Thorns of Decision (Dusk Gate Chronicles) (41 page)

Her eyes widened. “That seems like a long time.”

“I doubt we actually have that much time before he really starts pushing against us. I don’t think he has any intention of there being peaceful relations between our kingdoms, although he did send another offer of marriage along for Linnea.”

White-hot anger bubbled up in William’s stomach, and his hands clenched tightly at his sides.

Stephen saw the expressions on their faces and nodded. “Of course, I doubt that Hector has any idea what happened recently with Thomas. I believe that was Tolliver acting on his own. However, I don’t think that particular offer merits even a response.”

“Oh, it deserves a response, Father,” William spat, unable to restrain himself.

“Exchanging hostilities is not going to further our cause. Even if he doesn’t know the extent of what his son has done, I don’t think Hector really believes we would allow our daughter to marry him,” Charlotte said quietly.

“We think he’s mostly using the offer to stall us, anyway,” Stephen said. “He needs more time to get his people and troops in support of him, and against us. In the meantime, he would prefer to continue to undermine our own peoples’ confidence in us, and attempt to force
us
to close the border, so he can claim that we’ve initiated the hostilities, despite the fact that his kingdom has been poisoning our children and tracking down and killing innocent people.”

Everyone was silent for a moment as those words hung in the air.

Finally, Quinn cleared her throat. “So you need to act.”

“Yes.”

“And the hold-up is me.” She was sitting up straight, and her chin was taut, but William could feel her fingers trembling. His own surprise was heavy and thick – he hadn’t processed this whole thing that far yet, but he realized now that she’d pegged it correctly.

“Yes, Quinn. We never wanted to force you into a decision, but ultimately, what you decide will be the determining factor in how we proceed.”

She swallowed hard. “What would you have done if I’d never found the gate – if you hadn’t been able to tell me anything until I was eighteen?”

“We’d always prayed that another solution would present itself before we had to make that choice. We’ve walked a fine line in our dealings with Tolliver for a long time now – first with Rebecca, and then with Linnea. If Thomas hadn’t decided to go searching for Lily, it’s likely that we could have continued to stretch that out for a while longer.”

“And what is your other option, Stephen?”

“If you choose not to fight this battle with us, Quinn, we will attempt to install Charles’ daughter, Gianna as the heir apparent, and Charles as Prince Regent, until she is of age.”

“Why have you not done that already?”

Stephen sighed deeply, and William was surprised when his mother began speaking, instead.

“I know you were raised outside of our world, Quinn, outside of our beliefs. I don’t actually know if you were raised to believe in the Maker at all.”

Quinn’s eyes widened again, “I think that’s a little different in my world,” she said.

“We don’t actually believe it is, Quinn,” Charlotte said. “But either way, we have always believed that the Maker has his own plan for our kingdoms, and that it is only by following his lead that we will have the peace and prosperity he means for us to have.”

“And you think the Maker wants me to be the heir of Philotheum.”

“We believe that’s who he made you to be.”

Quinn dropped William’s hand then, and she stood, walking around to the back of the chair she’d been sitting in, and leaning her hands against it. He turned around to watch her. “If that’s true, then exactly how is
any
of this my choice?” Her voice trembled.

Stephen’s eyes were soft when he looked up at her, though there were dark, heavy shadows beneath them. “It’s always your choice, Quinn. Nobody can force you to be anything – not even what you were born to be. You could return to your own world and never look back.”

She paused for what felt like a very long time before she nodded. “And where would that leave you?”

He stood now, walking over closer to her, meeting her eyes. “It would leave us in the hands of the Maker, and we would do what he leads us to do. He hasn’t yet directed us to do something other than wait on you, and so we haven’t.”

“And we won’t, Quinn,” Charlotte said. “We may not understand the Maker’s plan, and it’s difficult, sometimes, when things look like they’re crumbling around us, not to take matters into our own hands and try to fix it.”

 “Maxwell is struggling with it very much,” Stephen said. “He thinks we are making a mistake now, but Charlotte and I, though I’m sure we will continue to make many mistakes, we truly believe that it’s never a mistake to wait on the Maker.”

“Does Max know about me?”

“No, he doesn’t. But it doesn’t matter. He knows enough to make his own choices about what he’s going to believe, and who he is going to trust.”

“So what do I do now?”

Stephen sighed. “Right now, tonight, Quinn, you get your first taste of what it might be like if you do choose to be the ruler of a kingdom. We’ve gotten some terrible and distressing news, but there is a celebration going on outside, and not one of us can afford to be away from it any longer.”

Although William and Quinn both did their best to switch back into “celebration” mode, the rest of the party had a strained feeling to it.

As soon as they got back outside, Linnea pounced on William, dragging him off to the dance floor, while Thomas took Quinn’s arm.

“What’s going on, Will?” his sister asked. “And don’t blow me off this time; I’m tired of not being included in anything. I’m almost of age, too, you know.”

William closed his eyes for a moment and then nodded. “I know you are Nay.” He did feel bad at how often things happened that Linnea didn’t get to be part of. And he felt even worse, because there was something else he’d taken away from her recently, too, something that he now realized might not have been the right decision.

 “Look, Nay, we just heard some really bad news, and I can’t talk about it right now and stay at the party and do what I need to do – and I think Quinn feels the same way. I promise I’ll fill you in on it tomorrow, though.”

And he would – at least the parts that were his to share. But the hurt didn’t disappear from her eyes.

 A little way across the floor from them, he could see from the expression on Thomas’ face that he and Quinn were having a similar conversation. As hard as he tried to enjoy the rest of his party and entertain his guests, dancing with everyone, he was preoccupied the whole time, always watching Quinn, wondering how she was doing.

All of this was an awful lot for a sixteen-year-old girl from another world to absorb – too much, he thought. Finding out that she was the heir to the throne in a kingdom in another world was bad enough without walking into the middle of a war, too.

She was holding it together impressively, though. As he watched, she danced with Thomas, with his older brothers, even some of his cousins, though he chuckled quietly when he saw her excuse herself for a few minutes when his cousin Gavin was approaching. She smiled and laughed, looking every bit like it was all natural to her, as if she belonged here. He was surprised to find himself following her lead, trying to navigate his interactions with his guests with the same grace she was showing.

It was only when she danced with him again that she seemed to let her mind wander back to reality, and then the deep crease showed itself between her eyebrows, and her hands trembled slightly in his.

When the night was over, William upset his siblings again by asking for a few minutes alone with Quinn as he walked her up to her room.

As soon as he’d closed her door behind them, she looked up at him. “Well,
that
wasn’t how I envisioned your birthday party.”

He smiled softly. “No. I guess things really don’t go according to plan sometimes.”

“I don’t have any idea what to do, Will.” She sank down onto her couch.

“I know you don’t.” He perched on the edge of her small table, putting his hands on her knees, tracing the lines of velvet flowers on her skirt with his fingers, trying to sort out his own thoughts.

“Part of me wants to run off to Philotheum tonight and tell Tolliver to get off my throne and send Dorian and James back home, right now.”

His eyes widened for a second – it surprised him that she’d actually thought that far. Trying to keep the pressure off her, he chuckled. “I know, love. I don’t think it’s that simple though.”

“No, it’s not. Especially because the other part of me
really
wishes that the biggest thing I had to worry about right now was how I’m ever going to get my grade back up in World History.”

At the moment, part of him felt that way, too. “Maybe you’ve been studying the wrong world,” he said with a wry grin.

Quinn snickered, and the suddenness of the noise caused him to burst out laughing, too. The pair of them sat there, laughing hysterically for several minutes. “In either case,” she finally agreed, out of breath, as she was overcome with another bout of the giggles.

When she was finally calm, though, her expression took on a serious tone that erased all of the laughter from the last several minutes.

“What are you thinking, sweetheart?”

Her chin shook as she swallowed, the crease on her forehead deepening. “I was thinking that I want to join the Friends of Philip.”

Somehow, her words didn’t surprise him at all; that should have seemed all wrong to him, but it didn’t; it felt right. Still, he had to ask the question. “Are you sure, Quinn? You’re still not obligated to this world, you know? I don’t think you should make any huge decisions this fast.”

She stood and walked over to the window – he could see from her posture that she was deep in thought, trying to figure out how to express what was on her mind. He waited while she looked outside for a long moment before finally turning back to him.

“I don’t know a lot of things, Will. But it’s too late now to pretend that none of this ever happened – maybe it’s even too late to pretend that I never should have followed you and walked off that bridge. I don’t know what it was – but I don’t believe it was just a freak accident anymore.”

She turned back toward the window again, looking out as her voice dropped low, almost as if she was speaking to herself more than she was to him.  “I know now that I can’t ever just completely walk away from this world. No matter what I decide, this is still half of who I am. This is who I was born to be. And I don’t know everything. I don’t know what I believe, and what I don’t. But I can see what’s right. And I know whose side I’m on.”

As she finished, a warm feeling settled in his chest. He stood and crossed the room to her, taking one of her hands in his, and with the other catching a long tendril of her auburn hair that had slipped from the intricate braid. Her breath caught as he twirled the strand around his finger, and he looked into her eyes, the warm feeling inside of him growing more intense, building slowly into something more, a warm glow that spread through every part of him.

“I love you, Quinn.”

He hadn’t planned on telling her that, hadn’t known until that moment that it was true. He didn’t have any idea how she would react – she’d probably feel like he was pushing her, except he wasn’t. He knew what the stakes were, knew that there was a good chance that he couldn’t keep her regardless, but at that moment he knew – down into the deepest part of his being, he knew that it didn’t matter. None of it, not how they’d gotten here, not where it was going to go, mattered. He loved her, would always love her, and she deserved to know.