chapter twenty

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"Another young woman was found dead yesterday morning, her body dumped in a water treatment plant on the south side of Mountain Ridge. Police are working to identify her. If you have any information that might lead to an arrest, please call..."

Joden Thomas, East City Daily News


"I'm sorry, Your Majesty," Galina said, blinking through tears. She bowed low, then made her way out, leaving just him and Reese in the small infirmary room.

Demitri's head fell back onto his pillow. "I don't see how we will keep this from the kingdom any longer."

Reese said nothing.

Three to five weeks. His cancer had spread much faster than they'd thought it would. And although they'd done what treatments they could, it had not been enough. Even before they'd begun what they could, under the radar, he'd known this was coming.

When they'd first noticed his condition, they'd warned him. They'd told him it had spread wildly, before they'd even known of its existence. That it would get bad. That, eventually, the kingdom would have to be notified.

Somehow, he'd deluded himself into thinking he had more time. That he could prepare himself and the kingdom for this day.

That wasn't the only thing he'd deluded himself about.

"It's just an estimate," Reese said. "It is not definitive."

"Exactly," he said. "It might be sooner."

"Or it might be longer."

"You've never been the optimistic one between the two of us, Reese."

"I suppose someone has to be."

Demitri lifted a hand to his face. Even the action, small as it was, was exhausting. The doctors had officially put him on complete bedrest. Other than a few paces down the hall to keep his muscles moving, they'd instructed him to rest.

He didn't want to spend his last days resting until he finally died.

Something dangerously close to a sob rattled in his chest and up his throat.
He closed his eyes and took as deep a breath as he could.

Eyes still closed, he said, "my regrets might take me out before this cancer does."

Regret and sadness had been his companions for so long, he didn't know how to kick them out of his life. After the doctor's visit today, they both hung heavy on his shoulders.

No, he mentally scolded himself, do not let your last few weeks be painted in self-appointed misery.

"Catalina is set to arrive tomorrow?"

"Yes," Reese confirmed.

"We will need to tell her the news," Demitri said. His tone wavered as he spoke around the ache in his throat. "And jump right into a crash course."

Reese stood and put his hands into the pockets of his black slacks. "Your Majesty, if I may be so candid..."

Demitri only shot Reese a look. One that said, just ask...

"Your advisors have been with you for years, some more than a decade. They will guide Catalina through it all. Instead of worrying, let me make sure all is alright, so that you can rest."

"I will need to do as much as I can remotely," Demitri said, already calculating. "Please have my schedule updated."

Without looking at his phone or giving any sign he'd done so, Reese said, "I've got the team preparing a press release for your review."

Knowing Reese, he'd had their public relations team, a carefully crafted small group of Loyalists, writing a press release the moment the doctors delivered their update on his condition.

"They will have it ready by end of day today," Reese continued.

They would not be pressed to release any information to the public just yet. Of the group present for the council meeting, no one but Commander Jackson Leonger and the Sarian royal couple saw what happened. His doctors and assistants were all Loyalists and would never out him.

The only leak at this point would be the rest of the staff once they noticed him absent from his usual routine.

"We cannot release full details," Demitri said automatically.

If the kingdom knew he was in anything but peak condition, they would worry. With worry came those that would doubt his position and his rule, and he would never give his enemies the blocks to build from.

"They have been instructed to start with something simple, but vague enough to leave it unconfirmed. The kingdom won't think it anything but a cold."

Although not a talker by nature, Reese had eventually settled himself back into his chair and attempted to breach a few subjects when the silence in the room seemed too heavy. His nurse had turned the television on, but Demitri hadn't heard a word of the news on the screen over his screaming thoughts.

After about an hour, Demitri found himself wanting to be alone. To digest it all in privacy. "Reese, I appreciate your company, but your job does not include babysitting. Please continue about your day. I will be fine by myself, I promise you."

It was a testament to how worried Reese was that he hesitated. However, when Demitri nodded at him, he eventually left the room.

The door snicked shut behind Reese. The moment it closed, it seemed to suck all the air from the room.

Just a moment, he told himself; you get two breaths to feel sorry for yourself.

Inhale.

He wished it had been different. He wished his brother had been here with him, to walk him through it all. To take the responsibility of the kingdom so he could rest. Just rest.

Exhale.

Or that he'd had a family of his own that could be with him today. But he'd been stupid with his time when he was young, and now he had no one but Reese at his side.

Inhale.

Why hadn't the Stars given him more time? Would anyone even mourn him? Truly mourn him? Not just because he was their boss or sovereign or because of some sense of duty or expectation, but for him. He wanted someone here with him. Needed someone.

Anyone.

Anyone.

A shaky, watery exhale.

Then he locked it all down and shoved it into a box. He turned up the volume on the TV.

The contents of that box continued to wail.

~

Iris hadn't found any paints. Instead, she'd made do with the colored pencils and pad of paper Thad had given her at the airport.

Clutching them like a lifeline, she'd waited until most of the beach house had gone to bed. Then, in a pair of borrowed pajamas, she went down the long, winding set of stairs to the beach at the bottom of the hill.

The moment her bare feet hit the sand, a sense of calm washed over her. She'd watched a few Sarian dramas, an Aerianan love story or two. In anything she watched, whenever a character stepped on to a beach, they looked... at peace.

Here now, with the warm wind, crashing waves, and smell of sand and salt, she could see why. The moon, bright in its fullness, reflected off the water, a glitter settling across the ocean surface.

It gave her just enough light to see. Finding a spot about midway, past where the shore started but just out of reach of the creeping tide, she sat down and pulled out her pencils.

She wasn't ignorant enough not to notice the guard that had followed her down to the shore. But he hadn't said a word to her, so she let it be.

She didn't think as she colored. Instead, she let her mind wander, let her hands be free to sketch and draw and scribble whatever felt right.

This was the best part of art. The chance to be open and let the creativity flow around her. Through her. Here, there were no rules. No social ladders, no routines, no deadlines. Here there just was.

She scratched out her first two pages and got to the third before her creativity settled on an image. She took that image and carefully, slowly, pulled it out. Brought it to life.

"Ris?"

Iris blinked and glanced behind her. Wylan approached, back in his track pants and t-shirt that must've served as his pajamas.

"You should be asleep," she said automatically.

Wylan flashed his phone screen at her. The clock read 2:34 a.m. "As should you."

2:30? Huh. She'd been out here for a while then. With the warm breeze, she hadn't even noticed. She could live out here, where even the evenings were pleasant. "The best things happen in the early morning hours," she told him, swapping pencils.

Wylan sat down next to her. Instead of looking down at what she sketched, he stared out at the sea. "I think that depends on who you ask. In my line of business, these early morning hours aren't a good thing."

Her pencil flowed carefully across the page, free, but controlled. "I hope someday you get to a point where that's not the case. The early morning is... quiet. There's a peace here you don't find during the day." It quieted her mind. Something she needed more and more lately.

The gentle crash of waves filled the silence. Eventually, Wylan said, "the appeal is there."

A smile curled the edges of her lips. "Everything feels more... real at night."

Out of her peripheral, she noticed Wylan turn his head. "Why do I have a feeling you take the word 'nightlife' literally?"

Her laugh settled into the surrounding air. "I do."

Wylan shifted next to her, bringing one knee up and resting an arm on top. "Did you intend to flip your hours, or did it just happen?"

Iris shrugged, the steady sound of pencil against page keeping her centered. She'd flipped the pencil on its side to add a different texture to the piece. "It happened slowly. I was one of those kids in high school that stayed awake into the early hours, and then caught an hour or two of sleep before the school day."

Wylan snorted. "I had a friend like that in high school as well. He was annoying."

"Annoying?"

"He always wanted me to stay up late with him and do things, but I was tired as hell. He jacked up my sleep schedule."

Iris pointedly looked around them, then up at the moon before meeting Wylan's gaze. "Doesn't seem like you have a sleep schedule now."

Wylan's laugh was like a warm blanket that settled over her skin. She basked in its richness. Only a few days, and she already knew he didn't laugh, truly laugh, often.

"The night owls strike again," he said, still chuckling. "My poor sleep schedule."

Grinning, she bumped her shoulder with his. "How'd you know I was out here?"

Wylan pointed a thumb over his shoulder at the guard down the way.

She snorted. "Oh, so they report back to you."

"No. I'm just not the type to lose track of you just because we're in a safe place."

Something about his words had her fingers stopping. She glanced over at him, taking in the way the moonlight traced along his strong jaw and the gentle ridges of his cheeks.

She must've stared for too long because he frowned at her. "What?"

Maybe it was his personality or maybe it was what they'd already been through together, but she found herself relaxing. Wylan felt... familiar.

She liked it.

"Someone must be waiting for you back home," she told him. The wind blew warm through her hair. She tucked it back behind her ear, watching as Wylan's attention followed the action.

"No one waits for someone like me," he said, gruffly.

She shot him a questioning look.

"Always away, always busy, always with his attention elsewhere," he supplied. Instead of giving her time to say anything about that, as if what he'd said was nothing but fact and didn't need to be addressed, he asked, "How do you decide what to paint?"

She got that question often, usually right after a stranger found out she was a painter and she'd somehow made it a budding career. "I don't really," she told him, just as she told everyone else. "I wait until something comes. Until it feels right."

Instead of looking at her like she was odd, Wylan seemed to mull it over. Then, he asked, "do you have anything that brings you inspiration? Or maybe a muse?"

She chuckled a little to herself. "Aerianan dramas always show painters as eccentric. That's not me. There's no muse. I'm about as normal as any other Ace in this kingdom. I get inspiration like most creatives - in the little things here or there. From a person on the street, or a particular landscape, or an interaction."

"Ah, so no artist magic."

Her laughter infused with her words as she confirmed, "no artist magic."

"What is the project today?" He asked, glancing down at her piece for the first time.

He froze. Completely.

"What?" She asked, her own body locking in response to the look on his face.

"I keep forgetting somehow," was what she thought he mumbled. She could hardly hear it over the gentle wash of water along the shore. "And you keep reminding me."

Although she'd wanted to capture some of the beauty that was the Twin Isles, when she'd sat down tonight and let her creative side take over, none of the scenery ended up on the page. Instead, she'd sketched a small scene that somehow comforted her.

It was nothing special or extravagant. It wouldn't bring money or have curators or collectors beating down her door. But it was another piece she envisioned working well in a children's book.

Two children under a tree in a courtyard, a bush of roses around the corner. The girl in the image was overdressed for the warm weather, her dark hair caught under a scarf and white silk gloves on her hands. As if she played dress up. Meanwhile, the young boy in the drawing used a large stick that matched his hair color as a pretend sword. Angel wings sprouted from his back and a gold halo rested crooked on his head. A woman with long skirts approached them, a gentle look on her face as she took in the two of them.

"I need to ask you something," Wylan said. His tone was careful steel as he continued, "please do not get offended. I wouldn't ask if it wasn't of the utmost importance."

Wary, Iris closed her little sketch book. "Okay."

"Iris. Is your—" He cleared his throat. "Is your Acemark a wave?" 


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