“Why won’t you come with us, Laura?” I ask her for the fourth time since I finally got away from my father to see her. My father has been nothing short of annoying, so happy his loyal son is home, and yet he doesn’t realise anything. He doesn’t know what has really been going on in this castle. I still remember the way Cassandra tasted, how her moans haunted my ears, and the way she looked at me like no one ever has. Like she is in love with me. Laura drops a plate, the banging reminding me of last night when I collapsed to the floor as a rush of power shot through me. I felt Cassandra bond with Chaz, and then Zack. When she bonded with Dante, something changed, something I don’t understand and have no one to ask.

“When you have children…you will understand,” she tells me simply and smooths down her dress.

“My mother doesn’t even know who you are,” I respond softly, and she sighs, coming over and leaning up to put her aged hand on my cheek. Her eyes so blue like my mother’s look up at me with an understanding I do not know.

“He stole my daughter from me. From you. But I will not leave her alone like I did once,” she tells me, moving her hand away as I don’t reply. I remember the last time we left here, how she wanted to take my mother with her, but we all knew we couldn’t do that. A chosen can always find their changed one, always know if they are alive or dead. It’s the same the other way around as well. My father would have found us before we even got to another island.

“And what of us? You left with us last time because you said we needed you,” I ask her, but she turns away and goes to the mirror, smoothing down her yellow dress. My father hates when she wears yellow, the old royal colour and the colour of the Dragon house for thousands of years. My father changed everything when he took the throne, from the royal crest to the very royal colour.

“You no longer need me, boy. You have someone far stronger and she will not lead you wrong,” she says as she picks up her walking stick and taps it on the floor. Laura is the only mother I surely had, the only one who read me stories and told me off when I pushed her too far. I gave up on having a relationship with my mother years ago. There is nobody left to have one with.

“He will kill you once we escape. There is nothing I could do to stop him. He sent four guards to kill you this week while you slept in your bed, and I had to stop them. Make them disappear,” I say, rubbing my hands through my hair as I get frustrated with her. I walk over to the mirror, hating how I look. My hair is styled to perfection, in long locks. My feather is tied in my pocket, because I cannot wear it here. Everything about me is wrong here; I feel trapped, suffocated, as I pull on the high collar of my shirt.

“I know,” she tells me, and I turn to see her walking towards the door.

“Then why stay?” I ask.

“To protect my child,” she answers and sees the confused look on my face when she turns back to me.

“Your mother was once a beautiful, strong-minded, stubborn woman. Very much like your girl. A woman like that needs protecting and cherishing, even when she is lost,” she tells me before knocking the door with her stick and waiting for it to open.

“Walk your grandmother to dinner, will you not, boy?” she asks as the door is opened. I have a feeling she always planned to stay here, for us to escape and for her to pay the price for helping us.

“Of course,” I respond, blanking my expression and walking to the door the guards hold open. I hook my arm in Laura’s and we walk down the corridors, with the guards falling in line behind us.

“Why the big meal tonight?” I ask her quietly, wondering if she knows anything more than I do. I was told there was a grand meal tonight and that everyone important in the castle had to be there. Hunter will be there already, deciding to go ahead and see if he could find anything else out that we don’t know.

“Boy, don’t ask questions which you know the answer. Your father would never trust me with that knowledge,” Laura huffs, making me remember how she used to tell me off as a child. Father would spend hours with me, teaching me everything I needed to know to rule, and when I finally escaped, I would get into trouble with Hunter.

“Move faster, lad. I am an old woman and walking faster than you,” she tells the guard hanging behind us and he gives her a small bow before looking worriedly at the stick in her hand. His head is probably sore from that stick if I know Laura at all. We walk down the long corridors of the castle, before I am stopped outside the room.

“The king would like to speak privately to you before dinner, my prince,” the guard says, bowing low.

“Please show my grandmother in,” I tell the guards behind me as I unhook my arm from hers and lean down to kiss her cheek.

“Careful,” she whispers, so quietly that I just pick up on the word. I pull away and watch as she goes into the royal dining rooms before turning and nodding to the guard. He leads me out of the castle, to the back where my father stands looking over the cliff. The wind is blowing his cloak around him, and the harsh noise of the windy cliffs fills my ears. The cold air pushes against me, wet with the water from the sea.

“Come closer,” he demands, and I tighten my fist before stepping closer and looking over the water below us. From here, you can see all of the Storm Sea and how angry it looks. There are tornadoes, whirlpools, and sharp rocks that huge waves crash against for as far as you can see.

“It is freezing, why are we here?” I ask finally.

“I never told you how I got my power…did I?” he asks me. I look over at him, as his dark hair blows around his face and he looks lost in thought. Or perhaps memories.

“Not once, Father,” I respond. He looks over at me, his face so like mine, and his eyes so much like Hunter’s.

“When I was five years old, the Sea God dragged me into the sea. He told me that I had a destiny, that I would be a great leader and he would be my friend,” he tells me, shocking me into complete silence.

“He was right, you are king,” I respond after I think about it. I think the Sea God was wrong, there is nothing great about my father.

“He was wrong, very wrong. He told me I would share the lands with three other men just as powerful as I am, and we could bring much needed peace to Calais,” he tells me. The Sea God was very wrong, then. Peaceful is never a word I would describe Calais as being. A dying world is more accurate.

“Didn’t my mother have three other husbands?” I ask, thinking of the stories I was told by my grandmother of the four princes of Calais.

“Yes, but they were never as powerful as me. They were kind and thought changed ones would bring some kind of peace if only we trusted them, if we stopped hunting them and pretending the royal family wasn’t full of them,” he laughs, “How ironic that the royal family who hunts changed ones is full of their breed?”

“People never knew, still don’t know, that changed ones have been on the throne for many years before you took it.”

“I never took it, I married into it,” my father says emotionlessly.

“Why did the other princes believe the changed ones could help?”

“Something about how their powers needed to balance out nature, there needs to be a balance. But it’s all a load of lies,” he spits out.

“What do you believe?” I ask him, wondering what goes on in his insane head.

“That they are too powerful, that the Sea God was creating an army of changed ones and would take over the world. If we looked after them, let them exist in our world, they would take over. We normal people, the people that should be ruling this world, would be hunted,” he says, anger burning in his eyes as he looks at me. I wonder if he knows how insane he sounds, or if he has spent so much time with my mother never responding to him, he doesn’t know.

“You still never told me how you got your power,” I change the subject, looking away from him and towards the sea.

“I made a changed one fall in love with me, and waited for her to be in love with others before taking their power. I planned and planned. It took years of pretending to love her. Of pretending to care.” He smiles at me. “You could do this with Cassandra. The Sea God blessed her as she did your mother.”

I fight to keep my expression natural, thankful that I’ve had many years of practice doing it, when all I want to do is push the evil excuse of a man in front of me into the water. “You never loved my mother,” I respond, trying to keep my tone neutral when I feel like exploding inside.

“Love is not real. My parents claimed to love me, but when the Sea God returned me home, they never looked for me. They forgot about me and had another child. When I went back to them, they said their child died ten years ago even though I was gone for only a few days,” he spits out, “I killed those liars for that when I grew older.”

“And your sibling?” I ask.

“Alive and lives on Sixa. I believe she had a daughter and she is on my Sixa council,” he tells me.

“I would like to meet her one day,” I respond.

“It could be made possible, but do you want power, son…real power? Enough to control all of Calais?” he asks me.

“Yes,” I say, when my real answer is no. That is not what I want, it’s not what I have ever wanted. The throne has never been for me. I don’t want to give up everything for it with my father looking over my shoulder until he dies. I would never have control, not with him alive and watching me.

“Then we should use the changed one. She already cares for you. It’s clear from what the girl told me,” he says, making me completely still in fear of what I need to ask.

“Girl?” I ask.

“Elizabeth, or Livvy as she asks to be called…she is an interesting girl and would do anything to be given a normal life. She told me of everything that happened on that ship,” he tells me, laughing as I try to hide my shock.

“Is she free?” I ask.

“No. I do not like people who betray those they are said to love. I killed her after she told me everything I needed to know,” he says, and I nod, keeping my expression painfully blank. I don’t even know how to tell Cassandra that not only is Livvy dead, but she betrayed us in the end.

“Time to return to the meal, but you might as well remove that paint from your forehead. I know you are her chosen. You should steal her power for yourself, be my son, and rule,” he tells me. I lean up and wipe the mark away, watching as he stares at my mark.

“How do you steal the power?” I ask him, knowing I would never do it.

“You pull it from her. It’s easy when you get used to it,” he says and turns to face the cliff. He puts his fingers in his mouth and sends out a long whistle. I step back, waiting for Fira to come; she will always fly for her king’s call. I look up as a loud dragon’s roar ripples across the sky, before she flies past us and turns back around, landing a few steps away from my father on the edge of the cliff to his right. Fira is a large fire dragon with a nasty temper. I look over her long neck, black scales that are tipped red, and the dark red eyes that watch my father. Steam puffs out of her mouth as she lowers her head into a bow for my father and he places his hand on top of her nose.

“Cassandra doesn’t like fire. She will not like tonight’s game,” he says, an evil grin appearing on his face as he looks at my tight fists. I close my eyes, waiting for a second to calm down. I hate that he hurt her, that he was alone with her, and that since then, he has tried to kill her many times. I hate that everything is a game to him. Whether life or death is the price, it doesn’t matter to him.

“What is the game?” I ask, trying to find out as much information as I can.

“Fire,” he says and whispers something to Fira before she steps back and flies off, her large wings and the power of her take-off nearly knocking us over.

“Remember, when she is close to death, it will be easier to take her powers and she cannot fight you. Your mother never fought in the end, she was too lost over the death of her other husbands,” he says and walks off towards the door. He stops, looking back at me. “Killing her other chosen would make you more powerful. We would be unstoppable together, son,” he says as I walk behind him, vowing over and over in my head one sentence, a sentence that I told myself for the first time when I was twelve.

I will kill the king and free the lands one day.