Chapter 306: Your Father Sends His Regards, Morgana

He did not step closer.

But his eyes slid past Draeven’s shoulder, and found hers.

They held her.

They were pale, and calm, and quite empty, like winter ponds. For a moment, she saw nothing behind them at all. Then, very slowly, the smile on his face changed. It became something quieter. Something almost tender. Something that made the skin on the back of her neck rise.

He leaned, just slightly, to one side, so that his voice would reach her past the king’s shoulder. He spoke very softly. It was hardly more than a breath.

"Your father sends his regards, Morgana."

The world stopped.

She heard it with perfect clarity. Every word. The pillars, the light, the sound of her own heart, all of it went still.

"He has been looking for you," said Carrick, "for such a very long time."

He bowed.

He turned, unhurried, and walked away across the marble toward the great doors, with the two guards falling in at his sides. His boots rang on the stone. His silver coat gleamed. At the threshold he paused for an instant, and looked back over his shoulder, and smiled.

Then he was gone.

Morgana stood where she was.

She did not move. She did not speak. She could feel Draeven’s hand around hers, hot and tight, and the sudden rigid stillness of all three kings. She could feel Kaelen saying her name, low and urgent, and Thorne’s shadow wrapping close around her like a cloak.

But all she could hear was a voice in her head.

A woman’s voice, cold and calm, from a pale room.

Your father is alive. He knows you exist. He is looking for you.

And, behind it, small and cracked and eighteen years old, another voice, in a dark kitchen, saying with absolute certainty:

Your father is dead, Morgana. He is dead, and he is never coming back.

On the high windows above the empty hall, a single long crack ran silently across a pane of glass, and the first thin lace of frost began to bloom along its edge.

They didn’t let go of her until the door closed.

She didn’t remember walking there. The great hall, the gallery, the long staircase, all of it had slid past in a grey blur while three bodies moved around her like a moving wall. Somebody’s hand was at her elbow. Somebody’s shadow was cold against her back. Somebody was saying her name, over and over, patiently, in a voice she knew.

Then a door clicked shut, and the blur stopped.

She was standing in the east study.

It was the same room. The long desk. The maps pinned flat under their iron weights. The big chair by the window where, only yesterday, she had sat across from three kings and said no, that’s all of it. Afternoon light fell through the tall panes in long bars across the rug. Somebody had lit the fire.

Corin’s voice came muffled through the wood. "I’ll be right outside, my lord."

"Let no one in," said Draeven.

"No one."

His boots receded half a step and stopped.

Morgana stood where she was.

"Sit," said Thorne.

She sat down slowly.

It was an armchair, wide and soft. She didn’t remember choosing it. Someone put a cup in her hand, and it was warm, and she looked at it as though she had never seen a cup before. Then she looked up.

The three of them were standing in front of her.

None of them were speaking. They were just looking at her, with an unguarded alarm that made her want to look away. Draeven’s golden eyes were fixed on her face. Thorne had folded his arms tight, as though he were holding something in. Kaelen’s jaw was clenched so hard that the muscle jumped.

"I’m all right," she said.

"You’re not," said Kaelen.

"I will be." She reassured.

"You’re white as milk."

"Kaelen," said Draeven quietly.

"I’m only saying it."

"I know. Say it more softly."

Kaelen drew a breath, held it, and let it out through his teeth. He turned, very abruptly, and walked to the window.

She watched his back.

He stood with both hands braced against the sill and his head lowered. She could see the rigid line of his shoulders and the faint silver glimmer climbing his jaw, the scales he never quite remembered to put away. The air around him was cold enough to fog.

"I’m going to kill him," he said, to the glass.

"No," said Draeven.

"I’m going to walk down to the east wing, and I’m going to take him by his pretty coat, and I’m going to...."

"No." Draeven repeated more firmly this time.

"Draeven....."

"You will do nothing of the sort." The first king’s voice was quiet, and utterly flat. "Carrick Greythorne is a guest of the crown. He is surrounded by his own men and ours, and the council is watching to see what we do. If you break his neck, every lord in that hall will say he spoke the truth."

"He threatened her mother."

"I know."

"In front of everyone."

"I know, Kaelen."

"He stood there and smiled....."

"Kaelen."

It was Thorne.

He had not raised his voice. He had only spoken, low and clear, and Kaelen stopped as though a hand had closed on his collar. Thorne stood with his arms still folded and his dark eyes on his brother’s back.

"It wasn’t a threat," he said.

Kaelen turned his head.

"I thought so, too, when he began. A threat, wrapped in kindness." Thorne’s voice was thoughtful. "But a threat is meant to make a person stop. This was not meant to make her stop. This was meant to make her listen."

"Listen to what?"

"To the last thing he said." Thorne’s eyes shifted, at last, and settled on Morgana. "Everything before it was a door held open. He wanted her to come to the end of the hall with her heart pounding, and then he said it so that none of us would hear."

"But we heard it," said Kaelen.

"Yes."

"He knew we would."

"I think he wanted us to."

Morgana looked down at her cup.

"It wasn’t a threat," she said. Her voice came out odd and thin. "It was a message."