by Grace Draven
Sheer netting enclosed the bed in a gauzy cocoon through which weak morning light filtered. She pushed the netting aside and swung out of bed, stumbling as her shift twisted around her legs.
The chamber’s ramshackle state had been replaced by one of pristine luxury. Like the bed, the rest of the furniture appeared new, wood gleaming with a softly polished glow. The fireplace remained unlit, but the inner hearth was freshly swept. She padded to one of the two narrow windows. Still no glass or shutters to cover these, but they didn’t need it. The air outside hung warm and damp, stirred briefly by the occasional breeze that swirled into the room.
This room occupied a high spot in the undamaged portion of the palace, and Imogen leaned out one of the window for a better look at the scenery beyond. Half concealed by mist made jaundiced by a weak sun, the broken city slumbered undisturbed by the voices of people or even bird song.
The oppressive silence that hung over Tineroth permeated the palace as well. Imogen left the window and padded to the door on bare feet. Even the hinges didn’t squeak as she opened it and peeked into the hallway. Only shadows greeted her. Wherever Cededa was, she suspected he’d remain unseen until he chose to reveal himself.
Assured of a modicum of privacy, she retreated into the room. Someone had left a pitcher of water and a bowl on a table by the bed. She found a chamber pot tucked under the bed and dry cloths stacked atop a clothes chest. She set to her morning ablutions, stripping off her shift to treat herself to a quick sponge bath.
The first touch on her neck, smooth and unblemished by the pendant scarring, made her cry out and then laugh. The room held no mirror to confirm what her fingers told her, but she sent Cededa a silent call of thanks for taking back his key. He was welcomed to it. She hoped never to see it or its like again in her lifetime.
She dressed in the one spare tunic and skirt packed away in her knapsack. Her journey clothes lay in a pile on the chair where she’d fallen asleep. If she could find a nearby stream, she’d wash them and lay them out to dry, though in this damp, Imogen doubted anything truly dried. Her lips quirked at the thought of asking an ancient mage-king if he knew where the washing bats and lye buckets might be stored.
There was still no sign of Cededa after she’d dressed and eaten from her dwindling supplies of journey food. The city beyond the windows beckoned with all its mysteries and ancient secrets. Who knew when the king might return, and she wished to see Tineroth in the daylight.
The shadows had only marginally lightened when she opened her door a second time and stepped into the hallway. The palace was a maze of cloisters and stairs, and Imogen tried to remember the path they’d taken the previous night that brought her to this chamber.
After three corridors and several blind turns, she was hopelessly lost in the palace’s belly. Had she not been raised by Niamh and surrounded by her mother’s earth magic, Imogen might have thought it her imagination, but the halls and stairs in this vast place changed their direction each time she made a turn or descended stairs, as if the palace teased her.
She paused in the middle of a long gallery illuminated by gray light that streamed through broken windows on the opposite wall. From where she stood, she glimpsed spires and rooftops spilling over with the ubiquitous vines, a pale sun obscured by clouds.
Hands on her hips, she exhaled a frustrated sigh. “Do you mind?” She called out to the silence. The sudden sensation of another presence—curious and distant, vast—swept across her flesh, leaving chills in its wake. Something listened.
Afraid but determined to find the front door without wandering this unending labyrinth for the next several hours, Imogen held her ground. “I wish only to go outside. To see the city of my childhood fables.” She held out both hands, palms up. “No harm intended. No malice planned.”
A weighty pause, as if that which observed her considered her for a moment before making a decision. A mist gathered in the darkness of the hallway facing her, rolling across the floor like surf over sand. Imogen clenched her teeth to keep them from chattering and crushed the instinctive urge to run. Niamh’s wisdom echoed in her mind.
“You don’t run from that which you don’t know. Such cowardice elicits bad judgment. Gain your knowledge first. Then decide to stand or flee.”
Sentient, purposeful, the vapor roiled toward her, swirling around her feet until it moved onward, pausing at the top of a set of stairs as if waiting for her to follow. She did, keeping a safe distance back. It might look like mist, but it certainly didn’t act like it, and if she looked from the corner of her eye instead of directly at the fog, she saw ghostly hands, the faint traces of faces, and the train of a gown in that swirling miasma. Gooseflesh pebbled her arms and back. Revenants. Tineroth was not only ruined, it was haunted.
The path on which it led her seemed straightforward and short, solidifying her suspicions to certainty that the palace itself had been playing a game of cat and mouse with her. She stood before the great double doors in no time. They opened of their own accord, and Imogen blinked in the pool of pallid sunshine that flooded the entrance. Feeling only a little ridiculous, she turned to the mist hovering behind her and bowed. “My thanks.”
That same otherworldly curiosity, overlaid with a hint of approval, buffeted her senses once more. The mist rolled back on itself, disappearing into the palace’s gloom. The doors closed after it on a dull thud as if urging her kindly not to dawdle on the steps.
Imogen shook her head. What a strange place Tineroth was with its pale, immortal king, and ghostly caretakers. She suspected that by the end of her stay here, she’d learn that the reality of the city far exceeded the fantastic tales told.
Tineroth stood even more derelict in the unforgiving daylight. Houses and temples had fallen to ruin, leaving only the skeletons of arches and broken columns standing as markers of where they once stood. Walls had collapsed, spilling rubble into grand avenues from which flowering weeds sprouted between the paver cracks. The houses and businesses leading off the main thoroughfare into alleyways made the temples look pristine by comparison, their hollow carcasses safe havens only for rodents and the ever encroaching vines.
Her light steps echoed in the silence. Imogen didn’t so much mind the quiet as the continuous sense of being observed. She didn’t think it was Cededa. He didn’t seem the type to lurk once he assessed a threat, and she was no danger to him or those things he protected. Something else watched, a new entity with the same curiosity she sensed while in the palace. The soul of the city itself?
An odd thwapping sound broke the almost sanctified hush, startling her. A repetitive sound punctuated by harsh breathing and several grunts, it was the most noise she’d heard since coming to Tineroth, outside of her initial conversation with its monarch.
She followed it like a beacon, sidestepping piles of rubble and clambering over short walls until she reached a long rectangular field surrounded on three sides by levels of stone seating. In the center, the Undying King exhibited his battle prowess, and Imogen forgot to breathe.
Man-sized effigies made of woven straw littered the field, hewn into pieces. Those that remained standing awaited their fate as Cededa spun and leapt, swinging the long glaive with as much ease as if he wielded a feather. Rivulets of sweat streamed off his bare torso, carving shining lines into alabaster muscle and plastering his pale hair to his shoulders and back. His dark trews stuck to his legs, the damp fabric delineating the long line of thigh and calf. He was moonlight and grace, speed and power. To Imogen, he danced on the air, lighter than a butterfly, faster than a striking viper. The glaive’s blade shone in the sun as it sang a metallic song and clove its straw victims into pieces. The thwapping noise had been their dismemberment.
Imogen shuddered and hugged herself. How many intruders into Tineroth had met just such a fate?
Still, she couldn't help but admire his masculine beauty. She was an innocent in body if not necessarily in mind. Niamh didn’t believe in keeping her child ignorant of the ways of
people, even if she kept her isolated from them. Imogen had often watched the villagers and townspeople those few times she accompanied Niamh to market day, swathed in both concealing cloth and illusion. She’d admired some of the men, idly wondering what kind of husbands they might make. With no hope of ever forming any attachment with a man, she’d kept any longing at bay, forming no infatuation for any she glimpsed.
There were some so handsome as to make any village maid swoon, but none equaled the man standing before her. She dragged her gaze up from a slim waist with muscles tight enough she’d bet she could bounce a coin off them, to a sculpted back and wide shoulders. She didn't have to see his face to be reminded of those exquisite features. He must have broken scores of hearts when he ruled a living city.
A few more breathtaking spins and arcing cuts from the glaive, and Cededa came to a standstill.
“Good morning, Imogen,” he said before turning to face her.
CHAPTER ELEVEN
Imogen of Leids hovered near the practice field’s entrance, watching him. He’d heard her approach long before she made it to the field and wondered idly how she’d managed to find her way out of the palace. He didn’t hold her prisoner, but the spirits that lingered in his home had a wicked sense of humor and a protective streak as strong as his when it came to guarding Tineroth. They would have held her there until his return. What had convinced them to let her go?
A flutter of movement, the swirl of skirts, told him he’d startled her. He walked to one of the enclosure walls to retrieve a cloth and rest the glaive against the stone.
“Good morning, Sire. I hope I’m not intruding.”
That cool, measured voice revealed no hint of her surprise, and her composure impressed him once more. He wiped his face on the towel before passing it over his shoulders and chest. He gathered his damp hair into a queue and tied it back with a leather strap. Even now, so early in the morning, the air hung humid and heavy, promising another lethargic day.
The usual numbing dread of dull sameness didn’t afflict him this morning. This morning was different. He had a guest, one uninvited but not necessarily unwelcome. For the first time in more years than he cared to count, Cededa felt a measure of eagerness, of excitement. He’d host Death in his abandoned city and welcome her with what little hospitality was available to him.
“No, you’re not intruding. I do this each morning. You’re welcome to observe if you wish.”
He caught the focus of her gaze—directly on his bared chest and stomach. He’d not been named Cededa the Fair as a lark. Before the Waters changed him, women and men alike lauded him as a man blessed with august features. He’d been used to admiring gazes from both sexes, along with many come-hither stares. Imogen wore that same admiring expression, though she wore it for the man who no longer bore a resemblance to the humanity that had deserted him thousands of years earlier. The colorless Undying King had lit the appreciative spark in her eyes. This surprised and beguiled him almost as much as the knowledge of her terrible curse. His eyebrows rose in amusement when she blushed at being caught. Her chin rose and she refused to look away.
“I don't mean to stare,” she said in her sure, even tones. “But you are the most beautiful man I've ever beheld.”
Her bluntness rocked Cededa. Spoken plainly, with no lascivious undercurrents, her straightforward compliment created ripples across the still pond of his emotions, igniting an already growing fascination.
He’d misjudged her solely on her appearance, so much more subdued than Niamh’s. But this regal girl matched her mother in every way. Equal, only different. In his more debauched past, he might have indulged in some flirtatious response. No longer. He’d changed, and her statement was far too dignified in its delivery to deserve a provocative reply. He settled for a quiet “Thank you.”
She nodded. “You’re welcome, Sire.”
He noted her change of clothes—no different from yesterday, except her garb now was dull brown instead of faded black. She’d foregone the hat, but not the gloves. They concealed those magnificent hands, protective armor to shield others from her touch.
Her gaze flashed wariness when he closed the space between them, but unlike the previous night, she didn’t give ground. He didn’t reach for her, only stood close enough that he heard the hitch in her breathing.
“Do you want to touch me?”
The blush painting her cheekbones a rosy hue deepened and spread to her neck. The proud stare lowered, and her chin dipped. The flutter of her fingers across the folds of her dress revealed her disquiet as she mulled over his request.
The silence stretched between them until Cededa coaxed her to look at him with a finger under her chin. “Do you want to touch me, Imogen?”
She raised her eyes to his. “Yes, I do.”
Decision made, she peeled off the gloves and tucked them into a spot at her waist. Cededa drew a quick breath as she raised those fair, deadly hands. Imogen paused. He grasped one hand, shuddering as the remembered black lightning surged up his arm. The sensation intensified as he laid her palm against his chest. “There’s no danger to me, Imogen.”
She inhaled sharply, and Cededa fancied the heavy drum of her heartbeat vibrated through her palm. Her hand was hot against his skin, the delicate fingertips tracing the silvery patterns now etched along the slope of his shoulder and line of his collarbone. “You’re wearing the key,” she said.
He was the key. She had simply returned that small part of himself he’d left with her mother years earlier. He said nothing, content to let her explore him as the atavistic power of her curse flowed from her fingers to surge through his bones. Her shoulders shook with a visible shiver, transmitting down to her hand until it too quivered as she explored his torso. She gulped audibly, her eyes growing wider with each passing moment.
Cededa stood as motionless as any of the statues gracing Tineroth, letting her grow used to the notion of touching another. Had he not lived so long in near perfect isolation, the expressions of terror and wonderment that flashed across her features might have puzzled him. Even then, he still had no concept of what this simple moment must be like for a woman who’d never known the pleasure of touching another human being without the armor of her gloves or the fear of killing.
He shivered lightly under her caress, and muscle flexed beneath her palm. Cededa watched her, enthralled by her ever changing expressions—curiosity, fascination, puzzlement—as she continued her study of his body. He stifled a sharp gasp when her palm brushed his nipple. Unlike the cold lightning that razored through his veins from her curse, this touch started a slow burn that radiated out from his chest until it suffused him from head to toe. Desire, an emotion he thought long dead, awakened and bade his body remember.
Despite his best efforts to remain still and silent, he must have made some small sound because Imogen hesitated and glanced at him. He countered her questioning look with a raised eyebrow and a silent bid to continue. She offered a small smile before resuming her exploration. This time both hands journeyed over his torso, mapping the strong column of his throat, the lean line of his waist, the solid musculature of his arms. He was a landscape of toughened terrain, complete with battle scars and fissures that bisected his midriff and ribs. Old wounds that had healed but left their mark and told a story of strife and violence.
Cededa silently willed her to glide her hand across his nipple once more so he might savor for a second time the glowing heat that set his heart to racing. Instead, she did something better, something that had him curling his hands into fists so that he wouldn't crush her to him. She leaned closer, close enough to press her ear against his chest and listen. The soft whisper of warm breath flowed over his sensitized skin, caught the rhythm of his heartbeat and matched pace with it.
Willingly trapped within her embrace, Cededa tilted his head back and closed his eyes to the anemic sun. He was swallowed by a living darkness, a power that strove to bring him low yet did the opposite, awakening him to emotions and s
ensations long asleep. Death sought a foothold within him, battering the fortress of immortality built by the Living Waters. He clenched his jaw and fought to remain still for Imogen, whose earlier euphoric expressions reflected his own emotions.
Is this what the blind suffer when they can finally see, he wondered. Terror and exultation?
As if she heard his thoughts, Imogen raised her head from his chest and laughed. It was a sound of unadulterated joy. Her eyes blazed in a face flushed with excitement. “I can hear your heart, Sire. It still beats, even now.” Her pale hands continued to stroke him as if he were made of the costliest silks instead of a body that should have turned to dust long before the stars changed their place in the heavens. “You live. I’ve touched you, yet you live.”
Cededa remained silent, letting her darkness surge through him and her hands flutter over him, light as moth wings. He’d give her this moment, this time to bask in the wonder of his unique resistance to her curse. And he’d drink the black tide and pray to dead gods that her fatal touch would somehow release him from his bondage.
CHAPTER TWELVE
Controlled mayhem swirled and eddied around Dradus as the men who accompanied him from Castagher set up camp on the edge of the forest not far from the deep chasm that separated them from the land on the other side.
Dradus sat his horse and stared at the wall of trees across the gorge. They were no different than those at his back, yet something hid in their concealing depths, vague silhouettes that were more than the slant of the sun through the trees. The odd hum that had flickered across his senses when he stood at Niamh’s grave sang a continuous melody in his head now, a tuneless canting without words that had grown stronger the closer he got to the gorge.
The girl remained out of reach. His scouts should have easily tracked her, following signs such as footprints, broken branches and crushed leaves. Nothing. There was nothing to mark her passage through the forest. She might as well have been a ghost.
