Chapter 20
GARRICK
I was summoned to a royal audience. There was even an appointed time. The scarlet summons burned my leg where I’d shoved it in my pocket. I’d have torn it into a million tiny pieces without opening it if I did not think the messenger would report it back to the king.
My father knew that I hated him. But blatant disrespect would not be tolerated.
It would be punished just to remind me that he could.
Before, I’d only had to worry about my mother.
Now he could inflict his wrath on Koryn or Isanara.
Both could defend themselves. I would do everything in my power not to put them in a position where they had to.
At least the royal summons gave me a purpose.
The fecund stasis of this place was slowly eating away at my sanity.
I would not face the king unprepared. I’d avoided the lower levels of the castle since arriving.
There were too many memories there. But the servants had always been the best source of information, and they were the only friends I had in Balar Shan. But I had one stop to make first.
I made it halfway to my mother’s room.
She had no window. I’d negotiated for a better place for her once, but she’d refused it. She said that she could enjoy the window in my room when she needed daylight. Really, she wanted to hide.
But I was used to the outside air on my face. I reached the courtyard that I’d passed through like a gauntlet the day I arrived in Balar Shan. I paused, taking deep breaths of the cold, clear air to sustain me before I descended deeper into the bowels of the fae stronghold.
But the cold was not the only thing that assaulted me. There were voices—many of them. A clear sign to go in the opposite direction. Until I heard the hiss.
The crunch of my feet in the thick snow was swallowed by the excited jabbering.
My height gave me a clear view even before I reached them.
They’d formed a circle, bold enough to keep her in but not to go any closer.
There was not even enough space for her to spread her wings.
Her head swiveled from side to side as she spun in place, snapping her jaws in the direction of one courtier then another.
Her tail whipped to the side, slicing the fabric of a woman’s skirt. It could have drawn blood.
They thought they had her. But she was toying with them.
Gods save me from irrational females.
I shouldered my way between the two nearest males. “Isanara.”
The focus of the group shifted immediately. This had been going on for a while, then. They were lucky that Isanara had not tired of whatever game she was playing and taken a bite out of one of them.
She may be no larger than a dog, but she was also an unpredictable adolescent. But dragons had been gone for longer than any of these courtiers had been alive. Realistically, so had dogs.
“Welcome, Your Grace,” a female voice rose above all the others.
It took me a moment to assign it to the golden-haired woman on my left.
She was extravagantly beautiful in the way that most fae were.
Sparkling gems contrasted with her delicate features.
Her hair was swept up into an intricate coiffure that followed the sharp lines of her cheekbones and emphasized the points of her ears.
Cayla, maybe. Or Caia? Her name did not matter.
“Go,” I said to the woman. I extended the command to the rest of the group, visually memorizing each of them.
There were ten in total, including the woman and the matching male at her side.
A brother, if my memory served me. “If the witch finds you harassing her familiar, punishment will be swift.” And deserved.
The woman reached into the depths of her gown. She opened her palm as she pulled it out, revealing a handful of coarse white crystals. Salt. “We are prepared.”
Isanara snapped her jaws at the woman’s hand. Her brother jerked her back just in time to keep her from losing a finger. The salt dissolved into the snow on the ground.
“Go,” I said again.
But even an inch from losing a finger or two, she was still smiling. The fae had not changed in my absence. Still just as arrogant. “The Winter Tithe is less than a moon away, Your Grace. I shall expect a dance.”
The invitation in her words could not have been clearer.
Interesting. Not the woman—she aroused nothing but distaste and always had.
But the fact that she courted my favor… why not Edmund, the trueborn prince?
It was possible that the court viewed my father’s gifting of Koryn into my stewardship as a sign of royal favor.
But any courtier with a brain would see that it was not that simple.
Which said plenty about this woman. So did the fact that she was stupid enough to bait a dragon.
“Come, Cala,” her male counterpart said. “Save a dance for me, too,” her brother mock-whispered as he tugged her away. He added a wink over his shoulder.
My preferences were still well known, then.
But if anyone in this court thought that I would abandon Koryn, they were delusional. And just as misguided as always.
Which brought me back to the lavender dragon in the snow. Now with no shortage of space, she’d spread her wings wide and was preening as she itched a stretch of membranes with the snout of her nose. The comparison to a dog was eerie.
I crossed my arms over my chest. “You should not be here.”
She ignored me.
She took her sweet, plentiful dragon time, scratching at her wing with her snout and jaw. She was truly her witch’s familiar. I made a sound in my throat usually reserved for Koryn.
Isanara hissed at me. I growled back.
Her citrine eyes narrowed. She did not need to blink—at least, not as often as humans did.
The result was an eerie intensity as she stared me down in an impossible contest I could not possibly win.
When I blinked, she tossed her head and bared her teeth in the closest thing I could imagine to a dragon smiling.
I growled again.
Isanara swiveled her head from side to side in that strange, serpentine motion she favored when agitated.
Then she thrust her jaw upward. I did not need to look over my shoulder.
I could trace the line from the point of her snout up to the window of the bedroom I’d occupied in what felt like a different life. And now, in this one.
“You do not think that I should be here, either?” I asked. She thought I should be with Koryn. Except, “She is with the Dark God. Training.”
I ground my teeth together to keep the feelings that knowledge conjured from playing across my face.
Isanara had a direct line to Koryn. I was more than jealous of their connection and closeness.
I longed for the restoration of my own bond with Koryn.
The Lifebind was still there, of course.
But goddess-given though it was, it paled in comparison to the affection that Koryn had once given to me freely, completely of her own volition.
I’d been compelling people for decades. I’d never needed to compel someone into my bed; the thought was abhorrent. But knowing that I could manipulate made Koryn’s choice even more precious. And her withdrawal more painful.
I missed her so deeply I’d almost given in to the offer she made. To have a piece of her, even just the physical, was like a cloak in the frigid darkness of Velora. But it was not just her body that I loved.
Isanara hissed again. This time, her citrine eyes focused on the distant window. She was not fond of the Dark God either.
“A sentiment we share,” I assured her.
She flared her wings but extended her neck again. The spikes along her spine stood up straight, agitated. I was not doing what she wanted. I was not doing what I wanted, either. Welcome to my damned life.
“She does not want me,” I said.
The look she gave me was half-irritated teenager and half-annoyed creature of ancient legend. Get over yourself, the first half said. I cannot comprehend your trifling mortal problems, said the other.
Her wings snapped in, legs tensed, and then she launched herself into the sky. She flew in a wide arc around Balar Shan’s central tower, past the window where Koryn and the Dark God were… doing whatever they did.
He wanted her. There was no doubt in my mind about it.
I even understood it. Her beauty transcended the soft, physical curves of her body and the intelligence in her guarded eyes.
It gilded her soul. Despite her death, she chose life again and again.
She protected her sister’s descendants. She forged a connection with her familiar and an acolyte in the temples. She fell in love.
He was a being of darkness, and she was the light of Velora.
Of course he wanted her. And he would have her.
She’d promised him her afterlife. But in this life, she was mine.
She would remember that fact eventually, I told myself.
The immortal blood of the fae ran in my veins.
For the first time, I was thankful for the longevity my heritage promised me.
I would wait as long as Koryn needed. The Dark God would wait longer still.
“I will never leave her,” I promised Isanara, long disappeared around the red and green spiraled curve of the tower.
“You never used to talk to yourself.”
As if this day was not bad enough already.
I was not surprised to see her. Her ability to sneak up on people had been the first sign of her wind-gift. She’d been doing it as long as she could walk.
“I am talking to the dragon.”
“Quite the conversationalist, is it?” Alize asked. She cast her gaze upward, scanning the sky.
“She.” A low throb at the base of my skull heralded the arrival of a headache. Naturally. Pure-blooded fae did not suffer from headaches. I could have done without the reminder of my humanity at the moment.
Alize shrugged her slim shoulders. Even returned to the Balar Shan, she eschewed courtly dress in favor of fitted leather leggings and a velvet surcoat similar in cut to my own, save for the quilting. But the trappings of her royal status were still there.
“She did not seem overly fond of me,” she said, refocusing her attention from the sky back onto me.
I didn’t want to know what that meant. If Alize had been among those taunting Isanara, then the consequences were her own damn problem. My sister had made it very clear in the temple before the Mercy Gate that she did not care for my advice.
“I can’t imagine why not, Alize.” Damn it all. I untucked my hand and massaged the knot forming at the back of my head, where my neck met my skull. “Aren’t you tired of tormenting me? The first five gates were not enough satisfaction?”
My sister had grown up in the Court of Lies. She was as good at dissembling as any fae courtier. Which meant the wrinkle on her brow was an intentional choice. That did not make it genuine.
“I did not know what he was planning,” she said quietly. Several yards of space separated us. But she carried her words to me on a gentle wind.
It was uncharacteristic, and I did not like it.
“You did fuck all to stop it,” I said.
She rolled her golden eyes. “You were the one stupid enough to make a bargain with him.”
“Not all of us have the luxury of caring only about ourselves,” I shot back.
Alize’s expression did not shift an inch, but I knew the hit landed, and I regretted it immediately.
I hated what this place did to me. It was so easy to get pulled back to the young man I’d been here, angry and unfocused.
Twenty years of separation was not enough. I doubted that even a century would be.
“I am sorry,” I said. I was getting very good at those particular words.
“One misstep, and your mother will be just as dead as mine.” Alize pushed off the red and white brick pillar where she’d leaned for the duration of our conversation. She jerked her head over her shoulder. “I need to show you something.”
“I have been summoned,” I said. I still had a bit of time. Instead of using it to check on my mother, I’d have to go directly down to the servants’ quarters. Any hint of what the king was up to would be critical.
“Then you should not waste time arguing with me.”
Alize disappeared into the shadows behind the pillar where she’d stood. She did not wait to see if I would follow. But a strong gust of wind caught me square in the back and shoved me forward.
Instinct told me to follow her. I’d ignored my instincts out of desperation before, and it had led to the bargain that hurt Koryn. It had led to Koryn.
There was no right decision here. Only a selection of wrong ones.
I glanced around one last time—the courtyard was empty, but anyone could be watching from the spiraling tower overhead. Nothing to be done about that.
Alize’s wind nipped at my heels as I followed her into the covered breezeway that connected the courtyard to the northeastern tower. She opened a door at the base with a wave of her hand. Her magic was still strong.
So was mine. Maybe that was why I followed the sister who had always been my rival through the door of a darkened room.
The door slammed closed behind me. One heartbeat was all it took for me to know I’d made a mistake. Then two fingers snapped together, and a single flame illuminated Edmund’s face.
My sword was already in my hand. “Is this an ambush?”
Alize leaned into the light, swiping a candelabra through the flame dancing across Edmund’s fingertips. It took only a few brief seconds, and the small room danced in warm candlelight.
“No, asshole,” she said as she set the candelabra on a sideboard. “This is a family.”