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Before I can think about it, I’m in front of Rognar, stopping him, holding him back, my need to protect the prince greater than my need for revenge. He is only nineteen summers, not yet twenty, the age of adulthood. He cannot, by law, Challenge for the throne. If he kills his father now, it will be considered regicide, and he will be put to death.

“Gunag!” I shout. “Help me! That’s an order!”

The elfborn orc rushes up from the ranks. I know he is Rognar’s friend and will help me in holding back Rognar as the young prince rages and swears, practically frothing at the mouth.

“Let me go! I’ll fucking kill him! I'll kill him!”

I grab Rognar by the neck and yank him forward so that my mouth is by his ear, whispering quietly enough that no other orcs can hear, save perhaps Gunag.

“Not now, my prince. You do not honor your mother by going to your death. Patience. Your time will come.”

My quiet words take a moment to affect the prince, but then he seems to register what I’m saying, his struggles stilling. His ax then hangs uselessly to his side, and I take the opportunity to disarm him.

More cruel laughter sounds behind me, and I turn to see Guruk chortling and clapping ironically.

“Why do we need a jester for the evening’s entertainment when we have Rognar?” he asks, provoking chuckles from his cabinet. “Fool. So dramatic over a weak female. Do not worry, my son, you’ll learn. Non-orc lives are cheap. Especially when they are mere breeders.”

Rognar twitches again in my grasp, but I subtly shake my head. No good can come from attacking him now. We need to plan and regroup.

When no one responds to Guruk’s crude remarks, the king says scornfully, “It would seem that the mood for feasting has escaped us, due to my son. Wodred, take the prince and let his temper cool. He may rejoin us when he has matured a little and realizes I am right.”

Wrath unlike anything I have ever experienced courses through my veins, but I keep it in check. I could Challenge Guruk for king and would almost certainly win. I could have won when Guruk was at his best, having always been more skilled than him, but he’s obviously sick now. But I want Rognar to be king. I have never craved that throne for myself. I want to live in an Orik ruled by Melelea’s son, one who has all of her goodness and none of his father’s wickedness. If I Challenged and became king, Rognar would have to kill me to take the throne from me, and I know he wouldn’t do that. I would be stuck on the throne, and Rognar would never realize his destiny.

So I nod stiffly, struggling to keep the hate out of my eyes. Keeping a hold of Rognar, Gunag and I drag the prince out of the throne room. I barely know where I’m going, what I’m thinking. I’m still in shock.

We find an empty room and go into it. As we enter and Gunag closes the door behind us, Rognar rips away from my grip and punches the wall hard enough to break a human hand. Even with an orc’s denser bones, the cracking sound is painful. Rognar then grabs a table and throws it into a wall, the wood shattering and spraying around the room. He screams in rage and grief, a broken sound in his rough voice before falling to the ground, his hands covering his eyes. Then my prince, who has seen the pain of war and endured the fires of Orikesh training, breaks down into feral, savage sobs.

Gunag and I stand, helpless, exchanging looks. I’m keeping things together, but barely. The truth is, I want to rage like Rognar. My Mating Instinct is screaming at me to go back into the throne room and relieve Guruk of his pompous, evil head. To take revenge for the female that I always loved who was never mine.

Finally, when Rognar’s sobs quiet, I finally say, my voice deceptively calm, “Explain this to me. Why, if your parents were a love match, would he have her killed?”

Rognar chuckles darkly. “A love match? What are you talking about? My father never loved my mother. He publicly beat and belittled her at court every chance he got.”

The blood rushes to my ears, and for a moment I can’t hear anything else. He publicly beat and belittled her at court every chance he got. The words echo around my mind like a death knell, with the weight of a blow from a cudgel.

“What do you mean?” I ask desperately. “I saw them. The night that they got back from their Bride Chase. They were in love. It could not have been more plain.”

“My mother loved him,” Rognar replies bitterly. “In the beginning. By the time she stopped, it was too late for her. He had her well and truly trapped. And now that he has finally tired of her, he couldn’t just let her go. No one else was allowed to have her, even if he didn’t want her anymore.”

Then . . . then . . . all these years. All my bitter yearning, my jealousy, my staying away . . . was for nothing? I left the mate of my heart to be abused and mistreated for how long when I could have stopped it? Because of my own jealousy, I didn’t see that she needed help. I could have killed Guruk, would have killed him if I’d known the truth. I’ve thought all these years that I was being noble, staying away and leaving her to her life, not Challenging Guruk for her, when really I left her in a nightmare.

I . . . failed her.

With a cry of anger and mourning, I slam Rognar’s ax into the wall, the orc-make weapon cleaving into the stone. It’s an impotent gesture and doesn’t make me feel better. Melelea is dead, and nothing will make me feel better ever again.

Gunag and Rognar are looking at me strangely, but I don’t explain. I can’t explain. How can I say that I’ve been in love with Melelea for years but never even noticed that she was being abused? The shame is overwhelming.

“You didn’t know?” Rognar asks. “I thought it was known throughout the kingdom what my mother’s life was like.”

“Brother Wodred doesn’t listen to rumors,” I say bitterly. “Everyone knows that. No one even tries to gossip with me anymore.”

I never knew that such a policy would come back to bite me. It will haunt me until the end of my days that I didn’t know that Lady Melelea needed help because of my own stubbornness and pride. It's a failure I can never take back.

There’s a long stretch of silence as the three of us stand around, looking at each other in the broken room we have destroyed. I don't know what to say. My heart is splitting in two, as surely as if it had been split with an ax, and my Mating Instinct growls and whimpers, still wanting to go back and kill Guruk. But I can’t do that. Not yet.

“Three months,” I say instead. “You’ll be twenty in three months at the New Year. Then you can legally Challenge Guruk and give him what he deserves. Can you wait that long?”

Rognar regards me gravely. There’s a spark of understanding in his eyes, though he doesn’t say anything. I think he realizes that Melelea was special to me, somehow, even if he doesn’t know exactly how special. Then he nods. “Three months. Then we take back the country and avenge my mother.”

He reaches out a hand, and I grab his with my fist, an unbreakable vow passing between us.

“I’ll be with you . . . My King,” I say, and Rognar nods, accepting the title as his due.

“I’m with you, as well, My King,” Gunag says, stepping forward. “Until my last breath. We will take your revenge for you.”

“Then the plan is set,” rumbles Rognar. “On my birthday, in three months, Guruk dies.”