One of the guards blocked my way and grabbed my arm.
“King Bramain wants to see you urgently. You’re to go straight to his bed chamber. Those are our orders.”
This motherfucker right here. I shoved him back to get his hands off me.
“Lemme ask you something, man. Do you see the King anywhere out here?”
The head guard was trying to look assertive, but as his eyes faltered, I could tell he knew he’d seriously overstepped. Laying his hands on me? Fucker was lucky I didn’t punch him right in the face.
“No, sir,” he replied.
One thing these guys understood was the chain of command and thank fuck for that.
“Exactly. You defer to me. And my orders are that you wait here for five fucking minutes. Got it?”
All at once, all six guards stepped to the right to get out of my way, with a clatter of armor and plate, and in unison they barked, “Yes, sir.”
Sometimes it was damn good to be the prince. I booked it around the corner to the entrance to my own quarters. It was a forgettable, shitty little wooden doorway, and that was how I liked it. The door looked like an access closet for the chambermaids, but it wasn’t. It was my gateway to my own private world. I made my way up the dark staircase and through another small door, and then emerged into what was known as the Ruined Tower.
From the outside, it looked abandoned and neglected. But on the inside, it was every bit a palace—my fucking palace. With its own private dungeon.
In my dressing room, I stripped naked and splashed my face with cool water from the wash basin. Then I dried myself with a fresh towel and wiped down my arms and chest. I didn’t give two shits for appearances, but I smelled like a farm and the cool water cleared my head.
Once I was clean, I put on a fresh shirt, clean britches and my boots. Then from my dressing table, I grabbed the thing that I both needed and hated. Desired and loathed.
My mask.
It was made of Damascus steel, fold-forged and oil quenched. Dark ripples of carbon interwove with lighter layers of silver. Lightweight and strong, I’d had it made by a metalsmith that I’d brought over from across the south sea. On one hand, it protected others from the discomfort of seeing my scars. It saved me having to answer questions about how I got to be the way I was.
But on the other hand—way more important—it protected me from having to show my true self to the court and those in the castle. The real me, the one that I had allowed Iris to see, was something I guarded aggressively.
The masked me could be anybody, and I liked that. It kept the queen, especially, on her toes. Not being able to see my face made her uncertain and nervous around me. Just like the bitch deserved.
I sniffed hard, fastened the leather strap behind my head, and looked at myself in the mirror. I’d been told that if a mask could be handsome, it was. Possibly. All I knew for sure was the masked man that looked back at me wasn’t who had fallen in love with Iris. This guy? He was a mean son of a bitch who gave no fucks about anyone except himself.
The masked prince was a bastard.
In every sense of the fucking word.
We took the long way to our destination, through the castle courtyard and past the barracks, before my father’s soldiers left me at the door of his bedchamber.
The guards weren’t cleared to move through the castle interior without specific orders, and apparently they weren’t willing to leave my attendance at my father’s bedchamber to my whims. Probably sensible, since every fiber of my being longed to be back with Iris, but irritatingly formal nevertheless.
As soon as they were gone, leaving me with only his room guards, I placed one hand on the doorknob, and with the other, I removed my mask, not having any idea what to expect inside.
But what I found was far worse than anything I could have imagined.
My father lay in bed. It had been a few weeks, maybe a month since I’d see him. Not because I didn’t care, it was simply that over the years my hiding and staying in the shadows felt right. I retreated into my own world and my father never begrudged my isolated leanings.
But, seeing him now, he was a changed man. He looked like he’d aged decades. Now I understood his guards’ rush to get me back here.
I went to his bedside, and though he looked weak and old, the light in his eyes was still there. Gone was the strong, authoritative lion that I had come to know as my father, but he wasn’t totally lost to me yet.
This was the man that had secured my safety, even in the face of the queen’s disapproval. This was the man who had made sure I had a safe and happy upbringing, even if it was in secret. This was the man who had made it clear that, bastard or not, masked or not, I was his heir.
This was my father, the man I loved with my whole fucking heart. This was the only man who had ever shown me any love. This was the king. And the king was dying.
He smiled at me, trying to look like his old self, but death’s shadow was coming upon him close and fast.
“There’s my son,” he said, reaching out to grasp me by the forearm. He always used the Roman handshake with me. Our secret signal, ever since I was a kid.
I remembered how massive his forearm had felt when I was young. And I noticed how thin and weak it felt now. “What the hell happened to you?” I asked.
He grunted. “A bunch of bullshit is what. I’m not long for the world. And we need to talk.”
I sat down on a chair next to his bed. “You were fine the last time I saw you.” I poured him a cool glass of water from the pitcher at his bedside and he took it from me. For a second, I thought that bitch of a queen might be poisoning him. But I suspended judgment for the time being.
“My heart,” he said, coughing a little as he swallowed. “Leaking blood, they tell me. I said it broke when your mother died. But the doctors said otherwise.”
“What the fuck do they know?” I said, knowing full-well he had the best care in the land. “Let me take you to Elaina. You yourself say she’s the best healer that there is.”
My father laughed softly. “She raised you to be as blunt as she is, and I’m glad. Your mother would have been happy to know her best friend had become such a good substitute for her own presence in your life. But no, son. Not even Elaina can help me now.” He clasped my hand. “I need you to get ready to step forward as the heir. I need you to prepare yourself for your duties, not as my son…but as the king.”
I growled. We’d had this conversation a thousand times. He knew how I felt.
I didn’t want the kingship and never had. I had thought about telling him to make it simple—write up a device for succession that named the queen as his heir. But as many times as I’d had that idea, I’d scrapped it.
Over the years, due to the circumstances of my birth, there were stories and rumors that she was responsible for my mother’s death, and my disfigurement. My father had fallen in love with my mother, a low born who grew herbs and flowers that were delivered to the castle. Their affair resulted in my birth, and as was considered proper, it was kept as quiet as possible. The queen, however, was certainly made aware, and since she’d never produced an heir—whether by design or simply chance—I was a threat from the moment of my birth.
My father had always refused to listen to the whispers of the queen’s hand in the death of my mother, or of her being behind my injuries. For him, what mattered was that their marriage secured the crown and our family line, but she was a cruel and dangerous harpy of a woman. For the royal family, the kingdom came first, even when it broke your heart.
If any part of the rumor was true, and she could order an infant set on fire, she’d fucking destroy my father’s legacy and revel in watching the kingdom burn.
But that still didn’t mean I wanted the job. “There’s got to be someone else.”
My father deadpanned me and flared his nostrils. “Ah, yes. One of my thousand other sons fathered out of wedlock. I’ll just send a flock of carrier pigeons and give the crown to whichever one sh
ows up first, shall I?”
It was good to see that even though he felt like shit, he hadn’t lost his acid sense of humor.
I blew out a long breath and stood, walking over to the window. This fucking life of mine. I had just started to figure out a balance between being a faceless royal and a man who could live and love. I had just started to let myself begin dreaming about a life with Iris.
And now this. Motherfuck it.
It broke my goddamned heart—not just my father’s illness, but what it meant for me and Iris, too. If I ascended to the throne, marrying Iris would be impossible. Any match I made would have to be planned and strategic, as my father’s marriage had been. Equal parts strategy and fucking misery. Great. Worse still, I’d never know the pleasures of Iris’ body. I’d never know how she sounded when she came so hard she cried.
My father had taught me about sacrifice. Even our damned family crest said it: “All for the kingdom, always for the kingdom.” Becoming king would mean I couldn’t be with Iris.
But as long as I was in power, I could guarantee her safety and well-being, and as best I could her happiness. I could still fucking obsess over her, every waking hour of every fucking day. Even if I couldn’t have her, I could take some fucking comfort in knowing she was safe and wanted for nothing.
But if she married someone else, I’d lose my motherfucking mind. Some other son of a bitch, putting his hands on my woman? The very idea made me want to punch the fucking walls. I could feel the sting of the stone on my knuckles already.
And yet, I wanted her happy. I wanted her fulfilled. I just didn’t want some other guy anywhere near her. The idea of her fathering some other asshole’s child? I’d kill him; didn’t matter who it was. Absolutely fucking positively not an option.
Christ almighty. All that would have to wait. For now, I had to deal with what was in front of me. If I were to be king, it would be on my terms: no strategic marriages, that was for goddamned sure. I loved a woman who I couldn’t marry, so I wouldn’t marry at all. I hated the idea, fucking hated it. But the way I felt didn’t change a goddamned thing.
I thought for a moment of bringing her here. Making her my mistress. But the thought sickened me. Mistresses were common and discarded as trash and treated as such by the court.
As was my own mother.
No, I could not do that to Iris. I could not have her if not in the bright light of day.
“But will the kingdom even accept a bastard prince? Will they accept this as their ruler?” I pointed to my face.
“They will,” he said, calm and certain. “You need to let them see you. Get rid of the mask. Show yourself. If you’re patient with them, they’ll be patient with you. And they’ll love you, just like I do.” He made a fist and pressed it to his heart. “I swear it.”
I turned away again. He’d told me that before, but I’d never believed him until now, thanks to Iris. She had accepted me—she had shown me that maybe I wasn’t so fucking horrifying as I’d always thought. I went back to the passion of our kiss and the white-hot need I felt when I was near her. I let it run through me like straight whiskey. Every fucking drop of that heat filled me, until my whole body fucking burned with the pain of loving her.
We were doomed. My life would be agony without her; but better to have tasted her once than never at all.
This was what fate had dealt me. It was my duty to accept it. And so I turned to my father, reached out my hand to clasp his arm, and nodded.
“If it’s what you want, I’ll do it.”
He squeezed my forearm, his old strength returning to his grip, and he smiled.
“Long live my son. Long live the King.”
Chapter 7
Randal
My heart was heavy as hell as I left my father’s bedchamber and put on my mask. He told me he was sure he’d see me again, and I fucking hoped so, but I had no idea if it was true. I took a deep breath to steel myself and then passed the guards outside his room.
I needed to think, and that meant I needed to be back in my own space as soon as possible. I knew the castle like the back of my hand, and so knew I had two options. I could go back the way I came, past the barracks and in through the door at the other end of the main castle but risk seeing more people. Or I could save myself time and irritation by going straight through my least favorite place in the entire goddamned kingdom: the royal private garden.
The place was seriously fucking creepy. According to Elaina, the healer who had for most purposes adopted me and brought me up as her own, she and my mother used to tend it for the old queen, my paternal grandmother, before she passed.
It was inside an open-air courtyard, and in those days it had been beautiful and purposeful, planted with all manner of medicinal herbs and flowers. Now it contained the most dangerous goddamned plants that anyone could possibly imagine. I’d learned about herbs and medicines from Elaina, I knew which plants were used for healing and which ones were used to cause harm. Even as a young man, I’d been completely aware of what the queen had planted there.
The royal private garden was its official name.
Bullshit.
Better to call it what it was. The Queen’s poison garden.
Queen Patara had filled it with monkshood, hemlock, nightshade. Snakeroot. Foxglove. Oleander. Every fucking plant she’d cultivated could kill a man quicker than the last. And I never spent more time there than was absolutely necessary.
But today, she was one step ahead of me. Bitch that she was, she wasn’t stupid, I had to give her that. As I rounded the corner to take the path that went straight through the middle of the garden, I saw her there waiting for me. She was trying to be casual about it, even made a fake-surprise face to say, Oh, it’s you, but I knew her game. It was a fucking ambush.
“My lady,” I growled, trying to pass her without having to have a conversation.
But her guards blocked my exit and she whirled around, placing her thin hand on my arm. She looked like death. Always had. As she’d aged, the veins in her hands had gotten more pronounced. They were bluish now, and they gave her skin a greenish tint. I’d seen snakes that looked more human.
I narrowed my eyes at her. Though I always wore a mask in her presence, I’d gotten pretty goddamned skilled at sending her leave me the fuck alone messages with my eyes.
“How is your father?” She asked.
Here we go. The bitch wants to talk.
“Dying. But he said he feels blessed that you’re not at his bedside. I think that was the word.”
She tightened her thin lips. “He did not say that.”
“What the fuck do you want, Patara?” I said.
She hated when I called her that—fucking hated it. Nobody was ever supposed to call her only by her first name. It was a crime punishable, of all things, by disfigurement by fire. Fucking hilarious. That was exactly why I did it.
If the rumors were true that she’d ordered me burned to death as an infant, I never wanted her to forget for a single goddamned second that she was responsible for how I looked—or how I acted. The fucking monster I had become. That was on her and nobody else.
She swallowed her ever-present rage, and tried to put on a kind face. Didn’t work at all.
“I’m really sorry about your father. I am.”
I inhaled hard, spotting a nearby cluster of monkshood. Strange how the deadliest plant can be really fucking beautiful.
“Can we cut the shit? I’ve got things I need to do.”
“Fine, you asshole,” she snapped, dropping the facade. “I’ve got an offer I’d like to make you.”
I stared down at her. She had dark circles under her eyes. The skin of her chest was leathery and wrinkled. Fuck almighty, I hated her guts.
“An offer.” I repeated, venom in my words as I knew nothing good was coming.
“Yes,” she said, hooking her arm around mine and leading me through the garden like we were friends. She always smelled like roses on the verge of rotting.
> “I know that your father would like you to be king. But I know full-well that you don’t want to be king at all. I, on the other hand, would make an excellent leader of the kingdom. But that can only happen if you abdicate. Or, even better, refuse the crown in the first place.”
Blah, blah, fucking blah.
“I’m not hearing an offer.”
She stopped walking and looked up at me. “I could pay you any sum that you ask. Name your price, I’ll meet it. You could go across the seas. Live in bliss with all the money you could ever need. Exile is a wonderful life, or so I’ve heard. You could find some nice blind girl to suck your cock and she won’t even have to see your face when she does it. Sounds wonderful, doesn’t it?”
How about I strangle your evil ass right the fuck now?
As much as I wished I didn’t have to become king, putting this woman in power was not an option. And I knew, that was my second motivating factor outside of granting my father his last wish and taking the throne.
“Know who loves exile? Former queens,” I said, and moved to push past her.
“Don’t you dare turn your back on your queen,” she snarled. “You are not yet the king, and you should take care to remember that.”
I turned on a dime, towering over her, with my arms crossed over my chest. I stepped into her, crowding her space and making her back up. The only way I found her bearable was when she was moving away from me.
“Here’s the thing, Patara. Unfortunately, I know you well. Under your rule, this entire kingdom would be royally and completely fucked. A bonfire for unwanted babies? Mass executions for the aging? Is that your plan for the first hundred days of your reign? No fucking thank you. I actually care about the people of this kingdom and that’s exactly why I plan to be their king.”
Masked Prince (Fated Royals Book 2) Page 5
