Mermen. Centaurs. Satyrs. Nymphs. Fairies. She counted none of them as friends. The only thing she’d craved had been her isolation—a place in the world to call her own and make her own, to fashion and to mold to her own unique sensibilities. And she’d done that.
She glanced up at the smooth, domed surface of her ceiling. The palace was a marvel of ingenuity and beauty, at one with nature and yet separate from it too. The landscape she called home was harsh and unyielding, almost cruel to outsiders, but it’d embraced her. Taught her strength, courage, and conviction of heart.
Soon, other creatures had joined her. Polar bears. Arctic foxes. Snow bees. Snow leopards. She did not want for companionship. Her life was simple but perfect.
A chilly blast of air whistled through an opening in the dome, combing through her hair. She’d built the palace that way, so that she could look at the stars.
Nibbling on the corner of her lip, Luminesa wondered at the properties of the mirror. She could almost feel Baatha’s eyes drilling into her again. But she refused to look back at him.
She turned on her heel, marched directly to the desk, grabbed the leather, and tipped it over so that the sliver spilled out. Its shiny glass surface almost seemed to sparkle.
She passed her palm just over it, and once again, she felt the heavy press of its dark magick throb against her.
Baatha snapped his beak.
“I know what I’m doing.”
There was a rustle of feathers and then a powerful surge of wings, and she knew he’d flown off in a furious huff. He did not trust anything that came from the Under Goblin, and truthfully, neither did she. But for better or worse, she’d made the deal with him and was stuck with it.
Planting her hands on either side of the mirror, she leaned over and peered into it. An image formed inside it, small and too hard to make out at first, nothing but a blur of shadow and movements. But eventually, the colors formed a tight ball, and the shadows became full of light so that she could finally see the image before her.
It was pitch black out, and yet the moon was pregnant with a buttery soft light, highlighting the shapes walking bent forward against the arctic press of wind and snow, nearly obscured by the whiteout conditions.
There were three of them, huddled together for warmth, their footsteps slogging and weak. Pines and skeletal trees whipped and swayed behind them as they trudged slowly through the thickening swell.
She narrowed her eyes. Two of them were unnaturally short—clearly the children, coming only to waist height of the third figure.
The shoulders of the third were broad, but it was hard to say whether the individual was impressively built or simply swaddled in layer upon layer of animal skins.
A long trail of black hair billowed behind like a banner in a breeze—the woman most likely, with hair that length. The woman wrapped her arms around the children, tucking them into her side, trudging onward with the persistent footsteps of one determined to make it out alive.
But her steps were strange, maybe due to the cold, her gait slightly off somehow. It was enough to make Luminesa idly curious but nothing more.
She wondered why they continued to walk outside rather than seek shelter. It should have been the obvious first choice. “They’ll never survive that way,” Luminesa muttered, knowing no human could withstand that arctic level of cold for long.
Just then the woman glanced up and stared at the sky with a bemused frown. But the woman was no woman at all. She was a he. And he was the most beautiful man Luminesa had ever seen.
His eyes were the color of a verdant spring meadow. His thick black brows and slashing cheekbones framed a patrician nose and full—though not overly so—lips.
“Who’s there?” the man bellowed. “Who said that? We need help. We will die without shelter. Please, you—”
Jerking, as though slapped, Luminesa moved away from the glass. The moment she did, the throaty tenor of his words died. There was no way the man could have heard her, and yet…she’d heard him.
With a hiss, she took a step away from the desk, peering at it as though it were a wicked thing, full of sharp teeth and intent on harm. Rubbing her hands together until her fingers began to grow damp from the friction, she realized that her curiosity had not abated in the slightest. In fact, it’d only grown worse.
Frowning, she twirled on her heels. Her agitation caused the snow bees circling her head to buzz an irritable symphony.
How was she supposed to do that? How was she supposed to help them? Panic clawed at her throat. What had she been thinking to enter into that arrangement with the Under Goblin? To put her life on the line for three perfect strangers…humans of all things.
Taking a deep, calming breath, she forced her footsteps to slow and then, lifting her head high, marched toward her throne and took a seat. Baatha came to her a moment later, his warm, tawny eyes full of worry.
“I’m fine. You need not worry, my friend.”
He whistled a harsh blast through his beak. It’d not escaped his notice that she’d been acting more agitated than was normal. The Ice Queen was nothing if not the epitome of cool and collected. But even as she thought it, she could still feel her pulse racing, still feel the heavy press of curiosity that made her stomach feel sick and twisted in knots.
Luminesa rubbed her brow. “I will be fine. This shall pass.”
She wasn’t entirely sure she said it for his benefit, though. Her left pinkie couldn’t seem to stop twitching.
Licking her lips, she took several more calming breaths until eventually, the flow of her blood evened out, and the nervous tic of her finger ceased.
“I am fine.” She peered at him. “Truly.”
Baatha hopped up onto her forearm—his sharp talons slightly painful, as she’d forgotten to encase her form in ice when she’d returned to her palace—and rubbed the crown of his soft head against her shoulder.
Her familiar was rarely given to sentimentality, but he’d clearly sensed her words for the lie they were.
She gently caressed his feathers. “All will be well.” But deep down, Luminesa wasn’t sure that was true at all.
She could have sat there for days, staring off into space and battling her internal need to leave the humans to fend for themselves—even knowing the fate that awaited her if she did—if a loud blast of noise hadn’t suddenly snapped her out of her reverie. Frowning, she turned to Baatha. “Go see what this is about.”
With a powerful flap of his wings, he sailed high into the air and out into the night, returning minutes later with a note wrapped around his foot. He dropped to his ice stand, then cried at her loudly.
“Yes. Yes,” she grumped as she walked toward him. Baatha was practically vibrating with excitement when she got there. Only once she drew close did she notice what she hadn’t before—a smell was lacing his feathers, an odor she rarely scented so high up in the mountains.
Equine flesh.
She sniffed once more.
Equine flesh, roasted meats, and fragrant barley.
Reaching for the note, she knew who it would be without even needing to open it. Inside was the inked stamp of a horse’s hoof. Twirling on her heel, Luminesa flicked her wrist, creating a bridge of ice for her centaur neighbor to safely traverse.
Rarely had Luminesa come into contact with them through the many years she’d lived there, but occasionally, a scout would come and seek her out, requesting safe passage between that realm and theirs.
The centaurs were a race of warriors, beauty notwithstanding; they would as soon stab someone as welcome them into their dwellings. But they were fiercely intelligent and even noble. The treaty she’d penned with the chieftain years ago still held strong, even after all that time.
Wrapping a cloak of ice around her shoulders, Luminesa glided toward the entrance of her castle, watching as the lone centaur trotted steadily toward her.
Female, with a snowy-white hindquarter bearing sweeping jet-black tribal markings on her back legs, she w
as a creature built to handle the snow. She wore a vest of pale plumage on her chest, but her arms and torso were exposed to the lashing snow, which didn’t seem to bother her in the slightest.
Her hair was thick and black—except for twin stripes of pure white that ran vertically down both sides of it—and trailed down her body in much the same fashion as a horse’s mane. Curving upward from the crown of her head were two small horns.
Something about the woman nagged at Luminesa, something familiar and yet foreign all at the same time. She narrowed her eyes, looking up at the creature who towered her by several feet when she’d finally come to a halt.
Her face was a thing of grace and beauty, her features slightly equine and yet also purely feminine. Green eyes with no irises stared back at Luminesa.
After several minutes, the centaur swept her arms to the side and gave Luminesa a regal bow.
“Ice Queen,” she said in a velvety voice. But that was all she said. She stood erect and proud once more, and her mannerism was one of patient study.
Luminesa clipped her head in acknowledgment and greeting. “Centaur. Why have you come?”
Snow bees, curious creatures that they were, circled the centaur’s head, looking like a glimmering wreath of ice as they buzzed about her interestedly. Her jaw clamped down tightly, causing the powerful muscle in her cheek to twitch.
A nagging suspicion began to manifest in Luminesa. Peeking over the centaur’s shoulder, she looked for the dots of shadows that normally hid within the shelter of trees.
Centaurs were herd creatures, never alone. If she’d been a scout, her party should have been behind her, awaiting her signal that Luminesa had given her blessing to proceed through her lands.
But the shadows were not there.
“Does your Queen know you are here?”
A sound much like a neigh dropped from the centauress’s tongue. “No.”
Luminesa’s brow twitched. “Then why have you come?”
A jet of arctic air whistled through the heavens, blasting between them. The touch of it soothed Luminesa’s cold soul, but the creature trembled. Her flanks twitched with a powerful spasm.
“I came to find you, Queen.”
“To render aid?” she asked, knowing already that if the centaur had dared seek her out, it could be for no other reason.
She nodded once, stamping her front hoof in agitation.
“Why?”
The female looked off into the distance, her lips tugged down into a tight scowl. “My brother was stolen, thrust into a land of ice which I cannot reach.”
Her fingers curled into a tight fist, and Luminesa knew that if the centaur could, she’d have had an arrow notched into the bow resting upon her back and aimed directly at Luminesa’s heart. Though centaurs were honorable, they weren’t known for being very trusting. It was why they preferred to stick to their kind almost exclusively, stepping outside of their herd only during times of absolute necessity.
To see the centauress there, at that moment, and alone…something very grave had happened indeed.
Luminesa lifted a brow. “And you think I’ve done this?”
Scowling fiercely, the centaur looked her head-on and grunted, “Aye, I do.”
Had she been less discombobulated by the events of the day, Luminesa might have caused a wind to roll by, pick her up, and toss her unceremoniously down the side of a cliff. But there was something about that female that Luminesa liked. Her straightforwardness, her fearlessness—possibly even recklessness—in seeking her out, even knowing the consequences that could occur.
“I did not do it to him,” she finally said.
“Then who has?” the centauress demanded, again kicking out her hoof.
There’d been something about the man’s gait earlier that’d seemed strange to Luminesa. It’d been hard to tell what he truly was because of the whiteout conditions he and the children had walked through, but it wasn’t hard to imagine that it was very possible he was only partly human.
Damn that Under Goblin. Hadn’t he said as much himself? If the centaurs believed that Luminesa had broken the treaty, there could be war on her lands, unnecessary bloodshed and violence. They’d never win. But the losses would be great on both sides.
Even if she’d never agreed to his little game, he’d ensured she’d not have walked away from him unscathed. The detestable male was a ruthless and calculating strategist; she’d give him that.
“Have you lost children too?” she asked quietly.
The centauress frowned deeply; her wide blunt teeth—very reminiscent of a horse’s—were in sharp detail as her upper lip curled back with disdain.
“No. Why do you ask me this?”
Sighing, Luminesa stared up at the heavens. So it was likely a centaur male and two human children. She hated the Under Goblin, loathed the male with every fiber of her being.
One of the many reasons Luminesa had rarely had issue with the centaurs was their own disdain for the human race. Though half human themselves, they had a tendency to view their kind as a superior breed that was set apart.
The male, whoever he was, would likely tend to those children only a while longer before he decided they served no purpose other than to fill the ache in his belly.
She wasn’t sure whether centaurs viewed humans as food, but without a doubt, they ate meat, unlike their gentler, more docile cousins.
“Because I believe I know what has happened to your brother.”
“Alador,” she snapped.
Luminesa shrugged. “Alador, then.”
“And that is?” the female barked, clearly growing frustrated by Luminesa’s continued lack of sharing.
“Tell me, centauress”—Luminesa ignored her—“why come to me and not your Queen?”
Those unearthly malachite-colored eyes flared, and for a brief moment, Luminesa caught a spark of fire dancing within them.
“I did.”
Luminesa picked up on the finality of her tone quite clearly. “Ah, I see. The Queen does not care about the fate of one lone centaur male? Not as valuable as a female. Why would you think I would feel any differently, then?”
That same quicksilver spark of fire continued to dance through the woman’s eyes. “Because…because Alador isn’t like the rest of us. He’s different.”
“How so?”
Centaurs were a matriarchal species. The consequence of losing a lone male was tolerable in the grand scheme of things. Especially if it meant preventing war and the deaths of the more valuable females of the herd.
“He has a peculiar type of kindness to him, one little understood by my kind. But he is my brother, and I would do anything to see him safe.”
Kindness to him. Luminesa almost scoffed at that.
Fiery. Intelligent. Brave…all adjectives she’d use to describe the centaurs. But “kind” wasn’t generally a word she thought of when she considered them. They were hard, antisocial, and standoffish when it came to dealing with anyone outside the herd.
“I’m sure you’re aware that coming to me as you are wouldn’t be looked upon favorably by your peers, seeking outside help such as mine.”
Her jaw thrust out. “Only you control the ice, mistress. Believe me, if I could bring him back on my own, I would. But that land is sealed off to me.”
“All for one brother?”
The centauress might not own to it, but her coming to Luminesa was also very different. Just what kind of creature was the centaur male that his sister would brave the wrath of her own kind that way?
Clenching her teeth, the centauress glanced down at her hooves but gave one hard shake of her head.
“You would risk your standing within your herd for him?”
Her nostrils flaring, she glared up at Luminesa. “I would do anything for him, even walk through a bed of burning coals and glass. He is my brother. Can you not understand that?”
The passion in her voice and the barely checked tears had Luminesa trembling. It’d been so long s
ince she’d felt much emotion, but she felt it burning off the centauress in great waves.
Baatha cried his terrible cry, the one that shriveled up human souls to hear. It was a cry to battle, a cry of war. His talons dug into Luminesa’s flesh, gouging and ripping through, causing her blood to well. But she did not flinch back from him. She felt his nerves, his fear for her.
The centauress glanced at him, smiling almost softly at the snow falcon.
“I mean your mistress no harm, falcon,” the female said.
And though Luminesa knew the creature was still furious over her perceived wrong, her words for Baatha were sincere. The falcon heard it, too, and tipped his head in acknowledgment.
The lashing winds gentled and became still. The air became pregnant with fat flakes of snow instead.
“What is your name, female?”
She blinked her long black lashes at Luminesa. “Why?”
Why indeed? Luminesa had no idea what she was doing right then, but names were power, names were truth.
Luminesa held her tongue, waiting the centauress out. None of them needed to know that she’d entered a high-stakes game with the Under Goblin and that Alador was an unfortunate casualty of it. Luminesa would bring him back, but not for that woman, that clan, or even for Alador himself. She would bring him back because she refused to lose. Period.
“Haxion,” the female finally whispered. “My name is Haxion.”
“Well then, Haxion,” Luminesa said slowly, “I shall do as you bid. I will find your brother, and I will return him safely to you.”
“And in exchange I will owe you what?” Hatred burned like a beacon in Haxion’s eyes.
Luminesa’s lips tipped up into a half smile. “Payment shall be determined later.”
There would be no offers of hope or pointless platitudes. Luminesa would give none. Instead, she turned on her heel and walked back into her ice palace.
The doors slammed thunderously behind her.
An hour later, Luminesa stood over that sliver of glass once again, watching the trio as they trekked aimlessly through the snow. She had to do something. Though it terrified her to her core, she knew she would never be able to live with herself if something happened to those children.
Alphas for the Holidays Page 141
