enjoyebooks CHAPTER 130
CHAPTER 130
POV: Evangeline
I see it before either of them understands what it is.
That is the curse of being a mother—you recognize the fracture while it is still a hairline crack, long before it splits bone.
The festival has barely ended when it begins. Not loudly. Not dramatically. It starts in the way dangerous things always do: in silence, in glances that linger too long, in words swallowed instead of spoken.
“They were unusually quiet tonight,” I say as Sebastian and I walk through the gallery back toward our chambers.
“Growing boys,” he replies. “Exhausted.”
“That wasn’t exhaustion,” I say.
He stops walking. “You’re imagining it.”
I look at him. “I watched them for thirteen years. I know the difference between tired and torn.”
Sebastian exhales, already retreating behind duty. “They’ll sort it out.”
“They won’t,” I say calmly. “Not without help.”
He turns away. “You worry too much.”
I let the words sit between us. I have learned that pressing him too hard only makes him deaf.
Later that night, I find Adrian in the library.
He stands by the window, hands clasped behind his back, staring down into the gardens like he expects answers to rise out of the hedges.
“You missed dessert,” I say gently.
“I wasn’t hungry,” he answers.
“Since when?” I ask.
He hesitates. “Since tonight.”
I step closer. “Talk to me.”
He straightens immediately. “There’s nothing to say.”
I recognize the posture. Sebastian wears it when he doesn’t want to feel.
“Is this about your brother?” I ask.
Adrian’s jaw tightens. “Mark doesn’t think.”
“He feels,” I correct softly.
“That’s the problem,” he snaps, then immediately reins himself in. “I mean—he doesn’t consider consequences.”
“And you consider nothing but,” I reply.
He looks at me then. “He’ll get hurt.”
“Or he’ll live,” I say.
“That’s not the same thing,” Adrian replies.
“No,” I agree. “It isn’t.”
I study him—the tension in his shoulders, the way his fingers curl like fists even at rest.
“Did something happen at the festival?” I ask.
He nods once. “Yes.”
“With the girl?” I continue.
His eyes flick away. “She’s… irrelevant.”
That answer tells me everything.
Mark is easier to find.
He is exactly where he shouldn’t be—on the balcony overlooking the lower courtyard, boots up on the railing, chewing on something suspiciously sweet.
“You’re going to fall,” I say.
“Probably,” he replies cheerfully.
I sit beside him anyway.
“You enjoyed the festival,” I say.
“Very much,” he answers.
“And the girl,” I add.
He grins. “You noticed.”
“I notice everything,” I say.
“She’s incredible,” he continues. “She doesn’t care who we are. She laughed at me.”
“That is not a qualification,” I reply dryly.
“It is when you’re surrounded by people who never do,” he says.
I glance at him. “Your brother likes her too.”
The grin fades.
“I know,” he says.
“Does that trouble you?” I ask.
He shrugs. “He can like her. Doesn’t mean she’ll like him back.”
“That isn’t what I asked,” I say gently.
Mark looks down at his hands. “He always gets what he wants.”
“That’s not true,” I say.
He snorts. “Name one thing he didn’t.”
I don’t.
He exhales. “I’m tired of stepping aside.”
The words echo too loudly in my chest.
“You don’t have to compete with him,” I say.
“I’m not,” Mark replies. “I’m just… choosing myself.”
I close my eyes briefly.
I have heard those words before.
Sebastian refuses to see it.
“They’ll resolve it,” he insists the next morning when I bring it up again. “Boys clash. It’s healthy.”
“Not like this,” I reply.
“You’re projecting,” he says.
I stop walking. “Don’t.”
He sighs. “Evangeline—”
“My brother and I were inseparable once,” I interrupt. “Until we weren’t. And the distance didn’t come from hatred. It came from silence.”
Sebastian stiffens. “This is different.”
“That’s what everyone says before history repeats itself,” I reply.
He looks away. “I won’t interfere unless necessary.”
I study his profile—the stubborn line of his jaw, the way his father lives in his posture even when he fights it.
“By the time it feels necessary,” I say quietly, “it may already be too late.”
He doesn’t answer.
That evening, dinner is a battlefield disguised as civility.
Adrian eats methodically, eyes lowered. Mark jokes too loudly. Sebastian corrects posture, pace, tone.
No one mentions the girl. No one needs to.
I catch Adrian watching Mark when he laughs. I catch Mark watching Adrian when Father praises him. The space between them stretches, invisible but real. Afterward, as the boys leave, I reach for Sebastian’s hand.
“They don’t need a king right now,” I say.
“They always need one,” he replies.
“No,” I whisper. “They need a father.”
He pulls his hand away—not unkindly, but decisively.
“I’m doing my best,” he says.
I believe him.
That frightens me more than if I didn’t.
Later, alone, I sit by the window and look out over the city.
Somewhere below, lanterns are being taken down, music fading, joy packed away until next year.
And in my sons’ hearts, something bright and dangerous has been lit.
I press my palm to the glass.
Love divides as easily as it binds.
I learned that once, long ago, when I lost my brother without choosing to.
And now, watching my sons drift toward opposite edges of the same desire, I understand the cruel symmetry of it.
History doesn’t repeat because we forget. It repeats because we recognize it—and hope we’ll be the exception.