38 Liar

Background color
Font
Font size
Line height

Iris~~

The six of us emerge from the fireplace to find Erik sprawled on the couch, a bottle of wine in hand. We've spent the past eight hours strategizing and creating a plan for if the Amoris do come in either the scenario that Jonas and I are here or gone. This is the first time any of us have seen Erik since he slammed the door in my face this morning. His presence during our meeting, as Jonas noted, would have been extremely valuable. He's the strategist. He spent his childhood attending meetings with his father to determine how best to defend the Society from rebel attacks. His own attacks on the Estate were as brilliant as they were merciless.

Erik's neck and legs are propped up on pillows. On the blue rug beside the couch, two wine bottles are overturned, and there's a damp ring around the mouth of one bottle. Andrew presses his lips into a line, but the wine appears to be white at least and not red.

Erik raises his bottle to his lips, but he isn't sitting up enough, and more wine ends up on his face and the couch than in his mouth.

Colton crosses his arms while Vienna cringes,

Erik wipes the back of his hand across his mouth and pushes himself up. "Done with the funeral arrangements? Is the schedule open to debate or is it too late for me to say I'd like to give a eulogy?"

Basile works his jaw. "You had to be on the funeral committee to get a say."

Erik swings his legs off the couch and plants his feet on the floor. "I've had lots of time to think while you were in committee."

"So have we," Jonas drawls.

Erik angles himself toward Jonas, elbows on his thighs, his expression expectant as if he's waiting for someone to ask what he could possibly have been thinking about.

Jonas sighs. "And what conclusion did this thinking lead to?"

"You lie."

Jonas stiffens.

Erik's expression is taunting. He wants Jonas to contradict him. When Jonas doesn't, however, Erik breaks into laughter, falling back against the couch.

His laughter subsides, and he raises his bottle to his lips. Once finished, he thrusts his hand that holds the bottle toward Jonas. "You're taking her home."

Jonas's shoulders relax, and he unlocks his jaw. I feel the skin between my eyes drawing together. Jonas is hiding something.

"As much as I would love to return home, Iris and I are meeting with Alix tomorrow.

Erik shakes his head. "But you lie so much; how can I believe you."

Jonas clenches his hand. "Why don't you sober up and then we can have a conversation?"

Colton holds out his palm toward Jonas. "No. I'd like to see Erik make a fool of himself. When has Jonas ever lied?" he asks his cousin.

For over a year now, Jonas has had to hide he's Expired. Erik may suspect it, but he can't prove it. With Jonas's Mark mutilated, Erik would need an Amoris to reveal Jonas's Expiration Date.

"There was the whole Iris isn't actually Expired thing."

I roll my eyes even as I hope that's all this is about. "He wasn't the only one who lied about it."

Erik tilts to the side, falling against the armrest, squishing the pillows he had been resting his neck on. "I didn't change information in a database though. Jonas, do you remember when you told Iris you shot her, so I'd be your Tresais?"

The room turns over itself, and I blink. "What?"

I feel Jonas's hand on my arm. "Iris . . ."

"Is it true?"

He looks between me and Erik. He swallows. "Yes."

"I shot you." Erik takes a sip. "But I didn't mean to."

I shake my head. "What?"

"Iris, please." Jonas grasps my arms in his hands. "I still needed him as my Tresais."

I step out of his hold and around him to stand before Erik. "Why would you take his offer?"

Erik props his legs back up on the pillows. His arm holding the wine bottle hangs limply off the couch. "What other reason would I have gone back to the Society as Tresais? You." He gestures to me with the bottle. "I'd never have any sort of chance to win you back if you knew it was I who pulled the trigger, that it was an accident. But with Jonas, you'd just believe it was an accident." Shrugging, he stares up at the ceiling. "It's no matter though. You still chose him."

I dig my fingers into my forehead, putting pressure on the headache cropping up. "Can someone get the bottle from him?"

Jonas moves to do so immediately, and it takes Basile holding him down for Jonas to wrestle the bottle away from Erik.

On one hand it's good to know that the man I love did not in fact shoot me. That's always good to know. Still the deception hurts. And I get it. At the time I meant little to him. We were hardly anything to each other and Elleany came first. It still has to come first. But he could have told me the truth a long time ago.

"Iris," Jonas starts, "can we talk?"

I bite my cheek, my gaze going from him to Erik. "Not right now. We have to make sure Erik doesn't puke all over Andrew's couch."

******

"We didn't know what we were at the time."

Jonas sits across from me in the car Gwen arranged to take us to Paris. There's the distinct scent of new embedded in the seats. The divider between us and the driver is up, but we still tread with caution while speaking.

"Obviously, I'm relieved the man I'm marrying didn't shoot me." I run my hands over the lap of my toga-esque dress—very Society like. Gwen made sure this dress had sleeves. When the car arrived at the abandoned farmhouse Basile had dropped us off at, we found the clothing Gwen promised. I'd be fascinated in knowing how she pulled this all off. "Why didn't you tell me the truth after Erik left the Society?"

Jonas runs his fingers over the silver laurel-wreath crown in his lap. A green one sits beside me. "I planned to but then I got scared that you wouldn't be able to overlook the lie, and so I held off and with every day that passed, I kept thinking you were less and less likely to forgive me."

We've entered Paris by now, and outside my window, historic buildings are filled by chain stores.

"Is there anything else you've kept from me?"

"No." He sets his laurel wreath to the side and slides off his seat to kneel before me in the space between our seats. Lifting my laurel wreath from the seat, he brings it in front of him and clasps it in both hands.

"You and our country are my greatest priority. You come before my throne."

It's like a hand squeezes my heart.

"But Elleany. . ."

Shaking his head, he raises the laurel wreath. "You come first. I'd give up my throne for you." Tears start to blur my eyes as he places the crown on top of my head and then cups my face with his hands. "In my eyes you are already my queen."

I place my hands over his wrists and after a moment pull his hands from my face so I can kneel beside him. I reach for his laurel wreath and place it on his head. "I promise to never force you to choose between our country and me."

"Iris—"

"I mean it. You can deny it all you want—I know how much your title, the Order, and the Society mean to you. You already gave up your son being Preeminence."

"Our son." He covers my hands with his, and my stomach tightens. "I wasn't supposed to be Preeminence right now." He pulls us up into the seats, and I hold is hand, squeezing it.

"Are you sure you should tell them about the Amoris?"

"They've been our allies since the beginning; it's time they knew."

"What if it makes things worse?"

"Worse would be France ending our alliance. Explaining the Amoris and Expiration Dates to Alix and Abella is the only way to move forward."

The car stops at the palace gate where we are cleared by security to enter.

At the end of the drive, standing before the palace steps, are the royal twins, Abella in a dark purple floor-length dress and Alix in a suit with medals and a sash. Each wear a crown. Beside them is Mid'haa in a gray pantsuit, her hair pulled back and under her hijab.

A guard opens the car door, and Jonas steps out first and offers me his hand to pull me up beside him.

"Thank you for meeting with us," Alix says. I don't know how to speak to him after seeing Vienna's neck.

Jonas offers me his arm. "I'm sorry we're having to meet under these circumstances. Where might my Theta and Undici be?"

"In the throne room, Preeminence." Mid'haa steps to the side, opening up a pathway and holds her arm out. "If you would accompany us there."

The journey through the palace is silent, and while Jonas may not look tense, I can feel how tight he is by his grip on my hand.

Two guards open the doors to the throne room. Immediately, I spot Tobias, one of the first people I met in the Society, and Sebastian. There are more than a dozen officials of France standing about, waiting. For a moment, I feel I've caught a glimpse of what it must have been like to be at court in the past.

Jonas can't tell these officials about the Amoris though. He'll have to convince Alix and Abella to send them away.

While Alix and Abella ascend the dais and ease gracefully into their thrones, Tobias and Sebastian join us, their expressions stern and arrogant. Would Colton see their expressions the same way? Does Jonas? Perhaps there's a touch of wariness in their gazes that I'm missing.

They bow before us. "Preeminence. Ms. Levine," they both say.

I curtsy while Jonas acknowledges them by title.

Tobias's dark gray laurel wreath catches the light of a chandelier. "The Tresais briefed us on your plan."

"And she told us about Be—the Digamma." Sebastian's black wreath blends in with his hair. For less than a second, I saw a hint of concern when he started to say his cousin's name.

"If we wish for a happy outcome for the Digamma, then we have to make sure the crown is once more on our side."

Alix calls out something in French, and Jonas turns toward the dais, where Mid'haa stands beside it, a tablet in hand.

"Preeminence, I hope you can account for the dozens of the murders we're suddenly plagued by." He speaks in English. I've no idea what Tobias and Sebastian are like with French. Perhaps they can speak none of it and that is why Alix has chosen English.

"I hope to assure you," Jonas says, "that these crimes are not being done by anyone from my country. Just two nights ago, I was confronted by the woman behind them."

Abella grits her teeth. "You allowed her to get away

"She belongs to a group. We were outnumbered."

Alix turns his gaze on me. "If the Society is innocent as your Preeminence claims, why did you flee from us with the Digamma and Beta?"

I keep my posture straight, holding his piercing gaze. "The former Tresais and Andrew Blackwood do not know how to imprint someone with an Expiration Date, and as they have both betrayed the Society in the past, we were worried what classified information they'd suddenly choose to share."

"You shot at my soldiers."

"With all due respect, Your Majesty, your soldiers shot at us first."

"But you could not die. My soldiers could have."

"I did not aim at them, Your Majesty. Only their tires. I wished to spare them as much injury as possible."

"You trust your skills enough to shoot at a moving target? You put my soldiers' lives in jeopardy."

To be fair, he was the one who put them in that situation.

"I do, Your Majesty."

Jonas threads his fingers through mine. "My fiancée was raised in an orphanage by rebels in my country. I know of no one in my family or any of my soldiers whose aim I trust more than Ms. Levine's."

Abella and Alix share a look before the princess says, "She was raised to be your enemy and you still trust her?"

"Absolutely."

The twins lean back in their thrones.

Mid'haa lowers her tablet. "Preeminence, how can you prove that you have no part in these murders?"

"To do so, I will have to explain how my country determines Expiration Dates." Jonas lets go of my hand. "As it is the Society's greatest secret, I ask to speak with Your Majesty and Your Highness alone."

Mid'haa taps her finger against her tablet, brow furrowing. "I would advise Your Majesty against this."

Alix waves his hand. "The Preeminence will not harm me." He says something quickly in French, and the officials bow and curtsy before exiting the room. Mid'haa is the last to leave. Once the doors clang shut, Alix and Abella stand and step down from the dais.

"Now, Jonas," Abella says, "please continue."



So I had an idea I thought might be fun. For anyone who wants to participate, in the comments write a short scene between characters in this series. It could be almost anything: two characters you ship, ships that were never even ships, funny scenarios between characters, a character playing a prank on another character. Anything! The most important thing is to have fun with it!


You are reading the story above: TeenFic.Net