*Maddy*
Cassian looks like absolute hell. His legs are stretched out on the couch in the informal den on the third floor, a place with a high-tech stereo and several bookcases stacked with magazines and board games. It’s normally a happy, relaxing place, but his presence sucks the very life out of the castle, let alone this room.
A wiry old man with bottle-cap glasses inspects the gleaming metal arm now attached to Cassian, replacing the right arm he lost in battle. I’m speechless, in total shock as I hover nearby, standing on my toes to look over the shoulder of the stooped old healer.
“Now, try to curl your fingers,” the healer says in a graveling voice. His nose crinkles with delight as Cassian does exactly that, the metal fingers flexing, then curling inward. “Incredible.”
Dark circles line Cassian’s eyes, and his normally handsome face is hollow and expressionless as he wordlessly goes through the exercises instructed by the healer.
Isaac stands nearby, his arms crossed, with a pinched expression on his face. I glance at him only briefly before turning back to the spectacle in front of us.
“And it turns into a paw when he shifts?” I ask, unable to help myself.
“Yes, my Luna. That’s exactly how it works. How….” He trails off, straightening, and turns to Isaac. “Well, that is your magic, Your Highness.”
I turn fully to Isaac, wanting a complete retelling of how exactly Isaac was able to craft this piece of machinery. Obviously it has to do with his strange powers of turning locks, manipulating those small gears, but he looks bored, uninterested.
I’m buzzing with excited energy, however.
“This is a marvel!” I grin, clapping my hands. “Cassian, it’s really just–just wonderful–”
Cassian gets off the couch and moves like a swift wind toward the door. He pulls it open and walks out without a word.
My chest twists, a deep ache thrumming back to life as my eyes meet Isaac’s. Isaac steps forward, a broad hand on the shoulder of the healer, and leads him out of the room toward his office with the promise of payment leaving his lips.
The men darken the doorway for only a moment before they’re gone, leaving me behind.
I wring my hands. I have two choices. Follow Isaac and try to get him alone to talk about what to do with his heartbroken Beta, or talk to that Beta directly.
I suck in a breath and tear myself from the room, hurrying down the hallway after Cassian’s scent. It mingles with Hannah’s. It’s something I’ve never noticed before, not until her absence from the house became more and more notable. I wonder if people can catch my scent on Isaac, and vice versa. It’s a mate thing, I know that much, and it breaks my heart even further as I grab my coat from a hook near the door to the back terrace and pull it on.
I can see Cassian in the back garden, his red hair shining in the stark sunlight. It’s cold today, a thick layer of ice and frost dusting over the shrubs and wilted flower beds. It hasn’t snowed, not yet, it’s been far too dry and cold.
I pull on a pair of boots and open the door, stepping out into the frigid sunshine.
He turns his head at the sound of the door shutting behind me.
“Can we talk for a moment?” I ask, curling my ungloved hands over the railing.
“Of course, Luna.”
“As friends, Cassian.”
He turns back to the shrubbery, the frozen grass crunching under his boots, but he makes no further moves toward the back gate that leads out into the woods. I sigh heavily, my hand gliding over the frost covered railing as I walk along the terrace and down the steps.
Cassian towers over me as I step up beside him, his broad frame casting me in a cold shadow. “Your new arm is very pretty.”
A ghost of a smile lifts one corner of his mouth, but it vanishes as quickly as it came.
“Have you tried to shift with it?”
“Earlier this morning,” he says, his words catching the air in a puff of white mist. “It worked. It’s stiff, but it works.”
“That’s great.”
He starts walking, and I follow, my steps hurried to keep up with his long stride. He leads us toward the gate, but he doesn’t go through it. He looks longingly into the woods now painted in silver frost.
I shift my weight from foot to foot. There’s so much I want to say to him, to ask him, but I settle on, “I’m sorry, Cassian.”
“She’s alive,” he says softly, his metal fingers curling around one of the iron bars on the gate. “I feel her everywhere, like part of her is still here. I just can’t–I can’t find her. I can’t find a way to get to her.” His words are clipped and coarse, and the strain in his voice carries over to the pressure he’s putting on the iron bar. It bends, the sound of twisting metal breaking through the air. “I have to find her and bring her home.”
“I know,” I say as calmly as I can. “We’re trying–”
“There’s no way inside. No way over the mountains. I looked everywhere. I can’t get to her. I can’t–” His voice cracks, just like my breaking heart.
I reach out and place a hesitant hand on his back, the two of us facing the woods. “Ella is taking care of her. She’ll find a way to bring Hannah home. I know she is, and I know she will.”
“We didn’t know Ella,” he says, his voice shifting to something cold and full of fury. “She lied to all of us.”
“She didn’t lie–”
“She did lie. She had these powers all along. Dangerous powers. Hannah loved her, and followed her blindly wherever she went, including–including there, to Eastonia. A place none of us can get to.”
“We’re trying, Cassian. Isaac’s doing everything he can to get in touch with them.”
“That’s the thing you’re not understanding, Maddy,” he breaths, looking down at me with fiery contempt in his eyes. “If he–Ryatt–wanted to get in touch with us, he can. How, I don’t know, but he can cross the veil. He hasn’t. Not since Ella went with him. How do you know she’s not also in danger? That this wasn’t a trap, or worse, that she’s just as bad as him, and is keeping Hannah there as her maid, as a slave–”
“Stop it,” I command, the voice I use as Luna cutting through the air. “You know that's not the case.”
“I don’t know that for sure,” he says, the iron bar in his hand snapping into pieces. He steps away from me and pulls the gate open. In a flash of dark red fur, his clothing shredding at his feet, he darts away in his wolf form into the woods, his metal arm glinting in the sunlight until he disappears.
I stand frozen, my heart barely beating.
I don’t know how long I stand there, my thoughts tangling, when Isaac’s voice drifts through the air behind me.
“He’s angry, Maddy.”
“I know,” I choke, wiping my tears on the backs of my hands before turning to my mate, who stands a few feet away now.
“He’s agreed to stay here, at the castle, while we’re in Maatua–”
“And you trust him to actually do so?” I snap, my eyes blurring with tears. “The Cassian we knew and loved is gone–”
“He lost his mate, sweetheart.” Isaac steps up to me and takes me in his arms, pulling me into his chest as tears flow freely down my cheeks. “But he still knows his duty to this kingdom. We’re going to Maatua. We’re meeting with my parents and the priestesses from KiloKilo. They may have answers for us, for him, and I made him a deal. If he stays and does his duty to me, his king… when I return, he will be free to continue his hunt for Hannah.”
“And if he goes against that promise?”
Isaac stiffens briefly then sighs. “He knows the consequences. I didn’t have to voice them.”
I curl my fingers into the back of his coat and nod grimly. If Cassian abandons his post, it will be seen as an abandonment of the royal family he serves, of the kingdom he swore to serve and protect. He would be cast out, banished.
If it had been another king, he might even be killed.
I close my eyes against the thought and snuggle deeper into Isaac’s touch. Several moments pass before he says, “Are you ready? The midwife is here.”
I chew my lower lip and nod, letting him step away and slip his hand into mine. His touch warms my ice cold fingers as he leads me back to the house.
Inside, the warm air makes my skin tingle as Isaac helps me out of my coat. As far along as I am, it’s still surprisingly easy to get in and out of my clothes on my own, but my belly is growing by the day, much faster than I thought it would.
I curse under my breath as I try to bend to take off my boots. Isaac chuckles softly and steadies me, reaching down to pull them off.
“Was your mom as big as I am when she was pregnant with Ella?” I ask, my cheeks burning with frustration.
“I don’t remember. I was very young when Ella was born.”
I huff a breath as I pad down the hallway with Isaac. Just walking up the grand staircase has me out of breath, my lungs singing with effort.
Finally, we reach our bedroom, where the midwife and her nurse are waiting patiently for us. An ultrasound machine beeps and buzzes next to the bed. Excitement blooms in my chest, temporarily replacing the constant ache that’s become a normal, daily feeling.
“Are you excited?” the nurse asks as she helps me against the pillows on my bed.
“I am.” I grin then look up at Isaac, who is watching the midwife set up the ultrasound machine. “It’s been a few weeks since we saw the baby.”
“He’ll look more like a baby now then a little tadpole,” the nurse, a very kind and pretty woman in her mid-thirties, says with a beaming smile. She squeezes my hand before walking over to the midwife to help finish setting up.
Isaac sits on the side of the bed, his hand resting on my thigh. He seems a little nervous, but he always is when it comes to me and the baby. “We’re fine, Isaac. I’m perfectly healthy, just as big as a whale and nowhere near the finish line.” I grumble the last few words.
The nurse comes back and gently lifts my shirt.
The midwife applies the gel then smooths the doppler over the rise of my belly, her eyes on the screen until a strong heartbeat fills the space between us. Isaac lets out his breath, his shoulders sagging with relief. “See?” I say to him, “I told you.”
He looks down at me with a smile, but then the midwife says something under her breath that neither of us catch. We turn to her to find her furrowing her brow at the screen.
“What is it?” I ask hurriedly, sitting up a bit. “What’s wrong?”
“Nothing’s wrong,” she says slowly, almost to herself as she moves the doppler to the other side of my belly. Again, a strong heartbeat fills the air. She swipes the doppler to the other side of my belly again, the heartbeat cutting out, then restarting. “Oh, my Goddess. How did we miss you?”
“What?” Isaac says, standing. His expression is unreadable, a mingled look of shock… and joy…
“Oh, my Goddess,” I say as the screen is turned in my direction so I can see what everyone is looking at. “There’re two of them.”
“Two big, healthy boys,” the midwife smiles, looking between me and Isaac. “Congratulations, Your Highnesses.”
But Isaac’s expression wavers, a sudden anxiety lighting behind his eyes. “Two boys,” he says softly, as if disappointed. “Two kings.”