I slowly walked up to the dais and the first thing I noticed was that my victim was a woman, but she was wearing a long gown, and a veil covered her face. Please don’t let it be Sharah. Please don’t let Chase lose the woman who has captured his heart. The refrain echoed over and over in my heart.
As I set foot on the bronze circle, a reverberation echoed through me and I knew that this would be no angry death. There would be honor here. This was why she had come—to be honored, revered, to walk through death’s doorway and escorted to the halls of the valiant.
I stood in front of the figure, as the sky overhead echoed an aurora of brilliant blues and greens. Glowing orbs rose up around us and I recognized them as will o’ the wisps, as a thousand voices joined in a lament so ancient that the language had been lost in the veils of time.
I stood tall, facing her, weariness dropping away as a surge of energy flooded through me. The smoke of bonfires lighting the hills, the drumbeat of time, the flutter of autumn leaves on the wind, the flurry of storms on the horizon . . . it was the harvest come to bear. The light touch on my shoulder told me Hi’ran was standing behind me, but I steadied myself, continuing to look at my quarry.
And then, without a word, without a protest, she reached up and pulled the veil back from her face.
The plants, the trees, the animals of the forest gave a collective gasp. The air fluttered as the lament grew stronger. And I stared into the face that I had come to know too well.
“Your Majesty . . .” I started to kneel but could not.
Greta’s words from a recent training session echoed in my memory. A Death Maiden supersedes royalty . . . supersedes all nobility and title. To us, all are equal, all come before us as they were born—without title, without class, without rank. All who come before us are here to die. Whether they die in obliteration, or are taken to the halls of the revered depends entirely on how they lived their life. Remember this. We only kneel to the Harvestmen, and to the Hags of Fate.
Queen Asteria faced me, a serene look on her face. She stood here, on the cornerstone of death, as she had lived in life: dignified, in her power, and accepting what could not be changed.
I stepped up to her. She was so very old, ancient beyond her days, and I could not imagine what she had seen in her life. Tonight, I would find out. Even though I was to escort her to her glory, I still had to break the soul-connection she had with life.
“Delilah, you do me a great service.” Her voice was steady. “I hoped, if this were to be the time, that I would be worthy of this honor.”
“Your Majesty—” What the hell could I say? I fumbled for words, my heart breaking. I didn’t want to do this, but there was no choice, there was no quarter to which I could retreat.
She tipped her head, in a fashion I had seen her do a dozen times over, and shook her head. “It has all been said. I understand. Please, though . . . look after my niece for me? She has a long road ahead of her, with what waits in her path.”
Again, I started to say something, but there were no words. “I promise.”
Sucking in a deep breath, I stepped forward, holding out my hands. She took them, her wizened face suddenly looking tired, and I could feel how very much she needed to rest. I clasped her fingers gently, feeling the slow pulse of her life ebb and flow. She was hurt, that much I could tell, and in pain.
I leaned in to place my lips against hers, and the kiss became a blur as our auras merged. I gazed into her eyes as I kissed her, the hands of the clock sweeping backward, first slowly, then at a great pace. The moon rose, and set, and then the sun—racing widdershins across the sky—and the moon again, until a blur of days and nights became a streak of time against the void.
Flash . . . a glimpse of Trenyth, and my heart rises, filled with love and longing and the knowledge that I can never have him. The desire to throw my crown away and run off into the wilds with my advisor almost wins out, but there is always duty, always honor, and it weighs heavily on my heart.
Flash . . . a glimpse of the night sky, and a longing to let go and be free. Daily duties grind the day into dust, and the years into ashes, and there exists only the slow march of time with no break, no reprieve.
Flash . . . The Scorching Wars are over, and Telazhar stands before the tribunal. I am the only member pleading for his death. The others relent and sentence him to the Sub-Realms. But I know, deep inside, that he needs to die. He looks at me directly—I was the only one speaking for his death—and he winks. A goose walks over my grave then . . .
Flash . . . and I am standing by a lake. The world is fresh and young, and I wonder, did we make the right choices in calving off Earthside? In leaving everything we ever knew behind? But there were so many dangers, and surely now, they were forever put to rest. The demons are safely locked away, and the portals are barred. And we have a world to explore . . .
Flash . . . I stare into the mirror. The heavy coronation dress—a glimmer of sparkle and light, of spidersilk and flower blossoms, trails behind me. I am not ready for this. I am not secure in my abilities. How can I ever fill the shoes of my mother, Queen Lia, who was recently killed by assassins?
Tears form in my eyes, but my cousin, Lent, shakes his head. “You must never show fear, never show doubt. After today, you hold the keys to the kingdom in your hand. You must learn to sweep your emotion under the rug and pretend it doesn’t exist. For you will be the living Court of the Elfin Kingdom. You are the throne. You are no longer a person, but an icon. You owe this to your mother.”
And I hear his words and obey. I know no other way. This was what I was born to do. This was what I must do. And so . . . I put aside my sorrow, and I tip my lips into a smile. I’m beautiful, and I’m brilliant. And I swear to my mother that I will become the shining star of the Elfin world, and never let my people slide into despair . . .
As I pulled back, I looked into Asteria’s eyes once more. And there, I could see her life laid out, road lines on the map of her face. She smiled, then, and reached up to remove her crown.
“Heavy is the head . . .” She softly dropped it to the bronze dais, and shook out her hair. “Shall we go then? I am ready. Let us take this life of mine and emblazon it on the pages of history.”
Still holding tight to her hands, I let out a slow breath and smiled. She was ready, and as much as I dreaded the next moment, I turned and walked her to the center of the dais. Where she was going, I could not follow—I was still alive, and the guardians of the Silver Falls would not allow me in. She stood in the center and began to let go of my hands. I caught my breath in my chest, not wanting to let go, wanting to hold on to her, to keep her here.
“You have to let go, Delilah. You have a life to live. There will be great challenges ahead. You must not let Shadow Wing and Telazhar win, and now—the seals . . . they are running free. You have to let me walk into the past, while you move forward.”
Crying in earnest, I felt her fingers slip away from mine. She began to fade, shimmering in a crystalline light that sparkled around her shoulders and head. It was so bright, it almost blinded me, but still I watched, unwilling to turn away, unwilling to let her go without proper witness.
Queen Asteria laughed, then, and she sounded free and easy and happy. And then as I watched, she faded away, her hair blowing in the astral wind, looking young again and strong. As the light paled, and went out like a candle, the forest let out a collective sigh, and fell into mourning.
A murder of crows rustled out of a nearby tree, their cries echoing in the night sky. As they went winging overhead, I reached up, as if to capture one in my hands. The scent of fire rose on the wind, as autumn fully took hold, and the season of death descended.
“How can we possibly win this battle?” I whispered.
And Hi’ran, still standing behind me, turned me around and gathered me in his arms. He pressed his lips against mine and kissed me, drinking me deep, drinking me down into the dark, carrying me into the depths of his season where skeletons danced an
d spirits sang, and the melancholy tombs gave up their dead for one night each year, to visit the living and remind them that all flesh is mortal, that all life comes with a price tag at the end, that all war claims its heroes.
I wept then, in his arms, and he loved me deep, laying me down on the dais, and parting my gown. He reached down, to stroke me with autumn’s sweet and dangerous touch, and everywhere I looked a shower of crisp leaves fell in a shower around us. I opened my legs, wanting him, hungry for his passion. We could not meet on the physical plane—there, Shade was my lover, and Hi’ran’s proxy, but here, Hi’ran could enter me, stroke me in fire, take away my pain with his pleasure. Here, we could fuck into the oblivion and freedom from pain that my heart sorely craved.
Into the night, we moved against one another, slowly at first, then furious in motion, until my sorrow was spent, and I was comfortably, peacefully, numb.
Chapter 12
“Wake up. Delilah, Camille—you have to get up.”
Trenyth’s voice echoed through my foggy brain. As I sat up, the memory of what had just happened washed over me and I realized that I knew something that neither Trenyth nor Camille did. Queen Asteria was dead. And I had guided her through the veil.
I sat up, yawning, more tired than I had been when I laid down. The question of whether I should say anything weighed heavily on my mind. If I told Trenyth, it would save him fruitless hours searching for her. Hours that he could put toward helping others. On the other hand, would he blame me for her death, even though it had been the attack that had caused it? And if he did, would he kill me? I was pretty sure he could take me out without blinking.
“Camille, can I talk to you for a minute?” I turned to Trenyth. “Let us take care of personal needs and then . . . well . . .”
“Fine, but hurry. You were out for three hours.” He nodded and we headed down the hall to the bathing chamber. At least it had a bathroom of sorts, and while we took turns, I told Camille what had happened.
She stared at her hands, soaping them in the chill water at the basin. “So, she’s dead. What the hell is that going to mean for Elqaneve? And . . . oh fuck . . . what about the spirit seals? Delilah, the Keraastar Knights! Where are they? You know Telazhar is aiming to find the seals and if the Knights were caught in the rubble . . . We don’t even know where Queen Asteria kept them hidden.”
I was shaking with both fear and weariness. The stress we were under had gone from meh to horrendous in the course of one evening. “I don’t know. I have no clue where she kept the Keraastar Knights cloistered. What the hell do we do?”
The Knights were formed by Queen Asteria, who had been protecting the spirit seals we’d managed to gather. Each knight was bound to a seal, and what she was planning, we did not know. One spirit seal we’d stumbled on was still unbound, and so it, too, was floating around. Until this moment, eight of the nine had come to light and we’d managed to keep hold of six of them.
Five of our friends had been conscripted into service—Venus the Moon Child, the Rainier Puma Pride’s former shaman, Benjamin Welter—a disturbed young man, Luke—Menolly’s former bartender, and his sister Amber, and Tom Lane, who was actually the Tam Lin from legend. He was a broken man, after so many thousands of years, but he still carried the spirit seal with honor.
“We’ve got to get word to Father and Tanaquar. They can help. But the way things are going, I don’t even know if there will be a city to save. The storm . . . Delilah, that storm is one of the most terrifying entities I’ve ever felt. Worse than Gulakah and he was a god.” She gave me a pale, strained look. Tears ran down her cheeks but they were silent, as if she didn’t even know they were being shed.
“Do you think I should tell Trenyth about Asteria? He loves her so much. How can I break his heart?” I hung my head.
“We have to. The pain will be there whether you tell him now, or whether he finds her body in the rubble. Best to prepare him, I think. And though he’ll be heartbroken, he’s professional enough to focus on the job at hand. Come on, let’s go.” She turned to the door and we headed back down the hall.
Trenyth was waiting in the hall for us, but before we could speak, he hustled us toward the storeroom. “Come on, we have to get out of here now. Save whatever it is for later. We have to move.”
We burst through the storeroom door that led to another chamber, which had a magically sealed door to the outside. Trenyth broke the seal with a single slam of the hand against the door and again, I wondered just how much power the advisor had hidden away. We had never really had the chance to see him in action, or to ask him what his specialties were.
When he opened the outer door, Camille and I clung together, not knowing what we’d be seeing. It was going on close to midnight. Surely the horrendous storm had to have broken. How long could it last? How long could the sorcerers keep fueling it? But a little voice inside whispered doubts. How many sorcerers are you talking about? A dozen? A hundred? Telazhar would not arrive with a short deck. No, this was all out war and so they’d be prepared. And they’d caught Elqaneve—and us—unprepared.
And now, Queen Asteria was dead.
We stepped out, and the storm was still raging. As far as we could see, the landscape was dotted with fires, raging in brilliant oranges and pinks and crimsons. Magical fire. Was this the Scorching Wars, all over again?
There were no buildings standing, save for the one we’d come out of, and that was only by the fact that it was hidden behind an illusionary barrier. But, as Camille and I looked around, the devastation began to sink in. The palace was in rubble. The outer buildings were so much wreckage, splintered beyond any hope of recognizing what they had been only hours before.
“We have to find your sister and friends, and the Queen.” Trenyth glanced at the sky. The churning clouds seemed to be thinning, but now they were streaking smaller bolts of lightning down to set off the tallest trees.
“Trenyth—stop!” I grabbed his arm. “Queen Asteria is dead. While I was asleep, I was summoned to Haseofon. I was . . . I had to . . .” I stopped, staring at him bleakly and, after a moment’s hesitation, blurted out. “I was assigned to escort her through the veil, in an honored manner, to her ancestors.”
He stared at me for a moment. Then, without a word, without showing a clue how he felt, he turned back to the palace. “We must focus on finding your sister and we absolutely have to find Sharah, if she’s alive. She’s the Queen’s niece. Technically, she’s an heir to the throne and who knows how many of them are alive? There were only two or three others in line before Sharah. And with the devastation this storm has wrought . . .” He trailed off.
But the thought was enough to send me into a tailspin. Sharah had mentioned this. She could end up being the next queen of Elqaneve. And what would that mean for her and Chase and their baby? If they still live, the voice of fear inside me said. If they made it out. And what about my love, Shade? While I had little doubt he could survive, there was also Trillian. So many factors. So many chances for death.
“Let’s go. We’ll have to chance the storm, but it seems to have let up some.” Camille headed toward the palace, trying to avoid the pieces of debris that could cut her feet if she stepped wrong.
We ran through the darkness, past bodies charred by fire, hit by shrapnel. Everywhere, the screams of the injured rang out and my heart ached because there was nothing we could do for them. We ran through the hail of lightning bolts, the ravages of the magical thunder, skirting trees, skirting debris, skirting chunks of marble and stone that had been blasted when the palace went down. The sky lit the night brighter than the moon ever could, but even so, the storm was moving to the west, moving away.
By the time we reached the palace, the strikes were few and far between. I looked around nervously, wondering where the sorcerers actually were. Surely they weren’t around the corner. They had no need to put themselves directly in the line of fire—magic traveled across long distances. And why not send in the grunts first, to take c
are of those left standing? Which meant, chances were that before morning a contingent of mercenaries would show up on the outskirts of the Elfin city. They’d want to get in before Y’Elestrial or Dahnsburg could send help.
Camille shouted and leaned on my shoulder, raising her foot. She yanked out a sliver of glass and tossed it to the side. “I need shoes.”
I let out a long breath. “Yeah. Hold on.”
There were several corpses near us and I shivered as I approached them. This was so surreal that I barely knew what I was feeling. But one of them—a woman, who had been struck by a piece of granite, had feet near Camille’s size. And she was wearing a pair of leather moccasins. I quickly, silently, yanked them off her feet and without looking at the dead woman’s face, handed them to Camille. She said nothing, looking mutely at me. But she put them on and we continued on to the palace.
The steps were broken, but still accessible in some places. The tons of stone and alabaster, of metal and wood that sprawled before us were daunting. Smoke filled the air from the still-burning fires, and dust hung heavy, choking us as we neared the shattered palace. Up was down, front was back, and it was hard to remember where anything had been.
Trenyth led us on, as we approached the behemoth that had been Asteria’s pristine court. Camille was crying, but her tears were silent and slowly ran down her face as she shook her head.
Trenyth’s lips were pressed together, as he grimly assessed the area. After a moment, he pointed to the left. “That way.”
And we were off.
Making our way through the rubble was a nightmare. So many death traps, so many blockades. Here a body, there a body. A pile of what was once a royal statue, now ground to rubble and ash. Skirt a fire that burned brightly, showing no sign of stopping—and don’t look because the fuel may just be a pile of corpses. The scent of burning stone, the scent of burning flesh. The greasy feel to the air because so much soot was flying loose. A bonfire to rival all bonfires, a testament to destruction and death, to hatred and greed. And there, to the right, that had been the throne room . . .
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