Page 20 of Queen of Ashes and Scars
Leo’s ribcage slowly rises and falls in the front passenger seat, and the sight of him so peaceful is bittersweet. I need to speak with him, and soon. Everything has changed overnight, and now that I am Queen, I will not let him suffer. Even though it means he’ll leave me…
My throat shrinks at the thought, and tears well in my eyes.
Alec combs my hair away from my face, the gesture so gentle, I feel like I might break. “How do you feel about your brother’s death? Truly?”
I swallow hard, a batch of red, sticky tears spilling over my lids. “I was so mad at him before we heard the news… I still feel I ought to fly over to France and yell at him, but he’s gone. I guess it hasn’t really sunk in yet.” My family is gone. The Delacroix empire is crumbling, and I’m standing alone in the ruins of a dynasty that lasted two thousand years. It makes me feel both incensed and exhausted, and I hide my face in my palms. “Maybe it would be better to just…disappear.”
Alec’s hand glides down my arm in a soothing manner. “I’ve hunted my share of outcasts. You’d never be safe again.”
A fresh batch of anger chases away my desperate train of thought. “I was joking—mostly. I will fight for my kingdom. To the death, if I have to.” I crane my neck around to look him in the eyes. “What about you? We both lost a brother today.”
A shadow passes over his handsome face. “Jasper was my brother by blood, but I barely knew him. Beaumonts aren’t really big on family, except when it comes to intrigue and power. Jude is more of a brother to me than Garrett or Jasper ever were.”
Anyone else might not be able to detect the trace of regret in his measured voice, but I do. Royals don’t have a chosen family. We’re meant to put blood first, always, but when blood goes sour, shouldn’t we be able to choose who we keep by our side?
I squeeze his hand, thinking we were both slighted most by the people who should have had our backs. “Family’s hard.”
“Family’s wretched.” He checks his phone at that, the gesture meant to appear casual, but I detect a hint of moisture in his golden-rimmed eyes. “Jude and Bella are safe for now. They’ve taken refuge in the city.”
A small smile escapes me. “I’m glad to hear it.” I rest my head on his shoulder again, my heart in my throat. “Victor was manipulating me when he sent me to Brazil, but he was right about one thing. If we don’t start to uphold our laws better, the shadow world will crumble. If we vampires keep fighting amongst ourselves, we’ll just make it easier for another demonic faction to take control. I need to rally Peter Chastain to our cause. And maybe Garrett—”
“Jasper said that Peter thought you were dead, so that seems to indicate they weren’t working together, but I don’t know… He might have been lying.”
It’s the second time now that Alec’s mentioned Jasper’s odd comment about Peter, and it’s…interesting. I don’t see Peter as the type to hire an assassin. He already holds all the political cards, and my brother had already confirmed him as his Prime Minister. Why would he need to have him killed?
“We’ll need more than words to test their true allegiances. I need to learn how to control my powers.” I lower my voice even more, speaking directly into Alec’s ear. “It’s a rare opportunity, really. At first, I could only catch a random thought from you or Leo, but when I spoke to the witch using only my thoughts…something shifted.”
He arches a curious brow.
“I think I could learn to control it better, instead of just picking up random thoughts. The same way you learned how to speak mentally with the other royal guards…it’s there, close enough for me to taste it.”
“Can you read my thoughts now?” Alec asks, his face wrinkling with a mix of worry and fear.
“I want to try something,” I say quickly. His grimace spells out exactly how unappealing me probing around his private thoughts sounds, but I take hold of his hands. “Please. If I control it better, I won’t invade your privacy by mistake and only use it on the people that deserve it. I swear.”
This power could drive people away from me, even people I care about. Hell, I wouldn’t want anyone hearing my private thoughts—that’s just not a recipe for great relationships. But I’ll have to test many loyalties and alliances to sit on the throne of shadows. “If I use it wisely, this power could make me a great queen.”
“Oh…alright,” Alec says begrudgingly.
We sit knee to knee, and he grips both my hands in his. “When we learned thought-speech, they stressed the importance of starting with eye contact.”
His hands are both strong and soft in mine, and I’m struck by his willingness to help me despite his own preferences. “That could prove distracting. You have the most beautiful eyes.”
His frown deepens for a moment like he’s wondering if I’m being sarcastic, and he searches my face. Whatever he finds in my expression causes him to relax, and he cups my cheeks. “Thanks, Lucky.”
The path between our two minds is strangely familiar, like finding an overgrown trail in the forest. Brambles obscure the path, but I just need to cut away the branches and thorns.
Alec pulls his brows together.“1, 2, 3…testing. Humpty Dumpty sat on a wall…”he thinks, the thoughts jumbling together like a waterfall of children’s rhymes and sarcastic quips.
It’s too easy.
“Is it working?” he asks on the verge of excitement.
“No. Think of something you’d never want me to know.”
I concentrate on his irises, the golden rim incredibly beautiful and distracting. It takes me straight back to our night together, when he looked down at me with such care and awe. I shift, trying to concentrate on the task at hand and not on how I wish he’d climb back on top of me… As I extend my mind and push through, I keep bouncing off a wall of defense in Alec’s mind, his thoughts veiled in shadows.
I squeeze his hands. “You’re too nervous. It feels as though you’re guarding your thoughts, knowing I could come in and steal them at any moment. Just…relax.”
