Chapter 5
5
T he royal line, wiped out. Tears refused to come, caught somewhere behind her eyes. This was worse, so much worse, than the years of despair and the poverty of her people. So much worse than watching her soldiers fight and lose their lives, or watching her mother slowly waste away.
Outside this room, the battle raged in every direction possible, and Aven couldn’t bring herself to care. Her world was in shambles, and looking away… she wanted to, tried, and failed. Someone behind her gasped, the sound shifting to a moan of disbelief.
One of her men retched.
“Come now. Nothing to say about my present? I’ve already heard what your father has to say. Now I am intrigued to know your opinion,” the man continued.
Another clap of thunder sounded from outside, close enough and strong enough to rattle the stained-glass windows on the wall behind the thrones. Maeve’s corpse shifted with the movement but remained pinned.
Aven swallowed down her despair, her fear and rage and absolute, gut-wrenching sorrow, and turned to face the speaker. Everything scattered from her mind and disappeared as she faced the man looking at her expectantly.
Donal Celestree.
The Fae king himself held her father in front of him, King Fergus bound by magic and a fae dagger pressed against his temple. Blood splattered both of them, and yet the grisly tableau did not seem to faze either one.
She had never met him; none of her family had. The monarch was ancient, the stuff of legend, nearly as old as the Thousand-Year King. And his reputation was as cruel as the cut of his smile. Yet somehow even seeing him here paled in comparison to this carnage.
“You call this a present?” Aven forced herself to say. Her attention remained on Mourningvale’s king even when she wanted to glance back at her siblings. Glance behind her at Major Stone or the other soldiers and beg them to make this go away.
To wake her from this nightmare.
The magic binds keeping her father in place prevented any movement whatsoever. Rather than answer, King Donal lifted a hand and forced the mortal king down to his knees.
He stood taller than King Fergus by several inches, snow-white hair trailing down past his shoulders. A sharp patrician nose dominated a face of angles, and his eyes were narrow set, the blue of ice, and penetrating. The collar of his tunic rose up and nearly touched the end of his cleft chin.
The Fae King tilted his head and stared at Aven, searching her face for whatever emotion he must have hoped to see. “It almost pains me to see how easily you jumped right into the trap. Not only that, but your family offered so little resistance. I expected to encounter at least a shred of talent when it came time to storm the castle gates. Literally and figuratively.” He huffed out a small laugh of amusement. “As you see, Princess, this is the result. You and your father are the only two of your bloodline still standing.”
His fine clothes and amused expression were a mockery of everything Aven stood against. It hardly seemed real to remain in front of him and hear him speak in such conversational tones.
She trembled, and rather than letting him see the movement, threw back her shoulders and refused to take her eyes off her father’s face. “What do you want from us?” The words were hoarse and strangled and the best she was able to muster.
“Look around you, Princess,” the Fae King continued. “I’ve taken what I want. Your leader is on his knees. It’s a direct path to victory for my people. Now is the time for your cooperation.”
“Let him speak. I want to hear what happened from my father.” Inside her head was a never-ending scream that refused to abate. Her skin went clammy, and her stomach clenched and twisted sickeningly.
“Oh, his tongue is not bound the same as his limbs. He’s able to speak whenever he pleases. He chooses not to do so,” King Donal replied.
Aven stared at her father, shaking her head back and forth uncontrollably. “This is no route to cooperation. This is slaughter . Why would we work with you when you surely have no intention of telling the truth?”
“Let me assure you, Princess, my end goal is nothing less than cooperation. In fact, I have only a single proposition left, and I’ve given it to your beloved father just as I will give it to you now. His life for a truce.”
“No.” She took a step forward before she realized she moved and caught a glimpse of the way her father’s eyes flashed, froze. “Don’t hurt him.”
She couldn’t survive losing anyone else.
She might not have ever been on the same page as her father, but they only had each other left. No one else. The gazes of her dead brothers and sisters watched them and stood testament to the fact.
“What else would you have me do? I am only interested in dealing with one member of the royal family.” The Fae King’s smile grew, and he wiggled his fingers. Her father gasped, his jaw clenching as magic choked him. “Whoever will be most willing to accommodate my wishes.”
“Take me instead.” It was natural for Aven to offer herself.
Her father had more experience in leading a kingdom. With the territory in tatters and the citizens murdered, their people would need his strength and wisdom to even attempt to rebuild. If the Fae King allowed such a thing.
“Please, take me, just let him breathe. Please! ”
She reached for him, and King Donal jerked her father away, the magic keeping him bound tighter than a pig over a roasting fire.
“You would trade yourself for that man?” The Fae King asked the question like he already knew the answer and she’d been a fool, playing right into his trap. “He’s old, at the end of his life. You have so much left to give.”
Aven stared at the two of them for moments that felt like an eternity. She was the last of her line, and if she had to step up, had to use herself for whatever purpose the Fae King had in mind, at least her father would be alive.
“Done.”
A snap of his fingers had the Fae King’s power writhing, a living, sentient creature attuned to his every whim. At once her arms jerked close to her torso and were pinned there. Aven had no chance to run to her father before the magic bound her.
Her heart thrashed inside her chest.
She glanced up to King Donal and glared at him, ignoring the bark of pain from her muscles twisting out of their usual position. The fight drained out of her and left her empty. She struggled uselessly against the binds, and her knees buckled with the resistance.
“There, now.” The Fae King looked her over and nodded once before he turned his attention to King Fergus. The movement was smooth, graceful, and utterly inhuman. “It seems we’ve come to an accord on one front.”
Aven gaped openly at him. “One front? What do you mean?”
Her father got to his feet shakily and dusted off his arms and legs, pointedly avoiding looking at the tortured corpses of his children. “What do you want from us?” He ignored Aven as well.
His eyes met those of the Fae King and were empty. A crimson stain she hadn’t noticed colored his entire right side. They were two predators sizing each other up, and only one of them postured at the power. The other could shake the castle down to its foundation with a snap of his fingers.
It tore Aven apart. She could not watch this knowing what would happen to her. She thrashed against the magic.
“I gift you another choice.” Neither monarch addressed the other by their title, yet the Fae King bowed his head to Father. “I will let your charming daughter live, in exchange for your cooperation. You will allow my people to occupy your territory. In areas of my choosing. You will do so without argument. It seems a fair arrangement. You only have a single child left to you. What is more important to you? Keeping Grimrose intact or keeping your daughter alive?”
Aven knew he hadn’t offered to keep her safe, only alive, and there were several fates worse than death. She looked at her father and shook her head, and although she still had the ability to speak, she found her tongue strangely still. The words beat at her in an attempt at freedom.
Decline . It wasn’t a fair trade.
The lands they fought so hard to keep safe from fae occupation, for so long… it wasn’t worth it to give them up now. Was it?
King Donal laughed. “Take your time. I will give you two minutes to spare, but know for every second you take, I will slowly constrict your daughter until the pressure forces the air out of her lungs.”
The magic began to tighten with his words, and Aven gasped.
“I agree,” King Fergus gasped out. He held his ground against the more powerful ruler and made his verdict before she could shake her head in argument. “Spare her and take whatever land you want.” His attention shifted to her. “She’s worth more to me.”
She wanted to cry out, to say his name or crawl to him. The pressure eased slightly, but she wasn’t free by any means. The burning magic kept her in place as surely as stones weighing her down.
“It is good to see you mortals still have a shred of loyalty left.” The Fae King clucked his tongue and with another flick of his fingers had Aven dangling off the floor. Her boots scraped the surface of the tile. “I will leave you to pick up the pieces of your loss. As for us, we must be on our way.”
“Where are you taking her?” King Fergus thundered after them on their way out of the throne room. “Stop!”
One of the fae guards stepped up to the side of his king and took hold of Aven, adjusting her over his shoulder before the feeling of weightlessness ceased.
A prisoner.
The thought circled around in her head, stinging her mind like a thousand wasps all attacking at the same time. She was nothing but a prisoner, and her family was dead.
She didn’t need to look back or even open her eyes to know her father remained immovable on the throne room floor, surrounded by the dead. The Fae King led the charge, and his soldiers followed him out, hauling Aven with them. Even Major Stone stayed behind, the ingrained need to protect his monarch stronger than his desire to follow his princess.
She let her head drop, shame a bitter taste in her mouth as it filtered through her veins, poisoning her cells.
She might be alive, but what was the true cost?
Nothing but a slave for her enemy.
Rain pelted her back on their way out into the main courtyard, and she caught a glimpse of those still burning doors.
“My children! Listen to me now.” King Donal lifted his voice, magic amplifying the dark tones and sending it out through the city. Hell, all the way across the field they’d planned to use today. “I assured you of our victory, did I not?”
He paused for effect, and the roaring of cheers came from the fae soldiers nearby, the sound echoing down the sloping streets.
“Did I not tell you our patience would pay off? Today, we have realized the dream of decades. Grimrose has fallen! We are assured a place in their territory, and as payment, look!”
Magic lifted Aven once again from the guard’s shoulder until she floated six feet above the ground. Her stomach tilted sickeningly at the change in altitude, her head pounding out a ceaseless dull pain.
“Look at the price the mortal king has paid. He has chosen to give us land, and in good faith, we have taken his only remaining child,” the Fae King continued.
She heard nothing around her. The world filtered through cotton, and distantly she felt her sobs, felt the way her body shook.
None of it was true. It couldn’t possibly be true. If she pretended, closed her eyes and kept them shut, then her family would still be alive. She could almost hear Fionn’s laughter, picture herself sharing tea with Maeve, sparring with Emmett in the yard, and enduring the twins’ relentless teasing about her disinterest in noblemen.
Aven didn’t notice as they brought her through the ruined city, as they loaded her into some kind of cart and four wheels turned over broken cobblestones. She did not look back although the storm battered her and the wind whipped hair out of her braid.
She didn’t look back even if it was the last time she’d see her home.