Renegade (The Captive Series Book 2) (12 page)

He wasn’t paying attention to her
though as he moved away. Panic was thrumming through her. She
couldn’t allow this to happen, she couldn’t allow people to die
because her father wanted revenge for things that had never even
occurred. At least not to her.

But they had happened to other people,
and they were continuing to happen right now.

However, the rebels had made an attempt
to take the palace when she was a child, and they had been
decimated. In retaliation for the rebel’s defiance, the king had
sent out thousands of troops that had razed, burned, and
slaughtered their way through villages and forests. It was how her
father had become the leader; the last one had been brutally
murdered and hung within the largest village as an example of what
would be done to others who tried to attack the palace.

“
We will have to be smarter
about it this time, go about it in a slower more methodical
way.”

“I would like to go in,” William said
softly.

Aria’s mouth dropped, she spun on her
brother, her twin, her other half. “No William,” she breathed. “You
cannot go in there.”

“Yes I can.”

“No! Your coloring, you’re too similar
to me. They’ll know you. Tell him Jack. Tell him!” She was
practically begging, and she was crying as she turned frantically
to Braith’s brother. “Tell him about Caleb, and what kind of a
monster he is. Tell him what Caleb would do to him if he discovered
him in there! Tell him he is a fool! That they all are!”

“Arianna, enough,” her father said
sharply.

“Who is Caleb?” Daniel asked
softly.

“My brother,” Jack answered.

“The middle one,” Max
elaborated.

“I thought you were held by the oldest
brother,” Daniel said.

Aria wiped the tears from her face,
shaking as she tried to regain control of herself. Acting crazed
and wild would not help; it would not get them to listen to her. It
would do none of them any good if she was a raving lunatic. She
needed to be calm, and she needed to be collected if she was going
to talk them out of this crazy suicide mission.

“I was,” she said softly. “Braith is a
good man…”

“He’s not a man,” Max
growled.

Aria glanced at him, hating the look of
hurt and disgust that radiated from him as his gaze landed hard
upon her. They would hate her, they would all hate her if they knew
the truth, but at the moment she couldn’t bring herself to care.
“My oldest brother believes in duty and honor. He values them
highly,” Jack told them.

“Including holding young women hostage
and using them,” her father interjected sharply.

“Braith was kind to me,” she said for
the thousandth time, but none of them wanted to hear
her.

“Caleb is not like Braith, or me,” Jack
continued, his glance at Aria sympathetic but hard. “Caleb is like
our father, cruel, twisted; vengeful. If he discovers that you are
Aria’s brother he will torture you in ways that you have never
imagined possible. Your hair color alone might be enough for him to
take his revenge on you.”

“But your older brother wouldn’t?”
William inquired the scorn in his voice more than
apparent.

Jack stared hard at Aria for a long
moment. She didn’t know what to say, what to do. If they found out
that she had just been with Braith, that she intended to see him
again, they would go crazy. They would think she had lost her mind,
that her time as a blood slave had twisted her. They would not stop
to think that she was with him because she truly did love him; they
would assume that she had lost her mind, and they would lock her
away. She would never see Braith again, and they would all run off
half cocked, determined to avenge her for absolutely no reason
other than bullheaded male stubbornness.

“No, he wouldn’t,” Jack said
softly.

Aria couldn’t look at him anymore. She
felt ashamed, she felt lost, and she felt completely awful. She was
running around behind her family’s back, and yet she was sitting
through this horrendous meeting discussing how to invade the
palace. Something that could get Braith seriously hurt, if not
killed. Something that could get members of her family
killed.

She had spent her entire life fighting
against the vampires, wanting to destroy them, and now she found
herself frantic to do anything to stop this.

“Well isn’t the future king special,”
Max drawled.

“He is,” Aria said softly.

Max’s lip curled in disgust, her family
stared at her as if she had sprouted another head. “Ok William
can’t go in then, but I can.”

“Daniel,” Aria moaned, dropping her
head into her hands as her mind spun. She needed to think of
something, anything that would stop this. She turned back to Jack,
but he was leaning against the wall again, his arms folded back
over his chest. “You don’t know what you are doing.”

“Yes, I do.”

Aria could barely breathe through the
lump in her throat, could barely see through the tears burning her
eyes. She had to stop this, she didn’t know how, didn’t know what
to do, but she knew that she had to stop this. She didn’t know when
Braith would be back, she didn’t know if she should even tell him
what they intended. She’d be betraying her own family if she did.
She’d be betraying her own kind.

But if she remained silent and
something happened to Braith, or someone in her family…

She shut the thought down. She couldn’t
live with herself if something happened and she could have stopped
it. Her legs gave out; she slid limply to the ground, her mind
spinning as they continued with their plans. Plans that she could
barely comprehend anymore. Plans that were slowly tearing her in
two.

***

Aria knew that she shouldn’t do it, but
she couldn’t stop herself from slipping through the woods, back to
the lake. It had become her favorite place over the past couple of
months, and now that she needed it the most, she was not supposed
to go near it. But after the events of the past few hours she
didn’t give a damn what she was, and was not, supposed to do. Not
anymore.

She slipped easily through the forest,
sticking to the trees, remaining hidden amongst their thick foliage
as she darted from limb to limb. She moved slowly, keeping an eye
out for any threat. She knew the forest better than anyone, knew
the signs of danger. She could read the animals as well as she
could move through the trees. They remained alert, and active, the
birds continued to sing, the squirrels hopped eagerly in out of the
branches, barely noticing Aria’s presence amongst them.

She reached the lake, sitting amongst
the limbs of a tree as she surveyed the area around her. The lake
was pristine, clear. There wasn’t even a ripple amongst his glass
surface. She folded her hands beneath her, resting her head upon
them as she sprawled out on the limb, content to lie amongst the
branches and just watch the lake for a long while. Content to just
take solace in the beautiful sight before her.

She didn’t realize she had drifted off
until she tried to roll over and nearly fell from the tree. She
started, sitting up on the branch in surprise. She hadn’t even been
tired, but the events of the day had beaten her down, and taken
more of a toll on her than she’d realized. She sighed softly, her
gaze turning to the sky. According to the movement of the sun she
had been asleep for a couple of hours.

She would have to go back soon, but
before she returned she wanted to take a swim. She kicked her shoes
off, letting them drop to the forest floor before climbing to her
feet. She ran to the end of the limb, leaping off of it as she dove
into the lake. She stayed beneath the water, swimming out for a
long while before popping back to the surface. The water felt
wonderful, refreshing, cleansing after the awful events of the
day.

She swam for a long while before
finally heading back. She stopped a few feet away from the shore,
treading water. Jack was leaning against the tree, her shoes
dangling from his fingertips as he watched her. Aria frowned at
him, pushing the hair from her eyes as she swam forward.

“You need to stop taking off like
that.”

“I can take care of myself.” She
grabbed her shoes from his hand, but did not put them on. “What are
you doing here?”

“Looking for you.”

“Did my father send you?”

“No, they’re still making plans. What
are you going to do Aria?”

“What do you mean?”

“Are you going to tell him?”

Aria couldn’t meet his gaze. The water
had managed to soothe her for a brief moment, but now she was back
into the harsh reality of her life. “Are you?” she
whispered.

“He is my brother, but I chose my
loyalties when I took you from that palace. I cannot go back on
that now, no matter how much I might want to.”

“You would allow him to be
killed?”

He was silent for a long moment, his
eyes sad yet accepting. “He would allow the same thing to happen to
me, if the roles were reversed. He would hate it as much as I do,
but we are on separate sides of this war. There is nothing that we
can do about that. Now you have to choose a side Aria.”

She shook her head, hating the fact
that she wanted to cry again. “How can I choose a side Jack? It’s
not so simple. If I choose him then I forfeit my life, there would
be nowhere for me to go after that. If I choose my family than I am
giving up the only man that has ever made me feel this way, the
only person I have ever been in love with.”

He stared at her for a long moment, and
then he turned his back on her. She followed him as he made his way
through the forest. They moved slowly together for a long time in
silence. “I didn’t say it was going to be an easy choice, it wasn’t
for me either. But it is one that you are going to have to make.
And soon.”

“I don’t know when he’ll be back,” she
whispered.

“He won’t be gone for long…”

“You don’t know that.”

Jack was silent for a long moment, and
then he stopped walking and turned to face her in the dwindling
daylight. The strong resemblance he bore to his brother caused a
tug of longing to pull at her heart. He watched her with the same
intensity that his brother always did, studied her with the same
confusion that she had often seen on Braith’s face. It seemed that
neither of them knew exactly what to make of her. But then, she
didn’t know exactly what to make of them either.

She had thought Braith a cruel,
monstrous bastard, and now she was in love with him. She had
thought Jack a human, their friend, and companion, but it turned
out she was the only one in her family that hadn’t known that he
was actually a vampire, and a member of the royal family. She had
been kept in the dark, because they all thought her too weak to be
able to handle the truth. In truth, she was far stronger than any
of them knew. There was far more to her than they had ever
imagined. The only one that seemed to understand, and accept the
true depth of her strength, was Braith. He was the only one that
did not try to coddle her, did not try to shelter her anymore from
the harsh realities of both of their existences. He was the only
one that knew she was strong enough to handle the truth.

And if there was one thing she was
becoming very tired of, it was being coddled.

“I do know it, and by the time he comes
back you are going to have to make your choice.”

“What if I choose wrong?”

He glanced over at her, his eyebrows
raised as he studied her. “I don’t think you have a right choice
here Aria.”

She bit on her bottom lip as she
nodded. “You’re right. Are you going to tell my family about
this?”

Jack shook his head as he started
walking again. “No. Braith is not a threat to them. Even if you
choose them, he will not hurt them, that’s not who he is. If you
don’t choose him he would not purposely hurt you in such a way. No
matter how much it will hurt him if he loses you.”

She grasped hold of Jack’s arm, pulling
him to a stop beside her. “I do love him,” she said
softly.

He managed a wan smile, his hand
enclosed hers. “I know that Aria. And though it is baffling to me,
I know that he loves you.”

She frowned fiercely at him, not at all
liking his comment. “Thanks.”

He grinned at her; his hand squeezed
her tightly before releasing her. “I just never thought it of
Braith. We may have been the closest out of all our siblings, but
he always kept a part of himself distant, aloof. As the future
king, he had to stay distant. It would always be his job to uphold
his duties and responsibilities. And to Braith those
responsibilities always came first. I didn’t think he would ever be
capable of loving someone; he kept himself too separated for
that.

“You may be the first thing he has ever
chosen over his obligations.”

Aria was silent for a moment, and then
she resumed her pace at his side. “But he hasn’t chosen
me.”

“He’s chosen you more than I’ve ever
seen him choose anything else. He came here for you, didn‘t
he?”