"If Stefanovich hadn't caught you, then you wouldn't have your Bride."
Inhale for calm. Exhale. Draw from the tie with Elizabeth. "What are you f**king talking about?"
"Have you never wondered why I would betray"-Nix made air quotes-"you?"
"Because we are natural enemies. Instinctively you despise what I am. It was only a matter of time."
She perched on the study's window seat. "If you hadn't been caught by Stefanovich, you would have died in the Horde invasion of Draiksulia."
"There was no Horde invasion of the fey plane."
She snapped her fingers. "Exactly. You, as well as all our Valkyrie allies, were spared. From just a whisper in your father's ear."
His lips parted.
"And had you perished then, you never would have made contact with Saroya-who would have killed even more while in Elizabeth's body, leaving no time for an attempted exorcism." Nix's vacant golden eyes shimmered. "I saw your Bride's alternate future as clear as day. One fall morning, Elizabeth did the laundry for her mother, folding clothes off the line. Then she took her father's Remington and walked into the woods alone. She tucked the barrels under her chin. Blood, brain, and bone splattered over leaves."
He flinched.
"I saw it all. Still think me a betrayer?"
I wouldn't have Elizabeth if not for Nix's actions. He didn't have her anyway! Then his eyes narrowed. "Why did you leave me so long in the grave? You were there the night Fyodor released me-I saw you in the woods."
"My foresight doesn't work with you. I was only able to find you by reading Helen's fate. You know what she became to you."
"Yes." My aunt. "An embarrassment."
"Speak ill of my dead sister again, Lothaire, and I'll take my crazy somewhere else."
"Somewhere outside of Dacia?" He waved his arm. "If you could find this kingdom all along, you might have told me how! I spent centuries searching. As you well knew!"
"You weren't ready to find it yet. Would you rather have warred with them or become their king by invitation? All it took was patience, which is what I told you again and again. But you never listened to me. You broke the trust between us-not me."
"Even after all the antagonism between us, I came to you for help just weeks ago. You turned your back on me and sent Dorada straight to my home! Don't you dare deny it."
"I was hoping Dora would find your addy okay. MapQuest is sometimes hokey."
His fists clenched tight, his shoulder muscles knotting with tension.
"You wanted Elizabeth, and you needed Saroya gone-without breaking your vows."
Nix had sent Dorada to help him?
"My plan was brilliant."
"And risky." If Elizabeth hadn't thought on her feet . . . We'd both be dead.
"Great risk leads to great reward, does it not?" Then Nix chuckled. "I do enjoy telling Loreans, 'Be advised that your blood debt is now being serviced by La Dorada, effective immediately.' "
He was rocked by these explanations. My millennia's worth of hatred for Nix was unfounded?
Who would be his nemesis, if not Nix? In the entire Lore, she was the only adversary worthy of him. Which was one of the myriad reasons he hadn't retaliated after she'd betrayed him.
Can always kill her, but can never bring her back. . . .
In a contemplative tone, she added, "You saw Dora when she was jubilant from a long-awaited victory. Most of the time, she's so apocalyptic. And now she has evil and good pawns to wage her war. I'll have to fix that in the future." Nix frowned, and suddenly she looked very, very tired. After seeming to count on her fingers, she murmured, "How will I remember to fix that in the future?"
At length, she glared at Lothaire. "I'm risking an apocalypse for you, and you don't even want to be with Elizabeth!"
"She nearly beheaded me! I've never been closer to death in all my years!"
"So now you're pouting in your castle. After the miseries you've inflicted on legions? You can dish it out, but you can't take it?"
"It's different."
"How?"
He stabbed his fingers into his hair. "It simply is."
"How?" she insisted.
"Because I think . . . because I was falling in love with her!"
"Then why isn't she here with you now?"
"It was unrequited!" He'd shocked himself by saying that aloud.
Lothaire Daciano, a king, admitting to falling for a female who disdained him?
"Do you believe that because of her dream memories? Or because of her actions?"
"I can't see her memories, Nix. But I know why-it's because vampires don't see what they can't handle!" I can't handle knowing she played me. She'd bested him. "Just tell me what I . . . tell me what should I have done differently, to make her love me."
Nix rolled her eyes. "Where to begin?"
"Fuck off!"
"Why should I help you with Elizabeth, anyway? You've betrayed me worse than I ever did you. Why did you strike out at Furie instead of exacting your revenge directly on me?"
"Where would be the sport in that? You're more crazed than I am! Why can't you find Furie, soothsayer? Is she another blank spot in your visions? I never doubted you would locate her."
"Would that have changed your decision to imprison her?"
"No. I followed my king's orders. You of all people should know why I was bound to obey him in all things."
"In any case, will you help the Valkyries find Furie now?"
"As I told Regin, I don't know where she is."
"But you did once, Lothaire. You are the one who chained her to the bottom of the ocean."
"For your interventions in the past, I should be honor-bound to help you," Lothaire said. "Alas, I have no honor."
Her face fell. "I can't help you like this. You're more eaten up with hate than I'd ever thought, and more ignorant about females than I'd ever imagined. I'm wasting time I need for other things." She turned to leave.
Behind her, he called, "I drank Commander Webb, Valkyrie. I have his memories. I know you were working for him."
Lothaire also now knew that Webb had probably been . . . reborn. As an immortal.
Before Lothaire had bitten him, the wily bastard had popped a sample of blood, like a cyanide capsule. As Webb died, he'd had the blood of an immortal running through him, one so powerful that even Lothaire had been overcome after drinking it.
Webb would rise, as gods only knew what.
Perhaps I ought to tell Chase all the dark secrets I've learned about his surrogate father, to relieve some of his guilt.
And to prepare him.
But Lothaire was still Lothaire, and blood tie or not, Chase was still a dick. I don't give without receiving.
Yet hadn't he with Elizabeth?
Nix turned back to him, her face marred with fatigue. "I wasn't working with Webb, I was using him."
"How would your allies feel to learn of your connection to him? Through Webb, you sent a witch to the island. Hell, you sent your own sister. I wonder why you gave him my name to add to the capture list. Yet another betrayal."
She tilted her head at him, her eyes gone silvery. "Had to catch you before you used the ring, Lothaire. One more second and you would seriously have rewritten the wrong female. You do not even want to contemplate what would have happened to your Bride if Saroya had been made a vampire, with the ability to trace. . . . And more, I needed you on the island for six purposes: Wendigo extermination, saving Thaddeus's life, giving Chase blood to stabilize him until his berserkertude took over. I forgot the others," she said with growing agitation. "No matter. Your takeaway: sometimes you have to be cruel to be kind."
"So after this night, am I supposed to feel beholden to you? Do you expect me to just turn off my animosity toward you?"
He couldn't even if he wanted to. She was right; he was eaten up with hatred.
"I see Furie drowning, but can never find her. She is my sister! And you wouldn't spare me that?"
Perhaps I ought to tell Nix where I left her. . . .
But there was more on the line. "You and I both know to whom she's bound. Sinking her was also strategic."
Nix looked dejected. Lips moving silently, she hugged her arms around her chest.
Understanding hit him. In order to help me tonight, she has hurt herself in whatever way. "Nix?" She was weary, bewildered, hardly the malicious being he'd thought her for so long.
In Old Norse, she asked him, "How will I remember the apocalypse?" Her voice was haunted, her slim frame shaking. "There's so much to see, to remember, so many faces . . ."
For all that the memories had been shadowing his thoughts, visions of the future had been obscuring hers. He'd played his one Endgame; apparently, she'd been playing thousands.
"How?" she cried. Lightning flashed, bolts inside the great caverns of Dacia for the first time in history.
In the streets below, screams rang out. Thunder rocked the entire kingdom, echoing until rubble quaked. The unknown threat Hag spoke of.
"Calm yourself, Valkyrie!" He grabbed her shoulders, giving her a jostle.
She thrashed against him harder, and two more bolts speared down in rapid succession. Like detonations. She could topple the castle!
"Phenix, calm yourself!" He lifted her into his arms to trace her away-
At once, the lightning ebbed. Seconds passed. A muted scream here and there. Disaster averted.
"Phenix?" she whispered up at him. "No one calls me that but you. Everyone who used to is dead. They're all dead."
He exhaled a gust of breath. "They always die before us, don't they?"
"Without fail."
"When was the last time you slept?"
"Not since I saw you on the island."
That had been several weeks ago. "Why? The shrieks at Val Hall keep you up?"
"I like to drift off to the sound of shrieks. No, it's because someone always needs my help. Loreans are incessant, skulking around the manor, with their languishing hearts and unfulfilled desires. I can feel them ache, like a bad tooth I can never yank free."
"You need a male to keep those beings at bay."
"You have no idea."
He muttered a curse, then said, "You may rest here this eve." Tracing to the sitting room couch, he gently laid her down. "I'll keep the Loreans away for one night."
"It is blessedly peaceful here, high in this castle. White queen and black king can call a draw for a time. . . ."
My enemy, my onetime friend. Why had she continued to help him? With a brusque "Good night," he tossed a blanket over her.
But she said, "Stay. Just till I fall asleep."
After debating a few moments, he sank down, resting his back against the couch, his arms stretched over his bent knees. "Why do you want me here?"
She yawned widely, as the young did. "We can watch each other's backs in shifts, as we used to do."
Though it did feel like times past, he said, "You still can't trust me. I'm considering cutting your hair when you sleep, just for keys past the Scourge."
"Naturally. Talk to me about other things."
"About what?"
"Anything."
Another exhalation, then he spoke his mind. "I feel . . . old." He knew she could sympathize. When they'd been friends, he'd once confessed to her, "Phenix, you are the only one who understands the truth: Eternal life alone is naught but an eternal punishment."
"Lothaire, I've met dirt younger than we are."
He scrubbed his hand over his face. "I didn't feel old when I was with Elizabeth. I felt like a young vampire, just starting out with her. The world was ours for the taking."
"I envy you that feeling."
After several heartbeats, he admitted in a low voice, "I'd go back to the grave if it would force Elizabeth to love me."
"Oh, Lothaire," she sighed, patting his shoulder. "I tried to help you with her. I watched out for her at Val Hall. I showed her that she could walk in the sun."
"Was she excited?" He twisted around to face Nix. "What did she say? Did she mention me?" Though Lothaire had long sworn never to bestow a gift with no thought of a return on his investment, he finally had. I gave Elizabeth the sun. He'd wanted her to know that happiness, even if he, himself, could not-
"Ellie was . . . sad."
"Sad?" he bit out. He'd never understand females! "Did she never speak of me?"
"In the weeks that you ignored her, humiliating her with every day that you didn't retrieve her? Honestly, Lothaire, if she'd brought you up to anyone . . . awkward."
He glowered at the ceiling. Silence reigned.
Damn it, Nix was going to fall asleep and leave him alone and unsettled, wondering how he'd made Elizabeth sad-and whether he should give his Bride another one of his black hearts in penance.
With a scowl, he gruffly said, "I'm not a pu**y, you know."
"Then dream her memories," Nix whispered, before drifting off.