King of Flames

by Ana Calin

  I step in front of Cerys at the last moment, and Marayke slams into me. She falls back on her butt, her armor clamoring against the ground.

  “Get a grip, Marayke,” I grunt. “We still need the girl.”

  “Oh, you still need me, yes?” Cerys says, stepping over to my side, and staring at me with daggers in her honey-colored eyes. “Because otherwise you’d let these bastards tear me apart, or your lover girl the Iron Maiden slice me to pieces. Well, let me tell you something King of Flames, I will not let you use me. You dragged me here, among people who hate me for no reason, and you expect me to what? Keep replenishing your magic tanks until you get the Firestone, when you’ll have no more use for me. What’s gonna happen then, huh? You gonna throw me to these lions, or will you let Marayke and her brother have their way with me?”

  My eyes fly over to Kareim.

  “I’m perfectly aware this doesn’t exactly look like good business to you,” I tell the girl as Marayke and Kareim retreat into the darkness at the back of the dungeon, their hateful eyes still on her. “You are in enemy territory.” I raise my voice so that everybody can hear. “You and your brother Zillard Dark fought on Lysander’s side, while the other mages split their loyalties.” I motion to the gathering. “These are the people who stayed devoted to me before and after the fall.” I lower my voice, saying the next words only for her. “Well, to me, and the riches I can still provide for them.” Her gaze flies to the glittering piles by the walls. She understands exactly what I mean. “I lost most of my supernatural powers when my core was shattered, I lost everything down to basic magic, my physical strength, and my innate ability to find great riches. But those are the most valuable abilities when you want followers.”

  I square my shoulders, towering over her.

  “I have a proposition for you, Miss Dark. You help me until we find the Firestone, and I promise to set you free afterwards, and guarantee your freedom. And there’s more. You can extend your immunity to up to two other people.”

  I owe her at least that much. In the end, there’s this one other thing that I need from her, and that she can never discover.

  Cerys

  “THAT’S A NICE OFFER, but I’m not sure I can trust you,” I reply.

  He cocks an eyebrow, his presence crushing. “You doubt my word?”

  Gasps travel through the hall, and I’m suddenly uncertain about whether or not I should say it, but I do. “You’re a creature of the dark, how can I believe in your promises?”

  The crowd vibrates, surely expecting the King of Flames to punish me for the offence. But what he does surprises not only them, but me as well.

  “Would a blood oath suffice? Would you believe me then?”

  My mouth pops open. Did he really just offer me a blood oath? Like the kind that would bind him to his promise, the kind that will kill him if he doesn’t fulfill it?

  I laugh, thinking maybe he’s making fun of me, but when he keeps a straight face I stop. “Oh, you’re serious.”

  His silence is confirmation enough.

  “But a blood oath would need to be sanctified by a—”

  “We will have it sanctified. Kareim, High Mage of the Fire Realm will do it himself.”

  “What?” Kareim snarls, a hand still covering the side of his face that Nazarean scratched bloody. The other half is full of hatred, paper white and too young for someone of his standing, his long hair like rusty wires. “May I remind you, Milord, that your oath would bind me not to harm her as well? And I have no intention to let this—” He drops his hand from his face and points to the wounds. I take a step back. “Go unpunished.”

  Nazarean did a nasty job on his face, with three deep slashes crossing his cheek. His appearance mirrors his inner self perfectly now, with two faces, one pale and flawless, and the other mutilated.

  “Let me remind you that it was your idea that I sought out Cerys Dark in the first place.” The King of Flames narrows his eyes at the mage. “I had a feeling you had a hidden agenda from the start. Now I know you did. So what was it? Why did you want her here?”

  The High Mage’s eyes dart to the others. “Can we talk in private?”

  His sister joins him, glaring at me with all she has from her red eyes. I can’t help but glare back, stroking Nazarean like a weapon. That’s right, badass, just because my face glows like a silver moon among creatures of the dark doesn’t mean that I’m a victim.

  “I suppose we can,” Xerxes accepts, and turns to address me. “We need to talk about the details of what we’re going to do anyway. So Cerys will be joining us.”

  As he leads the way out of the dungeon, I can feel his subjects’ glares stabbing my back—because that’s what they are, his subjects, loyal to him out of fear and greed. The threat that radiates from them makes me want to shudder, but I’ll be damned if I show it. So I focus on the King’s back, the iron muscles moving under his glowing bronze skin. His veins look normal now, but I know when magic lights them up they glow like rivulets of fire.

  I can’t keep my eyes from slipping down to his muscular ass under his leather pants. When he came to me he was wearing a vest, too, but now his upper body is completely naked, and my mouth waters. A strange pull takes over me, my hands itch to touch him.

  It’s only when we turn right into a moonlit corridor up the stairs that I realize I’ve been following him mindlessly, my mind taken with lustful thoughts, up onto the ground floor of the Flipside Edinburgh castle.

  I think it’s the background noise that pulls me back to myself. Low whispers in the dark corners of the corridor, shady patterns moving across the vaulted ceiling. I walk faster until I’m so close to Xerxes that I can feel his aura encapsulating me, and a feeling of safety comes along with it. Nazarean purrs, too, and my heart makes a small leap of forbidden joy—Nazarean’s reaction is a clear sign that Xerxes’ feelings about me are protective, and that I’m safe with him.

  Maybe I won’t need that blood oath after all, but I guess it won’t hurt to have it.

  But then it hits me—wouldn’t a blood oath bind me to him in some way as well? Isn’t it enough that we’re fated mates, and that this crazy connection has been created between us, even though we both have gone out of our way for so long to make sure that didn’t happen? A blood oath would make it impossible to break the connection, even though a relationship between us would be just as impossible. He’s the chief villain that we’ve fought so hard to defeat. I’m on the side of light, while Xerxes...

  I shake my head, determined to keep a cool head. I know the King of Flames is evil? He created armies of Undead, he desecrated the bodies of dead fae in order to make them. For all I know, he killed fae in order to transform them into undead soulless weapons. He allied himself with hellish creatures in order to take over the human realm. My brother Zillard is out there as we speak, in the shadows, keeping a grip on the human realm and making a villain of himself in order to ensure real evil doesn’t seep in to tip the balance.

  Xerxes leads the way up the regal stairs, dark and full of cobwebs, the stone cracked, grass growing inside the fissures. Unlike the Edinburgh castle in the human world, its replica on this side is full of ghosts, and no one wants to be inside it for too long. It’s the farthest thing from a tourist attraction.

  Which means no one will look for us here, especially not for the King of Flames. Castle Rock is the last place my guardians and even Lysander the King of Frost would think to look for us, simply because it’s not like Xerxes to stay anywhere close to a place where he wreaked havoc. A smart move to do just that now, I’ll give him that. I’ve only been around him for an hour, and I’ve already gotten glimpses of his brilliant mind. No wonder he was once literally the most powerful man alive.

  Xerxes opens the door to what might be the Jacobite room on the other side, but I’m not sure. It’s got the diamond-shaped wooden beams, the majestic feel and the size that people who’ve visited it told me about. But unlike in the human world, all we find here for furniture
is a few barrels, and a few logs that other fugitives before us must have used as tables and stools. There are remains of magic powder on the barrels, and small shards of broken crystals, the sign that someone had been struggling to teleport.

  “First things first,” Xerxes says as Kareim takes a seat on the first available log, Marayke crouching down in front of him. She grabs a candle from another table and snaps her fingers to light it up before she inspects the slashes on his face, her warrior-girl fingers more gentle than they look. “Can you use your magic to restore our mage’s face, Cerys?”

  I could throw up as I remember how Marayke raised her blade to pierce my brother a year ago, and I can’t bring myself to even want to help.

  “No,” I say drily. “I’m a magic energy worker, not a healer.”

  “Yes you are,” Marayke snaps. “All mages can heal, you just don’t want to.”

  “First of all, it’s not all mages, and secondly, even if I could, he’d still have the scars. The cuts are too deep. Besides, he’s a High Mage, can’t he heal himself?”

  Kareim glares at me, but says nothing.

  “Kareim is a young mage,” Xerxes explains. “He took over the job as High Mage of the Fire Realm when his father was killed—which happened when your friends stormed my outposts in the Flipside, and eliminated my courts and closest allies, after they shattered my core last year.”

  “Which means that you haven’t had time to train properly, is it?” I ask Kareim with a sneer. “But you heard your sister, healing magic is basic. You should be able to heal yourself.” Kareim glances at me with the promise of retribution in his eyes.

  “Which brings us back to the reason we’re here—why did you want Cerys, Kareim?” Xerxes demands. “Does it have anything to do with your lacking the basic skills of a mage?”

  “She is a special one, I knew she’d be a valuable asset,” he explains unwillingly, his face pointed up at the ceiling as his sister tears a bit of his expensive-looking robe, and starts to clean his wounds. “I knew she’d be beneficial for you, Milord, just like I said back at the cave. There was no other hidden reason.”

  “Yes, there was,” I say, fury balling in my stomach. “You thought that after Xerxes got what he needed from me, you could feed from my aura as well.” I’ve been doing magic energy work for so long that my body is basically made of positive energy, and the bastard thought he’d feed on it when Xerxes no longer needed me, and threw me away. “I guess there’s been a change of plans—your King will need my assistance for longer than you expected.”

  Kareim doesn’t answer. By the way his sister shifts and focuses harder on the wounds she’s uncomfortable with what has been exposed about her brother as well.

  “You’ll need at least fresh water for that,” I say, and turn to Xerxes, caressing Nazarean. “And I need food for Nazarean. Any way we can get some before we talk about the blood oath and what we do next?” But it’s clear to us all at this point that Kareim is so lackluster a mage that he won’t be able to sanctify something so high-energy as a blood bond.

  Xerxes

  “SO OUR MAIN PROBLEM remains finding where Apophis’ Wraiths hid the Firestone,” Cerys concludes, stroking her cat with her smooth fingers as the animal laps at its milk. He’s playing his part well. He could fool anybody into thinking he’s just a regular black cat, simply a mage’s familiar. But the more I observe him, the more certain I am that he’s a creature from Tartarus, sent by Hades to watch over his daughter. The strength and speed and viciousness with which he attacked Kareim wasn’t typical for a simple familiar. “In all these years, you haven’t found any leads as to where that might be?”

  “I didn’t think I’d ever need the Firestone,” I reply, leaning on the wall and staring out into the night. This place offers a view over the entire Flipside of Edinburgh, the orange light of lamps and candles flickering behind old windows, smoke rising into the air from the dark chimneys. The city looks much more modern on the other side, which has become cluttered with humongous buildings, infrastructure and high-end technology. Here, magic made such changes obsolete. The Flipside might look like a combination between the medieval and Victorian-gothic age, but it’s ten times more advanced than the twenty-first century of the human world.

  “It’s not like anybody can use its magic the way I can, and I never expected.” I pause. “What happened a year ago.”

  “Speaking of the confrontation a year ago, I didn’t get a good view of the fight between you and Lysander,” Cerys says, “but I remember that he kept attacking, and you never attacked back. I find it hard to believe that he overpowered you.” I can feel her eyes scanning me, as if measuring my strength, and heat rises in my groin. I wish she were checking me out with lust, and the realization makes me uncomfortable. “Now I know he couldn’t have overpowered you, not so easily.”

  “So what’s your question?” I keep my eyes away from her. I can’t let this connection deepen any more, or it will be impossible to do what I promised her, and let her go when this is over.

  “He was your greatest enemy. You had the chance to kill him, but it seemed you never tried.”

  “Lysander was never my greatest enemy. My greatest enemies have always been Apophis, the god of Chaos, and Orion, the lord of dragons, for thousands of years. Lysander was just the one standing in my way when I decided to extend my power to the other realms and, eventually, the human world. I never feared him, or even doubted that I would win against him, but he did prove a worthy opponent in many ways. It would have been a shame to kill someone with so much power and character.” I fold my arms across my chest, not wanting to admit this, but here it is. “By the time it came to that confrontation I’d decided not to kill him, but to try and get him on my side in some way. I would have only tried after I’d taken over the realms, though. I knew he wouldn’t see reason before that.”

  “Lysander would have never joined you.” Her tone prompts me to turn around and face her, as much as I wanted to avoid it. She’s staring daggers at me, her cheeks burning. I think she even forgot all about Marayke, who’s still tending to Kareim’s wounds, now that the others have provided water and a healing potion.

  “He hates everything you represent, all of us do,” she spits.

  “What do I represent to you?”

  “All things evil.”

  “And what have I done to deserve such a rank?”

  “Oh, you mean like besides the fact that you tried to take over all the realms, and overthrow every ruler? That you went after the Winter Realm, even though you needed it in order to keep the realm of Hell in balance?” She rises slowly to her feet, her pretty face shining with magic. “I don’t know, maybe that you created entire armies of Undead fae, by killing living, breathing creatures! Only here, in Edinburgh, there have been dozens of murders in dark alleyways.”

  “And you know for a fact I was behind those murders?”

  “Who else was building an army like yours, Xerxes?”

  I listen to her with my arms folded across my chest, not responding to any of her accusations. She sounds so convinced, that I don’t see the point in trying to persuade her otherwise, to explain to her how things actually happened. Besides, it might be better that she thinks the worst of me. It will help to prevent the connection between us deepening. She will sure as hell never want to bond with a cold-blooded murderer, which is what she’s convinced that I am.

  She keeps talking, and I take in every word without responding.

  “I understand,” I say when she’s done, breathing hard from how much she spoke, her chest heaving. “But none of that matters anymore, because I lost everything, and I don’t have that kind of power and influence anymore.”

  “No, but once you recover it, you’ll try again. You’re the most ambitious creature, we all know that much.”

  “Maybe. But let me remind you, you don’t really have a choice. Either you help me, or you remain my prisoner forever.”

  She bites her lip, hating that she
has no way out of this.

  “I will help you,” she declares. Then, unwillingly, as if she hates having to say it, “And I think I know where we can begin looking for the Firestone. The faster we’re through with this, the faster I can have my freedom back, and never see you again. He’ll also be able to help us with the blood oath.”

  CHAPTER III

  Cerys

  I have no choice but to go through with this. I decided it’s not such a bad thing, after all. If I help Xerxes, I will regain my freedom—I know he’ll keep his promise, I sensed it when his aura encapsulated me, and Nazarean did, too. The blood oath will help strengthen that conviction even more.

  But I’ve also discovered another advantage. The time spent with the King of Flames will also help gather vital information about him. I’ll know what military forces he commands, who his allies are, how his powers work, and I’ll get a pretty good feel for who he is as a person, too. With a little luck and a lot of observation, I might even find a weakness.

  For a moment back in the dungeon I thought his weakness might be Marayke, and my heart twisted painfully at the idea, but in the end it proved wrong. I can’t deny that I’m attracted to Xerxes because of this stupid connection between us, and the idea that he might prefer someone else over me does nasty things to me. But I swear I’ll take better care of my heart during the time that I have to spend with him. I won’t develop feelings for him, I’ll fight against that with all I have, even if it feels like swimming against the current.

  “The Grand Mage of the Dark Warlocks,” he says as we stare at the cathedral-like mansion in front of us. “He swore he knew nothing about the Firestone when I first spoke to him about it.”

  “Of course he did. Imagine what it would mean to him if you recovered your powers. He played on both sides all along. He fought on Lysander’ side, while making deals with you as well.”

  “Well, then, I’m looking forward to speaking with him again.”