Queen of Abaddon

by Heather Killough-Walden

  I am here.

  That voice again, so strong and deep and real, moved through her like a tidal wave to shove her confusion aside.

  She yanked her face away from Darken’s touch and took a long, solid step back. “You’ve made them exceedingly clear.”

  There was no time to pause or contemplate, no time to wonder whether she was doing the right thing, or even whether what she was doing, she was doing right. She followed her gut instincts, raised her hand, and shoved the ruby against Darken’s chest for all she was worth.

  It slammed into him with a flash that made her hand go numb, and at the same time, a word slipped from Raven’s mouth, ancient and Abaddonian. It was a syllable of immense power, composed of compressed magic. She realized as she spoke it that she was not alone in voicing the word. Drake was speaking it as well. It came from them both, from the Phylactery’s creator and the Phylactery’s user, from the devil and the Chosen Soul.

  The lightning crackling in a ring around them darkened into a blood red, and the air was sucked from the atmosphere. At once, Raven could not breathe. Her eyes grew wide, her head whipped back, and her body lifted from the ground. Across from her, Darken’s did the same, and for once, the Lord of the Nines had no control over what befell him. The Phylactery was in charge now.

  It hovered between the two rising bodies of king and queen, and spun slowly, the facets of its ruby surface reflecting the red lightning like a lighthouse. As Raven’s lungs began to ache from the loss of air, and her mind cried out in fear for her life, the Phylactery’s blood red center lightened, turning pink. Pink became off-white, and then bright white, until finally, it glowed like a miniature sun.

  Raven’s vision shot through with white motes like dust, the Phylactery flashed one last time, and suddenly, she was plummeting limply to the ground. She landed on her side, managing to avoid any harm. When her arm hit the dirt, her hand landed palm-open.

  The Phylactery dropped directly into it, and her fingers instinctively curled. She turned her head.

  Drake’s now empty body had fallen and landed several feet away. Raven watched his chest carefully. It neither rose nor fell; he wasn’t breathing. There was no life, no soul, inside to make it work.

  Chapter Forty-One

  She’d expected it to happen, and she’d known that this is what it would look like. Yet, actually witnessing it had a profound effect on Raven. Seeing Drake’s lifeless body caused a numbness to sweep through her. It was uncomfortable and foreign and she knew it was a portent to a kind of madness if it was allowed to go on too long. But at that very moment, it was also a blessing. It would help her finish the job she had started.

  She looked down at the ruby in her hand to find it shimmering with unnatural beauty, as if it had been filled with something that sparkled with untold magic. Because it had. Darken’s soul now swam within the Phylactery. She held in her hands a source of magnificent power.

  The words of Direan, the vampiric elf, came back to her. Sometimes it is necessary to cut away dead weight so the remaining flower can bloom. With any luck, that was exactly what she’d done.

  Speak your wish.

  The command filled the emptiness that remained in the aftermath of the sacrifice. The lightning ring that had encircled them earlier was gone. The vast desert of gray packed dirt was quiet, hollow and void. All that remained were Raven, Drake’s body – and the Phylactery.

  Slowly, achingly, Raven peeled herself up from the ground and used her free hand to shove her long black hair out of her face. Then she straightened and peered out over the horizon as if she were looking for her choices, seeking them out in the thin line between what was and what might be.

  But her choice was already made. It had been for some time.

  She would take the world to the moments before the war began. But she would not be making the journey alone.

  “We must remember,” she told it. “That is all I ask.”

  She thought of Drake, of Grolsch and Summer, of Loki and Sartorun, and even of Astriel. She saw their faces and looked into their eyes in her mind. Every story needed a storyteller. Every single thing that transpired in the quest of existence needed a historian to jot down its lessons, so that others may learn them. History needed to be recorded – whether it happened or not.

  It shall be.

  Raven was not surprised that the Phylactery was agreeing to her terms. It had been given one hell of a soul as a sacrifice and would probably grant her anything she wanted. But this was enough. Well… this, and perhaps the strength to do what she knew she would have to do once the Phylactery was finished with its own job.

  The ruby in her hand pulsed as if it were expanding. A heartbeat later, it exploded – or rather, it seemed to. A light emitted from its center and expanded at an impossible speed, engulfing everything.

  Raven closed her eyes, shielding her face with her arms. She felt a beat move through her like she was standing in an ocean against an incoming tide. She stumbled, just slightly, and the wave was gone. The Phylactery was too, however; she could feel the emptiness in her palm.

  She lowered her arms and opened her eyes. A vast landscape of hardened dirt greeted her. Drake’s lifeless body waited a short distance away.

  She raced to his side and knelt, slamming her already sore knees to the ground as she lifted his head with one hand and grasped his hand with the other. She was leaning over when the Phylactery’s final words issued their parting.

  You shall remember.

  The words faded, as if their speaker were traveling farther and farther away. Raven acknowledged them with the slightest hesitation – and then she bent low over the fallen king and placed a tender kiss upon Drake’s lips.

  Drake’s soul must have been ready, and he must have known what she was going to do. Of course he would; he was inside her, part of her spirit, part of her mind. The moment their lips made contact, he was moving. His soul at once separated from her own, rushing through her and into his own unconscious form like an electrical current.

  Raven gasped against his lips at the shock of it. She tried to move away, but a band of steel suddenly wrapped around her waist and pulled her forward. She, fell, landing on top of Drake’s rock hard body, but he was instantly turning with her, switching positions until she was trapped beneath him, and he was subjugating her with the kiss that he had quickly taken over.

  The press of him against her was so hot, she felt his fire enter her bloodstream, boiling her from the inside out. His fangs pricked her lips, and that deep throated growl was back, but it was fueled by his mounting hunger this time rather than rage.

  He wanted something from her, and she knew she was going to give it to him. She had no choice. She wanted no choice. She became lost beneath him, within him. Her heartbeat raged and her lungs ached; she needed to breathe. But air was just not as crucial as he was.

  And then, like a blessing and a curse, he broke the kiss, rearing up over her like the wolf above his prize.

  Raven gasped for breath, and gazed helplessly into his eyes.

  They were on fire.

  Without a word, Drake of Tanith braced his weight on one arm and gently grasped her chin with his free hand. Slowly, but firmly, he turned her head to the side, exposing the long column of her pale throat.

  Raven’s breathing quickened further, racing into hyperventilation as a new apprehension coursed through her. She’d known it was coming, but now it was here. It was just as it had been in her dream, fangs exposed, vein vulnerable, a temptation undeniable, and a hunger that would be fed…. Except the roles were reversed.

  Every ounce of Drake had become the predator, the beast. Even as she shook beneath him, and he showed no signs of reconsideration, she felt the shadow of his massive black wings unfold over her. He was changing form, turning into the beautiful, deadly monster he’d always been. He emanated a heat that would have incinerated her if not for the magic he wrapped her in, always had, and always would.

  He would never hurt her.<
br />
  But as he leaned in, Raven’s lips parted and her hands curled into fists in the armor over his chest.

  He stopped, hovering just inches from taking what he wanted, what he had been craving incessantly for more than a year. She knew, because she had too. Displaying an infinite capacity for patience with the woman he loved, his lips moved to her ear rather than her throat, and his thumb caressed lovingly along her jaw line.

  “Raven…” He said her name like a searing touch, like a deep kiss in and of itself, and Raven could hear his desire choking him. He needed her. He’d had his soul torn apart, ripped from his body, and then thrust back into it nearly without pause. He was hungry – and she was there at last.

  “Only you,” he whispered.

  And she understood. Only she could give him what he needed in that moment.

  It’s always been you.

  She was the one who could rebuild the king. Because she was his queen.

  Raven slowly closed her eyes, surrendering once for all.

  Drake wasted no time, allowing her no second thoughts. He moved in like the man he was, trapping her between himself and the ground as his fangs pierced sharp and slid deep, embedding themselves firmly in her throat.

  Raven’s eyes flew open. She cried out as he at once began to drink, and she finally experienced the very apex of pleasure. Her scream filled the heavens, a sound of abandoned ecstasy. Her vision went; stars exploded, the lightning was back and red as ever, but this time it was moving through her, zapping every nerve ending as it went, to fill her with light and fire.

  And for once in Raven’s wintery existence, the heat didn’t bother her at all.

  Chapter Forty-Two

  He drank, and she gave. Somewhere along the blissful way, his magic transported them from the Phylactery’s timeless realm. She recognized the swirl of colors as a portal, and knew when the transport had ended by the stillness that encompassed them once again. Instead of hard dirt, she felt marble beneath her, smooth and cool to the touch. Distractedly, like an afterthought, she thought she heard a scraping sound, like the sudden brush of a hundred pieces of metal against stone.

  Slowly, languidly, Drake pulled his fangs from her throat. The tug of the teeth against her taut flesh was a dull ache, and also a promise that they would be back before long, re-staking the claim they had made upon her.

  Raven stifled the low moan her throat wanted to make, and with a body that felt light as air with a satisfaction that somehow still yearned, she slowly opened her eyes.

  They were in the throne room of Nisse’s palace. She blinked. All around them, in a wide circle of shimmering black metal, Abaddon’s soldiers knelt on one knee, their heads bowed low, their strong, armored bodies utterly still. There were at least a hundred, probably more.

  “They’ve come to welcome their queen,” Drake told her, speaking the words softly enough that only she could hear. “And worship her,” he added as she turned her head to look up at him. “As I do.”

  He stood, lifting her to her feet as he rose. Then he stepped back, releasing her completely so that she stood alone at the center of the circle of reverence and loyalty, and only then did she realize that she had transformed completely into her Abaddonian form.

  Enormous wings of raven black feathers spread in glorious display behind her, an Abaddonian breeze brushed through her snow-white hair, and her tri-colored eyes revealed a world in stark colors, as if the rainbow of the mortal realm had been hiding something all along.

  Raven turned a slow circle, taking in her subjects, the luxurious throne room, and the double thrones themselves, where they waited empty and opulent on a dais at one end of the room. When she completed the turn and faced Drake once again, he smiled.

  Then he stepped toward her and gently took her hand. “I’ve wanted to do this from the moment I saw your image in Astriel’s scrying pool.”

  Raven blinked, then pulled her gaze from his and looked down when she felt something metal touch her fingertip. She froze as he slowly, inexorably, slid a ring onto her finger.

  The ring’s band was crystal clear, as if cut from the cleanest ice: Diamond. At its center, sitting atop the ring of diamond like a crown upon a queen, was a stone composed entirely of frozen fire. It was unfathomable and impossible, yet utterly breathtaking and very real.

  The brilliantly shimmering stone appeared to have captured a flickering flame in an outer cocoon of multi-faceted ice.

  For the Winter that harbors a heart on fire.

  Drake’s words brushed her mind once more, and Raven looked up to meet his gaze. There, she thought. Right there. That was the flame that the ring had captured. That was the fire that was her heart.

  The fire in Drake of Tanith’s ever-burning eyes.

  Beyond the throne room, beyond the towering walls of Castle Nisse, the skies of Abaddon’s ninth circle began to change. For the second time in Abaddon’s history, the red of its lightning faded, the clouds of ash grew heavy and white, and a hush fell over the land.

  But this time, it was not rain that fell from the heavens of Hell.

  Denizens far and wide across the ninth circle stopped what they were doing and looked up. The young ceased playing, their gazes as frozen as the skies, and held out their hands and tongues to catch the fat white flakes that floated down upon them. Laughter of amazement followed, filling the hollows of every Nisse alleyway, every Abaddonian school ground, and even the courtyard where soldiers stopped in their fierce training to gaze upward.

  At the edge of the Brittle Woods on the outskirts of Nisse, a solitary figure stood atop a cliff’s face and gazed out over the continuous rings of his home.

  A change was taking place.

  From up here, Tantibus could see it like a ripple in a pond, cascading over the nine circles that composed Abaddon. Where it was once too hot, a cool breeze touched fevered brows, and a snowflake graced a thirsty tongue. Where ice covered the land, and cold gave no recourse, a warm wind blew and glaciers melted, and something new and precious sprouted through cracks in the rime.

  In a land of shadows and secrets, a book on the seventh floor of an infamous library opened its pages of its own volition. A new story was written upon its bound paper, scribed in the ink of time, insoluble by happenstance or magic, to remain forevermore and be read by those willing to pay the price.

  In a realm of dragons, massive beasts of folklore and legend raised their heads and sniffed at the changing air. They yawned as if awakening from a very long dream, and some of them stood. They looked skyward and listened, catching hints of children’s laughter, carried on a breeze that came from many circles away.

  Lord Tantibus watched, took note of these changes, and nodded. And now, at long, long last, the Nightmare Lord smiled. For it was a rare and wonderful thing, in the wondrous, multi-layered pits of Hell, to see something and know that it was good.

  Epilogue

  Lord Astriel, king of the elven kingdom, gazed out over a calm and peaceful realm. It was the terran realm, one he had not seen without battle scars in a long and bloody year.

  It turned out that time had indeed been rewound. Raven Grey had followed through with her ultimate plan. The Phylactery was put to good use, the war was undone, and Lady Winter and Lord Tanith ruled the Nine Hells from their palace in Nisse.

  All was as it had been all those moons ago, and quite possibly, all was as it was meant to be. But for one thing.

  He remembered.

  He was not the only one, either. Raven had come to see him some time after she’d used the Phylactery in the cave beneath Eve’s Inn. The former princess had come in magical guise, so much stronger now that she was queen. They’d spoken with one another from his balcony, beneath the stars of the elven realm.

  She, too, remembered all that had transpired, no matter how much, as she’d put it, she wanted to forget her exhaustive time in Immeloria. That had made him smile.

  She’d made the choice to spare Astriel and the others from the Phylactery’s spel
l, allowing them their retained memories, and he had not needed to ask her why. He already knew.

  They were changed, he and the others, and the truth of the matter was that they’d grown. If the pain and death could be removed from the lessons of war, people would be better for learning them. He was living proof.

  Lord Tanith had retained his memories, as had Raven’s brother, and the ork, Grolsch. All around them, the world continued as if nothing had happened, as if thousands hadn’t died and graves had not been dug and un-dug, filled, emptied, and filled again. It was mystifying to know what he knew when everyone who looked upon him knew a year’s less.

  Some made comments when they thought he couldn’t hear. “His eyes are different.” “He seems changed.” “There’s a stillness about him.” “Well… he’s king now.”

  Ignorance was a kind of bliss that he would not buy, even if he could afford it. He was a better king for what he knew. But there was a light in the lonely darkness of this knowledge. He did not have to face it alone.

  “Astriel.”

  The elven king smiled to himself, just a little, then turned to face the woman who stood in the doorway of his quarters, her gold eyes large and bright as the sun, her smile a touch uncertain, a wealth of brave.

  Summer of Warrendale was a vision in white, draped in elven fineries that she’d shaken her golden head at but donned anyway because she couldn’t help herself. To remember the war, she’d adopted the name of the village where her townsfolk had gathered as refugees of a battle-torn world. Each day, it seemed, she did or said something that surprised him. Life was an adventure now.

  Summer tilted her head to the side, those large eyes gently scrutinizing. “You’ve been thinking again.”

  The smile he’d felt coming on spread of its own volition. “Never.”

  “Good, because you’ve had so very little practice, you might mess it up without the proper guidance.”

  Astriel’s teeth flashed in a grin he felt deep inside. “And you plan on supplying that guidance?”