0 5 A Kingdom of Gods and Ruin - Caroline Peckham
0 5 A Kingdom of Gods and Ruin - Caroline Peckham
0 5 A Kingdom of Gods and Ruin - Caroline Peckham
RUIN
A Kingdom of Gods and Ruin/Caroline Peckham & Susanne Valenti – 1st ed.
ISBN-13 - 978-1-914425-70-7
CONTENTS
Chapter 1
Chapter 2
3. Chapter 3
4. Chapter 4
5. Chapter 5
6. Chapter 6
7. Chapter 7
8. Chapter 8
9. Chapter 9
10. Chapter 10
11. Chapter 11
C racks tore through the white walls of the temple, the world itself
screaming as the home of the sun god, Saresh, was ripped asunder.
Ancient paintings on the walls split down the middle, depictions of Saresh
offering out the gift of life to the first of the Fae were blasted apart as the
wrathful fury of the deities made the air quake.
The ground beneath my bare feet bucked and quaked until I was thrown
onto my back so violently that pain lanced through my flesh, and my long,
ebony hair was thrown across my golden eyes.
The thin, white nightgown I wore tangled around my legs as I
scrambled backwards, trying to avoid the statues which toppled and
smashed on the marble floor, the face of Saresh shattering a thousand times
over as if he wanted all traces of his history destroyed.
The intricate marks of the gods blazed on what remained of the walls,
filled with golden light as their rage made the world tremble.
“We gave you everything,” the air itself seemed to cry. “And all we
asked of you was virtue. All we begged for was truth.”
Beneath me, a crack ripped through the marble floor, and I rolled over,
tearing at the nightgown as I fought to get up, throwing myself aside to
avoid the lumps of masonry falling from the domed, golden roof of the
temple.
There had been other Fae here worshipping with me. Those who had
come to pay homage to Saresh at the midday rite. But they had vanished as
surely as the peace had been broken. One moment sitting all around me, the
next, banished as if they had never been here at all.
What had I done to deserve this?
“You know the black deeds of your heart!” the world screamed, and I
screamed with it, a lump of glimmering golden tile crashing down from the
roof and slicing into my shoulder.
“I didn’t mean to,” I gasped as I lurched aside, blood pulsing through
my fingers as I clamped them over the wound, my gaze on the distant door
and the sunlight beyond. If I could only reach it, then I might stand a
chance.
But the light was fading, the golden glow sinking into grey, then black,
nothing but shattered starlight peering back at me as I ran for the arched
doorway. It only seemed to grow more distant, no matter how fast I moved,
and a sob tore from my throat as I saw the way my fate was falling.
“Please,” I begged of the gods who had cursed me. “Please, understand
why I-”
“There will be no mercy,” they spat, many voices as one. “There is only
the end.”
Power slammed into me with such violence that the air was torn from
my lungs. I crumpled, my knees splitting open on the stone floor. My power
was dragged from me, all that had made me what I was ripped free and
returned to those who had bestowed it upon me. My Affinities were cleaved
from my veins, the magical connection they had built between me and the
world snapping like the chords of a harp sliced with a razor, the off-tune
melody they released like a cry of death as my gifts were lost.
A sob caught in my throat as I tried to reach for those parts of my soul,
the power which had lived in my veins for years upon years spilling from
me like grains of sand through my fingers, impossible to hold on to.
The gods were taking away all they had ever offered us. Our magic, our
Affinities, our immortality. I could feel it racing out of me as I shook
beneath the force of its removal. I was consumed by the fear of what I
would become now, and I begged the gods for a mercy which they had no
inclination to give.
The ground broke apart beneath me and I gasped, my stomach
swooping as I fell with another scream tearing from my throat.
But it wasn’t my end I feared as the fires of the pit yawned wide for my
rotten soul. It was the end of all as we knew it which sent me careering into
the dark, our demise spiralling ever closer, and the wrath of the gods
insurmountable in its violence.
CHAPTER TWO
I was hurled from the nightmare of prophecy and fell panting and heaving
within sweat-soaked sheets.
“What is it?” a rough voice groaned from the darkness.
I flinched as my mind spun with the dream and I found myself back in
my bed once more, the air still around us, the balmy breeze sweeping in
through the gossamer curtains.
“I…” My heart was thrashing so violently that I could barely form the
words, true tears wet on my cheeks, the dream having felt so real that I was
struggling to take in my surroundings.
There was the metal framework at the foot of my bed, the sheets twisted
around my legs, and the space beyond it where the curtains moved in that
familiar pattern before the open doors to my balcony. The candle on the
mantle above the unlit fire had long since burned out, but I could see it
there, the nub and melted wax coating the bronze holder.
I looked to the wooden armoire and let my gaze trail over the whirls in
the design above the doors, counting them slowly as my thrashing heart
began to settle, and I gave in to the feeling of safety and familiarity which
filled this place.
The heated air rolling in from the distant desert was as familiar to me as
my own breath, the sounds of the blue-feathered harocs calling to one
another in the trees outside letting me know that the night was still at its
fullest.
Calvari rolled closer to me, the sheets shifting and the pale moonlight
gilding the bare skin of his broad back as he pushed himself onto his elbows
to look down at me.
I blinked up at him, his long hair falling forward over his shoulders as
the face I had once known so well pinched with concern.
Reality returned to me as I remembered the tavern last night, the singing
and the Faery wine. Calvari’s unit had returned from the Banished Lands,
another battle won and more lives lost. But he’d returned among the rest of
the Fated Legion, a few new battle scars marking the dark skin of his
powerful body. And just like we had many times before, we’d fallen prey to
the sinful nature of my secondary Affinity for seduction, gifted to me by the
god Bentos, and I’d brought him back to my bed.
“You had a nightmare?” he asked slowly, his weight shifting on the bed
as he reached out to brush a tangled strand of my ebony hair away from my
eyes.
“It felt so real,” I murmured, distracted by the lingering fear of the
nightmare.
“Did it hold a taste of prophecy?” Calvari asked seriously, and I
frowned as I noted the metallic taste on my tongue which the Fae had
always known to associate with the gods.
“Maybe,” I hedged, the horror of what I’d witnessed too awful to be a
true rendering of the future. “A warning, perhaps. The world was falling
down around me, the gods were filled with wrath. They stripped me of my
power…I…”
“It sounds like they had reason to be angry with you. Have you been up
to no good while I’ve been off fighting the Banished?” Calvari’s lips curled
up at the corner, and I narrowed my eyes at him, the fear from the dream
fading as I settled back into reality once more.
There were no cracks in the walls, no angry gods screaming at me, and
my power still imbued my limbs. Though my most prominent Affinity was
for healing, here, alone with him, I was far more caught up in the talents
Bentos had given me.
“When am I ever bad enough to incite the gods?” I taunted, and his
smile grew.
He wasn’t the most handsome of Fae, but there had always been
something about that smile which drew me to him. It didn’t hurt that his
training with the Fated Warriors had moulded his body into a work of art
worth studying for hours on end, and I liked that he didn’t ever flinch from
the sharpness of my tongue.
We were what we were. Two Fae who enjoyed sharing our bodies. Easy,
simple, no promises holding us to anything, no vows or declarations
hanging in the air between us. When he returned from war bloody, broken,
and haunted by the things he’d seen and experienced, I gave him a
distraction, a release, simplicity. While he gave me…
“Bad is what you’re best at, Kyra,” Calvari purred, his hand shifting to
my thigh beneath the thin sheet as our thoughts wandered to the truth of that
fact.
I bit down on my bottom lip and my gaze drifted down his chest, the
long scar which stood out across his abs letting me know how close he had
come to death this time.
“The Legion is smaller than it was when you last set out,” I said, my
hand finding the edge of that scar and my healing Affinity making my
fingertips tingle as I inspected it. “You lost a lot of warriors in the last four
years.”
“We did,” Calvari grunted, his gaze dimming with that reality, and for a
moment I could hear the screams of the dying, scent the blood on the air,
feel the hopelessness of war surrounding us. “The Banished hatched three
dragon eggs. They caught us off guard more than once.”
He tugged on my knee to widen my legs, and I obliged him as his
fingers shifted higher, seeking the wet heat of my core, the oblivion we
could claim in this bed.
I wasn’t running from the kinds of horrors he had lived through, but I
was always seeking my own kind of escape with him too. Escape from this
stagnation I felt in my life. This eternal nothing where days spilled into
weeks and months and years and I just…was.
I didn’t know when I had first begun to feel like my destiny wasn’t in
this empire, or when I had realised that I would never find true peace here,
but I felt like a bird in a cage within this city.
I yearned for adventure, a different reality, something more. I just didn’t
know how to begin seeking it.
“Surely the dragons didn’t serve them willingly?” I asked, my eyes
meeting Calvari’s as he sank two fingers into me and coaxed a moan from
my lips.
“They were chained,” he admitted, watching me as I writhed beneath
him, drinking in the sight of me at his mercy. “Beaten, scarred. It was a
terrible crime to witness. We released two into death before my unit drew
back.”
“And the third?” I asked, my heart aching for that most sacred of
creatures, even as my mind began to scatter beneath the feeling of his
fingers deep inside me.
“They still have it,” he admitted, the words sending a crack of sadness
through my heart. “We plan on seeking out Azurea and asking her to fly
into battle with us when we return to the front,” Calvari added, his mouth
moving to my throat as his thumb found my clit and he began working me
harder. “Perhaps we can convince a dragon to fly into war like they did in
the days of old.”
My spine arched against the sheets as a cry of pleasure fell from my
lips, and I imagined the fear such a thing might inspire in the Banished. A
fully grown dragon flying into war above the Fated Legion. No doubt
they’d die from terror alone.
“Nothing could stand between you and victory then,” I panted, and
Calvari chuckled darkly, the sound a sin against my skin.
“Nothing will stand between me and victory now,” he swore, his cock
driving against my thigh as he fucked me with his hand, and I drew closer
to the edge.
I almost came for him, a good girl bending to his masterful fingers, but I
knew we both wanted to work harder for it than that.
I turned my head to capture his lips, the thin line of a scar pressing
against the softness of my mouth as I tasted him, the bite of stubble raking
against my chin.
He was a brute of a man, built for war and ruin, his Affinities all linked
to fighting and battle. But my Affinity for the pleasures of the flesh was
more than a match for his unerring strength.
I pushed him back suddenly, pressing his spine to the mattress as I
swung my thigh over his body and knocked his fingers from me.
I bit down on his lip and kissed him harder, the fear of my nightmare
fading as the power of my gifts rose and my skin sang with need.
I broke our kiss, reaching for the curved metal of the headboard as I
moved up his body and knelt over his face.
Calvari obliged me, his mouth locking over my clit as his large hands
moved to grip my arse and he dragged me down to sit on his face.
I moaned as he sank his tongue into me, rocking my hips and beginning
to ride his mouth, sighing loudly every time his tongue circled just right.
My right hand locked tight around the metal of the headboard and I
began to tease my nipple with my left, my breasts full and heavy, bouncing
softly as I rode his face and the need in me heightened.
I was insatiable when this power was awakened in me. My body filled
with a hunger that I could never fully satisfy, but Calvari had the stamina it
took to at least take the edge off my need.
He devoured me with all the unsated lust he had gathered in the years
he’d spent at war. He’d told me once that he never took lovers while he was
deployed, though he had never asked me to withhold in turn, he simply
preferred to lean into his Affinities while at war. He was a warrior honed for
death and bloodshed, and the power the gods had gifted him made him a
perfect weapon for such things. When he was in the battle camps, he
became simply that; a machine intended for destruction. Passion and needs
of the flesh went unanswered until he returned to us here in the homelands,
where it was safe and he could let his guard down without risking his
survival.
It made sense. And it also made for an utterly ravenous partner in the
bedroom when he returned.
I came with a cry of ecstasy, my body bowing forward as I leaned on
the headboard for support.
Calvari lifted me so he could get to his knees at my back, and he was
inside me before I could even catch my breath, the feeling of his cock
sinking deep and striking hard enough to push out all lingering fear from
that nightmare.
His hand fisted my hair, his teeth nipping at the soft skin of my throat as
he tugged my head back to give himself the room he desired, and I hooked
an arm back around his neck to hold myself there.
My other hand dropped to my clit, and I rode my fingers in time with
every savage thrust of his cock inside me, moaning loudly with each pump
of his hips.
Calvari gripped my waist as he fucked me harder, stealing a brutal kiss
from my lips before pushing me face down onto the bed and sinking in even
deeper than before.
My hand was crushed between my body and the mattress, my fingers
rutting against my clit in time with the punishing thrusts of his hips, and I
called out for him to go harder, deeper, seeking oblivion in the release of
this passion.
I felt his cock stiffening as he drew closer to his climax, mine just out of
reach as I panted and writhed beneath him, and I pushed my hips up,
demanding more from him with gasping pleas.
He gripped my arse as he pumped into me harder, faster, cursing my
name as he tried to hold off his own release while chasing mine, and I rode
my fingers more frantically, sweat rolling down my spine between us.
I swore as I finally found my outlet, biting down on the bedsheets as my
pussy clamped tight around his cock and bliss trilled through my limbs.
Calvari jerked out of me, groaning loudly as he came all over my arse, the
hot splash of his cum against my skin bringing a breath of laughter to my
lips.
“You’re fucking ravenous as always, Kyra,” he growled as he grabbed
the sheet which had been covering us while we slept and used it to clean the
evidence of his desire from my body.
“I’m ready to go again when you are,” I teased as I rolled over to look at
him, and he dropped back against the sheets with his chest heaving from
exertion, a faint smile on his lips that told me he wanted to do that just as
soon as he recovered.
We fucked and swapped stories of the years since we’d last seen one
another then fucked again. The rhythm was endless, my need limitless as
always, my body bringing his to ruin time and again, while his took the
edge off of my lust as he made me come for him. Slowly, the night passed
to dawn, and we finally fell into a heap of limbs and succumbed to sleep
once more.
Or at least we did until the call of my sister’s voice drew me from my
bed, an amused curse passing my lips as I was dragged from slumber.
I left Calvari where he was, satisfied and a little lighter than he had been
after a night lost in the feeling of our bodies against one another, the
memories of war farther behind him once more.
There was a thin satin gown hanging by the door to my bathing
chamber, and I pulled it on to cover my nakedness, the deep red colour
contrasting prettily against the warm brown of my skin.
It was summer, and even an hour past dawn, the heat was stifling, the air
thick and humidity rolling in from the river which carved through the centre
of the city.
“Two more minutes or we’ll come in and drag you from your bed with
our bare hands!” Aalia called, amusement to her tone which let me know
the twins were close by.
I ignored the door and headed for the window instead, stepping out onto
the balcony and raising a hand to shield my eyes from the brightness of the
morning light.
The lush green gardens beyond my room in the manor house I shared
with my sister and her family were full of the chittering of small birds and
rodents, the burbling of the stream at the foot of the hill a welcome I had
received almost every day of my life.
My sister’s husband, Aren, stood beneath the broad willow, his back to
the bark as he eyed me with amusement, inclining his head towards the
lower floor of the house just enough to confirm that Aalia and the twins
were inside.
My lips quirked up at the corner, and I took several running steps before
hopping up onto the low white wall which ringed my balcony.
I threw my arms out wide on either side of me and closed my eyes as I
let myself topple from the edge.
My stomach swooped and my ebony hair whipped back, but before I
could so much as drop a full foot, glimmering golden wings expanded from
my spine, fluttering hard to catch my weight while the sun shone through
their near-transparent membrane and made the world glitter around me.
I swept into the trees in utter silence, my skin tingling as my lesser
Affinities for stealth and secrecy gifted from the god of tricksters, Carioth,
helped me land silently, my bare feet pressing into the soft grass before my
wings faded from existence again. The Affinities the gods gifted each of us
upon our birth varied from Fae to Fae, most of us claiming a single
dominant Affinity which supposedly matched the essence of our souls to
perfection.
Mine was healing, a trait from the goddess Luciet, who had blessed me
with a natural inclination towards medicine. It was magic, but it was also an
ability, a part of who we were. I could sense illness, my instincts always
helping me choose the correct remedies and treatments, while my innate
magic made my own ability to heal near boundless. I could share that power
with others to an extent when I willed it, but the magic which dwelled
within me made my own body heal from practically any injury almost
instantly.
In my youth, I’d wanted to use that gift to join the warriors fighting in
the Banished Lands. I’d wanted to learn to fight and travel the world, my
ability to heal from all wounds surely a gift any warrior would make great
use of.
But our parents had squashed that dream quickly enough, along with the
entire kingdom, I supposed. No woman could join the Legions, and only
those Fae blessed with Affinities from Efries himself, the god of war and
might, were allowed to go into battle. Perhaps I could have travelled to the
outer reaches of the war camps to offer medical assistance, but it wasn’t the
same, and our parents had been no more likely to allow that even if I had
tried to argue for it.
So here I’d stayed. For almost two hundred years, I’d woken up in this
house, wandered the gardens, enjoyed the company of my sister and… well,
not a lot of anything else, if I was being totally honest with myself.
Our parents had left to travel the western coast almost thirty years ago,
visiting the various courts and sending occasional letters to their forgotten
daughters. They hadn’t even returned when Aalia had given birth to the
twins. Twins! They were a miracle to be celebrated endlessly for our kind,
especially with how rare it was for Fae to conceive at all. A child was a
blessing, but twins were a gift from the gods themselves. Yet in the five
years since their birth, the only thing our parents had sent was a note of
congratulations, mixed in with commands for the way they expected the
manor to be managed in their absence.
I supposed I might have been bitter if it weren’t for the fact that we
were all so much happier without them here. We were free to do as we
wished, and I didn’t have to suffer the endless judgements over how I spent
my days and who I spent them with. There was no pressure to marry or to
attend court more often – which I did as infrequently as possible. I was
simply free, and if that came at the cost of a little restlessness and boredom,
then I’d take the trade gladly.
Aren watched in amusement as I dropped to my hands and knees, his
brown hair curling to his nape and the white shirt he wore loose around his
neck in anticipation of the day’s heat.
“Kiki!” a little voice shrieked, and I recognised my nephew, Rayan, as
he tore around hunting for me.
I began to crawl through the long grass in his direction, grinning at the
game as I closed in on him, growling like a desert beast to let him know I
was on his trail.
Rayan shrieked and started running for the house, but before I could
take chase, a little monster leapt from the grass to my right and landed on
my back with a cry of victory.
I laughed as I rolled beneath Lina, her gleaming silver hair tumbling
into her eyes as she fought to tickle me, and I made a good show of
screaming and crying out for mercy.
Rayan leapt into the dogpile too, the little beast punching me in the side
as he got too caught up in the game, and I quickly snatched his fist into my
grip before pretending to gnaw on his arm.
He half howled, half fell apart with laughter and suddenly, Lina shifted
sides, helping me tickle her brother as he kicked and shrieked between his
laughs.
“Ah, Kyra, I should have known we’d find you rolling in the mud,”
Aalia teased.
Her shadow fell over us, and I released the two hellions as I rolled over
to look up at my sister.
The golden light of dawn gilded her curling brunette hair in a crown of
its own design, her skin lustrous in the light and her smile captivating. All
over the kingdom, people whispered my sister’s name and coveted her
beauty. She was radiance embodied, this ethereal-looking creature who
stole the breath from men and women alike when they laid their eyes upon
her.
Some claimed Helios, the god of beauty and purity, had gifted her a
drop of his own blood during her creation along with her Affinities, but I
knew that the full truth of her beauty lay within her heart.
I was often compared to her, called the budding rose to her full bloom,
and though it may have been meant as an insult, I had only ever seen that as
a good thing. Alone, I was often called beautiful by those aiming to find
their way into my bed. I was coveted and pursued enough not to concern
myself with anything so petty as jealousy. My features had more of an edge
to them than Aalia’s, my eyes more feline, my smile sharper, and that suited
me perfectly because we were not the same creature at our cores.
Aalia was beauty. She was kindness and compassion to the point of
innocence, which frightened me sometimes. She saw the good in people and
turned a blind eye to the bad all too often. I was a darker soul, and I knew it.
I saw the bad in most before looking for the good, and I had more than a
little of my own bad too. It made me somewhat jaded, but I liked to think I
was more prepared for the reality of our world and therefore able to help
shield my sister from the worst of it.
I had been more than thrilled when Aren had been the Fae to finally
capture her interest fully. Marrying him in secret had been the one and only
time I’d known her to defy our parents. They had hoped to capture a royal
with her face, but Aalia had given her heart to a Fae whose dominant
Affinity was for baking, thanks to Aliot, god of sustenance and health. Aren
was a masterful baker, and I certainly had no complaints about the pastries I
consumed endlessly, nor the biscuits I devoured with my tea.
No doubt that snub was the reason our parents hadn’t returned to meet
the twins, but that was their loss, so far as I was concerned, and the longer
they stayed gone, the better.
“Is breakfast ready?” I asked, my gaze snapping to Aren who still
lounged beneath his tree, hiding from the sun as always. I’d never known
another Fae to be quite so scornful of the celestial being. He wasn’t the kind
to voice complaints, but I knew he far preferred it once the sun went down
and the stars were shining upon his skin.
“Sadly, you missed it,” he replied, and my mouth fell open in outrage.
“It’s barely past dawn,” I complained, getting to my feet as my stomach
growled to voice its own complaints.
“Well, the twins wanted to see the sun rise, so we made a picnic of it on
the roof.” Aren shrugged innocently while the twins broke into tales of how
beautiful it had been. Of how the sky had first turned from ebony to
sapphire, then palest blue with streaks of orange and pink lighting the few
clouds until they were burned up into nothing and the sun was reigning over
the land in its entirety once more.
“There were some rather alarming sounds coming from your room,”
Aalia noted casually, her eyes flicking up towards my balcony doors which
were flung wide as always.
“Were there now?” I asked, phrasing my reply as a question while she
tried to back me into an admission. We couldn’t tell a lie, one of the
conditions the gods placed upon us during our creation, but that simply
meant all Fae learned the art of evading answers from a young age.
“The children were quite curious,” Aren added, shaking his head. “I told
them that the warriors had returned from the Banished Lands.”
“And that was answer enough for them?” I asked, looking to the
children who had fallen into an all-out brawl.
I reached down to snatch Rayan off of his sister and tossed him over my
shoulder where he started kicking and squealing in protest at being carried
like a sack of potatoes.
“There was a convenient burst of drake fire towards the western
mountains which drew their attention away,” Aalia admitted. “So is that
Calvari up there or…”
“I ran into him in the tavern last night,” I admitted, and she grinned,
making me roll my eyes. “You know it isn’t like that between me and him.
Don’t go thinking you’ve found yourself a brother-in-law or anything
ridiculous.”
Aalia sighed dramatically before grabbing Lina and tossing her over her
shoulder too, Aren falling into step with us as we headed into the house.
The scent of lotus blooms greeted me in the open space, and I inhaled
deeply, looking at the arrangements Aalia had put together so skilfully.
Beauty and purity. Her Affinities were seen as somewhat useless and merely
decorative to many, but our family line held powerful magic, and the weight
of hers shone through in everything that surrounded her. She could see
beauty in almost everything. And she could see that which was truly ugly
too – though she avoided such things as much as she could.
We set the twins free and they tore away from us, charging towards the
table laid out with paints and parchment, both of them loudly claiming they
would paint me the best portrait of the sunrise they’d seen.
Aren slipped his arm around Aalia’s waist, tugging her close and
murmuring something no doubt sickeningly sweet into her ear which drew a
giggle from her lips before he stole a kiss from them.
She melted into him like she always did, and I smiled as I looked
between the couple, their love for one another so potent I could practically
taste it in the air.
“We’ve been summoned to court,” Aren said as I moved to take a seat,
and I fell still, glancing to my sister, then back to her husband.
“We?” I questioned, unease rising in my chest.
“The Fae of age who reside within our household,” he clarified, waving
a hand towards a letter which lay open on the table.
“It’s just one evening,” Aalia said softly, her attention shifting to the
twins as they began work on their masterpieces.
“One too many,” I muttered, scooping up the letter and examining it,
hoping for some loophole to the royal summons.
“We can’t be certain the emperor has any further interest in Aalia,” Aren
said, squeezing her hand in a way that was meant to be reassuring but only
gave away his concern.
The last few times we’d visited Emperor Farish’s court, he had paid my
sister all too much attention. He’d even asked for a night with her, sending
one of his guards to offer up the invitation as if it were some great honour to
serve him in his bedroom. No matter that she was in love, married, a
mother. Why should he care about such things?
The twins had been so young then that we had managed to use them as
an excuse, Aren somehow stopping me from losing my head entirely and
screaming my protests at the top of my lungs while he far too politely
explained to the guard that my sister needed to return home to nurse her
babes. It was the truth; no lies could pass the lips of our kind, and the
emperor had accepted it oh-so-graciously.
But I knew. I’d watched as the guard returned to him with the refusal,
while Aalia feigned flattery and curtsied so low that her nose practically
skimmed the floor and Aren bowed his head in deference to the man who
had so casually asked to take his wife to bed. They’d played the game all
courtiers had to play and had hidden their true feelings well. But I’d done
no such thing. I simply stood and watched that ancient bastard while they
played at being willing subjects to his every desire, and I’d seen the way his
eyes had flashed with fury at being denied. I’d seen the way he watched
Aalia as she was dismissed from his presence, his eyes clinging to her, a
possessive intent gripping his features.
I’d begged her to leave this place after that, begged her to take the entire
family and head across the empire to the western coast to reunite with our
parents if that was what it took to escape the emperor’s attention.
But she’d refused me. The world was a big place, filled with more
horrors than either of us could count. I knew that, though I had still been
keener to brave those horrors than remain and await this one. There were
beasts out there, fire and ice drakes who preyed on everything and anything
they could make a meal out of, the cruel, dumb cousins to the all-powerful
dragons who ruled the deserts.
Then there were the scorpious spiders - enormous, eight-legged
monsters with a sting as lethal as their fangs - not to mention wolves,
gremlins, the Coy Folk and the Banished. The world beyond the safety of
this kingdom was no place for young children, and the passages to other
cities of safety were perilous, to say the least. Yet still, I would have run if I
could have convinced them to.
But my sister was a stubborn creature when she decided to be, and once
her mind was made up, there had been no changing it.
Months had passed, then years, no word from the palace and no
demands for Aalia’s presence in court. I’d attended once or twice, sticking
to the outskirts and observing, wanting to know this enemy I felt lurking in
the shadows of our lives, but I had never learned much.
Farish was a cruel ruler when he wanted to be, but he pretended to be a
fair one too. There was no denying the power he held though, this entire
kingdom was locked in his chokehold, at the mercy of his whims. There
was no democracy, nor way to question his law. He played the part of
benevolence well but took all he wanted and was denied nothing; a tyrant
ruling through brute force. He was old. So old that hardly any Fae
remembered a time before his coronation. And he was bored.
I knew well that the oldest of our kind were the most dangerous.
Compassion and kindness were often the first emotions to dwindle in the
long lifespan of our people. When a Fae lived through loss, grief, and
heartache too many times, they were hardened to it, becoming selfish and
petty. Cruel and unyielding.
Aalia’s rejection of the emperor had been received simply enough at the
time, but it hadn’t been forgotten. And her excuse had grown irrelevant too.
“We should think up a reason not to go,” I said firmly, beginning to pace
as my mind whirled with ideas on what I could do to get her out of this. “A
sickness perhaps? I could mix up a tonic which would render you incapable
of attending and then-”
“If someone questions what made her sick and discovers what you did,
the situation would be far worse,” Aren objected, though I could tell he was
just as keen as I was to remove Aalia from this obligation.
“I can evade answering easily enough,” I replied stubbornly.
“It’s too risky. It would be far worse to get caught in a scheme like that.
Better we go and try to minimise the damage.”
“I can wear that orange gown which you claim makes me look like a
pumpkin,” Aalia suggested, forcing a smile, and I frowned.
“Nothing can hide your beauty, Aalia. Not truly,” I said, a note of fear
touching my words.
“We can try,” she replied.
I bit my lip as I found myself nodding in agreement. I hated this. Hated
every moment of it, but I knew there was no avoiding it. If she didn’t
appear at court tonight, she would only be summoned again. And again. No
one could refuse the command of the emperor and attempting it would
likely cause nothing but more harm if it ended up incurring his wrath.
“Fuck,” I hissed. “Fine. But I intend to spend the day making you look
as unattractive as Faely possible,” I swore and at the very least, I got to hear
my sister laugh.
CHAPTER THREE
W epaused
stepped out of the carriage which had been sent to collect us and
in the shadow of the palace, the tips of its many domed roofs
gleaming in the sunset as the heat of the day finally began to fade.
There was a long promenade between two perfectly still pools of water
which led into the grand entrance of the grotesquely ostentatious building,
beautiful flowers blooming in pinks, whites, and yellows from huge golden
planters standing on the far edges of them.
Koi of every colour swam slowly through the pools, their movements
lazy and progress slow. I eyed them for a moment, wondering if there was
any truth to the tales which swore that the emperor owned a pair of vicious
crocodiles, bound to his will by one of his advisers whose Affinities gifted
her power over animals. Supposedly, the pair resided in those pools, lurking
within their mirror-like depths, waiting for the command to strike at any
who dared come here with an intent to harm the ruler of our kingdom.
I raised my chin, keeping my shawl close to my body as I looked from
the imposing building to the sister I loved more than life itself.
“Kyra,” Aalia said slowly, moving closer to me while I inspected the
work I’d done to try and downplay her beauty. “What are you planning?”
She wore the orange gown, the colour as close to hideous as any could
be on her. It had far too many frills and embellishments, the design gawdy
and unfashionable enough that it would likely draw mockery from the
spiteful members of the court who followed trends like their lives depended
on it. Good. That was good. Let them mock her, and let the emperor hear it
too – he prized perfection after all, and I doubted he would wish to be
known to bed a woman who had been mocked by the entirety of the court.
Her hair was styled plainly, one overlarge lotus blossom tucked behind
her ear, and I had painted her makeup on in a way that tried to diminish her
natural beauty, making her cheeks appear a little hollow, her lips sallow, her
eyes smaller. Little things which honestly didn’t do much to take away from
what she was. My sister was beauty incarnate, the Affinity our vain mother
had always called a gift and which I had secretly believed to be a curse for
some time now.
“Planning?” I echoed innocently, and Aalia’s brow furrowed as I
avoided the question.
“There’s another carriage approaching,” Aren murmured, offering an
arm to each of us, and I took it, avoiding my sister’s gaze as we began the
long walk between the pools.
We were quiet as we closed in on the palace, no doubt each as nervous
as one another. Because when it came down to it, we knew where this night
was likely to lead. The emperor would see Aalia and want her as he had
before. He would request her presence once more, and there was no longer
a valid excuse beyond the fact that she simply didn’t want to accept his
offer.
Aalia was pale, and I knew a mixture of fear and acceptance had fallen
over her. Acceptance of what she might have to do this night, and perhaps
on many more, if the man who ruled our kingdom gained a taste for her.
She would do it to protect Aren and the twins. I knew her too well; her heart
was too good. She would sacrifice anything for them. But I would not allow
it.
Aren was stiff as he walked towards this fate between us, the curve of
his bicep beneath my hand rigid where I kept hold of his arm. He was
giving everything he could to this façade of calmness and confidence. He
was trying to be strong for Aalia, and I was certain that no matter what
happened tonight, his love for her wouldn’t sway. But I also knew that I
wasn’t going to let this happen.
I raised my chin as we passed beyond the pools, ignoring the prickling
sensation which made me think something watched us pass from beneath
that water. Let the crocodiles come for us. I had a feeling they would be the
easiest challenge we would face tonight if they did.
A row of twelve royal guards stood at attention either side of the door,
their bodies rigid where they clasped their spears, the golden breast plates
they wore more decorative than practical, the emperor’s crest of two
warring dragons emblazoned across the metal. Nothing but their eyes
moved as they watched us walk between them into the bright light of the
palace.
Servants approached us the moment we stepped inside, one of them
asking us to show our invitation. I released my hold on Aren as I finally
removed my shawl and handed it to the woman waiting to take it from me.
Aalia sucked in a sharp breath as she took in the entirety of the gown I
had chosen to wear tonight, her brown eyes widening as her gaze met mine
and accusation filled them.
“No,” she hissed, cutting herself off as the servant reached for her shawl
next, and I simply gave her a firm look.
Aren ran a hand over his face as comprehension dawned on him too. I
found a mixture of grief and gratitude in his eyes as I turned from my sister
to him, glad to find that at least one of them understood this.
The gown I wore was a deep scarlet, my lips painted to match the
colour, and my ebony hair styled in a way which left most of it hanging
loose down my spine. My bare spine. Because though the item I wore was
indeed a gown, there was so little of the top half of it that it was entirely
scandalous.
“It’s the latest fashion,” I said blandly to my sister whose cheeks were
colouring with her fury at me. It was true enough, though I had opted for
the most extreme version of the style, and I didn’t back down from the
accusation in her eyes as I smoothed out the full-length gossamer skirt and
adjusted the delicate golden chains hanging across my midriff beneath the
strips of fabric which encircled my neck and crossed over my breasts.
“The fashion may include exposing some flesh,” Aalia hissed as we
headed away down the corridor towards the ballroom where the sounds of
music lured us closer. “But you are currently dancing the line of nudity,
Kyra.”
“So?” I asked innocently, increasing my pace as I leaned into the
Affinities which Bentos, the god of seduction and fertility, had given me,
my hips swaying with my steps.
A hand gripped my arm and pulled me up short, whirling me back
around in the thankfully empty corridor. I arched an eyebrow in surprise as
I found Aren holding onto me.
“You mean to take his attention from Aalia?” he asked, pinning me with
his dark eyes and forcing an answer from my lips.
“Yes,” I replied simply, and Aalia hissed her disapproval.
“I won’t let you,” she growled, and I turned to look at her, though Aren
didn’t release his grip on me.
“It’s just sex to me, Al,” I said, letting her see the truth of that. “I’ve
fucked enough Fae to know the difference between my body and my heart.
And if this is the only way to protect you from him, then I will gladly do it.”
“I would never ask you to-”
“I know,” I interrupted her, tugging my arm free of Aren’s grip and
moving to clasp her cheek in my palm. “I know you wouldn’t. But I would
rather spend every night this year in that arsehole’s bed than allow your
heart to be broken by attending it a single time.”
The truth of my words drew a sob to her lips, and she gripped me
tightly.
“That doesn’t make it okay,” she said as I wound my arms around her
and let her break for a moment as she accepted this.
“There are two cliffs,” I said to her, the story we had both been told so
many times by our father, causing a touch of deja-vu to echo around us.
“The one you fall off blindly and the one you jump off freely.”
“Both hurt when you hit the ground,” she replied shakily.
“But I’d always prefer to see my fate coming for me,” I finished,
pushing her back a step as the sound of more Fae approaching reached us.
“I always picked the blindfold,” she muttered, and I smiled, wiping a
tear from beneath her eye before looking to Aren.
“I don’t want you to do this, Kyra,” he began, but I shook my head at
him, beckoning them both to start walking again before we were caught
lingering here by some nosy courtiers.
“If only we lived in a world where want carried any weight.”
Aren offered me his arm again, his hand landing over mine as I took it
and squeezed tightly.
“Thank you,” he breathed.
I looked up at him and the love and fear I found in his eyes only made
my decision on this plan all the easier to accept.
“Who knows?” I teased as we turned a corner and found ourselves
before the towering doors to the ballroom. “Perhaps I’ll enthral him so
deeply that he’ll take a queen at last.”
Aren scoffed while Aalia choked back a sob, both of them knowing that
the life of some pretty queen, dangling from the emperor’s arm and
enduring court life daily was about as far from the life I would wish for
myself as it could get.
The second set of guards bowed low as we passed inside, a herald
calling our names and waving a flourishing arm towards the raised dais
where the emperor sat on his throne, waiting to greet his guests.
I kept my chin high, my eyes fixed on the emperor while he spoke to
one of his advisers, not bothering to so much as look our way. His deep
brown hair was slicked back, his jaw rigid and brow broad. Attractive
enough, like most of our kind were, but he was no great beauty to look
upon. His body was more lean than powerful, his days of practicing with a
sword supposedly long forgotten, and I couldn’t help but think how terribly
average this great and feared emperor was in person. All across the world,
people whispered the name of this Fae. Even the rulers of the distant
kingdoms and empires didn’t dare oppose him too forcefully, and yet there
he sat, just another man with too much power and not enough purpose to his
endless life.
He was an ancient creature, though time had stopped him from aging at
some point in his mid-twenties, as it did to all Fae ever since the gods had
blessed us with immortality. But his eyes gave it away. That long life filled
with countless nights like this, watching people come and go, enduring
endless repetitions and the boredom all the oldest of our kind seemed to
indulge in.
I never understood why they didn’t just walk on into the Garden. The
place beyond. Most did once they reached that point in life, when nothing
gave them reason to live anymore, they embraced their end and moved on.
But not Emperor Farish. He simply lingered here on his throne, his children
watching and waiting for an inheritance I assumed they’d never get. Unless
war came to our door and killed him for us.
Farish’s head snapped up, his eyes darting to mine and locking with my
gaze, making my heart leap. I scoured my mind for any Affinity which
might have allowed him to hear that thought, to know that I had just
considered his death with not only amusement but anticipation.
Fuck.
I didn’t drop his gaze, knowing that all the time his focus remained on
me, it wasn’t on my sister. But I couldn’t think of a single Affinity which
might gain a Fae access to the thoughts of another, and I had to hope that
my paranoia was simply a side effect of my fear.
“Your Majesty,” Aren greeted beside me, his tone warm and submissive
as he released his hold on my arm and dipped into a low bow.
Aalia fell into a curtsy beyond him, but I hesitated another second, my
gaze still locked with the emperor’s. He arched a brow as I danced the line
of impertinence before dropping into a low curtsy and murmuring a
greeting to him. I didn’t lower my gaze though, looking at him while he
looked at me and letting him see exactly which powers the gods had gifted
me.
He held my gaze for several endless seconds more, and I didn’t so much
as release my breath until his attention shifted away suddenly, moving over
Aren without pause before falling onto my sister.
My heart stilled as the corner of his mouth hitched just the smallest
amount, but in the next breath he was waving us away, commanding us to
dance and mingle and enjoy the ball, and I was left wondering if I had
simply imagined his reaction to her altogether.
We didn’t linger, moving quickly to the far side of the ballroom where
we endured small talk. I accepted several invitations to dance, my attention
never slipping from the emperor while he greeted the rest of the guests.
He didn’t look at me or Aalia again, but I couldn’t shake the feeling that
something was brewing in the air, like an oncoming storm we wouldn’t be
able to survive.
I wished we hadn’t come here. I wished we’d ignored his summons and
run. With every turn I took around the dance floor, that feeling increased,
like a knot tightening in my stomach until I felt sick with it.
I spun away from my dance partner and gasped as I collided with a hard
chest, my gaze rising to meet Calvari’s as he took my hand in his and coiled
his free arm around my waist, stealing me from my current partner.
“I’m cutting in,” he said in a low voice.
The noble, who had looked about to protest, let his gaze roam over the
scarred warrior briefly before feigning a sweet smile and graciously
abandoning the floor.
“That was rude,” I teased as Calvari began to move me. He had less
grace than the partner he’d replaced but he knew the steps, and I could
admit that I preferred the breadth of his chest to the soft hands of the noble.
“You don’t like me for my manners,” he replied simply, guiding me
across the floor towards Aren and Aalia where they danced together, their
eyes on each other and so much emotion in the looks they were sharing that
people were starting to comment on it.
“What is it I like you for then?” I teased, and his smile only widened.
He drew my body flush to his, pushing a muscular thigh between my
legs with the movement and dipping me backwards as the music quieted for
a few beats.
“No need to be vulgar in front of the emperor,” Calvari replied, tugging
me upright once more.
I caught the grin he threw to the group of warriors who sat at a table not
far from the edge of the dance floor and rolled my eyes.
“I thought we didn’t do the whole possessive bullshit thing?” I asked as
his hand trailed down my bare spine, causing me to arch against him.
“I don’t usually,” he agreed. “But Ricos seemed to think he had a shot
with you. Said you wouldn’t look at me twice. Call me an arsehole, but I
wanted him to see how fucking wrong he was.”
“Ah. So I’m a point to be scored?”
“More like a notch I don’t want leaving my belt,” he taunted, and I
casually swung my knee into his crotch, rising to the bait he was laying
while he spun me in a circle and was forced to hide his pain to save face.
“You’ll pay for that,” I swore to him, drawing half a laugh to his lips
even as he continued to curse me.
“Any time, beautiful. You want to tell me what brings you to court
though? Can’t say I’ve ever seen you at any of these things before.”
As the highest ranking of Farish’s army, the elite members of the Fated
Warriors were often invited to the palace, brought in to remind everyone of
the might the emperor commanded through them. It was hard to miss any of
them with their huge frames and glistening weapons, let alone the battle
scars, so I understood the posturing, even if it did seem pointless for an
emperor who had ruled for longer than most Fae could even remember.
I glanced towards the throne once more, a shard of ice slipping down
my spine as I found Farish staring right at me, his gaze boring into the
centre of me like he could see all the way down to my soul.
“What’s wrong?” Calvari asked, sensing the tension in my posture, his
Affinities for war always making him keenly aware of any unrest around
him. A Fated Warrior was never caught off guard.
“Nothing,” I breathed, but he followed my line of sight, a low chuckle
rumbling through his chest.
“The emperor covets all he cannot have,” he murmured quietly. “He’s
noticed the way you’re looking at me.”
I scoffed, pulling my focus back to Calvari as I arched a brow. “And
how is that?”
“Like a woman who knows precisely whose bed she’ll be in by dawn.”
I began to protest, but Calvari leaned in and grazed my throat with his
lips, his hand fisting in my hair as he tugged my head back to give him
more room.
I couldn’t help it. I looked to the emperor again and, sure enough, his
focus was on me.
Fear skittered down my spine and I forced a laugh from my lips,
pushing Calvari back a step as I escaped his hold on me and rounded
towards the edge of the dance floor. I may have been willing to steal the
emperor’s attention from my sister if I had to, but I had absolutely no desire
to gain it on my own merits.
“I feel a great desire to warm my bed alone tonight,” I called loudly as
Calvari frowned at me in confusion. “But thank you so much for the offer.”
I dipped into a brief curtsy, then let the dancers cut us off from one
another before turning and heading to the closest servant holding a tray of
sparkling wine.
I needed a drink. More than that, I needed to get far away from the gaze
of Emperor Farish.
My heart was racing wildly in my chest, and I had to remind myself that
I’d known this could happen, that I had wanted it to happen if it would
spare Aalia from his notice. But there was something about the emperor
which had always unsettled me, and as I swallowed my wine in one long
gulp, I knew without doubt that I held no desire to become his latest
plaything.
Let the other jostling court ladies have him. All I wanted was to escape
this night with my family and stay away from this place for as long as I
could once it was done.
I passed several hours of inane conversation and pitifully tame drinking
with one eye on the clock and the other on my sister.
Aalia had clearly relaxed in the time we’d been here, finding herself
free of the emperor’s gaze and able to enjoy the night dancing with her
husband.
I watched them as they twirled around the dancefloor, his gaze riveted
to her every move and a smile so pure and beautiful on her face that I swear
everyone around them could taste their love for one another in the air they
breathed.
It was a connection beyond anyone’s ability to deny. Like fated lovers
or soulmates, simply meant to be.
I had finally begun to relax too as the final song of the night was struck.
I raised a celebratory glass of sweet wine to my lips, but as I looked across
the room, I fell still.
Emperor Farish was on his feet, shifting between the crowd on the
outskirts of the dance floor like a serpent moving through long grass,
somehow going unseen by so many of those who surrounded him.
His guards remained close behind him as he closed in on the dance
floor, and I found myself on my feet before I could even be certain of what
he was looking at. Because I knew. In the depths of my soul, I knew. And I
realised that somehow, despite my vigilance, he had been watching them
this entire time too.
I dropped my glass onto a small table without looking, ignoring the
sound of it shattering as I broke into a near run, the heels of my shoes
clicking against the hard floor as I pushed my way between the bodies. My
heart pounded with terror as I ran, my gaze scanning the crowd and finding
the large group of warriors among them.
I pushed between the muscular men, ignoring their surprised mutters
and grunts of protest. Most of the time, no Fae dared approach a group like
theirs, let alone shoved through them, but I wasn’t afraid of them, and I had
one last chance to stop the roll of fate from landing on my sister’s head.
Calvari looked up in surprise from his table, his lips parting on a
question, but I simply caught his hand and hauled him to his feet.
“Dance with me,” I commanded. “Make the whole world think I’m
yours.”
The music was just getting to the part where the tempo increased, the
song a temptation to sin, the lyrics sung in a language which had been long
forgotten but the meanings were clear to any who paid attention to the beat.
This song was written in honour of the god who had blessed me with his
Affinities for seduction and allure, and I was going to channel every bit of
that energy while there was still time to stop the coin of destiny from
falling.
Calvari smirked as he gave in to me, his grip tightening around my
fingers before he tugged me close, then spun me away from him fast.
My feet moved with the natural agility of our kind, my skirt flaring and
parting around my thighs as I spun onto the dance floor. Before I could stop
my spinning, Calvari was there again, catching my hand and yanking me
back to him.
My palms landed hard against his chest as he caught my hips and lifted
me, the heat which had flared between us last night building as I kicked my
legs back into the air before swinging forward and winding them around his
waist.
This kind of dancing was what had first brought us to one another, the
unfettered, feral kind which came straight from the depths of the soul and
simply had to be set free.
The solstice party we’d met at so many years ago almost seemed to
reappear around us, the depth of the night and the heat of the bonfire in the
sand, while the summer breeze tangled with my hair and we danced without
limitations in the heart of the desert.
Our bodies moved to the same rhythm, his hand locking around my
throat as he drew my mouth almost close enough to kiss me and then spun
me away sharply, turning me beneath his arm as my skirt whirled once
more.
He yanked me back to him, my spine to his chest as I dropped down
low then rose up again.
People were watching us; I could feel their eyes following our
movements hungrily, and more than a few Fae moved out onto the dance
floor to join in. Those who felt the call of Bentos’ power just as I did.
I could feel the allure of the god as he drew closer too, this dance a form
of worship to the one who had blessed us with his power.
My skin heated and desire flushed my cheeks, the friction of Calvari’s
body against mine riling me up and making me hunger for more.
His hands moved over my body, possessive, controlling, worshipping,
and as I whipped around, I found exactly what I had been aiming to
achieve.
Emperor Farish was staring right at us, his dark eyes ripping through my
skin as easily a hot knife shearing through butter.
I held his gaze as I ground my body against Calvari’s, biting into my
bottom lip with a promise sparkling in my golden eyes.
His nostrils flared just slightly, his head tipping to one side as he
muttered a word to his Royal Prophet, Kalir, and I tried not to look towards
the shadows within the hood of those ice-white robes.
I almost missed a step as Calvari’s mouth brushed the side of my neck,
but I refused to allow a moment of fear to colour my actions. Kalir was an
atrocity so far as I was concerned, and the magic he wielded was nothing
but stolen energy from the gods. It was an affront to the power and lives
they had gifted us to steal from them the way his kind did.
There were many who muttered fears that the Prophets would one day
curse us all for what they took, the sorcery they wielded which was
unnatural and unearned. They were capable of far more than the power of
our Affinities, but the cost it reaped upon their souls was clear to see the
moment they dropped those white hoods.
I had no idea why the emperor kept a man like that so close to him, and
the thought of Kalir turning his attention to me for so much as a moment
made a prickle of terror spear through me, despite my best intentions.
I forced my focus back to Emperor Farish just as Calvari dropped his
hands to my hips and dipped me backwards. I gave my body to him, my
spine arching as he whirled me around, my thighs locking around his waist
before he tugged me upright once more and our bodies were pressed
together again.
My head turned to the emperor, but Calvari caught my jaw and snapped
my gaze back to his, the cocky smirk on his lips letting me know that he
had figured out my game.
The music was racing towards its crescendo, and Calvari’s hand moved
to encircle my throat as he tilted my mouth up towards his.
“Trying to bed yourself an emperor, are you?” he purred against my
lips, a mixture of amusement and jealousy in his words as his eyes flashed
with the challenge of fighting for my attention.
“Perhaps,” I breathed, watching as his pupils dilated and his grip on my
throat tightened.
He drew me closer, not a breath between our bodies as he lowered my
left foot to the floor but gripped my right thigh tightly, keeping it at his hip,
our position beyond indecent and the world still watching.
Calvari leaned in, his mouth set to capture mine and the heat in my skin
begging for him to do so.
“Enough!” Emperor Farish clapped his hands together once and the
music fell silent.
A beat passed as Calvari kept hold of me, his nostrils flaring at the
command to stop while the heat of that dance and his own desire made him
reluctant to do so.
With a barely concealed curse, Calvari released his grip on me, lowering
my right foot to the ground before taking his hand from my throat and
stepping back with a harsh exhale.
I bit my bottom lip as I turned to look at the emperor, certain that I’d
had his attention, that he had seen Calvari’s claim on me and that it would
be enough. Because it had to be enough.
I didn’t dare turn to look for my sister as we all awaited the emperor’s
next words, and his dark eyes slowly surveyed the gathered courtiers like a
wolf in the midst of a flock of sheep, simply taking his time while he
selected a meal.
His gaze fell to me, and I fought my natural instinct to recoil as his
heated attention roamed over my body, taking in every exposed piece of
skin, the way my chest rose and fell from the dance, everything right down
to the flush in my cheeks. He glanced at Calvari too, a smile almost
touching his lips which seemed as close to a challenge as I could imagine.
The warrior at my side stared back defiantly for several seconds before
bowing his head in submission and taking a step away from me. An offer.
One which shouldn’t have stung but did just a little.
There had never been any promises between the two of us, but there had
been something. Or perhaps I had only wanted to let myself think that.
Either way, he was offering me up without protest, and I had to remind
myself that that was precisely what I had been aiming for anyway.
A smugness filled the emperor’s expression as he looked between the
two of us, and my heart began to race as his gaze slid over me and then
away, beyond me, looking through the crowd and seeking out the woman
who I had tried so hard to shield from him.
There was a flash of cruelty that flared in his eyes as his gaze fell on my
sister where she held her husband’s hand, her eyes lowered in hopes of
going unnoticed. An excitement filled Farish’s expression that surpassed
any lust he might have felt for me.
I saw it then. Saw the truth of this man who sat above all of us on a
throne which he had laid claim to for a thousand years, making the world
bow to his whims.
This wasn’t about sex. It wasn’t lust and pleasure between the thighs of
a beautiful woman he sought. I’d had him in my thrall, he had seen me, and
he had known what my Affinities were, known what I was capable of if he
had invited me to his bed. If he simply wanted sex, the rough, brutal act of
fucking for the sake of nothing but pleasure, then he could have turned his
attention from her. But that wasn’t it. This was about power. It was as much
about her love for Aren and her children as it was about her beauty.
He could fuck any number of beautiful women, and no doubt had over
the centuries as often and as endlessly as he pleased. But in that time, this
creature who called himself our emperor had grown bored of simply taking
his pick of willing bodies. So he’d created this game. One where he used
his power to take what wouldn’t be willingly offered without duress. One
where he could make a man relinquish his wife for a night or many nights if
he pleased, where he could watch his conquests’ hearts break as they gave
themselves up to him out of fear of what might happen if they refused. One
where he could taste the pain and destruction on the lips he stole kisses
from.
He raised his hand slowly, extending a single finger as he pointed Aalia
out in the crowd and lazily, almost as if this were boring him, he beckoned
her to him.
CHAPTER FOUR
T he day and most of the night had passed in a blur of constant action, and
my limbs trembled with fatigue as we worked to clear through the final
patients. Imra was the last of the healers left with me, the others having
headed out over the final hours of the evening to make some house calls
and deliver tonics to the Fae who hadn’t been able to show up in person.
As I turned to cross the room, the toe of my shoe caught on a flagstone
and I stumbled, catching the arm of a man who I hadn’t even seen.
“Sorry,” I muttered, righting myself and pulling back, frowning as I
looked up into his face and took in the uniform of one of the city guards.
“Are you here for the clinic?”
“No. I’m not here for myself. We found… There has been an incident
which I’m sorry to have to inform you of, but this is the Dumari household,
is it not?”
“Yes,” I replied hesitantly, looking beyond the guard and spotting
another lurking in the doorway, his gaze hard as he looked around the room
at the few remaining patients. “What is it you want?”
“Are the Lord and Lady home currently-”
“My parents have been travelling the continent for several years. My
sister and I act on behalf of the estate in their absence,” I told him. “What is
it?”
Fatigue tugged at my mind like it was laced in cotton wool and the
words he spoke were but distant things. I was tired. Right down to my
bones, I felt drained of both physical and godly energy. There had been
more than a few difficult cases today, and so much use of my Affinities
always wore on me. No doubt I’d remain in bed for the entire next day and
likely part of the one after to recover.
The guard cut a look to Imra, and my friend took the hint, dipping into
the barest suggestion of a curtsy before heading across the room to finish
bandaging a man with a broken arm. I’d used my power to help the bone
fuse back together, but he needed to keep it still for a week while the bone
hardened again.
“This way,” the guard inclined his head, and I followed as he led me
from the room, tossing the cloth I’d been using to clean my hands into a
bucket by the door as we went.
The torches which had been lit along the main hall had burned low and
darkness pressed in on me as I followed the two guards along it, their heavy
steps echoing in the empty space while mine stayed silent against the
flagstones.
I swallowed a lump in my throat as we walked, each step we took
towards the courtyard to the front of the manor house seeming to clear a
haze from around me, and I jolted in alarm as a voice hissed in my ear.
“One kiss from the lips that betrayed you, one smile for your time in the
dark, a scream for the monsters which plague you, a debt paid to he with
the mark.” Carioth’s voice made my feet trip over themselves, and I
stumbled forward, hardly even noticing as one of the guards caught my arm
to stop me from falling, let alone hearing the words he spoke to me.
I righted myself, whirling to look back down the long corridor into the
heart of the house, a breath of laughter weaving through the air which had
the guards cursing behind me just as I spotted a pair of bright green eyes.
I opened my mouth to demand an answer from the god of tricksters but
before the words could spill from my lips, a curtain seemed to lift from my
mind, memories rushing in so fast that they stole my breath, and my heart
began to race so quickly that I pressed a hand to it in fright.
“Why are you here?” I demanded of the god, feeling like a fool as my
mind raced over everything that had happened last night. Everyone knew
Carioth was the most likely of the gods to strike a bargain with a Fae, and in
my desperation, I’d called on him. But he was also the god of stealth and
cunning, a trickster who delighted in messing with the rules of the deals he
struck, and as my memories came crashing in, I realised with terror what he
had done, how he’d stolen them and stolen our chance to flee too.
He had helped us escape like our bargain demanded, but he had also
made us forget what we’d been running from. We shouldn’t have lingered
in the city. All of us should have fled the moment we were free of the palace
and never looked back, but instead we’d remained here, gone about our
days as if nothing at all had even-
“We found her in an alley in Rower’s Bay,” said the guard who was still
holding my arm, answering the question I had intended for the god.
Ice water spilled through my veins at his words, my head shaking in
denial even as I struggled to put them together.
“It ain’t a part of the city where noble ladies tend to go,” the second
guard muttered. “We were thinkin’ maybe she had business of an unsavoury
nature over that way. Or perhaps she was there for a clandestine liaison-”
“No,” I breathed in horror, yanking my arm free of the guard, and
looking beyond him, my eyes falling on the open carriage waiting there, the
covered shape which lay in the back of it looking all too still.
“Maybe you can shed some light on why she went out that way-”
I wasn’t listening to them anymore. There was a ringing in my ears
which was drowning them out and the pounding in my chest was so violent
that my ribs seemed in danger of cracking from the force of each pounding
thump.
My feet began to move as dread sliced me open and left me bleeding
out with every single step I took.
A shaft of moonlight pierced the sky to land directly over the carriage,
marking the spot in pale light which defied the press of the dark.
Inside my head, the voice of a little girl was screaming, begging me not
to take a single step further. The voice of the child I had been, the one who
had played in the long grass outside the family manor with Aalia day after
day, creating imaginary worlds to explore and speaking of all the things we
would venture out into the world to see when we were grown.
She was crying now, sobbing and begging, while on the outside I didn’t
so much as flinch. It was as if my skin had set to stone, my expression
halted in a mask of absolute nothingness as I fought the urge to believe
what my heart already knew.
It couldn’t be.
There wasn’t any light in a world without her.
The carriage seemed so innocuous, just a simple wooden structure lined
with hay and drawn by a single black horse who looked tired and ready for
a return to his stable.
My hand trembled as I reached for the blanket covering what lay in the
back of it, my throat thickening as that voice in my head kept screaming
and screaming, the force of her fear ripping through me like I might tear in
two and become half of the person I was if I didn’t heed her denial.
But the cold, hard statue which had taken control of my flesh didn’t
slow, didn’t stop.
My fingers reached the edge of the blanket, and I choked as I felt the
coldness of the body laying beneath the rough fibres. The unnatural stillness
that met with my touch.
My fingers knotted in the rough fabric, my heart racing, racing, racing
so fast that the pounding in my ears almost drowned out those screams.
I yanked it hard, the blanket tearing free of her and catching on the air
as it fell all too softly to the ground.
It shouldn’t have been soft. It should have caused a thunderclap which
ripped through the world and set it all alight with the power of the grief that
stole through me as my gaze fell upon her.
“Aalia,” I choked out, my shin slicing open on the edge of the carriage
as I hauled myself onto it, that screaming ripping through me, tearing me
open from the inside out while I scrambled for her, shaking my head in
denial of what I saw.
The guards were talking but there was no noise which could reach me in
the fog of grief echoing through my core at the sight of her beautiful face,
too pale in the moonlight, lips swollen with bruises, a slit through the lower
like she’d taken a strike to the face.
The screams broke free of me, pouring from my lungs in an unending
wail of denial and despair as I reached for her, pressing my hands to her
cool cheeks, and willing every ounce of power I possessed to rise up inside
of me and reverse this fate.
I hauled her into my arms, her body a limp weight as I heaved her into
my lap and screamed her name.
The collar of her dress parted as I begged for her to return to me, her
beauty only accentuated in death as the moonlight cast her stunning features
into stark perfection. There were bruises on her, dark, purple bruises which
ringed her neck like a collar, the outline of hands far bigger than mine
marring her skin and providing the reason for her demise.
My anguish turned to horror as I realised my own blame in this, the day
we should have spent escaping lost to us through Carioth’s tricks and the
cold bite of reality.
Power rattled through me as I called on all I had and tried to offer it to
her. I was a healer, blessed by Luciet herself with the power to ward off
death.
“Please,” I choked out between sobs, that power in me growing as I
tried to use all I had for the benefit of my sister, offering it all if only her
body could heal from this.
Silver light grew on the edges of my vision, and I knew the goddess was
watching me, I could feel her grief compounding with mine as she felt the
raw brutality of this loss, but she did nothing to change it. Because it was
already far too late for the power of a healer, far, far too late for my magic,
or even the power of the goddess who had bestowed it upon me, to have
any affect.
Tears spilled free of me then as my screams tore through the darkness of
the night.
“Take me,” I begged, my mind slipping to those precious souls who
needed my sister even more than I did. Her beautiful twins, the light of her
world and mine alike, waiting for her to return. “Herdat hear me, and take
me in her place. Her children need her, please take this trade.”
Her body was so cold in my arms, so still and void of life, everything
she had been so far removed from what was left of her here.
My soul was shredded apart, my heart destroyed and mind cracking as I
screamed to the gods for mercy, for pity, for anything and everything I
could, begging them each by name before offering myself up to Herdat over
and over again, my Affinities burning so bright that my skin glowed with
the useless power of them.
But the goddess of death and ruin did not rise to my pleas, did not
answer my request, and no matter how potent my own power was, I was no
match for death itself.
CHAPTER SEVEN
I knelt on the cold floor of the temple of Herdat, goddess of death and ruin,
my sister’s body laying before me on the stone altar, her hair brushed to a
shine, her silver dress accentuating her beauty beyond all denial and the low
neckline letting the entire world see what had been done to her if they cared
to look.
The time that had passed since her death had been an agony unlike
anything I had ever known.
People had come to mourn her, speaking words of loss and despair over
a woman they had never truly known. Not like I had. Not like Aren and her
twins had.
Something inside me had splintered and shorn off. A piece which would
never return because it had been so intrinsically linked to her that it couldn’t
exist without her to breathe life into it.
I felt cold. Deep down to the roots of my core, cold. Like frost had
taken root in the part of my soul which demanded I keep living beyond her
death. It was growing inside me, climbing through my veins and freezing
everything it touched, kissing my lips so that they forgot how to smile,
chilling my eyes so they forgot how to cry, and stilling my heart so that it
only beat in shallow, insignificant thumps which did nothing beyond
staving off death.
Because I didn’t want to die.
Not yet.
I wanted to claim my revenge first.
Inside me, a little girl still screamed and raged at the world, her broken
heart whispering words to me between thoughts, giving me a taste of her
pain whenever she could with the lash of her tongue against the inside of
my skull. She was me and not me. Fractured, divided. Like I had split in
two but remained in one body.
You made that bargain, she hissed with venom, the memory of Carioth’s
acid green eyes haunting me from within my own mind. You let her leave
the house that day.
“I know,” I told myself, because I wasn’t denying it. Aalia’s death fell
on me. It was my doing almost as much as it was the emperor’s.
I knew it was him without needing to ask the question. I knew what
he’d done, and I knew he had done it before and would do it again.
He’d seen something that wasn’t his. Something beautiful and pure and
loved beyond any emotion he knew, and he had wanted it. She’d denied him
in front of the entire court, embarrassed him and dented his ego. So he’d
snatched her, and beaten her, and taken what he had been refused before
wrapping his hands around her neck and stealing her from this world once
and for all.
The Fae couldn’t tell lies. But secrets were easily kept by the dead.
I took Aalia’s hand in mine one last time, the coldness of her touch so
alien that it didn’t even feel like it was her I was holding.
You killed her.
“And I’ll avenge her,” I swore in reply to my own mind. It wouldn’t fix
it. But it would at least reset the balance.
I pressed a kiss to the back of my sister’s hand and stood, feeling the
night pressing in on me as I forced myself to release her and turn away.
I was ice. A statue given breath. Inside, I was broken, but on the outside,
a calm had consumed me entirely. A plan had formed within my mind, and I
would see it done no matter the cost it bore.
I strode from the temple and into the night, the cicadas calling to the
moon all around me as I turned toward the river and began walking.
The temple of Herdat sat alone on an outcrop at the bend in the river,
right before it widened and swept out towards the distant sea. Death liked
solitude after all, and though the temple had Fae visiting it daily, the walk
from the city to its black stone walls was a long one. The thought was that
the journey brought you closer to the dead, finding memories and ghosts in
the solitude as you travelled the well-worn cobbles towards the iron door of
the goddess of death.
I hadn’t touched the door as I’d left, but many did, allowing the power
to be drained from them as they stood there in sacrifice to Herdat and in
honour of those they’d lost.
Death wasn’t a common companion to the Fae, and with the length of
our lives, it was always a tragedy. The murder of a lady of the court had
brought many out of their homes to mourn. I hadn’t recognised half of them
and didn’t care much for the rest. Their condolences had been empty, their
sorrow inconsequential. None dared speak of what had happened or who
might have done it. No one wished to utter the truth we all knew so
blatantly.
Aalia had scorned the emperor and had died for it.
I focused on the sound of rushing water as I traversed the darkness
towards the river’s edge.
They were there already, the boat loaded with all the coin we’d been
able to take from the family coffers, every valuable item which could be
transported with ease. The twins were curled up tight against their
grandparents, their tears fallen to exhaustion and sleep keeping hold of
them for at least a little while.
I nodded to Aren’s family but stopped dead at the edge of the small
jetty.
“Come, Kyra,” Aren said in a voice raw with grief, his bloodshot eyes
illuminated by the dim light of the moon as he offered me his hand.
I didn’t take it. Didn’t move at all.
“We need to get into the straights before the sun comes up,” Aren went
on as if he couldn’t tell what I was going to say, as if he hadn’t already
considered doing the exact same thing that I planned to a thousand times.
“If we can get that far down river, then no one from the city will spy us.
We’ll have a better chance of escaping this place without-”
“Tell them I wanted a lifetime under the sky with them,” I said slowly,
my eyes on the twins as my chest tightened and my resolve threatened to
crack for the first time. “Tell them I loved them more than words could ever
convey. And tell them…not to wait to begin their adventures. I wasted my
life looking at the horizon and never chasing it. The world was out there
this entire time, and I never got to taste it.”
“Kyra,” Aren rasped, taking my hand by force and gripping it tightly.
“Aalia wouldn’t want this. She would never wish for you to lose your life in
some impossible attempt at revenge for-”
“I’ll see him dead, Aren,” I swore, taking a gilded knife from my pocket
and pulling the sheath from it to reveal the iron blade. We’d had this
discussion already, both of us desperate to fulfil the task, though the
impossibility of it had convinced Aren out of the idea in the end, especially
when I’d made him think about the twins. They deserved better than to lose
both parents. But me? I was expendable. He just hadn’t wanted to admit it
until now. “I’ll see him bleeding and sobbing at my feet for taking her from
us.”
Aren’s throat bobbed with the desire to see that too, his fist closing and
then opening as he looked over his shoulder to the sleeping twins in his
parents’ arms.
“You’ll never get close enough to do it,” he breathed, the weight of his
words falling over me because he believed they were true enough to have
spoken them aloud.
“I will,” I told him just as firmly, letting him see my truth too. “I plan on
making whatever deals I need to, with whichever gods I have to, to see it
done. She was my joy, Aren. I won’t attempt any kind of life without her in
it. Especially not while that piece of shit still draws breath.”
Aren frowned as his grip on my hand tightened, words forming on his
lips before falling away again as he saw my decision on this. I wouldn’t be
swayed. I wouldn’t be turned.
“You’ll come find us when it’s done,” he said firmly, and I managed a
smile, a bittersweet smile for that pretty wish. We both knew there would be
no surviving this for me. If by some miracle I ended the life of the emperor,
I would never escape his guards.
“I’ll see you in the Garden one day if not,” I swore to him. “Aalia and I
will wait for you there on a swing seat just like the one beyond the river by
the house.”
His eyes roamed between mine, and I knew he was picturing her there
now, her bare toes in the long grass, a sweet smile on her lips as she
beckoned us over. She was at peace, waiting for us in the fullness of the
flowers, a summer breeze in the air.
A tear tracked down his cheek and I raised my hand to brush it aside.
“Live well for their sake,” I whispered. “Find that adventure, love fiercely,
die bravely. We’ll meet again, brother.”
Aren choked back a sob as he drew me into his arms, my face pressing
to his chest, and I returned his embrace knowing that this was it. I would
never see them again. The family my sweet sister had gifted me, drifting
away downriver in search of a new land and a new life. They would change
their names when they arrived in Souvion. They would use their wealth to
establish themselves and never speak of their past. And if by any chance,
the queen of Souvion ever discovered who they were and why they had
come to seek refuge in her kingdom, I was confident she would protect
them. She was one of the few Fae queens who had never been afraid of
Farish. She opposed him openly, even if it had never quite come to war, and
would welcome them into her court should the truth present itself. But I
hoped it never did. I hoped they could simply avoid the question of when
and where they’d come from and focus entirely on where they were going.
An adventure primed just for them. A new life where perhaps they could
find happiness again, despite all they’d had so cruelly stolen from them.
We parted in silence, no goodbyes escaping us while Aren moved to sit
with his children, drawing them into his arms as the boat set out towards the
distant sea.
I remained standing there, immobile, my gaze fixed on the silver hair of
the twins who I loved more than life itself as they headed away from me for
the final time.
I watched until the horizon swallowed them and the boat was lost
beyond it, their path set, just as mine was.
Your fault, the voice inside me screamed, and I accepted the lashings of
her words. She was me and yet she wasn’t. I was nothing but this cold
vessel for vengeance now. Who knew what I might become once I achieved
it?
I turned my back on the river, feeling so cold that I could have sworn
frost marked my footsteps in my wake.
I could feel the eyes of the gods on me. They knew as well as I did that I
intended to keep my word on this. The death of an emperor meant nothing
to me in the wake of my sister.
I hadn’t lied to Aren. I was willing to make a deal with any god to see
this done. But I didn’t need just any god. There were two who claimed the
crowns as the most powerful of their kind. Saresh, keeper of the sun and
giver of life. I had already begged him for anything he might wish for to
return my sister to me, but he hadn’t so much as replied to my call. He had
heard it all before, no doubt, the desperate pleas of those left behind to the
one god known to breathe life into the world, but he had never answered
anyone before me, and he ignored me just as surely.
So that left an option which none but the most desperate would attempt
to bargain with.
Herdat. Goddess of death and ruin, gatekeeper to the Garden, master of
souls.
I stepped back into her temple, my heart falling still as I spied the empty
altar, the priests and priestesses having taken Aalia’s body in my absence.
They were somewhere in the depths of this place now, preparing her for
burial. Speaking the rites over her body to help her stick to her path during
her final walk into the Garden.
You did this. You killed her. You should have done more, should have
taken her place. You never should have let her walk out that morning.
I closed my eyes to ward off the vision of that empty altar, but the
words which were screamed from within myself only grew louder.
I turned back to the iron door, reaching for it blindly before pushing it
shut, my palms flat to the hateful metal as I suppressed a groan at the
nausea which rolled through me from the contact. My knees buckled as I
felt my energy waning, my Affinities dwindling within me and my spine
tingling as even the ghost of my wings seemed to wither away. I hadn’t
flown since I’d lost her. Likely wouldn’t ever fly again.
“Herdat,” I ground out as my knees collided with the hard stone and my
body quaked from the prolonged contact with the iron. “I beg you for the
power I will need to gain entry to the palace to seek vengeance for my
sister.”
Several seconds passed as I trembled there, the vile spell the iron had
laid on me weakening me to my very core, but I simply called out to her
again. And again.
The fifth time I called her name, the air shivered in reply and a scream
caught in the back of my throat as something twisted in the shadows at my
back.
I gasped as I turned from the door the same moment the torches which
had been burning around the circular temple all guttered out.
Death lurked in the spaces between the shadows, its call a sweet caress
on the air as Herdat shifted closer in the darkness.
“And what might I get in payment for such a boon?” a voice of
nightmares purred in my ear, every muscle in my body tightening as the
desire to wet myself and run screaming from this place nearly consumed
me.
I bit into my cheek so hard that I drew blood, focusing on the memory
of my sister’s body, murdered for the crime of refusing the emperor’s
demands.
“I know you relish blood and suffering,” I whispered, taking my dagger
and unsheathing it before slicing a deep gash into my own arm.
I cried out at the pain of it as I struck the vein, my blood spraying hot
and fast against the wall. Herdat moaned in feminine appreciation as my
skin began knitting itself back together again, my Affinities healing the
wound over in a matter of moments.
“Oh, what fun we could have, daughter of Luciet. How I could watch
you suffer and bleed for me without end while her power maintains you.”
A strike of sharp claws collided with my shoulder, and I was knocked to
the floor as my blood spilled again, a yell of pain echoing from the walls
which made Herdat’s power pulse all around me.
“Is that your price?” I panted, willing to pay it if that was what this
took, but it seemed too simple, too easy. The priests and priestesses who
dedicated their lives to the worship of Herdat offered her as much pain and
suffering as they could endure on a daily basis. I’d never understood the
appeal personally, but there were plenty of them who did so, and other Fae
often came from the city to offer up their pain in worship of her too, so it
didn’t seem like something she would be short on.
“No,” Herdat breathed in my ear, and I flinched as I pushed myself to
my feet once more, turning wildly in the dark as I sought her out. “I will
give you what you need to gain entry to the palace, young soul. All I ask in
return is that you spill as much of his blood as you can. Make it hurt, pretty
thing. Make him scream and suffer for me. I have waited so very long to
taste his end.”
My lips parted, then closed, my answer so simple that it seemed
impossible.
“I want nothing more than to make him suffer,” I snarled, straightening
my spine as I felt the sinful presence of the goddess circling me. “That
won’t be a problem.”
Herdat inhaled so deeply that she drew the breath from inside my own
lungs, a soft moan escaping her as she feasted on that truth.
“Oh, pretty little thing. You will enjoy his death so very much. I do
believe you could become something far greater than you are once you have
a taste for it. Once you see what joy his punishment serves you.”
I swallowed a lump in my throat, wondering if there could be any truth
to her words. I had never killed before, but I had no doubt in my mind that I
could do this. I wouldn’t flinch, and she was right – if I pulled it off, then I
was almost certain I would find enjoyment in it too.
The screaming of the little lost girl inside of me quieted at that thought,
and I wondered if she feared me. If I feared myself and what the death of
my sweet Aalia had created in me. But it was far too late for all of that, and
I knew it.
“What will you give me?” I asked, unsure what I would even need to
accomplish such a task, and Herdat’s sultry laughter filled the space before
she replied.
“You shall have the power to speak the words you need to gain entry to
his palace. They shall fall from your lips like drops of dew, set to sow the
seeds of a new world for your kind and mine alike.”
“That’s it?” I whispered, uncertain of what she even meant by that.
“That’s it. But be warned, sweet soul, that if you do this, the gods
themselves will riot. The world may crack and tear in two. Chaos shall rise
and the dawn will break upon a new and different hour. This is your last
chance to avoid corruption. Turn from this path or follow it with your whole
heart. The power is yours.”
The oppressive weight lifted from the room, and I stumbled backwards
as I felt her departing, her words ringing in the air like a curse of their own,
but I didn’t understand their meaning.
It didn’t matter anyway. I would pay whatever price necessary to see my
sister’s killer dead, and damn the consequences.
CHAPTER EIGHT
I ’dsister,
expected the guards to kill me. I hadn’t cared. I’d gotten justice for my
and I had nothing left to live for without her anyway. Of course,
fate had a much crueller destiny in mind for me in the end.
I shivered in the dank cavern where I’d been left to rot since the night
I’d killed the emperor, his blood still staining my clothes and skin, the
sound of his pleas still ringing in my ears.
I had thought it would feel better than this. I had thought that gaining
this vengeance would have earned me at least a little solace. But it hadn’t
brought her back. It didn’t change what he had done. My sister was still lost
to this world, her children still left to cry themselves to sleep night after
night, her husband left to raise them alone. And me? Well, I was just…left.
I thought of Aren and focused on him and the two beautiful little
creations they had made together. I wondered if they were in Souvion yet,
where the guards of our city held no jurisdiction and the queen who sat
upon the throne there would be all too welcoming of someone who’d had a
hand in the emperor’s death. Though they would keep that secret to
themselves if they could. If they were there, then they’d be safe. It was the
one good thing in all of this.
All I had to do was keep the secret of their destination secret if I was
interrogated, and I would embrace any and all forms of torture willingly
before I ever spoke of their location.
I wondered if I could still lie. If that gift had been left with me or had
only worked that once. If I could, then perhaps I could use that to my
advantage, send the royal guards in the wrong direction altogether. Though
I didn’t dare speak aloud to test the theory.
The sick feeling which pressed at the base of my throat had become
normal after days of being shackled in iron and left to starve down here in
the dark.
I’d slept twice when exhaustion had forced me to keel over, the iron
manacles cutting into my flesh as I hung from them, and even the bite of the
cold, damp stone which surrounded me did nothing to keep me awake any
longer. Not that I had gained anything in sleep. All I’d been gifted were the
memories of my sister’s cold hand in mine, of the discoloured bruises
around her neck in death.
Water dripped in an endlessly changing rhythm somewhere close by, a
small pool just out of sight around the bend. My feet were still damp from
when they’d dragged me through it when they’d brought me down here
days ago, the cold, wetness of this place making certain they couldn’t dry.
No doubt the skin within my silk shoes was suffering for it, but I hadn’t
been able to bring myself to try and remove them. I hadn’t even tried to
remove the iron shackles which were secured around my wrists.
The thin, once pale blue silk of the gown I’d worn when I’d snuck into
the emperor’s bed clung to my body and did nothing to help banish the cold
from my limbs, the fabric near translucent now and stained with so much
blood that you could hardly even tell what colour it had once been.
The sound of heavy footsteps approaching made me crack my eyes
open, my head raising from where it had fallen to hang against my chest in
the most comfortable position I could maintain while my arms were
stretched out towards the walls either side of me.
“Has the heir decided what to do with her then?” a guard inquired, his
voice familiar to me after days of hearing him and the others exchange
words. They maintained a position guarding me out of sight, nearer the exit
of the cavern beneath the palace where I was being held.
“Savinia has decided to allow me the honour of doling out punishment,”
a cold voice replied, letting me know what the emperor’s daughter had
decided should be done with me, the sound of his words seeming to slither
across my ears, forcing a trickle of fear into me which I hadn’t even realised
I was capable of feeling anymore.
I knew who approached me. Kalir, the emperor’s former advisor and
Royal Prophet. He took the magic of the gods and wielded it like it was his
own. Many spoke out against the things he and his kind practiced, but the
emperor had always been too selfish to care for the fears of his people. He
wasn’t worried about angering the gods when he believed he had been
blessed and favoured by them since his birth so very long ago.
I wondered if he still believed himself blessed now that he was lingering
in the after. Who knew if he had found paradise or eternal torment, but I
hoped with all that was left of me that it was the latter.
“Come to execute me?” I asked impassively, my voice a brittle thing as
Kalir and the guard rounded the corner, the light of the torch the guard
carried making my eyes prickle and sting after days left to linger in the
dark.
“That would be all too simple an end for the Fae who killed our great
emperor, would it not?” Kalir asked, the eerie brightness in his eyes making
my skin pepper with goosebumps.
It wasn’t natural what he was or what he took from the gods. I didn’t
care what justification his kind used; we shouldn’t have wielded the power
of our creators the way he did. Sorcery went far beyond the use of our
Affinities.
The Royal Prophet was terrifying in his stature as well as his gifts. He
was a huge man, both tall and broad, his head fully shaven and eyes two
pits of nothing. I hated what he was and what he represented with his white
robes which he never removed in public, the stark, bright colour a contrast
to the deep stains I knew lined his rotten soul. Almost all of his power was
taken through methods which weren’t even whispered of, for all folk knew
how twisted and depraved the Prophets were.
“I will die shortly either way,” I muttered, not caring for their plans,
only wanting one thing now. “And then I will finally be with my sister
again in the Eternal Garden where nothing can touch me anymore.”
“You think you will be welcomed into the Garden?” the guard scoffed,
and I turned a cold look his way. “You’re a murderer.”
“I saved the kingdom from the rule of a tyrant. I stopped a monster from
hurting anyone ever again. I believe I will be welcomed into the Garden for
that,” I assured him.
The back of Kalir’s hand smacked across my face, throwing me to one
side as I tasted blood and felt bone crack from the unnatural strength he
held. My shoulder roared with agony as my weight was forced to hang from
the shackle securing that arm, but I didn’t let so much as a breath escape
me, much less a cry of pain.
I rocked back around to face him, spitting my blood at his feet as the
magic I had been gifted upon my birth sprung to life within me, my healing
Affinity flaring as the power raced along my jaw and healed the wound. It
was much harder than it should have been with the iron encasing my hands,
but I came from a long line of powerful Fae, and even that beastly metal
couldn’t fully contain my magic.
Kalir’s lips lifted in a savage grin as he watched my magic work, his
overly bright eyes pinned to me as he nodded.
“She is perfect,” he breathed, greed lighting his eyes.
“What do you intend to do with her?” the guard asked curiously, not
like he cared or wanted to protect me, more like he was genuinely interested
in what torture I was destined to endure.
“I will remake her,” Kalir said, imbuing my limbs with fear as I
wondered what he meant by that. There was no way he intended to offer me
anything close to kindness or redemption, so I was certain any plans he had
would only be designed to aid in my suffering. “I will bind her and create
her in the image of a god itself.”
“Why?” the guard asked as I frowned, not wanting anything at all other
than death now.
“She is destined for power only ever known by the gods, but the price of
it will be her will, her freedom, and her soul.”
“What?” I breathed, my pulse picking up, though I didn’t understand his
words at all.
“You, the woman who disrespected the highest of all Fae in the most
despicable of ways, will only ever know a life of servitude and submission
from this day forth,” Kalir said cruelly.
“You cannot break my will,” I assured him, my jaw gritting with the
knowledge that I would never bend to whatever he thought to force upon
me. I would die first. And if not by their hands, then I would do so by my
own.
“I won’t give you the luxury of a choice.”
Kalir jerked his chin at me before I could respond in any way and the
guard moved forward, drawing a key from his pocket which he used to
unlock the shackles which held me.
I let myself drop to my knees as I was released, the cold stone cutting
into my skin and making me bleed once more, before my power rushed to
fix it just as fast.
I feigned weakness, waiting for the guard to move behind me and haul
me to my feet, while my attention fixed solely on the blade hanging from
the sheath at his side.
I didn’t intend to waste any time on whatever plans they had for
punishing me. I was done with this world and all it had taken. I was done
with this endless life. Because without Aalia in it, I was lost. She was the
one constant I had held tight to, the one truth that had ever really counted
for me. And now she was gone.
The guard heaved me up and I twisted sharply, slamming my fist into
his jaw hard enough to knock him back, grasping the blade from his belt
before turning it on myself. The steel brushed against the flesh between my
breasts, and my muscles tensed as I moved to impale myself upon it. I only
had to strike my heart and even my gifts couldn’t save me.
But before I could go through with what I ached for so desperately, a
strange and unholy power locked around my limbs, freezing them in place.
A gasp of fear escaped me as the guard lurched forward, ripping the
blade from my frozen fingers before taking hold of me and squeezing my
arm tightly. The power holding me fell away and I shuddered as I was
whirled towards Kalir.
The Prophet was panting heavily, the dark skin of his bald head and
brow speckled with beads of sweat, his gold embroidered robes dampened
with it too. Whatever power he had just used to contain me was no Affinity
I had ever known of. That was some twisted sorcery which he’d stolen from
the lap of the gods themselves.
“I’m not letting you escape this fate, Esworn,” he growled, the use of
the cursed name stilling any words I held on my tongue. The Esworn were
the worst of the Fae, those who had done atrocious things and had forfeited
their right to even hold a name any longer. I wasn’t like them. What I had
done was no crime. “But I will make it easier on you if you give up the
location of your brother-in-law and his children.”
“I’ll die before I give them up,” I spat, and his eyes widened because he
knew I spoke the truth. There was no lying for our kind. At least not so far
as he knew. Which meant he really would make it easier on me if I spoke of
their location too, but I meant what I said with every fibre of my being. I
was already dead. If they wanted to cut me apart piece by piece before I met
with death, then so be it. I had already faced the worst pain I could ever
endure anyway in the loss of my sister, and no physical agony could be a
match to that, nor enough to ever make me give up her remaining family.
“We’ll see about that,” Kalir muttered.
My heart began to race as I was hauled away from the cavern where I’d
been held for days.
“Herdat, take me,” I begged of the goddess, but I hadn’t so much as
imagined the presence of any of the gods close to me since I’d left that
place of blood and death. She didn’t answer me, didn’t so much as
acknowledge my request for death, and in the pit of my gut, I still felt that
wrongness in the world which had begun with me speaking a lie. Something
had changed with that act which she’d encouraged. The gods had been in
uproar and now they were all too quiet.
We headed out into the brightness of the sun, the guard carrying me as
the strength I’d managed to summon fled and I paid the price of days
without nourishment while clad in iron.
I slumped against my captor, the ripe scent of him filling my nose as he
carried me towards some unknown destination. I knew I should have been
fighting harder. But it didn’t really matter. Whatever was done to me now
would still end the same way. I would find a way to end my life if they
didn’t do it for me. I would find a way to join her in death.
We strode away from the palace through the cool spring air, more
guards surrounding us as we went and the sound of their booted feet on the
ground carrying to me. The pastel shades of the blossoms blooming around
us made my chest lighten, the trees swaying in a light breeze and the scent
of spring caressing my senses, focusing on that instead of my destination.
We headed into the forest, following Kalir’s directions until the light of
the sky began to darken once again with the thickness of the canopy
overhead.
We finally arrived in an open patch of woodland, the trees parting for it
as if the hand of a god had swept the ground clear in this spot alone for
some unknown purpose. Maybe even for this very moment.
In the centre of the space was a heavy wooden chair with an iron collar,
the inside of it lined with sharpened spikes, locked to the top of it. There
were carvings in the wood which made my skin prickle, effigies of the gods
in their purest forms, the lines simple and yet endlessly intricate. It seemed
as though every single god and goddess were represented in those carvings,
each of them offered the same amount of space as a sign of respect to their
power.
I began to fight as I was carried closer to that chair, the sight of the
collar attached to it lighting fear in me beyond what I could even
understand right now. I had never seen anything like it, but I could feel the
power it held, sense the eyes of countless deities turning this way, and I
knew in my soul that I wanted no part of this at all.
“Stop,” I gasped as the guard’s fingers bit into me, another coming to
take hold of me too as they fought to contain me.
“Please,” I begged, even though I knew it would do no good. I began to
kick and fight, my nails catching and tearing on the metal of their armour as
more hands gripped me and forced me to bend to their will.
Many hands pushed me down, their power overwhelming mine as I was
shoved into the chair, forced to sit with my spine straight and my neck
roughly strapped into the confines of the contraption at the top of it.
My head filled with the sound of a thousand whispers, their voices
powerful and brimming with a range of emotions so potent that I could feel
them rattling through my skin. The gods were all around me suddenly, some
curious, some eager, others horrified or angry. It didn’t seem to matter
though; not one of them appeared to make their feelings known, and if the
Fae surrounding me realised they were close, they paid no attention to their
presence, instead focusing on me.
A scream escaped my lips just before the iron collar was locked into
place around my throat. My breath stuck in my lungs as I felt a ring of
sharpened points cutting into my neck from within the iron collar, and I
stopped thrashing as the wounds forced the metal to make contact with my
blood, every movement only driving them deeper into my skin though they
weren’t close enough to offer me the escape of death.
I tried to call on my healing power to aid me, but with the iron piercing
my flesh there was nothing that it could do, and my stomach roiled from the
taste of iron which coated my tongue.
“Tell us where your brother-in-law took his children,” Kalir demanded
calmly, as if he thought this would be enough to change my mind.
I spat at him, wincing from the movement as it made the iron spikes
sink further into my flesh, but at least my point had been made clearly.
“I will never tell you,” I hissed, my truth sizzling in the air and making
itself known.
Kalir eyed me for several moments, then nodded, accepting that much
and seeming to realise there wasn’t a power on this earth that would break
my resolve to keep this secret.
The guards disbanded and Kalir came to stand before me, taking a plain
metal coin from his pocket and holding it up for me to see. It was big
enough to fill the centre of his palm but completely smooth and unadorned,
unlike any coin I’d ever seen. It wasn’t currency, and the strange glow it
emitted suggested it was so much more than a simple piece of precious
metal.
“This coin shall be the master of your destiny from now until the end of
time, Esworn,” he purred, that unnatural light to his eyes burning more
fiercely, and I could do nothing but stare up at him. “Prepare yourself,” he
added as he placed the coin on the ground before me and took a step back.
“The power I am about to call upon will be anything but gentle with your
cursed soul. But I can make it hurt less at any point – all you have to do is
tell me where they are hiding and I will let you sleep throughout the
process. Or keep your secrets and pay the price of them in suffering.”
A whimper bled from my lips, a heavy kind of power building all
around me which made the guards shift uncomfortably, but I still held my
tongue, knowing nothing he could do would force their location from me.
“I suggest you all leave,” Kalir told the guards. “For I am about to steal
a slice of power from each and every deity in existence and place it into this
unworthy host, and I doubt they will be happy about it once they realise
what I am doing.”
The guards exchanged concerned looks as the billowing power
continued to build, and they all took off at once, abandoning me to this fate
even as I called out after them for mercy.
“Please,” I begged, looking up into the face of the only man left
standing before me.
He drew closer, an iron blade in his hand which was marked with the
symbol for Steelion, the god of metal, stone, and strength.
“The time for any kind of begging is long past, Esworn,” Kalir said
softly, closing in on me, and though I tried to recoil, that only made the iron
collar cut into my flesh more deeply. “Now you shall reap the true reward
of what you’ve done and forever pay for it with your servitude.”
My heart beat faster and faster as he closed in on me, that power
swelling and growing endlessly until all I could see was the fervent
brightness in his eyes and before long, even that was stolen from me by the
agony of the magic which he forced beneath my skin. He began to carve the
symbols of the gods into my flesh, my healing affinity chasing after his
blade and healing the wounds as he made them.
The gods screamed as he ripped a slice of power from each of them,
forcing that magic into me with every slice of his blade, their curses striking
against my ears, not one of them turning my way to offer any kind of help
as their fury grew and grew.
“The world will pay the price of what has been done here.” They hissed
and spat at me, Kalir not seeming to hear them or care for their warnings as
he focused on breaking me apart and remaking me in the image he had
designed.
I couldn’t make out their words between the agony consuming me, but I
felt them, one by one I felt them cursing our kind and the way we had
squandered what they’d given us. They snarled at us for twisting their rules
and skirting them entirely, and they sniped at me for turning to Herdat in
my time of greatest need, for taking her deal and speaking that lie.
The gods had been on the brink of forsaking us for years, and as the
pitch of my screams grew louder and louder, Kalir slicing away at their
magic as if doing so meant nothing at all and would come at no cost, they
began to turn from us.
One by one I felt them, like splashes of acid against my skin, the burn of
their rejection sinking down to my core. They were our creators, our deities,
our salvation. But we had finally pushed them too far.
Agony seared through me as Kalir hissed words of magic and theft,
cleaving me open and forcing the stolen essence of the gods inside me
while I screamed with the agony of my immortal life being torn from me
one bite at a time. But death didn’t come to claim me as it should have.
Instead, my magic pulsed and flared and consumed all it could as it fought
to keep me breathing through every agonising second.
I lost all sense of time and space, my mind cracking apart like a
lightning bolt had seared straight through me. I wasn’t good or evil, I
wasn’t kind or cruel, I wasn’t light or dark. I wasn’t anything anymore. And
as the roaring well of power reared up inside me, filling me so deeply that I
was on the brink of losing every last scrap of myself to the essence of it, I
found myself falling.
Down.
Down.
Down.
Until I hit the ground before that throne of destruction, the golden coin
winking up at me as I careered towards it then fell through it, into it,
tumbling impossibly further before landing on the cold, hard floor of gold at
its centre.
CHAPTER ELEVEN
M ykind
skin burned with the magic which roared inside me, a taste of every
of power rioting in my veins and my mind spinning with the
weight of it all.
Stupid, stupid, stupid girl, a voice hissed in the dark. My voice. And it
wasn’t coming from some corner of this cold and barren space, it was
coming from within me. A voice which was my own and wasn’t. Me and
yet someone else entirely.
“Where am I?” I breathed, pushing onto my hands and knees while the
magic crashed through my limbs like a tempestuous sea, and I fought to
keep my balance.
I got to my feet and moved to the closest golden wall, my hand pressing
to the cold metal as I looked at the gold roof above my head, the perfectly
flat disc which held no doors or windows.
Trapped. We’re stuck in here because of you, stuck and alone and lost.
I started walking, then running, my hand skimming the curved wall as I
moved, hunting for a hidden door, a seam, anything at all, but the metal
remained smooth and solid no matter where I searched.
I needed something to help me break out of his place, but there wasn’t
anything here, not so much as a speck of dust to colour the golden space
surrounding me. But as my thoughts began to spiral into panic, a heavy
mallet appeared in my hands out of nothing at all.
I stumbled back in shock, dropping it but then hurried to grab it again,
lifting it between my hands and slamming it into the wall as hard as I could.
Nothing happened. Not a dent or scratch was left behind, and the panic
began to claw its way up my throat as I struck the wall repeatedly,
screaming and cursing as it failed to make a mark.
As I hefted the hammer again, my mind buzzed with the echoes of
memory, and I cursed myself for forgetting. I didn’t care about escaping
whatever this was. I only wanted the release of death now anyway.
The hammer fizzled away to nothing in my hands, a wicked dagger
appearing at a single thought in its place.
“I’m coming, Aalia,” I breathed, hoping my words could be heard from
the Garden.
I turned the blade towards my own chest, closed my eyes and thrust the
dagger straight through my heart.
Agony stole through me as I crumpled to my knees, blood spilling all
around me as death came sweeping in on furious wings, and in less than a
breath, I was gone, drifting, falling into the embrace of the dark…
I sucked in a sharp breath as I woke. The dagger was gone, and my flesh
was unharmed where it had been punctured, the golden prison still intact
around me.
“No,” I gasped, pushing myself up as I hunted the dark corners of the
round room for any sign of blood or the weapon, but it was all gone. As if it
had never been.
Slave to the coin, the voice in my head mocked hatefully, and I recoiled
from her words.
But before I could attempt any other form of escape from this uncertain
fate, a thread tugged on the very centre of my being and the world fell away
around me, the golden room disappearing before I found myself on my
knees in a clearing in the woods, fat petals drifting past me on a gentle
breeze.
The soft swish of fabric drew my attention to the ice-white robes on my
left, and I turned to look up at Kalir with nothing but purest hatred in my
eyes.
The need to destroy him rose up in me so potently that the power I had
laid claim to began to glow beneath my flesh.
I made a move to stand, but before I could get my feet beneath me, he
spoke.
“Kneel,” he sneered, and my knees slammed into the dirt as the power
of his words consumed me.
I parted my lips on some barb or curse, but whatever it had been was
lost to me as a white light flared at my throat and I realised I still wore that
iron collar, the thing tight to my skin and the spikes impaled deep in my
flesh. I gasped as I clutched at it, fighting to get it off me even as the light
flared brighter and a thin, golden chain appeared from the front of it.
My eyes widened in horror as the chain snaked away from me,
slithering through the grass towards Kalir before shooting up and snapping
itself tightly around his wrist. The chain yanked tight, and I cried out as a
connection formed between the two of us like a bridge between our souls,
his dark and twisted essence worming its way inside of me while he
groaned in a show of ecstasy.
The chain faded away but the tug of it didn’t diminish in the slightest,
and as the corners of Kalir’s mouth lifted, I felt fear unlike anything I’d
experienced before.
“You are remade, Esworn,” Kalir cooed. “Born into eternal power and
robbed of all free will. The master of your destiny is the one who owns your
coin.” He lifted the golden coin before me and I lunged for it, trying to
snatch it from his hand. “Stop.”
His command was like the toll of a bell within me, my body jerking to a
halt, my fingers brushing the edge of the coin while he smirked at me
triumphantly and my heart thundered to an impossible rhythm.
“From now until the end of time, you will exist in this form. Death
cannot release you. Pain cannot end you. You will be The Blessing to all
who possess you, though no doubt it may seem more like a curse to you.”
“Why?” I breathed, unable to take in all he was saying.
“Even I cannot lay full claim to the power of the gods. But you, what
you now are, you can. You are the most powerful creature on this fair earth,
and everything is possible to you, aside from free will. You will bow to the
word of your master, and together, we will remake the world as I see fit.”
“No.” I tried to back up, shaking my head as I reached for the collar at
my throat once more, fighting to rip it from my flesh while begging every
god I could think of to save me from this fate. But they were gone, their
backs turned on me and my kind, no lingering spark of them remaining.
Death was what I sought, a place in the Garden at my sister’s side. This
fate was too cruel, too wicked. I couldn’t be a slave to this monster. I
wouldn’t.
But as Kalir parted his lips on his first command, all free will fled from
me entirely, and the power which had been forced upon me rose to follow
his will. Whatever demand he made of me would be done. I would forge his
every wish from this tempestuous power in me and hand them to him.
Blood, glory, death, destruction. If he willed it, he would have it all. This
monster made into a god by the magic he could command through me. And
as I gazed into his cruel eyes which held nothing but malice and greed, I
knew I would soon be the maker of purest evil and all I had once been
would be forgotten.
____________________
Continue the series now with A Game of Malice and Greed.
Once upon a tangled tale of broken hearts and blackened souls, comes
this dark fairy tale retelling from the Wall Street Journal and
Amazon.com #1 bestselling fantasy romance authors of Zodiac
Academy.
Zodiac Academy
(M/F Bully Romance Series- Set in the world of Solaria, five years after Dark Fae)
The Awakening
Ruthless Fae
The Reckoning
Shadow Princess
Cursed Fates
Fated Thrones
Heartless Sky
Sorrow and Starlight
The Awakening - As told by the Boys
Darkmore Penitentiary
(Reverse Harem Paranormal Romance Series - Set in the world of Solaria, ten years after Dark Fae)
Caged Wolf
Alpha Wolf
Feral Wolf
**
The Age of Vampires
(Complete M/F Paranormal Romance/Dystopian Series)
Eternal Reign
Eternal Shade
Eternal Curse
Eternal Vow
Eternal Night
Eternal Love
**
Cage of Lies
(M/F Dystopian Series)
Rebel Rising
**
Tainted Earth
(M/F Dystopian Series)
Afflicted
Altered
Adapted
Advanced
**
The Vampire Games
(Complete M/F Paranormal Romance Trilogy)
V Games
V Games: Fresh From The Grave
V Games: Dead Before Dawn
*
The Vampire Games: Season Two
(Complete M/F Paranormal Romance Trilogy)
Wolf Games
Wolf Games: Island of Shade
Wolf Games: Severed Fates
*
The Vampire Games: Season Three
Hunter Trials
*
The Vampire Games Novellas
A Game of Vampires
**
The Rise of Issac
(Complete YA Fantasy Series)
Creeping Shadow
Bleeding Snow
Turning Tide
Weeping Sky
Failing Light