Pain Seeker (The New Orleans Shade Book 1)

by D. N. Hoxa

  Chapter 30

  Mace

  Worlds didn’t exist wherever I was. Only space. Blank space and memories.

  I searched everywhere for something to hold onto, something to bring me back to Gaena, the Winter Shade, my castle, my bed…my elf. But there was nothing there, so all I could do was drown in the memories.

  They were all beautiful, even the pain of losing my best friend. Trinam had died from a sword, exactly like he always said he would, and I knew he wouldn’t have had it any other way. He died a hero.

  He died in vain.

  But the beauty of Taran smoothed the edges of the pain. Not just the way she looked, but the way she felt. Her beauty hid in the way she did the small things—a passing look, a ghost of a touch, a brush of her lips. She either gave it her everything or nothing at all. A kiss wasn’t just a kiss with her. It was her whole life, her soul served right into my mouth. I was lucky to have tasted her, and unlucky because I would never be content with the ordinary again.

  And something told me that that was all I was going to get.

  I remembered her hands, her touch—soft one second, hard the next. I remembered the feel of her magic slipping inside me, taking over my body. I remembered her words. I’m sorry, she’d said. For what? What was she going to do?

  Would she kill me? Was this where I was now—the afterlife?

  I pushed through the darkness and the endless space once more, and by some miracle, my eyes opened. I saw color, and I saw shapes. I saw stone—the stone ceiling of my chamber. I’d looked at it a hundred times, but I’d never felt like I felt now.

  My body was mine. There was no pain, no numbness, no nothing. My heart beat steadily. It was my mind that had trouble catching up.

  Eventually, I sat up and looked at the empty room, blue lights floating in the air, the world outside drenched in darkness. The Shade had never brought light to our castle before. I’d asked for it many times. It always refused.

  But it brought it for her. And now she was gone.

  I knew in my bones that I wasn’t going to find her, no matter where I looked. That didn’t mean I wasn’t going to. I stood up and my eyes fell on a bathroom wall to the side of my bed. A stone wall that had been empty ever since I got here.

  Now, it wasn’t, and the blue ball of light hovering over it showed it to me perfectly. It showed me the painting that covered it.

  I walked to it, and more lights followed me, as if they knew I would need them to see. Four of them floated over my head as I pushed the tub to the side and kneeled before the wall.

  The painting. The battle. The people and the colors, as if come straight out of my mind. I traced lines with my fingers and allowed my thoughts a second to make sense.

  I knew those lines. I knew those colors. I knew that style.

  By the gods. This was made by the same painter who’d created the painting I hid in the New Orleans Shade. The same as the one King Aurant hid in the worry room in his castle.

  Except this story I knew. I’d lived it. I’d been there, had fought there, had bled there. It was my first battle, a decade ago, and every detail was in it.

  There was only one person in the worlds that I had told this story. There was only one person out there who knew how this battle had looked through my eyes—exactly like it looked on the wall now.

  Taran. The elf. The painter.

  Closing my eyes, I held onto the wall and breathed. She’d been right here. All this time, she’d been here, and I hadn’t known.

  I wanted to break something so badly, my magic slipped out of me and covered the floor around me in ice. What else was right before my eyes that I couldn't see?

  Something I’d deliberately tried to look away from for over a year. It was this. My life. This whole place.

  This had never been enough for me, and it never would be. I’d gone through the days, focused on the end, focused on getting by, when I shouldn’t have. The idea of action had been foreign to me for so long, I’d completely forgotten about it. Why? How could I let myself be so blind? How could I stand by and watch all those people lose their lives without reason?

  My fist slammed against the stone wall, but it only hurt my hand. The pain did me well. It brought me some courage. I’d cowered back long enough, but I wouldn't cower any longer. I couldn't even if I tried. It was as clear as the Shade lights hovering over me now.

  Footsteps outside the door, rushing toward me. I stood up in alarm and reached for the bloody blanket I’d thrown on the floor by the bed to cover myself. I was completely naked still.

  “Come in,” I said, my voice thick with sleep, when they knocked on the door. The soldiers came inside, looking as disoriented as I felt.

  And they had a story to tell.

  “We saw her, and she raised her hands and she just…she was the elf. I saw her—it was the girl…the slave!” one of them mumbled.

  “And she put us to sleep. I swear it,” said the other. “We were this close to her, but her magic was strong. It knocked us out. We couldn’t block it. We didn’t know she could…she’s an elf!”

  And she could do Spring magic, too.

  “Dismissed,” I said to the soldiers and turned to the windows. She was always looking out there into the sky.

  “Sir?” one of the soldiers said. “She got away—we…we couldn’t catch her.”

  “I heard you. You’re dismissed,” I repeated.

  They stood there in my room for a little while longer, confused. They’d let a prisoner escape. They knew punishment awaited them. What they didn’t know was that I wasn’t going to be the one to deliver it.

  Eventually, they left.

  Why was she always looking out there? How could she see beauty in this world full of terror? All I saw was darkness, blood, death. That was all I had inside. Maybe she saw beauty because that’s what her mind was on the inside, too.

  Not maybe. It was.

  And now she was gone.

  I got dressed faster than I ever had in my life. My armor was not with me. My soldiers had taken it off the night before, while we prepared Trinam’s body to be sent home. I didn’t need it. I had my sword.

  And I was going home, too.

  The time had come to face my father. Cowering back was never going to lead me to anything. Death was a small price to pay for the chance to live the life I wanted. There had never been any doubt in my mind that my father could—and would—kill me, if he had a chance, like the one I was about to give him today.

  But these past couple of weeks, the world changed for my eyes. The impossible didn’t seem so impossible anymore. What I thought I knew for certain just might not be the whole truth.

  Chastin demanded answers, and so did my soldiers.

  Where was the elf? How could she put those soldiers to sleep? Were we going after her?

  Where was I going in the dead of the night?

  But I had no answers for them.

  “Be ready. If the elves attack, fight back. If they don’t, stay here and take care of the castle until further notice,” I said to Chastin. It was the first time I had seen him truly afraid, almost like he knew what I was about to do. Like he knew that he was probably never going to see me again.

  But it didn’t matter. Nothing mattered anymore.

  Even Storm wasn’t happy when I picked her up and rode her outside the gates. It only took her a few minutes to clear her head, though. Then, she ran like an army chased us—straight to the heart of the Winter Court.

  It took approximately six hours to get to my father’s castle—my home. I had been both so terrified of that place and so eager to see it again. Now I was simply impatient. So impatient that the six hours of riding Storm felt like six days.

  The closer to my father’s castle we got, the deeper the snow that covered the land. The heart of the Winter Court was in an everlasting winter. Most of the snow was magic, created by the people, so even when the sun shone in summer, it didn’t melt.

  I rode around the first town c
lose to my father’s castle, but I would have no choice but to go through the second. The only bridge that led to the castle was in it.

  Neva was called the royal town of our Court. It was vast, stretching almost all the way around my father’s castle, ending on either side of the mountains behind it. It was beautiful—houses covered in snow that sparkled like a magic blanket with the rising sun, wide cobblestone roads, cold air breathing life into me. It was still early so half the town was asleep—but the soldiers who kept guard and the people whose jobs started early saw me.

  They knew me. I’d grown up in these streets. They knew Storm, too. They also knew that I was not to set foot in this place without my father’s explicit invitation. You could tell by the panicked look in their eyes that they were aware something was wrong. They just didn’t know what.

  Nobody spoke to me. Nobody said anything, but they all watched me. Storm didn’t run—she was tired, too, and walking was okay.

  We were almost there now.

  My father’s castle was in the middle of two small mountains made of ice, their smooth tips curving to the sides and circling downward to point at the many towers of the castle. The last of the towers were the longest. Their length shortened toward the entrance as they went in a perfect circle. In the middle of it was the castle square—another town where my father’s family and most trusted people lived. I say trusted, but what I mean is the people who were in his full control.

  Behind the castle and the ice mountains were real mountains—eleven of them, hard grey rock covered in snow, each one more regal than the other. They looked like they were watching the castle’s back and would come alive if something were to threaten it. The windows of my room had looked out at them when I was a boy. It had taken me years to get over the fear of them watching me, while my brothers made fun of me for thinking mountains had eyes.

  Even now, as Storm took us over the arched bridge that led to the castle gates, I felt as if they were aware of my every movement. But the closer I got, the bigger they became—and the towers of the castle, too. It was like an entire city in there, and the soldiers who guarded the bridge were definitely surprised to see me.

  They were hesitant to bow to me, but they eventually did.

  “Your highness,” one of the three said. “We weren’t aware that you would visit.”

  “Step aside, soldier,” I said, and even I surprised myself by how dull and how tired my voice sounded. I just wanted to get this over with, see what the fates had in store for me. The soldiers didn’t move right away, but I sank my heels into Storm’s sides, and she trotted forward. If they didn’t step aside, she was going to stomp all over them--and gladly. Storm was a lot more bloodthirsty than I ever was.

  But the soldiers moved, and the other ones who guarded the silver gates of the castle did the same. They asked questions, but ultimately, they didn’t dare stop me from going into the only home I had ever known.

  Even the air smelled different on the other side of those gates. It was familiar, and it reminded me of home, but it wasn’t as powerful as I thought it would be. It didn’t waver my resolve.

  I stopped Storm in between the two lowest towers at the beginning of the castle, and I looked at the castle town. Nothing had changed. Everything was exactly the same as I remembered—the stores, the soldiers, the feel of the snow, the large fountain in the middle that sprayed water out of mouths of white stone fish. It never froze because the water came from the depths of the world, where it was too hot for even Winter magic to do what it was made to do. And every time water sprayed out, clouds of steam rose in the air from it.

  I jumped off Storm and with her reins in my hand, I started walking ahead.

  The time had come to meet my doom.

  My father was not happy. He was never happy, but this morning, he was furious, too. He hadn’t liked being woken up by soldiers who told him about my arrival at the crack of dawn, long before I set foot inside his castle.

  By then, the guards had been expecting me. They took Storm to the barns behind the middle towers, and they led me straight to my father’s throne room. Even though I’d had time to prepare, to think and rethink every possible scenario that had potential to come true here today, I was still shocked out of breath when the soldiers opened the black doors.

  The King and Queen of the Winter Court were looking right at me.

  They weren’t the only ones there. The square throne room was lined with soldiers, and beside my mother and father stood my brothers—all six of them. How awful a man did it make me to admit that I hadn’t missed them? I’d seen Ethonas and Arin in the Autumn Court days ago, but I hadn't seen my mother, and Borah, Sigmur, Philip and Raddol—my other brothers, in a year.

  The fear radiated from deep in my bones. I’d come here knowing what the outcome would be, but as I stepped deeper into the throne room, I couldn’t bring myself to regret my decision. This needed to be done. If I survived, there would be hope. If I didn’t…well, there was nothing here for me anymore. With Taran gone, I was already half of the half-man I had been before I met her.

  But whatever I was today, there was still some fight left in me. This time, I was choosing to direct it toward the people whom I believed deserved it—like my father.

  He stood up from his throne when I approached, and my mother held both her hands to her chest, eyes gleaming with tears. Fake tears. She hadn’t been a mother to me a day in my life, but she did serve her purpose. She was a tool in my father’s hands, and she’d managed to do her job perfectly until now.

  “What is the meaning of this, Maceno?” my father said, his voice echoing off the high ceiling. Everything about this throne room was grandeur—from the black and white marble to the chrome window frames and the torches on the ice blue walls that burned white flames. He saw the world in shades of winter, and no matter how much color you put in front of him, he would never understand it.

  “I’ve come home, Father,” I said and started untying the leather of my sheath from around my hips. “I was born here. I was raised here. Not you, not anyone can keep me from this place when I want to see it.”

  I never looked away from his face, so I saw the moment all the blood left it. He turned as white as the snow outside, and his jaw locked, the magic leaking from him covering the floor around his feet with ice.

  “You’ve gone mad,” he whispered, forcing a smile out of me.

  “No, I’ve been mad—mad with the terran spell you put on me. But not anymore. I have never seen clearer.”

  The sword was in my hands. I looked at the silver handle that was made for me, and I almost regretted doing what I had to do next. My father had given me that sword a month away from my first battle. We had been inseparable since. But I’d been inseparable with Trinam, too. And he no longer lived.

  So, I threw the sword on the marble floor, and it slid halfway to my father’s throne.

  My mother no longer felt the need to pretend to be happy to see me. She held onto the armrest of her seat and threw daggers my way with her black eyes. I didn’t even look at my brothers. Their opinions didn’t bother me in the least.

  “I come bringing news,” I said and proceeded to unpin the Winter Court emblem in the middle of my chest. “I will not marry Princess Ulana of the Autumn Court, no matter what you threaten me with. You will not control King Aurant, Father. At least not with my help.” I threw the emblem next to the sword, too. Then, I pulled the sleeves of my shirt up to my elbows.

  “I don’t know who you think you are, but my patience with you has reached its limits,” my father said, slowly stepping down the four steps of his throne to come closer to me. “I’ve turned a blind eye to your broken mind my whole life because you are my blood, but I will not—”

  “Liar,” I cut him off. “You know my mind isn’t broken. The only reason you let me live was because there was a chance you could use me. Blood doesn’t matter to you, King Caidenus. It never did. You’re just a monster who feeds on greed—by yourself and for your
self. You would sell every man, woman, and child in your kingdom for a bit more power.”

  The magic that hit me in the chest was expected, but I still couldn’t stop it from pushing me back. I held up my hands and released my own magic in the air, hoping it would shield me, keep me from falling, and it did. My boots slid on the marble for a bit, but I kept my balance.

  My father looked down at my things on the floor, then bent down to grab the emblem. Ten soldiers on both his sides had approached him, their swords raised, ready to fight me.

  “I should have killed you the day you were born,” he said and forced himself to laugh. “I should have killed you when you betrayed me, too.”

  I smiled. “But you can kill me now. And you’ll enjoy it, just as you did killing your own father.”

  His eyes widened and every vein in his forehead popped out. Nobody dared say that, at the age of twenty-two, the mighty King Caidenus had been the one to kill his father, making him the youngest fae king in Gaena’s history. But even if my grandfather’s death hadn’t been a mystery, even if I hadn’t known that he was found with his heart out of his chest in his chambers one morning, I would have known that it was him. My instincts knew it. My magic knew it, too.

  “Very well,” he whispered and raised his hand. All ten of his soldiers started walking toward me. “You want to die? You will get your wish, son, but only after I'm done with you.”

  “I am not your son,” I spit and raised my hands once more. His soldiers surrounded me, and he let them, even knowing that they would die. He would kill them himself, if I didn’t, only for witnessing everything I had said to him today.

  I wondered if he’d choose to kill one of my brothers, too, afterward, just to make sure that nobody else heard what happened here. Arin, for one, could never be trusted with a secret.

  But the time to wonder had passed. If I met my death here, in this room, in front of the people I had once considered family, so be it. I had a treasure of memories of my elf to keep me company in the afterlife. All I had to do now was fight until my dying breath—and so I would.