Chapter Eighteen
“IT’S. SO. HUGE!”
The stripling they’d brought with them gasped, looking up at the palace, green eyes aglow in wonder.
The pitch of Theo’s deep voice was at odds with the childlike giddiness that underscored his words.
Yet his levity was infectious. So infectious that Kadeesha found herself admiring the Apollyon palace with a similar zeal, and she didn’t even much like the court since it stood as a symbol of the king who called it home.
However, she had to admit the Apollyon palace cut a striking figure each time she beheld it.
And its beauty had nothing to do with the glimmering slabs of prized onyx and polished stone it was made of.
It was magnificent because the place was a fortress in every sense of the word.
She’d never seen a palace that was more unassailable.
The hulking mountains standing sentinel at its back in the north were already protection enough.
But whoever had scouted the land and advised where the stronghold should be built made brilliant use of the raging river cutting a path to the palace’s east, its turbulent waters crashing against the stone wall on that side.
The south and west had no natural barriers, and the palace might’ve been easily assailable from those directions if not for the wide moat that surrounded it, which Kadeesha suspected was deep enough to need to swim across.
Which left only two ways into the palace: either via the drawbridge they stood upon or by flight overhead.
And even then, myriad archers were stationed atop the walls and gargantuan towers.
As if that wasn’t daunting enough, stone and onyx sculptures of great legendary beasts ran the length of its battlements, making the Apollyon Court’s stronghold both more arresting and intimidating.
“Careful. I might start to think you fancy being here by the awestruck look on your face,” Malachi spoke low into her ear. His deep, quiet timbre was like soft thunder, and it traveled straight to between her legs. She locked her knees, intent on banishing the sensation.
Not that she had much success.
When she turned his way, Malachi’s piercing brown stare held its usual arrogant gleam—an observation that should’ve helped, not hindered, her goal.
She scowled. “Not at all. I’m merely gauging how much firepower it’d take for my kongamatos to burn the whole thing to the ground if I were to fly them overhead.”
The Apollyon king scoffed. “You may think your beasts infallible, but my archers are well trained and shoot arrows forged by void magic, which I’ve demonstrated works very well against a kongamato’s fire. I promise you, Princess, my castle is as impenetrable as it looks.”
Kadeesha raised a brow. “Are you certain of it? Perhaps we should test your confidence, Your Grace? We can call it a security trial: my war serpents against your archers. We’ll see how fortified against enemies you truly are.”
“I’ll pass.” Malachi responded dryly enough that Kadeesha gleefully surmised that, his boasting aside, he wasn’t one hundred percent certain his archers could fend off an aerial assault from her squadron. Good to know.
An amused chuckle caught her ear.
“What is so funny?” she snapped at Malachi, very much done with his ego and his games.
“Your desire to slit my throat in my sleep if not for your binding oath is showing,” he answered smoothly. Just as silkily he added, “Oath aside, it’s a good thing that the only times you’ll be sleeping beside me are after I’ve fucked you so thoroughly that you’ve passed out.”
The stiletto tips of her nails pricked her palms when she curled her hands into fists.
She imagined punching him. She imagined crashing her fist into his ever-smirking jaw, perhaps shattering it so she was spared of hearing his high opinions of his cock.
“I imagine,” she said as silkily, refusing to give Malachi the satisfaction of seeing her ruffled, “that when the oath no longer stands, you’ll still want to sink your cock into me so badly that you will surely be as foolish as any other idiotic male and jump at the opportunity, believing you can control me and the situation.
When you make that mistake, I will ride you into a stupor and, as you said, slit your throat in your sleep.
Then, I’ll have your head. Perhaps I’ll do you the honor of turning it into a war room trophy, since you seem to love such adornments so much.
” She uncurled her fists to study her nails, then looked up at Malachi, returning his arrogance in equal measure.
“Another thing I’ll let you in on is even though I’ve told you how I will maneuver you to your death, it matters not.
Because your ego will still make you think you can somehow enjoy the screw and best me.
I am going to relish staring you in the eyes and watching the light fade from them as you lament underestimating me and not being a wiser member of the cock-swinging club.
” With that she strolled off, leading her sisters through the palace’s heavily guarded gates without waiting for Malachi to take the lead.
The earth trembled as she passed beneath the raised portcullis.
She turned around to glare at Malachi, wondering how the hell he managed this latest trick with his void magic—only for the ground to once again lurch beneath her feet.
Then it shuddered more violently. It took her brain a few ticks to catch up with what her eyes beheld: that Malachi was gazing around, bewildered himself.
“What’s happening?” she shouted over the cacophony of shouts from the guards on duty.
It couldn’t be a land temblor, could it?
They rarely occurred on this side of the Yunnas, were mostly common among the lands south of the range.
She was pretty certain it wasn’t. But that meant whatever was causing the tremors was of a magical source—and not Malachi as she’d thought.
Then who? Was it an attack? Some trick? Malachi’s rival cousin messing with him via some rune magic?
Or was it void magic, as she’d first thought, but not from the Apollyon king?
Her mind was running through all the options so she could brace for whatever came next when the drawbridge behind Malachi started to roil.
Then, it buckled, as if collapsing under some invisible weight.
Behind it, chunks of silver stone and black onyx from the palace’s wall blasted through the air.
Theo, standing paralyzed nearby, screamed.
Kadeesha flung herself at the boy. They crashed to the ground and she pinned him under her, using her body weight.
She slid her body upward so her torso covered his head, the most vulnerable body part on an immortal fae, as it was one of the few things that couldn’t regenerate with time.
An endless deluge of stone and onyx debris smashed into the ground around them, smaller rocks pelting her back.
Samira shouted her name, and, on blind instinct, she jerked both Theo and herself to the right just in time to avoid a boulder bigger than her head slamming into her.
She threw up an impenetrable column of aether flames around herself and the boy, keeping them safe while incinerating every boulder that flew near.
She cursed herself for falling victim to shock and not doing it sooner.
The aether flames left her surrounded by a hazy purple wall.
Kadeesha squinted her eyes, a nearly futile effort to sharpen her sight amidst the chaos raining down on her head, and looked around wildly for Samira and Leisha to erect a protective column around her sisters.
She sighted Leisha, although barely, a few dozen paces to her left, and aether flames roared up around her second, ensconcing Leisha in a protective cocoon.
She then looked to where she’d last spotted Samira.
Her third no longer stood to Kadeesha’s right.
She yelled her sister’s name, even though Kadeesha knew it’d be impossible to hear her from within the tower of roaring flames and over the shuddering earth, which continued to groan and bellow as if thunder emanated from its very core.
She kept searching the space around her, kept combing through the hailstorm of castle chunks hurtling down around them.
When the havoc stopped, when the earth stilled, when she could at last sever her flames and get a clearer view, Kadeesha leapt up and began searching for her sister in earnest.
“Samira!”