Chapter 63
Belle
Valen found me in the library the next day, shortly before sunset. A low thrum stirred in my belly before he even entered.
“How was your reunion with the huntsman?” he asked as he slowly strode down the steps, a hint of amusement beneath his gruff delivery.
It had been a disaster, and I wanted to hold it against the king, but the fault wasn’t his alone, and the truth was, Valen had done everything I’d asked.
I flicked him a brief smile, then reshelved the book I’d been looking at. “Thank you for releasing him.”
Valen inspected the stack of books I’d collected. “He’s lucky to be alive.”
“I think he’s aware of that. Your beasts frightened the poor man half to death, and I think he’s still afraid you’ll castrate him if he comes anywhere close to me.”
“Smart man.” A wicked smile played at the corners of the king’s lips, and he approached, hands clasped behind his back. “I find it difficult to restrain myself when it comes to you.”
Something warm settled in my chest as I tracked his slow stride. It was nearly winter, and the castle was frigid, yet Valen wore trousers and a shirt.
And I now knew why.
His corded forearms were bare despite the chill. No wonder he could sling me over his shoulder like I weighed nothing. I recalled the warmth of his hands on my thighs again, and I quickly turned back to the shelves, trying to picture anything else.
“What are you doing?” he asked, drawing close enough that his heat warmed my back.
Ignore it. Remember your dreams—the one where he turns you to ash. Not the others.
“I’m looking for anything I can find on demons.”
“Is that so?” His breath kissed my neck, and I wanted to melt into him.
I pulled away, ducking under his long arm.
Dark amusement played across his eyes. “Easy now, princess. I won’t bite, I promise.”
I almost laughed, because he most certainly would bite if the opportunity arose.
I held the book I’d selected to my chest, a shield. “Is there something you want, or did you come here to distract me?”
He arched one eyebrow. “Am I distracting you?”
He certainly was, but not for the reason he suspected. His eyes had been a hazel color when he’d arrived, and now they were like warm honey. The dragon’s eyes were always golden…
Valen dragged his fingers idly across the spines, then headed toward a shelf at the far back of the stacks. “Locke and I gathered everything we could find on demons here. Unfortunately, nothing I’ve read so far has proved helpful.”
I hurried after. “Thank the gods. You’ve probably saved me days.”
I moved the ladder with my magic, then climbed up to the shelf he’d indicated, fingers playing over the spines.
Maybe there were seven or eight books on the subject—most tangential at best. I paused as I explored the titles further along the shelf, and I pulled one out.
“Why are books on demons filed next to collections of love poetry?”
Valen drifted to the base of the ladder. “Love, women, and demons. Three things I’ve learned not to trust. Consider it…a quarantine zone.”
My curiosity ignited, and I glanced down, trying to read the expression behind that mask.
Mistrust of demons I understood, but who’d broken his heart?
I had a hard time imagining Valen as ever having been in love.
Something about the thought stung like nettles, forming an emotion I declined to name.
Before I could formulate an adequately prying question, he withdrew and gestured toward the door. “Come with me. There’s something I’ve been meaning to show you—it won’t give you answers, but it might change the questions.”
I shrugged and reshelved the book, though curiosity tugged at me, a thread I knew I shouldn’t pull. Who knew what other demons I might discover lurking in his past.
I climbed down the ladder and hurried after him. “Where are we going?”
“You’ll see,” he said, ushering me out of the library.
Infuriating man.
The king wove through the halls of the castle, and it was all I could do to keep up with his long strides. Despite the strength of his frame, he moved effortlessly, like a shadow drifting across the wall. He guided me down the stairs and entered a section of the castle I’d never visited before.
We paused before a pair of doors that had been boarded up to prevent anyone from entering.
Or leaving.
Unease crept along my spine. “What is this place?”
“The castle chapel,” Valen answered in a clipped tone as he wrenched free one of the boards, snapping it like a matchstick. “Or at least it was long ago.”
The muscles of his back flexed as he yanked the remaining planks, and I forced myself to look away.
“Why is it boarded up?” I asked, my voice wavering.
He shoved the doors open, and the scent of stale air wafted out on a cloud of dust, along with it, whispers barely heard. “See for yourself.”
Covering my nose to block the dust, I stepped through. Terrified faces stared back at me, their mouths open and expressions twisted with despair.
I stumbled backward, and my leg collided with something hard. I twisted, careening sideways over the statue of a crawling man.
Valen shot forward and slipped one arm around my waist before I hit the ground, then pulled me upright against his body, the movement effortless and powerful.
I instinctively pressed my hands to his chest—a mistake.
We stood there, breathing quickly, my stomach tumbling at the feel of his warmth and how much I craved it.
His strength and the inexplicable sense of safety that came with his touch.
“There’s nothing to fear in here, princess,” he said softly, his gravel voice raking over my adrenaline-riddled skin. “At least, not anymore.”
Oh yes, there was.
I slipped out of his all-too-inviting arms and retreated a step. “I’m not afraid, just caught by surprise.”
“You forget,” he said quietly. “I can sense your emotions.”
He’d know there was far more than fear.
I wrapped my arms around myself. A shield. “My emotions are none of your concern.”
He lifted one brow as if to disagree. I stepped around his irritating bulk, this time prepared for the haunted congregation that stood in the chapel before me.
Two dozen people stared back, their faces contorted in grief and shock, their bodies twisting in fear. Only they weren’t real. They were stone, like the statues in the garden and the halls of the palace.
I moved into their midst, almost imagining the chorus of silent screams. Every detail was perfect: the lines of age and emotion on their faces, the curl of their knuckles, the subtle fall of their clothing. Too perfect.
Something opened like a yawning cavern in the pit of my stomach. “They’re not statues, are they?”
Valen joined me, his expression grim. “No. I suspect they were all flesh and blood once.”
“They were all petrified…” I whispered, my skin pebbling. I turned and knelt beside the prone figure I’d tripped over when I first entered. “Gods. He was crawling toward the door, trying to get away…”
I touched the elaborate lacework on the sleeves of the man’s tunic. For a second, my fingers grew cold, and my vision flickered. I saw polished floorboards before me, shimmering candlelight, and a long shadow that consumed everything.
Then it was gone.
I shook my head to clear the vision. This wasn’t the first time something like this had happened. It was like an echo of the past. Was it the castle, or something to do with my magic?
Valen grunted, looking down at the crawling man. “The poor fool was the only one with the presence of mind to try to escape. The rest cowered and met their fate.”
I rose and drifted through the room. While some of the statues stood, most were seated on wooden benches, the timber decaying and cracking under their weight.
All had twisted around to face the rear of the chapel and the door we’d come through.
My attention fell to the figures gathered on the raised dais at the front, and I stilled.
A couple stood before the altar, the priest frozen as he reeled backward, a stone book caught slipping from his fingertips. “This was a wedding.”
“A cruel reminder of the pain that comes with love.” His lips pulled back in a sneer, but it faded as if he’d heard the hollowness in his own voice.
I approached the dais, taking in every detail. The groom had been a prince or a king. He wore a crown and an ornate coat with billowing sleeves. He’d leapt to his feet, sword drawn. His face was contorted in anger, an unheard oath falling from his lips.
He hadn’t cowered. He’d faced whatever was coming.
His bride, however, was the one who took my breath away. She was more beautiful than any woman I’d ever seen. Her long hair had been braided into a crown atop her head, and her simple, elegant gown fell in cascading waves.
Where every other statue in the castle had been caught in the grips of emotion, she was on her knees, her face serene and hands folded in an unspoken prayer.
“What happened to them?” I asked, my voice cracking.
“We don’t know,” Valen said. “They were here when I arrived.”
“And the other statues throughout the castle?”
“The same.”
I turned to face him. “Why don’t you remove them? It’s gruesome. They have the staff half terrified to death.”
“This was their castle before I claimed it. What right do I have to move them?” His voice was pensive, almost distant. Then he caught my inquiring expression, and his mask of indifference returned. “If it keeps the scullions in line, then all the better.”
“Then why did you board this room up?”
“It seemed right.” He shrugged. “Being here feels like an intrusion.”
I nodded, trying to sort out the man before me. He was a living contradiction—a tyrant who delighted in sowing fear among his subjects, and yet he was obsessed with his duty to them. He treated statues with reverence and beasts with compassion.
I frowned. “Why did you bring me here?”
“You wanted to know everything about the curse. I think whatever happened here is part of it.” There was something haunted in the way he spoke, a dark weight over his words.
I shook my head. “The demon cursed you and created the beasts. But these people are stone—not beasts. They’re different. It doesn’t make sense.”
“I confess I don’t understand the connection, but I’m certain there is one.
” He paced the room, lost in thought. When he spoke again, it was as if from very far away.
“There’s a cruel irony to my curse—the demon gave me exactly what I asked for.
Strength, power, and yet no ability to control my fate.
I think he delights in suffering, in twisting your desires into the means to destroy you. ”
His fist clenched. “He told me as much when I first met him…I like a man to have a sporting chance. To have hope. That’s the most important thing of all.”
My thoughts came quickly, but we were missing something. “If you’re right, what did the men who were turned into beasts ask for?”
He shrugged. “A means to survive. Perhaps they didn’t even openly ask, but in their desperation found their way to the cursed spring and drank, just as I was going to do.”
Could there be something to his reasoning? “What about the people turned to stone?”
Valen turned to the ancient king, touching the tip of his drawn sword. “I doubt any of these people asked the demon for this.”
That left an intriguing question: then who did?