Chapter 41
“Get up.”
I gasp and jackknife up in bed, my heart a hammer in my chest. Digging my fingertips into the mattress, I stare at the window and squint against the harsh sunlight. A slight breeze weaves through the opening, and the curtains sway, but it’s the only evidence Isolde was ever here.
“Did you hear me?” Kressa says between gritted teeth. “If you don’t get up now, my father is going to send his guards in here and drag you out.”
I blink the haze from my eyes and push myself up against the headboard. “What’s going on?”
She hovers over me, a foot away from the mattress. A tailored, forest green uniform hugs her shoulders and sweeps down the curve in her waist. The metal pins at her chest catch the light, scattering gold across the room.
“It’s nearly the middle of the day, and you’re still asleep.” She crosses her arms over her chest. “My father has requested an audience in the throne room, and wishes for you to be in the audience.”
My brows pull together, and I glance down at myself, wrapped in the sheets. I must still be recovering from the near-burnout. There’s no other explanation as to why I slept in so late.
“What’s the occasion?” I untangle myself and push the sheets off, swinging my legs over the side of the bed.
Bruises pepper my thighs and spread down my shins from the amount of times I slammed into the wood of the ship’s deck. Kressa’s eyes trail over them, and a muscle feathers in her jaw.
She blinks, and the expression disappears as our gazes meet. “If I were to guess, it would have something to do with introducing my future husband.”
A pit opens in my stomach. “Already? But your father only mentioned it last night.” My voice takes on a plea, my heart racing against my ribs. “How is that possible?”
“It appears this arrangement was made far before the emerald ever went missing.” Her tone is cold, dismissive.
I go to argue, but press my jaw shut. I’m the reason she’s willingly agreed to such a thing—a fate I did everything to avoid. I’ve already done everything I can to convince her otherwise.
“So even if you found the emerald, he’d still make you marry?” I whisper.
She gnaws on her lip and strides toward the door. “It doesn’t matter. Not anymore. Now get dressed and meet me in the living room.”
I watch as she disappears around the corner, then stand from the mattress and shove my hand underneath. My fingers brush against the emerald, and I let out a sigh. If Isolde recovers my ship and I manage to get my compass back, I’ll return the emerald to Kressa.
Abandoning the bed, I throw on clean clothes and comb my fingers through my hair. I stare at my reflection in the mirror and hover my hand over the space where Kressa’s power resides in my chest.
How different this would be if we never exchanged power. We would have never known about the bond, and I wouldn’t have her fire flowing through my veins.
She clears her throat from the living quarters, and I tuck my hair behind my ears, turning away from the mirror.
I stride out of the room, and find Kressa standing near the front door, wringing her hands. She lifts her head, and the moment she catches my eye, she clasps her hands behind her back. She straightens her posture, as if there’s a rod sutures between her shoulder blades. A false confidence.
My feet carry me across the floor, and I force back the ache in my sternum. “You know, it would be a little more dignifying if I was giving something better than a tunic and leggings to wear before the King.”
“You’re a prisoner, not a guest.”
My steps stutter at the tone in her voice. A chasm opens in my chest, and the words I said to her last night filter through my mind. But as I close the distance between us, nothing about touching her, or letting her touch me, felt like a mistake. The only oversight I made was trusting her.
She pulls a pair of rhodium cuffs from her belt and holds out a hand. “The gloves must stay here.”
I meet her gaze for a heartbeat, then pull the rhodium from my hands. I let them pool in her palm, and she tucks them into a drawer before clamping the cuffs tight around my wrists.
“Will any of my crew be there?” I say.
“I wouldn’t know.”
She reaches for the handle, but I wedge myself between her and the door. “You can’t keep treating me like this.”
“Like what? Like the woman who slit my throat thinking I was my brother?” She steps closer, glaring at me down the bridge of her nose. “Or the woman who followed me to bed last night, just to say it meant nothing.”
My gaze flicks over her shoulder, at the closed door with my compass sitting on the other side. “This whole time, you’re the one who has wanted to break the bond. I can never tell whether we’re on the same side or you’re one step away from betraying me.”
“I am.” She weaves her arm behind my back and grabs the handle. “Because what I want for you, Briar, is apparently something I can’t give you without losing a piece of myself.”
“And what’s that? What do you want for me?”
“What I’ve wanted for you since the day we met. Something I’ve never had, and never will.” The door clicks open. “Freedom.”
I search her face, but she steps into the hallway and leaves me in her wake.
I follow, the door clicks shut behind us.
Julian stands at the mouth of the hall, leaning against a marble column as he waits for us.
His guard uniform is nearly a twin to Kressa’s, but his is a lighter green—the shade of early spring leaves.
“I lied about why I agreed to the marriage,” Kressa says, her footsteps silent over the stone floors. “Yes, I told my father I’d marry if it spared your life, but that’s not entirely why I did it.”
My gaze swings to her, but she won’t acknowledge me as her arms swing steadily at her sides.
“I found something in Amoren’s library,” she continues. “An ancient text.”
“About what?”
She presses her lips into a thin line. “How to break the bond.”
Her words cleave my chest in two, and a pit widens within me—as if the very fabric of my soul is unraveling. I open my mouth, but Kressa stops in front of Julian.
“The King is waiting,” he says, eyeing me with an iciness that wasn’t there yesterday.
I swallow, and Gemma swings around a corner in the distance.
She clears her throat and adjusts the collar of her advisor uniform as she strides toward us, her low heels tapping against the stone floors.
Two weeks ago, she was little more than a maid to the Sky Court, and now she sits on the board of the Earth Court. Her sister would be so proud.
“Hold still,” she says, placing her hands on either side of my head.
Her power slips beneath the surface of my skin, but unlike the tug and pull of muscle when she’d glamour me as Harriet, a featherlight touch skates across my scalp.
“I thought you’d appreciate the bruises gone from your body and your hair a little more presentable.”
She pulls away, and we share a warm smile. She’s not a member of my crew, but a friend nonetheless—one I owe my life to.
“Thank you,” I whisper.
She squeezes my shoulder and turns to Julian and Kressa. “Before you ask, I know very little about what this is about. It appears King Golan has kept the details of this address from the advisors.”
“Or he’s carefully chosen who to tell,” Kressa says.
Gemma nods. “But from what I’ve heard, some of the announcements may be less about the war, and more about the rise of the Fire Court.” Her eyes darken for a heartbeat. “It seems as if the tides are shifting.”
“What do you mean?” I say.
She gnaws on her lower lip. “It’s hard to say, but priorities have changed. Before the attack on Sarenia, Golan had his sights set on taking the Sea Court before Callum did. But there hasn’t been a meeting about that since.”
Kressa curses under her breath and turns away from us, pinching the bridge of her nose.
“Either way, we need to get to the throne room before Golan suspects anything.” She glances over her shoulder. “If he or any of the other advisors saw me talking with you, they’d be suspicions.”
I swallow. “And Elias?”
“Already with my father,” Kressa bites. “We can discuss when we have more information.”
She takes off down the hallway, and I go to follow, but Julian throws an arm in front of me. “You two cannot be seen entering together.”
I furrow my brow as Kressa and Gemma walk side by side down the corridor, exchanging a low conversation. “Why not? Aren’t I her prisoner?”
“Indeed, but this is an address where she may not only be introduced as a future queen, but a future bride.”
My stomach twists. Before I refused the marriage, my mother held an address not unlike this one. Every noble within the Sea Court was in attendance—watching as I stood on the dais and was unknowingly promised to a man I’d never met.
A fate I wouldn’t wish on anyone.
Kressa and Gemma disappear around the corner, and Julian wraps his hand around my upper arm, guiding me forward.
“Have you met him?” I whisper. “The man she’s meant to marry?”
He shakes his head. “Kressa doesn’t even know who it is yet.”
“But I thought he was a noble? Someone she knew or at least had met in the past.”
“The Earth Court is vast, as you can imagine. And after Sarenia was conquered, many of the noble families were scattered and restructured. It’s impossible to know.”
I press my lips into a thin line as we round the corner. Ahead, the throne doors sit propped open, armed guards flanking either side. Voices filter out from inside. The King hasn’t arrived yet, then, if so many people are talking amongst themselves.
“I’m going to do my best to not draw attention to you,” Julian says.
His eyes are wide—on alert. My pulse picks up, rattling faster with each step we take.
“Is there something you’re not telling me?” I whisper.
He doesn’t answer. A sour taste fills my mouth as the wooden doors cast us in shadows and the guards study me.
“A prisoner of the King’s,” Julian says by way of introduction.
The guard dips his chin. “Take her in.”
We sweep around the doorway, and the throne room opens ahead of us.
Unlike the underwater atrium of Delterran or the sunlit room in Sarenia, there’s not a window to be seen.
Lit candles hang from the cavernous ceiling, casting the space in a sunset glow.
The flames bounce off the deep divots carved into the walls—like riverbeds meant for fire.
That must have been how they lit the entire castle at night. They didn’t need oil lamps or candles when their power could flow through the walls themselves.
Bodies crowd the space, sitting along stacked benches that face the center aisle. Gazes land on me, then the rhodium around my wrists, and whispers follow on my heels. But I tilt my chin high as Julian leads me toward the thrones at the end of the runner.
I may be a prisoner, but I outrank and out power everyone in this room.
We bank left before the thrones, and I take a seat at the front as Julian hooks my chains around a tether—keeping me in place.
The stares don’t subside. If anything, the weight of them increases—a decade’s worth of hatred spewing from the court I crippled.
If not for me, they’d be in their homes in Sarenia.
Julian leaves me and takes his spot among the other guards behind the thrones. A silence permeates the air, then a man stationed at the door slams his scepter against the ground.
“All rise for King Golan.”
The people stand in a wave.
I don’t.
Every head turns toward the open doorway, and Golan appears with a crown situated on his head. Its gold glistens in the low light, and his black hair falls over the deep green emeralds lining the collar of his shirt.
He strides down the runner, as if this is his own castle. The same way Caelus treated Sarenia. That’s all they are, I assume—men who claim whatever their feet land on.
His eyes meet mine, and his jaw works—teeth grinding together as his cape sweeps over the aisle behind him.
He stops before me. “On your feet, prisoner.”
I hold his gaze, unyielding. “Never.”
He jerks his chin at the guards, and one of them strides forward. Gripping me by the collar, the guard forces me to my feet—jerking the fabric against my throat.
Golan leans closer and hisses, “Do you know how quickly I could kill your crew? I don’t know what information you have over my daughter, but make no mistake. I am not as kind as she is.”
“She’s many things that you’ll never be,” I bite.
“And yet, I raised her to be exactly who she is.” A smile curves his lips. “She’s a product of my making.”
I turn my face away from him, but a shiver skates down my spine as he climbs the dais. The guard loosens his hold, only enough for me to pull in a deep inhale. He doesn’t leave my side or pull his hand away.
Golan’s lip quirks at the edges as Kressa strides in, her chin held high. But the muscles in her shoulders strain—hands curled into fists at her sides. The hair on the back of my neck stands on edge the closer she gets, as if the rhodium cuffs aren’t as effective as the gloves.
I test the barrier into her mind. It spools out before me.
What’s going on? I say.
A muscle feathers in her jaw, but she doesn’t respond. Elias strides in behind her, followed by the advisors. Gemma takes up the back of the line—her face pale. Our gaze meet, and as her throat bobs on a swallow, my heart hammers in my chest.
I swallow, but it does nothing to soothe my racing pulse. Whatever this is, it’s far worse than we thought.
Golan gives a slight nod, and the audience takes their seats. The guard tightens his grip on me again, until the fabric strains against my windpipe and threatens to cut off my oxygen. My lungs ache, but I don’t dare give him the satisfaction of knowing I’m struggling to breathe.
“Do not disrespect our king again,” he hisses.
He drops me into my seat, and my knees slam into the railing in front of me.
The advisors take up the row directly across from me, and I find Gemma in the low light.
She grips the railing as she slides into her seat, but I don’t miss the slight tremble of her fingers—the way she wrings them in her lap.
The scepter hits the ground a second time.
A cold sweat breaks out along my nape, and I make eye contact with Kressa.
I’m so sorry, she says. I didn’t know this was going to happen.
My gaze swings toward the front of the room, and my stomach pitches.
Callum.