Page 85 of Queen
The silence afterward is absolute. Only the drip of blood on the wood marks the vow.
The Pact: A Marriage Beyond Flesh
The silence after Santino’s storming exit tastes like iron. Heavy. Metallic. The kind that hangs after a gunshot, when smoke still coils through the air but the body hasn’t hit the floor yet. Every head in this hall swivels back to me, waiting to see if I’ll falter.
I don’t.
My hand is still cut, palm slick with blood, warm and real. I lift it higher, gripping Zina’s tighter, holding it where everysoldier, every cousin, every crooked priest can see. Our blood mingles, a dark red ribbon dripping down both our wrists, splattering against the velvet tablecloth.
“You came here to measure a man,” I say, my voice carrying to the furthest shadows of the hall. “But you’ll leave knowing a kingdom has already been claimed. Not just by me.”
I turn to her. Zina stands tall, black silk sheathing her like a blade, chin tilted high like she’s daring anyone to challenge her right to breathe. My Queen. My ruin. My salvation.
“This woman is not an ornament. Not a trophy. Not the echo of Giovanni’s shadow,” I snarl. “She is the hand that steadied my blade. The voice that cut through betrayal. The mother who carried fire through blood and bone.”
Murmurs ripple, sharp and uneasy. Some men bristle, shifting in their seats. Others lower their eyes, unwilling to meet her gaze. They’ve seen her. They’ve watched her claim ground not with speeches but with scars.
Then Romeo rises. For once, he doesn’t hesitate, doesn’t linger in his brother’s shadow. He steps to the head of the table, boots striking like a drumbeat. His gaze flicks to Zina, sharp, reluctant—and then, in a move that freezes every breath in the room, he bows. Deep.
“To the Queen,” he says. His voice doesn’t falter. It echoes.
Gasps ripple. A capo crosses himself. One of the older lieutenants mutters a prayer under his breath.
Zina doesn’t move, but I see it—the flicker in her eyes, pride twisted with something heavier. Because for every bow, she knows there are knives waiting.
I raise our joined hands higher, crimson dripping onto Giovanni’s old oak floors. “She carries not just the name,” I growl, “but the fire that forged it. If you kneel to me, you kneel to her. If you betray her, you betray me.”
The weight of it presses into every man. Chairs scrape. Some stand. Some bow their heads. Others stay seated, rigid, defiance tightening their jaws. The room bends, not all of it, but enough to shift the current.
Zina turns her head, her gaze meeting mine across the blood binding us. For all her fire, her eyes shine with something dangerously close to vulnerability. I squeeze her hand harder, blood running into hers, binding us in front of every witness.
Then I speak the words that cannot be unsaid: “This pact is beyond flesh. Beyond marriage. Beyond crowns. This is legacy.”
The vow hangs like smoke, choking the hall. Some kneel. Some curse. And deep down, I know—this vow crowned us both, but it also split the empire clean in two.
Private Fallout: Fractured Brotherhood
The doors slam shut behind us, and the mask I wore in that hall cracks down the middle. My veins are still singing with fire, but here, in the silence of my private quarters, it feels less like triumph and more like chains. The ritual chamber was for spectacle. This room is for rage.
I rip the crystal decanter from the sideboard and hurl it before I even think. It explodes against the far wall, shards raining down like shrapnel, amber liquor streaking the wallpaper in jagged lines that look too much like blood. Thesound is sharp, violent, satisfying—for half a second. Then it leaves only the echo of my fury.
“Fucking Santino.” My voice is a snarl, guttural, almost inhuman. “Walking out like a goddamn child while the family watched. As if he had the right to turn his back on me—on us.”
Zina doesn’t answer. She leans against the window frame, her black dress still shimmering faintly with the candlelight from the hall. Arms crossed, face unreadable. Her silence feels like judgment, but her eyes track me like a predator waiting to see if I’ll stumble.
I pace, a caged animal, blood still caked into the lines of my palm. Shards crunch beneath my boots, dragging across marble like broken teeth. Every breath burns.
“I should’ve put him on his knees right there,” I spit. “Dragged him back to the table, made him bleed for every disrespectful word. Instead he storms out, and half the fucking room is wondering if they should’ve followed.”
Her reply cuts soft, deliberate. “You didn’t lose the room.”
I whip my head toward her, fury flashing. “You think I don’t fucking know that? You think I didn’t see them hesitate? You think I don’t feel Giovanni’s ghost breathing down my neck every time one of those bastards weighs me against his memory?”
The words tear out raw before I can choke them back. My fists clench until fresh blood seeps from the half-healed cut, dripping slow and steady. Zina’s gaze flicks to it. She doesn’t move. She lets me bleed.
Finally, she asks the question that lands like a blade to the ribs. “Do you regret it?”
For a heartbeat, the answer claws at me. Regret is weakness. Weakness is death. But when I meet her stare, I know I can’t lie. Not to her.
