by Ciara Graves
“You care to tell me why you felt the need to charge down Rudarius?” I finally said, waiting to get punched for it.
“I thought I could handle him.”
“Seriously?”
“Yeah, seriously.” She scrubbed her face. “I want him dead.”
“As do I, but you can’t attack him without a plan. He’s too damned strong.”
“Thanks, because his overpowering me wasn’t enough of a reminder.” She hung her head, digging her toes into the grass. Her eyes narrowed and the brave face she’d worn the last few days disappeared. Her hands shook.
I scooted closer until our shoulders touched.
“He had me, Draven.”
“I know. He got the better of you.”
“No, it wasn’t that.” She picked a blade of grass and tore it apart slowly. “My anger consumed me and took over. He wanted it to happen. Wanted me to fall apart. I couldn’t move,” she whispered, voice shaking with fear. “If you hadn’t stabbed him. If you hadn’t stepped in…” She choked on the words, chucking the grass into the breeze. “Never mind.”
“Talk to me. Don’t keep bottling up what’s going on with you.”
She let out a shaky breath, gulping. “He doesn’t just want me as his weapon. He said he would have me as his next bride.”
A deep growl vibrated through me as I gripped the edge of the bench hard enough to crack pieces off into my hands. “I’ll never let him take you back. Never.”
“And if you don’t have a choice?”
“What’s that supposed to mean?”
She picked another piece of grass, tearing it up. Her eyes took on a faraway look, brow furrowed as she hissed quietly. “Something someone told me is all. Think it’s coming true as much as I keep trying to fight it.”
“And why would you put stock in anything anyone says about you?”
“It’s the same woman who said she saw our futures intertwined,” she murmured, and I stilled. “But I’m starting to think you’re the good guy in this tale.”
“So are you,” I argued.
She laughed bitterly.
“Seneca, you haven’t done anything wrong.”
“Haven’t I? Since coming to Otherworld, you’re the one that’s stepped up, not me. I’m too busy plotting how to murder my family in their sleep.”
“You don’t mean that.”
“Don’t I? My own parents would sooner tell everyone I’m dead than admit I’m their daughter. And it took nearly getting taken by Rudarius again for Lark or my brother to stand up to them.” She pushed roughly to her feet, stalking around the small garden, looking like she was ready to get into another fight. “I feel it growing,” she said on a breath, pressing a hand to her chest. “The evil inside me, the darkness he attempted to cultivate all those years ago. I feel it waking up.”
I went to her and took her hand, forcing her to look at me. “You are not evil. Do you hear me?”
“Liar.”
“Prove to me that you are, huh? Prove it.”
In answer, she held up her left hand with her three fae rings. There was no power in them currently, but the fingers in them were red and burned. I grabbed for them, ready to take the rings off, but when I tugged on one, it remained. I tried the other two, but none of them would come off. It was like they’d become a part of her hand.
“He wanted me to be his weapon.” She pulled her hand away from me, running her fingers over the stones. “Whether I want to be or not, I think it’s happening.”
“You have to fight it.” I reached for her again, but she staggered away from me. “Seneca.”
“I’m tired of fighting it.” She curled her left hand into a fist, and the stones gave off a strange, sickly glow. “Tired of everyone seeing me as some abomination. What’s the point, when I clearly am one?”
“The point is, there’s a war to fight.” How could she be saying this? Seeing Rudarius again had messed her up more than I thought. Coming here really, that’s what sent her over the edge. Having her own people turn against her, her parents admitting they left her to die. “I need you to see this war through.”
“No, you needed these, and now I doubt they’re going to do either of us any good.”
“That’s what I thought, too.” I hesitated to say what was really on my mind, but the truth right now was what she needed to hear. No more lies or false words. Only the truth. “What I need is you by my side. Someone else who understands what Rudarius is capable of. Someone who’s gone to the brink of darkness and come back stronger for it. You have. You just have to believe it yourself.”
“I went to that edge,” she agreed quietly, “but I fell. You just don’t want to admit it.”
“Seneca,” I tried.
She blurred away leaving me reaching for air.
“Damn it.”
“You really know how to scare the ladies off,” Shane teased as he appeared on the bench. “How’s she holding up?”
“Not well.”
More steps alerted me that we were not alone. Lark and Marlie were there, Lark with his left arm in a sling.
“If you’re looking for your sister, she’s run off, again.”
“I am, but I was hoping to speak to you, first.” Marlie ran his hand along the rose bushes, deep in thought. “Her rings… when did that start? The shadows.”
“They weren’t like that when we broke out of the dungeon,” Shane replied.
“Or on the road,” Lark added.
“So, not until after your darling father made a scene in the Middle Kingdom’s court,” I surmised.
His actions sent her over the edge and after seeing her fight the vampires, pulling her back from that ledge was going to be more difficult than I thought. I had to show her she was not turning evil unless she gave up on herself. I wouldn’t. Seneca and I were more alike than she realized, and I needed her to understand she was not alone, no matter what her family said.
I glanced at Marlie. “She was already so close to crossing the line there’s no coming back from. Your parents might’ve just given her that final nudge forward.”
I may have said it, but I knew that it wasn’t entirely true. Facing down Rudarius, his threatening to take her back, make her his bride, that would have been the final shove. She would do whatever she had to do not to go back to him. I saw it in her eyes, the determination no matter what the cost might be. I shouldn’t have let her go after him like that, but it wasn’t only my guilt I sensed.
Marlie’s regret poured off him, making him stink. “I never should have brought her here. Any of you, actually.”
“And if you hadn’t, a lot more fae would be dead.”
“But my sister might not be losing control.”
That I couldn’t argue with. Seneca had found her brother and expected a happy family reunion, and instead, she got a shit show.
“What she did out there… She tore that vampire apart with shadows,” Marlie uttered. “I’ve never seen a fae use magic like that. There was no light in it. No good. Only anger.”
“Can you blame her for being pissed off?”
“No, but if she’s not careful, they’ll turn against her.” He glanced around as if worried she’d hear him. “I don’t want to see her hurt by our people, not anymore, but they’re scared of her. The magic she’s using isn’t normal.”
“She’s not exactly normal,” I added quietly, grabbing a quick sniff of the air, but there was no hint of her scent on the wind. “Aside from worrying about your sister, we should be thinking about the mages. Rudarius is plotting to use them somehow, but I don’t know how. We need to be sending spies to his territory.”
“You won’t get anyone willing to go.”
“I will,” Shane volunteered immediately.
I raised my brow at him.
He shrugged. “What? I hate the vampire, too, remember? And out of the two of us, I’m the sneaky one.”
“I’ll go with him,” Lark spoke up.
Marlie gave him a confuse
d look, motioning to his broken arm.
Lark shrugged. “I’ve had worse, and Draven is right. We need more information, and if this is how we get it, then I would rather risk my life than that of my guards. With your permission, Prince, I will go.”
“It’ll be dangerous,” I warned them both. “His territory is highly defended.”
“Yeah, but his army is scattered across all the fae kingdoms right now,” Shane pointed out. “We’ll get in, see what we can find on the mages, then get out. No problems.” He clapped me on the shoulder. “I got this. Don’t worry so much.”
It was hard not to with Shane. He was damned good at getting around without being seen, but if he got caught, Rudarius would torture him for answers, then kill him in the most painful way he could think of. I did not wish that fate on anyone.
Lark and Marlie spoke quietly together. Marlie told Lark to do his best not to get himself killed.
“Don’t do anything crazy,” I told Shane when he and Lark looked ready to hit the trail. “I mean it. You’re there to see if you can find the mages and what he’s doing with them. That’s it.”
Shane saluted me.
I scowled.
“If you aren’t here, where will your people go next?” he asked Marlie.
Marlie scratched his chin then shrugged. “Only one place left to go. The High Kingdom. We only have so many supplies here. Then we’ll have to move out.”
“I’ll get us there,” Lark assured us.
They left the garden to gather what they would need, already talking about the best way to get close to Rudarius’s stronghold. Most of the vampires might be following their Master into battle, but there would still be plenty guarding the walls and all gates leading in.
“Gods willing, they make it back to us alive. Well, at least back,” Marlie sighed with a half-smile. “Seeing as Shane is already dead.”
“Rudarius could still kill him.”
“Just have to have faith, I guess.” He patted his hand against his leg nervously, whispering under his breath to himself. “I’m going to find Seneca. Talk to her.”
“I would give her more time to cool down,” I warned.
He paused at the edge of the garden.
“I don’t want her to be alone right now. Everything that’s happened since I brought her back, it’s all wrong. It’s not how I saw it happening in my head. Not at all. I thought she would be welcomed back with open arms. Not shunned.”
“No offense, but you fae have always been a prideful, stuck-up race.”
Marlie glared at me for a few seconds until he must’ve realized how right I was. “I want her to be accepted.”
“I don’t think she does.”
“What’s happening to her now, these dark changes, they’re my fault.”
“Don’t carry that guilt around with you, not on top of everything else, or you’ll be no use to your people. She would’ve faced down Rudarius. Eventually.”
“Yes, but then she might’ve been prepared for the fight.”
He was right, but I wasn’t going to point it out. The guy was hurting enough as it was.
“I don’t want to lose her right after I’ve found her again.” He crossed his arms, his missing hand not seeming to bother him at all. Part of me wondered if he accepted it as his penance for not finding Seneca sooner. “You’ll take care of her, right? If anything happens to me. You won’t let her be taken over by whatever’s stirring inside her?”
Whatever bound me to Seneca lately told me I would not be leaving her side. Not for anything. I’d had no one to keep me from tumbling into that pit of evil, and it had been hell. So many times, I’d almost given in completely and forgot who I was, forgot about getting revenge. Meeting Seneca reminded me of my true self. If I could be there for her, help her get through this dark time in her life, I would do it.
Rudarius had broken her worse than he had me, and a niggling voice in my head said I was already too late to save her from turning into the monster everyone already saw her as.
“I swear it on my life,” I heard myself say, the words genuine.
“I believe you, and I even think I trust you, despite our first meeting.” He held up his left arm. “I know I wasn’t there for her before, but I’m trying to be now.”
“She knows.”
“Does she? Think she’d rather rip my throat out.”
“Not yours.” I glanced past him to where I spotted Raine arguing with several fae guards. “Your parents, however, are a different story.”
“I’ll try to keep them away from her as much as possible.” He nodded, then walked away, aiming for his father.
I silently wished him luck in dealing with the irate king and turned in the direction Seneca had gone. I wanted to give her space but letting her out of my sight while she was unstable bothered me. Half of me feared she would take off on her own, to either hurt herself or go after Rudarius again just to get herself killed.
I sniffed the air as I walked, growing more frantic with each passing moment I didn’t pick up her scent. When I reached a gate at the back wall of the fort, I cursed. Four fae guards stood nearby, watching through the iron bars.
“Did Seneca leave through here?” I asked them when I neared.
“She did, but we can see her. Not about to let the princess out of our sight,” one replied. “Captain Lark’s orders.”
“I’ll see to her.” I approached the gate, and two of the men turned the crank to open it high enough for me to slip out. They shut it right behind me.
I walked as quietly as I could through the grove of trees that grew just beyond the wall. Apples from the smell of them. I kicked a few, confirming my assumptions. The fruit left on them would rot if they didn’t get sunlight, only a taste of the blight Rudarius would bring over this land if he wasn’t stopped.
Seneca stood at the heart of them all, shaking out her left hand hard, muttering under her breath.
I stopped behind a tree and simply watched, listening. She kept saying something about a seed of evil and some lady named Minnie. She cursed the woman vividly a few times, then froze. I waited to see if she realized I was there with her, but then she doubled over as if in pain.
I was at her side a split second later, holding her up even as she hissed at me to leave her alone.
“Why are you out here alone? Rudarius’s vampires could be watching this place, waiting for you to make a mistake like this.”
“I can handle them.” She grimaced and curled in on herself again.
“Sure you can.” I scooped her up easily enough and carried her toward the fort.
“What are you doing? Put me down.”
“No.”
“I’m not a child.”
When she struggled, I tossed her over my shoulder instead, smiling when she growled viciously, but made no actual move to hurt me.
“Asshole.”
“You can call me whatever you like if it makes you feel better.”
“Don’t tell me that, you won’t like it.”
“Come on, lay it on me. You need to vent.”
“Put me down, and I’ll vent just fine,” she grumbled, pinching my side.
I winced, and she cackled.
I jostled her, and she pinched me again as I smiled through the slight pain. Her laughter was good to hear, no matter how brief.
We were close to the gate, the guards on the other side ready to raise it and let us through, when Seneca grabbed hold of my arm, digging her nails in deep enough to break the skin.
“Gah, alright, I get it.” I put her down.
She wasn’t looking at me.
“Seneca?”
Her breathing increased, and she dug her nails in even deeper in my arm. Was she having a fit? I lifted my hand to wave it in front of her unblinking gaze, and she snatched my wrist.
“Shifters,” she breathed. “Don’t you smell them?’
I sniffed the air, and the faint whiff of dog hit my nose. “Shit.”
“We can�
��t let them get inside the walls.”
“Aren’t shifters allied with the fae? They could be here to help.”
“If they were coming to give aid, why would they be sneaking through the orchard?” she asked, subtly looking over her shoulder at the guards who were watching us, confusion on their faces. “I can’t tell how many there are.”
Right out attacking the shifters sounded like a terrible idea. No matter what Seneca was thinking, they could be coming here to offer help. There were many packs in Otherworld, and last I heard, most were not on friendly terms with Rudarius. They would be chomping at the bit for a reason to attack the Black Hawk Coven.
“I’ll go out there,” I said, prying her hand off my arm. “See what they want.”
“Right. So they can tear you, limb from limb?”
“Princess, is everything alright?” one of the guards called out to us.
“Yes,” she replied loudly, turning around to fully face the guard. “Everything is perfectly fine.” As she said it, though, she motioned with her hand for the guards to lower the gate that they had started to open for our return. “Let the others know.”
I heard footsteps run away from the wall as one of the guards took off to get help. Not waiting for Seneca, I blurred back to the center of the orchard.
The stench of shifter was much stronger here.
Sticks cracked around me and the leaves rustled in the trees with the breeze.
I did a full three-sixty, and when I was facing away from the fort again, a set of glowing yellow eyes glared back at me.
“Show yourself!” I shouted. “Who are you?”
The shifter growled in reply. More sets of eyes appeared out of the gloom.
I took a half-step back, but a presence behind me made me halt.
They surrounded me.
Six. Maybe more?
I counted pairs of eyes as fast as I could, waiting for one of them to reply.
