My respect for her grew. It would’ve been all too easy for her to paint him with one brush. I wouldn’t have blamed her if she had. But she wanted me to know that there was some goodness to the man. The breath I exhaled was a little looser, easier. I appreciated what she did more than she may realize.

But it also left me with another question. “You said you hunted him down because—”

“Because he would have sought revenge against me. Against Atlantia. When the Council demanded that he deal with the mistress he Ascended, he felt betrayed by them. And when I annulled the marriage, taking the throne with the support of the Council, it compounded that feeling. He couldn’t believe it. That he, a deity and descendant of Nyktos, could be overruled.” She brushed a wisp of hair back from her face. “And things had…greatly soured between us by the end. He would’ve come back, and after what he did, he was no longer fit to rule.”

“And you think Casteel will be fit?” I asked, even at the risk of rehashing what I had shut down earlier. “He did the same as Malec. He had no idea that I would not become a vampry.”

Her gaze slid to mine as we passed lavender and vivid red hibiscus bushes. “But I do not believe Casteel would’ve attempted to take the throne if you had become one. I know my son. He would’ve taken you and left, not risking your life or Atlantia. Malec wanted Atlantia and his vampry mistress. While the risk he took disturbs me, the situations are not the same.”

She was right. The situations weren’t the same. And she was also correct about what Casteel would’ve done.

Although if I had Ascended into a vampry, I imagined that Casteel would’ve laid waste to quite a few people before leaving.

Through the soaring spikes of purple and blue flowers, Kieran matched our movements through the garden as we fell silent. If he was trying to be inconspicuous, he was failing. Queen Eloana noted where my attention had gone. “You will need to get used to someone always a few steps away.”

My gaze shifted to her. “I had many shadows when I was the Maiden.”

“And my son was one of them.” She stopped in front of a towering shrub of pale pink blossoms that formed an arch over a stone bench.

“He was.”

“Would you mind if we sat?” she asked. “I am far older than I appear and haven’t gotten much sleep the last couple of nights.”

Wondering exactly how old she was, I sat.

“I have a question for you,” she said once she was seated beside me. “You and Casteel…” She drew in a short breath, but I felt it. The punch of potent anguish as she slowly exhaled. “You plan to find and free Malik?”

This was why she’d wanted to speak to me in private. I started to respond when I stopped myself from lying—because I didn’t have any reason to lie. Casteel and I were no longer pretending to be in love to gain what we both sought. We were in love, and that didn’t change what we believed or wanted to achieve. However, as I focused on her emotions, her anguish was a tangy, bitter taste in the back of my throat, and I didn’t want to add to that.