Page 33 of Renegade Kingdom
I remembered. I’d been so young, and Dean’s pain had been so vast, and I hadn’t understood why no one else seemed to be drowning in it the way I was.
“This is the same thing,” Damon continued. “You’re carrying Rhidian’s death because you feel like someone should. Like if you don’t grieve for him hard enough, it won’t count.”
“Maybe.”
“Not maybe. Definitely.” A ghost of a smile crossed his face. “You always were the heart of us, little brother. The one who felt everything so the rest of us didn’t have to.”
The tears spilled over then, and I didn’t bother wiping them away. There was no point pretending with Damon. He’d always seen through me.
“I need you back,” I said, and the words came out raw and desperate. “I need you to accept the bite, Damon. I can’t do this without you. You were always the one I came to when everything fell apart, and everythingisfalling apart. If this is the only chance we have to get you free, then you have to take it.”
Damon’s expression flickered with something painful.
“I know you’d rather die than stay like this,” I pressed on. “Dean told us. And I understand that, I do. But I can’t lose you. I won’t survive it. Not after watching Rhidian die. Especially not you. Please.”
He closed his eyes for a long moment, and when he opened them again, they were bright with emotion he was trying to contain.
“You always did know exactly what to say to make it impossible to refuse you,” he said softly. “Even when we were kids. I could never say no to you, Maddox. I would have torn apart worlds to keep you safe.”
“Then do it one more time. Step up and fight for us.”
“I will.” The certainty in his voice caught me off guard. “But not the bite. Not as the first option.”
“What do you mean?”
“Alyssa.” His voice dropped lower, almost reverent. “When she touched me, when her magic reached inside my head, the nightmare vanished. Completely. Just for a moment, but it was real silence, Maddox. The first time in months that my mind was my own.” He leaned forward, his chains clinking softly. “Shecando it. I think she can destroy this thing or lock it away. The nightmare is afraid of her. I felt it flinch when her magic touched it. Actually flinch.”
Hope surged through me so fast it was dizzying. “You really believe that?”
“I know it. The bite as a last resort, if she can’t do it. But I want to give her the chance first. I think she’s meant to...”
He trailed off, but I understood. I’d felt it too. That pull between them, faint but undeniable. The bond that was waiting to be completed.
“I know,” I said simply.
“Does that bother you?”
I almost laughed. “Damon, nothing would make me happier than having you be part of this. Part of us. You belong with her. You belong with all of us.”
Something shifted in his expression. Relief, maybe. Or the closest thing to it that he could manage with a monster living inside his head.
“She’s special, Maddox. She can…”
Then his face changed.
It wasn’t the smooth, seamless takeover I’d seen before. Not the slithering transition where one moment it was Damon and the next it was that thing wearing his face. This time, I could see him fighting. His jaw clenched. Veins stood out on his neck. His hands spasmed, fingers clawing at the floor as he waged a war inside his own skull.
A strangled sound escaped his throat. Not a scream. Something worse. The sound of someone being dragged underwater.
His whole body convulsed. Once. Twice. His head cracked back against the wall, and when his eyes opened again, they weren’t my brother’s anymore.
The nightmare laughed.
“Well, well. The little murderer comes to visit.” Its voice was Damon’s mouth forming words that weren’t his, and the wrongness of it made my skin crawl. “Come to confess your sins to the only person who can’t run away? How touching.”
“Let him go.”
“Oh, but I know all about what you did.” The nightmare leaned forward, Damon’s chains rattling as it moved. “He shows me everything, he thinks he can play me into becoming his puppet. My icy master. He enjoyed watching you destroy a part of yourself. I could practically taste the satisfaction it gave him. That delicious guilt he knew you’d forever carry. He’s been marinating in it for days, you know. Replaying the moment over and over. The way the blade slid in. The sound your pretty prince made when his lungs stopped working.” It inhaled deeply, savouring something only it could sense. “Murder is such astrong word, isn’t it? But that’s what it was. No matter how you dress it up in talk of sacrifice and duty. You killed a man who trusted you. And I bet you liked it.”
