Chapter 56
Belle
We rode in silence as dawn began to break. The king was a dark brooding force at my back, but I felt the change that had come over him, like a great weight had been lifted off his shoulders. I’d given him the answer he so desperately wanted to hear but did not know he needed.
He was a broken man, but maybe in time he’d heal.
“Why did you never return to the Bloodvale?” I asked, finally. “Why didn’t you confront your brother?”
“I couldn’t,” he grunted.
“Why? Why not return now?”
He hesitated for a fraction of a second. I knew the pause now like I knew my sister’s face: he was preparing a half truth. A lie.
“Immortals don’t abdicate,” he said at last. “Our rule ends when we die, one way or another. By law, I’m a fugitive, to be killed on sight. Half the lords of the Bloodvale would jump at the chance. Enough attempts, and one would eventually bring me down.”
“He’ll want to know you’re alive.”
“His brother is dead. Only a monster remains. Best he never learns the truth.”
“Does that mean you’re not going to invade?”
The king was silent.
“Please,” I begged. “Let this kingdom be enough for you. The Bloodvale has a good king and queen who’d give their lives to protect it. If you ever cared for our people, call off the invasion. It would leave scars for generations.”
He stiffened behind me, his fingers tightening on the reins. “I’ve only ever wanted what is best for the Bloodvale. It’s why I risked my life and crown to try to depose the mages in the first place.”
“Then do your duty by them,” I said, using the one word I knew he still believed in. “Call off the Crimson Host.”
Valen exhaled through his nose. “You must think me a monster for ever having engaged them.”
What I thought no longer mattered. The king was teetering on the edge of conceding. For Ella’s sake, and for that of my people, I had to push him over the top.
I slid my hand on top of his and spoke from my heart. “I swear, if you grant me this mercy, if you spare the Bloodvale and spare Ella and Cassius’s lives, I’ll gladly remain your hostage. For as long as you wish.”
“Belle—”
I twisted around in the saddle, needing him to agree, to swear. “I’ll give you my blood, my power, even—”
“Stop!” he snarled and violently reined in Storm, his voice rumbling and low. My body tensed at the ferocity of his reaction.
He turned my face so that I was looking into his eyes—now blazing gold. “Stop offering yourself up for the sake of others. Fuck them all. You are worth so much more.”
His voice shook with passion and anguish that left me breathless, but more so, it was the truth thundering in his words. How could he really believe that my life was worth more than an entire kingdom?
“If my life is all I have to bargain with—”
“There is no bargain to make,” he growled, releasing me.
“But…”
“You push me too far, woman.” He squeezed his eyes shut, his face drawn. “By the gods, I swear to you that I will not allow Sarkis to invade the Bloodvale—and if he goes against my wishes, then I’ll send Cassius a warning myself.”
My jaw dropped. He was refusing me and giving me what I wanted in the same breath. I couldn’t understand it, barely believed it, but when he opened his eyes, I saw no deception there.
“This is the bargain you’ve been begging for, princess. Do you accept?”
I bit my lip, terrified to push him further, to break the fragile gift I’d gained, but I needed one more thing. “What of Cassius and Ella? Will you spare them?”
Valen looked off at the breaking dawn, and the velvety blue glow of the sky cast deep shadows across his face.
There was grief there, but with it, a look of resignation.
“If my bastard of a brother sends another assassin, I won’t hesitate to bring him down.
Until then, I’ll leave them be—I swear it on what is left of my tattered soul. ”
“How can I trust you?” I whispered, desperate for him to give me a reason to believe.
“Because, princess, you’ve broken me.” He looked down, his eyes betraying a pain that made my heart ache. “Just promise me, you will never offer your life up for another, ever again.”
Something inside me twisted. Did he really care that much?
I shook my head slowly. “I can’t promise that I won’t do everything in my power to protect those I love—even if it means offering my life.”
“Of course, you can’t.” He sighed, a low irritated rumble, but a mournful smile crossed his lips. “I will keep my word all the same.”
The shock of it rolled over me, like the wind rising before a summer storm.
I’d won. He’d agreed to everything I wanted. The part of me that lived in fear imagined only betrayal and lies, but he’d just shown me that there was more to him than a monster—he was a king who wore duty like armor, a man who’d once cared for the Bloodvale as much as his own people.
And Fates help me, I believed him.
“Thank you,” I said softly.
We rode on in silence for a while, then a deep rumble escaped his chest. “Hell. The Bloodvale probably got the better king in the end.”
“Quite likely,” I muttered.
Valen glanced down, then released a gruff laugh. “You may be the most extraordinary woman I’ve ever met, Belle Marquette—and I hope to never contend with your equal.”
There was a finality in the way he said it, and my brows rose with hope and expectation. “Does that mean you’re going to let me go?”
His arm tightened, the rumble in his chest wickedly possessive. “Absolutely not. I may have declined your offer, but I told you before: I will never let you go.”
Frustration flared. “Why?”
“You’ve forced me to spare my bloody brother. But the throne was not all there was at stake. There is a curse hanging—”
Valen’s voice cut off, and he pulled up on Storm’s reins, his nostrils flaring. His face was drawn tight, shoulders tense, and eyes scanning the dark woods around us. “Fuck the gods.”
He spurred Storm, and the horse lurched forward, running as fast as the overgrown road would allow. Valen’s arm clamped around my waist, rooting me into the saddle, the heat and hard strength of his chest pressing against my back.
“What’s going on?” I shouted over the thundering hooves.
“Beasts,” he snarled. “Why didn’t you have the sense to keep the damned tusk?”
I clung to him and the horse as best I could as I jolted painfully in the saddle. “Why didn’t you have the sense to make two?”
He grunted in irritation but made no reply.
Dark shapes flashed through the forest on either side of us, running as fast as the horses. A shudder ran down my spine at the memory of being chased through these same woods not long ago.
“Don’t they obey you?” I asked, my palms sweating. “I thought you were their master?”
“We’re far beyond my domain, and I can’t command them at the moment, princess. Now, stop talking and let me think!”
I glanced back, tracking the impossibly fast movement in the shadows. “Release my collar—I can help!”
“The key is in my saddle bag, which is a little out of reach right now,” Valen gritted out.
A dark shape rose on the road ahead, the low rays of the sun glinting over a pair of ivory tusks. Storm reared, and Valen’s arm tightened like a vise. “Hold on!”
I clung to him for dear life. Whinnying, the warhorse pivoted and landed, then backed away from the monster ahead of us, even as the others drew close. Clawed hands tore at the ground as the beast lumbered forward, twin tusks jutting on either side of vicious jaws.
It roared, and I pressed back into Valen’s body as Storm reared again.
Then the iron safety of the king’s arms vanished as he dismounted and drew his blade. He glanced back at me, his eyes pure gold. “Storm and Briar know the way back. Ride hard and don’t stop until you reach the castle.”
What was he doing?
The beasts broke from the cover of the woods, and I seized Storm’s reins as the horse spun around. “Are you insane?” I shouted. “Get back on!”
“Get out of here!” He slapped Storm’s backside, and the stallion surged forward. A shriek tore from my throat as I bent double and pressed my thighs into the massive creature’s sides to keep from toppling off.
I couldn’t leave him.
The warhorse bolted down the forest path, and I twisted to look back. Three beasts stalked toward Valen, but he held his ground as if he were the one they should fear.
My chest clenched. Tyrant or monster, I didn’t want him dead. If I could get the collar off, I could help. The key is in the bag.
I pulled hard on Storm’s reins to halt him, and he let out a bellowing neigh.
Valen’s head snapped in my direction. “Go!”
The air around him shimmered like heat waves in the summer—then his eyes became brighter, sharper, no longer human.
“I’m not leav—”
The beasts charged. The king moved so fast, I barely saw him. Blood splattered from the monster’s arm, but it wheeled, ready to strike—yet the king’s attention was locked on me. “On your right!”
Trees cracked as a snarling nightmare burst out of the woods. Storm veered to the left, and I lost my balance. My back slammed into a patch of ferns, and I rolled, my breath bursting from my lungs in a gasp. Pain arced through my body as it connected with every thicket and scrub.
Then the beast was looming over me, the hot stink of its breath billowing down in waves.
Adrenaline tore me into action. I rolled onto my side, barely missing the beast’s claws as they sank into the damp earth. I scrambled up, my ribs screaming, and turned to face the monster. It prowled toward me, its fur covered in brambles.
For a second I glimpsed the king—then he was the king no more.
The morning light fractured around him, like a crystal catching a beam of light and splitting it into a thousand rays. With a roar that tore through the air, dark scales flowed down his arms like molten metal, and a low hum carried on the wind as his form reshaped itself into something else.
The beast above me recoiled and scrambled backward into the cover of the woods, but I was transfixed, my legs quaking as an impossible metamorphosis unfurled before me.
Trees shattered and fell as Valen grew, wreathed in tendrils of smoke, and what emerged was the monster that still haunted my nightmares.
The dragon.
His eyes burned with forge fire, and his head shot forward as he snared a beast in his savage jaws. He hurled it against the trunk of a tree then bellowed.
The earth shook with the sound.
Terror flashed through me, and I bolted. Trees blurred past. Branches tore at me and roots grasped for my feet. My body jerked, and I fell, my head ricocheting against the stones and packed earth.
Darkness consumed everything, and with it, sweet release from the blinding terror.