The Redeemable Prince
The Star-Crossed Series
Book Seven
By Rachel Higginson
Copyright@ Rachel Higginson 2014
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Copy Editing by Carolyn Moon
Cover Design by Caedus Design Co.
Other Books Now Available by Rachel Higginson
Love and Decay, Season One, Episodes One-Twelve
Love and Decay, Season Two, Episodes One-Twelve
Love and Decay, Volume One (Episodes One-Six, Season One)
Love and Decay, Volume Two (Episodes Seven-Twelve, Season One)
Love and Decay, Volume Three (Episodes One-Four, Season Two)
Love and Decay, Volume Four (Episodes Five-Eight, Season Two)
Love and Decay, Volume Five (Episodes Nine-Twelve, Season Two)
Reckless Magic (The Star-Crossed Series, Book 1)
Hopeless Magic (The Star-Crossed Series, Book 2)
Fearless Magic (The Star-Crossed Series, Book 3)
Endless Magic (The Star-Crossed Series, Book 4)
The Reluctant King (The Star-Crossed Series, Book 5)
The Relentless Warrior (The Star-Crossed Series, Book 6)
Breathless Magic (The Star-Crossed Series, Book 6.5)
Fateful Magic (The Star-Crossed Series, Book 6.75)
The Redeemable Prince (The Star-Crossed Series, Book 7)
Heir of Skies (The Starbright Series, Book 1)
Heir of Darkness (The Starbright Series, Book 2)
Heir of Secrets (The Starbright Series, Book 3)
The Rush (The Siren Series, Book 1)
The Fall (The Siren Series, Book 2)
Bet in the Dark (An NA Contemporary Romance)
Striking (The Forged in Fire Series) This is a co-authored Contemporary NA
Brazing (The Forged in Fire Series) This is a co-authored Contemporary NA
To Angst.
To Love that doesn’t give up.
Prologue
Seraphina
One year ago.
“Sera, we’ve been over this and over this. What don’t you understand?”
Those words. That question.
As if I were stupid for wanting to talk about this, or a naïve child that couldn’t grasp reality. His reality.
I swallowed back a hundred different snotty responses. I didn’t like the taste of all that bitterness and resentment in my mouth. I loved this man, but I had never been angrier with someone in my life.
And once, I’d tried to impale the Queen with a thousand pieces of glass. So it wasn’t like I was a stranger to anger.
But that was years ago. I wasn’t that girl anymore.
I was reformed these days, and that meant keeping my vitriol at a low simmer instead of spitting acid all over this man like I wanted to.
“I don’t understand why it’s so easy for you to leave me,” I answered calmly. My voice hardly trembled at all and I prayed that I was the only one that heard my weakness. I felt like curling into myself and hiding beneath the covers until this all blew over. My heart physically hurt from the pressure of this fight and the thoughts swirling around inside my head.
But I couldn’t show him that. We’d been fighting for days about this and he was tired of my tears. Besides, they weren’t helping me make any progress anyway. So what was the point? I could cry myself to sleep later.
He let out an aggravated groan from across the room. His hands scrubbed at his face and when he replied it was muffled through his palms. “I cannot say this a different way. I am not leaving you! I have to go. I have to fight for our people. I have a responsibility to Avalon and to the Kingdom. Sera, I cannot stay here and do nothing!”
My heart squeezed in my chest and my lungs stopped working. Why didn’t he see how much his absence tore us apart? Why didn’t he get it? Why didn’t he feel this gaping hole opening in his chest, threatening to swallow him alive?
Didn’t he feel the emptiness?
Didn’t he feel the abandonment?
“I understand that.” My shoulders shrugged forward and I felt myself shrink back into the warm, leather couch I’d collapsed onto a few minutes ago. I pulled my knees to my chest and wrapped my arms around them. I needed to hold onto something. I would have preferred it to be him, but I could tell the only comfort I would get tonight would be from myself. “Sebastian, I’m not asking you to do nothing. I’m asking you to do everything and anything you can, but from here. You don’t have to be on the front lines to make a difference! You don’t have to go after Terletov yourself! Let someone else do that. Stay here. Stay with me.”
He looked at me for a long time. His body stilled and his hands fell heavily at his sides. His face remained expressionless, which grated against every last one of my nerves. These fights we’d been having lately were killing me, they were tearing me apart limb by limb and he couldn’t even bother to look upset.
And when he spoke, the accent that I used to find so distinguished and sexy, resonated in this painfully hollow way. It sounded like an empty echo in my pounding head. I loved him, but I’d already lost him. His next few words weren’t even a surprise.
Although they still hurt. So much.
“I can’t,” he said. His voice broke at the same time it held so much conviction.
He loved me, but he loved this Kingdom more.
I should have expected that. I should have seen it coming.
Sebastian would always do what was best for him first. He would always think about his needs first. That was just the way he was: A spoiled prince raised to think his wishes superseded everything else.
I had known that since the day I met him. In fact, at first I’d appreciated his self-centered attitude because I could relate.
But things were different now. We were at war again. Our lives and the lives of those we both loved were at risk.
We came together under a similar set of circumstances. We both fought for a better life for this Kingdom, for justice and the end of tyranny. We were on the same page and it was easy.
And since Lucan fell, our relationship had been relatively easy. Sure, we fought about silly things, but I thought all couples did that. We went through the normal stages and worked to get to know each other and build something substantial.
I put all of myself into these last three years. I did everything I could to make this a lasting, committed relationship. I thought Sebastian had too.
Now that we had something to really fight about though, I wasn’t sure we’d done that great of a job. We were so similar in so many things. And when we didn’t line up perfectly, I thought our opposites complimented each other.
I thought we had what it took to make it.
I pulled my knees tighter to my chest, so tight
I found it hard to breathe. But I couldn’t let them go. I couldn’t give myself the luxury of breathing freely, not when every other part of my body and soul felt like it was crumbling apart.
“We’ve been talking about getting married, Sebastian. You told me you wanted to take this relationship to the next level. How can we do that if you’re dead?”
His face scrunched with frustration. “Why is it that I am always the one getting offed in your imaginary scenarios? Why do I have to die? Why can’t you choose Avalon or Kiran? Both would be better targets than me! I’m not even royalty anymore!”
“It’s not about who Terletov chooses to kill, Sebastian! It’s about what could happen to anyone that goes after him! And Kiran wouldn’t leave Eden to go run after bad guys. He’s not signing up for missions and offering up his life. He’s playing it safe for the Kingdom and for the people that count on him!”
“So I should just do whatever Kiran does? He knows best, is that right? My cousin, the perfect King. Do you still hate Eden for stealing your boyfriend after all of these years?”
I sucked in a sharp breath. It felt as though he’d taken a dull knife and gutted me with it. I felt my heart hemorrhaging the last remnants of hope and my spirit shrivel into a hard, lifeless ball.
This was how shrews were made. Hags. Old Maids. This was the point in my life I would be so very broken I would never be able to put myself back together.
In a hundred years, I would look back at this moment and know this was the exact point in time I became destined to own sixty cats.
Because after this, I was done with men. I would never put up with this again.
He’d managed to strip away my self-confidence and good faith while shattering my heart at the same time. That took both skill and a pure ruthlessness I had not known he was capable of.
“This has nothing to do with Kiran,” I rasped with a voice that could only just be heard. “Whether you want to believe it or not, you’re still a prince. The entire Kingdom thinks of you as royalty. You have a prominent position in Avalon’s cabinet and you’re Kiran’s closest confidant. You can lie to yourself or feel sorry for yourself or whatever, but you will be a target out there. Terletov will see you and know he can use you. So maybe you’re right. Maybe he won’t kill you. Maybe he’ll just conduct all those sick experiments on you or steal your magic. And maybe that somehow justifies this stupid, save-the-world attitude, but you’re leaving me and you don’t seem to care. And that is my problem! That is my biggest issue.”
“You are being unnecessarily dramatic about this. Stop acting so crazy.”
He probably could have said anything else but that. That one phrase, that one word, actually did make me crazy. It was like a trigger for my temper and he knew that.
We’d had plenty of fights over this before.
I was fine with being labeled high-maintenance. I was high-maintenance. And if he wanted to call me difficult or habitually late or temperamental or even bitchy, I would be fine with any of those.
But crazy was too far.
When I didn’t immediately respond, Sebastian went on, “Seraphina, I don’t want to leave you, but I have to do this. I need you to understand. If you force me to choose between you or the Kingdom, you won’t like the outcome.”
I felt like he’d slapped me in the face. I never said he had to choose. He said that. And then he simply informed me that I would be the loser.
“What if I do like the outcome?” My voice shook again, but this time it was from anger, not from hurt.
He let out a gruff laugh. “What do you mean? You’re saying you want to break up with me?”
“It sounds more like you want to break up with me.”
He took three steps toward me and his entire body radiated with some emotion I couldn’t understand. I was too wrapped up in my own world of pain.
I watched his tall frame move toward me and admired him in the way I always did. I couldn’t help but notice the muscle packed tightly all over his body, his broad shoulders that pulled his t-shirts tight or his long legs that sent all kinds of memories heating my body.
I couldn’t help but take in the perfect angles of his face. The strong Kendrick nose, the lips that were almost too pretty for a man. His dark blonde hair that he’d let grow out a little more recently. It piled on his head in a tussled, rebellious way that hinted at his devil-may-care personality.
I loved his hair. My fingers tingled with the memory of running through it, of holding on tight, of pulling it. I stared into his hazel eyes and saw myself reflected there. Not literally, of course, but figuratively. I felt myself in the endless depths, in the soul that sat so closely to their surface. I belonged to this man and he belonged to me. So why was he hurting so irreversibly me now?
“You want to end what we have over this?”
“I want you to make me a priority in your life.” My chin tilted defiantly, but I felt none of the confidence I pretended.
There was a part of me begging to get down on my knees and tell him I didn’t care about any of this. I just wanted him and I would take him however he would give himself to me.
I’d been brushed aside in the past for his cousin or Kingdom duties, and I’d let it all slide off my back. But this felt different and I knew I couldn’t give in or I would be second place for the rest of my life.
I had already been that in a relationship. I’d already been promised to a man and thrown aside for another woman.
Sebastian wasn’t technically cheating on me, but he had chosen something else over me. He was willing to leave me for a crusade that could easily get him killed. And I hated feeling this way. Again. I hated being second choice again.
He loomed over me. His hands clenched into fists, his magic coiled tight with irritation and simmering fury. “Sera, I love you. And when I go to take out this sick monster, I will still love you. This entire discussion is ridiculous!”
Tears welled in my eyes and slipped unforgivably down my cheeks. I didn’t want him to see how much this tore me apart. I didn’t want him to see me shatter.
It might have been silly and maybe pointless, but he chose this. I couldn’t say my feelings any clearer. He knew how much his decision hurt me and he was willing to make it anyway.
“I love you too, Sebastian. But this is it for me. I cannot just wait for you to come back, hoping you’ll survive.”
He dropped to his knees in front of me and I felt it through his magic how hard it was for him to humble himself like this. His hands rested on top of my kneecaps and pressed into my skin. It was this version of him that nearly broke me.
I could take him angry and annoyed. I could not resist him broken in front of me.
“Sera, please think this through. Think about everything we’ve been through. I do want to marry you. I do want to give you a commitment. This will all be over soon and then we’ll get onto the good stuff.”
I clenched my jaw and held back my questions. We’d been dating for three years. Why did I have to wait until after he got back from his suicidal testosterone-fest?
“You gave me an ultimatum. I don’t want this any more than you do.”
His eyes flashed with that same emotion I didn’t want to see. “Fine,” he bit out and backed away from me. “If it has to be this way, then fine. But you remember that I did not want this. You chose this. You ended us. I’m not going to come crawling back to you, begging for you to take me back. And I sure as hell am not giving up this mission or any other future missions. You’re going to have to live with this. Not me. I didn’t do anything wrong.”
I turned away from him and stared out at my room. It was the room I always stayed at when I visited the Citadel. There were so many years wrapped up in this place, memories and thoughts and stolen moments with this same man who was now tarnishing everything we had.
“Fine,” I echoed in a whisper. “I’ll take the blame. This is on me.” As if I didn’t already know that.
As if I didn’t also know that if I c
ould just get over this damn need for validation in our relationship, this obsession with my need for him to pick me above all else, that we wouldn’t have a problem.
I hated how damaged I felt, how irrevocably screwed up I knew I was. God, if I could just hold myself together, then Sebastian wouldn’t have to suffer from my crippling insecurity.
“This is on you,” he repeated. He stepped back and stared at me for a long time. I couldn’t look at him. I couldn’t face him. I was ashamed and guilty, but at the same time I felt the conviction burn through me.
His magic pulled itself free of mine and I felt it the hardest. I was bereft. Lost without him. My soul felt split in half and my magic immediately grieved his departure.
No.
But it was too late. He turned and fled the room. He didn’t look at me again. I didn’t have to watch him to know that was true. I felt his distance, I felt it widen and deepen and crack into a gaping canyon.
Sebastian and I were finished.
The love of my life left me to fight for our Kingdom while I wept his absence, my decision and the brokenness inside of me that always seemed to ruin everything.
He was right. I did this. I destroyed us.
I destroyed everything I touched.
That had been true about me for as long as I could remember. He was my one shot at happiness and I didn’t just destroy him, I annihilated him.
And myself in the process.
Chapter One
Sebastian
This goddamn wedding.
Sure, I was happy enough for the couple, but their eternal bliss really churned my stomach. How could anyone stand this much happiness? Or love? Or… happiness?
“Don’t like the champagne, Cousin?” Kiran asked with that frustrating smirk plastered on his stupid face.
“The wine is fine. Why do you ask?”
“You look ready to murder someone. I hoped it was simply bad bubbly.”