Chapter XIII
CHAPTER XIII
DAGFIN
Dagfin was starving. Not for food or drink. Only Ocras.
His body was slowing, screaming at the Faerak to feed it what it craved and yet, what was left of his supply was stripped from his person when they were first captured by Fionn.
And times like these, when the hunger was at its worst, was when Dagfin remembered her voice.
“You don’t want this, prince. It may look glamorous, heroic even, but the gauntlet of the Faerak is a curse.”
It had looked heroic. That day, the sound of Roktling was deafening. The screams of undiluted joy when the myths of werewolves on the periphery of their coastal kingdom were, at long last, ended by the heroine crowned by scars and riding into Roktling on an ivory mare. The corpse of some nightmarish beast slung over the rump of her mount.
“If I wanted glamor or heroism, I’d accept the Roktan crown today. I want to make a difference. I want to fight,” he’d said, biting back tears. Praying this strange woman saw him as a man and not a boy running from his legacy.
“Join your father’s fleets then,” she’d said, counting the coin Feradach had paid her before spinning on her heel to leave. “Forge knows they’ll need every pair of hands they can get.”
Dagfin ran to catch up with her, grabbing her jacket. It flashed open, revealing a bandolier shimmering with powder-filled bottles.
The Faerak ripped her jacket from Dagfin’s grasp. Nostrils flaring in annoyance.
“If you weren’t a prince, you wouldn’t still be standing before me.”
“Take me with you.”
The Faerak ’s expression muddled, considering Dagfin more closely this time. As though she hadn’t anticipated another attempt on the Roktan prince’s behalf to flee his crown.
“The life of a Faerak is one chasing ghosts. Nightmares the world hardly knows are anything more than either myth or legend yet terrorize them all the same. We live coin to coin, on the brink of death, for blood and hushed victory. What you saw as I entered Roktling this morning, isn’t common, prince. This isn’t a life anyone asks for. Especially someone like you.”
“Neither is the one I run from.”
The Faerak tilted her head to the side.
“The late prince died and so you have a duty to inherit what he could not. I’d be doing an injustice to all of Roktling to encourage you to become a Faerak .”
Dagfin flinched at the mention of his eldest brother.
Adair was born to rule, not Dagfin. Dagfin preferred fighting invisible beasts in the forest at Aisling’s side. Not learning politics nor enduring endless lectures. And when Adair had fallen ill and collapsed, had passed on to the Other, Dagfin was no more suited for the crown than before his brother left him. Abandoned him to inherit his ghost. Something that was never his to begin with.
“If you don’t take me with you, I’ll find another way to circumvent my legacy. I’ll run, I’ll disappear, I’ll?—”
“Enough, prince.”
“No!” Dagfin shouted. “I’ll not waste a life Adair couldn’t live, ruling from a throne. I do not wish: I will make a difference with my own two hands. Fighting that which threatens humankind in the periphery whether I die trying or live to make my life worth anything.”
Silence was thick, scoffed at by the echoes of Dagfin’s voice still ricocheting off Roktling’s bronze walls.
At last, the Faerak shifted, crossing her arms.
“I’ll take you with me on one condition, prince.”
“Anything.”
“You vow that when the day comes, you’ll inherit your crown. Vow to me, to Feradach, to Roktling.”
Dagfin paled, unable to swallow the stone lodged in his throat. He opened his mouth to argue, to scream, to curse death and its greedy hands for taking what was never theirs to begin with.
Instead, he closed his eyes and nodded.
The Faerak inhaled deeply before turning on her heel for the doors.
“Once I have approval from Feradach, we’ll begin your training. And you’ll have your first taste of Ocras.”
Dagfin shook his head, batting away the memories.
Unwanted thoughts heralded by the smell of the arena in which they stood. A colossal structure supported by statues carved in the likeness of hands, cradling the stadium even as winter encased them in glass.
The roar of spectators thrummed through his core. Thousands of bipedal beasts and fair folk alike, shouting from the rafters with their fists in the air.
As honored guests, Dagfin, Starn, Iarbonel, Fergus, and Killian stood next to Fionn’s royal box. All save for Annind still recovering in his private chambers somewhere in the pits of Oighir.
Dagfin desperately tried to focus on the fae king at the center of the arena, twirling his axes between his hands. Yet Dagfin couldn’t help the way his eyes kept darting to Aisling, sitting beside Fionn. A space surrounded by Sidhe guards, plush with silver furs. That armored bear lingering at Aisling’s side.
She gripped the arms of her throne, eyes pinned to Lir. Her mouth pressed into a thin white line. Concern riddled across the tense arch of her shoulders. And at the sight of it, Dagfin’s chest tightened.
“Keep your focus, Fin,” Killian whispered beside him.
Starn nodded in agreement. “Any hint of disaster and our opportunity to flee is nigh.”
“I already told you: I’m not leaving without Aisling.”
“She made her loyalties clear the last time we spoke with her. She wishes to go forward alone.”
Starn cleared his throat. “Aye, you may not have a choice.”
“I never had a choice to begin with,” Dagfin replied. “There was never a possibility of me leaving without her.”
Starn opened his mouth to speak, but before he could utter a word, Dagfin moved through the fair folk and to Fionn’s royal box.
Even without his Ocras, even despite its absence gnawing at his bones, he moved nimbly.
Yet as soon as he bypassed the sentinels, Fionn’s bear rose on its hind legs, blocking Dagfin just before he was to reach Aisling.
“Now, now, little human. Where are we off to in such a hurry?”
“It’s quite alright, Greum,” Aisling said, standing from her seat. “Fionn promised me an audience with the Faerak .”
Greum exchanged glances with Fionn. The son of Winter clenched his jaw but nodded in approval, nevertheless. His need to appease Aisling overruling his immeasurable annoyance. Yet Dagfin couldn’t care less he was making an enemy of a fae lord. So long as he spoke with Aisling.
Greum lumbered to the side and Aisling sprung forth, wrapping Dagfin in her arms.
“Fin.”
She smelled of lavender and holy gardens. Was the vision of dreams that left the heart broken come morning; a silver gown made of glittering chainmail wrapped around her elegant form, and the soft curls of midnight black braided away from her face in intricate patterns. The crystal collar gleaming around her throat.
“I’m alright,” he said, eager to mask the roughness in his voice. His strength rendered brittle without the Ocras as she embraced him. So, he took the opportunity and whispered in her ear.
“We need to speak. Alone.”
He needed her to tell her he’d never leave her. If she chose to continue alone and wished for him to go home, she’d have to banish him herself.
Aisling pulled away, resolve flashing in her violet eyes. She couldn’t respond now. Not for the sentinels that surrounded them, Greum, and the son of Winter listening keenly to their every exchange. And not for the pounding of the earth that unbalanced them both.
Aisling’s attention whipped to the arena, returning to Lir at its center.
The first test was beginning.