by Eva Brandt
“And even if through some kind of miracle, you were able to get rid of the side-effects of the vow and of Darius’s family, you have to remember he is a prince. That’s not just a word. For paranormal individuals, he’s a public figure. He can’t exactly run away and hide in the human world. The Accursed have a lot of enemies, and the Alarian royal family is no exception. He wouldn’t last a month without real protection.”
Lucienne looked at me, and I hated myself more than ever for being the cause of the desperation I could see in her eyes. “Is that true?”
I couldn’t lie to her face again, not now. “Yes. He’s right.”
“Oh.”
That single word echoed between us like a gunshot. Lucienne stared past my shoulder, her eyes blank and empty, devoid of life. If I hadn’t known any better, I could have sworn she was the one who’d fallen into a vegetative state.
But she was Lucienne Hastings, my beautiful, brave soulmate, so it didn’t take her long to recover. Mere seconds after Mathias had dropped that revelation onto her shoulders, she took a deep breath, straightened her back and faced him once again. “What do you want, really, Mr. Vandale? When we spoke, you mentioned vengeance for your family. If that is the case, if you’re truly as angry as you seemed at the time, why would you want to help us?”
Her words were sharp and biting, carrying an edge that would have made anyone flinch. They had a different effect on Mathias. “Because I want my family back, and I believe you can help me with that,” he replied. “You’re more powerful than you know, Ms. Hastings, and you’re not on a leash anymore. Trust me. I swear on my wife’s soul that I am not lying.”
A wave of something deep and pure vibrated through my mindscape, and I could sense the genuine solidity of the oath Mathias Vandale had just made. He wasn’t joking around. This was truly what he wanted. I couldn’t help but be leery of his admittance that he needed Lucienne’s power to get his family back, but it was at least a logical explanation for his behavior. It certainly made more sense than his previous claim that he cared about us.
Lucienne must have felt the same thing I had because she slowly nodded. Still, she didn’t seem inclined to go along with his plan just yet. “You know, I think I believe you. But even so, that means nothing after everything you’ve done to all the people I love.”
Mathias didn’t even blink at her question. “Pierce Garnier and Declan Whelan, right? I can assure you Guardian Whelan is perfectly fine. I have a tentative agreement with him. As for Mr. Garnier...” He hesitated, and the uncharacteristic behavior shocked me almost as much as his previous declarations of affection. “I’m afraid I don’t know what happened to him,” he continued. “I’m still looking.”
“You don’t know?” Lucienne asked in disbelief. “How can you not know? It was your people who attacked us at my apartment.”
“Yes, and a lot of them acted individually. On my orders, but separate from me. You might not be aware of this, but every single person who entered your apartment was killed, Ms. Hastings. My current working theory is that Mr. Garnier’s sister and mother might have been involved and they might have fled together, but I can’t be certain. There are other factors involved, such as your father.”
That was definitely not something I had expected Mathias to say. Lucienne was even more surprised than I was. “My what? You do realize I’m an orphan, right?”
Mathias shot her a small, smug smile. “You’ll find that’s not quite true, although I admit your father has done a good job at hiding from me. Not anymore, though.”
It wasn’t the best idea to act that way with Lucienne in a bad mood. Snarling, she stalked to Mathias’s side, took hold of his shoulders and actually shook him. Sparks of power flashed at their point of contact, hitting Mathias’s skin and leaving slight burn traces behind. “Stop talking in riddles. If you really want us to work with you, don’t bullshit me or play games. I don’t have a father. I’ve never had one. The Garniers were the closest thing I’ve ever had to a family, and that didn’t work out well for me at all.”
Ah, yes, those damn twice-blessed. If I hadn’t been stuck in a bed, in a coma induced by my own mother’s magic, I would have gone after them and given them a lesson on the consequences of using the soulmate of an Alarian prince as a food source.
Then again, judging by Lucienne’s reaction to Pierce Garnier’s disappearance, that might have been a bad idea.
“I don’t have all the answers for you, Lucienne, and the answers I do have, you would not believe,” Mathias replied. He tilted his head as if listening to something Lucienne and I couldn’t hear. “But that’s enough for now. You need to go. Go back. If anyone finds you like this, it would be bad. We’ll talk again later.”
“Wait!” Lucienne shot back, clinging to him so tightly I almost felt jealous. “You can’t just drop such a bomb on me and tell me to leave. What are—?”
She never got the chance to finish the sentence. One moment, she was there, and the next, she had vanished into the ether, her body dissipating into bright golden crystals.
The sight made vicious anger rise up inside me. The destructive energies I shouldn’t have been able to access while in this part of my mindscape lashed out at Mathias. An invisible blast struck him in the chest, propelling him back with such force that he landed almost thirty feet away from me.
When he didn’t immediately get up, I made my way to his side, still furious with him. I grabbed the lapels of his jacket and pulled him up, hating myself for failing to protect her and him for taking advantage of that. “How dare you? How dare you do such a thing to her?”
He met my angry gaze without flinching and didn’t try to free himself from my hold. “I had my reasons, but I suppose I could have been a little more tactful in my words.”
“Tactful?” I snarled at him, tempted to attack him again. “This isn’t a matter of tact. You were deliberately cruel. Lucienne deserves better than to be the target of your mind games. Why would you say such a thing to her?”
Mathias finally extracted himself from my grip and pushed me away. “Because it’s true, and she needed to find out. I would have told her about it even if I hadn’t met with her today.
“None of what I said was a mind game, Darius. It was a secret, one she had to know. Secrets are dangerous. By their nature, they want to be revealed, and three-quarters of the time, when that happens, the result is very messy. Your people have been keeping a lot of secrets. I’m just trying to do some damage control and hopefully get us all out of this one alive.”
Once again, I could not argue with him. After all, I’d tried to keep an important secret, and that had ended with me in a healing room, alive only because my enemy had decided to save me. But this was bigger than me. I knew better than anyone that The Pure Kingdom of Alaria kept more secrets than I ever could. Most of the records that dated from the time of the High King were sealed, and no one but the ruling monarch and the cardinal had access to them. I had never questioned it because it hadn’t been my place, but now, I wondered if maybe I should have.
I supposed this meant Mathias and I were at a stalemate since he was being as tight-lipped as my parents.
“You’re right, Mathias,” I told him. “Secrets are dangerous. When you’re ready to reveal yours, I’ll trust you. Until then, we won’t be able to get anywhere. Maybe it’s true that you have your reasons, but that means nothing if you don’t explain what those reasons actually are.”
“I might not have to,” Mathias answered darkly. “I’m afraid, princeling, that soon enough, my reasons will come out on their own, and no one will like the results.”
Six
Family
Malachai
It was quiet after Bjorn left, almost eerily so. I should have felt happier about the fact that we’d succeeded in mind controlling one of the most powerful men in The Pure Kingdom of Alaria, but instead, I just sat there, on the floor of my cell, staring at my shackled hands and wondering where we would truly be going with th
is.
Cardinal Vaughn might be able to arrange for the accusations against me to be dismissed since I’d never actually worked against Alaria and had only slipped up once. It was a bit of a long shot, but not impossible. Still, even assuming he succeeded, where would I go from there? Bjorn had not elaborated on what kind of plan he had to find Declan—if he had any plan at all—and Prince Darius’s fate was even more questionable than mine.
On the other hand, I now knew my soulmate would be safe. Lucienne would at least survive this, no matter what happened to us. But even that was a double-edged blade since it drastically changed my perspective on Declan’s situation. I was thrilled that Lucienne’s survival didn’t have to come hand in hand with our deaths, but that made Declan’s disappearance even more difficult to deal with. Worse still, we were presumably the ones being affected by the curse. If Declan wasn’t already dead, he would be, soon, and I might not even find out about it.
I shook my head, trying to force back my errant emotions. I couldn’t lose hope. The trial was coming up, and I needed to keep my promise and work with Bjorn. Declan was still alive, and I would find him. I had to. This was a good thing. I needed to focus on that and... and...
And what?
I felt cold. Why did I feel so cold?
“It’s the blood. You’ve been feeding on Bjorn Lindberg’s blood a lot, and the effects are starting to show.”
The words seemed to come out of nowhere, and I jerked in my chains, frantically scanning my cell for the source of the sound. At first, there was nothing there for me to find, and I thought that I’d started to hallucinate. Perhaps my subconscious was trying to warn me about relying so much on Bjorn for every single thing.
That theory was thrown out the window when a blond-haired young man glided through my cell door. He waved at me cheerfully, and his translucent body glowed so brightly the light almost made my eyes hurt. His clothes were a strange, mismatched ensemble, the shabby, dirty shirt and pants clashing with the elegant Alarian cloak he wore over them.
“Greetings, Guardian Malachai Braun,” he said. “You’re looking a little peaky.”
I narrowed my eyes at the young man, not finding his sunny demeanor in the least bit encouraging. “I’ve had better days. Who in the name of the High King are you?”
The young man shot me a small, almost teasing smirk. “My name is Alois, and I’m someone who wants to help you. Keep your voice down. We wouldn’t want anyone to hear you talking to me.”
“I don’t think that’s really such a big issue right now,” I replied neutrally. I followed his advice and lowered my voice, but not necessarily because I believed him. Considering my following words with care, I added, “I’ve given Cardinal Vaughn all the information I have.”
I didn’t know who this Alois person actually was, but he was clearly a mind mage of some skill. He seemed young, but appearances were deceiving. There were plenty of supernatural creatures in the world that aged very slowly. Some could live over a thousand years and not look any older than I was. Mathias Vandale was an eloquent example.
Alois could be just as dangerous as the plagues, maybe a trap arranged by one of the Alarian nobles to make me give myself away. If they had deemed Cardinal Vaughn’s behavior suspicious, they might have wanted to double-check the information the man had provided in a subtler way. It seemed unnecessarily convoluted, but I couldn’t come up with any other explanations. Perhaps my lie would be enough to make Alois clarify my dilemma.
It wasn’t. In fact, Alois didn’t believe me at all. He snorted and rolled his eyes at me. “Yes, I know all about how cooperative you are with The Pure Inquisition. Then again, it’s one inquisitor, in particular, you’re cooperative with. The cardinal wasn’t so lucky. I have to admit I didn’t expect your little mind control scheme to work so well. Congratulations.”
The nonchalant reference to our earlier actions sent shivers down my spine. I went rigid, wishing Bjorn hadn’t been forced to cuff me again for the sake of appearances. “I don’t know what you’re talking about.”
“Sure you don’t.” The look Alois shot me was so unimpressed it could have rivaled the straight-faced, blank expressions of the Alarians. “Don’t worry. I won’t say anything. Even if I wanted to, which I don’t, by the way, no one but you can see or hear me.”
The comment made a strange discomfort stir in my chest. I couldn’t quite pinpoint the reason, but it was there, like a fist clenching around my heart and my lungs, making it difficult for me to breathe.
Fortunately, vampires didn’t need air, and I’d endured worse experiences and burdens. “Who are you?” I asked again because his earlier introduction hadn’t explained anything at all. “I want a real answer.”
“We’ve been over this. I’m someone who wants to help you.” His exasperated expression melted into a serious, dark frown. “Now, listen closely. You’re not wrong in being wary of what will soon happen. Bjorn’s plan will come in handy, but it isn’t nearly enough to save you and the others from the mess you’ve landed yourselves in.”
It was my turn to snort. “I’m well aware of that. Tell me something I don’t know.”
My words weren’t meant to come out like an actual request, but Alois interpreted them as such. “Okay. There is a legal way for you to avoid execution. A quirk of Alarian law, in a way. Have you ever heard of the High King’s Privilege?”
The concept was familiar, but I didn’t actually know much about it. “Isn’t it that ancient and obsolete enchantment that predated the Alarian Vow?” I asked, trying, but failing to remember the details.
“Yes, but do you know what it does?”
All future guardians were required to study the history of The Pure Kingdom of Alaria before they became part of the Guardian Corps, but none of the readings I remembered had actually explained what the High King’s Privilege involved. I hadn’t looked into it too deeply, because I’d been more concerned with the present than the past.
I really should have known better. Everything about our species was affected by something that had happened over a millennium ago, and we would never escape it.
Pushing back the bitterness that always came when I acknowledged that thought, I shook my head and replied, “I assumed the High King’s Privilege worked like the Alarian Vow and was something related solely to the royal family. I take it I was wrong.”
Alois confirmed this guess, although the explanation he provided after that was nothing like what I had expected. “It’s not a spell at all, not really, or rather, not just that. It’s an artifact, the only item known to be capable of holding back the Accursed Syndrome.”
All right. That settled it. The incubus blood had indeed gotten to me, but the side-effects were even more powerful than I had realized. I was having a strange hallucination about a young mind mage telling me a cure existed for the curse we had been trying to fight for over a millennium.
“It’s not a cure,” Alois told me as if he could read my mind. “It’s more like... a protective enchantment. The High King’s Privilege is a pendant, and whoever carries it is kept safe from the dark forces that cause the Accursed Syndrome.”
“If that is the case, why isn’t King Sterling using it?” I asked, making no attempt to hide my skepticism. “Why is it a secret? Why is the enchantment not something we’re all taught?”
Alois took my frustrated outburst in stride. “Because it can only be used by people with a certain connection to the High King. It never worked for the High King’s heirs, so after he died, the enchantment on it went dormant. It was impossible for his children to mimic it, so they decided on using the Alarian Vow, instead.”
This was all so very strange. I’d always been under the impression that King Alaric had been the one to come up with the vow, but apparently not.
Did it really matter, though? While Alois’s story was interesting and all, it had very little relevance for my situation and couldn’t actually fix any of my problems. “Assuming I believe this, that I believe
you’re telling the truth and you’re not a figment of my overactive imagination... How does the High King’s Privilege help us in any way? I’m not an Alarisson. Neither is Bjorn. And if Prince Darius had been able to use the pendant, he’d have done so already instead of nearly killing himself during the battle with Mathias Vandale.”
Alois let out a low sigh and his shoulders slumped. “It’s complicated. Technically, Darius could use the pendant, but for him to be able to do that, he’d have to go through a specific process. I would have told him about it or explained, but he can’t see me, so I couldn’t make the suggestion.”
I rubbed my temples tiredly, trying to stave off my stress-induced migraine. Vampires weren’t supposed to be able to get headaches, but I was on well on my way to changing every single rule about my people. “I hope you know none of this makes any sense. If Darius can’t see you, why can I? He’s far better at mind magic than I am. And nothing you’ve said so far answers the most important question I have. Why would I be able to make use of the High King’s Privilege?”
“Let me put it this way.” Alois walked up to me and reached for my hand. He didn’t actually touch me, but when his transparent fingers hovered over mine, my skin started to buzz in an odd way I wasn’t sure I felt comfortable with. “You weren’t always Malachai Braun. Once upon a time, many years ago, you were someone else.”
“Once upon a time?” I repeated numbly. “You mean... In a past life?”
I’d always known reincarnation was possible, because that was half the reason why the Accursed existed, to begin with. Even so, I hadn’t given much thought to the identity I might have had in any of my past lives. It had seemed like a useless thing to worry about when I’d already had enough on my plate with my current existence.
