Lady of Shadows (Lady of Darkness #2)

Chapter 54 Callan

CHAPTER 54

CALLAN

T here was a knock on the door that had Callan glancing up from his book. Finn and Sloan had gone down to the training rooms to spar. They had gradually become more comfortable leaving him alone here. He had become rather accustomed to not being known here, and while he was growing restless, he was also enjoying not being noticed. He liked that he seemed to blend in with the common folk, that he wasn’t something special here.

The knock came again, and he closed the book, rising to answer the door. Lunch wasn’t for another two hours, so he wasn’t sure who it would be.

He pulled the door open to find Scarlett standing on the threshold. He blinked, wondering if he was seeing things. He looked down the hall in both directions. She was completely alone.

“Hello, Callan,” she said quietly. She was dressed in black pants and an emerald green tunic that set her silver hair shimmering against it. A beautiful sword was at her hip, and she had her hands clasped behind her back. “Would you be willing to take a walk with me?” He stood frozen, staring at her, unable to find his voice. She shuffled on her feet. “Unless you are busy? I could come back this afternoon.”

“No,” he finally managed to get out. “No, now is fine. Let me just put my boots on.”

“Sure,” was all she said.

“You can come in. While you wait. I will not be long,” he said, stepping aside.

“All right.” She took a few steps into the room, just enough for him to shut the door behind her. “Where are Finn and Sloan?”

“Sparring. Down in the training rooms,” Callan answered, crossing to his bedroom. He grabbed his boots from near the door and slid them on.

“You were reading?” she asked, noting where his book still lay on the sofa near the fireplace.

“I was. I find I have lots of time on my hands here,” he answered. Scarlett only nodded her head. Noting she was not wearing a cloak, he did not bother with one either. “Shall we?”

She was silent as she opened the door and started down the hallway.

“You are alone,” he said, following her.

“I am.”

“They do not even have a guard with you?” he asked. He could not keep the slight bitterness from his tone.

A half smile lifted on her lips. “I assure you, I am scarier than anything that will attempt to accost me in these halls.”

“Even Eliza?” he asked with a raise of his brows.

She huffed a laugh. “Valid point, Prince.”

“You are back to calling me that,” he said quietly. She said nothing, and he suddenly realized they were heading towards the bridges. “I cannot cross the bridges, Scarlett. Not without an escort of the Fire Court.”

“You have something better,” she replied simply, again with that half smile, as she stepped onto the bridge. He held his breath, waiting for Rayner to step from smoke, and Cyrus and Eliza to come striding from wherever they were, but no one came. She was halfway across the bridge when a fire message appeared near her head. He watched her reach up, plucking the note from the flames. A soft smile crossed her lips. Then she incinerated the note in her palm. “Come, Callan,” she said with a nod of her head to the other side of the bridge. “I promise no one will bother us.”

Callan sucked in a breath and stepped onto the bridge. True to her word, nothing happened. He bit back his snide remark about her being able to go where she pleased unescorted and followed her across the bridge.

“Your shadows are gone,” he remarked as she led him up several sets of stairs.

“They appear when summoned,” she answered.

“As panthers?”

Scarlett grimaced slightly. “Sorry. It has been an…emotional couple of days, and I needed some time…”

He forced himself to hold back his retort about Sorin being able to follow her.

They continued in silence up to the highest level of the palace. She led him down a hall and then she pushed through a door. He followed her through and stepped into a large glass greenhouse. Plants and flowers bloomed everywhere. She walked to a bench beside a little pond where various fish swam about. In the center of the pond was a sea star.

Scarlett sat on the bench and patted the spot beside her. “Sit, Callan. There are some things you deserve to know.”

He studied her for a moment. A soft, almost sad smile was on her lips as she watched the sea star move along the bottom of the pond. Her hair was partially pulled back, putting her Fae ears fully on display. Her hands were under her thighs as though she were trying to keep them warm, despite the magic that kept the entire palace comfortable and the heat of the greenhouse itself.

Callan crossed the short distance and sat down beside her, watching the fish dart to and fro in the water, and waited.

“I am sorry for missing dinner the other night. I got caught up in some things and wasn’t able to send a note,” she said.

“In the Witch Kingdoms?”

She cast a side-long glance at him before saying, “We are returning to Baylorin. Tomorrow evening.”

He jerked his head to her. “We are going home?”

She winced slightly. “Yes, Callan. It is time for you to return home. We still don’t entirely know what Mikale’s plans are, but we— I have matters to attend to there and have waited long enough to return.”

“The orphans?” he asked softly.

“Yes. Among other things.” She did not look at him as she spoke, her eyes still fixed on the sea star.

“Have you heard from Cassius? Is everything all right?”

“No. I have not spoken to Cassius since that day weeks ago when Sorin brought him here for me.” Silence fell again. “When you return home, you need to stay alert, Callan. Finn and Sloan need to be with you at all times until we have Mikale under control. I will provide them with all the ways I have entered the castle undetected. Mikale caught me in one of the tunnels, so I know he knows about them as well.”

We. She kept saying we, which meant…

“Who all is returning with us?” he asked slowly.

She closed her eyes, taking a deep breath. “Sorin and his Inner Court.”

“All of them?”

“Yes,” she replied softly.

“Cyrus, Eliza, and Rayner?”

“Yes.”

“Why?”

“I need them. To help me with everything.”

“I can help you. Finn and Sloan can help. With Cassius and Nuri. We can figure it out, Scarlett,” Callan argued. “We will figure this out.”

She finally turned to face him. That was indeed a sad smile on her lips. “There is much you do not know, Callan. I need them with me.”

“And who will take care of his Court, his people? He will just leave them?” Callan demanded.

Again, Scarlett took a deep breath, seeming to steady herself. “Someone from my Court will be in charge of the Fire Court, as well as his own, until we return.”

“Return? You will come back here? You have decided then?” He stilled. The blood in his veins froze. His heart stopped at the words. “You will come back here to be with him?”

“I will,” she whispered, her eyes dipping to the ground.

“Look at me, Scarlett Monrhoe,” Callan commanded. “Look at me and tell me why.”

She brought her eyes back to his. They were full of sorrow, as if she knew that what she was about to say was going to shatter him completely. “He is my twin flame, Callan.”

Her twin flame? No. Sorin was her soulmate, not her twin flame. He’d had the Mark since they arrived here. She had not had one. Everything he had read about the Fae twin flame bond came rushing back to him. Everything Eliza had explained to him. “No. There is a Marking and Trials and an Anointing. You have not had time to…”

He trailed off when Scarlett held up her left hand. He had thought she was keeping her hands warm, but she had been hiding it. The black Mark wound and swirled around the back of her hand and down three of her fingers, a stark tattoo against her golden skin, and a gold band with a large diamond and two smaller rubies adorned her finger.

“When?” he whispered.

“We initiated the Trials a few days ago, but we also had a marriage sanctified.”

“You are married?” Callan breathed, realization and understanding slamming into him, one after another. How Sorin was able to find her in the Lairwood House. How he was able to speak to her when she was lost in the thrall of her magic. His overprotectiveness. Her dancing with him and practically glowing. How he had raged when she had been hurt in the Courtyard. Her shadows dimming, disappearing, in his presence. How they were always godsdamned drawn to each other.

“Yes,” she answered. “He is my husband. I didn’t… I didn’t acknowledge the twin flame bond until a few days ago. Deep down, I’ve known, but I was such a mess, I couldn’t— I wouldn’t let myself accept it. Not until his life was in danger, and I realized…”

She brought her eyes back to his and tears glimmered there. One slipped down her cheek, and he clasped his hands together to keep from reaching out and catching it. Someone else’s. She was someone else’s. He had lost her.

“I loved you, Callan,” she whispered. “I did. I do.”

“But not enough,” he said softly.

“No, Callan,” she said, and she gripped his hands in her own. He tried to jerk them back, but she held firm. “I love you enough to know that it would never have worked. That I could never be what you will need when you are king. We come from two very different worlds.”

“You never gave me a chance,” he argued. “You kept parts of yourself hidden from me.”

Shadows suddenly swarmed her, and he lurched to his feet. The shadows mixed with flame and ice, her eyes becoming flames themselves. Another breath and it was gone, snuffed out. “That fear I see in your eyes, that I can smell on you, Callan? The parts I keep hidden from you are far worse than what you just witnessed.” She stood facing him now. She seemed different, almost regal. “I couldn’t be my entire self with you because I didn’t know my entire self. I did not know I was Fae. I did not know I had magic. I did not know my family name is Semiria, not Monrhoe.”

“What?” Callan’s eyes snapped to hers. “That is the Fae Queen’s last name.”

“Indeed,” she replied, and a crown of ice and shadows appeared above her head, with a red flame like a sun in the center.

Someone from my Court will be in charge of the Fire Court. The words clanged through him.

“If Sorin’s Inner Court is going with you, who shall be left in charge?” Callan asked slowly.

“Briar will be left in charge as he is part of my Court. I am the Queen of the Fire and Water Courts. My mother was the Fae Queen of the Western Courts. My cousin rules the Eastern Courts,” Scarlett answered.

“How is that possible?”

“Much was hidden from me as well,” she said sadly. “There is still much I am discovering.”

“He has not bothered to explain it to you?” Callan snarled bitterly.

“Sorin has explained what he can, but we are learning more each day. I am doing the best I can.”

He started at the bitterness in her tone. “You do not wish for this?” he asked slowly.

“Do I wish to be queen? No. I’ve never lied to you, Callan. I have no desire to be shackled to a throne.”

“Then why choose it?”

“Because…” she stared around the greenhouse. “Because while it is my fate, I get to decide how to use it, and so I shall use it to aid my people. Starting with the children in the Black Syndicate. If my crown will allow me to help those who cannot help themselves, then it is a burden I shall endure.”

Callan studied the woman, the female, before him. He knew. He had known for quite some time that Sorin was her equal, that he pushed her and challenged her in ways he never could. He knew that Sorin was better for her, could care for her better. None of that eased the pain in his chest. None of that made it easier. None of that lessened his bitterness.

“You could have done that from my side,” he ground out.

“No, I could not have,” she said simply. “But I will need you, Callan. I will need your alliance. I will need your help, as a prince and as a king, but more than all of that, I will need your friendship.”

“Why would you need me when you have him?” he sneered.

“There are battles coming, Callan. There are enemies deeply entrenched in your lands and others. They have been waiting for centuries for this exact moment in time. There are rifts in the world. Beings we are only beginning to recognize. We shall need each other to keep our people safe.”

“We will not need you or your Court or your people,” he snarled. He turned on his heel. “I am going back to my rooms. Send word as to when we need to be ready to return to Baylorin.”

“Callan,” she called after him, taking a few steps towards him. “Let me walk back with you. You do not know the way…and cannot walk through this side of the palace unattended.”

Callan gritted his teeth. Of course he couldn’t. “Then find me an escort that is not you.”

She stepped back as though he had hit her, hurt flitting across her features. She only gave a slight nod of her head, and a moment later, a fire portal appeared. Sorin and Eliza stepped through, Sorin coming to her side.

Callan thought he would vomit at the perfection they were as they stood beside each other, Sorin’s hand coming to her lower back. “Tomorrow evening, at sundown, we will depart,” Scarlett said, her tone now formal.

“Fine,” Callan answered, striding for the door, but he paused, not turning to look at her when she called after him again.

“Almost three years ago, I watched a young prince from a tree branch. He became a friend and so much more. He had a dream that he could make the world a better place for those already in his care. Hope is for the dreamers, Callan.” She crossed the space between them, gently grabbing his arm. She pressed a small vial into his hand. The vial looked just like the ones that used to hold her tonic, and he wished she were still taking it. That none of this had happened. That it could all go back. He would take her secrets and shadows over this. Anything over this.

“You will need me, Callan,” she said softly. “When you do, I will come. Smash this to the ground, and I will be there in an instant. I will come for you. For my friend.”

Callan only jerked his arm from her and headed to Eliza who was now waiting by the door. He stalked past her out into the hallway. They silently descended the stairs, and he gripped that vial tightly in his fist, resisting the urge not to smash it against the steps of this damn palace.

After the third set of stairs, Eliza spoke. “I tried to prepare you.”

“You could have just come out and said it,” he spat, not looking at the female leading him down the stairs.

“No, I couldn’t have. I swore to my prince I wouldn’t say a word, but you were there the day I Marked him. I hoped I had given you enough clues.”

“Why did you even bother?” he growled as they approached the bridges.

“Because you seemed as lost as she did when you arrived,” Eliza replied, more gently than he had ever heard the female speak.

“And now?” he asked when she stopped at the bridge.

She studied him for a long moment. “I think an obstacle that was preventing you from moving forward has been removed, and you are now free to find your own way.”