Free Black Canary: Book Two

1. The Price of Her

THE PRICE OF HER

The decanter struck the edge of the glass table with a hard, hollow clink. Amber liquor sloshed over the rim, spilling across the polished surface like blood from a wound. Malec noticed. He simply did not care.

Only a few days had passed since Malec dragged Allora back to Caelistra, her fists striking his chest as servants lined the corridor in stunned stillness.

A decorated war hero endured the assault without faltering, dragging the furious Canariae through marble halls meant for ceremony and praise. Her rage echoed against vaulted ceilings, wild and uncontained, a living contradiction to the reverence usually afforded his name.

When he finally placed her in the care of the palace maids, he did not linger.

He withdrew instead to Surion’s private chambers, leaving her to be tended and adorned while he sought solitude to manage the damage she had carved into him.

And now, he sat hunched in the chair nearest the hearth, platinum hair damp against his brow, sweat gathering at his temples.

The fire snapped behind him, offering no warmth.

The scream still rang in his skull, tangled with the memory of the portal collapsing and her eyes burning with betrayal.

His fingers tightened around the crystal glass. The drink dulled nothing.

Across the chamber, King Surion stood rigid in a robe of golden velvet, its hem trailing behind him as he moved.

His face remained bruised beneath the gauze, swelling dark and ugly.

A visible consequence of Malec’s fists. His shoulders held the posture of authority, yet his movements betrayed him.

He paced before the gilded window with restless precision.

Beneath the anger, fear flickered.

“You’re going to tell me what happened,” Surion said, his voice cold and honed to an edge. “You were meant to stabilize the portal, secure the gateway, and prepare the army. Not obliterate the damned thing!”

Malec did not bother correcting him. He did not tell the King that the Canariae had destroyed it. The truth no longer mattered. What mattered was that it was gone, and that he would bear the cost regardless.

Surion stopped pacing and turned fully, his silhouette framed by a sky scattered with stars.

“And yet here you are,” he continued, stepping closer, “empty-handed. Except for her.”

Malec did not flinch. He lifted the glass and drank, letting the liquor burn its way down his throat.

“She’s mine,” he said quietly. “That is all that matters.”

Surion’s nostrils flared but did not approach.

“She does not belong to you,” the King snapped. “She belongs to us. That Canariae was the key to ending this feral problem. That portal was our only chance to drive them from this realm and cleanse our lands of their chaos.”

His voice rose despite himself, strain creeping through the veneer of control.

“And you destroyed it,” he hissed, “for a Canariae female who would slit your throat the moment she could.”

Malec stared into the flames as they climbed higher, restless and hungry. Whatever had been readable in his expression vanished.

“She is not just a Canariae,” he said, the words slipping out more like a confession than a defense.

Surion ignored it. “You believe you’ve saved her,” he said bitterly. “Without the portal, we are trapped with them and everything they bring with them—with their filth, their constant rebellion, and their unchecked breeding. You chose her over all of this.”

Malec rose.

It wasn’t a shout or a shove. It was quiet—too quiet.

He stood with the eerie stillness of a predator before the strike.

Even the fire seemed to recoil. Surion stepped back instinctively.

He hated himself for it, for the way his stomach clenched when Malec moved like that. Not like a cousin or a soldier.

He moved like a storm given form.

“You don’t understand,” Malec said, turning slowly. His voice was glacial, each word heavy with restrained wrath. “They were never going back. Not her. Absolutely not while I breathe.”

Surion drew himself upright, masking the tremble in his hands by folding them behind his back. “Then you’ve sentenced us to rot,” he replied. “You’ve chosen your whore over your kingdom.”

Malec’s gaze cut to him, pointed and merciless. “Then rot we shall.”

He turned back to the table and seized the decanter by its neck, lifting it without a glass. Liquor spilled down his chin, soaking the collar of his dark tunic. Firelight carved deep shadows along his face, leaving him hollowed and haunted, still unsettlingly beautiful.

Surion’s mouth twisted. “Look at you,” he muttered. “She is destroying you.”

Malec lowered the decanter. His eyes gleamed, not with tears or fury, but with a far more dangerous hunger. A slow smile spread across his lips, crooked and far too knowing. The smile of a male Awyan unraveling in real time, and not giving a damn.

“I don’t mind,” he rasped. “Not if she’s the one who destroys me.”

He moved closer to the hearth, watching the flames coil and lift. The smirk faded from his mouth, leaving a far less sane expression behind. “I would let her reduce me to ash,” he said quietly, “so long as it is her fire.”

Surion remained silent. Disgust shifted across his face, tangled with what looked almost like pity. Malec did not look at him again, instead he turned from the hearth and crossed toward the door, guilt and liquor weighing down his steps. Even so, there was direction in him, wild but certain.

“I’ll take your chambers tonight,” he called over his shoulder.

His voice was rough, touched by drink but unmistakably deliberate.

“She needs distance. And your bed is larger.” At the threshold, he braced one hand against the frame and glanced back, the corner of his mouth lifting in a crooked half-smile.

“Try not to miss me too much, Your Majesty.”

Surion’s expression tightened, but he did not answer at once. When he did, his voice carried clean and precise through the chamber. “Sleep in my bed if you wish, Malec. Just remember—you are not King. You are a fool in love who pretends he does not want the crown.”

Malec let out a sound that might have been laughter. It carried no amusement. Only the hollow ring of an Awyan at his limit. Then he stepped into the corridor and vanished into shadow.

When the heavy door closed, the chamber fell back into a lull.

The fire continued its low crackle, the only movement left in the room.

Surion stood unmoving, the bandage along his jaw pulling tight against tender skin.

He pressed his fingers to it and felt the ache bloom beneath the gauze.

The bruising had darkened to a deep violet, but the wound to his pride sat far deeper.

He returned to the window and clasped his hands behind his back, staring out into the cold scatter of stars.

He believes I fear him.

The thought rose cool and measured. His fingers curled behind his back, nails pressing into his palms as memory settled in.

Malec had struck him and drawn royal blood, and Surion had permitted it to pass without spectacle, without consequence.

The Council had been told it was a private dispute, nothing more.

Every blow, however, had carved a ledger entry, and Surion did not forget what was owed.

His gaze settled on the abandoned decanter, firelight splintering across the crystal. Beyond it, the dark corridor waited where Malec had disappeared.

Let her be your flame, cousin.

When you burn, it will be because I chose the moment.

Malec collapsed onto the vast bed, armor groaning beneath him as the silk sheets bunched coldly under his weight.

He made no effort to remove it. He had not earned the comfort.

Above him, the gold-threaded canopy loomed heavy and ornate, a crown-shaped mockery suspended over a space that felt hollow despite its excess.

Surion’s chambers smelled of incense and old authority, but Malec could not separate any breath from her.

Her presence lingered on his skin in memory alone, embers and wild earth, an essence that resisted being held.

He dragged a pillow to his chest and pressed his face into it, fully aware it carried none of her scent.

The knowledge did nothing to stop him from breathing as though it might.

The room tipped, not from exhaustion alone.

The liquor burned hot in his blood, a dulling agent he had hoped would be stronger.

He had emptied half the decanter before reaching the chambers, telling himself he was doing the honorable thing by staying away.

A coward’s excuse, perhaps, but even cowards needed somewhere to sleep.

It had not erased her.

The way she had looked at him at the portal still lived behind his eyes. The anger in her eyes had already given way to cold clarity. The realization. The understanding that what he had done was deliberate. That he had taken from her and called it protection.

She had looked at him as if he were the end of everything she believed in. As if he were not a rescuer, but the thing closing the door.

Maybe that was all he would ever be to her now.

His hand tightened in the sheets, the silk slipping beneath his gauntlet as tension ran through his arm. The thought pressed in, unwelcome and relentless. He had destroyed her escape and replaced it with himself. Whatever forgiveness might have existed between them had shattered in that moment.

She had struck him while he carried her, weak fists landing against his chest as sobs tore loose.

He let it happen. Words would have made it worse, so he said none and endured the blows until her strength faltered.

The fury mattered; it meant something in her still resisted him.

That resistance, twisted as it was, tethered her to him.

Because it meant she was still his.

He would have given her anything to silence that pain. He would have carried her across worlds if it would have eased the sound of it.