Chapter 12: The Advisor

The morning after the boots appeared outside my door, I woke to the sound of someone entering my room without knocking.

I sat up so fast that my head spun, pressing my back against the headboard and pulling my knees to my chest, ready for whatever new cruelty the day had brought. But the woman who stood in the doorway was not a guard, not a noble, and not anyone I had seen before in the weeks I had been trapped in this frozen castle.

She was old.

Her hair was silver, pulled back from her face in a braid that hung over one shoulder, and her skin was pale and lined with wrinkles that spoke of centuries rather than decades. Her eyes were grey, like mine, but sharper, brighter, and they looked at me like I was a puzzle she was trying to solve.

She did not ask permission to enter. She simply walked inside, closed the door behind her, and stood at the foot of my bed with her arms crossed over her chest.

"You are the mate," she said.

It was not a question. She already knew the answer. She had come here to confirm it, not to discover it.

I did not speak, because silence was safety, and silence had kept me alive. But the old woman did not seem bothered by my silence. She just studied me, her grey eyes moving over my face, my hands, and the way I held my body like a shield against the world.

"He has never loved anything," she said, and her voice was matter-of-fact, like she was telling me the weather or the time of day. "He does not know how. If you want him to learn, you will have to teach him."

I laughed.

It was a bitter sound, sharp and ugly, and it echoed off the stone walls like something broken. The old woman did not flinch, and she did not look away. She just waited for me to finish reacting to whatever had amused me.

"Why would I want that?" I asked. "Why would I want to teach a monster how to love? So he can destroy me slower? Or so he can hurt me in new ways I have not imagined yet?"

The old woman tilted her head, and something flickered across her face. Recognition, maybe. Or patience. Or the kind of weariness that came from watching the same mistakes happen over and over again for hundreds of years.

"Because he is trying," she said. "That is more than most monsters ever do."

I stared at her. The boots on my feet were warm, and the honey on my tray had been sweet, and the king's hands had shaken when he touched me, and he had stopped when I said nothing at all. But none of that meant anything. Kindness from a monster was still a weapon, and it was still a trap.

"Who are you?" I asked.

"My name is Elara," she said. "I have served the kings of this land for longer than you have been alive. I was here when Leandro's father ruled. I was here when the humans killed him, and I was here when Leandro took the throne and swore that he would never let anyone close enough to hurt him again."

She crossed to the window and looked out at the frozen wasteland, with her silver braid catching the light of the fire. "And I have watched him for three centuries, waiting for something to crack the walls he built around himself. I did not expect it to be a human. But the goddess chose you, and the goddess does not make mistakes."

"The goddess cursed me," I said. "That is what he said. 'The goddess has cursed me.' Those were his exact words."

Elara turned from the window and looked at me, and for the first time, her sharp eyes softened. "Leandro has spent three hundred years believing that humans are monsters. He watched his father die at the hands of a human who pretended to be his friend. He grew up on that hatred, and it kept him safe. It kept him alone, and it kept him from ever having to feel anything again."

She walked toward me, slowly, like she was approaching a wounded animal that might bite. "And then you arrived. You're the human who was supposed to just be a sacrifice. Someone he was supposed to use and discard. And the goddess looked at him and said, 'This is your mate. This is the one I have chosen for you.'"

I shook my head. "That is not a gift, that is a punishment."

"Perhaps," Elara said. "Or perhaps it is the only thing that could save him."

She sat on the edge of the bed, and the old mattress creaked under her weight, and I pressed myself harder against the headboard because I did not know what she wanted from me. Everyone in this castle wanted something from me. Ramiro wanted to use me to destroy the king, the nobles wanted to see me broken, and the king himself wanted something I could not name.

But what did this old woman want? That I could not tell.

"I am not here to hurt you," she said, as if reading my thoughts. "I am here to help you. Because you are not a sacrifice anymore, Sergio. You are a choice. What you do with that is up to you."

I looked down at my hands, and they were still shaking.

"I did not ask for this," I said. "I did not ask to be born, and I did not ask to be beaten. I did not ask to be sold to monsters, and I did not ask to be the mate of a king who cannot even look at me without flinching."

Elara was quiet for a long moment. The fire crackled, the wind howled outside, and I sat there with my back against the headboard and my heart in my throat, waiting for her to leave, or waiting for her to tell me that I was wrong, that I was weak, and that I was nothing.

"He flinches because he is afraid," she said finally. "Not of you, but of himself. He has spent three hundred years learning how to take whatever he wants. He does not know how to want something without destroying it. And you are the first thing he has ever wanted that he does not want to break."

I stared at her. "That does not make me safe."

"No," she agreed. "It does not. But it makes him try. And that is more than any other human who has walked through these doors has ever gotten."

She stood up, walked to the door, and her hand rested on the handle, and she looked back at me one last time. "He will make mistakes. He will hurt you without meaning to, and he will push you away because he does not know how to pull you close. But if you can be patient, if you can teach him what it means to be loved, then you might save him from the darkness that has been eating him alive for three hundred years."

"Why would I want to save him?" I asked, and my voice was smaller than I wanted it to be.

Elara smiled, but it was a sad smile. The kind of smile that had seen too much and hoped too hard and had been disappointed too many times.

"Because he is your mate," she said. "And whether you like it or not, some part of you already knows that. Some part of you already wants to save him, and some part of you already loves him."

She left before I could answer.

The door closed, the lock clicked, the fire crackled, and I sat there against the headboard, with my back to the wall and my eyes on the door, and I thought about what she had said. I thought about Leandro's golden eyes and his shaking hands and the way he had looked at me like I was the only thing in the world that mattered.

Some part of me already loves him. I echoed and repeated these words but still, I did not know if that was true.

But I knew that Elara was wrong about one thing.

I was still a sacrifice, and I would always be a sacrifice. Because that was the only thing I had ever been good for.