A deadly vow, p.35
A Deadly Vow, page 35
“Careful,” I said with violence edging my throat. “I do not let any man speak to me like that. I make no exception for kings.”
The flaming crown around his dark, long curls flared in challenge. He shared the same eyes that Zehra had, except he exhibited a darker green which bore a fountain of envy.
I braced myself as I traced the corners of his face and fell to the unscathed hands that held the other end of the rope. A memory flashed through my mind as my skin contacted the magic, but it was not my own; it was Keahi’s.
A low, deranged humming sound drew from my throat. “I see. . . you have been stealing. . . and I am a threat to your supply.” A hungry grin formed on the lower half of my face as my grip tightened on the rope. “You should know I crave the death of kings more than the Gods themselves. I will let you choose which of your makers you would like to meet, King of Solstice, because it would be in your best interest to be certain it is not me.”
He strangled the leash, forcing me to stumble upright onto my feet. My fingers pressed into Iahni’s body as she dangled between us in my arms.
“Is that what you told yourself, Princess, when your people nearly died out? When your father waged a war while you were sitting up in that porcelain castle of his, as the realm rotted with the death of our power source? The veil is on your skin, marked with sin. I do not heed feeble threats. You would have already killed your father if that were the case.”
The healed split in my lip cracked as my smile broadened. “You may not want to show your hand too soon, Emric. It makes me eager to play with a king who never realized he was his own damsel, sitting up in his guarded castle as he sent his son to fight a war on his own.”
I would know. I was the one who gave him a battle scar, but it was his father who made him a martyr instead.
The King slammed his fist into my temple, but only because I allowed it. My vision flurried in black and white until I caught my bearings. The rope tugged when I reached the end of the line as I stammered back to set Iahni down on the floor. My forehead brushed against hers as I did, hoping she would forgive me in the next lifetime as I let go of her. When I finally looked back up at him, his breath was ragged.
The King of Solstice snarled into a confident grin. “And how eager are you now?”
Even though he was several feet above me, I stood taller. The rush of my power pulsed underneath the collar, fighting the temptation.
“I’m starving.”
The magic that spelled the rope slowly unraveled as it morphed under my curse. The twine encircling my neck turned black, spiraling until it transformed the other end of the rope into the same shade. Satisfaction coiled inside the pit of my curse when the King looked down at his blackened hand. He held it out in front of me, frozen in his own lapse of judgment.
“Only fools will think they will not fail when they rise to such heroics. Who did you think you were saving?” I reached up to the twine that now served me. “Better yet, why do I have the feeling you were so simple-minded to believe that it was yourself? Because I promise you, it was not my people.”
I snatched his force of gravity as I jerked the end of my rope. His shoulder dipped in succession when his entwined hand pulled toward me. My boot pressed into the back of his shoulder blade as I sent him in the other direction, looping the black rope around his neck.
A humiliating sound whimpered out of his throat. I drove my knee into his spine before his body could hit the floor and wrenched his neck up with all the force I had left in me. The leftover pain from the battle worked its way into an agonizing tremor as I let his body fumble underneath me.
‘The others are coming.’ Iahni’s warning rang through my ears. I knew I did not have long, or enough power left in me for the forces barreling toward me. But I would not let that stop me from stripping his pride in the meantime.
“Do you want to know what I thought as I watched my people die from my so-called ‘tower,’ knowing that one of the most powerful kingdoms had stood by while they watched my father do it? When you so poorly underestimated him as a threat then, and now look where that has gotten us.” The rope loosened momentarily to let him catch his breath before I strangled him again.
“I see no difference compared to what he has done when I look at you.” I breathed out this last part down his spine. “So let me ask you this. Do you plan to underestimate me as well?” I watched the hairs raise on the nape of his neck as I smashed his forehead into the marble.
The door was forced wide open, and I stood in time to spread my arms out wide, ripping the collar off my neck with a slight bow. It fell on top of the King’s back as I said, “We have been waiting.”
47
SABINE
Ilocked eyes with the King of Solstice as his Kingsmen peeled his chagrined body mass off the floor. He thrashed and spat at the bloodied foam building between his splintered fangs.
“Off of me! Get off of me! Grab her now!” He roared, jamming his elbows against his own soldiers as he staggered into a crumpled position, watching him piece together his balance from the blow to his head. A matching angry welt flowed down his temple, shards of glass jabbing from his wound where I had attempted to drag Iahni’s body away from him.
I anchored myself into a tranquil stillness as I watched the scene unfold. It redirected the attention in the room toward me at his command. I stretched my arms out wider, hinging into a graceful bow as I observed the energy in the room peak with lividity. I met his intangible snarl with a crimson smile as his Kingsmen shoved a leathered sack over the top of my head.
It was pitch-black when I felt the brush of cold metallic chains against my torso. The heightened contact caused my abdomen to clench as a fervor of magic went through me. A rush of awareness lit the rest of my skin on fire as a piece of memory transferred through the spell’s binding.
My composure broke under the mask, hiding the uncontrolled panic I did not give them the privilege of seeing. I could not stop the frightened gasp that escaped past my lips, or the dark laughter charging through the surrounding room in response.
I knew the curse of the veil could not overtake the chains this time, not when I had seen a glimpse of what they could hold through the enchantment.
My breath was rough in my throat as I attempted to contain what came next. I pinched my eyes closed despite not being able to see the inner workings of the cuff scrape against my lower limbs, along the soft inner portions of my wrists.
They forced a strangled groan from me when the first metal thorn hammered into my skin. The following spikes of pain drew out the strain that was holding my body together, within an inch of my life, as I collapsed. Their hands cupped underneath my arms with a bruising grip. When I could not stand, a brass knuckled fist slammed into my stomach; a high-pitched cry throttled from me. Hot blood dripped out of the four puncture sites the hit created.
My knees buckled as they dragged me across the floor, leaving a trail of blood behind as I sucked in shallow breaths of suspended pain. They wanted him to find me. That much was clear, but they did not know the regret they would feel when he found me like this.
The Kingsmen let out a string of grunts as they struggled to push against the lock they had placed on a massive set of creaking doors. A palpable hush descended over the occupants in the room before a single scream of agony blistered my ears.
It was a reverberant echo. A piercing sound. One I would have to spend many nights trying to forget if I survived. An ache carved itself into the crater of my chest as they drug me up and over a set of stairs onto a hollow platform. I flinched before I even heard Iahni’s body thump next to me on the ground.
“My daughter!” His devastation sent a stabbing sensation through me, worse than the one I had physically received. “Not Iahni. My daughter!” Elias wailed until his voice was a shrill and fragile murmur of pain. “Please, no! I’m begging you. Not my little girl. Nooo!”
My stomach retched inside of my hood, convulsing as it burned through my nose. The King let out a disgusted, disapproving scoff beside me. It did not matter how much I wanted to hold myself together. It broke me in the exuding presence of the pain, grating the repetition of her name so thoroughly into my mind I was convinced it would haunt me into the next lifetime as I saw her stone blue eyes in him for the first time.
Emric’s impersonal voice barreled over his cries. “Remove him. I cannot stand to hear him anymore.” A struggle broke out, but all I could hear was his own chains rattling as they dragged him out of the throne room. “Bring me my son!”
“You will regret this!” Elias cried from a distance, “You will not come back from this, Emric! I will not protect you from him this time!”
Fire crackled like a furnace, building outside of the doors as if in response. Screams of terror were no longer a muffled sound in the distance as a familiar force came within reach.
Even from a distance, I could feel the pain Keahi was battling through as he fully expended his magic with a piercing rage. I had to swallow the acid building in my throat when I felt it—his gaping wound. My magic had not healed him at all. How was he still standing? Elias’s struggle quieted as the Kingsmen hesitated to unlock the door, knowing what was waiting on the other side.
A hardened laugh came out of him. “You should have thought about that before you allied with my son, Elias Griselda. I said, remove him!” The double doors slammed open from the outside, sending a lashing crack through the room.
“The prodigal son returns; it is a pity I had to come to you though, isn’t it?” the King said as he ripped my hood off like I was a captured prize. “As you can see, I have become well acquainted with your wife. My apologies for missing the wedding. I now see why you allied yourself with our enemies, Keahi Aldeer. She’s so. . . spirited. I can only imagine what she is like elsewhere.”
My shoulders slumped forward as I grasped the fresh air into my lungs. I looked up through tear coated lashes as my vision fogged, taking a moment to acknowledge a glimpse of the diamond-like crystals embroidering the floor. I could barely see the pebbled red and clear quartz through the thick layer of dust coating it, similar to the ones I had seen when we had united the sorcerer’s bond in ceremony.
The King shifted on the silver throne next to me, a hood thrown over his head in a useless attempt to hide the markings I had given him.
The bond pulled taut as Keahi stared at me, completely drenched in blood, as if he had bathed in it. His eyes burned like coals, dropping to the line of flesh purpling around my neck. A rumble went through the castle as his gaze dropped lower to the silver spiked cuffs around my extremities.
“What have you done?”
“You brought this upon yourself.” The King clasped his hands together and leaned forward. “You all did.”
Zehra and Drakkon were flanked behind their father. The Kingsmen crushed their metal staffs against their windpipes. Their own clothes dripped with blood from the fight, but not how Keahi’s did.
“It was so much more than you refusing to give me your blood, was it not?” He dropped his chin toward me. “So much more.”
“It was never yours to take.”
He slammed his fists against the arms of his facile throne. “I am your king! It will always be mine to take. Tell that to your second in command, as I ripped your schemes from his throat. Did you think you could finally overpower me with the sorcerer’s bond? You couldn’t even finish it.”
A strangled whimper broke from behind me. Drakkon’s tearfilled eyes flashed with hurt as he looked between me and Keahi as he sobbed against the metal beam strangling him.
Emric flicked his gaze over to Zehra. “You, I am so very disappointed in, but I will overlook it just this once.” Zehra grimaced underneath the bar, her words set in a chokehold. “When we return home, I will crown your sister as the next heir of Solstice, strip you of your title, Keahi Aldeer, and I will chain you in that prison for an eternity if I have to.”
As the King twirled a piece of my white hair between his fingers, I shivered. “I might even let you keep her down there with you—on good behavior, of course. . . after I’m done with her.”
Keahi tensed, holding himself in place as the slicing sound of a sword drew from its holster. “You remember this. . . don’t you? It has been far too long.” He placed the metal exactly where the rope marking welled against my skin.
“Put the Sword of Rhiannon down, Emric,” Keahi growled in a low threat.
His breath was hot against my skin as he neared. “I will drain her right here and make you watch. Did you really think I wouldn’t notice once you brought her to the capital? That you could hide her? You can see the magic from the Veil of Seven on her skin, the one that her father is responsible for.”
Keahi took a step forward but stopped at the sight of Emric pressing the side of the blade deeper into my throat. A light trickle of blood fell from the very tip where it connected. Keahi’s pupils dilated as he watched it hit the floor.
“I will not let you have her power.” Emric shook his head. “When I reopen the veil to the Gods, I cannot wait to see what they will do to you, Keahi Aldeer. It will be a reward enough for me to know I will not need your blood anymore. . . perhaps Rhiannon herself will give me the ability to turn freely.”
Emric turned his lips up, his fangs vanished from his twisted smile. “A gift for returning the beast to his cage after he betrayed them.”
A line of torches blazed with flames as Keahi’s power funneled within him into an intangible depth. Wrath lit the entire room. His voice was turbulent against the rage building inside of him. “Have you ever considered the Gods might have been the ones to betray me first?”
The fires blew out all at once.
48
SABINE
Warmth flooded through me as Keahi opened the pathways between our connection. My vision flooded with a haze. It coated the between like he had blown out a match; the entire world had gone gray. I could still feel the sword at my neck, but I could only see Keahi as we crossed into the edge of time before each other.
The torches he had diminished flooded the between with black clouds of smoke. It poured onto the floor as it curled, wrapping itself until it wound into the body of a serpent underneath him. It slowly snaked itself up the wall behind Keahi when its ember eyes snapped to me while Keahi’s remained closed. I could not fight the tremble in my voice, even as I spoke through the bond.
What are you?
The serpent tilted its head as Keahi remained still at my question, his voice resonating around me.
I cannot hold us like this for long. The scar you see could not heal—frozen in its state unlike before. I have been weak since we accepted the sorcerer’s bond. You had asked me what we needed in order to finish it. . . and I had wanted to give you more time before we entered the second binding. I cannot give you that, not this time. You had offered it to me once before, as a test, but it must be your choice, Sabine. I will follow the path you decide to take.
Distrust placed a wall between us. I reread the pages in my mind; the response he had written in the journal I had been given.
Even as I tried to make sense of it all, I could not shake the feel of his wound, even with my eyes closed. I homed in on the dark line painted across his chest from injury, knowing I had the key to relieve the torment he bore. It was glowing with the dark magic that had ripped him open, even under the layers of his clothes.
I swallowed hard.
Tell me what you are, and I will give it to you.
The serpent in his shadow danced back and forth as it hovered behind Keahi on the grayed wall. A growl ripped through the bond, reverberating as the serpent behind him bred wings; the peak of it was sharp, talon-like as it tripled in size.
You—you’re not a sorcerer. . . my eyes trailed over the wings. . . you are not even human.
A grim smile appeared on Keahi.
Not originally, no.
As he walked toward me, the ground shook with each step as the beast followed. His shadow grew until the serpent tore itself from the wall, its wings stretching as it pulled itself out into the open.
They have disgraced my kind, using my blood to shift into monsters. I am not an abomination, but I cannot claim the same for what they have done with my power.
The shadow’s tail coiled, whipping back and forth.
Are you one of the Gods, in human form?
The serpent growled behind him.
I cannot lie to you, Sabine. He paused before he kneeled before me. I am not a God exactly, but I might be worse.
I thought Rhiannon. . .
Keahi’s jaw tightened, sweat beaded on the side of his forehead from holding us in this space of time. On the verge of collapse—the rest would have to wait, as I confirmed my decision. I swallowed just before I pressed my neck further into the blade on the other side.
Are all dragons this cryptic?
A low sound tore from his throat as he lowered his head to my neck, his lips hovering over the blood welling at the base of my collarbone.
I may speak in cryptics, but your answer must be clear to me. Keahi opened his true eyes to me now. The shadow dragon blinked in time with him. I will not take from you, not unless you ask me to. You are my sorcerer bonded, and I will always choose to honor you in my promise for lifetimes.
I shuddered a violent breath at the last word.
You will take my blood, Son of Fire, an offering of my bond to you in the second binding of our fate.
Keahi kept his eyes trained on me as he lowered his lips, hovering over the side of my neck with a deep restraint, dipping his lips into my blood softly with a full body shudder.
“Which one of them caused this wound?” Keahi’s words muffled through time as he spoke out loud. His fingers traced the four puncture sites of my abdomen as he drank from me.
“Which. One.”
The magic he bore crossed over in waves as I felt our connection through the bond strengthen. It was so powerful I felt it tearing at my soul, restitching itself with his. Keahi swept his thumb across his bottom lip and slowly placed it in his mouth. The dragon’s wings arched up as a pained moan slipped between my teeth.
