Chapter 169: A King’s Regret (2)

Russel did not speak for several steps. His gaze remained upon the Bell House, but Misha suspected he was seeing a different place altogether.

At last, he said, "Yes."

Misha folded her arms. "You had a lot of women."

One corner of his mouth curved faintly. "I am aware."

"You desired many of them, and cared about some too."

"I never claimed sainthood."

"No kidding."

A faint laugh escaped him. There was no offense in it, only the resigned amusement of a man who had long ago accepted that his own history provided too much evidence against him.

"But I loved my queen," Russel said.

He was silent long enough that Misha thought he might leave it there. Then he spoke the name she had never heard during the vision.

"Lavinia."

Misha looked at him.

It was strange how much a name changed things. She had watched the woman rule, argue, laugh, bleed, and die without anyone naming her. In the memories, she had been the queen, Your Majesty, Mother, and my wife–titles describing what she was to others rather than who she had been. Hearing Russel say her name felt intimate, almost intrusive.

"She deserved better than I gave her," he said.

Misha did not rush to contradict him. She had witnessed enough to know the statement was true, and empty comfort would only insult both of them.

Russel accepted her silence for what it was. "I was not the husband she deserved, nor was I the father my children needed. I chose the kingdom over my family more times than I care to admit."

Misha said nothing, since that was true enough.

His gaze remained forward. "Sometimes, necessity demanded it. Other times, I merely found necessity a convenient name for choices I wanted to justify."

Her eyebrows rose. That was more honesty than she expected from a king, especially one speaking about decisions made centuries after no one remained to hold him accountable.

Russel continued before she could answer. "There were nights I should have gone to her, yet chose another’s company. There were years when I assumed she understood what she meant to me simply because she remained at my side."

His fingers curled loosely against his palm. The gesture reminded Misha of the way he had once reached for Lavinia’s hand while councilors argued around them, trusting she would always be there to take it.

"She never demanded all of me."

Misha looked down at the road as she remembered the queen saying she only needed to know which part was hers.

"Maybe she should have," she murmured.

"Perhaps." Russel considered the thought. "But demands were never her way. She would tell me what she needed once, clearly and without tears. If I failed to listen, she simply learned how to live without it."

"That... sounds lonely."

"It was." His voice lowered. "I did not understand how lonely until it was too late."

They never married for love so things could have easily remained cold and transactional between them. Somehow, somewhere along the way, that had changed.

"My greatest regret is that I loved her too late."

Something tightened in Misha’s chest. "You were married for years."

"I loved her before I understood that I did." He shook his head faintly. "That is what I mean."

He drew a slow breath, though Misha did not know whether souls needed one.

"I respected her long before I understood her. I trusted her before I recognized how rare that trust was. I desired her, relied upon her, and built my reign around the certainty that she would remain beside me."

Russel’s gaze lowered. "By the time I understood how thoroughly my life had come to depend upon her presence, we had already spent half our years together."

Misha remembered Lavinia bleeding into white sheets. She remembered Russel on his knees beside the bed, all the authority of a king rendered useless before death. He had begged then, not as a monarch bargaining for an heir or as a ruler trying to preserve his dynasty, but as a man discovering that regret could not purchase one more day.

"At least she knew..."

"Yes..." His expression softened. "She knew."

"Did you tell her?"

"Not as often as I should have."

"Men always say that after the woman dies."

A short laugh escaped him, but grief remained beneath it. "You are merciless."

"I’m just being practical."

"Is that what you call it?"

"It’s probably what Dorian calls abandoning people, so apparently the word has a very generous definition."

Russel looked at her for a moment, then shook his head. "Lavinia knew because she understood me better than I understood myself. I wish I had spared her the labor of translating my failures into love."

That answer silenced Misha.

Russel took several more steps before continuing. "Toward the end, I did tell her. Not perfectly, and never enough... but plainly. She knew she was loved."

"And then you followed her."

His expression changed. The sadness remained, but a gentler emotion passed beneath it. "It was the greatest heartbreak of my life. For years, I believed I had survived wars, poisonings, rebellions, and grief because my kingdom still required me. Then Lavinia died, and I discovered how much of my strength had simply been the knowledge that I could return to her."

His voice did not break. It became quieter instead, the restraint somehow revealing more than tears would have.

"How could I remain unchanged after losing the woman I loved?"

His gaze moved toward the Bell House, where the funeral cart had once carried his body. "Duty kept me breathing for a time. But something in me had already gone with her... My body stayed, but the rest of me followed slowly."

Misha remembered the older king from the final memories. She had seen the weariness gathering around him, the way victory no longer stirred him and celebration passed through him without leaving a mark. He had simply become less anchored to life with every passing season.

"She wouldn’t have wanted that for you."

"I know..." Russel accepted the rebuke without defensiveness. "That knowledge was one of the reasons I endured as long as I did."

For several moments, neither of them spoke. The Bell House finally seemed nearer, its archway broadened ahead of them. Misha could now see the old carvings around the entrance and the dark stains left by countless failed processions.

Russel stopped. When he turned toward her, the weight of the king seemed to fall away. What remained was not the conqueror from the memories or the corpse carried through the Walls of Death. He looked simply like a man who had waited too long for something to change.

His expression softened, and he reached toward her.

Misha nearly stepped backward. She had just watched this man order armies into battle, so her instincts did not immediately accept the harmlessness of the gesture. Before she could decide whether to dodge, his palm settled lightly upon the top of her head.

"..." She stared at him.

He smiled softly.

"My child, you have given me something I believed I would never possess again... a future." His gaze moved toward the gray sky. "A chance to leave this Floor. A chance to carry my memories beyond the grave prepared for me. And perhaps, one day, a chance to stand against what destroyed my world."

Misha’s suspicion returned so quickly it almost gave her whiplash.

’Caleb you bastard...’

"I already have enough mysterious dead people living in my head."

He raised an eyebrow.

"Soul Inventory. They live in my Soul Inventory." Misha corrected herself, before heaving out a sigh. "Great... Another dead person for my collection."

Russel chuckled. "And you will not regret having one more."

"It’s not like I was given much of a choice. You clearly haven’t met my family." She sighed. "If I wake up and find my idiotic brother somehow arranged this behind my back, I’m killing him."

He looked mildly amused. "You speak affectionately of him."

"I just threatened to kill him."

"Affection takes many forms."

"Not in a healthy family."

"Ang yours is healthy?"

Misha opened her mouth, then closed it again. "That’s beside the point."

Russel removed his hand from her head, though for some reason, the faint warm of the gesture remained. "This brother of yours, does he possess the power to interfere with souls?"

"He has Administrator access and the self-restraint of a bored child left alone beside a large red button."

"I understand only half of those words."

"He is powerful, nosy, and convinced that consequences are problems for future Caleb."

"Then I understand him well enough."

Misha folded her arms. "Don’t encourage him if you meet him through his interference with my class."

"I shall attempt to resist."

Russel smiled rather than answering. It carried a trace of the reckless prince, the tired husband, and the king who had stood and saw the death of his world.

The Bell House loomed immediately ahead. Its entrance stood open, darkness filling the space beneath the bell. Russel looked toward it, and his smile faded into something quieter.

"I have crossed this threshold countless times," he said. "Never once did the road beyond it change. Now, I believe I shall awaken somewhere else."

"Inside my head."

"Your Soul Inventory."

"Yeah, yeah. Don’t get comfortable."

"I ruled a kingdom from a saddle for three years. I can endure modest accommodations."

"You’re going to fit in terribly well."

Russel’s expression brightened with restrained amusement. "Then perhaps your brother chose wisely."

"My brother has never chosen wisely in his life."

"Yet you are here."

Misha frowned. "I don’t like the direction of this argument."

"Then we need not finish it."

A pale light appeared beneath Russel’s feet. It spread in thin lines across the road, tracing the faded carvings toward the Bell House. His form began to lose its solidity, the edges of his coat dissolving into drifting motes.

The light climbed farther up his body. Russel looked once more toward the gray sky. His body dissolved into amber light. Before his face vanished, he inclined his head to her–not the formal bow of a king greeting a stranger, but the quieter gesture of one traveler acknowledging another.

"Thank you, Misha."