Casimir's Journey Read Free Page B

interest on her part was a move forward for him. He took a breath, hoping he would say the right thing.
    “Yes. He told me that he would have no choice but to send me to death if I failed. He wanted me to know that he would go through with it, and he wanted me to have one final opportunity to walk away from the challenge.”
    “Why did you not walk away?”
    “I didn’t want to.” He looked at her directly. “I love Thea. I have loved her always. Because I did not speak to her father before Sebastian did, I didn’t have many options as to how I might win her hand. Additionally, I didn’t want her to suffer. I wanted to solve the riddle and end her suffering.”
    “How do you know she suffered?” Now Catrin sounded cold, the hint of uncertainty gone.
    “I know her. She didn’t speak of it, didn’t speak of much, truthfully. But she was in agony over something. She could not tell me. I don’t know what it was to this day, but she was not herself. I saw it, the last I looked upon her.”
    “I think you see what you wish to see and ignore that which does not support your belief.”
    Casimir shrugged. “All men do. Everyone sees what they wish. You are no different. I’m asking you to see as I do. I was willing. I made the choice. If I could not free the woman I love, I would die in the effort to do so.”
    “What good did that serve you or even your Thea, since you claim such concern for her?”
    “Perhaps that was not well thought out.” Casimir said wryly, “In all honesty, I felt secure in my ability to solve the riddle.”
    “Did you discover anything?”
    “No. I could not bring the king one shred of information. I did not feel that I could allow Thea and her sisters to suffer without trying. I did not succeed, and while it did not, as you mention, further the cause of Thea or myself, I died trying. Well, for a time, at least.” He looked down. “Does everyone I care for think me dead?”
    “Yes. I took your body, ostensibly to return you to your homeland, but I brought you here to heal you, give you life, and a second chance to live it.”
    “Why? Why would you do that? You say I cannot go back. What, then, do I have to live for if I cannot go back to the one I love, the one with whom I planned to share my life?”
    “You think there is nothing without love?” She spat the last word at him.
    “Have you never loved?”
    “Love is merely the first step on the path to betrayal, something to be discarded if a better situation presents itself. You yourself know this,” her look was sly. “Your beloved is still betrothed to another.”
    Casimir leaned back. “I take responsibility for that. I didn’t go to her father immediately as I ought to have.”
    She waved her hand in a dismissive motion. “Think what you like. Love allows those who claim it to treat you shabbily and expect to be excused.”
    “Perhaps I expect better of my love.”
    Catrin looked at him. Casimir was struck at the depths of both anger and hurt he saw in her eyes. “Then why did your love watch you die?”
    “I don’t know.”
    “You know. You do not wish to see. Yet you retain faith in her.”
    “I do.”
    “Thus proving that you are incapable of making the best choices for yourself.
    “No. Proving that I am willing to believe even when circumstances suggest otherwise. Things are not always as they seem. There are things that prevented her from acting as she wished. I am certain of it.”
    “Perhaps she merely wanted to be free of you and could find no other way out.”
    “You are determined to see all of my choices as poor. I cannot change that,” Casimir said. “I knew that I was risking my life. I didn’t think I would lose it, but I knew the chance existed. I may have had more optimism than perhaps I ought to, but I was neither deluded nor misled. I made a choice, and I am asking for you to allow me to do so again. I also do not believe that Thea could have changed things. She did not want me to die. You