Page 89 of Storms of Allegiance

My brows contracted. “Hayes says—”

“Hayes wants to believe the best of things. He has a positive nature.” Nik’s harsh tone derided such positivity. “He was always busy at the Guild. He knows nothing of my childhood.”

“Tell me,” I said, my voice soft. “I want to know about it.”

Nik looked at me, unseeing for a moment before my expression registered and his arm tightened around me.

“Are you sure you want to know? It isn’t a neat, pretty story.”

“Of course I do!” I gave him a stern look. “It’s a part of you, and I don’t only want to know the pretty parts of you.”

For a moment, he just looked at me, something reflected in his face that made my insides tremble. But then he tamped it down, hiding the depths of his feelings away as he usually did.

“From my earliest memories, I always knew it mattered that Gia was a few minutes older,” he said, and it took me a moment to remember that Gia was his nickname for Princess Morgiana.

“But as small children we were always together, and everyone treated us the same. Sometimes I even forgot we were two separate people and thought of us as a single unit, two who would always be together.”

I smiled, but before I could do more than picture the two of them as toddlers, he continued. “But then the rumors started.”

“Rumors?”

“All the healers at the palace know not to privately test royal children until their official seed testing when they turn five. But people started to notice we were drawn to play in the gardens, and that after we’d been there, the flowers bloomed bigger and the grass grew lusher. Whispers began to flow around the palace about a plants seed.”

“What’s wrong with a plants seed?” I asked, indignant.

“Nothing, if you’re a regular person.” His eyes burned into the closest plank. “All three of the main affinities serve different functions, and all are essential to the well-being of the kingdom. Officially, none of the affinities rank above the others.”

“But unofficially?”

He gave a sour laugh. “Elements is the affinity of warriors and kings. Elements controls tempests and tidal waves and brings down lightning bolts. Elements is the affinity of Tartora’s royal family.”

I was silent, remembering some of his conversations with Amara. This was why he had accused her of believing her affinity superior, although I’d never seen her show any evidence of such thinking.

“So Father brought our testing forward,” Nik continued. “He told Mother it was to quiet the rumors and put the issue behind us. But even as I child, I sensed the truth. He was afraid.”

“Afraid?”

“Afraid it was true.” He swallowed. “I may have been young, but the memory of our testing is still crystal clear. I can recall my father’s exact expression—the relief on his face when he discovered it was me, not Gia, who had the undesirable seed. That was the moment I knew.”

“Knew what?” I asked, my heart sinking as tears welled in my eyes for Nik’s childhood self.

“That Gia and I weren’t the same at all. That we had never been one, and we never would be. We were always separate, never equal. I knew in that moment that I was the disappointment. But the worst thing of all?” His voice grew jagged, his volume dropping even lower. “Worst of all was that my being a disappointment didn’t even matter.”

“Oh Nik!” I threw my arms around him, squeezing his shoulders as tears slipped down my face. “I’m sure that’s not true. I’m sure your parents love you too.”

Nik leaned into my touch, as if he couldn’t help himself, but he continued talking as if I hadn’t spoken. “And the irony of it all? The irony is that Gia didn’t even want the crown. When we got old enough for that to become clear, it was like constant salt being rubbed in my wound. Gia was the one who mattered, the one with a future, the one with the right seed—and she didn’t even want any of it.”

I put my head on his shoulder, unable to think of anything to say, and he rested his chin on top of my hair, breathing out deeply.

“My parents always thought she would come around to her duty—that it was just a phase, and she would get over it. But Gia was the one who got what she wanted in the end.” His angry laugh sounded again, low in the confined space.

“For one brief moment, when they were forced to accept the truth, I thought they finally cared about what a disappointment I was. I thought maybe they would at last realize that if only they’d ever believed in me, I could have become what Gia never wanted to be. But it turns out there was always a better option than me.”

“Evermund.” The name fell heavily between us. “So your cousin will get the throne after your father’s death. Do you…do you hate him for it?”

Nik ran a hand over his face, his smile bitter. “Sometimes I think it would be easier if I could. Just like I used to wish I could hate Gia. But Gia was always impossible to hate. And Evermund is…Evermund. He’s everything Gia is not—focused, disciplined, controlled—and always dutiful. My older cousin has only ever wavered in his duty to the kingdom for one reason. And look how that turned out!”

“One reason?” He clearly expected me to know what he was talking about, but I had no idea.

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