The Dark Queen

by M. Dalto

  “Sarayna…” Lexan’s voice cracked.

  She shook her head. “I’ll be alright…I know Mom won’t let anything happen to me.”

  Almost as one, they looked to the Empress. Alex could feel their gaze and she knew they were watching her every move, but she was wholly focused on Treyan and Reylor, just as they both focused on her.

  “You don’t have to do this, Alex,” Reylor insisted.

  “I do. You both know I do.”

  “Alex, please—I…we…we just got you back.” Her dear Treyan pleaded.

  “You never lost me. Neither of you did.”

  “Please,” Reylor begged, and she brought a hand up to the Lord Steward’s cheek.

  As she did Treyan’s.

  “I love you. Both of you. Just promise me you’ll remember that.”

  “Alex,” Treyan whispered, but she turned to her daughter, who had finished her goodbyes and was watching their exchange.

  It was Sarayna’s turn to approach her father, wrapping him in a tight hug before he would understand what it truly meant. She tried her best not to listed in on their whispered exchange as a lump formed in Alex’s throat, making it difficult to swallow as tears began to form. She quickly wiped them away as Sarayna released Treyan, still hesitant to let her go.

  But they were running out of time.

  Extending a hand, Alex watched as Sarayna gave her family a final smile before stepping away to accept it. Together they found the strength to ignore the calls and pleas behind them, begging them to stop. Together they approached the Empire’s very first royal family.

  “What is this?” Xavon asked, his conversation with Leminol disrupted by Alex and Sarayna’s presence.

  “This is the end,” Leminol replied knowingly.

  Alex and Sarayna focused on the former Queen Empress. “You now know the truth,” Alex explained to her. “It’s what I’ve been trying to tell you the entire time.”

  “There’s no going back now—” Brynaxia said, desperation in her tone.

  “There is,” Sarayna assured her. “There’s always a way back.”

  “Don’t listen to them!” Xavon yelled, just as panicked. “She’s an Otherrealmer bitch who took over your Empire, and her spawn of a daughter might as well be a bastard daring to carry on your line. Is this what you want your Empire to become?”

  Slowly, Brynaxia turned to face the frantic Xavon. “I’d rather it all end now, than become what you’ve done to it. The lies you have told, the lives you have destroyed. Yes, I may have been just as guilty for not loving who I was supposed to love, but you used our own daughter to create this conflict. Now, I must use yours to end it.”

  Despite the pain in Brynaxia’s words, Alex tightened her grip around Sarayna’s hand, reassuring her she was with her in this. Through all of this.

  Brynaxia turned toward them. “You’re ready to do what you must, then?”

  “We are.” Alexstrayna nodded. As did Sarayna.

  “No!” Xavon shouted and lunged toward the three women.

  No one knew where the knife came from, and their shouts of warning were too late as the blade plunged into Alex’s back.

  The pain coursed through her, and her screams echoed those of Sarayna and Brynaxia while the dream shattered into oblivion.

  Chapter Forty-Four

  The warmth of the Empire’s twin suns was unmistakable, even while lying in the desolation of the battle that ravaged the land all those years ago. He had used his body to protect Jared’s when the realm began crumbling and was relieved to discover the Emperor was safe when he felt him stir.

  Sitting up to allow Jared space to move, he had to blink his eyes to focus. The dreamlike world had been dark in comparison to the light of the Empire. Aside from Jared, Treyan and Reylor began stirring not too far away.

  Of his mother, or Sarayna, or the three immortal souls who began their Empire, there was no sign.

  The ground glistened with the essence of golden magic, as if the suns’ light was playing on the dew of the grass that had finally decided to grow in the once dead lands. The rays glinted off something and Lexan slowly moved toward it. On the ground, in almost pristine condition, was a knife not unlike the one that he watched sink into his mother’s back. Had she made it free, or was she now lost to him—to all of them?

  Next to the knife was a picture—one of Sarayna as an infant, with Alex and Treyan. One he remembered from his mother’s apartment in the Otherrealm. Had she taken it when she last visited?

  His breath caught in his throat and his eyes stung, but calls in the distance had him standing on the defensive, with the picture and the knife in hand.

  It was Jamison who spotted them first, running toward them from the palace with what looked like a lord in armor at his heels.

  And a baby in his arms.

  Lexan didn’t dare move as Jamison approached Treyan and Reylor with the child. Jared stood next to him, but Lexan didn’t have a chance to say anything before Treyan motioned him over. Swallowing, he approached cautiously, their words hushed by the time he arrived.

  The child had Crystal’s eyes but was bestowed with his coloring and features through and through. There was no denying her birthright. But Crystal…

  Lexan looked up, an unabashed hope in his gaze despite what he knew in his heart, but the unasked question was answered as they shook their heads.

  “We searched after we found the girl, but one of my remaining informants told us what happened. Crystal’s body had been discarded in a newly dug grave. I can show you—”

  “Later.” Lexan would allow himself to mourn her but only for a moment. She was merely one more on the list of those lost to the Empire’s conflicts.

  His mother, his sister…

  The child in his arms—she was a new beginning. With Jared they would make things right. The way they needed to. The way they had to be.

  “What are those?” the lord who arrived with Jamison asked, and they turned to look toward where his gaze was directed.

  Nearby were two books. The Annals lay open, and as Lexan approached, he spied an illustration not unlike the photograph of his family he still held in his hand. This one, however…it depicted Leminol and Brynaxia, with Seyth and Alara as children.

  He swallowed around the lump in his throat, and hoped that one day, wherever they ended up, that they’d be a family, together again.

  He sought out his father, wondering if he had seen the same, but Reylor and Treyan were otherwise preoccupied. On the ground at their feet was another book, emanating a force as if a true darkness exuded from its pages.

  “We need to destroy it,” Reylor was quick to announce.

  No one disagreed.

  Lexan handed the Crown Prince the knife he had found, as well as the picture of his family. Treyan choked back a sob when he realized what Lexan had handed him, but like Lexan he, too, knew the time for mourning would come later.

  Duty first.

  With the knife that killed his wife gripped in his hand, Treyan pocketed the picture. Lexan watched the light in his eyes fade, watched the strength in his features crumble as the prince cried out and brought the knife down, stabbing the book through again and again. Lexan swore he heard an otherworldly scream emit from the pages, but then…silence.

  “Now we burn them,” Treyan breathed, letting the knife drop.

  “Them?” Reylor asked his brother.

  “Both of them,” he agreed. “These books…they’ve done too much harm. Too many lives were lost. We’re done with them. Never again.”

  Lexan couldn’t have agreed more.

  Chapter Forty-Five

  Crystal’s body was removed from the shallow grave and burned in the middle of the battlefield. Lexan did not contest the decision—he knew she was a traitor to the Empire and did not deserve a place in the family crypts. Her pyre would be meaningful enough as the Annals and the black book burned with her. Knowing now they were no more than spiteful writings from centuries ago, there was
no need to keep them. No more would the writings of madmen, whether or not their intentions were good, control the future of the Empire.

  The same went with traveling between the realms.

  Would they have burned The Complete Manual to Key Construction if they knew where it was? Chances are they probably would have. Whether there would be anyone else who had the knowledge to travel between realms, they would never be sure. Too many mysteries remained with the mages in the north who initially brought magic to their Empire so many centuries ago.

  But that, in part, was why Lexan was allowing Jamison to leave with Treyan and Dremond.

  Using Lexan and Reylor’s directions, Jamison and Treyan would show Dremond to Symon’s final resting place. Lord Dremond, upon realizing it was the Betrayer and his spawn from whom he was receiving his instructions, was more than pleased to leave. The lingering looks from the lord were enough to let Lexan know he would cause him harm if ever the two of them faced one another again.

  He didn’t blame him.

  Treyan independently decided he would go north to oversee the removal of the tree line between the Empire and the Borderlands, and together he and Jamison would give the mages the freedom they had promised. After that, there Treyan would remain at the northern castle. He claimed he had spent too much time in the shelter of the Empire, but the pain of his memories haunted his words. His wife and daughter had sacrificed themselves to save them all—it would take him a long time to come to accept that. Their memorials were at the palace, and Treyan would one day return.

  Just not any time soon.

  Lexan promised Treyan he would be welcome at the palace whenever he returned. Though the Crown Prince claimed he would stay in contact, Lexan knew it would be a long time in coming.

  Jamison informed Lexan that he was going to venture to the mountains to assist the mages in returning to their home. Permission was requested to take some leave before he needed to prepare for the new regime, and Lexan could not deny him the request. It had been too long since he saw his own children living their own lives, Jamison explained, and he was looking forward to starting anew.

  A gleam in the Captain’s eye told Lexan that he didn’t expect to spend that time alone.

  Lexan promised him he could have as much time as he needed, just so long as he came back before Xandra needed him to lead her armies.

  Xandra…Lexan’s daughter and heir to the Empire.

  Jamison bowed respectfully to his new prince, assuring him the Empire’s heir would never need to worry about his loyalty to the Empire.

  No, she would never have the chance to know her birth mother, but she wouldn’t need to.

  Jared was the rightfully crowned King Emperor, and even if he wished to return to the Otherrealm, there was no way to get back. The Empire was where he belonged, and Lexan selfishly didn’t want him to be anywhere but at his side.

  There was guilt, of course—they both felt it…but neither of them could stop what had been out of their control. Knowing that they would be able to raise his daughter—their daughter—in a new and different world, where she would have the choice to choose who she wanted to spend the rest of her life with, on her own terms…that meant something.

  But the guilt, he knew, would take a long, long time to disappear.

  As for his father…

  Lexan and Jared saw the party off, Tryan and Reylor having said their own goodbyes privately. In silence they watched as the brothers braced arms and nodded their farewells, and as Reylor disappeared around the place walls, the party began their journey north. Lexan wondered how long it would be until they saw each other again, but he knew they would. Someday. Despite their past, they would always have one common ground neither of them could deny.

  Now that they were on their way, Lexan and Jared, with Xandra in his arms, made their way beyond the gardens, following Reylor to the royal crypts.

  The Lord Steward stood with his head down, as if praying, but Lexan knew otherwise. He was talking to her, as if she could hear him. One day Lexan would come down here and do the same. Not now however—instead, he would give his father the privacy he needed for whatever attempt at healing he required.

  Reylor looked to them as they approached, giving one last glance to the grave markers they had made for Alexstrayna and Sarayna next to the one that had been laid out for Bria and the empty grave for Saratanya. It occurred to him then that every woman in his father’s life had been taken from him. It was no wonder he decided to stay at the palace even when given the chance to leave.

  “We didn’t mean to interrupt,” Lexan said as they approached.

  “Yes, you did,” his father responded.

  “We just wanted to let you know they’ve left.”

  Reylor nodded, and his eyes dropped to the child in Jared’s arms. Her green eyes opened and looked to Reylor. Whether he meant to or not, the Lord Steward’s finger met her tiny hand as it wrapped around his. “How much will you tell her, when the time comes?”

  “We’ll tell her enough,” Jared said softly as he looked down at the interaction between the baby and Reylor. “She’ll know about her grandmother, who fought harder than any woman should ever need to for her family’s safety. About her aunt who loved fiercely.”

  “As well, she will know about her grandfather—who sacrificed more than anyone ever needed to,” Lexan added reverently.

  Reylor gazed at his son. “When her time comes, I expect her to train as anyone else in her position would. Magic, politics, tactics, swordplay…everything. If she’s going to run this Empire one day, I won’t allow any weakness—”

  “We won’t,” Lexan corrected, and Jared gave him a small smile.

  Reylor cast a glance between the two of them, refocusing on Jared. “And you? You’re King Emperor, yes, but are you also prepared to be a husband and a father? Despite all you’ve endured, those may be your greatest challenges.”

  Jared swallowed as if he wasn’t expecting the sudden interrogation from the Lord Steward, but still he dared a bashful glance at Lexan that made the prince’s cheeks flush. “I am, sir. Yes. Absolutely.”

  Lexan snorted at the formality, and Jared jabbed him in the side despite the sentiment.

  Reylor shook his head and glanced over his shoulder at the quiet graves.

  “Are you ready to come inside?” Lexan urged. “Dinner will be ready soon…”

  “Just…give me a few more moments.”

  So they did.

  “Do you think he’ll be okay?” Jared asked as they returned to the palace, shifting Xandra on his shoulder.

  “Will any of us ever be okay?” he asked him sadly.

  Jared merely nodded in response as they made their way up the steps to the entrance of the palace, but the setting suns caught Lexan’s attention from the corner of his eye as dusk settled over the land that was now theirs.

  “You’re sure this is what you want?” he asked Jared quietly as his gaze remained on the Empire before them.

  “Now’s a horrible time to ask me,” Jared mused, and Lexan draped his arm over his shoulder and pulled him in tight against him, placing a gentle kiss to the side of his forehead.

  “I hate to tell you, but none of us ever asked for any of this.”

  “So I suppose we just have to make the most of it while we can,” Jared responded with a smile, and after placing a soft kiss to his cheek, he took Lexan’s hand.

  “Come on, Prince…” and he led him back into the palace.

  Smiling himself, Lexan followed Jared, and silently promised his Emperor, their daughter, and himself that he would be determined, from then on out, to indeed make the most of every damn moment.

  Always. And forever.

  Acknowledgments

  One would think, after completing four books, that writing out the acknowledgements section would come easier each time. I can attest that it is, in fact, harder with each novel. But in order to ensure I don’t forget anyone this last time around, I’m going to start at the begi
nning.

  To my parents for nurturing my creativity, for encouraging me to read, and for showing me that there’s nothing wrong with applying yourself. To my sister for the years of playing pretend and being the subject of so many Barbie games. To Sarah for giving me the spark to apply my storytelling to logging our roleplaying campaigns and starting on the road towards actually wanting to write fantasy.

  To the people behind NaNoWriMo for the motivation to finally focus and write a novel. To the random person on the NaNoWriMo forums for telling me that I should never write again. To Lisa for telling me to ignore the naysayer, for introducing me to Wattpad, and for convincing me to share my story with thousands of eyes rather than just one set.

  To the Wattpad community for showing me that my stories could become something more, to the readers who fell in love with the Empire, and to the folks at HQ who deemed it worthy enough of a Watty. Without you, I never would have considered giving publishing these books the chance.

  To Chantal for convincing me to submit my query to The Parliament House. To Shayne, for giving my stories a chance. To the rest of the team at TPH for all of their hard work and effort to help in releasing each new installment of The Empire Saga.

  To Jennia for being the best developmental edit the Empire could as for—thank you for always being there as my sounding board when I needed it the most. And to Alyssa for helping to make my words shine before they’re shared with the world.

  To my husband Chris, for his constant love and support and understanding when deadlines loomed and stresses were high. To my daughter Samantha for understanding that with hard work and perseverance you can achieve every goal and reach for any dream. I know late nights weren’t easy and I can’t be the easiest to deal with when under pressure and I appreciate both of you more than these words can convey.

  To the friends who have continued to show their support by reading the books, coming to events and sending general well wishes with each release. Thank you for always be there in all the ways you’ve been able to over the years.