by V. St. Clair
“Oh!” Jessamine had thought Gareth disappeared just to get away from her, but he had actually taken her desperate plea as an order and followed through. The unexpected kindness caused another wave of emotion and she fought back tears a second time.
I need to get out of here before I starting crying and screaming in front of everyone.
“I tried to convince him to stay, to support you if for nothing else,” Reya said quietly. “I’m sorry he couldn’t find it in himself to manage it. I think tonight has been fairly unpleasant for him as well.”
No need to say who ‘he’ was. Jessamine grimaced and said, “Is there a plan for getting me out of here, or are you winging it?”
Reya leaned forward and said, “We’re both going to keep these very serious looks on our faces for a minute longer, and then you’re going to tell our new Viceregal something urgent has come up that requires you to return to the Augenspire, but that he should stay and maintain appearances at the party so no one worries too much. Lorna is already waiting in a speeder for you.”
“Remind me of this during performance reviews and I’ll double your raises.”
Reya smiled briefly and then said, “It’s a deal.” She fidgeted with one of the beads on her necklace and said, “Package delivering in five. Stand by.”
Jessamine summoned up the last of her calm and walked back to Darius with a regretful look on her face.
“I’m sorry, but I need to return to the Augenspire to deal with this.”
“Are you kidding?” he demanded. “It’s our wedding night!”
“The bad guys don’t care what day it is,” she replied. “This is what my life entails—we don’t get days off.”
Darius frowned and said, “Should I come with you?”
“No, I want you and Shellina to stay here and keep up appearances. No one else needs to know anything is wrong, so keep dancing and networking and I’ll see you later.”
“After the reception, should I—join you?” he asked awkwardly.
Jessamine’s stomach flooded with ice.
He wants to know if he should come to my bedroom tonight…
The very thought made her want to vomit, or scream. She may decide to face a night with him soon, if only to avoid distancing him, but it would be unbearable tonight.
“No, I’ll brief you in the morning,” she explained, already backing away.
Darius looked momentarily disappointed, but then she turned and was walking towards the nearest exit.
Look relaxed, look relaxed, don’t fall apart until you’re alone…she chanted the mantra in her head as she made her way through the south door and into the fresh air.
Blessedly, Lorna was waiting in the aerial speeder as promised, and Jessamine hurried over to it and climbed into the back seat, a massive weight lifting from her as they took flight and sped through the emergency lane towards the Augenspire.
Without the eyes of thousands of people on her, Jessamine finally began to cry, softly at first, struggling to remain quiet and wiping furiously at her eyes with her hands to stop the stream. A strangled sob escaped her lips, and then she was unable to hold it back any longer, crying unrestrainedly into her hands as they approached the Augenspire.
Lorna, wonderful person that she was, didn’t look back at her or say a word in consolation. In fact, she didn’t speak at all for the duration of their trip, landing carefully near a side entrance and walking behind Jessamine to watch for threats as they entered the building. Jessamine could only fathom what the woman was thinking about her Vicereine right now, which only made her cry harder.
Nothing was going right for her today, so she anticipated half the building to be awake and working on the ground floor when she walked in, but miraculously she encountered no one as they hurried towards the nearest elevator and hit the button for the two-hundredth floor.
Jessamine’s tears began to subside on the ride upwards, though she knew her makeup must look ghastly in the glaring lights and small confines of the elevator. Still, Lorna didn’t look directly at her or call attention to it, stepping lithely out of the first lift to check for people before waving her out and onto the second one.
By the time they reached the three-hundredth floor, Jessamine had control of herself again, though she felt wrung out from crying so hard. It had been a long time since she had broken down. When they reached the top floor, Lorna stayed behind on the elevator and Jessamine mumbled, “Thank you” as she departed.
She knew she was alone on this floor, as everyone else of high enough rank to live or be here would be at the reception right now. She left the lights off, crossing through dark rooms with only moonlight to guide her until she reached the safe haven of her rooms at last. She thrust her wrist at the biochip reader and pushed the door open, shutting it hard behind her and slumping against it with her eyes closed, fighting back a fresh wave of tears and exhaustion.
A single tear slid down her cheek as someone said, “Jessa—what’s wrong?”
Fear thrilled through her at the realization that someone else was in her room, and she reached for a weapon she didn’t have until she saw who was sitting on the couch.
“Topher?!” she gasped, the last of her adrenaline burning out. She sank to the ground and began to cry horribly in front of him, which only made her angry at herself for letting him see her like this, which made her cry harder.
If Topher was shocked or uncomfortable, he hid it well. There was something of her pain reflected in his expression when he stood up and moved closer to her, crouching down in front of her and resting his hand on hers.
“I hate everything about today,” she said through tears, struggling to regain mastery of herself. “Hanna had to stand in for my dead mother, no one could stand in for my dead father, and I hated every beautiful thing about the Laurel because all I could see in it was my sister. Darius is still an ass, and when he isn’t being an ass I goad him into it because it makes me feel better to dislike him. I spent most of the night talking to people I barely know, who were only there to suck up, knowing half the room was talking about my dress choice or my makeup or any other stupid thing about me. And you promised to dance with me but you just left without saying a word, and I just feel so—ugly—like I’m rotting away from inside and this job is going to be the death of me and sometimes I don’t even care. And now here I am, crying like a madwoman in front of you—”
“Jessamine, I love you.”
He said it with the air of a person standing at the edge of a cliff who was determined to jump without looking at the ground below. In her haze of unhappiness, it took a long moment for the words to sink in.
“W—what?” she asked at last, no longer crying.
“I have loved you since I was fifteen years old,” he said calmly, though Jessamine could see the tension behind his eyes. “Do you remember Ground-Commander Derek?”
Hearing him say the words she had dreamed of for so long made her wonder if she was actually asleep and had made up this entire day, but her elation took a detour at the mention of Commander Derek.
“Of course I remember him; why in the world is he relevant right now?”
She was fourteen at the time and had a mad crush on the commander, who was twenty, handsome, and extremely popular. Everyone had known about her feelings, as she had been horrible at concealing them, and though Derek acted professionally in public he would give her little smiles in private, or take her hand for a moment in passing, little acts of encouragement. She’d made a complete fool of herself over him, until the day a Sky-Captain accused him of assault.
Jessamine had been devastated and was immediately convinced the woman must be lying, though she forced herself to go with her father to see the Sky-Captain and hear her story. The bruises on her and the shame in her eyes were real, and it had been devastating for Jessamine to accept that the man she adored could do such a heinous thing.
For some reason, Jessamine’s father had appointed her as the judge in the case, giving her con
trol of Derek’s fate. At the time, Jessamine had no idea why he would have done such a thing, knowing how she’d felt for Derek, but later she had come to believe he did it as a test of her character.
She didn’t like being reminded of that unpleasant day at a moment like this.
“I had recently been promoted from the Halstead conflict, so I was in attendance at his hearing,” Topher explained. Jessamine, who barely knew of Topher at the time, had no idea he had been present that day.
“Why—why does this matter?” she asked, still confused.
“Everyone knew how you felt about Derek. He was wildly popular and a great commander. If found guilty, the punishment was a dishonorable discharge from all government service for life and ten years in prison, thanks to your father’s hard stance against assault.”
“He wanted to discourage bad behavior as much as possible.” Jessamine shrugged, still not seeing where this was going. “It was one of the things he was most memorable for.”
“But he was not the judge that day,” Topher said softly. “You were.” He paused before continuing. “We all believed you would find him innocent—hell, there were bets on it. Even Derek wasn’t worried, sitting in the courtroom looking mournful and giving his sob story about how she was making it all up. The only one who didn’t look shocked when you found him guilty was your father. You were crying when you stripped him of all honors and dishonorably discharged him, and when he was screaming at you to change your mind while the jailers carried him away. That was when I decided I loved you.”
Utterly shocked by this, Jessamine blurted out, “Why? I consider it one of my most embarrassing failures of all time. I was stupid enough to like the man, not knowing what a viper he actually was, and ran around like a love-stricken idiot in front of half of the Augenspire.”
“For me it was one of your greatest moments of strength. You wanted the Sky-Captain to be wrong. You wanted to continue believing in Derek. Even though it crushed you to do it, you did the right thing, and you sent a clear message to anyone who thought you were going to be a soft ruler that you would always choose the right thing, no matter the cost. You have been that woman ever since, and I love you for it.”
Jessamine turned her hand and tentatively laced her fingers between his.
“Then why are you just telling me this now? Why didn’t you stay and dance with me tonight?”
Topher sighed and said, “I didn’t even want to tell you tonight, to be honest, but Hanna cornered me.”
“Hanna?!”
“She seemed to think you were depressed, and she thought you would be happier if I told you how I’ve been feeling all these years, though I don’t see what possible good can come from it. We argued about it at the reception, and ultimately I came back here to think about it and ended up in your room. I have no idea what I was planning to do if you came in here with Darius; come to think of it, are we expecting him soon?”
“No, not tonight,” she replied, still feeling dazed. “I can’t believe Hanna would tell you to do this; she’s always been so against the idea of us because it’ll make trouble with the Hamish alliance.”
“I think she just wants you to be happy.” There was a question in his eyes, like he wasn’t sure how his declaration of love was going over. It occurred to her that she hadn’t actually responded to it yet.
“I love you, too,” she said at last, and some of the tension seemed to leave his body. “I have for a long time now, but you were always so self-contained and hard to read. I had no idea you even liked me, or I never would have agreed to this marriage to Darius.”
Topher winced as though she had said something painful and got to his feet.
“I’m not sure if I feel better or worse hearing that. Knowing how you feel won’t make it any easier for me to watch you with him.”
Jessamine got to her feet as well, tripping on the hem of her dress and catching herself with a frustrated, “This stupid dress!”
“I like it,” Topher admitted with a glance. “It shows off your scars well, though it’s practically begging your enemies to try again.”
Jessamine laughed at someone finally understanding her and threw her arms around him, burying her face in his shoulder and taking a moment to just breathe him in. She drew her face back a moment later and kissed him.
Topher’s normally-stoic expression faltered and he raised his eyebrows in surprise and said, “We shouldn’t—”
“You don’t want to?” Jessamine looked up at him.
“Oh, I want to very much…” he acknowledged, so she kissed him again, drawing it out longer this time.
“It just seems like a bad idea,” he mumbled between kisses, though he held her more tightly.
“Why?”
“I can’t remember.” He wrapped his arms around her, pulling her up against him.
Jessamine pulled his suit jacket off and tossed it to the side as they stumbled backwards towards her bedroom. She didn’t care whether she was doing the best thing, or even the right thing. Just once, she wanted something for herself, not for Elaria. She sincerely hoped no assassins would break into her room again tonight, because she was determined to enjoy her wedding night, even if it was with the wrong man.
19
Carl Vucanis
Carl had never felt more awkward at a party.
After only being a member of the military for weeks, he suddenly found himself surrounded by a horde of government employees, socialites, and high-ranking businesspeople at the Vicereine’s wedding, and he hardly knew any of them by name. Thousands of Gifted partied outside and in the city, and he could have shed his uniform and enjoyed time in more familiar territory, but it would have been career suicide to miss out on this invite.
The result was him walking around aimlessly for hours, trying to ignore the looks people gave him at being in military uniform and also wearing an emblem, like the two were an impossible combination.
Well, for a long time, they were.
He felt like an exhibit at a zoo, and could only imagine how much worse it must be for Jessamine living every day of her life under such a microscope.
He had seen a few people he knew tonight, and had stopped for several brief exchanges with them, trying desperately to network and fit in even though he still wasn’t entirely sure who the right connections were.
It was by complete coincidence that he backed up into the new Viceregal, nearly tripping the man mid-conversation.
“I’m sorry!” he apologized immediately, though the Viceregal just laughed it off and stumbled a little on the spot, cheeks flushed with energy and alcohol.
“Not to worry—have a drink!” he grinned. “Drinks are on me tonight!”
I thought they were on Jessamine.
“Oh, um, thank you, Excellency.” He stood there awkwardly for a moment and then said, “Excuse me,” and turned away.
“Wait a minute,” the Viceregal stopped him, grabbing him by the arm and nearly startling him into using his Gift. “Is that an emblem around your neck?” He looked flabbergasted, his mouth gaping open dumbly.
“Yes, sir.”
“But you’ve got on an officer’s uniform!” He seemed confused and upset by this, his voice pitching slightly higher. Carl hoped to quiet him before others began to notice and cause a scene.
“I am a Ground-Captain. The Vicereine has been trying to integrate the Gifted into various roles in the government.” It seemed odd to him that her husband wouldn’t already know this, but he had no idea how much they spoke or what the man was like beyond this brief meeting. He couldn’t imagine Jessamine ever getting sloppily drunk at an event, and found the encounter with her husband doubly-uncomfortable for it.
“Oh, right.” Darius waved a dismissive hand at the idea. “She seems determined to get us both killed with her love of you people,” he continued tactlessly. “I’m surprised she didn’t marry one of you all instead of me.”
Before Carl could do anything other than open his mouth in shock
, Vicerina Shellina took Darius’ arm and said, “Darius, that’s enough. Why don’t you go dance with Augusta? She’s been dying to talk to you about her birthday party next weekend.”
The Viceregal immediately latched onto the suggestion and wandered off in the direction she pointed.
“My apologies for his behavior,” Shellina said to Carl, perfectly sober and put-together, despite an evening spent dancing and flitting about the room socializing. “He is in full support of my sister’s effort to integrate the Gifted back into society, as are we all.”
Carl, stunned at speaking to the Vicerina directly, merely said, “People say all sorts of things when they’ve been drinking. I take no personal meaning from it.”
“Good,” she smiled. “Then may I express my very dear hope that you will not share what he said in a moment of silliness with anyone else?”
“Of course, Excellence. I understand.”
“Good.” She smiled again, glancing briefly at his emblem. “So you’re the captain everyone is talking about.”
“Oh, are they?” He had no idea what the appropriate response was in this situation, and suddenly wished he could go back to being ignored in this room full of people.
Before she could respond, someone tapped Shellina lightly on the shoulder and she turned and said, “Major Andro! You look absolutely dashing tonight.”
Carl’s gut turned to ice out of sheer reflex at being in the presence of a Provo-Major, though he imagined he had probably walked past at least a few of them tonight. It was hard to spot them out of their signature armor unless their enhancers were uncovered, which somehow made them more terrifying.
“Thank you, Vicerina. I took your advice on the green shirt.”
“And didn’t it turn out wonderfully?” She beamed at him.
“I’ve received a number of compliments for it. As always, I bow to your expertise in these matters.”
Suck-up, Carl thought privately, mentally filing as many details as he could about this Major and trying to remember whether anyone had told him if he was one of the good or bad ones.
