Ice Baron (Ice Chronicles, Book One (science fiction romance)) (12 page)

It seemed only a moment before
irritating
beeps
awoke her. She swung out of bed, brushed her hair and
left the room, still yawning. Hopefully, Joshua was still sleeping. She wanted
to speak to Richert alone, before lunch.

A servant in the hall directed her
to the dining room, where Richert brooded near the window.

“Hello,” she said brightly.

The old man sent her a startled
glance. A flash of something indecipherable gleamed in his eyes, then
disappeared. “What do you want, girl?”

“Thank you for your hospitality.”

He grunted. “Get on with it. No
one speaks to me without a reason.”

“I need your help.”

For the first time, she noticed
the cane in his hand. Noticing the direction of her gaze, he prodded it into
the floor. “I can walk, you know.”

“Why don’t you?”

A coarse chuckle erupted. “I’m
afraid I’ll fall.”

She hadn’t expected honesty, nor
the vulnerability he had allowed her to see. After a moment elapsed, she dared to
ask a personal question. “What happened to you? You’re not that old.”

“Doctors don’t know. Maybe I have
a parasite.” Richert levered himself to his feet. Slowly, he shuffled forward,
a few centimeters at a time. It was painful to watch. Anya tensed, ready to run
to his aid, should he need it. He now rested his weight on the dining chair
back. A feeble plucking, and he dragged it back enough so he could plop down on
the cushioned seat. Harsh breaths rattled in his chest.

Richert propped his cane against
the table, and with a wheeze took up the conversation again. “A viral one, they’re
guessing. Or maybe someone’s poisoning me.”

Anya was surprised he’d speak so
matter-of-factly of possible assassination. “Who’s next in line for power?”

“My son. He’s sixteen. Two years
until he reaches his majority. Or it could be my first-in-command. But I think
it’s Lisa. She hates me.”

“Probably.”

He chuckled loudly.

“Maybe you should get a new cook.”

The black eyes glittered. “What do
you want, Anya?”

It was the first time he had ever
referred to her by her Christian name. “I want to go with Joshua. I need to
fight Onred and protect my people.”

“He asked if I’d watch over you
when he dies.”

Alarm rushed. “He
won’t
die.”

“He probably will. He’s a brave
buck, but he’s going against impossible odds.”

“I want to go with him.”

“You’ll die, too.”

“So be it. If Joshua dies, I die.
It’s the way it has to be. It’s the way I want it to be. Let me choose my
death.”

“You love him that much?”

Anya swallowed, and then said, “Yes.”
It was the first time she had ever admitted that to anyone.

His eyes glittered. “Against my
better judgment, I’ll help you. Listen carefully.”

Anya wasn’t fooled by her uncle’s
sudden generosity. Richert didn’t suddenly like her. For one thing, she still physically
reminded him of her dead mother, whom he despised. For another, if she and
Joshua died, it would give Richert the perfect opportunity to conquer her
territory. With two of Donetsk’s cities gone, he would likely succeed with
ease.

Richert had just finished
outlining his plan when Joshua entered the room. “We were just talking about
you,” her uncle said.

Anya cast Richert an uneasy
glance. Would the unpredictable baron let a clue slip about their plans?

But Richert only told Joshua to
pull up a chair, and then rang for lunch to be served. “Eat up,” he advised.
Ghoulishly, he added, “It may be your last meal.”

Lunch consisted of hot rolls,
slabs of ham, and cheesy potatoes. Joshua ate silently. He also looked tired.

“You’re boring guests,” Richert growled.

“How did you come to power?” Anya
asked. She didn’t really want to talk. Worry about her family, Onred’s threats,
and, in a short while, mutinying against Joshua’s orders again, all coalesced
into an uncomfortable lump in the pit of her stomach. Getting Richert to ramble
on about himself seemed the best plan. Most people loved to talk about themselves,
and she felt certain Richert was no different.

His heavy brows lifted. “You want
a story? Fine. My father was Baron. He passed the title on to me when I turned
thirty-six. It was about the time your mother married my brother.” His lips
twisted, as if tasting something sour.

“Your father didn’t die before you
took power?”

“No. He tested me first. I was a
protector for eight years. I started at twenty-five. Most protectors are older.
But my father ordered it, because he thought it would mature me for the job of
baron. He wanted to test my mettle—for me to prove I could control myself.” His
lips twisted into a faint smile. “I was quite the lady’s man in my day. But I
did a fair job as protector. I watched over two teenaged girls and their
brother. Their father died in the old wars. The mother needed help.” Richert
lapsed into silence.

“What happened?” Anya asked,
assuming he had a point to his story.

“The oldest girl was your mother.”

Anya stared at him in complete
silence.

Richert’s fiery, obsidian gaze
bored into Joshua. “So you see. We have much in common.”

Joshua’s gaze flicked to Anya, and
then back to the baron. Quietly, he said, “What happened between you and Anya’s
mother?”

“I loved her. Rachel loved me, but
refused to admit it, because of the scandal.” Richert huffed a laugh. “My
father saw, of course. He warned me to stay away from her. If I broke the
protector’s sacred trust, he’d disown me. The title of baron would go to my
brother.”

Anya squelched a disbelieving
snort. Her mother had never loved Richert. But better to let Richert talk. Then
she could better understand what made him tick now.

“Then my uncle died in an attack,
and the northern territory—your territory—” this to Joshua, “—needed a baron.
My brother was nominated. Jason asked Rachel to go with him. Not because he
loved her. But because
I
did. He’d always been jealous of me, and all I
would become. He wanted to be Baron of Tarim Territory, but he didn’t have the
guts to kill me for it. So he took my Rachel.”

Anya bit her tongue. Rachel had
hardly been Richert’s.

“The night before she was to
leave, Rachel came to me in tears. She said her mother and Jason had come to an
agreement. She had to marry Jason, but it wasn’t by her choice.” Richert’s face
gentled. “She said she loved me, and didn’t want to leave me. But she also didn’t
want me to lose my future, either, as I would if I married her. All the same, I
asked her to marry me, and she said, ‘Yes.’”

Richert’s voice grew quieter, and
he looked into the distance, as if into the past. The true past? Or one he had
reengineered for his own comfort? “I was ecstatic. I figured I could get my
father to overlook my transgression, eventually. After all, he didn’t have any
more sons to become baron. It seemed like all of my dreams were about to come
true. I should have known.”

“Known what?” Anya said, beginning
to feel impatient with the story that Richert clearly wove from figments of his
imagination. She had to bite her tongue to keep from asserting that her mother
had loved her
father
, not Richert.

“I should have known when she gave
herself to me that night, that something wasn’t right. Waiting until marriage
was ingrained into Rachel’s character. But I was a fool, and took her for my
own. When I woke up, she was gone. So was my brother.”

Richert sat silently for a long
time. “She married him. I waited like a fool, hoping she’d be miserable and
leave him. Finally, I wrote to her, begging her to return to me. My brother
wrote back. He said he’d kill me if I wrote another letter like that to his
wife. Rachel was his, forever. Rachel wrote a note, too, saying that she’d
never loved me. Later, I believed it. But not then. And then you were born.”
Richert spared a brief glance for Anya.

The full implication hit, and she
gasped.

“Don’t worry,” Richert snapped. “DNA
proved you were his. Plus, you were born too late, in May.”

Anya had been born in March.
Joshua met her gaze and held it, but Anya said nothing to put the delusional
old man straight. As Richert had said, DNA had proven that she was her father’s
child. And her mother had loved her father. Anya had seen it in the way she had
kissed him goodbye in the morning, or smoothed his collar. The way she’d given
him five children. Bitterness had bent this old man’s mind and warped his body.
Anya would provide no more fuel for his twisted fantasies. It was time for
peace. Time to put the past to rest.

“So you started a bloody war, all
in the name of love,” she summed up.

Color rushed to Richert’s face. “I
started the bloody war because Jason stole her. Then he held her prisoner. The
first skirmishes were to try to steal her back.” He waved a bony hand. “Matters
escalated from there.”

Anya gasped. “Thousands of people
died! Your jealousy has caused heartbreak for…”

“Anya,” Joshua said.

Joshua was right, of course. What
did she hope to accomplish? Richert would never see the truth. He had given his
entire life to pursuing “justice.” What were the chances that he’d admit to
being wrong all this time? That he’d wasted his entire life, as well as the
lives of thousands of young men, on a war spawned by his crushed pride and jealousy?

The old baron glowered at her, his
black brows beetling over burning black eyes. Did she want to start another war
right now, when Joshua had just negotiated peace? When Richert had just “magnanimously”
agreed to help her?

“I’m sorry if I spoke out of turn,”
she managed.

“You’re damn well not sorry,”
Richert snapped. “Don’t lie to me, like your mother did.”

In a flash of understanding, Anya
guessed that this was what had hurt Richert most of all. Rightly or wrongly, he
had given his heart to her mother. She had betrayed his trust, and so had her
father.

Drawing a deep breath, Anya
touched his cool, papery hand. To her surprise, he didn’t snatch it free. “I’m
sorry,” she repeated in a low voice. “I’m sorry for the way my mother hurt you.
And I’m sorry that both of my parents betrayed you.”

Richert looked away. A deeper
scowl knit his brows. He fumbled in his shirt pocket. As if summoned by an
invisible command, his wheelchair noiselessly rolled up to his chair.

“I’m glad for a chance at a new
beginning,” she pressed on. “For you, me, Joshua, and my family.”

The black eyes glittered. “I don’t
trust you, you know. I don’t trust anyone.”

“I know. But we’ve taken the first
step toward peace, haven’t we?”

Now he jerked his hand free. “We’ll
see.” With shaking arms, he levered himself up and plopped into his wheelchair.
With an impatient poke at a button, he whirred away.

“Good job.” Amusement lurked in
Joshua’s eyes. “Ready to sweet-talk Onred next?”

“You’d let me come?”

“Not a chance.”

Lowering her gaze, Anya spooned up
soup and blew on it. Joshua could read her too well. She was afraid her eyes
would give away her true intentions. He would be livid when he found out what
they were.

CHAPTER ELEVEN

Joshua slowed
to a stop before Anya’s door.

It was almost time for the mission
to begin. He looked forward to seeing Onred face-to-face—his visceral desire
was to kill the monster with his bare hands. First, though, he had to say
goodbye to Anya. She had left the lunch table shortly after Richert, and it was
why Joshua stood outside her door now.

He didn’t want to leave her again.
What a waste, to never be able to show her or tell her how much she meant to
him. His overwhelming longing to hold her in his arms threatened his rational
mind; even worse, it threatened to undermine his fierce vow to honor, loyalty,
and duty. He had to control himself one more time. And he had to be prepared,
too, for he knew she’d beg to come with him. Part of him selfishly wanted to
grant her wish. He wanted her with him, so he could see her as long as safely
possible before he left for his ultimate mission. But Anya was too unpredictable,
and might find a way to follow him. So he absolutely could not allow it. It was
far too dangerous. Protecting her was his number one job. And he’d continue to
do so until his dying breath.

So now he had to tell her goodbye.

What if this was the last time he
would ever see her? Would it matter if he broke his sacred protector’s trust?
She would forgive him. Joshua knew it.

If he died, his sins would die
with him. If he lived, perhaps there was a chance…

No, there wasn’t.