A Crown of Cursed Hearts (Kingdom of Blighted Thorns #3)

57. Vexxion

57

VEXXION

I took Reyla to one of the little-used parlors, and we sat across from each other. I told her about Tempest’s bone vision, and Reyla surprised me with her lack of doubt.

One frown, and her face cleared. “It’s . . . true.” She pressed her palm against her chest. “You’re truly my older brother.” Tipping her head back, she stared up at the ceiling.

“I am.” I shared my memory of seeing her after she was born.

“I . . . This is going to sound weird, but when I was little, I dreamed I had an older brother. My parents . . . Alright, they weren’t my true parents, but I loved them,” her eyes shimmered with tears, “they laughed, though in a nice way. They said they wished I had an older brother, too, and patted my head, telling me to go play. I was an only child, and I assumed this was wishful thinking on my part. But the idea that there was someone out there stuck with me. I couldn’t shake it free. And now you’re here.” She puffed out a breath and gave me a wan smile. “I’m not sure what to say now.”

She looked so much like my mother, from her slender, petite frame to her red hair that was lighter than my mother’s but would probably darken as she grew older. The same eye color too. How had I missed it?

“We’re family. I’m yours, and you’re mine,” I said.

“Hold on. Does this mean you’re going to try to tell me what to do like with Tempest?” Rising, Reyla started pacing back and forth across the small room. “Because I’m not putting up with shit like that.”

“I’m not sure what I plan to ask of you,” I said with a huff. “It hasn’t occurred to me.” Since I didn’t like that she loomed over me, I also stood, though I didn’t pace.

“I’m sure it will.” Stopping in front of me, she looked me up and down. “Why’s your hair black when mine’s light red?”

“Our mother had red hair, though hers was darker than yours.”

“And you get your hair color from our . . . Fuck!” Her eyes—our mother’s eyes—widened. “Please don’t tell me we share the same father. Tell me our mother was with someone else. Anyone but him.”

“ We control who we are now.” If I’d learned nothing through my years of torture, it was that I had the final say in my actions and behavior. Never him. “But yes, he’d claim you as his if he knew.”

Ivenrail kept asking me where she was, and I’d assumed he meant my fated mate, that a witch or foreteller had told him that my mate was a serious threat to his existence. All that time, he was looking for Reyla. One more child to mold. I wasn’t sure why he hadn’t bothered with Zayde, unless that same witch told him to leave my half-brother alone.

She started pacing again. “Why in all the fates was she with him?”

“They grew up together. She adored him. She didn’t see who he truly was until it was too late.”

“He’s horrible. How could she miss something like that?”

“He can be charming when he chooses. Lately, he chooses to be the person you know today.”

“I don’t care how he’s related to us. We’re going to kill him.”

I nodded.

“I had another mother,” she sighed, her eyes shimmering with tears. “I don’t know anything about her, and that sucks. One more thing that monster took from me. From us. Us , Vexxion.” Her long sigh rang out. “He also stole the parents who raised me. His cursed dregs slashed through my village and killed them. My mother put me up in a tree and told me to stay there. Hide among the leaves. I remember clutching the trunk and wailing, begging her to come back. A rider came across me and took me to the fortress. I found a new family there with Tempest and Brodine.” Her face cratered with pain. “Beast that Bro was. And . . . Kinart.” Her shoulders slumped, all her energy sucked away by grief. “My Kinart.”

If only I’d known who she was back then, though it wouldn’t have made a difference for the man she’d love. But I could’ve held her, been there for her.

Or would I? Back then, the hardness I’d formed at Bledmire had started to sink into my bones. My fury saved me in more ways than one. She’d drawn out the man I was meant to be and made him better.

“I’m sorry about Kinart,” I said.

“You didn’t do it. He learned what the king is doing, and he was eliminated before he could act.”

I wasn’t sure what a dragon rider from a fortress town could’ve done about someone as powerful as Ivenrail, but that didn’t matter. “I still regret that I . . .” Pain made my voice hoarse. “That I haven’t done more. Stopped him in some way.”

She spun around and strode over to me, jumping up to swipe her fingertip across my neck. “You were as manipulated by him as the rest of us. If anything, you were the last person who could kill him. He collared you! I understand why you didn’t do it.”

“I was willing to die as long as he did.”

The softening of her face struck through me like a blade, making my chest hurt in a good way. “If you’d died, I would never have learned you’re my brother. I’m not sure what that means to me yet, but . . .” She grunted and her eyes darkened, her fierceness restored. “From what I’ve seen and heard, you’ve delivered one lie after another, but that needs to stop. If we’re going to be true siblings, we need complete honesty between us.”

“You have it.”

Her eyebrows lifted, and I was hit anew with her resemblance to my mother. They had the same chin. The same high cheekbones and brow. “No more tiny secrets held back because you don’t dare share them? ”

“None. Who you see is who I am.” Would that be enough? My childish memory of my adored little sister was scrambled up with my thoughts of this strong young woman before me now. I wasn’t sure how to mash them together to form someone new, but I’d try.

“I just realized that I— we —have a half-brother.” She sucked in a shaky breath. “We need to tell Zayde. And . . . wow. I have two brothers. Our cursed father sure was prolific. I don’t suppose you know if there are any other siblings lurking around?”

“None have come forward.”

“If they’re wise, they won’t. He killed our mother because she wouldn’t tell him where she hid me, didn’t he? I owe Vera a huge debt.”

“Vera didn’t tell Mother where she hid you, which was wise. I’m not sure our mother could’ve held that information back.”

“He’s a fiend. A monster. He hurt her.” Her tentative hand rose and trembled before she laid her fingertips on the scar coiling up from my chest and around my neck. “He hurt you . So many lives destroyed in his quest to rule the world.”

I gently held her wrist. I didn’t nudge her away. No one other than Fury had dared touch me in so long, I’d nearly forgotten how vital contact with someone who cared could be.

“This will be over one day soon,” I said. “And then there will be time for us.” For me and Tempest. A future where we might be able to let down our guards and care without worrying that the person we loved would be murdered before our eyes.

And a time for my sister and I to know each other completely .

“I want to hug you, if that’s alright.” Soft tears trickled down her face. “Say no if you don’t want—”

I tugged my sister close and wrapped my arms around her.

When she held me as well, it felt amazing.

All of us spent the afternoon in the parlor, strategizing.

Drask flew into the room, but while Tempest jolted when she saw him, she stroked his back after he landed on her shoulder.

Once Zayde found out about Reyla, he barreled into her and hugged her, lifting her and spinning around while she barked out laughter. They settled on the sofa after and kept looking at each other with wonder. When Reyla gazed my way with the same happiness in her eyes, it . . . I couldn’t even describe the feelings rushing through me, but I welcomed them.

Before I met Tempest, I would’ve shoved Reyla away, built a wall between myself much like the one I held between Zayde and I. Trusting but wary. Caring but not giving all of myself. Something vast was rising within me, and I wasn’t sure I liked it because caring meant being vulnerable.

Loving someone meant loss and pain.

Yet I couldn’t hold myself back. My walls were cracking, and I couldn’t find the will to reseal them. Relying on anyone but myself terrified me. But I was tired of living behind the wall alone .

“The dragons are amazing,” Airia gushed. “Whatever Madrood told them worked, because they’re cooperative.”

“They miss riders, strangely enough,” Fury said. “And our grooming.” She leaned into my side and linked our hands together, laying them on my knee. “Even knowing why we asked them to come back didn’t dissuade any of them from joining with us. I think Madrood helped there as well. He knows the king as much as anyone, and knowing someone terrifying is coming for Lydel has united us.”

“I also have a full staff for each aerie,” Airia said, her eyes wide with excitement. “It gives me hope we can do this.”

“We will do it,” I said firmly. “Never doubt that.”

She sucked in a jerky breath. “The flying dregs are scary. I imagine they were hard enough to kill when they remained on the ground. In the sky, they’re more our equals.”

“I think we have to stop killing them,” Fury said.

“What?” Airia’s eyes widened even further as she stared at my mate. “If we don’t kill them, they’ll destroy every one of us. Or haul us to Bledmire, and you know what happens after that.”

Tempest explained about the powerless.

“Let me get Ember’s Shadow ,” Reyla said. “Maybe it’ll reveal more details.” She pinched her eyes closed and scrunched her face in a cute way.

Damn, I had a sister. I adored her already, in a soft, squishy way so unlike the Vexxion I’d leaned into all my life. She’d cracked open another part of my heart and stuffed herself inside. There’d be no pushing her back out and . . . that was alright .

No, it was perfect.

She flitted, but she only made it to the open parlor doorway, where she collapsed against the frame. “I think I’ll walk the rest of the way.” She staggered out of the room, returning not long after with the book she dropped in Airia’s lap.

Airia started scrolling through it. “Blank pages.”

“From what I’ve seen,” Fury said, “the book will only reveal what it wants you to know.”

Airia snorted. “Which is nothing.”

“Back when the treaty was formed, the lesser fae wanted to forget they had magic,” I said. “A spell was cast to suppress it indefinitely. If present day Nullens knew they were lesser fae and equal to those living in faerie, that their magic was hidden, we’d hear them yelling even from this far away.”

“ Lesser fae?” Airia said with lifted eyebrows.

“Not lesser, truly. Those without much power didn’t like being subjected to the whim of those who had more. There was unrest, and war was brewing. That’s when the two factions formed a truce. Those with less power were given land to the west of faerie and their magic was suppressed. They didn’t want to use magic at all, but it’s not something you can take from someone.”

“Not without draining it beyond the point they recover,” Fury said dryly.

“The Claiming was part of the deal,” I said. “The lesser fae agreed to send a certain number of Nullens each year to be collared.”

“To be used as sources of energy or as servants,” Reyla said. “I can’t believe they agreed to something like that. ”

“If they hadn’t, they wouldn’t have been allowed to leave, let alone live in peace.”

“And the powerless?” Layla asked. “Where do they come in?”

“They’re the dregs,” Fury said softly. “They were molded into those things by one of the fae rulers in the past, perhaps even when the treaty was formed. They’re the true Nullens, not those living in the middle part of the continent.” Her gaze swept across us all. “That’s why I don’t think we should kill them.”

“And now they can fly,” Zayde said. “As Airia pointed out, it’ll be nearly impossible to defeat them. At this point, I doubt they can be changed back.”

“Maybe.” Fury’s brow furrowed. “I keep thinking there must be a way, though I haven’t found any suggestions for how it could be done.” She looked up at me. “Are there books out there that might contain this information?”

I shrugged. “The king isn’t one for collecting old tomes, and I doubt he’d keep anything like that around for someone to find. I’ve already read the books he still has around, but there was nothing about the powerless inside them.”

“I think—” A rustling sound made Fury still.

Drask flapped his wings and released a shrill caw that made all of us jump.

My heart came to a stop then burst into speed, slamming against my ribcage.

A Liege shuffled into the room.