“Nay.” Thomas shook his head in denial and stood. He motioned Geoffery to follow, as he led the way from the hall to the circular stairwell that led out to the bailey yard below. “But the creature would not let up if we did not tell him as much. The truth is, Hugh is probably glad to be rid of the spright. Blind admiration makes him uncomfortable.”
Thomas glanced up as they walked into the yard lit by evening sun. The limed white stone of the castle took on an orange cast. In front of the castle was the courtyard. The castle itself set atop a motte of earth and rock. It towered a good fifty feet above the bailey. A taller wall, constructed of stone and timber, ringed around the inner bailey to guard the main part of the keep.
“Is that the magical message you were telling me about?” Sir Geoffrey motioned at the blue-filled vial in Thomas’ hand.
“Aye,” Thomas answered, continuing past the bailey wall. He glanced under the gateway toward the outer yard. Beyond the wall a second, lower wall made the outer perimeter. The only way in and out of the yard was through the front gatehouse and currently the guards were at their posts, standing upright and alert.
Contained within the inner courtyard was the exercise yard for the knights, a small chapel, the newly built stables, a barn, a few workshops, and a small brewery. Thomas walked alongside the inner courtyard, toward the stables. After the old building burned down during a demon attack where horses were killed, everyone in the castle made a concerted effort to keep a sharp eye on the new one—not that they knew an actual demon caused the fire. To many it was an accident, the last in a line of very unfortunate events which, though attributed to the devil, could not be proved beyond faith.
“Are you going to see what Hugh has to say?” Geoffrey again eyed the vial.
“I want to check on the horses.” Thomas heard the animals in their stalls for the evening. “The missives always say the same thing, urging William to hurry and find a cure for our sister or telling us whatever he’s tried hasn’t worked.”
The stable boy bowed, immediately moving toward the back to give the two men privacy. Going to his horse’s stall, Thomas patted the animal’s muzzle. Known as the Bellemares, the breed was an ancient mix of bloodlines, a cross-breeding of French trotters and hunters for stamina, with the intelligence of a Holstein Warmblood and the jumping abilities of a Lipizzaner. There was also some Arabian blood in the English stock. And, the newest addition, a magical elfin breed brought from the Immortal Realm to help replenish the stock after the fire. To the common ear, it sounded like a hodgepodge, but the men of Bellemare knew horses.
Like the others, Thomas’ stallion had a distinctly simple chestnut coloring to its coat with a dark stripe down the back from shoulder blades to tail. The horse’s hair and eyes were also dark chestnut, making it nearly invisible at night.
“Cure?” Geoffrey reached for the animal, petting the side of its neck. “What is this about Lady Juliana?”
“There is more I should explain.” Thomas stared into the horse’s eyes, not wanting to look at his friend as he felt the responsibility of his family on his head. Hugh’s responsibility was now his. He was Bellemare.
“Aye, methinks you should, Thomas,” Geoffrey agreed. “I have a feeling there is much you need to tell me.”
“So you are the crone who gives my little Anja such wonderful presents.” Lucien lifted his hand to materialize the jeweled dagger that had belonged to Queen Juliana. He let the demon have control, knowing the creature to be fiercely persuasive if not deeply impressive. Besides, with the beast in control, he didn’t have to feel Mia upstairs, in his bed, waiting. “A fine dagger it is, too.”
The Damned King smiled at the frail, blind witch kneeling before him in the main hall of the Fire Palace, bidding her with a subtle tipping of the knife blade to stand. Her eyes were missing from her head and a band of dirty white material covered the sockets, pulling tight to her short white hair. Despite this, she didn’t need eyes to see him. Her dingy linen gown was tattered from many years of wear. He could feel her strong power, running deeper than Anja’s. And, as the soothsayer neared the old woman to embrace her, he felt their combined powers growing. Not really old woman and child, the two were born from the same dark magic that fed his reign. They were manifestations of the darkest desires and most hateful lusts.
When the witch spoke, her low words were enunciated and raw, “And you are the new Damned King. A pleasure that our magics should finally meet. Let me offer you some of King Merrick’s pain as tribute.”
The witch held out her hand, letting a thin strip of power twirl off her fingertips. As it touched him, Lucien instantly smelled Merrick. He tasted the agony and frustration the Unblessed King felt in seeing Juliana’s stone prison. It was a potent taste of evil magic and he was empowered by it, knowing Merrick suffered still. Queen Juliana had kept Merrick from joining the damned completely, being as the Unblessed King was always teetering between blessed and damned. Now, with Juliana gone, it was only a matter of time before Merrick came to the Damned King to beg for her back. He felt King Merrick was close to crumbling and laughed to know it.
“A great tribute you bring me, witch, and a great many plans you have laid while imprisoned by the Unblessed King,” Lucien said.
“Once Merrick’s bride succumbed to the fears I cast over her, she rearranged my prison just enough to let me out. It is how I can now come to visit my sweet Anja in your very lovely dungeon. So many delightful screams, so much agony, so much torture.” The crone nodded in approval. “And my Anja knows how to bring them forth with such precision.”
“And what would you have of me in return?” Without waiting for her to answer, he lifted his hand. A new gown appeared on the woman’s body, as fine as any faery princess. The cloth around her eyes shifted to match. She reached down, feeling the shimmering material, her bony fingers sliding along her waist. She grinned, nodding in approval. “A witch as fine and powerful as you should not be kept in such rags.”
“I want one too!” Anja demanded, stamping her foot. The crone chuckled, reaching out to pat her head, not needing to see her to know where the child was.
“Very well, seer,” Lucien allowed.
Nodding once, he gave Anja a gown to match the old woman’s. She clapped her hands, jumping up and down, before holding her arms to the side, pretending like she was flying around the room. A loud moan sounded, followed by panted breaths, to interrupt their conversation.
“This is tiresome,” Lucien growled, his voice echoing his frustration off the hall’s ceiling. Flames wrapped around his ashen flesh, sinking into the black pits of his eyes. A mouthful of fangs rubbed along the inside of his mouth and he bit down, causing his lips to bleed. He drew the flames down his arm to his hand, bouncing a ball in his palm as he turned to eye the three faeries on the floor before them.
Their limbs were free, laying limp on the hard stone. There was no need for chains, for there was no escaping the Fire Palace now that he had them—not that they would have been able to find the strength to get away.
“Are these the first?” the witch asked with interest.
“Aye,” Anja answered. “All three suffer from a dark affliction, one that will end in only two choices. Either they trade their souls to our king for immortality or they give in to the pain and die a horrific death.”
“Both would be a pleasure to watch.” The crone nodded in approval. “Only one serves a darker purpose.”
Anja skipped to the three faeries. Pointing at the first, she said, “This one with the pale yellow wings that do not flutter is named Jolynne.” She moved to the next. “And she with the blue, which have grayed with little use, is Leliah.” The child moved to sit on the stomach of the last, patting her on the face. “And this is Nyda, with her green wings rotting like the decayed leaves on the forest ground. Pretty in her rot, is she not? Rot, not, rot, rot.”
“Aye, lovely,” the crone agreed, sounding very much like a tolerant and proud grandmother to a young child.
/> “Open your eyes and look,” Anja whispered to the green faery, her voice so innocent the faeries on the floor could not help but obey her. All three shallow gazes moved slowly around, taking in the thin columns leading up to the ceiling, to the rough, black stalactites with their jagged sharp edges. The ceiling was tall, but like the rest of his palace, they were subject to Lucien’s whims. With one inclination, the Damned King could call those spikes down to pierce the faeries’ hearts. Anja stood once more, swinging her hips to make the skirt of her gown dance in the firelight. “If you do not ask, he cannot give. Do you want to die, sweet, sad faeries? Ask him and he can take the pain. No more hurt. No more sadness. Only pleasure eternal.”
“Your innocence is truly deceitful, soothsayer.” The Demon King laughed, the raspy sound again echoing, causing the blue faery to whimper.
By Lucien’s will, a large bonfire surged in the circular pit in the middle of the hall. The edges of the floor lifted up slightly around the flames, as if the stone had been rolled over to make the fiery centerpiece. Eerie orange light cast over the prone, delicate beings. He felt their resistance to them when they first awoke to face him, just as he now felt that resistance faltering as their pain grew.
“The body might die,” Leliah whispered, her voice hoarse and cracking with each word, “but the soul cannot be bartered.”
“I knew you would be the difficult one,” Lucien growled menacingly, standing over the blue-winged beauty. Even in her frail state, he felt the fire of good in her soul.
“You are a demon,” she answered. “Naught you say to me I will hear.”
Lucien laughed. He knelt on the floor, touching Leliah’s pale face. He traced a sharpened nail along her cheek, taking some of her pain into himself. “Not always a demon, sweet one. Once I had a soul, a horrible, painful, pleasure-sucking soul. I promise you, it is nothing to miss.”
“I will,” came a whisper.
Lucien turned his sharp attention to the yellow-winged Jolynne. “What was that, sweet faery?”
“I will trade.” Jolynne’s voice shook.
“Will you?” Lucien chuckled, edging along the floor toward her, his knees bent and his fingertips holding part of his weight as he half-crawled, half-walked.
“I beg you, my king, take my soul to end the pain.” Jolynne closed her eyes, gasping and panting as a tear streamed over her cheek. “I do not wish for death for I know not what is on the other side.”
“Nay, Jolynne! He lies,” Leliah screamed, finding more of her voice. “Only a devil’s eyes burn in such a way. He lies. Lies!”
“This one is lost.” Anja rested her hand on the screaming one’s head. The faery tried to pull away, but the soothsayer’s touch wasn’t thrown off. “She will not succumb. I see it clearly.”
“Aye, she will not,” the crone agreed, not moving. “My Anja is right, that one is lost.”
Lucien sighed in frustration. “Very well.”
Falling stones sprinkled along the floor like rain, dropping around the blue faery. Leliah closed her eyes tight. The earth shook, the ceiling cracking in a jagged pattern across its great length. Suddenly, a stalactite broke free, falling from above. The sharpened tip pierced through the faery’s stomach, stabbing through the floor with its huge size. She didn’t scream, merely clenched her teeth for the brief, painful instant before death.
“You showed mercy,” Anja accused, sounding almost embarrassed by his actions as she looked at the crone.
“If she will not ask, then I will no longer listen to her sniffling cries,” Lucien growled.
“A Demon King should feed off the cries off the dying, not vanquish them,” the soothsayer said.
“I am the king and I will feed off what I wish and that one had little left. Now bother me no more about such petty things or I will feed off you.” Lucien glared at the child, knowing she tried to impress their old guest but not caring to be the victim of her insolence.
“There is no soul in me to feed off of,” Anja grumbled in her little girl pout.
“Nevertheless,” Lucien warned.
“I will trade,” Jolynne repeated, over and over again. “I will trade. End the pain. End. Please, end.”
Anja moved to the dead faery. Reaching for the tips of the blue wings, she pulled, ripping them off by the root. Setting them on the floor, she laid down on them, adhering them to her back with the faery’s blood. When she stood, they drooped from her back, fluttering in the breeze as she ran in circles like a little girl at play.
“Ask me to end the pain in trade for your soul,” Lucien instructed Jolynne, turning his attention from the seer.
“Aye, end it,” the faery begged. “Take my soul.”
“I accept, little one.” Lucien stroked back her golden hair. “Do not be scared, I have great purpose for you.”
Time stopped, all of them kept within a single instant. Flames did not move or crackle as the hall was left with the silence of the grave. Color faded, drained from the passing moment. Jolynne didn’t move, but her eyes stayed on Lucien’s face, pleading for the pain to stop. Next to her Nyda watched.
Anja clapped, jumping up and down, her new wings flopping to the floor behind her. She pouted her bottom lip, picking the fallen wings up and running to the crone so that the old woman could pat them back onto her blood streaked back.
The Demon King held out his hand, lifting it toward Jolynne. Fire came from his fingertips, deep red flames that wound through the air like smoke, curling a path to the pale creature’s face. The color was strange against the gray hue of Lucien’s colorless world. Fire encircled the faery. Lucien let his power enter her eyes, searching within her for the root of her soul only to find it hidden within her chest, close to her aching heart.
Now that her soul was freely given, his power plucked it easily from the faery. A blessed soul, no matter how battered, was always a powerful delicacy. It fed his magic, strengthened his body and made the blood rush in his veins. His thoughts turned to Mia, even as his demonic eyes burned with a fiery pain. All around them was dark stone lit with bright flames, though their color was still faded.
Lucien drew the flames carrying her soul toward his body. Opening his mouth wide, he swallowed it whole. Pleasure rippled over him, causing him to shiver. His flesh tingled with arousal and he shuddered violently. No matter how many times he did this, no matter how many souls he consumed, each time was like the first. The faery didn’t move, but he knew she was still alive and would come to as soon as her body recovered from the shock. She hadn’t made a sound while he took it, but inside she’d screamed in pain.
“The fall from grace is always so pleasurable,” he said to Anja. The seer giggled. Turning to Nyda, he stepped over her, his feet on either side of her hips. Like all faeries, her outfit barely covered her womanly charms, but though he could appreciate her sexual appeal, his thoughts again turned to the nymph in his bed.
“You should put her back into my care,” Anja said.
Realizing that he stared at the ceiling, Lucien snapped his eyes away. When he looked at the soothsayer, she wouldn’t meet his gaze.
“I do not—” Nyda began to reject his offer.
“Sh.” Lucien fell to his knees, straddling the faery. Placing his palms flat on the floor, he leaned over to hush into her ear. “Nay, blessed one, consider first what I offer. You are a faery lady. A mortal death is not for you. This is not a faery’s fate. I see you so frail, so near death, so far from the pretty life you deserve and it saddens my heart. Let me give you pretty things. Give me your burden and I will give you your life back. I can give you the power to take what you want, to have pleasure better than you have ever tasted before because you can have it without consequence.”
Nyda turned her head to the side. One of her friends lay crushed and the other unconscious and whole. She swallowed and closed her eyes.
“Death is coming for you. I feel it,” Lucien whispered. “It’s time to choose.”
Nyda opened her eyes, moving her
head back toward the Damned King. He pulled the demon from his eyes, letting the fire in them die. Giving her his kindest, most deceiving look, he let a comforting smile cross his mouth. Slowly, she nodded. “Aye. I do not want to die. Take my soul. End the pain.”
“I accept.” Lucien pushed up, nearly flying to his feet. To Anja and the witch, he said, “Bring forth two of the demons. It is time for them to plant their seeds.”
“If you please, my king, I must be sent back to my prison. I feel the Unblessed King will come for me soon,” the crone said. “Anja, be a dear and show me the images of the demons mating with the faeries once I’m back in my home. They were always such virile and vicious creatures. I shall enjoy seeing how they take the frail, delicate things.”
Lucien lifted his hand, motioning toward the crone to send her back to the Black Palace. “Until we meet again, witch.”
The witch bowed her head, before going up in flames. Lucien smiled, breathing hard. His body taut with pent up desire, he willed the demons to hurry. The sooner the mating was over, the sooner he could find his own bed. Tonight, Mia would be his once more.
Chapter Six
“Giants be big and piskies be small, but that no’ affect the bedsport at all!” Halton and Gorman sang, their drunken voices ringing high over the Black Palace’s great hall. The words slurred into each other, but neither spright seemed to notice in their merriment.
Merrick looked up from his throne, for once not lounging as he sat rigid in waiting. His feet were planted on the floor and his hands gripped tightly together in front of him until both knuckles were white. He frowned at the sprights as they stumbled along the floor, dancing and weaving their way through the watching goblins. He detected liquor on them, even from across the long hall. Drunk, they were obviously unconcerned by the Unblessed King’s ill humor.
“Dragons snort fire and sprights do they tame,” the two sang in unison.
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