Page 35 of The Promise Born
“Kiala, stop!” Asante chased after me. But I ignored his call and ran until my lungs burned from the effort.
“Why are you doing this? Stop running!”
“I can’t I have to keep running.” I doubled over, gasping for air but keeping my back to him. “No, I can’t stop.”
“What is this?” He demanded. “Tell me they’re wrong. They have to be mistaking you for someone else.”
“If I told you that now, would you believe it?”
“You’re really their daughter?” I heard him move closer to me, but he stopped. “Kiala, just tell me, please.”
“Asante, please.” I wanted him to leave me alone with my shame, but he refused.
“Talk to me, Kiala. Help me understand this.” He tried to mask the pain he felt, but his voice trembled in an unfamiliar way. This was the first time I’d heard him be truly unsure of himself.
“I am the promise born.” I turned to face him as I spoke. “That’s what they call it in Frostspire. First born to the king and queen, next in line to rule.”
“You are?” there was hope in the question. He wanted me to tell him I wasn’t who they said I was. This was the last grasp at preserving what reluctantly grew between us.
“Yes.” I crushed that hope.
“Why would you hide something like this?” Asante stepped back from me. “How could you lie about who you are?”
“You talked about how it sucked to be second born. How your brother overshadowed you. Did you never think about running away from that?” I swallowed my emotions. “I was first born, Asante. Thrust into a life predetermined for me. Nothing about my life was a choice I could make for myself. From how I spent my time as a child to who I would eventually marry. My parents had it all mapped out before I said my first words.”
“You could have told me.” He shook his head. “I would have understood.”
“I was going to tell you, Asante.” I paced. “If this hadn’t happened, I would have told you myself.”
“When, Kiala? When were you going to tell me?” He turned away from me for a moment, as if regaining his composure. When he looked at me, I could see the hurt he tried to bury behind a mask of anger. “You know it is impossible for us to be together. Fire dragons and ice dragons aren’t supposed to do this! Why would you let me share so much of myself with you?”
“I didn’t ask for this, remember? You forced me to be here.”
“Right, so I’m to blame for your dishonesty?”
“That’s not what I mean. The point isn’t to place blame.”
“You’re to blame, Kiala. Do you not see how you’re accountable for this? Your people thought you died! Your family, your sister!” He shouted. “Did you ever stop to think about her? Did you think about how she would feel without you? Have you imagined what her life must have been like without her brother there by her side?”
“Her brother?” I frowned at him and then it hit me. Asante’s rage wasn’t for my people or my sister, it was for him. For the loss he felt when his brother died. “Asante-,” I stopped when he held his hand up to me.
“Prince Asante.” He corrected me. “To you, I am Prince Asante.”
“Wow. So, everything just stops now?” My eyes burned with unshed tears. “I understand that you’re hurt right now. And I get how this makes you feel, especially after everything you’ve been through. I should have seen that before, but does that erase everything? How you felt about me? That ends?”
“You’re not who I thought you were.” His jaw tightened as he looked at me. “The person I thought you were would never lie about something like this.”
“You knew nothing about me.” I pointed at him. “You saw me and decided I was the one for you before you even knew my name. You held me to a standard in your mind long before I would have ever been able to show you who I am. And now, because I made a choice to take ownership of my own path, you’re judging me again? You don’t know what my life was like. You have no idea how hard it was for me to walk away from everything! How can you stand here and talk to me like this?”
“I should have let my mom continue with her search.” It looked like Asante was ready to cry but he held it back.
“What do you mean?”
“I stopped her. Caught her aides leaving your room with things and I told her to back off.” He paced for a moment. “She was going to have my uncle look into you. That’s what he used to do, find the things no one else could. If I hadn’t talked her out of it-,”
“You did that?”
“Yes, because I felt you deserved your privacy. Had I known this is what you were hiding from me, I wouldn’t have stood in the way. You should have told me!” He swallowed back his emotions. “This wouldn’t have been this way.”
