Chapter Twenty-Six
We return to the palace at nightfall, and I am escorted to Luthian’s house by the sylph guards. I asked Arcus to keep silent about our engagement until it’s publicly announced, for fear that Luthian might spirit me away. Arcus agreed but warned that the announcement will come soon.
Back in the house, free of the sylphs, I lean against the door and take a few deep breaths. Then, I rush to Luthian’s study. When I don’t find him there, I try the library. Finally, I venture to his bedroom.
I’m about to knock when I remember that he may not be without company. I brace myself to find him with Firo, and rap my knuckles against the wood.
“Enter.”
I step inside and find Luthian thankfully alone. He’s in his dressing gown, lounging in a chair before the fire, reading. He looks up, his expression lighting with interest. “How did it go?”
“Better than we could possibly have expected,” I tell him, and hurry to kneel in front of him. “Arcus is going to make me his queen.”
I expected... I don’t know what I expected. A whoop of joy? A congratulations on a job well-done? But Luthian’s face turns to stone.
“I-I thought you’d be happy.” I don’t understand. “He trusts me. I’ll be close enough to him to—”
“To lose your head, like the last queen,” Luthian snaps. He stands so quickly I must lean back to avoid being knocked over. “You didn’t agree, did you?”
“I did. I thought it was the best thing for us,” I say, still utterly blindsided by his anger.
He scoffs and paces to the fireplace, leaning with both hands on the mantle. “Whenever did you get the impression that you were to decide what was best?”
“I—”
He whirls to face me, cold eyes filled with silver rage. “You forget our bargain, Cenere! You were never to defy me—”
“I was never to say no!” I protest, climbing to my feet, for I will not grovel. “There was nothing in our bargain about me saying yes!”
“What will happen, do you think, once you are queen?” he demands. “Do you think I’ll be allowed to stay?”
“No, he plans to banish you,” I spit back. “He never intended to let you stay at court.”
“That’s the point of the plan!” Luthian shouts. “To remove him. To remove Kathras. To install Cassan so that I will be allowed to stay.”
“Shouldn’t it be easier now that I’ve gained Arcus’s trust?” I counter. “We were alone together today, Luthian. No guards. In the forest, at a faery bath. He went somewhere alone with me because he trusts me. We can use that to our advantage. And when I am queen—” I can make you my king.
I have no idea the thought was simmering in my mind until I nearly, disastrously, speak it.
“When you are queen, and you are discovered to have killed Arcus, you will be executed,” Luthian points out. “When you are the only person alone with him, his blood will be on your hands.”
He’s right. But I won’t admit it. “I was in a precarious position. How was I to say no to a king?”
Luthian’s shoulders slump. He presses a hand to his forehead. “Forgive me, Cenere. I did not think.”
“You didn’t think beyond using me as bait,” I finish for him.
His shame is visible in his defeated posture, in his silence. My own heart is heavy with it; I considered breaking our agreement, letting Luthian fail for my own ends.
I am a wicked woman. Faithless. As faithless as Arcus believes Luthian to be.
Finally, Luthian speaks. “This complicates things, but it doesn’t sink us. I need to think about next steps.”
“You don’t have much time,” I admit. “The king plans to announce our engagement. After that, he’ll banish you from court.”
Luthian shakes his head. “He won’t. You’re going to ask him to keep me here until the wedding. So that I will be properly humiliated.”
His mind works so quickly. Perhaps that’s why I’ve fallen in love with him. I admire him, and I’ve confused that admiration with romantic inclination.
“You’re more than capable of convincing him, I’m sure,” Luthian says, and steps toward me. He touches my cheek. “I shouldn’t have shouted at you. You’ve only done exactly what I wished you to. You simply did it too well.”
“I had a skillful teacher,” I say.
He smiles. “I’m sorry we fought. I sometimes forget that you have a stake in this, too. I become too focused on my own revenge.”
“Because you’ve been planning it for so long?” Long enough that he could grant a faery’s wish and wait for that wish to bloom into a sufficient tool. But I don’t ask. As much as I want to, I still can’t convince myself that particular truth won’t hurt me.
“Once your engagement is announced, we will have to work fast,” he says, dropping his hand and turning away to pace. “The date has already been set for his death. Now, it will have to change.”
Was that why he was with Firo, then? Did Luthian seduce the ambassador to the Court of Time and Destiny for that favor?
“When it does,” he goes on, “I might need you to carry out the deed, yourself.”
My stomach drops. I’d thought myself willing to do it, but when faced with it as a fated certainty it carried a much heavier weight. “Kill the king?”
“I vow to you; it will not be your head on the block. That, I’ve already assured.”
I believe him. Though I don’t think he loves me, I do trust the bargain we made. He promised I will be safe.
“In the meantime, I want you to turn your attention only to the king. You will not lie with anyone else unless he requests it. He must believe you are taken with him and him alone.” Luthian puts his hands on my shoulders. “I cannot stress how important this is.”
“I think I know how to manipulate Arcus.” I giggle a little. “In fact, that is what I call him. He loves to hear me say his name.”
There is a flash of jealousy that Luthian is not quick enough to repress. I revel in it.
“Good,” he says stiffly. “Even his last queen was not afforded that privilege. He must be truly infatuated with you.”
At least, I think, someone is.
* * * *
I go to Arcus the next morning, as promised. The sylphs allow me to enter his chambers freely, and I wonder if Luthian’s plan won’t simply be for me to stroll in with a knife. No one would stop me.
What does stop me is the sight of Kathras at his father’s dining table. His boots are propped on the tabletop, and he gives me a look of contempt when I enter.
“Your Highness,” I say, sinking into a curtsey.
He makes a disgusted noise. “No need to be so formal, mother .”
So, Arcus has informed his sons. I wonder how Cassan took the news, considering his bet with Luthian. In stride, I assume.
“Please, don’t call me that,” I say, lifting my chin. “Especially since—”
“Especially since I fucked you?” He sneers at me. “Don’t worry, it won’t happen again.”
“I know it won’t. I’ll be queen. And your father’s mate.”
Kathras sniffs. “Interesting order in that sentence, Your Majesty.”
The title is a mockery.
I refuse to endure it. “You shouldn’t address me so. It’s disrespectful to the crown.”
“And what does a human know of the crown?” he demands. “What do you know of a faery court? You’ve only just arrived. Oh, I’ve heard all about your prowess, your exhibitionism. It’s the talk of every salon and card game. But do you know, really, what it will mean for you to be my father’s queen?”
“King Arcus is a wise man. I trust that he will teach me everything I must know.”
Kathras laughs. “Good luck with your trust.”
I’m about to retort when a door beyond the archway opens and Arcus emerges. “My sweet! You’re earlier than I expected.”
I go to him with a skip in my step. “I apologize, Your Majesty. I simply couldn’t wait any longer to see you.”
Kathras scoffs.
Arcus’s attention shifts to his son, then back to me. “This will take but a moment, Cenere, my love. Why don’t you sit on the bed and wait for me.”
I do as he asks and wonder if I should disrobe. I’m certain he means to have me.
Kathras rises and bows to his father. “You summoned me?”
“Yes,” Arcus says. “After you left last night, I thought of the things you said. Your attempts to dissuade me from making Cenere my queen.”
I narrow my eyes at Kathras. He is in an interference I will be glad to remove.
Arcus continues. “I couldn’t put my finger on what bothered you so about my lovely new mate. Then, the solution came to me.”
The king looks between me and his son.
“You want her,” Arcus says finally.
“That’s absurd,” Kathras replies.
“Why wouldn’t you want her?” Arcus goes on, dismissing Kathras’s denial. “She is intoxicatingly beautiful. A mortal, born of a faery wish. She’s like a story. You see it in her. How enticing she is.”
Kathras’s jaw is tight. “I’m happy you’re pleased with her, but I have no interest.”
No interest! After the labyrinth? After he pinned me down like a rutting animal?
“Come now. I know you better than that. You are my own flesh and blood. And my flesh and my blood are...” The king sighs helplessly as he looks me up and down. “Very interested.”
“Then I’ll leave so that you may indulge your interests.” Kathras heads toward the door.
“Don’t be petulant, boy. I’m offering you the chance to have her before she is queen and it’s forbidden.” Arcus waves toward me. “Take her now. Slake your lust, and this whole temper tantrum of yours can be over.”
Kathras’s spine straightens. “I do not object to the human on the grounds that I want her for myself, Your Majesty. I object because I do not trust her mate. I do not trust her.”
“He objects,” I insert myself, seething, “because he has had me before.”
Arcus goes deathly still.
“The reason you could not find me in the maze,” I say, locking eyes with Kathras, “is because your son was using me as if I were a stray dog in an alley.”
Arcus turns to him. “Is this true?”
“It is.” Kathras swallows, and I see real fear pinch the corners of his mouth. “It was dark. I had no idea I was coupling with a human. If I had, it wouldn’t have happened.”
“You had no idea?” Arcus strides to me and pulls back my skirt. I yelp at his fury, scramble back on my hands instinctively, but he plunges his fingers deep into my unprepared cunt. “You felt this, and had no idea?”
I shudder at his withdrawal and hurry to cover myself.
Arcus strides to Kathras and waves his fingers beneath his son’s nose. “You smelled this, and had no idea?”
Kathras, to his credit, keeps his eyes forward, looking past his father into nothing. But his nostrils do flare, slightly.
When Arcus drops his hand, Kathras says, “I’ve spent the past seven months fucking humans, father. The difference never crossed my mind.”
“It wouldn’t have happened,” Arcus says, repeating his son’s earlier words. “But you’ve been fucking humans for seven months?”
Kathras settles his cold gaze upon me. “Desperation sometimes overcomes disgust.”
“You will not speak to my future queen in such a manner!” Arcus gestures wildly to the door. “Out, before I banish you from this court!”
Kathras bows stiffly to his father before he leaves. I wait silently as Arcus watches him go. When the king turns back to me, his expression is still twisted and angry, but he covers it in a flash.
Now, I know what his insincere smile looks like. That will be useful in the future.
“This was not what I summoned you for,” Arcus says, leaning over me until I must lay back. The bed dips as he braces a knee on the edge. His mouth finds my ear, my jaw, my collar bones as he speaks. “You will never experience such indignity at my son’s hands again.”
No, I think. Only at yours.
I need to endure Arcus’s narcissistic, violent behavior until his death. I can endure it until then. And in the meantime, I can take my pleasure while pretending he’s in control.
There is something delicious about knowing a repugnant person’s death is close at hand.
I lift one leg to draw him closer, and he groans. “No, no, fair Cenere. I wouldn’t spoil you for the surprise.”
I mewl with feigned disappointment. “You would deny me your magnificent cock?”
He laughs, the sound of a well-stroked ego. “I have something you’ll find… not better, but more interesting, I think.”
Before I can sit up, I find myself standing, clinging to Arcus in a dank, windowless room. The walls are coated in damp, with algae dripping down from the cracks between the slime-blackened stones. In the center, only steps from us, is a pool of blue, illuminated like the water from the faery bath. It casts rippling shadows on the ceiling and walls, and across Arcus’s suddenly stern face.
“You made quite a spectacle of yourself in front of my court.” His voice is laced with venom. “Wantonly cavorting with mermaids.”
My brow crumples with confusion. There was no understanding between us then, and even if there were, isn’t wanton cavorting what this court is about? “I apologize, Your Majesty. I never thought—”
“You participated while my son rutted with your mate in the gardens,” Arcus goes on. “Do you think it appropriate to make yourself a whore to everyone in my court?”
I shake my head, open my mouth to protest. “Your Majesty—"
“It won’t happen again.” He grips my chin roughly and forces me to meet his furious glare. “And you will call me by my name. I don’t wish for you to fear a king. I wish for you to fear me.”
I do. I don’t have to pretend for him. In this moment, alone, in this dungeon-like room, I can do nothing but quake with fear. “I’m so sorry, Arcus.”
His touch turns gentle, petting my hair and smoothing a tear from my cheek that I didn’t know had fallen. “It’s all right. I know that it will never happen again.”
I exhale in relief.
“Because you’ll learn your lesson,” he adds, and I see the immense satisfaction he takes in my renewed fright.
Something brushes my ankle, then squeezes hard. I look down to see a thick, dark red tentacle snaking from the pool to wind around my leg. Instinctively, I try to shake it off, then wish I had not, for my terror will please the king greatly.
“Since you so enjoyed your time with the mermaids,” he says with a dark chuckle, “this seems a fitting punishment.”
“Arcus—” I begin to plead, but the tentacle jerks and pulls me into the water.