Chapter 12 #3
He stepped away. This woman was clearly insane. Or had no sense of decorum. And who wore a voluminous layered gown into a volcano?
The new queen turned to the frozen crowd, zeroing in one of the Vektors. “Viggo.”
A man stepped forward.
“Viggo, I need you to secure these prisoners in the Ice Prison. I will help with the transportation from here and manage the cells, of course. Can I trust you and your comrades to guide them?”
“Of course, Majesty.”
“Wait.” Daemon shook off the sparking fingers Perla had rested on his forearm and took another step away. “You’re going to let them live? They lost a Challenge. You’re within your rights to execute them.”
Her brows rose. “Death is mercy—life is punishment. Or so they tell me. Which do you think they deserve?”
Were it up to him? An eternity in the underworld sounded about right. But they wouldn’t last long among the lava, before it overwhelmed their ice. And a quick death was too good for them. “They’ll worm their way out of the Ice Prison. It’s made of what they control.”
“As are the blocks they’re currently locked in.
” She shrugged, and the temperature dropped ten degrees.
But the frozen prisoners began to slide toward the exit, guards scrambling to help push them along.
“You’re welcome to help me design a few backup security measures.
But the prison will hold them for now, and its crystal channels will keep them from reaching any water outside it.
I’d like them gone before I meet your people—though Henrik, you stay.
” She glanced at a man dressed as a scribe who looked about to wet himself, then back to Daemon. “How many of you are there?”
He waited until the prisoners were gone, the door closed behind them. For the fun of it, he aimed a glare at the scribe, who backed into the closed door and whimpered. “We were six. Then five. Now six once more.” He nodded to Nik, who had risen to his feet.
Perla, flame it, slid into his line of sight again. “Are they your children? Grandchildren?”
“What? No.” He sidestepped her and moved to Nik’s side. “You’re the terror-maker’s son? Was he one of us?”
Nik shook his head, brows drawn. “I can’t think so. He took part in the Test when he was a young man. They’d have found it then, wouldn’t they?”
Perla spun to face Nik, at least. “They would have, yes. Which means it came from your mother, if this fire magic is like my mother’s wind magic, which I suspect it is.
It’s still new enough that it must be passed directly from parent to child.
” She turned to Daemon. “Your magic is as old as mine, perhaps a bit older. Isidor called you king of your kind—does that mean you were the first? When were you Awakened? When were you born? And before you snarl and walk away again, if you just answer me for two minutes, I’ll leave you alone. ”
He opened his mouth, ready to refuse out of principle.
But she smirked. “I have a little brother, King of the Daemons. I can play this game for the next decade.”
Valkyrja chuckled and brushed her hands over her white robe. Snow fell away, leaving a silvery-purple dress beneath it. He hadn’t even seen a color like that in centuries, so cool and muted.
Gauzy blue quickly filled his vision again. He sighed. Or perhaps growled. “Fine. I do not know how many years have passed, princess. But I can tell you that your parents married when I was twenty, and I was Awakened, as you call it, right around when you were born. I was the first, yes.”
Valkyrja frowned. “You’ve been down there for over a hundred fifty years?”
He shrugged. Glanced at the princess. “Does that satisfy your curiosity?”
“It’s a start.” She flounced toward the closed door and sat on the ground, that ridiculous skirt billowing out around her. She gave him a cheeky smile. “There. Left alone, as promised. And I didn’t even take the full two minutes.”
He’d forgotten how much trouble females could be. Compared to this one, Ember and Elianne were pillars of reason and fortitude.
He opened his senses, gauged how long it would take the others to arrive. Not long.
Nik moved to him. “Excuse me, my lord. What should we call you? The other man—Eldrid? He only referred to you as a daemon.”
Daemon shook his head, rolled his shoulders to rid them of the tension. “Not a daemon—and certainly not a lord. Just Daemon. It’s my name.”
“Not the one you were born with, I’d wager.” Valkyrja moved closer too.
He granted her point with a tilt of the head. “I was Sig for twenty years. I have been Daemon for a hundred and fifty, apparently. It is more my name now than the other. And the only thing I’m likely to answer to.”
“All right.” A smile flitted over her lips. “I’ve already invited Nik and Perla to call me Kyrja, so you might as well too. What are the names of the others among you?”
They emerged even now from the tunnel, so he motioned her and Nik both to the edge and pointed as they each leapt onto the lava. “Logi has been with me the longest, and that is his mate, Ember.”
Nik bristled. “Mate? Like an animal?”
“We have no dominies Below, brother. They exchanged vows, but there was no one but us to witness and we were none of us endowed with any particular authority to make it official. Call it marriage, union, partnership…they are together. Behind them is Elianne, the youngest of us until today. And bringing up the rear is Eldrid, who Nik has already met. We had Brandr for many years, too, but he has passed into the Beyond.” He didn’t volunteer the how.
He watched them move across the burning lake, these people he called family, who he knew better than he’d ever known anyone Above.
They’d been his whole world for longer than most people lived—and now suddenly he was on a first-name basis with a new queen, being harassed by a princess, and had earned the ire of the entire deposed High Council.
Strange what could change in a matter of minutes.
It felt stranger still as his people climbed up the ramp and joined them. A half-dozen black-clad, sulfur-ridden Cursed, ink on scalps and arms and even throat, in Logi’s case, ranging out opposite the two women with their cool colors and mockingly delicate dresses.
They outnumbered these two Blessed. There was nothing to stop them from scorching their way to freedom and burning the whole flaming Fjordlandi government to ashes.
Yet neither woman had a trace of fear on her face, nor a shadow of doubt or suspicion, and Daemon was curious enough to want to see what the new queen had in mind.
So he focused on Nik, who still stood on the royals’ side of their odd little gathering, looking at the line of Cursed with complete disbelief, and smiled.
“Allow me to introduce your new brother,” he said to his people. “This is Nik.”
Daemon wasn’t exactly surprised when Elianne stepped away from the line, her gaze latched onto the newcomer, not given her reaction earlier. It was the first time she’d ever seen a survivor. The first time she’d ever been on the welcoming committee.
But he was surprised when she said, “He isn’t my brother, Dae. He’s my son.”