A Beast's Tale

Chapter 50

"That wasn't fair, bringin' her with ya."

I closed Luke's door and leaned back against it, crossing my arms over my chest. "I wasn't interested in being fair."

He was lounging on his bed, his hands interlaced behind his head and his legs crossed at the ankles. The massive oak bed frame was in the middle of the room, set at an angle on a square, forest green rug, with an open suitcase next to the oak footboard. The only other furniture in the room was a chest of drawers next to the window, to which Clavis had returned the plush bear. Several jars of honey sat beside the tattered toy, and moonlight spilling through the open draperies lined the room's golds, greens, and browns with silver.

"Ya gonna have her question me, too? Figure I'll tell her everythin'?"

"No."

He turned his head from studying the ceiling to look at me. In the dim lighting, his leaf-green eyes were almost black. "Ya expect me to believe ya only brought her so ya wouldn't kill me?"

"Whether you believe it is your choice. It remains that you owe your life to her. Now, you must decide what to do with it."

He blew out a breath and returned his gaze to the ceiling. "Who did it?"

"Does it matter?"

A muscle pulsed in his jaw. "Ya know why I came here."

"To identify and kill the man who took your sister's life, and then to kill yourself. But the man who sent you here was counting on revenge providing you with no relief. He expected you to postpone your suicide and kill the rest of the royal family in search of fulfilment, thus weakening Rhodolite from within and allowing him to overtake it without a single battle. You were a puppet."

"I hate royals, an' I hate Rhodolite. He was helpin' me get what I wanted. If that helped him, so what? I don't care."

"He has already taken a special interest in the little dove."

That muscle pulsed again.

"I want to know about the year you spent in Obsidian, particularly the medical treatments you received. You may not care, but advancements in the medical field will improve the population's overall health and decrease mortality from injuries such as your sister faced. I also want to know everything you can tell me about Eyepatch. In exchange, I will allow you to stay here at the palace and assist in ensuring the little dove's safety when he arrives. After that, you may stay or leave, as you choose." I paused. "You care about her, don't you?"

He turned his head to shoot me a venomous glare. "Usin' her as leverage so ya can use me? What makes ya any different from him?"

"I'm hiding nothing from you. If you choose to decline my offer, I will find another way to keep her safe and get the information I want, and I will see you to the border personally. Once you leave Rhodolite, I don't care where you go, but I can ensure your death should you step foot here again." I pushed off from the door and turned to go. "You have one week to decide."

"One week? Ain't that kinda long?"

With my back still turned to him, I smiled. "If I kick you out now, I'll never hear the end of it."

I wiped the smile off my face before I stepped into the hall. The two guards who had replaced Lucien and Cyril stood silent at their posts, but we were not the only ones still awake. Nokto was coming down the hall, his silver hair and white coat seeming to glow in the dark, and in his arms was a sleeping woman clothed in blue taffeta.

He shifted Belle as he reached for his bedroom doorknob. "She had a little too much to drink."

"You could take her to her own room."