We were directed to the wing reserved for special guests, but I made so much of a fuss of how unfit it was for me to stay. Too small. The bed too hard. The furniture too distasteful. The windows not being large enough, and the view rather drab.
At the end of it all, Randale and Kier decide that I'll stay on the same floors that houses the King and Luna. I'd been hoping for a room closer to Renae's, so I could keep an eye on her, but Kier caught the drift, putting me on the farthest end of his hallway, with a vast library wedged between our chambers. A new development. It would seem in the past months, someone's been moving things and redecorating.
I could really use that tour.
Basically, I won't be leaving my chambers without Kier finding out. There are guards stationed out my door and at the hallway's entrance. Security befitting a princess, Kier had said when I argued against it, asking for Az to be placed out my door instead, but he's just trying to make sure I don't walk up those steps and murder his mother in cold blood.
I'm invited down for dinner, but I ignore it, keeping to my room and feigning tiredness after our long, long trip. I'm too busy trying to get acquainted with my room, it's window and how high I might have to jump every night in order to sneak out.
Gripping the ledge hard enough to hurt, I hurl myself up the window, ready to drop down when my door creaks. My head snaps back at a frowning Az. "What are you doing?" he asks me, striding over to where I'm dangling several feet above the the ground behind the castle.
He snatches my collar and pulls hard until my butt hits the floor. "Have you lost your mind?"
I growl, wiping the dust on my nightdress. "I wasn't going to jump. I was just trying the height--and you don't get to question me. I'm the princess and you're the guard."
"I serve the King. Not you, and last I checked, he wanted you back home with all your bones intact. Need I remind you that MY HEAD is on the line if anything happens to you?"
"Piss off."
"You first."
I stomp over to the couch, picking up the book I'd been trying to read. A dirty, smutty romance with things I cannot ever unsee. "What do you want?"
He extends a scroll. "This came for you. I believe it's from Alpha Darrock."
I snort. "Darrock wrote me a letter? Pigs must be flying outside."
Az gives the scroll a pointed look. My brows rise as I take it from him. "Really?"
He just nods and takes up the space on the couch beside me, his eyes seemingly haunted. I'd tell him to get his ass off my couch if he didn't look so frustrated. I stretch, setting the scroll down on the table beside me. "Did someone die?"
He glances toward me and covers his face with large fingers. "I don't..." He cusses. "That woman..." He cusses again. "She's..." A heavy sigh. "I wasn't sure, not until I spoke to her this eve." Weary green, serpentine eyes turn to me. "She's my mate."
I have to pick my jaw off the floor. I shoot to my feet, pacing left and right. "Moira is your mate?! Why, that's... surprising. I mean...who would have thought she'd get paired with you and...wow. This is...is this good? I have no idea if I should congratulate you or feel sorry for you, but--"
An exasperated sigh. "Could you not be loud about it? She's already...rejected me."
I halt. "What? Why?! You let her reject you?"
His glance is scathing. "Not everyone is able to achieve the impossible like your mate and get everything he wants." His lips twists into a bitter frown. "She's been mated to an Alpha. A king. She's in love with him. I'm a Beta. I have nothing to offer her. It's only right that she rejected me."
"You don't know that," I whisper, uncertain of how to broach the topic without sounding mean and angry. I mean, it's Moira we're talking about. Moira who's been a bitch to me more times than I can count. Moira who's tried to kill me. Az deserves better, but now is not the time to tell him that, or assert my opinions. I couldn't even possibly be the perfect judge of what either of them deserves. I'm not the Goddess.
"Why come to me?" I ask softly, settling beside him once more.
He shifts uncomfortably. "I thought you might offer some insight...on how you dealt with it. Him getting mated to another."
"I..." My lips quiver and I blink thrice. I try to search for the right words, but my thoughts come up blank. I swallow as thinking becomes futile. "I... didn't..."
Az's eyes narrow. "Ah, that explains it then. You haven't dealt with the problem. You haven't even faced it. It's why you're always mad, in a piss poor mood and vindictive."
Heat stings my cheeks and my throat closes. "I don't know what you mean, and I'm not vindictive."
"Sweeping everything under the carpet or locking it in some box isn't the way to heal. You have built a fortress around your hurt, a castle of anger so tall you can't see past its walls. You think your rage keeps others at bay, but it cages you in just as tightly. What hope is there to heal if you cling of forever to the ashes of what could have been?"
My eyes sting and my lips part on a shaky breath. "I'm not clinging on to anything. You don't know anything."
Az straightens. "Have you even thought for a second about the pain mating with Darrock will upon your wolf? Do you even want to mate with Darrock? "
"That!" I snap, "is none of your business. You forget yourself."
He doesn't let up. He leans in, his green eyes searching mine, and I catch a whiff of liquor when he speaks again. "Perhaps, I have, but you are no better. You do not even know who you are anymore without him. When last did you have a good laugh without the influence of the liquor? When last have your decisions being swayed by your wants and desires alone, not because you're trying to forget or hurt him back? You say I don't know anything, but I've stayed by your door everyday for more than a month. I've stuck to you like second skin and all I see is a woman trying to escape her own skin. It's why you can't shift. Wolves will never submit to cowards."
I unclench my jaw, just enough to speak. "Say all of that to me when you have responsibilities as heavy as the crown. Repeat that to me again when you find your mother in a cold pool of blood, the light in her eyes forever gone, because of the woman who birthed your mate."
Az's smile is sneaky. "Sure, I can't fucking ever relate to that. My mother died during the split. She was in labour when the Neredian tyrant decided to divide our kingdoms. Father was away and she was a nurse in the castle. She barely made it out alive and died right after premature labour." His eyes shutter from a memory I can't imagine, and I'm at a loss for words. I had no idea. It's hard to tell with Az. When he's not snapping at me, he's an easygoing male, frankly just easy to be with, honest to a fault, honourable. Even kind. Too kind. I never could have imagined something like this happened to him.
When I don't say nothing, he goes on, "You don't see me prancing and stabbing knives at his son. It's fucking obvious he's not his father. Or his mother. He's many a fool for the decisions makes, but he loves you."
I still. "Love?" I echo. "Kier loves me how?" My nostrils flare. "How drunk are you?"
He grins harder. "Enough to think you look pretty, even with all that going on," he says, pointing at my disheveled hair. Then he's suddenly closer and I freeze grabbing for the pillow to whack his senses back into him, but all he does is drop his head on my shoulder. "Will you...relieve me of my duties? I imagine I've crossed the line tonight." His words are a little slurred.
I stay still. "I'll think about it. You can have the couch, as long as you don't snore and wake me with it."
"You're being nice to me," he sighs, leaning on me with his full weight. "Will you kill me in my sleep?"
"I'm beginning to consider it," I groan, slipping out from under him and he crashes onto the couch with an, "Ow."
I throw a blanket over him and give up altogether on falling asleep.