Fantasy Romance
Rohan was right.
The woman inside was not his daughter. Had never been his daughter.
Where was Elise?
Where had they buried his little girl?
A sickening thought wormed through his stomach.
What if Rohan was right again and she was still alive, hurt, and all alone?
The king began to run.
Despite his better judgement, his advisers’ suggestions, and his own wife’s wishes, the king allowed his daughter’s grave to be disturbed.
They had to take great care given the poison, but he had to lay Rohan’s doubts to rest.
And, he had to lay to rest his own.
When they opened the coffin, the king closed his eyes and turned away.
By the gods, what had he done?
The crowned prince walked beside his father for a time, neither saying anything. Finally, the king stopped. “I miss her, too. No father should ever outlive his child.”
“She’s not dead. Or if she is, she isn’t buried there.”
The king’s jaw twitched.
“I have fought in a hundred battles. Watched men die a thousand deaths. I am not unfamiliar with Mor’s handiwork. For the longest time, I thought…”
“You thought what?” his father gently prodded.
“That she had not gone to the gods of the light, but I could never bring myself to truly believe it.”
“And now?”
“I think she is hurt. And in pain. And out there all alone.” He nodded toward the dark shadow of the Dragonscale mountains.
His advisers tried to stop him. His aides. His retainers.
It was only the king’s voice that cut through the desperate haze of grief. “Price Rohan.”
Even now he could not dishonor his father. Standing, he saluted, ashamed of the mud that stained his surcoat and crusted his fingernails.
His father nodded toward the path. “Walk with me.”
Of course his father didn’t yell. His father never yelled.
That made it all the worse.
They had not let him see her after the poison had taken her. Not let him perform the ritual cleansing.
Not let him free his sister’s soul and let it return to the gods.
She was trapped. Alone. In pain.
His sister. His twin sister.
His own soul twisted in anguish, and now he understood why.
He ordered a shovel and began digging.
Staring at her grave, tears glittered in his eyes even now.
He’d lost count of how many enemies had fallen to his blade, how many that swore allegiance to those that had taken her life he’d ended.
Yet she still lay in the cold unforgiving ground.
Uncertainty knotted his stomach.
She’d been dead and gone more than ten summers, yet he still felt her pain. Her torment.
The poison must have been pure agony.
Her soul had not passed.