Chapter Nine
I stand in an empty city built before my arrival. Everything is foreign but familiar. Standing at the precipice of change, I know I will not back down. I cannot. This land is cursed, tainted by a force no one can understand. The aether is the lifeblood of Laconia… and all it would take for everything to change is a single drop of poison.
I did not know it then, but my arrival in the land that would become Laconia would be that poison. I was the first drop. Every empress after added to the poison, until that poison became strong enough.
Until you.
Me. Until me.
I wake with a start, my breathing unsteady as I slowly sit up and feel my head. It pounds a little, but I can ignore it—mostly because my mind is too busy remembering what that inner voice told me after I passed out.
It was the memory of the first high empress. The memory must’ve been stored inside that box with Invictis, and when he was unleashed, the memory remained, waiting for someone to activate it.
Waiting for me.
It takes me a moment to realize I’m outside. One of the guys must’ve carried me out of the labyrinth when I passed out. I’m by a fire, a sky of dusk above me, pretty colors dancing off the few clouds there are.
Frederick notices I’m awake, and he comes to sit near me, his brows drawn together like he’s studying a science experiment he can’t quite figure out. Behind him, I see Invictis on the other side of the fire, pretending not to watch us, but not being covert enough to get away with it.
“Are you all right?” Frederick asks me, his tone laced with concern. “When you passed out… I thought the worst.” He starts to reach for my face, but he stops short of touching me, settling for saying, “I told you you lost too much blood. Your body decided to rest for you.”
“Did you get everything you needed from the labyrinth?” I ask. My voice comes out dry, and Frederick hands me a flask of water, which I gratefully take and drink.
He nods. “Invictis held onto you while I… I said we could go back, but I didn’t want to risk having to fight that creature again. I’m sorry.”
“It’s fine. I’m glad you got what you needed,” I say, slow to return the water.
Frederick frowns at me. “Rey, why didn’t you use your magic against that beast? Why did you let it attack you like that?” The way he keeps looking at me, I can tell he’s not going to let it go. He wants an answer and he won’t stop until he gets one.
“I…” My feeble response trails off. I practiced coming clean in my head so many times, and yet not once did I ever expect we’d be where we are, so far removed from civilization, just me, Frederick, and Invictis.
Fuck it. Might as well just spit it out.
“I haven’t been able to cast anything since I bound Invictis to me,” I say. “I don’t know why, but… it’s like it’s just gone.”
“What? It’s gone? It can’t be gone. You’re the high empress. You have all of the magic from your predecessors. That magic can’t just disappear,” Frederick tries to reason, as if sound reasoning will bring back my ability to sling spells. And then something must occur to Frederick, because he whips his head around and glares at Invictis. “This must be your doing.”
Scoffing as he rolls his eyes, Invictis huffs, “It is not. Although, you could convince her to unbind me and see if that helps anything—”
“Fuck off,” I hiss, causing Invictis to smirk. “You’re not getting unbound. You’re stuck with me from here on out, magic or not.” Quieting my voice, I tell Frederick, “I’m sorry I didn’t tell you. I didn’t know how. I didn’t want…” I look at my lap and sigh.
Frederick knows what I was going to say, because he says it: “You didn’t want to worry anyone. You’d just saved Laconia. You wanted everyone to have faith again.”
“I don’t know about faith, but… yeah, pretty much.” My eyes shift to the golden tattoo on my right arm.
“Is that why you wanted to visit these labyrinths with Invictis? To see if you could find a way to regain your magic?” When all I do is sigh, Frederick shakes his head and gets to his feet. “I need a moment.” Without another word he walks away from the campfire, away from me.
“Frederick, wait.” I try to call out for him, but he doesn’t stop. Fifteen feet away, Invictis is busy frowning, and I can tell he wants to say something, but I don’t let him. I get up and go after Frederick. Still woozy and a little light-headed, but my legs hold me up.
A ways from camp, I find Frederick standing just before a sharp drop-off, one of countless in Pylos thanks to its mountainous land. His back is to me, and his arms are folded over his chest, a stance he doesn’t often take.
I stand behind him for a moment, trying to think of what to say to him, but he beats me to it. He doesn’t turn around, though. He simply says, “You should have told me.” The hurt in his voice is plain, and it’s like a knife in the gut.
Or a claw in the side.
“I know” is all I can say.
Frederick is slow to face me, and his arms fall to his sides. “You should have told me, Rey, about all of it. About Invictis, about your magic. Do you not trust me? Did you think I’d tell everyone the moment you told me?” He lets out an exasperated breath. “Empresses above, Rey, if you would have told me and asked me to keep it to myself, I would have—I would have gladly done so while trying to help you.”
My eyes fall to the grass between us, although it’s more like dry weeds here than actual grass. “I know.”
He takes a step toward me. “Do you? Do you know? I don’t think you do. You’re so engulfed in your own problems you never stop to think. I can help you, Rey, but only if you let me.”
“It’s not easy for me, Frederick, to let anybody help me! Don’t you get that? Ever since my dad died I’ve been on my own. My foster family was a joke. I grew up when I was ten years old. I’ve had to depend on myself since. I’m the only one I can count on. Me. Not anyone else. Just me.”
“The circumstances might’ve been different, but I was forced to grow up in much the same way.” The expression on Frederick’s face is pained. “You can count on me. I thought you knew that.”
“How can I know that? Let’s not forget the first time we met, you lied to me and said if I went looking for your dad’s stuff you’d help me get home.” I don’t know why, but I throw his lie back in his face. Maybe Frederick lying to me in the beginning hurt me more than I wanted to admit. How else can I explain why it so easily came to the tip of my tongue now?
He inches forward, his brow furrowed. “And I’ve regretted lying to you every single day since. You were a stranger who could somehow walk through shadowstorms as if they were nothing. You were my only chance at finding my father’s research. I never imagined—” He stops himself from saying more.
But I need to know. “You never imagined what?”
“I never imagined you’d bring him back. I never could have anticipated the way things have gone. Rey.” Frederick reaches for me, and before I know it, his hands are around mine, holding onto me so softly the tender gesture freezes me in place. “In the beginning, I saw you as a possible solution to our problems. To the woes, to all of the hard times that fell upon Laconia. But now…”
Frederick’s hands squeeze mine, and I know I should pull away, but I don’t. Blame it on the recent blood loss, blame it on anything, but I stand right where I am, gazing into Frederick’s amber eyes like they hold the answers to everything.
“Now, everything is different,” he whispers. “Everything changed. I don’t know when. It’s not like I planned on it. You’ve changed everything, and I need you to know that you can trust me with anything. I will never do something that will lead to your harm.”
With every whispered sentence, he sounds more urgent, and his body keeps inching closer until there’s nothing between us but our hands—which he then drops so he can cup my face. Gingerly, like he’s scared or nervous, like he doesn’t quite know what he’s doing, or maybe he’s afraid I’ll push him away or stop him.
But I think, just this once, I won’t.
His head bends and his eyes close, and I let him take the lead. My own eyelids flutter shut mere moments before his mouth brushes against mine. Tentative, unsure, the softest kiss I’ve ever felt—and that includes the ill-fated kiss I shared with him before.
Why does this feel more intense, even though it’s ten times gentler? Why can I feel this kiss in every part of me, from my fingertips to my freaking toes? I don’t do soft and gentle. It’s not my thing. But this… there’s something special about this.
Maybe it’s the blood loss, but I swear I could kiss Frederick all night.
One of Frederick’s hands drops to my side, slow to curl around my hip, around to my lower back. His mouth on mine is warm and soft, and the slowness of the kiss does anything but dull the urgency. I can still feel how much he needs me, how much he wants me. It’s almost enough for me to give in completely. I’ve never let my walls down for anyone before, but this kiss makes me want to let him in.
The keyword there is almost. I don’t know what would’ve happened if we would’ve kept going, but we don’t. The kiss is interrupted by a harsh yank as Frederick is pulled away from me, and the moment my eyes open, I see a tall, wide, glowing man standing in between us with his hand around Frederick’s throat.
“I think it would be best if you kept that mouth to yourself,” Invictis hisses out, the tattoo on his arm glowing gold, like he’s ready to use his magic against Frederick for kissing me—which is ridiculous because A) Invictis shouldn’t give a shit about who kisses me, and B) I forbade him from hurting anyone.
That command must be the only reason Frederick is still alive right now, because when I step aside and see the pure fury on Invictis’s face, I don’t doubt he would’ve gone for the kill immediately if he would’ve been able to.
Frederick tries to peel the hand off his neck, but he can’t. Invictis is too strong. It takes me a good moment to snap out of my shock and say, “Let him go, Invictis.”
“I could let him go off the edge of this cliff,” Invictis muses with a certain type of evil glee no one else could ever master. “By the time he hits the ground, he will surely regret placing his mouth upon yours.”
“I said let him go now .” I emphasize the final word, and I watch as Invictis huffs and frowns—but pulls himself away from Frederick all the same, finally removing that hand from around his throat.
As he rubs his neck, Frederick glares at Invictis. “I thought you said he couldn’t hurt anyone?” That question is spoken to me even though his eyes rest on the glowing individual in front of him.
Invictis sounds rather bored when he mutters, “I did not hurt you. I simply pulled you off of her. That mouth of yours should be nowhere near hers—”
Letting out a chuckle full of disbelief, Frederick says, “I don’t think you get to make that decision. If I want to kiss Rey and she wants to kiss me, it is none of your concern.” As he says that, Invictis’s hands clench into fists, and I don’t doubt the godlike-man is imagining pounding Frederick’s face into the ground.
I let out a chuckle, too, which causes Invictis to glare at me, his eyes a beautiful, molten gold. “I just think it’s funny. You threw a hissy fit the last time I kissed Frederick, too.” I slowly cock my head at him. “Are you sure you’re not jealous, hmm?”
“Jealous?” Invictis echoes. “Of that mortal? The last thing I would ever be is jealous .” The way he says the word makes it sound like a curse, something he would only wish upon his enemies.
Which is, you know, basically every single person alive, but whatever.
Frederick must’ve had enough of this conversation, because he moves around Invictis and starts to reach for me again as he says, “Come on. Let’s get back to camp and ignore Invictis.” But his hand doesn’t reach me, because Invictis steps between us once again, blocking the movement.
“Touch her again, and you will be the first human who dies the moment I am free,” Invictis growls out. Maybe it’s just his accented voice, but the threat sounds kind of sexy.
Yeah, yeah, I know. I shouldn’t find anything about Invictis sexy, but we’ve already passed that point a long time ago, so let’s just move on and pretend I never had that thought.
“I don’t believe this,” Frederick huffs. “This is asinine. What—”
Before Frederick can say anything else, Invictis turns around to me. Our eyes lock as the glowing tattoos fade and the gold in his eyes are replaced by a pretty, clear blue. He says not a word more—but he does do something that catches me so off-guard, I’m too stunned to command him to stop.
He picks me up. Yep. Invictis just picks me up and throws me over his shoulder like I weigh nothing. His large hand remains on my ass so I don’t topple completely over him.
My mouth falls as Invictis marches to camp ahead of Frederick, my body swaying with each step he takes. It’s like he thinks if he doesn’t separate me and Frederick, more will happen, and he won’t let anything else take place on his watch. Which is ridiculous and stupid.
I should really yell at this asshole to put me down, but the bastard actually rendered me speechless.
Even Frederick is stunned. He stands, motionless for a good five or ten seconds, watching Invictis carry me off, anything he might’ve said completely forgotten about.
Invictis marches us back to camp, where he finally takes that hand off my ass and sets me down near the campfire, where I was passed out before. He stands beside me like a watchdog and waits for Frederick to come along, and once the man does, he glares and points at a spot on the other side of the small fire, wordlessly telling him where to sit.
Frederick stalks to the spot, muttering, “I’m sitting here because I want to, not because you told me to.” He runs a hand through his hair, and I can tell through the flames he’s a mixture of pissed off and embarrassed.
Me? I don’t know what I am, besides stunned at Invictis’s balls. I mean this in all seriousness: what the hell?
Invictis is slow to lower himself to the ground beside me, sitting only inches away from me, the closest he’s been this whole trip. It’s like he thinks he has to sit near me to keep Frederick away.
Instead of making him get up and go away, I lay down and give Invictis my back. My head still kind of hurts and I’m a little woozy—something which that kiss did not help. I need sleep. If I pay any more attention to the asshole next to me, I’d only give him what he wants.
Invictis says he’s not jealous? I’m calling bullshit. Everything he did was some alpha male crap that should only piss me off.
I’m not pissed, though, and that’s a bigger issue.