The King's Queen | ✔

Chapter 79

On this board, we would ensure that the correct history was taught and never erased.

***

After the frenzy calmed down, weariness took hold of me. It was a suffocating sense of restlessness that no amount of tossing and turning in bed could ease.

I hadn't had time to get a proper rest since January when Malekh first introduced me to Luca. It was June now, and the war was over. Still, every time I went to bed and woke up, I questioned my surroundings, unsure if I was in Crysauralia or the Spade Kingdom. Memories of Garrett, Twain, and Demetri visited my dreams regularly.

Now that I didn't have the war to occupy my mind, I had to come to terms with something I hadn't had much time to think about before now.

My near immortality.

Origens lived longer than the average human, but nowhere close to the lifespan of an Origin. It hurt to even imagine the possibility of outliving my friends, my family... Ashton. The thought made my stomach churn with nausea.

Ashton often wondered what was on my mind, but I couldn't bring myself to tell him about my greatest fear, which was losing him. But I didn't need to. Our hearts and minds were one. He knew, but despite being the emperor of the most prosperous empire in the world, he was powerless to fight against the one thing capable of tearing us apart-time.

I was trying to distract myself from such thoughts by reading, when an unexpected visitor arrived at the main palace. Ashton and Luca had been in a meeting together, but they swiftly ended it when they heard the news, their expressions changing instantly.

Malekh was here.

The political climate between our kingdoms was still tense. Malekh offered no apologies for the havoc he'd caused and Ashton had no intentions of including him in the peace treaty. Normally, Malekh wouldn't have gotten across our borders to be in the palace uninvited, but such were his powers. He simply appeared out of thin air.

Immediately, the guards formed a tight ring around him, their weapons and expressions sending an immediate message. Some were Origins, others were Origens, but Malekh leveled his cool gaze at me and smiled his velvet smile.

"Elizabeth Angeles, how I missed you."

"Why are you here?" My voice was colder than I'd meant for it to sound, but this was Malekh I was dealing with.

"I'm here because everything went perfectly."

The entire room heated up with Luca's presence. "Did you come here to take your final breath, Malekh Luciano?"

Malekh glanced at the carpeted floors with a guarded smile. "I have already fulfilled my goal-peace between the Origins and Origens."

"You started a war." Ashton narrowed his eyes at him. "That doesn't exactly scream peace to anyone."

"There was bound to be a war eventually," Malekh objected. "I might have hastened the process, but that doesn't change the fact that it would have happened. Origins and Origens have been at each other's throats since the far ages. Wouldn't you agree, Luca? You would have burned Crysauralia to the ground, but that's not what I wanted.

"I needed the Origins to take a stand for themselves, but if I pitted them against the Origens, they would have continued the cycle of hatred. They needed a common enemy. I was the enemy of Crysauralia and the Origins. You all came together to defeat me. Origins depended on Origens, and Origens depended on Origins."

"You expect us to believe that?" Luca growled. "Then explain to me why Eleanor changed you, of all people?"

"Eleanor was badly injured by Nightshade. She was dying, and I granted her asylum in the Spade Kingdom. She knew she would eventually be captured by the Origen Association and have her memories erased by Lady Freya, so instead, she charged me with her dreams of finding peace and risked her life to change me into an Origin. It worked, but my unique ability immediately manifested, and I accidentally stole her ability. You know that an Origin can't survive after losing their unique ability."