Page 15 of Queen of the Wicked
“I made the worst mistake of my life and went to the Priestesses, and begged them to make me something else.Anythingelse.They made me a demon of lust, and I let them use my body as payment. Immediately after they changed me, I felt the bond between Kaius and I begin to fade, and I knew I had to explain…but Kaius didn’t want to hear it. He saw it as a betrayal, and he was right. He wouldn’t even look at me. I went back to the Priestesses, distraught. They didn’t care. They collected on my payment for a hundred years before they let me free. By then, my mating bond with Kaius had faded to this dull black line on my arm, and I knew I couldn’t go back to him.”
“So you sent Cassius,” I interject. “To watch over him.” Rowan nods. “So why did you come back now? Because of me?”
He looks at me then, his grey eyes meeting mine with all the vulnerability in his body emanating through his gaze. “Because I was so jealous of how quickly he gave himself to you. How quickly he gave you his devotion. Some part of me thought he might have still loved me, deep down. But I saw the way he looked at you, and when I finally pieced together who you were and how you fit into his life…I was angry. I knew he’d never go through with killing you. Vampirism tore us apart, but he would have lived with it for you. I’ve never hated anyone more than I hated you. That’s why I didn’t interfere when the Priestesses came for you. I wanted you to die, because I knew it was my only chance to have him feel anything for me again.” I can feel the sadness rolling off of him in slow, steady waves. No lust, no manipulation. “I came here to tear you two apart.”
“You came here to seduce me,” I clarify. He simply nods in shame. “But you haven’t.”
He smiles then, a real smile this time. “I couldn’t do that to him. Even now, I still love him, and I’m glad he found love in you. It’s the only way you will survive what lurks in the shadows.”
He doesn’t elaborate, but he doesn’t have to. We sit together for a long time, sharing the night sky, and maybe even wishing on the same stars.
Twelve
Adelasia
The night suddenly feels heavier than it did before I spoke with Rowan. It’s the kind of weight that painfully presses into my skin, making it hard to breathe.
I quietly approach the bedchamber I share with Kaius, and moonlight spills through the tall terrace doorway of the balcony that is enchanted to shut the doors when the sun rises. The moon casts silver ribbons across the floor, breaking up the shadows.
Kaius lies on his stomach, head facing away from me when I enter. His shoulders are drawn tight, and his body is still like marble.
My mind races and my body is still restless from my conversation with Rowan in the courtyard. He did not use his lust magic on me, but his entire existence was made to lure others in, and my skin still blossoms with goosebumps if I think about him a fraction too long.
Now that I’ve heard the truth from his side, I want to learn the other half from Kaius. I want to understand what he’s tried so hard to keep from me. Is he worried that I will judge him? Is he worried I won’t understand? Will asking simply open an old wound that will make him shut me out even more?
I approach the bed and trace the hard planes of his back with my blackened fingertips, forcing him to accept my tender touch when his body is tight with tension. Where my fingers touch him, I feel the rot inside me stir, thrumming against his skin like it’s searching for weakness.
I place my hands back in my lap. I want to touch him. I want to smooth my hand over him like I did when I was human until we’re whole again, and until this distance is simply an illusion instead of a crack in the bond between us.
But I can’t, because I’m afraid I’ll hurt him.
Finally, I whisper. “Kaius–”
His shoulders tense. “Not tonight,” he murmurs.
“Please?” I ask, my voice barely a whisper. I try to keep it steady, careful not to let the rot take over and make my request a demand. “You and Rowan are an ancient tome in a language I don’t know how to read. Help me understand.”
For a moment, he’s still, and I think he’ll stay silent. But then, slowly, he exhales and flips over onto his back. He doesn’t look at me, keeping his eyes firmly locked on the ceiling above.
“He told me about your bond,” I admit.
“I know. I heard you talking.”
I hesitate, but let my hand rest on his where it lays on his stomach. “There are two sides to every story. Let me hear yours.”
His eyes find mine in the dim light, and for once, he looks unguarded–bare. An immortal man who has spent too many years trying to bury his ghosts.
“He was my best friend. The only thing that made this curse tolerable. He stayed where others didn’t. He tried to understand me while others ran. When he asked me to change him…I thought he was doing it for me, to help me live this undead life. He was my shadow. My friend. Eventually, my lover, in a physical sense. When fate tethered us with a bond, I was confused. I didn’t reject it, but I didn’t necessarily accept it either because a part of me…” he takes a deep breath, “a part of me still longed for what I had with Yekaterina, even after what she did to me. I longed to love that deeply again, but I had already vowed not to. Rowan embraced our bond, but I never reciprocated in an equal way.”
I swallow, feeling a strange tightening in my chest, but I say nothing and let him speak.
“I think that’s why he went to the Priestesses, at least part of the reason. He thought he wasn’t enough, and so he thought he could change himself into something more loveable, knowing how much I despised being a vampire.”
His hand curls violently into the sheets under him, fingers trembling. And for the first time, I truly see the wound Rowan left on Kaius’ heart when he went to the Priestesses.
“The Priestesses gave him something that he very well knew they would never give me. Still a demon, but one that others could see past, one that could love and be loved, and it only deepened the valley of loneliness I was in.”
“You saw it as a betrayal,” I say.
