Chapter 28
“ D on’t do it,” I say as our bedroom door closes gently behind us. I pace from the door to the sofa, then back again, the plush carpet muffling my footsteps. “Please, don’t do it.”
“It’s done, Elly.” He sits heavily on the edge of the bed, running a hand through his hair.
Dropping to my knees before him, I wrap both hands around his calves and look up at him through my lashes. “This goes beyond us. Faerie and Ellyllon have stood as the barriers between worlds for generations. You have a responsibility?—’’
“Fuck Ellyllon. Fuck Arcadia.” Dae leans forward, his voice raw with anger. “Fuck responsibility and fuck your dad. The second the date of the sacrifice passes, I’m storming their gates, severing their limbs, and raining hellfire down on them.”
I’ll ask what on earth the sacrifice is in a minute—right now, I just want to convince him not to do this. Besides, part of me doesn’t want to know, not if it means having to admit to something that’s been creeping up on me in the back of my mind—that my dad may not be who he says.
“This isn’t you,” I say. He’s consumed by rage. Blinded by it.
He captures my chin in his fingers, his touch surprisingly gentle despite the fury burning in his eyes. “What would you know? Aberith killed my dad, did you know that?” Dae’s eyes, usually a warm grey, turn a chilling, metallic silver as my breath quickens. He’s lying. He must be lying. Dad wouldn’t... would he? “I watched him do it with my own eyes. Would you like to see where he did it?”
I shut my eyes tightly and shake my head, my voice barely a whisper. “You’re lying.”
With a scoff, Dae grabs my arm, hauling me roughly off the ground and dragging me through the door. The scent of dust and decay grow stronger with each step as he pulls me down a dimly lit corridor and practically throws me into a dusty study. A heavy mahogany desk dominates the centre of the room, surrounded by towering bookcases overflowing with ancient volumes. A thick layer of dust coats every surface, and the air hangs heavy with the scent of forgotten things. My stomach churns. “I don’t want to see.” My voice catches in my throat.
“Right there.” He points a finger at one of the wide brown leather sofas sitting opposite another. “That’s where my father admitted to Aberith that he’d found you, the next sacrifice, in a house on the edge of a forest near Devon. Only a few metres from the Nori.” My head whips to Dae as he points at a dark stain on the faded rug. “And there’s where Dad begged for his life. Promised not to tell anyone. There’s where your father ripped out his heart, anyway.”
Grabbing my shaking shoulders, Dae turns me to face the door we entered through. “And right there, that gap between the door, there’s where I watched, a fucking coward.” He grabs a glass from a carved side table and smashes it against the wall. Shards of glass scatter across the floor, and he collapses onto the opposite sofa, staring at the spot on the rug where his father died.
Crouching down before him, I let out a shaky breath. It’s hard to keep hiding from the truth with Dae breaking down right before me. Dae’s never lied to me. Tricked me, maybe. Bent the truth, certainly. But he’s never told a flat-out lie—he can’t. I say, “Father told me the old King of Faerie suffered a sickness of the lungs.” Dae hides his face in his hands, his shoulders shaking with silent sobs. “He died when you were about thirteen, right?”
Dae shrugs, unable to speak. I run a finger along his hand, my touch hesitant. “That’s when I finally found you.”
It hits me like a brick—our meeting wasn’t a happenstance. He must have wanted to come and see the what his father had died for. Dad must have killed Halycon to make sure no one would kidnap me and do whatever Dae is doing right now.
“I heard Dad first talk about you at nine. I watched Aberith kill my father at thirteen. I’m a fucking coward, Elly,” he chokes out, his voice muffled by his hands. “Don’t talk about responsibility to me.”
With a light touch, I pull his hand away from his face. He lets me take it and rest it on my lap as he tips his head onto his other palm, his body trembling. “What could you have done? I remember you at that age, you were teeny tiny. Dad was at least five times your size. Tell me, Dae, what could you have done?” I love my family, but Dae’s in pain and I’ll say anything to make it stop.
“Something,” he whispers, eyes closed, “anything.”
“It wasn’t your fault.” I trace circles around the skin of his palm, my touch light and soothing. Dae shrugs, so I say it again. And again. And again. Until his other hand has dropped into mine, his head is on my shoulder, and his tears are falling onto my chest. Pulling me onto his lap, he buries his face in the crook between my neck and shoulder.
Curling my legs into his lap, I take a deep breath as Dae encircles my waist and squeezes me tight. The scent of pine and earth fills my senses, a familiar comfort amidst the turmoil. “What’s done is done,” he whispers into my hair. “But I’m not letting him do to you what he did to my father.”
I frown and stroke my fingers through his thick, dark locks, tracing his hair up, until my fingers reach one of his horns. I gently stroke it, tip to base, feeling the smooth texture beneath my fingertips. He nudges against my hand, the tip of his horn accidentally cutting a small mark on one of my fingers. He smiles, but it doesn’t reach his eyes. “He won’t,” I say, trying to sound confident.
“He will.” Dae mutters, his voice heavy with certainty.
“He’s my father. He won’t kill me.”
Without looking at me, Dae says, “It’s the whole reason you were born. One of Aberith’s children gets born and sacrificed every twenty years, at the age of twenty. Ellyllon have been doing it for a thousand years. They’ve got this core, this… living thing… in the middle of their planet. It needs to feed, I guess.”
My stomach drops.
The ground feeds on rot and decay. But what kind of creature needs a human heart to survive?
He continues, his voice flat and emotionless, not waiting for me to emotionally catch up. “Usually, the sacrifice is killed outright at twenty, and Aberith chucks the heart into the core of the planet. I guess your dad must have gotten sick of that, since he put the curse on you. Even gave you a few extra months after your twentieth birthday, but you were supposed to be sick and weakened, not at full strength and drawing from nature. Ellyllon’s already been hit by earthquakes. The latest the sacrifice can take place is in about a week. They’ll be really weak then. That’s when I’m attacking.”
I expect myself to feel rage, but instead, a wave of dizziness washes over me, and I have to grip Dae’s arm to steady myself. I lean on old habits, seeking comfort in his presence. “Dae,” I rest my forehead against his, my voice trembling, “do you know how many children will die if you go ahead with this? Not just in Ellyllon, but in Arcadia. If Hell gets there, what’s stopping it from turning and marching towards earth? You’re about to put millions, maybe billions, of lives at risk.”
I accepted death a long time ago. But this... this changes everything. Knowing my survival will put millions at risk makes death feel like even more of an obligation.
His grip on me loosens a little as he asks, “Have you ever been to Arcadia, or Ellyllon?” His voice is calm, but his face is a thunderstorm, angry and cruel. He’s always hated when I don’t fight for my life.
“Why should that matter? I know there are children there.”
I struggle not to lean into his touch as he runs his fingers through my hair, his touch a stark contrast to the harshness of his words. “What about the kids in Hell and Faerie?”
“What kids? I haven’t seen any.”
He drops a small kiss at the end of my nose, his lips lingering for a moment. “Let’s go to bed. Tomorrow will be a better day.” He doesn’t believe that—I can hear the hollowness in his voice.
Capturing his hand in mine, I ask, “Why is our magic so similar? Mine and yours? I guess, yours and Dad’s too.”
He shivers but interlaces his fingers with mine, his grip tight. “The two lands, Ellyllon and Faerie, are linked. Two sides of the same coin. Two bridges between opposing worlds.”
“Doesn’t that mean we’re supposed to be the guardians, not the destroyers?” I press our joined hands to my lips, my voice pleading.
He sighs, the sound heavy with resignation. “Sweetheart, there’s nothing you can say or do. When the moon is at its fullest, I’m attacking, and I’m taking the demons with me. And when I’m done with Ellyllon, I’m taking Arcadia down.”
“Where do I fit in among your plans?”
“In an ideal world?” he asks, his voice softening slightly, and I nod. “You’d stop asking me shit like that and take control of your own life. You’d start planning for a future you actually want. Whether that’s as my enemy or as my queen, you’d start making your own choices.”
“Dying is my choice, Dae. That’s the thing you never really understood.”
“That’s not a choice.” His voice is rough with emotion. “It’s a fucking tragedy.”
It’s not a choice. It’s a tragedy.
The words swirl around my head as I lie in our bed, Dae sleeping soundly beside me. A soft breeze floats in through the window, carrying the scent of honeysuckle and freshly turned earth. The early spring chill has given way to a welcome warmth—I was getting sick of the cold.
It’s not a choice. It’s a tragedy.
He only thinks that because my choices don’t align with what he wants. If he were a resident of Ellyllon, he wouldn’t be saying that. A real tragedy is millions of lives lost on top of Mum’s.
I decide I’m right, and he’s wrong. But I still can’t sleep. I toss and turn for hours, the sheets tangled around my legs. Throwing the covers off, I swing my legs over the side of the bed and find a seat on the sofa. I look around. The room seems so much smaller than when I first got here, but brighter all the same.
It’s not a choice. It’s a tragedy.
I don’t think he means me dying. I think he means the fact that I’m choosing it for myself. That I’m not fighting back. That I’m not following that instinct within myself that mourns every time I enjoy something too much, every time I witness love or feel happy…
A creak. A shadow falls across the wall. Before I can jump up, before I can shout, before I can even register what to do, the metallic glint of a knife is being smothered by my abandoned pillow as a small man drives the dagger down on the spot I was just lying in.
Half-masked, he flinches as he realises his mistake, but it’s too late. Dae explodes into action, his face contorted in rage, an animal frothing at the mouth. Grabbing the assassin’s wrist, he twists until I hear a sickening crack, and the dagger clatters to the ground. Throwing himself across the bed, Dae tackles the assassin and they both tumble to the floor. Straddling the assassin, Dae pummels him with relentless fury.
Thud. Thud. Thud.
“Dae,” I whisper, my voice trembling, but he doesn’t hear me. Or if he does, he doesn’t care.
The assassin’s face is a bleeding mess. He’s no longer whimpering and his arms are flailing weakly at his sides.
This isn’t the kind of controlled violence I’m used to. A firm smack to prove a point. A harsh word to control the situation. This has no point—Dae isn’t trying to manipulate, he’s not strategising. This is just… mayhem. Chaos. Raw, unbridled rage.
“Dae,” I whisper again, my voice caught in my throat.
He’s going to beat this guy to death with his own hands.
And it’s terrifying.
Our bedroom door swings open, and Abnehor stalks in. “What’s?—’’
Dae, his knuckles smashed and bleeding, growls in the assassin’s face. He grabs the man’s half-crushed skull and shoves it towards Abnehor. “Tell me,” he snarls, his voice thick with fury.
Abnehor’s amethyst eyes widen into white pools of shock before he blinks, and they return to their normal colour. He glances towards me, pursing his lips.
Dae roars, “Say it! Say it so she can hear it!”
Abnehor’s eyes are cold. “He’s been sent from Ellyllon. To kill Elysia.”
“Sent by who?” Dae drops the assassin’s head back down to the mossy floor with a sickening thud.
“Aberith.”
Dae smirks, vindicated, before continuing to pummel the assassin until he’s nothing but an empty shell, and Dae’s rage is finally spent.