Chapter 167: A Viper’s Nest Of Horseshit

BLAIR-O-METER : Passive-Aggressive

Kael’s eyes flew open. "Maddox, get off me. I’m delicate. I’m literally dying."

"What?" Blair snapped.

"I’m not sharing my blanket," Kael declared. "Wait. Blair, why do you have Maddox’s voice?"

His eyes fluttered closed and the purring resumed like nothing had happened.

Blair’s heart was slamming against her ribs so hard she could hear it in her ears. She pressed her hand flat against her chest and forced a breath through her nose.

"I am nowhere near that box. There is zero reason for cardiac arrest, Blair," she reminded herself.

"Shhh. You’ll wake the baby," Maddox mumbled.

Blair crossed her arms. "You both sleep-talk like it’s a goddamn debate in here. I am allowed to verbally process."

"...no more... opinions..." Maddox grumbled.

"...let her... have one..." Kael breathed.

"...denied Ashenvale..."

"...hostile work environment..."

Blair dragged a hand down her face. "This is not normal. Nothing about this is normal."

"It’s for you Blair," Kael muttered. "Tell the fish I said no."

"Guinevere... Yes, good girl," Maddox moaned. "Just like that. Fuck. The healer can wait."

Blair recoiled in absolute horror.

"Oh hell no. Whatever fantasy you’re having, I’m going to need you to shut it down. Right. Now."

The double doors opened. Aldric entered the room and his gaze instantly zeroed in on the bed and the Guinevere sandwich currently occupying it.

"Is that purring?"

✦✦✦

🧠 CONCUSSION : Thriving. Memories buffering.

🛌 NAPTIME : Gold star. Shoutouts to blankie and wife-teddybear.

Resting more sounded fantastic. The kingdom, however, did not give a single flying fuck about its king’s exhaustion. The pile of shit Maddox Drakencrest needed to deal with kept growing.

So he peeled himself off Kael’s bed with all the reluctance of a cat being removed from a sunbeam.

The second he separated from Guinevere, the warmth in his chest vanished. Something he hadn’t realized was there until it was gone. He glanced down at his hands just in time to watch a golden glow fade from his skin.

"Huh. That’s new."

His gaze shifted to his mate.

"Careful, wife. I’ll start to think you’ll like me."

That’s when he noticed her forehead resting against Kael’s shoulder. His brother was glowing the same gold she was.

Maddox’s content smile instantly flipped into a thunderous scowl.

"Absolutely not."

He pulled her away from Kael, then wedged a brown decorative pillow in between them.

Problem solved.

She was staying in this room because Aldric was due to check on his brother within the hour and could monitor both of them at once. Maddox’s chambers were also still tainted with dark magic, and the room across from his was a flooded mess.

Wife stays. Husband takes out the trash like the boss he was. Pillow holds the line.

He looked at Kael, who was unconscious, grey, and drooling slightly.

"No parties while I’m gone."

Kael did not respond, on account of being mostly dead and fully asleep.

The second Maddox left Kael’s chambers, his dragon growled loudly.

We take mate with us.

I can’t take her to this, Maddox thought back to the beast.

The beast continued to protest the entire walk to the War Room.

We left mate with a man in his bed.

Maddox pinched the bridge of his nose. They are fine. There’s a pillow between them.

It will not hold. It is decorative.

✦✦✦

WAR ROOM - DRAKENCREST

Maddox picked up the chalk, and drew a circle on the black table.

"Everything inside this circle cannot be mentioned to Kael or Guinevere." He set the chalk down. "If you do, they die. Blood oath. Does everyone understand?"

The room went still.

Maddox looked at Blair, then Griffin.

Blair stiffened. "Yes. Relax."

"Understood, Commander." Griffin stood at perfect attention, face carved from stone. He looked like he was guarding the last donut on earth.

Maddox picked up a golden token from the pile he had just placed on the table.

"Are those Kael’s?" Blair asked.

"Yes." He did not elaborate. But he had, in fact, looted them straight from his brother’s room after his nap.

Maddox dropped the first token into the circle. "House Solandris is a viper’s nest full of horseshit. Lord Solandris is Guinevere’s grandfather, and kept that hidden this entire week."

Griffin’s lips moved silently, repeating ’viper’s nest full of horseshit’ to himself like he was memorizing scripture.

Second token.

"They attacked her last night," Maddox continued. "Lured her into their tent with the goal to get her to produce Luminari light bullshit. If she did, they planned to hand her over to the Luminari King like a prize. They can choke on that plan. She’s not going anywhere."

Third token.

"Marek, their Master Mage, is practicing dark magic. The bad kind." Maddox looked at Lux. "Confirm."

Lux gave a single nod. "Yes. He is also a master at half truths. Was he pulling from existing dark fragments within Guinevere? Sure. Was that his first time? No fucking way. Was that all he was doing? No."

"And," Maddox prompted.

"And I’ll need to speak with your wife to be absolutely certain," Lux said. "But I have a good idea of what that slimy little weasel did. Yes, he was telling the truth about the shards inside her. Shocking, I know. He reached in, gave them a little tug, and used them to conjure up those delightful hallucinations. Amateur hour, really."

"Let me put this in perspective," Jaxon cut. "Lux was touching Guinevere and found nothing. I also felt nothing. From across the keep, in his tent, Marek was able to not only sense it inside of her, but he was also to able draw from it. Take that at face value. It’s concerning."

"The initial hallucinations didn’t work," Lux said flatly. "So the hack doubled down and added his own magic to the mix. Still feeding off her mind, but now the hallucinations were far more convincing. That’s where he overplayed his hand."

Maddox’s jaw shifted a quarter-inch to the left.

Lux met his eyes. "The second a hallucination starts grabbing physical objects is the second you cut it off, because you’ve lost control. Hallucinations are supposed to be mirages, not able to pick shit up or affect the real world. Judging by your chambers, Commander, he also vastly underestimated what your wife’s subconscious would drum up."

"Death penalty," Blair said, voice final. "Next."

"Premature," Maddox replied.

"Premature," Blair repeated, offended. "The word you’re looking for is overdue, not premature."

"Arrest him now and Solandris knows we know," Maddox explained. "He’s sloppy and cocky. We can use that." He looked at Lux and Jaxon. "Put together a black-ops team. Trusted mages. They don’t need the whole picture. I want constant eyes on him. He doesn’t take a piss without me knowing."

"Consider it done," Jaxon said. "He is expecting to meet with myself about the letter still."

"I’m sorry... what?" Griffin asked. "You were working with Kael on that. Does he think Kael forgot about everything?"

It was a surprisingly logical question. The room stared at him like a golden retriever who had just solved quantum physics.

Blair broke the silence first.

"The rumor mill says Kael Ashenvale died last night."

Ryker nodded. "Four houses ask me if he’s dead. I told all of them the status of our Fourth is classified."

Maddox slid a fourth token into the circle.

"They held zero reservations about wiping Kael’s memory. Zero. Like they’d done it before and had a system for it."

Fifth token.

"House Solandris are bound by blood oath. They follow through or they die. That makes them predictable in the worst possible way."

✦✦✦

Across the Keep, a decorative pillow lay on the floor of Kael Ashenvale’s quarters.

He was asleep. He was glowing. He was also big spoon behind a girl that smelled like vanilla and an alarming amount of bath salts.

"Fifteen percent," he mumbled into her hair.