Chapter 153: Hate 1

EDELINA

Johann’s face had nearly finished healing. The swelling had receded enough that I could finally see the shape of my own son beneath the last of the fading bruises, his features settling back into something I recognized, something that no longer made me flinch every time I looked at him.

I was going to get that bitch that did this to him, and I was going to get her good

Then something tore loose inside my chest.

I gasped and clutched at my sternum. The sensation came without warning, so sudden and complete that for one terrible moment I could do nothing but stand there and breathe through it. There was no wound, no cramp, no physical injury I could name. Yet something was missing. I could feel its absence with a certainty that frightened me more than pain would have.

Johann’s body jerked at the exact same instant.

His hand flew to his own chest, his fingers pressing against the place where mine rested. His eyes found mine, wide with confusion.

"What the hell was that, Mother?"

"I’m not sure."

The words came too quickly. I knew that before they had even left my mouth.

I had felt that sensation before.

Not exactly. Never with this suddenness, never with that terrible finality, but I knew what it meant. I suspected. Somewhere beneath thought and reason, something in my blood had already recognized the severing. It was the soul kiss. It was the soul kiss breaking. My stomach tightened as the realization took shape, and the warmth seemed to drain from my hands.

Lycaon.

I did not know what had happened. I did not know why it had been severed, or why I could feel it so thoroughly through my own body, but I knew that name belonged to it.

Something had changed between us.

And whatever had just been taken away, my blood had known before I did.

Was Lycaon... dead?

A heavy banging on the door interrupted whatever answer I might have found. Three hard knocks rattled the frame in its hinges, sharp enough to make Johann glance toward the sound.

"Stay in bed," I told him, already crossing the room.

My skirts brushed against the furniture that had gradually accumulated around his convalescence over the past hour, a chair pulled close to the bed, a table crowded with medicines and half-finished cups of water, a blanket someone had left within reach. I had barely noticed any of it until now. My attention had narrowed to the door.

Johann obeyed, though I saw the tension settle back into his body. He remained upright against the pillows, shoulders drawn tight, every muscle prepared for whatever might come through that door. He had been too close to danger for too long to treat an unexpected visitor as anything harmless.

The banging came again.

"Queen Edelina. Queen Edelina."

I opened the door.

A retainer stood on the other side, young enough that he could not have been much older than Johann. His uniform was slightly askew at the collar, and his chest rose and fell with the uneven rhythm of someone who had run most of the way there. His eyes were too bright, his face strained with an urgency that had nothing to do with the simple act of delivering a message.

He looked at me as though he already knew I was going to hate what he had come to say.

"What is it?" I asked.

I kept my voice level, but unease had already begun gathering beneath my composure.

"There’s something you should know, Your Majesty." His voice caught faintly on the title.

"What?"

"There was an attack in the infirmary." He swallowed. "A witch was responsible. There were several killings."

My stomach tightened.

"It was Willow," he continued. "The witch who had been invited to assist the royal family. She was discovered and killed before she could do further damage."

For one brief, treacherous moment, relief loosened something inside me.

Willow was dead.

And if Lycaon had been responsible for what happened in that infirmary, then perhaps he had also been the one to clean up the mess before anyone could trace it back to us. The thought brought such sudden satisfaction that the corner of my mouth nearly lifted.

I stopped it before it could become a smile.

Instead, I lowered my gaze and arranged my face into the appropriate expression of concern.

But the relief did not settle properly.

That question still lingered, and I could not push it away.

Had Lycaon done this deliberately?

Or had he simply lost control?

I had felt something tear away from me only moments ago. Johann had felt it too. Whatever had happened between Lycaon and us had not been subtle, and I could not convince myself the timing was meaningless.

Perhaps this was his way of containing the damage.

Perhaps it was evidence that he was no longer capable of containing anything.

I still did not know what was happening.

Yet if this retainer had come here to tell me about the attack, then the immediate danger had surely passed. Surely it meant we were safe.

I looked at him again.

Something about that assumption bothered me.

"By whom?" I asked, though some part of me already suspected the answer.

"The healer," he said.

His voice dropped.

"Bonnie."

I studied him more carefully.

The panic in his voice did not belong with the words he was giving me. If Bonnie had killed the witch, then that should have been the end of the matter. An explanation. A conclusion. Instead, he stood in my doorway looking as though he had brought me the beginning of something far worse.

Then I noticed something else.

I did not know him.

Not really.

I knew the faces of the people who moved through the palace often enough to become familiar, knew the High sentinels who guarded the royal family and the retainers who answered to them. This young man belonged to the latter, but I could not place him. I could not remember seeing him at my side, carrying messages for me, standing guard outside my rooms, or attending any of the royal functions where the household gathered.

That should not have mattered.

But it did.

My gaze dropped briefly to his uniform before returning to his face.

Sentinels who were pressed into retainer duties answered directly to Bradley. Their loyalty was drilled into them until questioning an order became almost unthinkable. They didn’t decide on their own who needed to hear sensitive information, especially information about an attack inside the infirmary.

So why was he here?

Was this a fucking trap?

Why had Bradley sent him?

Why had he come directly to my door?

"What is it?" I asked again, quieter this time.

His brow furrowed.

"What do you mean, Your Majesty?"

"I mean the part you’re not telling me."

He went still.

I watched his hands. One was clenched at his side. The other kept flexing against the seam of his trousers, opening and closing with nervous, unconscious movements.

My suspicion hardened.

"Aren’t you all supposed to be Bradley’s loyal little lapdogs?" I asked.

The color drained from his face.

I did not look away.

"Then why are you standing here telling me this?"

Something shifted in his expression. The mask he had walked in wearing, whatever careful performance had kept his fear contained until now, cracked clean through.

"It’s quite simple, really."

His jaw tightened until the muscle stood out beneath his skin.

"I hate you. All of you."