The Stolen Princess

by Kristen Gupton

  Keiran nodded and tried to settle back. The firelight reflected from the sweat again starting to run down his face.

  Sytir leaned closer toward him. “It’s getting worse, isn’t it?”

  Keiran simply nodded, not wanting to let Jerris know exactly how bad the pain and shortness of breath was getting.

  Sytir rose up and went to put the sword back where he’d found it. He returned to Keiran’s bedside, visually evaluating him. Keiran’s breaths were becoming short and labored.

  Keiran didn’t know whether he’d do better standing up, lying down, or continuing to sit like he was. Any move he made flared up a burning pressure in the left side of his chest.

  The door to the room opened, Kayla standing there, looking exhausted but worried. “Sytir? What are you doing in here?”

  He looked over his shoulder at his wife. “I’m afraid your brother’s condition isn’t improving. He needs blood to heal, or I need to be allowed to cut into him to relieve the pressure against his lung.”

  She closed the door behind her, glancing over at Jerris. The redhead stared back at her before they both went closer to the side of the bed.

  Sytir sat beside Keiran again, not asking permission as he reached out and moved the wrap to expose the dagger’s entry point. He then leaned in further, placing his ear against the side of Keiran’s chest and listening before sitting up again. “Yes, I can alleviate what’s happening, but it will be extraordinarily unpleasant.”

  Keiran’s eyes went wide with fear. Though the pain was growing and the sensation of not being able to breathe worsening, the idea of being opened up further terrified him. The way he felt was bringing back memories of his assassination, and he started to slip into panic.

  The vampire wasn’t the only one who thought back to that day, however.

  Jerris looked down at Keiran as he began to grip at the bed sheets, the horrified expression the vampire wore cutting through him. Keiran had suffered far too much, and if it took a little pain of his own to end it this time, so be it. Whatever cut he sustained to bleed for Keiran would be far better than whatever Sytir was preparing to do.

  Kayla shook her head. “I’ll give him my blood. Get me a knife.”

  “Damn it all, not you, Kayla,” Jerris groaned, shaking his head and running his hands down his face. Guilt over not helping Keiran already rushed in on him. “You can’t risk infection when you still have to go all the way into the Northern Wastes. I can help him. He’d do it for me.”

  Through his anxiety, Keiran heard that and lifted his head, surprised to hear Jerris surrender.

  The guard tensed his jaw and went to where his things were heaped in the corner. He dug out a small utilitarian knife, knowing it was likely the sharpest blade at hand. He went over, already pushing up one of his sleeves. Sickness writhed in his stomach, but he tried to keep his mind as void as possible. It needed to be done quickly before he backed out or simply hit the floor, though he wasn’t sure the latter wouldn’t happen anyway.

  Keiran’s pain abated slightly as the notion of drinking and getting the relief he was desperate for overtook him. He sat up straighter, his throat burning as his fangs slid down.

  Jerris landed on the bed next to Keiran as Sytir stood up and moved out of the way. He held the knife out toward Keiran, giving it over without a fight. Jerris closed his eyes and turned his head away, keeping his arm extended. He tried to block out the memory of Keiran drinking from Kanan on their last outing, but his brain was persistent.

  Though part of Keiran wanted to take the ethical high ground and refuse, he had the blade pressed to Jerris’ wrist before any inner debate could ensue. The cut was small and quick, not needing to be terribly deep.

  Jerris drew in a hiss between his teeth as the sting of the cut set in. His ears started to ring, but before he could waver and fall, he felt Kayla sit beside him, wrapping her arms around him tight.

  Keiran dropped the knife as blood began to well up from the wound. He leaned in and drew out what he could, need pushing away all of his conscious thoughts.

  Jerris kept his eyes closed and let his head lull over onto Kayla’s shoulder. An odd sensation of drunken tranquility flooded into him, and a lax smile came to his lips. “S’not so bad…”

  Keiran let go of Jerris’ wrist after several silent minutes. Though he wasn’t completely sated, he didn’t want to do any real harm to his friend. What he’d gotten was enough, and he flopped back onto the bed. He was about to lift his head again to tell his sister she needed to get her talisman far enough away for him to heal, but the sudden ache of his body mending cut him short.

  The Northern Star was no longer working.

  His hands gripped at the sheets. As the wound healed and the pressure in his chest alleviated, Keiran’s body was rocked with pain. He knew it was only temporary from the other times he’d healed. As it began to pass, he drew in his first, full breath since the fight with Athan.

  Keiran remained where he was until the tension in his chest subsided. His eyes opened, and he stared up at the ceiling, dazed. “Thank you, Jerris.”

  Jerris’ previous fear was all but forgotten. He pulled himself back into reality and lifted his head to look down at his wrist, seeing the small cut there. “Is that it?”

  The guard was almost uncomfortable with how oddly relaxed he’d become. No longer in any danger of passing out, he rose up and wandered toward the fireplace again, the weird euphoria still circulating within him.

  Kayla stood up from the bed and turned around to look at her brother. “You’re recovering?”

  “Aye.”

  She pulled out the pendant. The last hints of any glow from it had been extinguished. It had lasted long enough to get them past the threat Athan posed.

  Keiran slowly sat back up, enjoying the simple act of breathing. His senses were coming back to him, a feeling of confusion coming from Jerris as he stood off a ways, cleaning up the small laceration. “Are you all right, Jerris?”

  The guard turned around, having tied a small remnant of bandage material around his wrist. “Not honestly as bad as I was dreading, Keir. My father told me it made him feel strangely when you did the same to him, now I know what he meant.”

  He quirked a brow, not having much of a response for that.

  Sytir glanced at his wife and gave a small nod. “I think these two are ready for some rest now.”

  She smiled and tucked the spent Northern Star away. “All right, try not to get into anymore excitement tonight. I think we’re all too exhausted to deal with anything else. We’ve already said our goodbyes. Let’s not need to do so again.”

  Keiran gave her and Sytir a smile before getting up and embracing her one last time. “If we don’t see each other come morning, goodbye.”

  She laughed and shook her head, moving toward the door after letting him go. “You won’t. Goodnight, boys.”

  Chapter 8

  For several days, Sabetha’s ability had only garnered her fleeting glances of Athan after his encounter with Keiran. Though she hadn’t been able to see the fight itself, she knew he’d been hurt. Worry set in, making her increasingly agitated. She’d paced around the fortress, feathers ruffled, muttering to herself nonstop. When anyone dared to go near her, she’d snap out with her short beak, removing small triangles of their flesh in anger.

  Traveling back from the coast of Minar only took Baden a day, but as it pushed into a third, and Athan still wasn’t home, Sabetha became frantic. She began ripping out her own feathers in her worry.

  Baden was the only one capable of getting close to her. He did his best to console Sabetha, but nothing seemed to get through to the harpy. She was making herself sick, but his efforts to assure her Athan would make it home were futile.

  Baden was headed toward his room, but stopped in the corridor when he heard someone running up behind him. He turned, seeing Sabetha sprinting in his direction. Her odd, swaying gait was usually laughable, but Baden didn’t have the time. Sabetha screeched a
nd bowled past him, knocking him into the wall.

  She continued on, heading out into the courtyard as fast as she could manage. The guards at the gate turned toward her as she approached, moving into her path. Allowing her out, unescorted, was forbidden, and they cross their arms over their chests, expecting her to stop her rampage.

  Sabetha came to a halt before them, the fingers hanging from her wings writhing at her sides. She shifted her weight from one leg to the other and back again, her head remaining stationary, eyes fixed on the men.

  “You know the rules, Sabetha,” one of the two said.

  Her response was to shriek. Not a small, plaintiff cry, but a blood-curdling cacophony. Both men, as well as the others in the courtyard, immediately winced and bent forward, placing their hands over their ears. The sound she made was deafening, and would leave them all with ringing ears for hours.

  With the guards incapacitated temporarily, she darted past them, long strides carrying her away from the castle before anyone could react. The structure sat immediately above the tree line of the Talausian Mountains. Given the downward slope of the road, the clear space allowed her to achieve liftoff.

  She glided down toward the dense coniferous forest, her large eyes scanning ahead. She’d seen Athan in her visions, and she had to find him. The fear over not knowing what was wrong with him was driving her into a desperate madness.

  The harpy wasn’t a skilled flier, and negotiating a graceful landing in the forest was beyond her abilities. She spotted a small clearing and dove for it, hitting the snow-covered ground and sliding forward on her stomach.

  Athan sat back against a tree, watching her come down. He took a deep breath and rested his head against the tree again, eyes closing. “I suppose this means I have deaf guards again.”

  She struggled to her feet, before shaking out her feathers to get the wet snow off. Her head pivoted toward him, a series of clicks coming from her as she approached the vampire.

  Athan opened one eye when he felt her looming over him. “Worried?”

  She gave a bob of her head and lowered down. Her eyes settled on the sight of his left hand held up to his right shoulder. “Injured? You must drink! You will be fixed!”

  “I have fed, Sabetha. Six times between Minar and here. It did nothing.” Athan sighed and dropped his hand to his lap. “Keiran has his mother’s sword. How we managed to miss that, I don’t know.”

  Sabetha had been told about the sword in the past, she’d even gotten visions of it before Ilana had taken it out of Aleria, but it was all long ago and lost to her. Her head rotated sideways, her large eyes blank. “You can’t be fixed?”

  “It will take time, Little Bird. I won’t be leaving home for a while. This feeling of being without my full abilities is…unwelcomed.” He moved to get up, knowing they were only a short distance from home.

  The wound pained him to the point it had sapped his strength. Even when he’d shifted out of a physical form, the damage to his energy field had continued to drain him. Athan’s trip home had been punctuated by multiple stops, unable to keep his nonphysical form intact for travel.

  Sabetha rose up with him, sensing his weakness. Athan put his good arm around her would-be shoulders, and leaned on her for support. “Let’s get back. I’ve been away too long.”

  * * *

  Vinson pulled his gaze up from the desk he was chained to, a charcoal pencil gripped in one hand, wondering who was coming to check on him this time. Vampire or not, his vision was blurred from the constant work he’d been forced into by his father before his departure

  “Baden,” he said, leaning back in his chair, wondering what the disturbance was about.

  “Any progress?” Baden looked down at his half-brother before tugging out a chair opposite to Vinson and sitting down. The table was covered with documents and schematics, the technical aspect of which was all above Baden’s comprehension.

  Vinson dropped the pencil to the side of the drawing he’d been working on and crossed his arms over his chest. “Of course there has been progress. The nightly torture I’ve been subjected to has kept me nicely motivated.”

  Baden glanced to the side, knowing Vinson wasn’t speaking metaphorically. There was no particular bond between the brothers. Baden was Athan’s favorite, and Vinson was generally regarded as the lowest in status within the fortress.

  Though Vinson didn’t mind the interruption from his mind-exhausting work, he generally preferred solitude over Baden’s company. “What? What do you want?”

  Baden leaned forward on the desk, folding his hands together. He hadn’t imagined Vinson would be eager to converse with him, but the other vampire was the only one in the place who might have an opinion of value. “Do you remember your mother?”

  Vinson’s mouth opened, his brows tipping downward. “Yes. What does that have to do with anything?”

  “What do you remember about her?” Baden asked, glancing around to assure they were still alone.

  There was something unusual going on. Vinson rarely had genuine, civil conversations with Baden, his brother generally nothing more than a puppet for their father. Intrigued, he opted to humor him.

  “My mother never wanted much to do with me, Baden,” Vinson said. “I was pushed away from the outset. When I would try to approach her as a child, it was…”

  “It was what?” Baden leaned even further forward.

  “She’d break down into hysterics about me being an abomination and do her best to get away from me.” Vinson’s pain over the memories lingered, though he tried to cover any outward signs of it. “She had the servants poison me several times. She was ultimately the one who killed me. Came into my room and drove a sword she’d taken from one of her guards into my heart as I slept. So, if you’re looking for someone to give you a good accounting of what a mother should be like, I’m afraid you’ve come to the wrong person.”

  “But her rejection of you was always obvious?” Baden asked.

  “I believe I just conveyed as much.” Vinson’s eyes narrowed. “Why?”

  Baden scanned around the room again, debating on how much to say. While he and Vinson didn’t have a good relationship, he was desperate to talk to someone about the thoughts plaguing him. If nothing else, he knew Vinson wouldn’t sell him out to their father, ill-will between them or not.

  “I met my mother while I was away,” Baden said.

  Now, Vinson was intrigued. Like everyone living in Athan’s home, he’d felt the ghost of the long-lost woman haunting his father. He’d been brought to the fortress long after she’d disappeared, but he’d learned everything he needed to about Kayla over the years.

  Athan’s first demand of him had been to build a life-sized automaton of the vanished woman. Vinson had been required to base it off of the several paintings Athan had done of her over the years. Athan was clearly obsessed, and it was something he would never let go of.

  “Our father has been mad with the hope of catching her since he found out she was alive, hence all of this.” Vinson waved his hands over the documents before him. “So, how did it go?”

  Baden shrugged. “Considering I was stripped of my powers and kept in chains during a trip across the Northern Sea? Not as bad as it could have gone.”

  Vinson folded his arms on the table. “So, what of it? What about it is bothering you to the point you’d subject yourself to a conversation with me?”

  “Meeting her as brought up some problems. Not the least of which is she may have never shunned me as Athan has claimed all of this time.” Baden met his brother’s gaze. “I believe our father lied to me about that.”

  Vinson pushed back his urge to laugh, but a smirk cropped up. “That should come as no surprise. Athan would lie about anything to further his own agenda. You know that well enough, or have you really held onto some notion you’re special in that regard with him?”

  “Perhaps I have thought he has been honest with me. I’ve always felt like I was the one in his confidence,” Bad
en admitted.

  Vinson gave out a single laugh. “Baden, Athan is loyal to no one. Perhaps that has always been easier for me to see given my position here.”

  “Or, perhaps, it is Kayla who is trying to manipulate me by placing this doubt,” Baden said.

  Vinson leaned back and thought. He wondered how far Baden would run down this rabbit hole with him, and opted to dig it a little deeper. “Tell me, Baden, how did your mother treat you when she was here?”

  “I have no memories of her ever pushing me away or treating me poorly. She was always loving, a far cry from our father, I will admit.” Baden shook his head and averted his gaze to the side.

  “I wasn’t around here then. I don’t have any personal accounting to give you of Kayla.” Vinson narrowed his eyes. “If she was loving and good when you were with her, though, how were Athan’s claims alone enough to change your mind so easily?”

  Baden hung his head and closed his eyes, thinking back. “I was only a child, not even ten. I’d seen the way Athan treated her. He came to me one day promising to give me great power if I did a few things. I allowed it, thinking…”

  “Thinking what?”

  Baden lifted his head and met his brother’s gaze. “Thinking if I let him do what he wanted to me, so I would become strong like him, that I’d be able to escape here with my mother.”

  Vinson’s brows rose. “Ah, you let him change you in order to help her? That says a lot, don’t you think? So, how did he turn you against her afterward?”

  Baden nodded. “After I was transformed, I woke up in a different place. Athan told me she had rejected me, and she wanted nothing to do with me now that I had become a true vampire like he was. He said I had to live in the new place as she wouldn’t allow me to come back home. He told me he was the only one who would ever accept me for who I was, because he could relate it. He said a human, like my mother, could never do so.”