Tale of the Heart Queen (Artefacts of Ouranos #4)

Chapter 1

C HAPTER 1

LOR

S OMEWHERE O UTSIDE A PHELION

M y heart lives outside of my body now, bleeding out on the hard-packed earth where I kneel on the unforgiving ground.

Sobbing, I cling to Nadir, pressing my ear to his chest, willing his heart to beat. It remains silent and inert, like wood charred by wildfires, drained of life and slowly crackling to ash.

My ribbons of my dense crimson magic pump through his limbs, grasping at nothing but the yawning emptiness in his chest. It’s no use. My grip slips and stutters, and I struggle to cling to the shreds of his spirit draining into the soil.

If I keep pushing myself, I risk losing control of my healing magic and sliding into the electric threads of my lightning, causing even more damage.

It’s hard to believe I could make this any worse.

I scream. I cry. I let every tear fall. I plead to the skies. I beg the goddess to save him. I bargain with the heavens. I offer up my soul in exchange for his life. I will do anything.

My vision blurs at the corners, and my stomach roils, bile basting the back of my throat. Sweat beads on my forehead as my surroundings tilt on an axis. My cries vibrate through every nerve, assaulting my ears and the tiny hairs covering my arms and the back of my neck. My skin hurts. My hair hurts. The pain in my chest feels like I’m being manipulated by giant hands, twisting my body at opposite angles until I’m nearly torn in half.

Distantly, my mind registers that Rion and his army are still close. Though we’re hidden from view, I need to stay aware. Soon enough, they’ll wake up under my dome of lightning unless I managed to kill them too. But something tells me it won’t be that easy to finally rid myself of the Aurora King.

He has the ark of Heart in his possession. Until a few days ago, I’d never heard of it, but it belongs to me. And I want it back. Something tells me I need it back.

I recall the way it looked as it landed in my outstretched hands. What the Empyrium shared with me in the Evanescence. Virulence. That black glittering stone I looked upon so many times when I stared at the Aurora Keep from the Hollow, vowing to tear it apart.

Are the arks made of the same substance?

The memory of Rion’s choking black magic filters into my turbulent thoughts. What shadowed power flows in his veins? What forces has the Aurora King been toying with? Is that what all of this has been about?

The Lord of the Underworld was the first Aurora King of the Second Age. He used virulence to attempt to destroy Zerra, and now Rion has his hands on the ark of Heart. Does he intend to destroy me with it? But why? Or am I only a step on a ladder to some other purpose?

Does Rion know that he sleeps in a bed surrounded by dark magic?

Could virulence bring Nadir back? I’d crawl into the very heart of the Beltza Mountains on my hands and knees if that’s what it took.

“Nadir,” I sob into him, soaking his shirt with my snot and tears. “I’m sorry. I’m so sorry.”

I did this. I was reckless and impulsive, failing to consider who might be close when I unleashed. Rion and his guards had to pay for touching me again.

Thank you for telling me where she would be.

Rion’s words come back to me with the diamond-hard clarity of honed steel.

But I refuse to believe them. If Nadir gave me up, he had a reason. He had no choice. He would never have done so willingly. After everything we’ve been through, I have to believe that. I handed him my trust, and I refuse to waver at the first test.

I fist the fabric of Nadir’s tunic as I wail, wondering how I’m supposed to go on. How can I possibly exist without him ?

My magic fizzes under my skin, pulling towards him like fingers seeking a drop of moisture in a desert. It’s that same formidable tug I always felt before we finally admitted who we were to one another. Does it feel his loss, too?

No one’s heart has broken into as many pieces as mine. No number exists high enough to count these shards pushing under my skin. I am bereft. Tossed in the waves of a sea with no bottom where I’ll sink and sink for eternity.

My mate. I killed my mate.

“Help!” I scream as though anyone could make this stop being real. My stomach lurches, and my pulse pounds inside my skull, chipping away at its brittle walls. “Take me too,” I whisper. I can’t go on knowing I did this to him.

My heart lives outside of me now, exposed and raw for the world to witness the monster I’ve become.

I cry, and I cry until my soul melts out of my chest and my limbs drain of every emotion and feeling, leaving me numb and hollow and broken.