A Kingdom of Flesh and Fire

by Jennifer L. Armentrout

  Restlessness hummed through me, an almost nervous sort of energy as I tried and failed to shut off the emotions of others. I didn’t know why I couldn’t when reading the emotions only when I wanted to had become so much easier throughout the day. Was it because I was tired? Maybe it was what happened with Beckett or possibly even what I’d done in the cavern with Casteel.

  Or perhaps it was learning that Casteel had kept yet another thing from me?

  It was probably all of those things that played a role in my sudden failure to shut down my abilities.

  I looked at my plate of mostly untouched food, and I…I simply did not want to sit here any longer.

  And I was tired of doing things I didn’t want to do.

  “Excuse me,” I said to no one in particular, rising from my seat.

  Jasper watched me but said nothing as I stepped around the chair. I walked past the tables, aware of conversations halting as I passed. I kept my chin high, wishing I’d had the forethought to go through the clothing Vonetta had brought over. Nothing took the dignity out of one’s exit like wearing clothing several sizes too large.

  But I doubted being dressed in pretty tunics or even the richest of gowns would’ve changed a damn thing.

  I pushed open one of the doors and stepped outside, dragging in deep breaths clean of others’ emotions. Stars had already started to glimmer in the deepening sky, and I stared upward. I was finally able to close myself off.

  Turning, I spotted Delano and Naill sitting on the crumbling wall that led to the Bay. I didn’t try to read them, and it worked. Their emotions weren’t forced onto me.

  “You look like you could use a drink.” Delano offered the bottle of brown liquid he held. “It’s whiskey.”

  I walked over, taking the bottle by the neck. “Thank you,” I said, lifting it. The woody aroma was powerful.

  “Tastes like horse piss,” Naill said. “Fair warning.”

  I nodded, tipping the bottle to my mouth and taking a long swallow. The liquor burned my throat and eyes. Coughing, I pressed the back of my hand to my mouth as I handed the bottle to Delano. “I don’t know what horse piss tastes like, but I’m sure that’s a good comparison.”

  Naill chuckled.

  “We were getting ready to head in there.” Delano stretched out his legs, crossing them at the ankles. “But we figured we’d wait until the air cleared a bit.”

  “Good choice,” I muttered.

  “Looks like the room is airing out now.” Naill’s gaze flicked over my shoulder.

  The muscles in the back of my neck tightened. “Please tell me that’s not him.”

  “Well, I suppose it depends on who him is,” Delano drawled.

  I turned to see Casteel coming down the steps and across the short distance that separated us, his gaze locked onto mine.

  “I have a feeling the air is going to get a bit thick out here.” Naill hopped off the wall. “I think it’s time we head inside.”

  “Wise call,” Casteel remarked, his gaze, nearly feral, never leaving mine.

  Delano pushed off the wall. “Please, no stabbing. All of that makes me anxious.”

  I crossed my arms. “No promises.”

  Casteel smirked but said nothing as Naill and Delano made their way back into the fort. He stared at me.

  I stared at him. “Do you need something?”

  “That’s a loaded question.”

  “I was hoping it was a rhetorical one with the answer being: obviously, no,” I said.

  “Sorry to disappoint you,” he replied. “Why did you leave?”

  “I wanted a few moments to myself, but apparently, that isn’t going to happen.”

  A muscle flexed in his jaw. “I’m sorry, Poppy.”

  My brows lifted as I focused on him. There was still a potent thread of anger in him, and I didn’t delve deeper into the layers of emotions. “About what exactly?”

  “About more than one thing, apparently,” he replied, and my eyes narrowed. “But I’d like to start with how my people have behaved toward you. I hate that they’ve made you feel so unwelcome, and I hate that you know how they feel. I can promise you that will change.”

  “You…you really believe that you can change that? You can’t,” I told him before he answered. “They will either accept me or not. Either way, I expected this, and there’s no way you didn’t. You just hoped I wouldn’t read them.”

  “I wished you wouldn’t have known,” he corrected. “How could I not wish that? And I do believe how they feel about you will change.”

  Pressing my lips together, I looked away. I didn’t think it was impossible for them to change. Feelings were not stagnant. Neither were opinions or beliefs, and if we stopped believing people were capable of change, then the world might as well be left to burn.

  “We need to talk and not about the people in that room,” he said.

  I turned from him to where the reflection of the moon rippled across the Bay. “That’s the last thing I want to do right now.”

  “Do you have better ideas?” He stepped closer, the heat and scent of him reaching me. “I know I do.”

  My gaze shot to him. “If you’re suggesting what I think you are, I am going to stab you in the heart again.”

  Casteel’s eyes flashed a warm honey. “Don’t tempt me with empty promises.”

  “You are so twisted.”

  “Alastir was right. I do take after my father when it comes to women with sharp objects,” he said.

  “I don’t care.”

  He ignored that. “My mother has stabbed my father a time or a dozen over the years. He claims he deserved it each time, and truthfully, he never seemed all that torn up about being stabbed. Probably had something to do with the fact that they’d be holed up in their private chambers for days after a spat.”

  “Glad to know the disturbed apple doesn’t fall too far from the crazy tree.”

  He chuckled.

  The door opened behind us, and Kieran prowled out. “Don’t yell at me,” he said as the door swung closed behind him. “But my father wants to speak to you.”

  “Your father?” I frowned, and then it occurred to me. “Jasper?”

  Kieran nodded, and now I knew why I thought some of Jasper’s features were familiar.

  A muscle flexed in Casteel’s jaw once more. “He’s going to—”

  “Go speak with Jasper,” I cut in. “Because as I already said, I don’t really want to talk to you right now.”

  “Keep telling yourself that, and maybe it’ll be true.” Casteel turned to Kieran as I came this close to punching him. “I really hope your father has a good reason for wanting to speak with me right this moment.”

  “Knowing him, he probably just wants to laugh at you,” Kieran replied. “So have fun with that.”

  Casteel flipped Kieran off as he stalked back toward the doors.

  “Very princely,” Kieran called after him and then turned to me. “Come, Penellaphe. I’ll take you back to your room. Then I must ensure that Casteel actually doesn’t end up slaughtering someone, because my father is sure to drive him crazy.”

  “I don’t—” Exhaling heavily, I was too irritated to even argue. “Whatever.”

  Kieran extended an arm and waited. Swallowing a mouthful of curses, I walked past him.

  “That was a spectacular dinner,” he said as we rounded the fortress.

  “Wasn’t it?”

  He snorted.

  Neither of us spoke as he walked me back to my room. It was only when he went to close the door that I asked, “Your father is the what? Leader of the wolven?”

  “He speaks for them, yes. Brings any concerns or ideas to the King and Queen.”

  Remembering that Vonetta planned to travel home to visit their mother, I asked, “Is your father normally in Spessa’s End?”

  “He comes quite regularly to check on the wolven that are here. Sometimes, our mother travels with him, but she’s due soon.”

  For a moment, what h
e’d said didn’t make sense. And then it did. “Your mother is pregnant?”

  A faint grin appeared. “You look so surprised.”

  “I’m sorry. It’s just that…you’re around Casteel’s age, right?”

  “We’re the same age. Vonetta—who won’t be the baby of the family much longer—was born sixty years after me,” he answered. “My father is nearly six hundred years old—my mother four hundred. Next to Alastir, he is one of the oldest wolven still alive.”

  “That’s a…hell of an age gap between children,” I murmured.

  “Not when you think about how long it takes to rear a wolven. Beckett may resemble a mortal who is no older than thirteen, but in reality, he is older than you by many years. So is Quentyn.”

  That made sense. Casteel had said that aging slowed once an Atlantian entered the Culling. Quentyn may look my age or slightly younger, but he was most likely years older than me. “How did your father come to this position?”

  “Not many wolven survived the war, so there simply wasn’t a lot to choose from,” he explained, and that…that was sad to consider. “Are you sure that is what you want to ask me about?”

  It was.

  And it wasn’t.

  Another question burned through me, but I wasn’t going to ask that.

  Kieran hesitated and then nodded. “Then goodnight, Penellaphe.”

  “Goodnight,” I murmured, standing there until the door closed. Then I was alone. Alone with only my feelings, my own thoughts.

  Promised to another.

  Weariness enveloped me as I slowly walked into the bedroom. I went to the clothing Vonetta had brought over, relieved to see not a single item of white. I picked up a dark blue tunic with fine gold threading along the hem and edging. It was sleeveless and long, with slits up the sides. There was another that was gold, nearly the color of an elemental’s eyes. I smoothed my hand over the soft, cottony material. There was another shirt of emerald green, one with frilly sleeves and a fancy neckline. I sat the tops aside, finding two pairs of black leggings that were as thick as breeches, and both appeared as if they’d fit me. A hooded cloak made of cotton was folded on top of several new undergarments. Vonetta had mentioned the cloak, and now that I saw it, I knew she was right when she’d said it was far more suitable than the heavier winter cloaks.

  But it was what lay underneath that confused me.

  It was a splash of blue nearly as pale as a wolven’s eyes. I picked up the slippery, silky material, my eyes widening at the tiny straps and minimal length.

  The thing was indecent.

  But the nightgown I’d been given in New Haven was far too heavy for nights that didn’t drop below freezing, and this…this nightgown didn’t actually require a sash to stay closed, so there was that.

  Dropping it onto the bed, I turned around and I had no idea how long I stood there before I sprang forward, racing back into the living area. I went to the door, placing my hands on it. Tentatively, I reached down and turned the handle.

  The door opened.

  I quickly closed it and slowly backed up, waiting for Kieran to return, to realize that he’d left the door unlocked. When he didn’t—when no one came—my hands trembled. And when I realized that no one had locked the door behind me earlier today or even the first night Casteel and I arrived, my arms began to shake.

  I wasn’t caged anymore. A willing captive. I just hadn’t noticed that none of the doors had been locked from the outside.

  Gods.

  Realizing that did something to me. It unlocked the rawest emotion inside me, and it hit me hard. Sinking to the floor, I clasped my hands over my face as tears poured from me. The doors were unlocked. There were no guards, no one to govern me. If I wanted, I could simply walk out and go…well, wherever I wanted. I didn’t have to sneak out or pick a lock. The tears…they were borne of relief, and they were tinged with earlier hurts and older ones that had scarred many years ago. They were weighted with the knowledge of future pain, and they fell from the realization that tonight, when I sat at that table, I had finally shed the veil of the Maiden by defending myself. It wasn’t that I hadn’t done it before. I’d stood up for myself with Casteel and Kieran, and even Alastir, but tonight was different. Because there was no returning to the silence, to that submission. It didn’t matter if I was the neck that turned the head of a kingdom or an outsider in a room full of people who had every right to distrust me. Staying silent was only temporarily easier than shattering the silence, and that realization was painful. It shone a light on all the times I could’ve spoken up—could’ve risked whatever consequences. All of those things fed my tears.

  I cried. I cried until my head ached. I cried until there was nothing left in me, and I was just a hollow vessel, and then…then I pulled myself together.

  Because I was no longer a captive.

  I was no longer the Maiden.

  And what I felt for Casteel—what I was only beginning to accept—was something I had to deal with.

  What I said tonight at dinner? It was true. All of it. Even that last part was true, wasn’t it? That even if I hadn’t entirely forgiven him for his lies or the deaths he’d caused, I’d accepted them because they were a part of his past—our past—and they didn’t change how I felt, right or wrong. That was what I’d denied for so long.

  I loved him.

  I was in love with him, even though that love had been built on a foundation of lies. I loved him even though there was so much I didn’t know about him. I loved him even though I knew I was a willing pawn to him.

  And this didn’t happen overnight. It shouldn’t come as a shock, because I was already in love with him the moment my heart broke when I learned the truth of who he was. I fell in love with him when he was Hawke, and I kept falling once I learned that he was Casteel. And I knew it wasn’t because he was my first everything. I knew it wasn’t my naivety or lack of experience.

  It was because he made me feel seen, and he made me feel alive even when I genuinely wanted to cause physical harm to him. I kept falling when he never once told me not to pick up a sword or bow and instead handed one to me. I fell and fell when I realized that Casteel wore many masks for many reasons. What I felt only grew when I realized that he would, in fact, kill whoever insulted me, no matter how wrong that was. And that love…it entrenched itself deeply when I realized the kind of strength and will he had within him to survive what he had and to still find the pieces of who he used to be.

  And the catch in my breath, the shiver and the ache whenever he looked at me, when his eyes were like twin golden flames, whenever he touched me, it went beyond lust. I didn’t need experience to recognize the difference. He didn’t have pieces of me. He had my whole heart, and he had from the moment he allowed me to protect myself, from the moment he stood beside me instead of in front of me.

  And that realization was terrifying. Scared me more than a horde of Craven or murderous Ascended ever could. Because I had to deal with what Casteel felt and what he didn’t.

  The reason Casteel hadn’t told me about this Gianna was the same reason he hadn’t told me about the Joining or about Spessa’s End. Kieran could be right, and he could be wrong. Casteel may care for me—care for me enough to not want to see undue harm befall me, and Casteel did want me physically, but that didn’t mean we were heartmates. That didn’t mean he loved me. And no amount of pretending would change that or how I felt.

  I had to deal.

  And I would.

  Because my agreement with Casteel remained. I wouldn’t back out because of how I felt or that my feelings were hurt. My brother was more important than that.

  I lifted my head, bleary eyes focused on the ancient stone walls. The people of Solis were more important than how I felt, so were all those who called Atlantia home. Casteel’s brother was more important, as were all those names on the walls of the underground chambers.

  Casteel and I could change things. We could stop the Ascended, and that was what mattered.r />
  Climbing to my feet, I shakily made my way to the small bathing chamber, grateful that Casteel hadn’t returned while I’d been having a complete breakdown and moment of realization. I splashed away the tears staining my face and then undressed, pulling on the nightgown that could barely be called clothing. The cool material skimmed my breasts and hips, ending just below my rear. Tomorrow, I would question whether or not women actually slept in this…this scrap of silk, but tonight, I was too tired to even be concerned with it. After locking the doors, I took my dagger to the bed, placing in under the pillow. Pulling the blanket up over me, I tried not to think about how everything smelled of Casteel. I closed my aching eyes, and as weary as I was from everything, I immediately drifted into the oblivion of nothing.

  It was the bed shifting under unexpected weight that woke me sometime later. Rolling onto my side, I slipped the dagger from under the pillow.

  A hand caught my wrist in the shadows of the room, and a voice whispered, “Are you going to stab me in the heart? Again?”

  Chapter 33

  The scent of rich spice and pine reached me the second after the words.

  Casteel.

  My racing heart didn’t slow. “Why don’t you let go of my wrist and find out?”

  “That sounds like a yes if I ever heard one,” he replied as my eyes adjusted. The glow of the lamp outside the canopy cast most of him in shadow, but he was close enough that I could see the arch of a brow and the amused tilt to his lips.

  Promised to someone else.

  Anger was a heatwave that swept away any lingering sleep. “Let me go.”

  “I don’t know if I should.” His thumb moved in an idle circle along the inside of my wrist as he said, “Someone is likely to be very irritated if you stab me, and I end up bleeding all over the bed.”

  “You could always clean up after yourself.”

  “There’s something innately wrong with the idea of being stabbed and then having to clean up my own blood.”

  I pushed against his hold, but my hand remained pinned to the bed. “There’s something innately wrong with you being in here! How did you even get in? I locked the doors.”