt like forever. 

Without any natural light breaking through the bleak and humid air in the dungeon, it was hard to gauge the passing of time. His swirling thoughts added to the distortion effect, and he found himself constantly losing awareness of his surroundings.

His thoughts were circular, following a pattern he had come to know as well as his own heartbeat.

Kat and how he couldn't understand how everything had crumbled so quickly.

The magic flowing through him and through her and what it had done to them both.

How much he missed her and longed for her.

How much he loved her even if she was the heir of Endir.

Jazz, Jinx, and Trix, and whether they were alright.

What had Jazz seen? What could have been worse than what had happened? Why had he chosen to push Kat so hard that she ended up destroying the ship and almost killing them all?

Lucille... Lucille was still around, disguised as Leila. Why did she push him and Kat together like that? What was she after?

The frozen fields and the piles of burning corpses. Kat, and ice queen on her throne.

The images of the impending war came to him more often, tormenting him whenever he drifted to sleep. Every time, there seemed to be more details. Patterns of frost, the swirling colors of flames. The more real it became, the more he dreaded that he would soon see other things as well. Faces he remembered, people he loved.

Would Kat really raise Iride to the ground? Had the magic changed her enough to forget him and wage war on her own kingdom? Her father was there.

You can't escape your fate.

He'd heard that so often lately. But what was his fate? As it played out so far, he was going to die, executed by order of the man who had taken everything from him.

How had it all boiled down to Fherras when Cage had always tried to belittle his importance in his twisted, shitty life?

The maddening thought began to take over, only strengthening his vision of destruction and doom. Every time they came to his mind, the images were in sharper focus as if the more he thought about it, the more real this particular bit of future became.

He could feel the frost biting his skin, smell the burning meat, and the decay. After a time, it became all he could think about, everything else nothing more than a passing shadow.

Could he do anything to change this? Was it his fault? Had he made a terrible mistake when he'd revealed who he was? He'd only done it to save Jinx, Trix, and Alathea. Not for selfish reasons. It had been very long since he'd done anything for selfish reasons. His life had always been about control, ever since he was a child.

Don't show who you really are. Keep up the lie. Keep in your feelings. It was why he'd chosen to be at sea for most of his life. It was another world in which he could forget everything. Then, the curse hit, and it had been about a whole different kind of control. Don't snap. Don't murder anyone. And now...

His past and the probable future mixed into a jagged knot inside his chest, pushing him, tearing him apart.

Kat... He loved her with everything he was, but could he put his feelings for her above the loyalty to his kingdom?