The Hellhound King

by Lori Devoti

  With Geir wrapped in the net and flung over his shoulder, Raf followed her out of the room. She walked up two flights of stairs and down a hallway he hadn’t been down before. At the end she flung open a door.

  At first, in the semidarkness, he thought they were standing in a small room, then she flipped on the lights. A huge silver and crystal chandelier blazed to life. They were in a balcony, overlooking a ballroom.

  “There.” She pointed to the chandelier.

  The decorative light hung two stories above the dance floor below.

  “When my parents were still alive, there were parties here. I used to sneak up to watch.” She walked to the right and reached behind a curtain. There was the sound of machinery grinding. The chandelier began to move toward them.

  “Once a year the servants would take the chandelier down and clean it. I used to watch that, too.”

  The light stopped at the edge of the balcony.

  Marina leaned over and stared at the ground below. “It’s a long way down. Even an elf wouldn’t try to jump.”

  Finally understanding what his niece meant to do with him, Geir began to complain. Raf lifted the netted elf from his shoulder and began hooking the silver arms of the chandelier through the holes. Once Geir was dangling like a cocoon from a branch, he stepped back. Geir kicked out, but Raf had twisted the net well. The chandelier began to sway, but the elf was unable to find an opening big enough for more than his fingers.

  He looped them through the weave and yelled, “There are other ways. I should have listened to the others. If you are dead, Ky will be princess. I shouldn’t have held to the legend. I should have—”

  Raf cut off the rest of his tirade with a kick. The net swayed violently. Geir’s face paled. “This chandelier is an antique; it can’t take movement like that,” he muttered.

  Standing by the curtain, Marina flipped the switch. The chandelier began its journey back to the center of the ballroom. “Then you’d better hold perfectly still.”

  She turned on the heel of her foot and stalked from the balcony. With a grin, Raf followed.

  This was the Marina he loved.

  After leaving the ballroom, Marina lead Raf to Ky’s room. She placed her hand flat against the door.

  Raf didn’t say anything, just watched her.

  She was having a hard time accepting that her sister wanted her dead, felt deep inside if they could sit down and talk they could work all this out.

  Raf placed his hand next to hers. “Forget her.”

  “Could you forget your brother?”

  His jaw tightened. “My brother didn’t betray me, didn’t bring people into my home to kill me. He didn’t fail me—I failed him.”

  Marina nodded. She knew he was right, but still…“Maybe I failed Ky, too. Growing up I didn’t give her much thought. She was just a kid who lived in the same house as me, and then when things started going bad, I got so caught up in my own world, I practically forgot she existed. When I left for Gunngar, left her here with my uncle, I didn’t consider her or her feelings. I wasn’t a sister to her, not really.”

  Raf slipped an arm around her waist. The weight of it was reassuring, so was the smooth baritone of his voice. “That’s what being young is about, being wrapped up in yourself. It’s only when you’re older that you get past that.”

  She licked her lips. “Ky is young. She’s never left Alfheim.”

  He didn’t say anything, but she could feel his doubt.

  Marina sighed. He didn’t understand. “It doesn’t matter now, anyway. She’s left hasn’t she?” she asked.

  He paused, listened, then nodded. “I don’t think anyone is in the house. I don’t hear anyone. Of course, your uncle fooled us—someone else could, too.”

  They should leave. He didn’t say that, either, but it was true.

  Marina pulled her hand away from the door and leaned against him. “Let’s go. After we get the stone, and you get your answer, there will time to face Ky.”

  They solidified on the street outside the castle. Marina stiffened against Raf’s chest. He waited, realized the place would mean something to her.

  “I haven’t been here in years. Before I went to Gunngar, I walked by, but I never went inside. I tried not to even look at it…” Her lips curved into a self-mocking smile. “It’s pretty hard to ignore, but I tried.”

  He stared at the giant structure he’d thought of as Cinderella’s castle when he first saw it. The stone glistened, shifting between pink and sea foam green. “Did your uncle come here, or your sister?” he asked.

  She wrapped her hands around her arms as if she felt a chill. “I don’t know. I doubt the elf lords would have let Geir inside. They probably wouldn’t have let me or Ky in, either.” She laughed. “Funny, I hadn’t thought about that before—that I wouldn’t have been able to go inside even if I’d wanted to. I just knew I couldn’t handle being in there…remembering.”

  He ran his hand down her spine, a light touch just to remind her he was there, that she wasn’t alone.

  “The last time…the day my parents died. I was playing in the bailey, and there was an explosion outside the walls….”

  Raf pulled her to his chest. “You don’t have to tell me.”

  She nodded, but kept talking. “Someone, a servant I guess, got Ky and me out of the castle and took us to Geir. He wasn’t happy about it. I guess if we’d stayed here, we’d still have technically had the throne, but the elf lords were already here. My parents had hired them to investigate using technology. The royals weren’t organized, and the elf lords were.”

  “There was an opening and they filled it,” Raf added.

  Marina nodded. “If I had stayed here, I’m sure Geir and the royals would have claimed my position, but everything got very complicated.”

  “Are you sorry?” Raf asked.

  Marina’s brows rose. “Sorry? I’m sorry my parents died, but the rest of it? What’s there to regret? It’s not like if I’d grown up here my life would have been any better. I still would have been a puppet with the royals in control of my strings.” She glanced at the castle, then as if a thought had just hit her, back at Raf. “No, that isn’t true. I’m happy that servant took me away from here—because if I’d grown up here as reigning princess rather than princess in name only, I never would have gone to Gunngar. I never would have met you.”

  Raf squeezed her against his chest. “Are you ready to go inside then?” He murmured.

  She nodded and he shimmered them into the bailey.

  Marina’s heart thumped, and her knees bent. If Raf hadn’t been beside her, holding her up, she would have fallen.

  She was in the castle, almost on the spot where she’d heard the explosion that had ultimately killed her parents and changed her life.

  Things were very different. There were picnic tables and statues, all scattered and broken. Where her mother had grown wildflowers, there were rows of ordered decorative grasses—and even those were trampled.

  “What happened?” she asked. “Who did this?”

  Raf shook his head. “The subversives, I think. Unless there’s another group. The royals were busy attacking you.”

  Marina spun in a circle taking everything in. The sorrow she’d expected to hit, didn’t. It had been so long ago, it was almost surreal now. It was time to let it go, let it all go…her past, her family, Alfheim.

  She looked at Raf. “The stone. Let’s get it.”

  He clasped her hand in his. Her body began to tingle—the shimmer coming—movement followed, then a jolt and they landed right back where they had started.

  “What happened?” she asked.

  Raf stared at the keep. “I can’t shimmer inside. I thought I’d be able to…I shimmered here.” He gestured, indicating the castle walls they stood behind. “But the buildings must be protected.” He frowned.

  Marina glanced at him. “So we walk.” Ignoring a stone path that wove through the grounds, she cut across the grass. She was halfw
ay to the keep when a spear thunked into the ground beside her. Instantly Raf was there. His arm around her waist, he started to shimmer.

  She pushed against his chest. “Wait.” She wanted to know who had taken over the castle and why. From above there was a glint of sunlight on metal.

  “Thank you for coming back, hellhound. Saves me the search” a voice called.

  “The guard,” Raf mumbled.

  Another spear flew toward them. Raf took a step back. The metal head sunk into the ground an inch from his foot.

  “I have plenty more,” the guard called.

  Marina could see him clearly now. He was thin and pale, and on his back was a pack loaded with weapons. He reached behind and pulled out two throwing knives. “Don’t think I’m alone,” he yelled.

  Marina glanced around, but saw no signs of anyone else.

  Raf growled low in his chest. “Don’t think you can threaten us.”

  Marina licked her lips. There was something about the guard…she stepped forward, from behind Raf, into full view of the guard perched up above. “We have need of something in the keep. Nothing you’ll miss, I’m sure. Let us retrieve it and we’ll leave. We’ll never return here again. I swear it.” She held up her hand in a sign she hadn’t used since childhood, a sign her mother had taught her in her cradle.

  There was a clatter of dropped knives. “Princess? Is that you?” The guard scampered over the keep’s inclined roof.

  Raf reached for her, but she stepped farther away. She needed to see this elf.

  When he reached the edge of the roof, he dropped his pack and jumped, hit the ground in a roll. Within seconds he was standing before her, his eyes huge and solemn. “You came back. It’s time. Follow me.” He didn’t wait; he spun on his heel and scurried toward the keep.

  Marina glanced at Raf. He arched his brows, seemed to say, “We wanted inside…”

  Marina agreed; she followed the guard.

  He held the door open for her, then hurried ahead. She waited for Raf, had to take time to adjust again. The pain she’d expected when she’d found herself in the bailey finally hit.

  The keep smelled of old stone and wood, spice and magic. Her family had spent most of their time here. She could hear her father’s laugh and see her mother sitting in front of the fire weaving magic into cloth. Ky, too. She’d learned to walk here, had pulled herself up by using Marina’s leg as a crutch.

  A tear crept into Marina’s eye. She left it there, afraid Raf or the elf would notice if she wiped it away.

  The guard had barreled ahead, stood in front of another door now. This one Marina didn’t remember because it wasn’t a door at all, not at first glance. It was a panel in the wall flung open to reveal a secret room.

  Raf stepped into the keep behind her. She started to move ahead, but saw Raf glance to the left at stairs she knew lead to the tower. “Up there?” she mouthed.

  He nodded.

  She hesitated. They were here for the stone, but now that she was inside the keep she didn’t want to leave, not yet, not until she’d seen whatever it was the guard seemed so eager to show her.

  It was likely another mistake, could be a trap even, but she couldn’t help herself. She needed to see.

  Raf seemed to sense her thoughts. He pointed toward the elf. Marina walked forward and ducked inside the small door.

  Raf followed Marina to the tiny door. It was small by even elf or dwarf standards, and had obviously been built to be kept hidden. He didn’t feel good about following the guard, but Marina seemed determined, and it was her home, her past she was facing.

  She ducked her head and stepped through the doorway. Raf closed the few feet between them in seconds, bent his own neck to follow her through, but when his hand brushed the wood, magic zapped through him, sent him flying. He landed on the floor, more startled than hurt and leapt to his feet. In front of him the tiny door snapped closed.

  With a curse, he lunged toward it, but the door was gone. And there was zero sign of where it had been. He ran his fingers over the wood, searching for even a hairline crack—but there was nothing. It was as if the door hadn’t existed at all.

  He slammed his fist into the wood, then kicked, pulled back and kicked again. Nothing, not a splinter or creak. He walked through the keep until he found an old stone bust. He battered the thing over and over against the wall. The stone cracked; hunks of the bust fell off onto the floor—but the wall didn’t change.

  Raf dropped the now headless bust onto the floor and stalked outside into the bailey, circled the keep looking for some sign of a window or opening that might lead to a hidden room. Again nothing.

  Rage and panic surged inside him. Marina was in there, but he couldn’t get to her, had no idea what was happening to her. He picked up a statue and flung it at the keep’s wall. The statue broke into chunks just like the bust had.

  He paced up and down, wearing a path in the bailey’s lawn. They had been so close. If he had just gone up the stairs, made Marina come with him…they’d have had the stone and been on their way.

  But he hadn’t. They hadn’t. He stopped, fisted his hand and smashed it into the wall again, felt the pain, forced himself to calm down and think.

  The guard had seemed excited when he saw Marina, eager to show her whatever lay inside that damn room. Yes, the elf had attacked Raf on each of their encounters, but he’d shown no animosity toward Marina.

  Raf couldn’t see or hear her, but that didn’t mean she was in danger.

  He concentrated on the thought, waited for calm to come.

  It didn’t.

  Fury still coursed through Raf’s body. He picked up the pile of knives and spears that had fallen from the roof, from the elf’s pack and carried them inside. If he had to dismantle the keep splinter by splinter, he would get inside that room.

  Chapter 18

  T he room was bigger than Marina would have guessed based on the door’s size. Open and airy. The walls, floor and ceiling were all white. Dressed in his brown pants and tunic, the guard stood out against the background.

  He stood across the room, next to a box. It reminded Marina of the box she’d used in Gunngar to hold Raf—except instead of a hellhound or garm, this one held a throne.

  The throne.

  The throne of Alfheim.

  She wanted nothing to do with it.

  She turned on the ball of her foot, back toward the door. Except the door was gone. There was nothing but uninterrupted white where the opening had been. She threw her body against the wall and ran her arms over the surface. There were no bumps or cracks. It was smooth as glass.

  She pressed her ear against the wall, and strained to hear Raf.

  Nothing. Either the walls were too thick or Raf had left when the door closed behind her.

  No. She shook her head. He wouldn’t. He wouldn’t leave without knowing what had happened to her. She wouldn’t believe that.

  She laid her palm against the wall and prayed he was there.

  Raf fell exhausted against the wall. He’d battered at the wooden paneling until his hands were bloody, and there wasn’t a weapon, stone or piece of furniture left that he could smash against it. His fingers no longer bent and his legs no longer held his weight.

  He’d lost track of how long he’d been here. The sun had set hours ago, and was rising again. He could see it through the door to the bailey which he’d left open.

  He tried to stand, but his legs gave way. He fell to his knees. He had only felt this lost once before in his life—when he’d found his wife, son and brother dead.

  But somehow this was even worse. They had been gone, lost to him forever, but Marina was close—so close, and he couldn’t reach her. He turned and smashed his fist into the wall again. He didn’t feel a thing, no pain, not even the vibration of his hand hitting the wood. His body was numb. He was numb. He didn’t know what to do.

  Yells sounded past the drawbridge. It was up—no one should be able to get inside. Still, he forced himself
to stand…placed a hand against the wall he’d been battling to steady himself.

  More yells, followed by smoke—thick and black billowing from where the drawbridge would be. The smell of burning tar tore at Raf’s lungs.

  The castle was under siege.

  Elf lords, subversives or royals with Ky? Did it matter?

  He glanced back at the damned wall and the door that was no more. Despite the guard’s claim, Raf seemed to be the only living being inside the castle walls.

  His instinct was to fight; as a hellhound it was always his first reaction. But for what? He had no interest in who took the castle. He did however have an interest in keeping Marina safe—but he had tried everything to get to her, and sitting here was wasting precious time.

  If he stayed and fought, he’d buy some time. He could hold them off for a while. But if they pulled down the keep around him…he had his limits. He wasn’t worried about himself, he could shimmer away—but Marina…what if the door chose to open just as he lost the fight? What would greet her?

  The drawbridge was burning; the beings on the other side would be inside soon. He had to get Marina out—but he had no idea how.

  His gaze shot to the stairs. The stone could tell him. He could use its vision to free Marina from the room.

  The sound of heated wood and metal creaking gave him new strength. He turned and pulled himself up the stairs. Halfway up he realized while he couldn’t shimmer into the keep, perhaps he could shimmer inside it. He tried and found himself standing outside the door that held the stone.

  Now he just had to pray Sim hadn’t left any little tidbits out—that he could grab the stone in its box and leave. His hand on the doorway, he started to step inside, but remembered the sizzle.

  When he’d come here with Sim there had been some kind of force field on each doorway. Raf was fairly certain Sim just walking through before him had deactivated it, but today he hadn’t heard a thing.

  Had the elf lords turned it off before they left?

  Prepared for whatever might happen, he held his hand toward the opening. No sound. No pain. He squared his shoulders and steeled himself for whatever might happen. Then he stepped forward.