Keepers of the Crown

by Lydia Redwine

  “But you’re here,” Riah said.

  “Still don’t feel too great after your party.”

  Riah tried not to smirk. Arria went to slap him for it anyway, but he caught her wrist in a firm grip. “How many people live here?”

  Arria pulled her wrist from his hold and tipped the teacup to her lips once more. She took an annoyingly long sip. She shifted her weight, that thin piece of white clothing she was wearing brushing her body in the golden light casting itself through the window.

  “No one lives here in the castle but me. And Leviathan when he decides to visit. But there are homes below. Built into the sides of the mountains and such.”

  Riah saw it again. Home. Where homes of commoners were found in the sides of hills, little burrows for large families. But the smallest family, himself and his father, the least amount of people, had lived in the castle.

  Riah breathed. In, out. Again. He concentrated on the rise and fall of his lungs.

  Arria was tilting her head, examining him. She was guessing his thoughts. “Sound like home any?” Riah didn’t respond. He didn’t have to. She was gazing at him steadily, one finger tapping the side of her cup. “What was it like?”

  “Stifling,” Riah said at last. “They taught me everything and nothing. About who I am supposed to be and not supposed to be. And oftentimes, I am unsure which is right.”

  He leaned against the edge of the table, a sigh parting his lips after he had finished speaking. “Be yourself unless ‘yourself’ is about you and not everyone else. Makes so much sense, doesn’t it?”

  Arria was nodding in agreement. “I grew up with something a bit different,” she said with a bitter laugh.

  Riah was smiling just a bit. “What monster did they say would come out and eat you if you misbehaved?”

  Arria was not smiling. “The ghost lover of the Wise One as we calledhim.” Riah’s brows rose. Arria sighed. “The leader of our people came from across the sea supposedly bringing with him his dead lover in spirit. Almost as strange as his teachings.”

  Arria pulled a chair from the table, sat in it, and rested her cheek on a fist. “What sort of teachings?” Riah queried, his interest heightening.

  “That the world is constructed of seven layers and ruled by three gods I know nothing about. My father always said they were too important to be talked about to children.” She sighed once more, her gaze growing distant. “But all the other children knew. They were told stories before bed about the gods and the blessing they would bestow on people when they died and went to reenter another life.”

  “Another life?” Riah asked, his eyes widening.

  “A concept that when one dies they come back to this realm in another body, but their soul is the same. And their new body and their new life are determined on how well they lived their last life.”

  “So...according to your people,” Riah began, “I could come back after I die as a...dragon, perhaps?”

  Arria shrugged. “Sure. But there were no stories of dragons. That I was told anyway.”

  Silence passed between them until all Riah could hear was the air breezing in from the mountains beyond the open doors. Arria’s voice was soft when she spoke next. “I don’t hunt with them becausethat’s all we ever did at home. We huntedand trapped. And chased butterflies.” Riah knew she was speaking of the people who lived here.

  “What are they anyway? Shadow Bearers?”

  He did not ask the question aloud, for Arria seemed to be far away, her hand clutching the drawing of the young man until it crumbled in her hold.

  Thirty

  Peter’s fingers were still tapping the bar before him.

  Nervousness. Anxiety. The dread of waiting. “Where are you, Cam?” The question persisted. He heard shuffling and glanced to his right to see Fiera approaching the other side of the bars. Her expression wore the same question. “I can’t do this much longer,” he said, his voice shaking and eyes wavering. “She’s been gone for hours.”

  “I know,” Fiera murmured back. She glanced down at his leg. “That must hurt like hell.”

  Peter nodded.

  “Did Cam try to convince you to take the Medulla?”

  Again, he nodded.

  “But you didn’t.”

  Peter didn’t have to nod.

  His leg hurt like hell. “Wonder if this is how Saff felt?” he muttered. His sister...he hadn’t seen her since they had left her outside the valley. “She is safe though. She is with the Lumenbirds. She will wait for us,” he reminded himself. He smiled, remembering her great rescue in Gnosi after which Apollyon met his demise. “Don’tyoudare thinkaboutcomingin here, this time,” he said as if she could hear him.

  Silence passed.

  “Sheseems different, andI’m not sure why,” Fierasaidat last.

  Peter turned, his brows knitting together as he realized she was speaking about Cam. “In what way?”

  Fiera shrugged. “Like she’s more...distant. She was the same way after she found out about Cole being her father. But since then she hasn’t gone that distant. Until recently.”

  “How recently?” Peter asked, for when he had last seen her, she hadn't seemed different. “If I was even paying any proper attention to her.”

  Again, Fiera shrugged. “It's been gradual. Like she’s shutting people out. She stopped telling me things and made plans on her own. I mean, they worked, but they were dangerous.” Fiera blew out a sigh and leaned her forehead against the bar.

  “And you’re telling me because…” Peter began.

  “Because if anyone’s noticed it too, it would be you.” Fiera’s gaze met his. “You care for her. I can see that.”

  Peter’s laugh was shaky and though he didn’t deny anything, hewouldnotlookdirectly at Fiera. “Isit that obvious?” Fiera was only grinning. Peter felt his face flushing.

  “And now you get to share a cell and everything,” came another voice.

  Caleb appeared from the shadows on Peter’s right in the cell beside him. Fiera was scowling. “Why don’t you mind your own business and not listen in on other people’s conversations?”

  Caleb threw his hands up in a defensive motion. “I didn't hear anything but ‘is it that obvious,’ I swear. And I figured he was talking about Cam so…”

  Fiera was almost laughing.

  “Both of you shut up,” Peter choked out. But a smile was spreading his lips apart.

  “I mean, I don’t blame you, Peter,” Caleb began. “If I could have a cell with Fi”

  Fiera hissed, her hand rising, and a second later a small size rock hit Caleb’s shoulder. “Calm down, Darling,” he said. Peter was laughing now, and it was hurting him. His sides, his ribs. Even his leg.

  But the smile faded when he saw two figures flickered beneath blue light down the passage. One was a Shadow Bearer, that much he knew, for scaly hands were gripping an arm.

  “Cam…” he breathed. “You’re back.” But she did not hear him. And it was only until she was before the cell door that she lifted far off eyes to meet his.

  Cam had never seen the arena.

  Neither had Caleb nor Fiera. Cam triedto breathe. “Focus,” shewhispered. Shelooked down at Peter who was watching her, his brows furrowed.

  “Why were you gone so long?” he whispered gently.

  “I-” Cam started. She arched, her back stinging. Theache in her chest expanded. She closed her eyes and breathed. “I met with Silva and she told me about the next round and then…”

  Cam lookedthrough thebars, her gazedistant. “Andthen they drugged me,” she said at last. “And I must have stayed somewhere nicer than this because when I awoke I was wearing this.” She waved her hand over her new outfit of the deepest raven black embellished with dripping chains. A dress cut off at the thighs where formfitting pants reached to her ankles. “And there was a bed and a fire…”

  Peter was on his feet, hobbling to Cam’s side. His hand brushed her arm and rested there. “You can face it. Whatever it is that you
will have to do tonight. And maybe you should…”

  “No,” Cam cut in sharply. “No one is taking my spot.”

  Peter’s expression hardened, but he did not argue. Not when her eyes were filling with tears.

  Cam turned from him to glance in turn at her sister and at Caleb, the ones who had claimed they would join her. And as for the rest of their company...well, they wouldn’t have any say. They wouldn’t know until the time came. If even then.

  She began to pace.

  Caleb leaned against his bars with his hands folded over the ones which ran horizontally.. Fiera, for once was silent, though familiar in her manner of brooding in the cell adjoining Caleb’s. Cam was murmuring the words of the song beneath her breath. Caleb caught part of the stringed sentences.

  “Where did you learn that?”

  Cam halted and cast a glance through the iron bars. “My father sang it to me when I was younger.” Cam forced herself to sit upon the cell floor, her back against the hardened wall. She drew in a sharp breath at the pain surging through her back. “Don’t wince, Cam. Not while they’re looking at you.”

  “Sounds encouraging,” was all Caleb said.

  Silence reigned in the dungeons.

  Each was left to their own devices of calming their racing hearts. Survival was key. Or maybe it was just necessary. “These games were supposed to help us stall. But for what? We haven't done anything.”

  Cam clutched the vial of remaining Imber Fel magic. No one in their company knew which of the three poisons it held. It was either sleep, weakness, or death. The remaining Medulla magic was still in Peter’s possession. He had refused to turn it over knowing that Cam would apply it to his injuries while he slept if he did so.

  Peter was lying on the floor beside Cam, staring up at the ceiling.

  A hiss drifted down thedungeon’s corridor. TheShadow Bearers shifted. “It is time,” Cam breathed, her heart beating against her chest.

  Peter’s gaze flicked to Cam, and he grasped her hand. “Don’t die out there,” he said.

  “That’s it? No goodbye kiss?” Caleb called out.

  Cam rolled her eyes. “Leave it to Caleb to bring humor to the most dire situations.” Peter squeezed her hand once. The three prisoners were shackled with chains once more and marched up the endless terrain of stairs. Cam’s legs no longer ached after the vast ascent, for she had come to accept it as a consistent occurrence.

  But her back…

  She tried not to think of it, even as dread rose in her chest.

  Cam’s eyes slipped shut as black material slipped down over her face. She didn’t even hear Caleb or Fiera protest. Wherever Silva was leading them, they were not to know how to navigate their way there.

  Finally, bitter air penetrated Cam’s clothing. Goosebumps erupted, and the blindfold was ripped from her face. For a moment, she was blinded. Glowing moonlight was sprayed across the crimson toned heavens. The sun did strange things to the heavens in this valley.

  Cam flicked her gaze upward and saw that reaching in all directions in the shape of a circle, were seatings for an arena. And there were people. Figures shivering and shackles. Her friends and comrades. She tried not to meet their eyes. Joel and Lia and Owen and the others…

  Cam could feel rather than see the sneering smile of the queen. But she turned anyway. Across from them, Silva sat in a seat crafted much like her throne while clad in warm clothing. Black furs lining her neck and wrists while Cam shivered with tiny chains dangling at her sides.

  She clenched her fists at her sides and ripped her eyes from Silva, willing the recurring pain in her back to recede. And anyway, there were scaly hands at her wrists, unclamping those chains.

  Cam glanced up, finding that the top of the arena was non-existent, for they found themselves out of the stronghold and beneath the sky.

  “Not as I expected,” she thought. “The arenas in stories hold jeering crowds and blood bathed floors. But here...it's empty. And cold.” Death spoke far clearer here than it would have with a raging, bloodthirsty crowd.

  “Welcome, Camaria, Fiera, Caleb,” Silva said, jerking Cam’s attention to her. Cam’s muscles clenched at the voice. Her breathing seemed to cut itself off.

  “Tonight is thenightyoumeet your death,” Silva saidthis in a dull, bored tone. “I am sure each of you has imagined in which manner you would die though I am certain this manner is foreign to your imagination. Allow me to conjure it. No, allow me to make it your reality.” Silva flashed a wicked smile. “Anything you would like to say before you greet your doom?”

  Silence.

  All Cam could hear was the cold wind hissing.

  “I have something to say.” Cam whipped her head to Caleb who had spoken. He was looking up at Silva. “But not to you.” He turned, facing Fiera.

  Fiera’s eyes widened. “Oh, don’t do anything stupid, Caleb,” shehissed. “Don’t confess your love or...anything. This is the worst timing”

  Caleb’s grin cut her off. He shook his head. “I was just going to say that if I do not make it out of this, and by some miracleyoudo, that youwill try to knowElyon. That way, there’s a chance I’ll see you again.”

  Slowly, Fiera nodded. “Not what I was expecting.” Her eyes had been cast to the floor but swept up to meet his intense gaze.

  Cam wasn’t breathing when Caleb stepped back into the line they had previously formed. She cast one look at her sister who was already gazing at her. “This could be it. We’ve run out of time.”

  Cam felt the rumble first. The rumble threading through the sand her feet were planted upon. A hissing wind reached her ears and beyond that, the distant sounds of …

  Slithering?

  Her nerves tremored and quaked. Her stomach plummeted. Her body lurched, and she was falling headlong into darkness.

  Thud. And she realized the sound was of her own body hitting some surface. She groaned at the impact as pain shuddered through her chest, then her stomach and down into her knees.

  Her eyes were burning and throat filling with enough substance that she started coughing. Sand raining down upon her. She winced, willing the pain to recede. When she had cleared her vision, Cam flicked her eyes upward to find that Silva and the prisoners and everything else was farther away. That the floor of the arena had dropped immensely.

  The slithering sound reached her ears again.

  Slowly, Cam arose to shaking feet and turned around. Her gaze swept over Caleb who had just helped a cursing Fiera to her feet. A small object was crawling upon the ground. It was glimmering; slick and black with glints of poison green.

  Cam froze, petrified.

  A memory flashed before her eyes. Fiera stood in a sunlit glen dangling a garden snake over her face as she shrieked horrendously. She did not shriek now, not even when hundreds of the creatures were slithering from seemingly nowhere into the pit and roaming the length of the floor towards her.

  Hundreds. Hundreds...

  She saw gleaming black eyes and scales. Silva's pets. With a heart which attempted to pound its way from her chest, Cam stumbled back, hitting the hard wall of the pit. The slashed flesh of her back screamed, and the sound shuddered through her throat and ripped apart her lips.

  Cam fled. To nowhere in particular. She scrambled for the wall, clawing at it with her fingers until dirt was caked in her nails. Cam screamed, her throat burning. A serpent wrapped itself around her ankle. But there were more. So many more than in one gaze she couldn't even begin to see them all. Coldness wriggling up her legs. And then sharp pricks. Teeth clamping on her flesh followed by the dribble of blood.

  Then a jerk. Cam’s body lurched, and she came plummeting to the floor once more, her head colliding with the sand. Her hands scrambled for something. Anything. She threw sand.

  And now she could hear the laughing. The taunting of the queen from far above who was watching them below her as if they were a game.

  Cam was slick with sweat from the effort. She rolled on her back and then to her st
omach, crushing the snakes beneath her. Her back screamed. She screamed. Her heart slammed against her rib cage. “To kill asnake youhave tocutoffits head,” Fiera had said, swinging a knife and slashing the creature to death.

  Shear panic ricocheted through Cam’s veins even as she thought of the magic. It was very little and would not kill all of these creatures. She was thrashing, moving. In what manner, she did not know. All she could comprehend was that Silva had played to her weakness and was gaining victory.

  The intensity in her stomach lurched as a cry sounded out. She whirled to find Fiera looking aghast at the floor covered in snakes. Caleb was nowhere to be seen. Only a flashing hand was to be seen from a mountain of feasting reptiles. Cam was screaming but could not hear them as her sister lunged forward.

  “Caleb!” Fiera cried out. She threw herself into thebed of snakes as if they were merely a blanket of black and green upon the pit’s floor. And the creatures slithering over Cam’s own flesh were now roaming to their new victim.

  Fiera grasped at Caleb. At what part, she didn't know. She twisted him in her hand and yanked mercilessly. A shoulder now. And his head. His chest...more. But the snakes were dispersing now. To Fiera and Cam alike.

  Cam’s stomach writhed and coiled as the snakes twisted themselves around her ankles and crawled up her legs. Coldness seeped over her legs. A slithering sensation ran up her spine, and it wasn't a tingle of wildfire anticipation. They were crawling up her back, under her tunic. Bile threatened her reflexes. She hurled. She hurled again, the taste of her own last meal disgusting in her own mouth.

  Her hand found Fiera's. She pulled with all her might. All she knew was shouting of agony, black and green roving on the ground, and pain in her head. She only knew sharpness upon the side of her head and a tail wrapped around her neck.

  Cam slipped and stumbled backward. For a long moment, her view was entirely distorted and vague. She saw vague, moving figures accompanied by a cacophony of cries. Hisses and snarls. Pain stabbed her skull. Crawling serpents feasted on her flesh.