CHAPTER TWENTY-THREE
Duty soldiers and Strati swarmed the city streets like angry wasps. They stood at every intersection, patrolled the alleyways and perched on rooftops, watching from above. Obviously, it would be smarter to stay hidden. Safer to go back into that cellar and wait till nightfall. I wasn’t in the mindset to play it smart or safe.
I needed to find Rowan. Needed to find my boys. But first, I needed to find Sera and learn more about what she and Balor had done to me. What was I capable of? How did my connection to the elements work?
Stealth was a polished skill of mine. It was the work of twenty minutes and I was down the hidden stairs in the back of Balor’s townhouse and searching the underground apartment.
I knew before I finished looking around that Sera had cleared out. Balor’s things remained in place but the apothecary room was cleaned out. The only thing left was a piece of paper sitting on the mixing table with a single sentence written on it. From the one with forethought and prudence, a leader shall rise.
Allrighty then. So, Sera would be no help.
I made my way back to the street and considered my next move. Beeline it to Rowan’s mansion, check on Coal, and see what the legal ledgers of the Nobles said about ousting the Queen. Rowan still owed me and my injuries a private once over. My current need to get naked with Rowan was more than a biological urge to satisfy and more than easing the hurt and anger of the way his own people judged him.
A brush with death had a way of bringing the world around you into hi-def, surround-sound focus. It made you want to live out loud and crank up the volume. And time spent skin-to-skin with Rowan was exactly the kind of sensory explosion I was amped for.
Ousting the Queen could wait. Our troubles could wait.
I skirted down a side street and jogged along the backside of a low retaining wall. My leg was still kicking up a stink and my shoulder felt as if it had been ripped from its socket and knocked back in place with a sledgehammer. Boo-fricking-hoo. In the long list of ‘things that have gone to shit’ that was the least of my problems.
I tucked behind a stone monument as the rhythmic footsteps of a military run of soldiers approached. A faint, metallic k’tang . . . k’tang rang in the distance. Lifting my head, I caught my bearings and wondered if I could find his blacksmith shop without Terran or Coal to guide me.
The formation of Strati soldiers passed without incident and I ducked through a merchant’s yard and then down a side street. After slipping behind a dozen bronze architectural buildings and down another alley, I peered around the corner and saw the modest one-story building with huge paneled walls and smoke rising up through the chimney.
My heart beat as if I’d run a marathon, but it had nothing to do with my outing and everything to do with the man bent over his forge, glistening in the sun like an ancient Greek god.
After double checking the way was clear, I slipped inside and hid in the shadows by the back wall. “Hey, Doc, mind closing up shop for a bit?”
Rowan dropped his hammer, his hazel’s filled with an emotion I didn’t understand. He cursed under his breath. “You shouldn’t have come here. You just don’t think, Princess.”
Princess? “I was careful,” I said, jutting my chin forward. “Gods, it’s stifling in here. Why are you working in the middle of the day?” It dawned on me that he’d told me he only smithed at night for just that reason.
I gauged his posture. His shoulders were stiff, his jaw clenched so tight I could see the hollow of his cheeks twitching. The hair on my arms rose just as the door to his back room opened and Strati flooded inside the open walls.
I drew steel, but before I could engage, one of the soldiers poised a blade at Rowan’s ribs.
“Think well, darling,” Zale said, strolling out from the back room looking like a well-dressed peacock in full preen. “You don’t want more blood on your hands than you have already, do you?”
My gaze snapped back to Rowan and the Strati standing at the forge. The odds were bad, but I’d fought worse. Rowan had a sword billet right beside him. If he made any move for it, if he did anything to defend himself . . . anything other than let them take him hostage I could—
Zale’s stupid face broke out in a gloating grin.” You should know, Princess, we have your little scorch. If you want your pet unharmed. . ..”
Coal? They have Coal. What about Terran?
My breath left my lungs in a rush. As quickly as my mind and muscles could react, I broke my stance, laid my blades onto the back bench and raised my empty hands.
“All of them,” he demanded.
My hands shook terribly, whether from fear or fury I didn’t know. It took great effort to empty my pockets. In the end, every gift Rowan had given me was left abandoned.
“That’s my girl,” Zale said, his smirk lifting with malicious intent. “I told your mother you could be trained—given proper motivation. We just need to get you in the mood for our wedding and then I’ll have you all to myself.”
I stared over at Rowan and swallowed the bile burning up the back of my throat. How could things have gone so wrong, so fast?
Rowan met my gaze. Disgust and anger burned in his eyes and struck me like a physical blow. Rowan and Elani would suffer for this. They would both pay for him getting involved and helping me in my fight. In just a few short days, I had ruined everything he’d endured to protect his sister.
Bruin’s deep timbre growled in my mind. “It was an accident you’ve said. You didn’t mean it, you’ve said. Fuck, Lexi, your actions have consequences. You hurt the people around you and don’t even see it until they’re lying there bleeding.”
My reflection stared at me from the polished surface of the metal wall. I clutched my chest, sure my heart had shattered. Mika, Tham, Eury, Coal, Rowan, Elani. All of them either had suffered or soon would because of me. Bruin was right. I hurt people. I did this.
Darkness hit fast as my mind shut down. I let the blackout take me. I deserved nothing less.
“You have to go back, Lexi,” Tham said, swinging the hammock with one leg draped down and his toe against the forest floor. With the gentle sway of our bodies, we watched the dappled afternoon light dance between the lacework of leaves above us. “As much as I love our time together, you can’t stay here with me indefinitely.”
I snuggled tighter to his chest and breathed in the suede and outdoor scent that was Tham. “Stop being logical. A few more minutes, ‘kay?”
Tham squeezed my shoulder and kissed the side of my head. “It is your dream, neelan. You hold all the power.”
I sighed. Dream, vision, or visitation from beyond the Fade, I didn’t care. Tham came to me when I needed him and that was enough for me. “If only that transferred into real life, maybe I’d know how to get everyone out of this mess.”
“You will, sweeting. I have faith in you.”
“Well, that makes one of us.” I closed my eyes and soaked in Tham’s warmth. It was unnerving to not hear his heart beat beneath his open vest. Dead or not, he possessed the biggest heart of anyone I’d ever known. “Will you stay with me? It’s silly, but I feel stronger knowing you’re watching over me.”
“I swear it.”
The moment the sky clouded over and Tham sat up, I knew the evil was back. Cold tendrils crept over my body, seeking, probing. The icy slither snaked its way into my mind and into my chest. The evil lured and coerced, grew to be more and more seductive each time it entered my dreams.
Whatever it was . . . whoever was inching inside me wanted to possess me—take me over and consume me. I felt it to the depths of my soul.
“Lexi,” Tham said, shaking my shoulders. “Go now. Fight for the others as you fought for me. Go. Find your boy and get him away from that female.”
“But, I . . .”
“Go,” he shouted. “By the love of all things holy, listen to me now and go, neelan.”
I sprang bolt upright and kipped to a ready stance. My legs trembled as my fingers grasped at my chest. The darkness of evil dissolved into a phantom chill. Honestly, if it wasn’t for Tham shaking me from the illusion each time, I would never have the strength to fight off the abyss that threatened to consume me.
“Princess? Are you well?”
My neural pathways were tangled like boxed strands of Christmas lights. Bits of reality flashed in strobes inside my head. My palms tingled, itching for the weight and feel of steel and hilt. I scanned the room and tried to clear the fog from my mind. Where was I?
Silk draped walls, ancient frieze, Greco-Roman carvings, gaudy, oversized desk . . . fuck. I was in the Queen’s private study. Sitting tall and regal upon her throne, she watched me, her long black hair framing her elegant features.
It was something in her emerald stare that set off the alarm bells in my scattered mind. Disappointment? No. Frustration. She looked at me as if I had once again thwarted some cold, evil plan . . . and I had, hadn’t I?
A chill ran down my spine. I don’t know how I was sure, but I was. She was the entity trying to get a foothold in my head while I slept. My bat-shit mother. She might be jaw-drop gorgeous squeezed into haute couture, but she was as lethal as a viper.
“I asked you a question,” she said. “Are you well?”
“Peachy.” Always, wildly feminine the woman possessed a seductive power that I didn’t want anywhere near me or my boys. I swallowed the bile at the back of my throat and hit head-on. “What have you done to my friends?”
She arched a brow, picking up the slim-line dagger from the leather blotter on her desk. Turning it over in her hand, she sliced a flower off its stem from the vase between us. The corners of her mouth twitching in a twisted smile. “Your little urchin and your chamber guard are safely tucked away for the time being. Do as you’re told and they will remain that way.”
“And Rowan? What have you done with him?”
“Mmm, a great many things. He is a gifted male.”
While she twirled the tip of the letter opener against the pad of her finger, I gauged my chances of launching myself at her and slitting her throat with it. I calculated the distance then eyed the two Strati soldiers standing guard in opposite corners of the room behind her. Damn.
“Pity he aligned himself with you and forfeited our arrangement. Especially considering that was the one thing protecting both him and his sister.”
My heart stilled. “Why are you doing this? Don’t your people mean anything to you? Don’t I? I’m your daughter. You’re supposed to be my mother!”
For the briefest moment, her eyes softened to a pale moss green. Gone was the hard edge. Gone was the hateful bitch. Instead, a sad expression of loss and confusion clouded her eyes. My mouth dropped open but, before I could think of what to say, the illusion shattered.
Gathering myself, I limped to the curio cabinet. I poured a glass of amber liquid and one-timed it. I downed another while I tightened up. When I had control of my voice again, I closed the glass-fronted door. “What is it you want?”
“A great many things,” she said, amusement in her melodic voice. “I want puppets to remember their places. I want the hopes of some grand rebellion to die. And I want you to join your sister Eligibles at the leap year celebration and accept Zale as your husband.”
“Why? What could me marrying that asshole possibly do for you?” But I knew. She wanted control of the Nobles Council and was infiltrating it every way she could. To break my will and force me to be one of her pawns would send a very clear message to others.
If I could believe her, Coal, Rowan and Terran were alive—that was the important part. As much as I wanted to run the silver point of that dagger through the top of her glamorous skull, I couldn’t jeopardize their lives.
I needed to curb my natural impulse to strike and step back before I did something really stupid. I set my tumbler on the desk with a subtle thump. Maybe it was the booze interfering, but I couldn’t see any plausible way to get around her and ensure that everyone remained safe.
“Fine. Tell me about the fucking wedding.”
The Queen’s lips narrowed into a fine ruby-red line. “Correct answer, but I don’t appreciate your tone.”
“Sorry. I have several others. Contemptuous. Angry. Snide. Aggravated. How about we settle on extreme sarcasm and get this conversation over with?”
My egg-donor cast a gaze to the desktop in front of her and with a careful hand took a moment to ensure everything was straight and in its place. “Leave us.”
Her words were barely more than a whisper, but the two Strati statues came to life behind her and scurried away like mindless mice. “I should put you to death for speaking to me in such a way. Have you no sense of self-preservation?”
I shrugged. “I know exactly what you’re capable of.”
A thin smile tugged at the corners of her mouth. “No, Princess, you still have no idea.”
I rubbed my damp palms down the thighs of my leather pants and tightened my hold on my temper. “If you’re referring to your little sleep invasion, I already figured that out. You can stop trying to get control of me with tricks.”
She barked out a menacing laugh. “Tricks? Oh, I have much more than tricks, Princess. I am the tingle at the back of your neck when you walk in the dark. I am the sound in the shadows when your heart races and you fight the urge to run. I am every terrifying, throat-clenching horror you dream of when you wake damp with sweat and chilled to the bone.”
The boogieman rant was more than creepy, but I’d be damned if I’d let her know that. She smiled, pointing the tip of the dagger at me. As she turned it over and over, the light caught the metal, flashing along the beveled edge of the blade.
“But, it doesn’t have to be that way. You have true character, Alexannia. Potential beyond your own imaginings. Despite Balor’s betrayal—or perhaps because of it—you are the only progeny of mine to possess the strength and conviction to lead my army beyond the walls of the city. You are the only one of my offspring to ever be truly Eligible.”
Ahhh, so there really was more to the title than farming us out to the Nobles.
“If you wish to gain your freedom in Attalos,” she continued, “to turn down your marriage, to keep your pets safe, to have my ear and my approval—instead of standing in my way you will stand at my side.”
Long, graceful fingers reached toward me and beckoned me closer. My mind made the connection between the words and the shock of hearing them with the speed of a lightning bolt. She wanted me to join her, to rule her evil army against who? Members of the other realms?
Drawing a deep breath, I looked at her outstretched hand and fought the little girl in me who’d always dreamed of having a mother. Maybe, if I joined her, I could pull her away from the ledge of maniacal insanity. My legs trembled, ached to go to her. The gods and I both knew I would do almost anything to have the love and approval of my mother . . .
But stand at her side?
I stepped back. “I see the dictatorial terrorizing you inflict on the people of Attalos and I can’t be part of it.”
“Even if denying me puts the people you care about in more danger?”
“I’ll have to help them another way. There must be something else you want from me.”
She tilted her head as if thinking that one through. “You marrying Zale tomorrow and smiling for our guests would be a good start.”
“You realize he’s a self-serving, egomaniacal dick, right?”
The Queen laughed. “He, like everyone, serves a purpose in the grander scheme of things. The only question is will you play your part so that your friends may live?”
Try as I might, I could think of no other option. “All right. For now, I’ll play submit to your game of quid pro ho.”
Her melodical laugh rang like church bells in a graveyard. She turned the dagger again and pressed the flesh of her finger into the point. Intentionally, she drew the blade across the flesh of her finger. “Wonderful. Compliance is at least a step forward. Tomorrow is a big day. Perhaps things will look different after a time and you’ll see how things are meant to be between us.”
Pat. Pat. Pat. I watched the violet drops fall from her finger and splat on the leather blotter. As the blood converged into one larger drop, my resolve solidified. I would never be absorbed into her rule. Dead or alive, I would fight her control and search for a way to help free Coal and the others.
Turning on my heel I headed for the door. What had I agreed to? Gods, if this was the work of the Fates fucking with me, I was going to skin the three of them.
With my hand on the grip of the door, I paused and stared at the ornately carved panel. “You may have forced me to accept Zale and the farce of this marriage, but don’t take my compliance as submission. You can kill me, you can kill people I love, but I’ll never be who you want me to be. I’ll never stand beside you.”
The rustle of fabric alerted me and I dodged to the side as the dagger sunk into the door. My heart thumped once as I ripped the weapon free and spun. With a flick of her finger, the dagger had changed course and bulls-eyed the pool of purple blood on the blotter. Thump.
Staring at the dagger’s hilt twanging right in front of her, she clapped. “Alexannia, you are such a breath of fresh air.”