revelations 02 - on a white horse

by corwin, monica

  The towering walls were black onyx and the floors were black marble, with light white and gray veins. Every surface cast light around the room, reflections, and illusions. This palace was made for illusions. Drawing in its prey until you couldn’t get out again. Hades had built the place, beautifully, but Hel twisted it to something dark and forbidding. Like the scary house at the end of the lane no one spoke of.

  “I am married, my lady. I cannot offer myself to you. You know the rules of my house.”

  “So what with your house. You can move here.”

  He thought quickly, trying to come up with a way to turn her down without hurting her feelings. He needed her amenable to his wishes. He decided to head straight into his points and ignore the fact she stood in front of him naked. Her body almost too disgusting to look at. He didn’t mind a little weight on a woman, he loved curves, but Hel was more deformed than thick. She had boils and moles covering portions of her body, and he did not relish the pets she used to satiate her thirst.

  He swallowed and glanced away so he didn’t stare and offend her. “My lady, I wish to renegotiate our deal.”

  She arched a too full brow at him. “Oh, and what is it you wish?”

  “You ordered me to marry Bianca and I did. Now I am married and have no way out.”

  “Oh, I think you do.”

  Confusion swamped him. She knew something he didn’t, obviously. “How is that, my lady?”

  “Oh, simply kill her.” She produced a knife in her hand. Now that she is simply a fairy, she has your same vulnerabilities. She held the knife out to him. He blinked at it, could it be oer Haearn? She offered it to him, and he was almost afraid to take it. A weapon meant to kill immortals with no hope of resurrection. What if taking it sealed something between them. Despite everything and all the choices he made, good and bad, he didn’t think any part of him could kill Bianca, even if she held the same blade pressed to his throat.

  The image in his mind almost drove him to his knees. Her standing over him naked and the sharp edge pressed to his skin. Well, maybe not this knife, which could kill him permanently.

  He swallowed and reached out to take it from her.

  She released it. “Let me know when it’s done.”

  He blinked, trying to find something to say to refute her assignation while not offending her. He kept getting distracted by the disgusting oddities of her naked body. She waved her hand at him, and he realized he’d been dismissed. He bowed low and exited back into his room, sealing the portal before the idea to follow him entered her mind.

  He sat the knife on his dresser and backed away from it. She wanted Bianca dead, and she’d made that clear from the beginning, but his orders had only been to hurt her. Make her love him and walk away so she would know that same pain, but now he couldn’t do it and he very well couldn’t kill her either. He loved her. To the very core of him, he loved her more than anything he ever had before. He would give up his kingdom for her, but could he give up more than that?

  He needed a way out of this situation while still keeping everyone he loved alive. It would be a much harder task than he fathomed.

  The spell binding her to him was already in place. It also served to drive her away from her friends and into his arms. That betrayal would stay with him for the rest of his life. She would never be able to forgive him for that.

  An idea struck him, and he knew in his heart it was the only way. She wouldn’t forgive him for that choice either. If he went through with this he’d lose her, even if she lived. Could he watch her for the rest of her life knowing he couldn’t touch her?

  Mania began to descend in his mind, and he decided to gain help from the only source he could think of. He threw on jeans and a T-shirt and opened the portal again. This time to a bookstore in Washington D.C.

  Gwyn stepped across the portal into the little bookshop and came face to face with one very pregnant human. She blinked and yelled, “Arthur, I think it’s for you.”

  Gwyn turned and spotted Arthur bounding down the stairs and stopping short at the sight of him. “Gwyn? Is that you?”

  Despite the dire circumstances, he was happy to see Arthur, and it had been a very long time since he watched the man floundering in Morganna’s realm. Longer still since they shared an enemy on the battlefield.

  “It’s me, brother. I came to seek some advice.”

  Arthur finished his descent and stopped in front of him. His hair was shaved close and his skin shone bronze from the sun. The lines around his mouth and eyes were deeper than Gwyn remembered. As if he’d been living, truly living, and had achieved happiness. A wave of jealousy washed over him. No, he had no right to be jealous of Arthur’s happiness. He deserved it and had certainly paid for it.

  Arthur led him over to a set of chairs and Gwyn sat, his bare feet chilled on the cold hardwood.

  “What is it, brother? Can I help?”

  Gwyn chuckled. “If you can release me from a deal with a goddess maybe, but probably not.”

  Arthur’s brow wrinkled, and he gave him his patented regal glare. “What did you do?”

  Gwyn sagged over and clutched his head. “What I thought was the right thing for my people. I had to do it. It was the only way, and now I can’t back out.” He seized Arthur’s arm. “I love her.”

  Arthur clutched Gwyn’s hand with his free one. “Then you need to save her. Whatever it takes. Whatever the sacrifice. If you love her, then you protect her no matter the cost.”

  Gwyn glanced up at Arthur’s bride busying herself behind the counter. She was well within earshot, but she gave them the illusion of privacy and Gwyn was grateful. He surveilled her a moment as she teetered around under the bulk of her growing belly. A pang of envy swamped him, and he turned his attention back to Arthur.

  He spent a lot of time with Arthur on the battlefield once. One of the only humans he ever considered a friend without the guise of a deal or trick. When Arthur was trapped in Merlin’s magic, moving in and out of Morganna’s realm, Gwyn had searched a hundred years for a way to help him, save going to Morganna directly. He and that woman had a history longer than he cared to think about. It would seem he made a habit of dealing with unscrupulous women.

  Gwyn swallowed. He’d known what Arthur’s response would be before arrival, yet it didn’t make it any easier to hear.

  Arthur pulled him into a hard embrace and clutched him tight before releasing him. “I’m always here if you have need of me.”

  Tears threatening to fall from his eyes, he hugged his friend back. “Thank you.”

  He stood and bowed to the woman behind the counter, who nodded her head in response, and Gwyn stepped back into the mirror to his own room. The time had come to make a decision, and he hoped when it ended he would be dead because living with the choice would be so much harder. He eyed the knife on his dresser. That would make things easier, he could use it to slit his own throat before succumbing to Hel.

  Gwyn grounded himself with a deep breath. It was time. He grabbed his phone from the dresser to check the time: mid-day. Victor would be at work, and Bianca recovering and oblivious to her life before him. The phone weighed heavier in his hand with the decision he was about to make. He opened the home screen, hit a button and held it to his ear. The sound of the ringer clanged like a death knell.

  “Victor, it’s Gwyn. We need to talk.”

  Chapter Twenty

  BIANCA JERKED AWAKE IN Anwyn with a heavy weight in her chest. Something wasn’t right. She reached out and groped the cold down coverlet. Both Gwyn and Victor weren’t in bed, but much worse, Victor wasn’t in Anwyn. He didn’t have work this evening, and in the middle of the night he usually didn’t leave her side. She threw back the covers and grabbed a T-shirt off the floor before heading to the door. She burst through and padded down the hall to Gwyn’s room. He lay on top of his bed reading. The moon hung heavy and full outside his windows.

  He looked up as she approached his bed, seemingly pulling himself from the pages
. “What’s wrong?”

  “Victor is gone.” She hated the hysteria entering her voice. These two men had become her world in such a short time. She couldn’t live with herself if something happened to either of them.

  Gwyn sat up and stretched his arms over his head, his chest arching in the moonlight. “What do you mean gone?” He sounded a little less worried.

  An idea jerked her into action and she rushed from the room with Gywn hot on her heels. She burst into Victor’s room and began running her fingers over the surface of everything. If she could spark a vision she could attain information.

  “This is ridiculous. Why don’t you just call him? Do you even get visions anymore without the seal’s power?”

  She glared at him over her shoulder as she trailed her fingers over the cold blankets. “I have a feeling. Psychic remember.”

  He shifted and crossed his arms over his chest.

  She shuffled her feet along the rug, touching every stray accessory within reach.

  “He really didn’t spend much time in here, you know,” Gwyn cut in. “He spent most of his time in your room.”

  She stopped moving and plucked at her shirt. It belonged to Victor. “You’re right.”

  She brushed a kiss across his cheek as she squeezed around his hulking frame to the door. Her room was a short distance away, and she found Victor’s hairbrush on her vanity. The second she touched it, a vision engulfed her, dragging her into unconsciousness. From somewhere else, she felt her physical body hit the floor, but her mind was in Hel’s dungeon. She heard a moan and whipped around to find Victor chained to a wall, a hellhound standing guard. It was the same vision she had awhile back. Except this time, Victor had a knife with a jeweled handle stuck through his shoulder blade. Just as she knew how to find him, she knew he was dying. She looked around the dank room for anything else that could tell her anything. A dark corner caught her eye and she crept closer. A figure huddled there, a man by the size of him. She reached toward the figure, and as her hand cut into the shadows the figure reached out and grabbed her wrist.

  No one save Gywn had ever interacted with her in a vision before. He pulled her in and when she caught sight of his face, she screamed herself back to consciousness.

  A gentle hand cupped her cheeks and a cool wet cloth lay across her forehead. She opened her eyes to stare into the face of her lover and the other man chained in Hel’s dungeon. Before she could say anything, nausea rolled through her belly and she threw herself across Gwyn’s lap to hang her head over the edge of the bed. Nothing came up but air, and eventually the dry heaving subsided enough she could sit up.

  She looked up at Gwyn, trying to understand how he could be here and there at the same time. Maybe Victor was there but not injured yet. Maybe it was the future since she had that vision of him chained before and it had yet pass. She folded over and clutched her stomach.

  “What is it love?” Gwyn asked, rubbing her back gently. “What did you see?”

  “Victor is with Hel, and he is injured.”

  “Are you sure it’s not the future?” he asked.

  “I don’t know. I couldn’t tell because…” Her voice broke.

  “Because what?”

  She swallowed and sat up to meet his gaze. “You were there too.”

  He jerked back. “What would Hel want with me?”

  She shook her head. “She hates me for humiliating her. She wants to take everything, and everyone, from me before she tries to kill me.”

  She leaned over her bed to grab her cell phone as if there was anyone else in her life she could call when she was in trouble. She couldn’t take the chance of leaving Victor there any longer. When she brought him into her world, she vowed to protect him. She’d hope to delight him with a life of unexpected and magical things, but now that life put him in danger.

  Bianca flipped through her contacts, trying to call someone, anyone, but only Victor and Gwyn’s name sat under her thumb. Finally, she gave up and threw the phone across the bed. Something was missing. She knew there was something to call, someone who would help, but she couldn’t pinpoint the source. Gwyn wrapped his arms around her. “You’re going to get him, aren’t you?”

  She nodded against his chest.

  Gwyn sighed. “He means more to you than I do.”

  “Don’t say that. I care about you both.”

  Gwyn squeezed her and stood up. “No, if you cared about me, you would stay here. Victor is as good as lost. A human can’t survive in the Underworld alive. Even if you do rescue him, he will never be the same for having been there and returned.”

  “But he’s my consort. He has Fairy magic now too, right?”

  Gwyn pursed his lips. “Inside Fairy he does, yes. But outside these borders, no.”

  Bianca shook her head and climbed out of the soft blankets. “It doesn’t matter. I can’t let him stay there, alone and terrified. If he is going to die, it will be in my arms. I got him into this mess. It’s my fault he is there now when he could be safe and oblivious in the human world.

  Her emotions spiraled and sob ripped itself from her throat. She turned away so Gwyn wouldn’t see the tears falling for Victor.

  Gwyn threw up his hands and stalked from the room. Over her shoulder, she watched him go, and her heart broke a little. If he cared for her, he would know how much Victor meant to her and help. No use crying over that now. She grabbed some clothes off the chair, dark, denim, skinny jeans, and a long-sleeved, black, fitted T-shirt. Black combat boots sat by the foot of the chair, as if Fairy were trying to help its queen.

  She dressed quickly and tied her hair up with an elastic she kept on her wrist. If she didn’t make it back, she would never forgive herself for leaving Gwyn that way. She took a deep breath and left the room to hunt him down. If anything, to say goodbye and get a kiss for luck. She marched through the house, courtiers bowing as she passed. Every bit of her spelled combat, so they probably assumed blood was on tonight’s menu. From what she’d been reading, the Queens of Anwyn had never been gentle women.

  She pushed open Gwyn’s door, but he wasn’t there. This time, she walked in and began to feel around, trying to catch another vision. It would weaken her, but a tingling in her chest told her something wasn’t right here. She touched the dresser top and a vision seized her. Gwyn stood in the room, with the same knife she saw embedded in Victor. His voice floated in her mind. “I wish to renegotiate our deal.”

  And then Hel’s response punched Bianca in the gut.

  Mercifully, the vision ended and she found herself clutching the edge of the dresser for support. Victor was gone, and it was Gwyn who had delivered him to Hel. Now he went to collect his reward. An anger built in her. It consumed every tender feeling she’d ever felt for Gwyn leaving a wasteland of apathy in its place. No man would betray her and live.

  A portal opened from the mirror behind her, and she could see the hazy outline of Hel’s castle. It rose, twisting above the rocky crags gouged out by the rolling river.

  She reached through the glass, stepped beyond, and found herself standing outside Hel’s enormous stone palace. The river bellowing and coursing behind her was the only sound as she walked up the steps. This woman had become far more than a nuisance. Bianca planned to end this tonight.

  The doors opened before her as if the palace itself expected her arrival. She knew the way from her last visit, but the throne room looked decidedly different than her previous trip. Hel sat on her throne, attempting to be seductive but failing in her golden gossamer robes. A glittering crown sat on her head and Bianca glared. If it had looked anything like her seal, Bianca wouldn’t have been able to control her reaction. The rest of the room was lined with cage after cage, hellhound after hellhound inside. Before they had free reign, Bianca had wondered if Hel’s control over her hounds was slipping or maybe she feared something else. Was one of them Victor?

  “Ah, it seems we have a guest.” Hel’s voice cut through the litany of growling and barking and sile
nced the room. “Did you bring your husband, our guest of honor?”

  Part of her hoped her vision proved wrong, but Gwyn’s absence spoke for him. Hel’s validation of her fears hurt more than Gwyn’s betrayal. She had nothing, no one. Part of her hoped Victor would stand by her side, but she could never allow that with him being human—well technically. Hellhounds weren’t immortal. Like werewolves, they could be killed.

  Bianca cleared her throat and addressed Hel with a simple demand, “where is Victor?”

  Hel chuckled. “He is a beautiful one, isn’t he?” She waved her hand and Victor stumbled from behind a curtain, bloody, beaten, and with a danger shoved through his shoulder.

  The sight of him caused her knees to weaken but only for a moment. No. She needed to be strong for Victor.

  She squared her shoulders and leveled her gaze on Hel. “What are your demands?”

  Hel laughed again, pulling the chain tethered to Victor’s neck. “I have no demands except causing you pain. And besides, you have nothing to bargain with. You have no one coming to your aid. You have nothing but your power, and even that is weakened by the loss of your crown.”

  Bianca reached out instinctively for her magic, the part of her that demanded obedience, conquering, and Hel was right—it was barely a flickering light in her chest. Barely anything to hold on to and wield. Her mind stumbled over options. What did she have to barter with? She had only one thing Hel could possibly want.

  “I offer my life in exchange for his.”

  The room went eerily quiet. Even the roar of the river beyond seemed to hush in the wake of her pronouncement.

  “You would give your life, an immortal life, for one measly little human?” Hel asked, astonishment heavy in her tone.

  The sound of stone on stone echoed through the hall, and she looked back to find Gwyn standing in the entrance behind her. Hope lit in her chest until she caught sight of Hel’s smile. No, she’d almost forgotten; he’d betrayed her.