50. Tempest
50
TEMPEST
“ W ake, sweet storm,” Vexxion murmured in my ear.
I could feel his threads wrap around us, sheltering us.
I only had to half open my eyes to see it was still dark out, though dawn and the day of the wedding bloomed in gold streaked with blood red on the horizon. “Go away. I need more sleep. You kept me up all night.”
“You adore it when I do that.” He climbed over me and nuzzled my neck, kissing along my jaw to my throat where he bit down hard enough to make my eyes open all the way.
“I do, but I need more sleep.” I swatted at his head, but only ran my fingers through his hair when I made impact. I tugged on the white band and coiled it around my thumb.
He lifted his head and grinned at me, stunning me all over again with how gorgeous he was. How adoringly he looked at me. “Are you ready for a surprise? Today is about giving. ”
Today is about killing the king. The thought shot through me like a bolt of white-hot lightning blasting down from the sky, coating my joy in this moment in a bitter taint.
You still get a surprise, he said.
Am I finally prepared?
He nodded. You will be. You’ll do what’s necessary, and you’ll do it with all the passion inside your heart.
As long as his head rolls by my feet, I don’t care if I have to hack it off with a dull knife, splattering his wretched blood everywhere.
When you arrive in the throne room, I’ll place the dagger in your hand.
Won’t any dagger do?
This one is as special as you. You’re going to stun the world just like you’ve stunned me.
Vexxion. I held his shoulders while he kissed across my chest.
You’re distracting me, he drawled.
I believe you’re distracting yourself. And me. Always.
He levered himself up and off me, moving to stand beside the bed, gazing down at me. “I love you.”
The words came out so simply, so profoundly, I wanted to cry.
“Dress quickly,” he said with a lift of his mouth that didn’t reach his eyes. “We don’t have much time.”
The wedding would take place late this morning.
I slid from the bed and padded to the bathing area to clean my mouth, wash quickly, and dress in the clothing Vexxion had waiting. I lifted the leather tunic and pants. “Brenna’s expecting me to help her dress for the wedding. I can’t go to her wearing this.”
He strode over to stand in the doorway dressed only in snug black pants. “I want to see you in your leathers one more time.”
He said I could do this. Why did the tightness in his voice suggest he was worried?
“Tell me.” I tugged on my under clothing and strode over to stand in front of him when he didn’t speak. “ What aren’t you telling me?”
He pulled me into his arms, holding me sweetly. My heart shuddered with dismay.
“This feels too much like the day we arrived here, Vexxion.” My voice croaked. How could it not? The memory of the razor’s edge to his voice, how snide he’d been around his father, and how he’d made me believe he had been betraying me all along. This man was a master at subterfuge while I was a mere apprentice.
He had what it took to do this while I still held my doubts. The realization shook me, gouging across my soul.
“I’ve told you everything I could.” His words were a whisper on my hair. He tapped my ass and backed away, leaving my arms to flop at my sides. “Hurry.” Turning, he strode back into the bedroom.
I joined him a short time later. Drask soared over from his perch and landed on my shoulder, grounding me when nothing else could.
Vexxion held out his hand.
“Can Drask come with us?” I asked, and he nodded.
When I touched Vexxion’s fingers, he flitted, taking us to the meadow where we’d trained. He quickly wrapped his threads around us, shielding us from the feral world determined to spy on anything we might share.
“I have a gift for you,” he said.
I fingered the pendant I wore all the time. “I don’t need more than this. More than you.”
“What about this?” He magicked something into his hand, holding aloft twisted strands of thorny gray vines with delicate appearing red leaves bursting from the surface.
“That looks too much like the collar you coiled around my throat.” I swallowed past the ones embedded beneath my skin and willed the strands to stop writhing. Poking. Devouring me one moment at a time.
“These are different from the one I used in the Claiming.” He tugged them apart. “Three.”
Studying them, I tilted my head. “Three?”
“One for you. One for Reyla. One for Brodine.”
I couldn’t breathe. I could barely think. But oh, how my heart surged up into my throat. “You’re going to free us like I did the creatures, with magic.”
He nodded. Looping two of them over his arm, he let them slide in a jerky way down to his elbow as he unlinked the last one and held it toward me.
“I trust you,” I said.
His mouth quirked up endearingly on one side. It killed me each time he did that, because I knew that smile belonged only to me. “They’re ingenious.”
“What did you have to give for them?” There was always a trick. Like everything in faerie, nothing like this would be granted for free.
“A price I was willing to pay.”
I peered up at him. A few shadows drifted through his eyes, but his expression remained neutral. “What did you promise?”
“Nothing significant.” He blinked.
“ Vexxion .”
“ Tempest .”
“Tell me. What price did you pay?”
“Don’t ask.”
Fear rocked through me, and I could no longer breathe. My heart shattered, but with one stroke of his fingers down my face, he fused me back together again. “I want to know.”
“ Please don’t ask.”
My eyes pinching, I jerked out a nod.
“When I place this collar around your throat,” he said. “It will destroy the vines.”
My fingers fluttered against my neck. “Everyone will know. They’ll hunt me. Kill me.”
“To the world around us, you three will still be collared. Only we’ll know.”
“And what happens to this collar once the first has been destroyed? Will it remain instead?” I wasn’t doubting him, but I did feel as if I was trading one torture device for another.
“You can remove it when you’re free of this place.”
“ You can remove it, you mean.”
He shook his head. “You can take it off whenever you want. It’s fake. Its only purpose is to make everyone believe you’re still bound to me.” He smiled again, and it lulled me. Not in a fae, magical way, but in a way unique to this fae man I loved.
His gaze full of flickering stars met mine as he gently secured the collar around my throat like it was the prettiest necklace. Perhaps it was.
It sunk deeply, but not with pain, only the feel of a soothing balm that could put a person to sleep. The touch of a mother’s hand on a brow. Or the wildly free feeling found only with a lover.
The first collar shuddered. Squirmed. With my breaths jerking in and out of me, I raked at my skin, finding the second collar gone. It had sunk deep. To join the other or emerge once it was the victor?
Vexxion held my upper arms, staring into my eyes, watching me as always. Ready to lay down his life to protect me.
I stilled my shaking body, closed my eyes, and let it happen.
Something slid from my neck, bumping down the front of my snug leather tunic to land at my feet.
When I opened my eyes, the Claiming collar lay on the grass, a withered, twisted, wretched thing.
I lifted my foot and brought my boot down hard on top of it. With a feral cry, I ground it into the grass. And with a shriek, I dropped my knees, lifted the pulverized strands that remained, and burned them to ashes with my power.
Vexxion joined me on the ground.
When he held out his arms, I plunged into them.
We returned to our suite. He left to attend to the king, and I donned the green gown he’d laid out. With the new collars in my pocket humming assurance, I flitted to Brenna’s sitting area, skipping arriving by the hall.
Brenna . . .
We can’t let him collar Brenna, I told Vexxion, my voice shrill. I’d almost forgotten. When I killed Delaine, Will died. If I kill the king after he collars her, she’ll die as well.
I have a collar for her. She’s safe.
Thank you. My pulse backed down a few notches.
Reyla waited beside the fireplace, and when she saw me, she rushed over and gave me a hug. “You look happy.”
“I have a gift for you,” I whispered, quickly explaining. “There’s one for you and one for Brodine.”
“He is a good guy,” she marveled, her fingertip tracing across the new collar in my hand. Brodine’s waited in my pocket, and I’d find a way to place it around his throat before the king’s wedding. No matter what happened today, Reyla would watch out for him, help him awaken if she could. Then they could flee this horrible place together.
Bravery shone in my friend’s eyes. “Do it.”
One day soon, the fates willing, we’d be able to mourn Kinart’s loss. When we did, our horror and dismay would be cauterized by the vengeance I’d carry out this day.
I placed the collar around her throat, and she shuddered. But her gaze remained locked on mine, shining with trust.
“Love you, Reyla,” I whispered, and she nodded.
The Claiming collar fell off her like it had with me. I kicked it into the cold fireplace with my shoe and burned it with magic while my friend held my hand.
“The other unhooks,” I said softly. “There’s a clasp at the back of your neck. Keep it hidden with your hair.”
Loosening the high arrangement she’d crafted, she encouraged some of her hair to drape down over that area to mask it.
“We should rouse Brenna,” I said. “The king will be waiting.” Everything was waiting.
How had the time flown by so fast? I felt like I’d just arrived at the castle, that I’d fled the throne room with devastation burning through my heart. Everything had changed since then.
I’d changed. I was forged in a fire of my own making, and I welcomed the knowledge that no matter what the fates delivered today, I will have tried.
Dread thrummed through my veins. I kept steeling myself, reminding myself that there was still time. Not to back out of this but to compose my thoughts and my body for what would happen next.
As Vexxion had said, a storm was coming. It would crash across this world and when it was over, everything would be changed. If luck and fate and my heart had a say, it would be changed for the better.
We softly opened Brenna’s door, finding her sitting in a chair, staring out the window.
“So strange,” she said, her voice sounding funny.
We joined her and peered down.
Reyla and I both gasped.
At least thirty Lieges had gathered on the bridge. They stood in a cluster, staring toward the castle with their long, tattered robes fluttering around their skeletal frames. None had dropped their hoods. Only the wretchedness of their souls fell from the thick folds.
“What do you think they’re doing?” Brenna asked, glancing our way with splotchy eyes and tears tracking down her cheeks. Darkness saturated the front of her deep green nightgown. How long had she been sitting here, crying? She snorted out a breath. “I doubt they’ve come for the wedding.”
Or perhaps they had. Had his minions arrived to provide protection?
Tremors gripped my heart, making the beats too fast, relentless. Chills kept seeping into my bones, twisting them to the point of pain.
“It’s time for you to get ready,” I said, brightening my voice and doing all I could to slow my heart and my too-fast breathing. “Your wedding’s about to start.”
“I don’t want to marry Ivenrail.” She gave me a stark, horrified look. “Would you?”
Frankly, no. “You adore him.”
“You do,” Reyla echoed.
“He cares for you,” I added.
Reyla jerked her head in a nod. “He does.”
Most of all, I couldn’t kill him until this woman had taken her place in the throne room.
“Come along,” I said, urging her to rise with a hand beneath her elbow. “Reyla, help her get undressed while I draw her bath.”
The Lieges remained where they were, staring toward the castle. I couldn’t hold back my shudder. His gathering minions were not part of my plan.
While Brenna sobbed, we hustled her through the motions. Who could blame her for dreading this? She didn’t know her future husband planned to drain her today, but the thought of marriage to that fiend would be almost as bad.
We dressed her in her gorgeous wedding gown, arranged her hair, and painted her face to cover up her tears and dismay. Then we took her out to the sitting room to wait for someone to come tell us it was time to leave for the throne room.
She continued to cry, and I had to craft a spell to keep her make-up from drizzling down her face to stain the fabric of her dress.
I dropped down in front of her, taking her hands and squeezing them. “You have to stop crying. You must remain strong.”
“I can’t.” Her teary gaze met mine. “I don’t love him. I tried to pretend, but I can’t. I never will.”
Reyla joined her, her body dipping down the sofa cushions. “Think of the bright future you’ll have by his side. He’ll place a crown on your head, and you’ll become his queen.”
“I don’t want a crown. His horrible collar that he insists I must accept. And I don’t want to be a queen,” she said with strength in her voice. “I love someone else, and I only want to be with him.”
“Marry the king,” I said firmly. “Then be with your lover. I doubt Ivenrail will notice.”
Reyla’s breath hissed out of her lungs, and she deflated against the cushions. “You shouldn’t . . . ”
“Shouldn’t what?” I said. “I’m not going to lie to her. Would you want to marry him?”
Horror tightening her face, she shook her head.
“We’re in agreement, then.” I straightened in front of Brenna. “I know what it’s like to love someone more than anything, to only want to be with them.”
She gazed up at me. “Surely not the controller.”
“Do you trust me?” I asked rather than answering.
Her shrug shifted the pristine gown across her shoulders. “Did you kill Delaine? That’s what everyone’s saying.”
“What would you say if I told you she attacked me, and that sometimes, a person has to act in self-defense?”
“She could be mean at times,” she said carefully, staring down at her hands clasped on her lap. They trembled and were paler than a corpse freshly drawn from the river. “Delaine wasn’t mean to me, naturally, but I heard what she said to you. I saw how she mistreated Reyla and not just that one time.”
“You saw only a fraction of the real Delaine.”
“I don’t know what to think about this, Tempest,” Brenna said.
“Do you trust me?”
Reyla watched us, saying nothing.
Brenna’s head tilted as she gazed up at me. “Do I have a choice?”
“There are always choices.”
“Not in this,” she said simply. “There has never been a choice in this, only duty, demands, and my need to give into a will stronger than my own. But yes, I trust you, Tempest. ”
Leaning close, I whispered by her ear. “You won’t end up with the king.”
She gasped and thrust her frame against the sofa, but before she could speak, someone knocked on the door. The guards opened the panel and High Advisor Adwarin swept in. As the door closed behind him, the hatred in his eyes pinned me in place.
“The king wishes to speak with you,” he said.
“Tell him I’ll see him at the wedding,” Brenna said. “That’s soon enough.” She’d mustered some strength and there would be no stopping her now.
“I meant the collared Nullen.” When his icy glare shot from me to Reyla and back again, I understood what he wasn’t saying. If I didn’t go with him now, my friend would soon be dead.
“I won’t be long, Lady Brenna,” I said in a breezy tone, rounding the sofa and approaching the high advisor.
If only I held a blade in my hand.
His hand snapped out, latching onto my arm, and he flitted.
We landed in the king’s living area, and he dragged me over to the chair, forcing me to sit. Vines snaked around my limbs before I could yelp.
Vexxion, I hissed, sending him the image of the high advisor smiling with glee and the king lounging on the sofa, watching me with an equally snide smile.
My love opened the outer door and strode inside the living area, Drask soaring in behind him. “A party without me?”
“Go away, Controller,” the king bit out. “This doesn’t concern you. ”
“But it does. Tempest belongs to me .”
Drask landed on the back of a tall chair, watching.
“We’ve been through this already.” The king rose and strolled around the table to stand in front of me. His fingers snapped out and latched onto my jaw, and he jerked my head back, forcing me to meet his eyes. His heavy gaze studied my features. “I don’t see why you bother with her. Why you care. She’s pretty. I’ll give you that. But not worth the time it would take to train her.”
A wisp of movement on my left dragged my attention to the Wraithweave gameboard—where pieces were moving all on their own. The master had added another game piece, an enforcer.
Fuck. I couldn’t help but compare what was happening on the board to the situation inside the castle. While I didn’t know who the king—the master’s—defenders were, Kerune had been assigned the role of the king’s enforcer.
Brenna was the high lady and . . . My gaze met Vexxion’s.
He was her shield. The knowledge ripped through me like jagged wire.
The high lady had also added an enforcer. If this game mirrored real life, who could that be?
The dragon had moved closer to stand behind her, but I didn’t know what that meant either. Brenna had never visited the aerie. When I met her in the city, she rode in a pretty carriage. She’d only been on a dragon once and never wanted to ride again.
Perhaps the dragon was symbolic of an additional protector.
She’d need it .
And I swore I saw . . . I focused on a bit of mist floating at the high lady’s side, but when I blinked it was gone. I must be mistaken.
It could not be a wraith.
The game had been named for the wraith, though as far as I knew, no one had ever played with the piece. It chose the game. The gamers did not choose it.
“Come closer, Vexxion,” the king said, drawing my attention his way. He released my chin, and I dragged my gaze to the floor, doing all I could to appear passive. Partly drained.
Compliant.
No— controlled .
When Vexxion reached the king, he purposefully placed his body between mine and Ivenrail’s, forcing the king to take a step backward.
The high advisor cackled, and I looked his way, wondering what was driving his humor.
Ivenrail latched onto Vexxion’s arm and jerked it up into the light coming in from the window on my left. A flick of his finger and a swirling pattern appeared on Vexxion’s wrist.
His mating mark.
It was different from Brenna’s, yet similar enough to suggest the male match to the female.
“Tell me, son,” Ivenrail said in a deadly voice. “When were you going to mention that you’ve bonded with your fated mate?”