“What I did last night…I’m sorry for it, Azur,” Kaldur said, meeting and holding my eyes. Just as our mother had taught us. He reached out to clasp my shoulder, turning me so I faced him. “And when your—when Gemma feels better, I will make my apology to her as well.”

“But will you actually mean it?” I couldn’t help but wonder. “I don’t think you regret what you said. I think you regret when you said it. I don’t want you to give her false apologies. I’d rather you just leave. I’d rather that you return to Vyaan before she wakes.”

Kaldur’s jaw tightened. His hand fell away from my shoulder and he went quiet. He leaned his forearms along the banister, mulling over his thoughts as a tense silence stretched between us.

“She didn’t know, did she?” Kaldur asked, after I’d watched two fishing boats disappear around the cliff bend and counted the waves crashing into the walls below.

A dagger of unease slid between the bones of my chest.

“No,” I answered. “She didn’t.”

“You told her everything last night, didn’t you?” he asked. “Because of what I’d said? Is that why you’re standing under her window like a sentinel?”

A sharp breath made my shoulders slump. I didn’t have it in me to hold a grudge against my brother when it was me that had dragged out the truth for too long. Shortly into our marriage, I’d suspected that Gemma hadn’t known anything about her father’s actions. Yet I’d kept her in the dark purposefully.

Why?

Because I’d begun to fear the repercussions of the truth?

“It’s raw for me, Azur. It’s raw for all of us. Even though it’s been seventeen years, it’s this…this dark tragedy and mystery that’s hung over us nearly all our lives. We’ve only just learned the truth, and it’s stirred up memories that I would rather forget,” Kaldur said quietly. “It broke our mother’s heart. She died fearing she would never be reunited with Aina again, and I still feel her sorrow. I can still feel it, even now. And I took it out on Gemma last night because it gutted me to hear you call her Mother’s title, knowing what her blood did to ours.”

Kaldur’s grief and anger was justified. All of ours was.

“Would you have felt any differently,” I started quietly, “if one of the soldiers had lifted their plasma gun from their holster instead of Rye Hara?”

Kaldur stilled. “What?”

“There were others involved,” I said, the words twisting my gut, “but we’ve only set our sights on the male who did the actual killing. Not the ones who sliced her wings and pinned her down, holding her steady for that piercing shot. Because they killed her too. They might not have pulled the trigger, but they all killed her. And even knowing that…I wonder if we are pursuing the wrong enemies. I wonder if we should be hunting down someone else entirely.”

There was something that Gemma had whispered last night, after the video had cut out and tears had streaked her face, that had made for a restless sleep.

Why?

That word had hummed through my body late in the night, into the early hours of morning when I’d reached for my wife, only to find her absent beside me.

Why?

Why had a human unit of soldiers targeted a peace ambassador after the Voperian victory had already been claimed? It had been an intentional assassination. And I’d been too blinded by my hatred for Rye Hara to take a step back, to see what would’ve been gained from Aina’s death.

We should be seeking out the one who gave Rye Hara the order for her death.

“What do you mean?” Kaldur asked, narrowing his gaze on me.

“They were soldiers,” I told him. “And what do soldiers do in a war?”

Kaldur’s jaw tightened, but I saw a flicker of understanding.

“They carry out orders,” he answered gruffly. “I don’t care. They still made her suffer.”

“Yes,” I agreed. “They did.”

“They never turned themselves in to War Crimes,” Kaldur added. “What they did was immoral, hateful, and illegal. On every level. If they’d had any honor, they would have turned down the orders and reported their superior to the High Quadrant Council. But they didn’t. They acted like mercenaries, hunting down someone for profit, when the war was already over.”

“You’re right,” I told him. “I know you’re right.”

Kaldur was breathing hard, but I watched him take a concerted effort to calm down.

“But I just don’t see it in black and white anymore. I don’t see it carved in stone,” I informed my younger brother. “I can’t. I can’t hate Rye Hara with everything I have in me if I’m falling in love with his daughter.”

Kaldur’s wings snapped. He looked at me with surprise.

“And you can hate me for that if you want,” I added. “You can hate me for choosing her. You can hate me for bringing her here. You can hate me for breaking my vow. You have every right to.”

Kaldur ran a hand down his tired face. “I could never hate you, brother,” he said, shaking his head, his shoulders sinking, his eyes closing. “Don’t ask me to.”

“Kyzaire,” came Zaale’s urgent voice, yelled from the entrance doors.

My chest lurched, and I swung to face him. “What is it?” I asked. “Is Gemma awake?”

“Yes,” Zaale replied, his wings propelling him forward quickly. His eyes were troubled, however. “But Azur…she’s requesting passage on a ship to journey off planet. As soon as possible.”

“What?” I rasped, feeling like I’d just been rammed in the gut.

Zaale’s features were grim when he told me, “The Kylaira demands to return to the Collis.”

Chapter 42

Gemma

Azur burst into my room, nearly shattering the balcony doors, which I had expected the moment Zaale had left. I had expected a dramatic—and sudden—appearance.

“No,” Azur growled, fire burning in those eyes, snatching a dress clean out of Ludayn’s hands—one of my older hideous ones, as he liked to call them—when she tried to pack it into my trunk. “Absolutely not!”

“I’m not asking,” I informed him, feeling my heart twist at the sight of him.

I felt like an open wound right now. A sore, open, oozing wound.

My throat was raw from crying. I had no tears left. My skin felt tight across my bones, and there was a heaviness in my heart that just wouldn’t leave. There was an ache in my body like I’d just climbed up a mountain. I felt hungry and thirsty, and yet I couldn’t bring it in me to eat or drink.

And I was so damn tired even though I’d just slept a full day.

Even still, I felt determination rising through me. I’d woken mere moments before, and I’d known, deep in my soul, what I had to do.

I wouldn’t let Azur dissuade me.

He wouldn’t succeed.

Kalia came through the hallway door just then, nearly skidding across the floor with her speed. “What’s going on? Zaale just said…”

A heavy thud landed on the balcony. When I looked beyond the doors, I saw Kaldur. I met his silver eyes before I looked back to my husband.

I wasn’t even certain if I should call him that anymore. The marriage had likely been the most tortuous thing he’d ever had to do, and I didn’t want…I didn’t want him to suffer for it anymore.

The thought hurt, twisting and aching, until it left me breathless.

“I said no,” he growled, stalking toward me.

“And I told you,” I said, infinitely patient, “I’m not asking. I want you to help me. I want you to get me passage to the Collis or at least to the nearest colony port that—”

“Oh, you think I’d drop off my wife at one of those crowded cesspools of—”

“Then give me a ship,” I said simply, meeting his eyes. “But I want to leave tonight.”

Kaldur was watching the exchange, arms crossed over his wide chest, frowning. Kalia too, but she was nibbling on her bottom lip with her fangs, uncertain if she should step in.