by Sage, May
The moment Nalini disappeared from the strange vision, Devi felt incredibly out of balance. As if her worst instincts, her darkest impulses, were all she could think of.
"Why are you here, Devira?"
"I don't know. I touched the throne and…"
"Why are you here?" he repeated, his voice darkening.
Her mind felt like it was set ablaze, a burning sensation starting inside her very soul.
A punishment. A warning.
If she lied or obfuscated the answer, he'd torture her.
She repeated, forcefully, "I don't know. I should be home, with Vale. I should be trying to figure out the mess we're in. The wards protecting us are down and they need to be fixed."
"What will you do? Once the wards are fixed and the war is over. Once there's peace."
She blinked. Devi didn't think she'd truly asked herself that. "Get married. Visit Carvenstone. Travel everywhere, without being chased. Help Valerius with his duties." That wasn't all. "I'll try to learn to be better, too. My friend Rook might have been wrong about a great many things, but he was right about me. I am privileged, and as such my duty should be to take care of those who have less. Not just the handful of peasants under my responsibility. Everyone. I'll…help."
The words were pouring out of her mouth, bleeding out of her like she couldn't help it, and she knew. He'd demanded the answer. He was a mind-manipulator like Vale.
A thousand times worse than Vale.
"If I tell you that you dying right here, right now, is the only way to recreate those wards? That you need to sacrifice yourself to save your world. What will you do?"
A single tear fell down her cheek. She would have answered faster if her throat hadn't felt so tight and dry. It took her three long calming breaths before she said, "I would wish I'd said goodbye first."
The male rolled his eyes. "Pull yourself together, child. That was a rhetorical question. Another one for you. If I said the only way to save everyone in your little Isle was for me to sacrifice your mate. What will you do then?"
Her fists curled at her side. She glared. "Kick your ass and let the world burn."
There was a laugh all around her before Nalini appeared again, looking up at Kai. "Told you so," she taunted. "She's it."
What was she?
Devi was about to ask when Kai interrupted her.
"The castle planted in your little city is the ship inside which our children arrived to your world. The tower that was destroyed was one of four antennas. The walls can be rebuilt if you restart the power. The damage sustained won't have affected the core of the mechanism. Let me teach you."
He proffered his hand, and after a second, realizing she had no choice, Devi took it.
She yelled as a jolt of energy flew through her. Not unlike when Styx had shared her experience, her control, but this was faster, stronger—a series of information that had been entirely foreign to her moments ago. Science and algorithms. Technicalities. Weapons forging? So many skills, accrued over the space of thousands and thousands of years, flew from his palm to hers.
When he took a step back, she sighed in relief.
"We're out of time. You're ready, child," Nailini said kindly. "You'll make a marvelous queen."
Wait.
What?
Before she had time to say a word, she blinked, and was back in the throne room.
The blinds on the window had disappeared, letting in the soft light of a waning moon.
And she was seated on the throne.
Worse yet…
She belonged there.
Thirty-One
Under the Keep
Vale didn't think he breathed the entire time Devi remained frozen like a statue, cold and white, her eyes wide open and dead. If it hadn't been for her heart, its beat echoing in his chest, and their bond telling him that she was fine, he would have despaired.
He stayed seated on the side of the crystal throne, his hand over hers, caressing it, willing her to come back to him with his every thought.
"She's fine. She's syncing with the throne. It always takes a few moments," Styx assured him.
"How can this be?" Aurelius questioned. "She's not of our bloodline, is she? I know Father dearest appreciated females, but I don't feel a kinship with her."
Valerius ignored them all, concentrating on Devi.
"She's Valerius's mate," Telenar stated. "Their bond makes her part of him, down to the flesh. As far as the throne is concerned, that makes her a candidate. Obviously."
Vale wasn't surprised that the throne had chosen her over him, over anyone else in the room. Young as she was, she was good, fair, smart, and above all, she was selfless. No misplaced ego would make her ignore someone else's advice, nor was she likely to erupt in a temper tantrum that shook the Isle from one coast to the other. If he'd ever considered that she was a contender for the throne, Vale would have known she'd be chosen.
Finally, she inhaled deeply, and her eyelids fluttered.
They zeroed directly on his, and Devi smiled, as her skin recovered its color, her eyes their focus. Her hands lay on the armrests of either side of her seat, and her fingers started to tap on the smooth surface with alarming speed and precision. Before he'd opened his mouth to ask what she was doing, the tops of the armrests parted, opening up to reveal a device that lifted to her wrists. Two cuffs closed around her forearms, the silver devices identical to the ones his father had worn.
"These are remote commands for the throne," Devi explained. "So is your crown, by the way. It should work better now."
Valerius blinked in confusion, before taking out the device in the breast pocket of his cloak.
He handed it to her.
"Keep it." Devi winked. "Just because I sit on this stupidly gaudy chair doesn't mean you can't hold power."
Though he hadn't questioned it before, now Vale knew exactly why the throne had chosen her.
He would have named her his. Finally marrying her, after all this time. He would have seen that she had all the luxuries and distractions that she wanted. He would have also asked for her advice and heeded it when he could.
But Vale was self-aware enough to know that he would not have shared the throne. The crown. The actual power.
She didn't even think on it.
She got to her feet and immediately, as one, everyone in the room went to their knees, heads bowed deferentially.
"No time for this. I've seen a glimpse of our future and it isn't pretty. Rook."
His elder half-brother lifted his head. Vale could tell he was awaiting his punishment, though he did it with equanimity.
"I need you to look at what's going on beyond our walls. Fly to the coast. And see what side you want to take."
He frowned. "You're letting me go?"
Devi rolled her eyes. "I have no time for this. We need to fix your mess, and I don't want you in the way."
Though he hesitated for half a second, Rook turned his heels, leaving the chamber before she could change her mind and lock him up in a dungeon, no doubt.
"Telenar, with me, please." Now, she turned to the ancient gods. "Do any of you have any idea how to operate your spaceship? The original one you used to get here thousands of years ago."
The Colossian bald titan bobbed his head. "Aye. I used to pilot it."
"Good. Follow. The rest of you, we have an invasion. Deal with it."
The gods brought their fists to their heart and clicked their heels before rushing out of doors.
Devi led them through the palace's corridors and down endless flights of stairs.
"Where are we going?" Vale asked, catching up with her.
She was jumping two or three steps at once, as she had the very first time they'd run into each other. She was still Devi. With the command of the entire Isle.
"Underground, to the very last floor. This castle isn't a castle at all. It's their spaceship. It's been modified to blend in and provide living accommodations, but everything we need to rebuild the w
alls is still there. The tower Rook blew was an antenna. There are another three, under and above ground. As the ship was piloted by a team of four to six, I might need help."
"Accurate enough," the Enlightened said. "This begs the question of how a child of this world, born not even a century ago would know this, however."
"You can thank your grandfather, Hyperion," Devi replied.
The titan gasped. "Kai Lor Hora?"
"Sure thing. The throne synced me with him and Nalini. This way."
She touched a part of the wall and pressed on a few commands; a panel slid aside, and a dark, dusty room full of spiderwebs lit up.
Devi grimaced, lifting her hand and pushing through enough air and ice to clean some of it and build a front walkway.
"Wait, are you saying that you were actually in contact with our lords in Vratis? They've not talked to us for an era."
"Wrong. They talk to the overking. Or overqueen, I guess. And as long as we do well enough on our own, they have no reason to interfere with our affairs. Right now, we aren't doing well. If we don't fix this, they're sending a ship to bring us back and throwing the key to Ertia in a black hole. Or something."
Shit.
"All right. Let's go save the world, I guess."
The chamber was a smooth, triangular-shaped room littered with half a dozen seats that had seen better days. Now they were bare and disgusting enough for Vale to thoroughly ignore them. Standing sounded like a great idea.
Each chair was in front of a console table.
"I should be able to start this somehow…" Devi frowned, concentrating on her wrists.
"There's a manual lever, if I recall," Hyperion said, heading to one of the walls. He tapped on it until he found a spot that sounded hollow, and pushed it until a small part of the wall collapsed.
He pulled the lever within, and the tables came to life, revealing five blue screens. The fifth, at the forefront of the room, before a more imposing chair, was red.
"Okay, everyone, take a seat. Those of you who can read alien languages, now's the time to show off."
The moment she actually tried to decipher what could potentially be written on the bright screens, she found that she could understand the unfamiliar signs as clearly as her own alphabet. Hell, she wouldn't have been surprised if she could fly the damn vessel. Had it been in one piece.
Just like they had in the throne room, her hands flew over the consoles.
"Unless I'm mistaken, this should start the ship. We’ve amassed enough solar energy over the last thousands of years…I just need you guys to fire the auxiliary engines, as the main one was damaged in the blast."
"Do the words you've just said somehow make sense to you?" Valerius questioned.
Inexplicably, they did. "Sort of? You should see a command popping up on your screen right about…now."
The command room roared as it came to life, each panel lighting up in cold blue lights, the floor under their feet cool and white. Though they couldn't see it from there, the screen in front of Devi indicated that the entire ship was online.
She got up to show Vale how to operate his station. "There, see?" She clicked on the model of the ship and turned it around, face down, so that they could see the castle rather than a horizontal vessel. "This was the antenna Rook blew up." She pointed to the rear end fixture that had been the tower. "There are others like these."
Vale's fingers traced the identical towers. "Here."
"The ground level is right about here." She traced a line toward the rear of the ship. Like an iceberg, their vessel was much larger under the surface. "So, they're underground, which means less reach. One may be enough, but just to be safe, I want to start two. That means both sides of the ship need to be functional while we set them up. You're on the left command, so your station is connected to this side. If anything pops up—a light, a sound demanding your attention—while we're working, let us know. You'll be prompted to tune up the power in a moment." She pointed to a lever at his right. "Pull it up when we say it's time."
The ship was old and cumbersome. With the updated knowledge of the latest technology that Kai had provided, she found it awkward and frustrating. The fact that part of it was missing certainly didn't help. Still, they managed, with time and patience, as a team.
Finally, the walls were back up again.
Devi laid back on the strangely comfortable skeleton of a captain’s chair, and breathed.
Their problems weren't solved by a long shot. There were still orcs on the continent. Hundreds, maybe thousands. Ships surrounding them, waiting for the next weakness, no doubt. And then, there was everything Rook had told her just hours ago. The fact that the Isle was dying, held together only by magic. Then there was another potential threat at the edge of her mind. Álfheimr, who'd offered overtures of "friendship", according to Rook. An empire strong enough to let their outer wall collapse, and still keep the orcs in their place.
They could be an ally. Although everything in Devi's mind, including the newly acquired knowledge of a million-year-old warlord, said that they weren't.
Regardless, this specific catastrophe had been averted.
She'd only closed her eyes and taken a calming breath for a short instant when her heart screamed in sharp pain, as surely as if it had been pierced.
A thousand miles away to the south, in the kingdom of the fae elders, Shea stood alone at the city gates, four ugly, thick arrows planted inside her limbs, a fifth in her chest, so very close to her heart.
"Open the gates!" Jibriel yelled.
It was his third attempt to give that specific order, and Shea yelled back, "No."
There was no saving her. Each of these arrows had been poisoned; the last was her undoing.
There was only one thing left for her to do. The one thing that had moved her since she'd been little more than a girl.
Protect her people.
With a battle cry, she plunged Orin's sword deep in the earth, burying it to the hilt, and pushed whatever was left of her power through, letting her self, her mind and soul, dissolve into the soil.
There was nothing at first. Then a thundering earthquake rumbled, surrounding the city, from the beach to the borders of the Graywoods.
The millions of orcs surrounding the gates of Elderdale, attempting to climb its wall and force its door, turned to follow the sound and fell silent, motionless. As one, they all ran west, attempting to reach safety, desperate. But it was too late.
The ground collapsed, crumbling like sand, and the ocean rushed to claim its new territory.
All drowned, joining the strongest queen the Isle had known.
And Elderdale stood alone in the New Sea.
Rook stood on the battlefield, stepping over a broken corpse with light blue skin. His gaze took in the endless sea of corpses. Elves and fae and orcs, all dead because of his gullibility, his mommy issues.
He's grown up with tales of his people. Lies for a scared, hungry little boy. And he'd been stupid enough to believe them. He was sentient, intelligent, worthy of affection, safety. His mother had been just as civilized. Imagining that his people had been grossly wronged, betrayed and robbed of their heritage, their lands, he'd been consumed by a desire to right the wrong. As if it could fix his own life, fill his own emptiness.
And now, it had come to this. The orcs were monsters. Not even a hundred thousand had come through in the time the walls had remained open, and they'd ravaged, hunted, and killed everyone in their path until they encountered an army ready to stop them.
These deaths were on his shoulders. And there could be no atoning for them.
Rook looked back over his shoulder, to the crystal court high on the hills of the immortal city. He'd come to see it as his birthright, another thing that he'd been robbed off. As the firstborn son of the lord once ruling there, he should have been given a soft bed in the most comfortable room since the moment he'd opened his eyes. And his rage had been based on the fact that he hadn't.
He ha
d a soft bed now. He knew he could return to it. The overqueen wouldn't turn him away. It might take her consort time to warm up to him, but he could go back. He wanted to. Not for riches or titles, not even to attempt to redeem himself. He wanted to go back because she was there. The one person in the world who'd seen through him, who'd looked straight at the monster and found something worth caring for.
Kira Star Rivers.
Another thing he'd never deserve.
Rook outstretched his wounded wings and took off into the night.
At first, he roamed the sky without a clear direction, as his wings took him southwest.
There was one place in darkness and shadow, under a harsh bed of rock, enclosed by many spells he could restore.
It looked like he couldn't stop coveting his brother's dues, after all, Rook thought, as he stepped inside the empty halls of Carvenstone.
More from May
Most of the creatures assembled on the floating dome above the surface of the endless torrential waters of Sidhe were cruel. Others, cunning. Some, wise. All were beautiful, from the dainty, delicate winged pixies flying around their masters while carrying bluebells and riding dragonflies, to the tall, sturdy, green-skinned woodland fae with branches for hair and moss on their skin.
Among the cruel, cunning, wise, and beautiful, Caim liked to believe he distinguished himself by also being the only one with drive, focus, determination.
The scent of wine mixed with blood coated the air, along with the taste of every pleasure of the flesh and mind. The lords of Sidhe were seldom as wild and extravagant as they were on this occasion.
The lords of the Silver, Gold, Iron, Brass, Steel, Nickel, and Bronze circles met every seven years to discuss their affairs and keep the peace. A tradition started by the very first queen of Sidhe, and though it had been long since their world had crowned a monarch, still they honored it.
In the old days, there had been offerings to the gods and demons of the underworld after each conclave.
There would be no tithe today. Just politics and revelry.
