I look up at Kol, realizing his close proximity, those knowing dark blue eyes on me. “How did you do that?”
When he smiles this time I don’t feel the same icy chill as his arrogant smirks. “Don’t worry about it.” He withdraws both hands and then holds one out to me to take. When I look at it questionably he says, “Relax. I’m going to take you to Taya. I could bring her to you, but there’s something I want you to see.”
I want to refuse, but my curiosity gets the better of me as it always has. My curiosity, in fact, is the reason for half the trouble I’ve gotten into in my life, him included.
I whip the blanket back and crawl to my feet, letting him guide me up. I stand there for a moment to gather myself before I let Kol lead me down a long hallway at the back of the infirmary.
“In here.” Kol gestures to a door on my left.
Inside is an open room with a couple of nurses tending to, surprisingly, several infants in tiny, individual cribs. There are a dozen or two at the very least. I glance up at Kol questioningly.
“You think you’re the only one who’s having a baby?” he says as he approaches one of the cribs. The sticker at the end has a name on it. Hunter. “This is Hunter, he’s the son of a servant here.”
“Do you want to hold him?”
Pre-pregnancy I might have cringed away from holding a baby because they’re so breakable, but now that I’m expecting to have not one, but two of my own, I concede and allow Kol to place the newborn in my arms.
“I can’t believe there are all these babies here.” I say, eying the other newborns surrounding me in the nursery.
“This isn’t just some makeshift palace Theon has created. The people who work here are people too. They have husbands, wives, families to care for. This country has come back together, not just for Theon, but for their rightful ruler. His people, Amara’s people, they yearn for equality, just like Amara would if she could get her head out of her ass long enough to see the injustice happening around her. Theon may have restored this country, Kara, but it is going to be up to Amara to lead it.”
“What does that mean?” I ask impatiently. Why do they have to keep revealing Theon’s wicked plans for me and Amara in pieces?
“It means there is a lot of work to be done, starting with finding Amara.”
But I’m not listening to him anymore. Hunter’s tiny little fingers curl around mine and all I can see is his tiny face, his tiny belly moving up and down with his breathing as he sleeps.
I can feel Kol’s eyes on me. I wonder if he’s thinking about what would have happened if he’d stayed in Baal with us. I know he said that Amara was always the one he wanted, but I know he’d loved me. I’d felt it, many times. No matter what he says, we had been real and we thought about these things. Marriage, kids, a life away from Baal. I know he is not as detached as he’d like me to believe, especially when he looks down at this baby.
“Do you have names for yours?” Clea asks from behind me. Kol casts her a look that makes her inch back cautiously. It’s difficult for me to remember that she’s the girl I used to have sleepovers with rather than the girl who murdered Tristan in cold blood. I don’t know that we’ll ever be friends again, but I do know that if she really is herself again I’m going to need her help getting the hell out of here.
“Maybe. We’ll see.” I say, very gently placing Hunter back into his crib. “But if you think a little baby cuteness is going to distract me from my questions than you are very wrong.”
Kol glances over at the nurses nearby and groans, grabbing my arm and forcing me out into the hallway. “Kara, you can’t get something without giving it. You want answers? Why don’t you start by using that convenient little Echo of yours to find out exactly where Amara is.”
“Why? So you can exploit her too?” I fire back. “You do not get to demand anything from me. It’s your fault I’m having two babies with a dead boy in the first place. The only reason I…when you left I blamed myself. I thought it was my fault. I needed to feel something, anything to get my mind off of how you abandoned me and so I found a distraction in the first person who showed me a sliver of attention. You did this.”
“Kara,” Clea says from behind me.
“And you—you failed her. You failed her in every way possible and now she’s gone.”
“Alright, enough.” Kol grabs my arm and yanks me back into the infirmary, kicking the door shut behind us. “What do you think we’re trying to do?”
“Let go of me, Kol.” I sneer, ripping my arm out of his death grip.
“I know Clea’s soul is back. The only reason I haven’t told Theon about it is because she is the only way we’re going to get Amara back alive.”
“What?” I breathe.
“I told you I know who has Amara.” Clea reminds me.
“Good for you. The only way my children keep breathing is if I use this Echo to tell Theon what the two of you already know. Even if you don’t tell him he’ll force me to.” I am not foolish enough to believe a man like that is above hurting children. He’ll do whatever it takes to get what he wants.
“That episode you had last night was pretty scary, Kara.” Kol says to me. “Maybe it affected your magic, your ability to sense Amara. Maybe you can’t feel her anymore.”
It takes me only a moment to understand what he’s suggesting. “You want me to lie and say I don’t have access to my magic anymore? The only thing I have to defend myself? And what’s to say he won’t just kill us then, for outliving our usefulness?”
“Theon is not going to kill you, Kara.” Clea argues.
“What is this plan going to get me?”
“The prince of Vakrov has her, Kara.”
I blink, shocked. “What?”
“Theon won’t care, Kara. He won’t care that the person who has Amara has one of the largest armies in Endecore. He’ll go after her anyway and will get many of our people killed.” Our. I do not miss the word. Kol somehow possesses abilities of an ether user. How, I don’t know, but he considers these people his people. “People whose numbers have been dwindling for centuries because of what Theon’s father did. But if we can get her back without starting a war with Vakrov I have to at least try.”
“Why? Why do you care?”
“You want to know what Theon really wants Amara for? His kingdom fell at the hands of his father. The people are following him right now because it’s what they need to do to win this war, but once it’s over Theon needs a fresh face to lead our people. A face they can trust. Amara is that face. She’s good and kind and hasn’t succumbed to the dark magic running through her veins. She will be queen of Llíria one day. That’s what Theon wants, but if we get her killed she’ll never get the chance.”
I’d like to say this is surprising, but it isn’t. I can’t be the only one who sees Theon Beleros as nothing more than a tyrant. Even his people see it. But there is no way he’ll simply hand his throne over. He’ll have a hand in her rule one way or another. Still, something doesn’t add up.
“Theon had Tristan killed because he’s the heir to the original ruler of House Cancer. He can’t just pick and choose who he wants to rule.”
“That isn’t why Amara will one day be queen.”
“Then why?”
“She isn’t just elected queen, Kara. She is the rightful queen of Llíria.”
“What does that mean, Kol?”
“It means Aaric, Aaren, and Amara are our descendants as well.” Clea cuts in. “It’s why I went to protect her from Theon in the first place. I wanted to keep him from destroying her life the way he destroyed mine.” Kol cuts Clea another threatening look and she evades his eyes.
“But Aaren is the oldest.”
“It doesn’t matter. Even if Aaren was born a few months early, in the eyes of the law they’re triplets. And the way a monarch chooses which triplet rules is through something called the Monarch Trials. Whoever wins gets the crown. Aaric is the oldest. But…”
“But not t
he strongest.” Kol adds. “It’s why Theon wants Amara on the throne.”
“He needed someone he can control.”
“When he gets his hands on Amara he plans to wed us, so that Llíria will have their rightful queen…”
“And he’ll still have someone he can control on the throne. You.” I say to Kol. His only response is a devilish smirk.
They had it all planned, right from the beginning. Limacore, Vakrov, Llíria. No matter where she goes she’ll be used as nothing more than a pawn. Nothing more than what she has been from the moment we got our magic back. Just when we thought we might finally be safe, in Limacore, with the king who hid his love for his godchildren, we’ve all been ripped away, separated, and chained once more.
I’m beginning to learn there is no freedom in a world like Endecore and the only way out is at the end of a blade.
THREE MONTHS LATER
—CHAPTER SEVEN—
AMARA
BLOODLETTING
Time passes different here than it does back in Limacore.
In Limacore time moved so quickly, before we knew it we’d been there months, but it doesn’t feel like that here, in Vakrov. Time is frozen, just like the country itself, just like the heart of its king. Three months have felt like an eternity and we are no closer to getting out of here than we were three months ago when Bastian finally let us out of our cages. Me, Missy, and Finn.
Court life is different too. There I was a teenager, going to classes, learning how to wield my element. Here I am the lost princess of Llíria by day, attending balls and strategy meetings, and nothing more than a blood bank by night.
The only thing that feels the same is me and Kara. After that odd experience months ago when I’d been drawn into Kara’s head while she was having pregnancy cramps, the same thing had happened to her not long after. It was following the announcement of me and Keenan’s engagement out on the balcony. When I’d gotten back to my room I fell to pieces and Kara had felt my despair. It was then that we realized something vital. Because we could be drawn into the Echo at any time we could communicate. It is very complicated because it only seems to work when one of us is angry or in pain.
Still, it’s enough. I can see her, talk to her, and assure her that I am okay. She does the same for me. I haven’t had the heart to tell her about Keenan just yet and what he’d tried to do to his very own niece and nephew and I know there are things she is keeping from me too, but we share the important things. We’re alive, we’re somewhat safe, and we’re surviving.
Over the last few months she’s told me some good things. Aaric did what he promised and got Clea’s soul back. Then she told me things I didn’t particularly want to hear. Her being forced to fake not having magic so Theon wouldn’t use her to find me, that he plans on wedding me to Kol. Though enemies, Bastian and Theon think alike. They’re both trying to marry me off to the boys who betrayed me, though the thought of marrying Kol doesn’t vex me as much as Keenan. That is because I don’t hate Kol as much as Keenan. Kol I’ve only known for two years. Keenan I have known all my life and he still chose to hand me over to his king like cattle for the slaughter.
I don’t have as much to tell her, mostly because I cannot tell her I am being forced to marry Keenan without telling her that he had been the one who’d betrayed us, who’d hurt her in ways she never thought possible. So, I tell her that Haven’s wedding to the king is scheduled for the fall and that I’ve made friends here, that I am being treated as well as possible. I tell her about my blood, that it’s supposed to hold magical properties, but she already knew that, from Clea. I know the real Clea is back because the soulless girl she was the last time I saw her would have jumped at the chance to tell her about Keenan. Instead she withholds this information too. To protect our friend.
It feels good, to know Kara is safe, Clea is back, and her babies are healthy, but it always brings me back to Aaric. I wonder, night and day, how he is, if he’s as broken by our separation as I am, if he’s trying to get me back. I know he is, of course, because there isn’t a person in this world who fights harder for me than him. Still, the not knowing kills me. I wish there was some way for me to communicate with him the way I can with Kara. I wish he were here. It’s all I can do these days. Wish for things that will never be again.
I wince when Skylan inserts the needle into my arm. When the bloodletting had first begun three months ago the needle had felt like nothing, but with all the blood donations I am forced to give, my arms have started to bruise and there are no places he can stick me that doesn’t feel like I’m being punched in the same place a dozen times.
“Sorry, Bo.” Skylan says to me. Bo is a nickname he’d given me when we first met, a shortened version of my last name. “We’ve gotta get our hands on an ether user so that we can heal these bruises.”
I hide my reaction well. If only he knew I had one waiting for me just outside this infirmary. “Trust me Sky, this is nothing compared to the pain I feel in my chest every time I’m forced to eat a meal with Keenan or hold his hand while at some new court function.”
“Oh,” Skylan feigns a frown for me. “I’m sorry. Do you—would you like me to bring a box of tissues with me to your pity party? Maybe a nice bottle of woe is me? It’ll pair well with that wonderful spread of bitching and moaning you’ll be serving.”
I cut Skylan a look and fight hard not to cross my arms in full-on pout mode. “You suck.”
Skylan laughs. “You don’t keep me around to tell you what you want to hear. You keep me around for the laughs and the occasional reality check.”
“So, what does your reality check have for me today?”
“That you’re badass.” Skylan says bluntly and I laugh. “And you’ll get through whatever it is that evil, little prince can throw at you.”
It took me two weeks after the engagement announcement to make that connection. If Bastian and Keenan are cousins that makes him a prince as much as Bastian. And if they’re related through Keenan’s mother than Lucia Volterra is the sister of the former king of Vakrov. A princess run off to live a village girl life? Something in the story doesn’t add up, but I have yet to find the courage to ask Keenan for the real story. I do little more than scoff at him these days.
I laugh at Skylan and it hurts when I do. “Mm,” I groan, resting my head back on the infirmary chair I’m spread out on. The smile is wiped from Skylan’s face when he realizes the blood loss is weakening me as it always does.
“Rest, little one.” Skylan says gently, but my eyes are already closed.
When Skylan takes all he can take for the day he sends me on my way. Outside the infirmary my trusty guard Daxon waits with a pack of crackers and a bottle of apple juice. “Your Highness?” he says with a devilish smirk.
“Shut up.” I say, snatching the bottle from him, but the tough girl act isn’t going to work today. All I want to do is sleep so I let him wrap his arm around my waist and guide me down the hall.
“He’s instructing Skylan to take more and more every week, isn’t he?” Daxon asks me.
I avoid the look of pity in his eyes. “I’m fine Dax.”
“You say that every day.” he says, waiting for a response. When he doesn’t get one he shakes his head, looking away. “I need to get you out of here.”
“Daxon,” My voice is soothing. I resist the urge to grasp his hand, to assure him that he is doing everything he can, but there are other guards around and so I simply let him carry us both. Always carrying us both.
After I found that note Daxon slipped me three months ago Haven and I quickly found a way to meet Daxon alone. It was there that he explained he was really a Limacoran guard, enlisted in the terribly difficult task of protecting me. A precaution from Roman.
When Daxon realized I was being taken by the prince of Vakrov and knew he could not stop him alone, he killed a Vakrovian guard, stole his uniform, and quickly became Vakrovian, in order to continue his duty of keeping me safe. He blames himself for our
still being here and I do not know how to comfort him in this. Daxon takes his job very seriously.
“Amara,” Daxon prompts when he realizes I am leaning too much of my own weight against him. He looks down to find I can barely keep my eyes open. “Amara!” Daxon quickly moves me into a cradle position in his arms, brushing a strand of hair out of my eyes. “It’s okay, little princess. I’m going to get you out of here if it’s the last thing I do.”
I doze off in his arms as he carries me toward my chambers. Sometime later I wake to voices. One is Daxon’s. The other? Keenan. I’d know that voice anywhere.
“I’m just bringing the princess back to her chambers to get some rest after her donation today, Your Highness.” I hear Daxon saying to Keenan respectfully, even though I know very well what he’d like to do to Keenan for his betrayal.
“Unfortunately the king has requested an audience with her in the throne room so that will have to wait.” Keenan responds heartlessly.
Daxon is positively put out, perhaps even more than I am. Against my ear he whispers, “I’m sorry, little princess.” Daxon places me gently down on my feet and steadies me by the shoulders. “I’ll find you once you’re done.” He tucks the bottle of apple juice into my hand.
I clutch the bottle to my chest and force a soft smile for him, to assure him I’ll be fine, but it is weak and he doesn’t buy it. “Thanks, D.”
“Of course.” he says softly, cutting Keenan a look.
Keenan just smiles back. “Come along.” he says to me.
I grip the bottle in my hand and begin to follow Keenan as best I can. My muscles hurt, as do my bruised veins and it hurts to try and keep up with his long strides. He takes notice after a time.
“Oh for heaven’s sake,” Keenan bites out and in one quick motion scoops me up into his arms. They burn like nothing else, his skin on mine. We’ve touched many times over the last few months. Hand-holding for show, a brush on the shoulder, a hand at my back, but this is the first time I am completely submerged in him and it makes me quiver. I have fought hard against the thought, but it’s true. I am very afraid of Keenan Volterra, as I know I should be.
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