Chapter 73 Chapter 73

Chapter 73 Chapter 73

Twilight's POV

The cut on my side hurt worse once the gold light faded.

That's usually how it goes with me. While Ryaknorg's power is moving through me I don't feel half of what I should feel. The second it settles back down, everything I ignored comes due at once. I sat on the steps of the throne dais because my legs decided sitting was happening whether I agreed to it or not, and Devonye dropped down next to me before anyone else could even react.
"Let me see." She said.

"It's fine."

"Twilight."

"It's fine, Dev."

She gave me the look. The one she's been giving me since we were nineteen and I told her a sword wound was fine when it very much was not fine. 

She didn't even argue this time, just reached over and pulled my shirt away from the cut without asking permission, the way you do with someone you've patched up a hundred times before.

"This is not fine." She said. "This needs stitches, 
not opinions."

"Later."

"Now."

"There's a king sitting right there having the worst day of his life, Dev, I can't just—"

"He'll still be having a bad day in ten minutes." She said. "Sit still."

That's Devonye for you. We've fought side by side since before either of us knew how to do it properly, since we were both just angry kids with stolen blades and nothing to lose, and somewhere in those years she became the person who tells me the truth even when I don't want it. 

Especially then, actually. She's never once let me talk myself into something just because I wanted to believe it.

Isla was across the hall, and I could feel her wanting to come over the way you feel someone's attention land on you even with your back turned. She didn't move though.

Couldn't, not with half the court still standing there working out what they'd just watched. Whatever Isla and I are to each other isn't some secret nobody's ever heard of. People know. Some people. Enough people that it's dangerous, not so many that it's safe. There's a difference between an open thing and an accepted thing and we've been living in that gap for a long time.

She caught my eye for one second. I gave her a small nod that meant I'm okay, stop worrying, and she gave me a look back that meant I don't believe you but I'll let it go for now.

Devonye saw the whole exchange and didn't comment, which from her is basically a hug.
The king still hadn't moved from the throne.

"Someone get him down from there." I said, loud enough to carry. "He doesn't get to sit up high while we sort this out."

Two of Prati's people went and helped him down, not gently, not roughly either, just efficiently, the way you move furniture. He looked smaller on the ground level. People always do once you take the height away from them.

James was still on the floor where I'd put him. Breathing. Just unconscious. I'd checked before I let myself sit down, because as much as I hate him I wasn't about to be the reason he died on a throne room floor with half the court watching. That's not justice, that's just becoming him.

"What do we do with James." Prati asked, coming to stand near us.

"Lock him up." I said. "Somewhere he can't talk to anyone and nobody can talk to him. We deal with that properly, not in the heat of the moment."

"And him." She nodded toward the king.

I didn't answer right away because I genuinely didn't know yet. There's a version of me that's wanted to watch that man suffer since I was eight years old and didn't know why everyone looked at me like I was a problem to be managed. 

And there's another version that knows revenge isn't going to fix what's broken in this kingdom, it's just going to feel good for about a day and then leave a mess for someone else to clean up.

"Hold him." I said finally. "Same as James. We figure out the rest once I'm not bleeding on the floor."

That got a small laugh out of Devonye, which was the point, honestly. Easing the room a little.

That's when Alexandro pushed through the crowd.
I knew it was him before I even saw his face properly, just from the way the room shifted, people stepping out of his path like his anger had its own gravity. He stopped a few feet from me and just stood there, jaw tight, looking at me like I was something that had crawled up out of the ground specifically to ruin his life.

"You." He said.

"Alexandro." I said, and I kept my voice level even though I already knew where this was going.

"You walk back in here like you're the hero." He said. "Like none of this is your fault."

"Alex." Devonye started, standing up beside me.

"Don't." He said, not even looking at her. "Darla is dead because of her. You all know that. Everyone in this hall knows that and we just stand here and let her play savior."

There it was.

I'm not going to pretend I didn't feel that one land. Darla had been kind to me back when almost nobody was, one of the only people in the early camp years who didn't treat me like a problem with legs. 

And then she was gone, and Alexandro needed somewhere to put all that grief, and I was the easiest target in the room because of what I was, because of everything that had already attached itself to my name before I even understood why.

"I didn't kill Darla." I said quietly.

"You might as well have." He said. "Everything that happened to her happened because of what you are. Because of what followed you everywhere you went."

"That's not fair." Isla said, finally crossing the room, and I felt something in my chest tighten because I didn't want her pulled into this, not here, not in front of everyone, not when it could be used against both of us in ways that had nothing to do with Alexandro's grief.

"Isla, don't." I said quietly.

"No." She said. "He doesn't get to say that and just walk away from it."

Alexandro looked between us and something shifted in his face, calculation replacing grief for just a second, and I saw him understand exactly how much weight those two words carried if he chose to use them.

"Interesting." He said slowly. "That you'd jump in so fast for her."

The room went very quiet.

"She's my friend." Isla said, even and controlled, and I admired her for it even as my heart was doing something complicated in my chest. "I jump in for my friends."

"Sure." Alexandro said, in a tone that made it clear he wasn't buying it but also wasn't going to push it right now, not with this many people watching, not when there were bigger things on fire.

He looked back at me. "This isn't over." He said. 

"Darla deserves better than you walking around like none of it touched you."

He turned and walked off before I could answer, and the room slowly started breathing again, conversations picking back up in low murmurs, people pretending they hadn't just watched something very tense happen in the middle of an already tense day.

Devonye sat back down next to me. "He's not wrong to be angry." She said quietly. "Just wrong about who he's angry at."

"I know." I said.

"You okay?"

"No." I said honestly, because with Devonye I don't have to pretend. "But I will be."

She bumped her shoulder against mine, light, the kind of thing you do with someone you've known so long words aren't always necessary.

"Let's get that cut stitched." She said. "Before you fall over and make my life harder."

I let her pull me up. Across the hall, Isla was watching, and Nixon was standing near the doorway not saying much of anything, and I felt that particular old discomfort settle in my stomach when I looked at him, the kind that doesn't go away just because someone's useful to you now. He'd helped get us this far. That didn't erase what he did before, and I knew it, and I think he knew I knew it, because every time our eyes met for more than a second he looked away first.

Trust is a complicated thing to rebuild. Some people you let back in slow. Some people you never fully let back in at all, you just let them stand close enough to be useful.

I followed Devonye out of the hall, holding my side, with the king under guard behind me and James unconscious on the floor and Alexandro's words still sitting somewhere in my chest where I knew they were going to stay for a while.
It wasn't over. Not even close.
But for the first time in a long time, it felt like it was actually moving in a direction I'd chosen instead of one chosen for me.

Devonye took me to a smaller room off the main corridor, somewhere quiet, and made me sit on a table while she dug through a cabinet for something to clean the wound with.

"You know this is the third time I've patched you up this month." She said, not looking at me, focused on tearing a strip of cloth.

"Feels longer than a month."

"It's been a long month." She agreed.

I winced when she pressed the cloth against the cut and she didn't slow down or apologize, just kept working with the same steady hands she'd had since we were kids learning this the hard way, usually on each other, usually because nobody else was going to do it for us.

"Can I ask you something." I said.

"You're going to anyway."

"Do you think Alexandro's right."

She paused for just a second, needle already threaded, and looked at me properly for the first time since we sat down.

"About Darla?" She said. "No. You didn't do that to her. The kingdom did that to her, the same way it tried to do it to you, and he needs someone to be angry at because being angry at a system doesn't feel like anything. Being angry at a person does."

"That doesn't make it easier to hear."

"No." She agreed. "It doesn't."

She started stitching and I made myself hold still, breathing through it the way she taught me years ago, counting instead of flinching.

"You know I've got your back." She said quietly, halfway through. "No matter what anyone else in that hall thinks they know or think they're owed. You and me, that doesn't change."

"I know." I said, and I meant it.

"Even with her." Devonye added, glancing toward the door, toward where Isla had gone to deal with something else.

"I see it, Twi. I've seen it for a while. I'm not going to pretend I haven't and I'm not going to make you pretend either, not with me."

Something in my chest loosened, just slightly, the kind of relief that comes from not having to manage every single person in your life the same careful way.

"Thank you." I said.

"Don't thank me." She said, tying off the last stitch.

"Just don't die. That's the only payment I want."

I laughed despite myself, despite the ache in my side and the weight of everything still sitting unresolved in the hall behind us, and for a moment it actually felt okay. Not fixed. Just okay, the way things feel okay when you've got at least one person who isn't going anywhere.

I sat there a little longer after that, letting the quiet settle, letting my side ache in a way that finally felt manageable instead of urgent.
"Go check on her." Devonye said, nudging me with her elbow. "I know you want to."
I didn't bother denying it.