Chapter 15
Sylvan
I hold my head high as I step through the threshold. Built in a circle around the dark shaft of the hearth, the forge has runes and magical symbols carved into the floor and walls. Some of them emit the faintest red glow, and as I enter, inhaling air that’s hot and sulfuric like dragon breath, the steady tap of metal against metal stops.
My knees feel like marshmallows when I face the tall form of the grimsmith, who regards me from his place at the massive anvil.
“Who are you? What are you doing here?”
I’m struck how very out of place he seems in this elven forge. Tall and broader in the shoulders than a member of my kind ought to be, he reminds me of the old quarry workers who congregate at Best Burger Bonanza every Friday after work. The fire deepens the grooves marking the spots where his skin folds whenever he emotes, and seeing them makes me doubt it’s the man I seek in the first place.
“Tassarion?” I ask, keeping my voice steady only thanks to the training a life at the Nocturne Court has given me.
“Who’s asking?” the smith says, approaching me in slow steps. His bare chest glistens in the glow of the fire, and I follow a drop of sweat until it reaches his leather kilt. Over his heart, a dark brand marks him as banished. It’s the crest of the Nightweeds, a kelpie on a shell in a circle of seaweed.
I meet his dark eyes, mustering all the royal dignity I’ve been taught to carry myself with. “I am Prince Sylvan Goldweed.” I recoil when he pushes back some of his dark hair and I get a glimpse of his ears, cut short where they should become pointy. A symbol of his banishment being permanent.
How barbaric.
“Ah, the one sent here to grow old and stale, just like me?” Tassarion asks as an ugly grin stretches his lips. I struggle to keep my eyes on him. I have seen plenty of humans with wrinkles, but they look so unnatural on an elven face it makes my blood pump faster. Is this the future Lord Kyran wants for me?
“I have so much sympathy for your plight. It has only been two months for me in the human realm, and I already sense it seeping my life force. I cannot begin to fathom what you have been through. I know I’m lucky that my banishment is not meant to be permanent.”
Tassarion shakes his head. “I heard all about it. Fifty years. You will be a husk by the time you’re allowed to go back. Time doesn’t stop just because you’re a royal.”
I clasp my fingers in front of myself to fight the urge to bite my nails. “That is why I’m here. I need to go back, and I need my shadowcraft. You’re the only one who I know of who can take off this collar.” I unbutton my shirt to show him the contraption on my neck.
Tassarion steps closer to inspect it. “And why would I do that when I’ve been left to rot here? Your family has been greatly diminished.” From up close I realize he even smells more like a human now, of musk and salty sweat.
I swallow when he slides his fingers under the collar and runs his thumb over the crest etched into it. “You owe my family the favor. I wasn’t even born yet when you were banished, so there’s nothing I could have possibly done for you, but my mother fought for you. Lord Arsen wanted to execute you for experimenting with Sunlight fire, but thanks to her intervention, you were banished instead.”
The grimsmith leans against the wall, but at least he lets go of my collar. “After thirty years here, I’m not sure if that was a favor or a curse,” he says bitterly.
“And yet here we are. You are alive, and if you play your hand right with me, you might still have a chance to come back to the Nocturne Court. My mother and I are the only Goldweeds left, and I don’t even toy with the illusion that I may fight Lord Kyran for the throne, but I will have power at court. I have new means to redeem myself. And when my position’s reestablished, I will do what I can to bring you back. Lord Kyran was only a child at the time of your transgression, so it will not be that difficult for him to forgive you once he sees how useful you could be.”
Tassarion lets out a raspy laugh. “You? I’ve heard your talent for shadowcraft is the most insignificant in generations. On top of that, you took part in a plot to assassinate Lord Kyran. He will want nothing to do with you.”
I drown the urge to lash out, because I need his help and I’m in no position to fight a man twice my size. Story of my life. Always forced to pull back. “He knows my siblings were most at fault, and as for my talent or lack thereof… I have a plan. Do you not wish to be part of a future in which the son of your tormentor is cut down?” That is a fantasy I indulge for his pleasure, because I will get rid of the collar by any means necessary.
The grimsmith rubs his chin, assessing me from head to toe, but then walks over to his tools with a smirk. “I have plans of my own to find my way back to the Nocturne Court, but I do owe your mother a favor, and an enemy of my enemy is my friend. I will have use for a Goldweed ally. Come here, princeling.”
I hate how patronizing it sounds. When Hawk calls me that, his voice is filled with affection, but from those parched lips it’s nothing short of condescending. But I won’t gain anything by expressing this sentiment, so I approach his collection of tools and eye the unfinished dagger resting on the anvil. It’s no longer red-hot, but seeing it brings me back to the moment when the damn collar was first closed around my neck. The thought of hot tools once more working so close to my skin has my stomach dropping, but I can’t get my life back otherwise. Who wouldn’t trade off a moment of fear and discomfort for freedom and a new chance at life?
The tools of Tassarion’s trade cast deep shadows on the walls, but both of ours are gray, mine even more faded than the smith’s. This mirror of my form has always been a source of great shame, and even the simplest of peasants could easily spot my weakness at a glance.
But that won’t matter any longer when I can use what little shadowcraft I possess to bind myself to the hollow darkness of Hawk’s shadow. It will make up for everything I lack, and the Nocturne Court will be forced to respect me.
“Sit,” Tassarion commands as he pulls several vials out of a cupboard. He might have been here for decades, but unlike me, he was allowed to keep his shadow powers, and jealousy eats at me. I watch him form a long needle out of nothing, then dip it into each of the bottles. He lets the shadow spill onto a set of cutters, and runes marking the tool awake with a blue glow.
I can only imagine what his shadowcraft was like at the peak of his power, before the human realm exuded its crushing force on him.
“Lean your head back,” he instructs, and I’m painfully aware of the lack of any pleasantries. He’s making a point of not using my title. One day, I will get even for it, but I suppose the life he’s been forced to live is punishment enough.
I expose my throat to him.
He snorts with laughter and taps his fingers where the purple sparks bit into my skin. “You were trying to get it off with human means.”
“An attempt as good as any,” I groan.
“My tools will do the job, but they’re old, and like me, not what they used to be. They might scrape you, but that will be much worse if you flinch. Are you sure you wouldn’t like to be restrained?” I sense the smirk of satisfaction without even looking at him. And no, I most definitely don’t want to be anymore at his mercy than I already am.
“I will manage.”
Tassarion shrugs and picks up the glowing cutters. When I sense their hot radiance so close to my skin, my thoughts drift to Hawk, who’s still waiting for me in the other room. His distrust still hurts, but if he wants proof, I will be able to deliver it to him the moment the collar is off. I imagine him holding my hand in his overgrown paw, and that reduces the fear coiling in my guts like a snake.
But when metal slides against flesh, burning the side of my neck, I utter a frantic shriek.
I stay still, despite the tears pooling in my eyes and my heart beating out of my chest.
“Just the other side now,” Tassarion mutters, and I might be wrong, but I have a feeling he’s being careless on purpose. He wants a royal to suffer, and I’m the closest thing he can get.
I don’t dare to nod and wait for more pain, watching his lips quirk as the umbrasteel burns my flesh the second time. It’s an excruciating sensation, similar to a stab, but I squeeze the armrests, and by the time the collar rolls off me and clatters to the floor, I know it was worth the pain despite the humiliating tears in my eyes.
I’m as free as I can be.
“That wasn’t so bad, was it, princeling?” the smith asks, casting a shadow over me as he leans forward.
I’m still catching my breath, exhausted by fear and the tension lingering in my muscles, so I respond by shaking my head and try to focus my gaze on the unnatural face looming above.
Something about it makes me uneasy, but before I can make up my mind as to why, the door slams into the wall, and Hawk barges in, the engraved axe high above his head. “What the fuck are you doing to him, you freak?”
Tassarion grabs a dagger off the side table. “And who in all hells are you, huh?” he snarls but then his tone changes, and he steps a bit closer to my promised. “E-exquisite…” he whispers.
“It’s fine, Hawk, I’m fine,” I say, even though I’m still a bit dazed by the pain burning the sides of my neck. I don’t know what this is about. I just need to rest for a few seconds before we can go on and enter the Nightmare Realm, leaving behind this in-between place.
Tassarion ignores me, so I look up, forcing my eyes open, and my stomach drops when I spot Hawk’s long, tar-black shadow. It’s almost reaching the smith’s feet.
A split second is all it takes for Tassarion to pull a strand of hair-thin shadow from his head. He reaches toward my promised’s darkness, luring in one of the threads always pushing out of the edges. He squeezes both in his right fist.
“No!” I scream, stumbling forward, but when the grimsmith opens his palm, his shadow is already one with Hawk’s.
I’m breathless as fury rises inside me, scorching every ounce of good will and kindness I ever possessed. How dare this washed-out criminal steal my promised in front of my very eyes, using my moment of weakness against me in a way so perfidious?
I spin my shadow into a lash and send it at the bastard, but after not using shadowcraft in months, it makes barely a ripple.