by Elena Lawson
“Sorry about that—you—well, I think you were sleepwalking.”
I swallowed past a lump in my throat and looked up, gasping and scrambling backward when I saw Morgana’s regal face looking down on me.
“Hey, it’s alright,” Tiernan said, moving to comfort me.
I let him pull me to him, let him rub warmth back into my arms. “Shhhh… come on, let’s get you back to your chambers.”
“How did I get down here?” I heard myself ask though the question was mostly for myself.
Tiernan scooped me up into his arms, shivering against the chill of my body, “I’m not sure, but I think maybe you walked here in your sleep.” He pulled me closer to his chest, and I curled my arms around his neck, “I’m sorry, Liana. I—I barely remember closing my eyes. I shouldn’t have fallen asleep.”
“There’s nothing to apologize for,” I whispered against him, reveling in the feel of his warmth, “I’m alright.”
But I wasn’t sure if that was true… was I alright?
I closed my eyes against the warmth seeping into my bones and was assaulted with more fragmented pieces of the dream. A ridge covered in shadow from the dark clouds. The crack of thunder in my ears. Blood on my hands. I snapped my eyes open, frost bloomed at my fingertips. My blood roared through my veins, spurred by the chaotic beating of my heart. I worked to calm myself, but I was so weak—so tired. Tiernan shivered again, pulling me in as tight as he could to share his body heat.
The stairway wavered in and out of focus as he carried me, and I flinched when he bent to pick up a torch from the ground. The light too bright for my eyes.
Strange, that I had been sleeping not long before. I couldn’t think of a time when I had ever been so tired. I longed for my bed. And the comfort I only felt in the company of all my men. I needed to see them all—that they were safe and unharmed—yes, I would see them safe, and then I would sleep.
I tried to draw on my Grace of fire but found ice at my core instead. The fire unable to penetrate the thick wall of it shrouding my heart.
Tiernan told the others what happened, though at my request, he left out the part about having found me distraught and cocooned in fear. No more secrets, I had promised them all.
Since sleepwalking was a new occurrence, and one they should all be aware of in case I walked myself right off the terrace or walked my way out the palace. But they didn’t need to know what I had dreamt.
I hardly knew what I dreamt. Bits and pieces of the nightmare came back to me, but the bulk of it was lost to the dark recesses of my mind, as though the dream itself were a nocturnal creature, running from the light.
I don’t know what Alaric would have done to Tiernan if I hadn’t asked him not to punish my guardian. He was seething when Tiernan told him he’d fallen asleep, and I was glad I was there, still half in and half out of consciousness when Tiernan told his captain. It was clear as crystal to see how Tiernan already punished himself for his moment of carelessness, he didn’t need to be punished more. I was glad Alaric saw it too—or felt it.
Kade held me loosely in his arms as we waited on the tiny island off the coast of the palace. It had been a day since Tiernan carried me all the way back to my royal bedchamber, careful to seal the passageway in the wall behind him and place my armoire in front of it. There was no way I’d ever been able to move it alone—no more sleepwalking in dark, forgotten passageways for me.
And it had been three days since the Wraith agreed to help us and search the seas for a possible threat against us. Now we waited for the Wraiths to return, under a moon that was on the fuller side of half.
“Where are they?” Alaric asked, “They should have been here by now. They’re late.”
“Maybe they forgot,” offered Tiernan.
Finn huffed, “Small chance of that—they are wise creatures, with memories that can go back hundreds of years. They would not forget the events of three nights past.”
Kade said nothing, but he sighed against me. I turned around in his arms, “Hey,” I said laying a hand on his cheek, “Are you alright?”
He gave me a wan smile and a small nod, “Of course. I’m fine.”
I swallowed back the burning in my throat. He had that look again, the same one he’d been wearing off and on since we returned to the palace. In his eyes I saw another Kade, a Kade that hung from a noose of his own making. Suffocating and in pain.
I opened up my senses, searching for the sixth sense Alaric had been training me to use. Sometimes I felt their emotions by accident, and sometimes, when I didn’t have the Grace activated, I felt nothing from them at all. He was teaching me to invite the emotions of others in, but only when I wanted to feel them.
And how to block them out when I didn’t.
I reached through my flesh and felt Kade with my Grace. I recoiled at the blow of his raw emotion. He was in anguish. On the verge of collapse. He hadn’t been the same since that day in the ruins of the old palace. I understood why, but I wouldn’t accept it. Alaric told me to leave him be—that he needed time to process what had happened and realize the truth on his own—that he had nothing to do with my death.
Gods! I was standing here, wasn’t I? What was there to mope about?
“You have to stop,” I said, forcing him to look at me, “Do you hear me?”
His dark brows pulled together, and his adams apple bobbed. “What—”
“You know exactly what I’m talking about.”
“Liana—”
“Be quiet and listen,” I said, pulling him back when he tried to pull away, “You did nothing wrong. You were not in control of yourself—”
“I don’t think—” Finn warned, stepping in to break us apart.
I gave him a sharp glare that had him backing away instead. “I saw what happened, Kade. I was there. I know what Ricon did to you. Why can’t you see it wasn’t your faul—”
Kade set his jaw, “Oh and you think you know everything, do you?” He grabbed my forearms and glared into my eyes. His own golden eyes glowed, and I felt the heat of his Grace awakening where his skin touched mine. “You have no idea what it was like!”
“Then tell me.”
“I almost killed Alaric, and that was bad enough. I’d have never forgiven myself. He controlled me, yes, but I gave in to his will. I was not strong enough,” fury gleamed in his eyes and heat rippled off him in waves. I activated my own Grace of fire to keep from burning where his molten fingers circled my arms. “And then… I killed you.”
“Yes,” I said, “You did.”
His eyes widened, and his grip on my arms loosened enough for me to pull myself from them. “Now you listen to me, Kade. I’m done seeing you like this. If it had been me who wielded the sword and I had killed you, would you hold it against me?”
“No, of course I w—”
“Exactly. And if I were distraught over it—if every time you looked into my eyes you saw me hanging from the end of a noose I had created for myself, how would you feel?” I shoved him back and he flinched at the contact, his breathing coming hard and fast, his glowing eyes narrowing.
I didn’t give him time to answer me, “Would you want me to feel like that?” I paused, and said more calmly, my voice breaking, “Kade,” I started, and at the sound of his own name, soft and broken coming from my lips his fire went out all at once and his jaw tensed, “Would you blame me at all for what I had done?”
He came and wrapped me in his arms, and I buried my face into his chest, “You have nothing to feel remorse about. Nothing. Do you understand me?”
He nodded against my hair, “I do,” he said.
Ricon’s face came to the forefront of my mind, smiling wickedly, his eyes alight with insanity. He would pay for what he’d done to us that day. I would make sure of it before the end.
Alaric cleared his throat, “Welcome back brother,” he said, “We were wondering when you’d snap out of it.”
“Asses, the lot of you,” Kade grumbled, but a small smile l
it his eyes and I wanted to cry at the sight. I stood on tip-toe to kiss his still Grace-warmed cheek.
“I’ve missed you.”
He bowed his head low to nuzzle his forehead against mine, “I missed you, too. I’m sorry.”
“Don’t be.”
“Liana,” Finn called, and I turned slightly to see him standing near the water, his boots on the shore and his trousers rolled up to his ankles. “They’re coming,” he said, pointing out into the black water rippling with ribbons of shimmering silvery blue.
He was right, though I saw only three of them streaking their way through the water, just under the opaque surface.
Kade planted a soft kiss on my forehead and spun me around, “Go,” he said, giving me a little shove and a tap on my rear.
I gasped at the vulgarity of the action but rather enjoyed it. I made my way over to Finn, kicking my boots off as I went.
Alaric, Tiernan, and Kade stepped up closer to the water. They didn’t visibly ready themselves for an assault as they had the last time, but if you knew them at all, you would know they were always ready for an attack. Poised. Their muscles taught and eyes always searching their surroundings. Looking for danger, filing away ways to escape, measuring distances, and noting changes as they occurred.
I took Finn’s outstretched hand and together we stepped in the water to meet the Wraiths.
Chapter Eight
Liana
I had been right—there were only three. Their movements slow, and a bit disjointed compared to their perfect formation three nights before. They halted several yards from where we stood, now up to our knees in the icy water. They raised their heads from the surface and stared at us with unblinking black eyes.
The one in front—who I assumed was leading the other two, was not the same Wraith we’d spoken to before. Though they mostly looked identical, I could tell this one was different.
“What news?” I asked of the Wraith, “Where are the others?”
I noticed the way the one in front swam. It was having trouble holding itself up. And I heard it hissing with the effort.
“Is everything alright?” Finn asked.
…the boats come…the boats leave Emeris…they come here…
I swallowed, my face heating and fingers prickling with ice. A shiver darted up my spine, and Finn’s gaze met mine, his jaw clenched. He had been right. The Mad King planned to bring an army form Emeris, but…
“How many?” I asked the Wraith who was shaking with the effort of staying afloat.
…there are many…we help queen…we sink two ships…
I shook my head, not understanding. How many is many?
I didn’t ask them to fight, but they had anyway. And if they took down two ships, then how many could remain? Depending on the ship size, a warship could carry anywhere from three-hundred to five-hundred.
“How many ships?” Finn asked, his hand tightening around mine, the cold seeping through.
The Wraith shook its head, and closed its eyes, bowing its head. An image flashed into my mind. Finn gasped, staggering back. They were showing him, too.
I saw through the eyes of the Wraith. A fleet of ships above. Their hulls looked like dark shadows on the surface of the water. There were so many. As far as I could see, ships dotted the oceans surface. Twenty? Thirty? I couldn’t tell.
Up to the surface she went, following the alpha Wraith, ready to attack, a long crystal-tipped spear in her hands. She broke the surface. It was chaos. There was fire, and ice, and shadow, and lightning. Arrows sailed through the dawning sky, finding their marks in silvery blue flesh.
Thousands. I was looking at an army of at least ten-thousand. I couldn’t breathe—my chest tightened painfully, and I fell to my knees in the water. “Stop,” I said between panting breaths, “Stop!”
All at once the images—the memory left my mind and I was thrown back into the present, sputtering and unable to catch my breath. My males surrounded me, trying to help me stand.
“What did it do?” Kade growled, and the Wraiths backed away.
“No, wait!” I called to them, and they halted.
Finn was utterly silent, still standing, his eyes were wide. He didn’t look like he was breathing. “Finn,” I called to him, and he snapped out of the trance-like state.
“Did you see?” he asked me, the weight of what stood against us tainting every word.
I nodded, and turned back to the Wraiths, extricating myself from the others. “I’m alright,” I told them, “I just need a minute.”
I could hardly make sense of the images still flooding my mind. There were Fae on the ships—though few. And Draconians in the sky—though not more than one hundred.
The bulk of the Mad King’s army was made up of men. But not mortal men. They bore strange markings on their heads. A circle within a triangle within another circle. Alchemists. They cast incantations at them, poured potions into the sea. And all around the Wraiths fell, eyes wide in their final moments as they sunk down into the dark.
But how? How had Ricon got them to join his regime? The Alchemists were the ruling race of Emeris. They took power over the Vocari and the Endurans only a century past. Why would they leave themselves vulnerable to an attack on their own lands by sending their army here?
It doesn’t matter, I thought. They are coming. Ready or not.
Even though the Wraiths sank two of their ships, Ricon’s army was still ten-thousand strong. We had no hope of defeating them. The Horde armies totalled five-thousand men. They would outnumber us two to one.
…they will meet land soon… two moons… they make for the north… for the Wastes…
“What is it?” Alaric asked, and I turned to him in a daze.
I shook my head. Not able to bring myself to reiterate what I’d seen. His eyes were narrowed and focused, filled with latent worry. His hands were fists at his sides.
I looked to Finn, who still hadn’t moved. For once he didn’t look like he was trying to solve the problem. And that made it so much worse—more real.
“Finn,” I said, and he lifted his head, “Tell them what we saw. I need to help her.” I gestured to the Wraith who was sinking lower into the water. Catching a glimpse of a spot on the side of her neck that looked black—as though it’d been charred. They lost four of their pack. And many, many others from what we saw.
I couldn’t help them all, but I would help this one. She didn’t have to come back. She wasn’t the one who struck the bargain—that was their alpha. But she did anyway. And that was honorable.
My males didn’t try to stop me as I waded further into the water. The trio of Wraiths hissed at first, recoiling in fear.
“I won’t hurt you. I want to help. I can heal you,” I said to the one who was the most hurt—their new leader. “Please—let me help you.” My heart broke at the sight of them. Afraid. Grieving.
Tears stung my eyes. It was what would become of us if we didn’t think of a way to stop them. My court would fall. Families would lose loved ones. It would leave us broken and bleeding when he was through with us.
No. I would find a way. We would find a way.
“Please,” I repeated, standing near the edge of the underwater embankment.
The Wraith came closer, it’s glowing blue skin shimmering dully beneath the cold, dark water. Its movements were jerking—hesitant, but it came near, and I bent low so I was at eye level with the strange, beautiful creature.
Its black eyes were eerie but also so large and round they reminded me of a doe’s. Innocent and frail. Its long silvery hair pooled around its sharp face in the water.
…not hurt us…
I shook my head, and reached out an arm, feeling the slick, silk-like topside of one of her tentacles. She recoiled slightly, but then relaxed.
The healing Grace was still one of the more difficult to wield. And now that I didn’t have Aisling to help me anymore, it was hit or miss when I tried to use it. But this time it answered my call within seconds
as though the Grace itself knew this was no practice run.
I flinched, finding not one, but seven dark spots within the Wraith. Seven grave injuries. It was a wonder the creature was even still alive. I heaved in a deep, quick breath and pushed—letting the Grace flow from me into the Wraith. Let the healing light wrap around the darkness, eat it away. Smother it.
But I had to keep pushing—keep calling forth the Grace to heal all of her wounds. My strength waned, and it became more difficult. My muscles tensed, my lungs ached, and my head throbbed. The last of the dark spots faded and I let go, falling back, my head heavier than I’d ever felt it.
The Wraith reached out to steady me, and I tried to refocus my gaze and find her face in the crooked, spinning world. My heart sputtered, trying to find its proper rhythm.
…you are strong… but you cannot defeat him… not alone…
Vaguely, I heard my guardians arguing behind us. I didn’t have long before they saw how much trouble I had standing on my own and dragged me away.
“How?” I asked the creature, and she pulled me close.
An intense sadness drew down her eyes and mouth, her thin slimy fingers squeezed where they held my arms, imploring me to listen.
…queen must run…
Chapter Nine
Alaric
I couldn’t believe it. Not when Finn told me, or when Liana confirmed it. Ten-thousand men. Alchemists. We knew a fair amount about their kind, but not nearly enough. Like us, there were some who were granted more strength than others, though for them it was more to do with natural selection than it was to do with the circumstances of their birth.
But we didn’t know how many were gifted with the ability to use the ancient magical art and how many weren’t. The army could be made up of foot soldiers, men not gifted by the power of the Alchemists, or they could all be gifted—though that was highly unlikely.
Damnit. I slammed a clenched fist down on the wide wooden desk. My dark chamber was only making the foreboding feeling worse than it already was. The walls seemed like they were closing in, the darkness growing claws.
