"This will be interesting, a civil war," Ashby pondered. "A civil war involving the most powerful regime ever to rule us. A war between the murderous, vicious father, and the son who hates him; imagine the consequences of such a thing, imagine the horror."
Braith stiffened as he turned back to them. Relief radiated from Melinda, hope gleaming in her eyes.
"Or imagine the wonder of it," she whispered. "Imagine the freedom that would come if such a tyrannical, ruthless ruler could be broken."
"Is it your love for Ashby that has so turned you against our father?" Braith inquired.
She tilted her head as she quirked a dark eyebrow at him. At that moment it struck him how very much she looked like their mother. He had never thought much of it; he hadn't thought much of his mother, as he was taken from her at a young age. His father hadn't allowed him to spend much time with a woman he was worried might coddle Braith, and weaken him.
The same thing happened with Caleb and Jericho. He wasn't sure when Natasha was taken away, and Melinda was a toddler when their father banished their mother from the palace. The king cared nothing for the youngest child who left with the woman.
"No, Braith, that isn't the reason. I have always hated him."
"I didn't realize that."
"You wouldn't."
Braith stared ferociously at her for a moment, but Melinda didn't back down from him.
"You were in your own world,” she said. “You were the prince, the future king; you thought nothing of the young sister who suddenly reappeared in your home. And once you lost your vision, I was even further from your mind, from everyone's mind. No one noticed when I disappeared for a day or two, sometimes even a week at a time. I am a nonentity in the palace, I always have been, and that is just fine by me.
"You had it far worse than I ever did, even with my early years outside of the palace walls. I understood my circumstances were better than the scrutiny and constant cloud of hatred and disappointment you had to live under. You were never going to be the monster father tried to make you. No matter how badly he treated you, no matter how often he beat you. Caleb should have been the firstborn son. He's the only one father even remotely approved of."
"It would have made things easier and father happier," Braith agreed without sorrow.
"Caleb may be harder to overthrow than father. If he hasn't already realized it, he soon will know he is the new heir apparent. He won't give that up easily, and the things he will do with the power..."
Melinda shuddered; her hand tightened on Ashby's, who looked just as appalled as Melinda. Even the vampire girl was watching them with protruding, wild eyes. What Caleb would do with that power would make everything his father had done seem petty and small. Blood would spill freely through the palace streets. Debauchery and death would rule.
"How were you able to survive the day mother was killed?" Braith inquired. He had never asked before, never thought to, or even given much thought to the fact his sister survived the fight that claimed their mother.
Melinda closed her eyes; her hands fisted in her lap. Pain flickered briefly across her features as her lip trembled. Ashby rested his hand on her shoulder and squeezed it reassuringly.
"Isn't that obvious?" Arianna asked.
Braith hadn't realized Arianna had awakened until she spoke. Her eyes were slightly swollen with sleep, but they were dark with pain as she sat up. Her question hung in the air; she waited for him to say something.
"No," he admitted, feeling as if he were somehow disappointing her by not knowing the answer.
Her eyes were filled with sadness as she rested her small hand on his face. However, the sorrow was not for her, or even for Melinda; it was for him. Braith was stunned by the grief he saw there, and he didn't understand it.
"Your mother sacrificed herself for Melinda," she said.
Braith frowned at Arianna as he seized her hand and pulled it away from his cheek. "How could you possibly know that?" he demanded.
Her full mouth was tremulous, and tears burned in her beautiful sapphire eyes. "Because it's how William and I survived."
Braith was taken aback. He turned toward Melinda, surprised to find his sister watching Arianna with compassion.
"Is that true?" he demanded. "Did our mother sacrifice herself for you?"
"Yes," Melinda confirmed.
Braith slowly digested this information. He hadn't really known his mother; she'd been kind to him during their brief time together, but he hadn't known what life had been like for her within the palace, or outside it.
"Why would she do that?"
It was not Melinda who answered, but Arianna. "Love. Simple, unconditional love."
He saw the need in Arianna’s eyes and the burning desire for him to understand. And he did understand. He understood the kind of love she was talking about, and what it was to die for someone else because he would die for her. A few months ago, before he met her, he never would have fathomed doing such a thing for someone else. Now, nothing would stop him from saving her life.
"I understand," he assured her. Her smile was tremulous; a single tear slipped free. He wiped it gently away. "What happened?"
Arianna’s eyes darkened, darted away, and then slid back to him. Her jaw clenched, and her chin jutted proudly out.
"Our father thought it would be best to hide us, not in the forest, but in a home,” Arianna said. “He felt if we were out of the woods, if we were living an almost normal life, we would be safe and blend in. We lived there for about a year, and then one day the troops came to raid the village.
"My father built a small room for all of us to hide in just in case that ever happened. It was a panic room of sorts; there was food, air, water to survive for days. We could have stayed in there until the soldiers left and my father came back. We could have all stayed in that room." Arianna's dark eyebrows drew together sharply. Her lips pursed and the awfulness of the memory etched misery onto her features and beautiful eyes.
"But you didn't?" he asked.
She focused on him as she seemed to come back to the present. "No, we didn't." Her tone was clipped and her voice ragged.
"Why?"
She appeared confused by this question. "I didn't understand at the time either. She put William and me in that room, told us to remain silent no matter what happened, and then she closed the door."
Braith took her hand as she shuddered. "And what did you do?"
She looked helplessly at him. "Nothing, we did nothing. There was nothing we could do. We were four years old, we were terrified, and we didn't know how to get out of that room. We tried, but we couldn't find the way out, and then they came into the house. We sat in a corner, and we held each other, and we cried. We did what our mother told us to do, and we listened in silence as they tortured and killed her. The entire time she swore we went out with our father."
He didn't think she was aware of the tears sliding down her cheeks or anything outside of the past she seemed to be trapped within. A past he would have done anything to take from her, but there was nothing he could do. There was no way to right her past, no way to ease her sorrow; all he could do was give her a better future.
He rubbed the nape of her neck as he tenderly kissed her forehead. She grasped his forearms, clinging to him as if he were a life raft in the sea of her agony.
"There was nothing else you could have done," he assured her.
A small smile curved Arianna's mouth, but there was no humor in it. "That may be true, but I'll never believe it."
He closed his eyes, savoring the amazing scent of her. She eased every awful thing inside of him. He trusted he did the same for her.
"Why didn't she go in the room?" Ashby asked.
"Because the soldiers would have torn the house apart looking for the three of them, so she sacrificed herself. She allowed them to torture her until they were satisfied her children weren't there. Right?" Melinda inquired.
Arianna nodded. "Yes. I believe that is why."
> Braith thought about the woman who had given life to Arianna, and in the end, saved it. He gave a silent thanks to her; he guessed the proud, brave, giving, and strong person before him was exactly as her mother had been.
"Is that what your mother did?" Arianna asked.
"I was older, not quite a child anymore, barely a teen when they came," Melinda confirmed. "My mother managed to get us upstairs before they invaded our house. She pulled us into one of the backrooms and using furniture she blocked the door to the best of her ability. She helped me out the window, pushing me down the small roof before assisting me to slip over the side. She promised me she would follow before I dropped to the ground. Instead, she scurried back up the roof, slid the window shut, and locked it. By then I could hear them breaking down the door and shoving the furniture aside to get at her. She fought them off to buy me more time to escape.
"I tried to go back in after her. But I was stopped by four of our servants. Mother was always kind to them; she always treated them with respect and kindness. She taught me to do the same, and over the years we became more like a family.
“I was young, and though they were not strong vampires, the four of them overwhelmed me. They forced me away from that awful place. One of them went back the next day for mother's body. We buried her in the woods beneath her favorite willow and marked her grave with a simple stone."
Arianna rubbed her thumbs leisurely over his hand. He was sorry Melinda suffered through such a loss; sorry she'd witnessed it. He hated the fact his mother had died, and known only terror at the end, but something else Melinda said had ensnared his attention.
"You didn't come back to the palace until you were in your twenties."
Melinda frowned at him. "I know."
"Then you weren't a young teen when she died."
"I was fourteen when she was killed, Braith."
A strange tension grew inside him. He had never asked Melinda her story and never thought much about it. Their mother, a woman he’d barely seen in the eight hundred years before her death, hadn't meant much to him. But, she was still his mother, and Melinda was his sister. He required answers.
"Where were you all those years, Melinda?" he grated. Arianna shifted nervously when she sensed his escalating tension and ire.
Melinda swallowed nervously; Ashby patted her hand reassuringly. "It's okay, Melinda, tell him."
"Tell me what?" When she continued to stay silent, he rose to his feet. "Tell me what?"
"Braith, give her time," Arianna urged.
"Were you with the rebels? Did they capture you after you buried her?" he demanded.
"The rebels?" Melinda inquired her confusion evident.
"The rebels who killed her," he snarled impatiently.
Melinda bit her lip, and Arianna rose to her feet beside him. He could hear the furious beat of her heart; she was already looking at him with concern, and her hand trembled within his.
"I never said rebels killed her," Melinda whispered.
Something stirred at the far edges of his mind as something sinister began to make its way through him. Braith straightened his shoulders and took strength in Arianna's presence at his side.
"Then who?" he demanded.
Melinda's lip trembled. Ashby rose risen to his feet and stepping forward, he placed his body in front of Melinda's, but Braith had no intention of going after his sister. It was the last thing in the world he was going to do.
"They were father's men, Braith. It was father's guards who came into that house. Father had her killed. I didn't return to the palace until I was accidentally discovered ten years later. I never planned to return; I hate the man, and I was certain he would kill me too."
Braith couldn't move through the outrage gripping him.
"Where were you all that time?" Arianna wondered.
"Hiding with our servants. It was dumb luck I was caught and forced back there. They presumed me dead, though the guards were honest with father and told him they hadn’t seen me. They assumed I died before the raid, or I was somewhere else and died later; they felt it unlikely I could survive and stay hidden on my own. I was in a village deemed a possible traitorous threat when they raided it. My servants, my family, were killed. If Jericho hadn't been with them, I probably would have been killed too, but even after all our years apart, he recognized me."
"Blood knows blood," Braith said. Arianna shuddered.
"He's the reason I'm still alive."
"Does he know what happened to our mother?"
Melinda gulped, and Ashby became edgier. "I hid it from him at first, but when he wanted to bring me back to the palace, I refused to go. I was afraid of what father would do to me. I became hysterical when he insisted I return, and when he tried to force me back, I spilled the story and told him why I couldn't return. He is the only other one who knows the truth.
"He told me to tell father I saw nothing the day our mother was killed; that the servants had taken me out shopping, and we discovered mother's body that night. I was to tell him I hadn't returned to the palace because I was uncertain of how to get there and fearful of wandering too far from the only home I'd ever known.
“He told me not to say anything, but he had to take me back. The other guards had seen me; there was no way he could let me go without looking suspicious. Father would continue to hunt me until I was uncovered again, and he would probably kill me when he found me. But if I went back on my own I would be able to keep my knowledge of events to myself. No matter how outraged and resentful I was, I had no choice but to return. All I could do was hope to escape one day."
"Jack knew about this," Braith grated. "The whole time."
"Jack?" Ashby asked in surprise.
"Jericho," Arianna answered when Braith remained silent.
He was furious his father had done this, and his siblings had kept him in the dark, furious he had stood by his father's side, and been a pawn in all of their lies and deceit. He understood the reasons why they hadn't told him, but he would like to throttle them all for their duplicity.
It wouldn't continue.
He may not be his father's heir anymore, but he was still a prince, he was still the next in line. He would set right all the wrongs he had so blindly followed.
"When Jericho came to live with us in the forest, he changed his name to Jack. It's what we know him as,” Arianna explained.
"It's who he is," Braith grated. "It's who he's been since he encountered Melinda. It was only six years ago that he broke free, officially became Jack, and allowed the other side of him to come out. He left the palace with no intention of ever returning to it."
The betrayal was sharp and far deeper than he expected it to be. When Jack took Arianna, Braith realized Jack had changed and was no longer the brother he’d always known, but Jack hadn't been that brother for far longer than Braith suspected.
Arianna leaned against him; she released his hand to wrap her arm around his waist and hold him close to her. Her forehead rested against his chest; he could feel her distress and knew it was for him.
"Why didn't you tell me?" he demanded.
"Because we were trying to keep you safe. No matter how little you knew our mother, your sense of duty, your sense of responsibility, your sense of honor would have driven you to go after father, and he would have killed you. We decided to wait, to bide our time until we thought there might be a chance to take father down."
"And you believe that time is now?"
Melinda's gray eyes flickered, and sadness crept into them. "If you asked me that five months ago, I would have said no, but I didn't know Jericho had immersed himself in the resistance until he took her, and I would never have guessed you'd decide to relinquish your title for a human.
“You are a powerful ally, Braith, the rebels are powerful allies, and I believe even if we weren't expecting it that yes, this is the time. Things are rapidly changing, and I don't think there is any way to stem the flow of this tide. Not anymore."
"Were you eve
r going to tell me?" he asked.
"One day. We weren't entirely sure when we were just waiting for the right moment. I never expected you to fall in love with a human, your blood slave, and to have her be one of the prominent figures of the resistance no less. How could anyone have seen that coming?"
Braith took strength in Arianna's presence and unwavering love and loyalty, but it couldn't ease the betrayal festering inside of him. He thought Caleb and Natasha were the deceitful and manipulative ones. Apparently, he was wrong. It seemed they were all dark and twisted in their own ways, and they all kept their secrets from each other.
"What a trusting family we are," he drawled sarcastically.
"We were only trying to keep everyone as safe as possible," Melinda said. "If father had known anything..." Her voice trailed off; horror filled her gaze as she shook her head. "Awful, it would have been awful."
Braith silently agreed, but he wasn't willing to concede anything to her. "Your father used the war as an excuse to kill your mother, and probably Melinda, but why?" Arianna questioned.
"Because he didn't use the war as an excuse to kill our mother, he used it as an excuse to start the war."
Arianna jumped in surprise at the new voice, but Braith had sensed Jack's steady approach a few minutes ago.
Braith smoothly pushed Arianna toward the wall as he turned to face his brother. He couldn't stop his instinctual urge to protect her from the people who entered the room. Even before she uttered the word dad, he knew immediately which one of the seasoned, disbelieving, infuriated men was her father.
And that man was mad enough to kill.
Chapter Sixteen
Aria tried to take a step toward her father, but Braith held her back. The muscles in his ridged arms clamped against her, the taut muscles of his body rippled beneath his clothes. She hadn't missed the fact Braith had turned her, putting her in a more secure position and using his body to defend hers.
There was no reason for him to protect her though. This was her father, her family. As she watched, William and Daniel slipped into the room behind Jack and her father.
The Captive Series 1-5 Page 34
