Chapter 28 28

Chapter 28 28

Oberon's POV

I had never felt such fury. It scorched through my veins like flame, driving my wolf to howl for blood.

Esmeralda was a threat not only to Eudora, but to the entire palace. Playing them for suckers with their compassion and their sense of duty. Battering us all with insanity and desperation.
I had trusted her once. Had considered her a friend. Had spent years of my life with her.

And now here she was, standing with poison at her lips about to become a monster. Willing to murder its own civilians simply to hurt my feelings. To hurt Eudora.

“And do not even think about it,” I told Eudora when I noticed the math in her purple pupils. Watching her balance her own life against others. "She is bluffing. She won’t actually drink any of that.”

But even as I uttered them, I knew that those words were a lie. Esmeralda looked determined to me, I thought that she was thinking about it. Someone flinging wild desperation because nothing is left.

She absolutely would do it.

Some folks, when backed into a corner, got unpredictable and dangerous. Esmeralda had crossed that line in the meantime, though. Had moved from wounded to vengeful to bat crap crazy.

“Drop the vial,” I said, and forced my voice to be calm. Reasonable. "We can talk about this. We can work something out. No one has to get hurt.”

Esmeralda laughed with a hard, cracked laughter. "Talk? Like you spoke to me, when that was your words when you threw me out? Did you listen when I told you about her?”

She waved at Eudora with her free hand, which the vial wobbled dangerously in. "I loved you, Oberon. For years I loved you. Waited for you. Supported you through everything. Had your back when everyone else bailed.”

Her voice cracked with emotion. “And you were able to replace me with her in weeks. You threw away all those years of friendship, of partnership, for some girl you hardly know. Children come, including the daughter of your enemy.”

I watched Yamal shift a bit, trying to position himself. Attempting to find a lever to disarm his sister without setting her off on the sauce.
But Esmeralda noticed, turning her head sharply in his direction. "Do not try it, brother. I’ll drink this if anyone fucking flinches. If anyone so much as eyes me in aggression.”
The vial rattled at her lips, and a drop of the inky liquid nearly fell.

Eudora took a step forward, and I swear my heart stilled in that moment. “Hold on," she murmured, hands reaching up in a truce.

I wanted to pull her back. To prevent her from being in danger. From offering her very life for creatures that weren’t even of her pack.

But something in her voice gave me pause. Convinced me she was in control.

“Esmeralda you are the truth,” Eudora went on softly. Compassionate. "I took something from you. Something you wanted. Something you had dreamed was years away.”

Trill trembled, but she did not shake the vial.

“I didn’t get to pick this,” said Eudora, very truthfully. “I didn't decide to be his mate any more than you decided not to be. The Moon Goddess decided. Fate decided. Not us. We’re just both living in a world where we are suffering the consequences for things we can’t control.”

“And that’s going to make me feel better?” Esmeralda's voice was sharp, cutting. "That fate chose you over me? For the universe itself to deny my existence in favor of you?”

“No. No,” Eudora said as honestly as she could, shaking her head. “It’s not supposed to make you feel better. It’s supposed to make you understand that this has nothing to do with worth. Nothing to do with who deserves what.” She took another slow step forward. “You are so beautiful, Esmeralda. You are strong, so capable. Any man should be so lucky as to have your love. To earn his place inside your loyalty and devotion.”

I watched the scene in silence. Eudora was showing compassion for someone who had tried to destroy her. Someone else was threatening to kill everyone she loved at that very moment. It was so perfectly her. Finding the humanity where it was easy for others to be angry. To see that the suffering was inherent in any cruelty. “But Oberon and I,” Eudora continued, “we’re slaves to something neither of us can control. Something that has nothing to do with deserve. It just is.” She was close enough, now that Esmeralda touching her would have made it simple touch. Close enough that the first heartbeat of the transformation had already begun. “I know what it is like to lose everything,” she said softly, her voice dropped so low it was almost a rasp. “Like my family, my home, my whole world was destroyed in one night. To wake up and discover that all of my history, everybody I cherished, everything I ever knew was gone.”

Genuine drops of tears slipped from her eyes. Not deception. Not seduction. Just real sadness. “The pain of it. The injustice. It makes you want to lash out on others. Punish them for your misfortune. Ruin everything because your OWN world was wrecked.” Though Esmeralda’s eyes started to water, she spat out, “Do not act like you know me. You do not understand the ugliness.

"I get it," Eudora protested, her voice hard but with a hint of softness. "And I am sorry. So sorry you’re hurting because I exist. That I was the choice of the mate bond, not you. That’s not fair, and I wish it were otherwise.”

Slowly, she extended her hand toward Esmeralda. “But a vial of that won’t cure anything. Your anguish will not be alleviated, and it won't bring back Oberon. It will only add more death. More suffering. More innocent people affected by something outside of their control.”

I actually thought Eudora's words were getting through for a second there. Had thought her compassion was reaching beyond Esmeralda's anger to the pain below.

Esmeralda's hand lowered slightly. The vial was an inch, maybe a little more, away from her lips. Not much, but something.

“I wanted to matter,” Esmeralda said in a whisper, breaking down. "To be chosen. To be loved. Shoot to be the opening act instead of the next in line for a promotion.”

“You do matter,” said Yamal, speaking for the first time since she had walked into the room. His voice was heavy with telegraphed emotion. "You are my sister. You will always matter to me. Even after everything. Even after this betrayal."

Esmeralda glanced at her brother, and the real pain that swamped her look was something she couldn't avoid. Pain and regret and shame. “Yeah, I've gone and fucked that too, haven't I? Screwed it all up by being bitter and jealous and spiteful.”

Yamal stepped forward with caution, peace held high in his hands. "You made mistakes. Bad ones. But they don’t have to be you. They don’t need to be the end of your story.”

Another step. "Put down the vial. Let us help you. There’s got to be a way through this that doesn’t result in more death.”

I watched the moment that Esmeralda made her decision. Saw her hand relax. Saw the vial beginning to descend, drifting clear of her lips.

Such a wave of relief overcame me I almost collapsed in my knees.

Then movement caught my eye.

One of the soldiers who had given evidence against Eudora. The one who is young and has dark hair. He was bounding along at inhuman pace.
Not toward Esmeralda. Toward Eudora herself.

His eyes were turning black. Spreading from the pupils outward. Infected all along. A sleeper, waiting for the proper time to awake.

I acted on ingrained reflexes, pivoting aside. My body flowing between forms. But I was too far away. Eudora i am can not reach in time.

"Eudora!" I bellowed, horrified as the infected warrior grew long claws. Reaching for her throat. Going for the kill.

She was frozen. Unprepared for this new threat. Still focused on Esmeralda.

I was still too far. Running as fast as I could, but knowing with sickening certainty that I wouldn’t make it. Would not get to her in time before those claws ripped into her flesh.
Then Esmeralda was there.

She was the fastest of us, had moved ahead. It was faster than it theoretically should have been. Flinging herself across behind Eudora, in front of the infected warrior.

His claws ripped into her instead. Tearing across her chest and abdomen. Ripping wounds so deep I could see bone.

The vial left her hand, spinning in the air. It crashed to the ground and broke. A black liquid ran over the stony floor, steaming and smoking like acid.

Esmeralda crumpled, blood spilling from her cuts. Pooling beneath her. Too much blood. Fatal amounts.

But she was smiling. Staring up at her brother with something that made peace. Something like redemption.

“This time I picked right,” she wheezed, blood boiling from her mouth. "Tell Oberon. Tell him I am sorry. For everything. For all the pain I caused."

Yamal was the one to catch his sister as she fell, his face turned with sorrow. With grief. "No. No no no. Esmeralda, don't leave me. Please."

I arrived at them a moment later, taking care of the warrior by communicating to its skull in no uncertain terms. I ripped his throat out with my claws. My jaws crushed his skull. He was already dead by the time his body fell to the ground.

But the damage was done.

Esmeralda was dying in the arms of her brother. Her sacrifice the last thing any of us could have anticipated. A last act of one who had been selfish, cruel for so long.

and Eudora dropped to her knees beside them, tears streaming down her face as she took Esmeralda’s hand in hers and I suddenly had an epiphany.

My make had transformed an enemy to a hero - just by being kind and understanding. Had transcended hate to reach into the person beneath. Had extended grace, when she had no right to give any.

She was remarkable. Extraordinary.

And I was just madly, irrevocably in love with her.