Chapter 10
CHAPTER TEN
Sin Audience Chamber, Blood Kingdom
Freya
I stand on the raised dais of the throne room next to Daire, anxiously shifting from foot to foot.
I scrunch up my nose at the scent of citrus blossoms, which is mixed with the sweet resin from the guttering lamps that hang on the walls.
The walls are painted inky blue with scattered stars.
Moonlight spears down from the high windows, which are set in the four sides of the pyramid shaped audience chamber.
The chamber is vast and ceremonial.
The floor is inlaid with tiles of turquoise, lapis lazuli, and gold-flecked ochre, forming patterns like a rippling sea.
Daire wraps his wing around me. I rest my head on his shoulder.
Shadow yawns, revealing her razor-sharp teeth, before settling back down on one side of the throne, while her sister guards the other.
Lanlin sprawls on the throne like he wasn’t just carried back the night before to his palace slumped over his demonic lion.
I bite my lip, barely able to look away from the Shadow Vampire King’s face.
Lanlin looks as resplendent in his glimmering night sky robes, with ribbon and jewel decorated hair, and cat-like eyes, as he did when he arrived in Bael.
The Alpha dominantly stares out over his court without moving, as if he’s carved out of stone.
His pheromones are thick and overwhelming.
But then, vampires can use their pheromones as a weapon both to allure and harm.
I mustn’t drop my defenses and forget that.
The Bloods’ beauty is also a weapon.
A trap.
Am I already caught?
“Is that bone?” I blanch, pointing at the sharp shards that branch out of the pale throne that reaches almost to the roof of the pyramid.
The armrests of the throne are shaped into lions with diamonds for eyes.
“The bones of their enemies,” Daire murmurs into my ear, pretending that he is merely nuzzling me.
He’s still careful not to say anything that would give us away.
Vampire hearing is enhanced. Who knows how good Lanlin’s is?
“Cute, aye? Dragon wings, mainly. But also, fae…” He breaks off.
“The bones of my brothers and sisters too.”
Bile rushes into my mouth.
Lanlin is sitting atop a throne of bones in a court that worships pain and blood.
And he wants to make me Queen of this kingdom…?
I steel myself.
I can do this.
I need to find out if there is more to the monster who took out an entire army. More to the King who assassinated Tarquin.
I’ll spy, but not for Maximinus or the Council.
I’ll spy for myself to find out if this Shadow Vampire King is someone who deserves me risking everything to save them…who truly has a place in my pack.
I nudge Daire. “How do you know that?”
I can feel Daire smile against the top of my head. “I’m a fae encyclopedia. Also, a god.”
I huff. “Okay, god, who are those Betas in the silver robes with glowing pyramid hieroglyphs on the front?”
I point to one side of the pyramid, where Betas with shaved heads stand calmly like they’re meditating. Their eyes are bright and calculating, however, in a way that makes my skin crawl. At the front of them, slouches a portly Blood with a leathery face, which is etched with wrinkles.
His eyes are silver and cold.
When he catches my eye, he gives me a creepy smile, revealing his fangs.
I force myself to smile back.
“Making friends, love?” Daire increases his pheromones in possessive warning against my new friend. “I’d choose more carefully. That’s Ruin, leader of the Void Cult. Ehm, I’m not sure entirely what the cult do. I may have exaggerated my god-like knowledge.”
“Shocking,” I tease.
“The Void Cult’s activities are shrouded in mystery even within their own kingdom.
Maximinus had me study everything that I could about Blood Kingdom with only an hour or two’s sleep all week.
The bloody parchments that Maximinus forced me to read, however, barely said more about Ruin’s cult than that they worship order, balance, and the Void. ”
“What’s the Void?”
“Damned if I know. Those villagers were calling Sin Void Vampire, aye? Chanting it like he was some kind of god or…?”
“Sacrifice.” I furrow my brow. “Shall we put the mysterious cult in the avoid column?”
“Where’s the fun in that?”
“So, who are those freaky Omegas who are dressed all in red?” I point to one side of the pyramid, which has been hung with long crimson ribbons like strands of flesh.
To be fair, it’s surprising to find so many Omegas in the court.
The only Alphas are the King himself and Daire.
Do Omegas and Betas truly hold equal power within Blood Kingdom to Alphas?
In Fang Kingdom, Omegas weren’t even allowed to hold weapons, let alone positions of authority. King Ulf deliberately oppressed us. In Draca Kingdom, Omegas could gain some respect by becoming dragon riders, but even noble Omegas still didn’t have equality.
Have I finally found a kingdom where I can hold the same status as anyone else?
Where I won’t be judged as just a rejected, orphan Omega?
It doesn’t matter that I was born to be a queen. I have seen what that duty has done to both Aurelius and Daire. It has torn them apart.
What matters is the chance to live my life free…and equal.
Excitedly, I study these Omegas, whose magic crackles across my skin.
A group of female Omegas stand closely gathered and watchful. They are dressed in long dresses that trail behind them. Fascinated, I am amazed that the dresses are made up of red ribbons that weave around them serpent-like, as if they are alive.
The Omegas’ faces are covered by veils that mask everything apart from their fanged mouths.
One stands in front of the others. She is tall and stately. Her lips are painted a striking red, and her fangs are longer and more curved than any of the other vampires’.
To my surprise, Daire’s voice lowers with warning, “The Scarlet Temple. The most powerful faction in the kingdom. The one with the mouth full of fangs? The High Priestess, Nebet. Pray to the Shadow Devils that we don’t catch her eye because she has the power of visions.
She tortures by showing you anyone’s memories from the past. It’s meant to feel bloody real like falling through a portal into the past. The Scarlet Temple worships pleasure and death.
They run both the courtesans and the assassins.
” He glances at Lanlin. “They trained Sin.”
Surprised, I glance at Lanlin. “In which of those?”
Daire huffs a laugh. “Does he look like a courtesan?”
“Do you?”
“Aye, and I am.”
Lanlin still isn’t looking at Daire and me. By the studied stillness of his expression, however, I’m certain that he’s listening to our conversation.
Lanlin is staring with an unwavering intensity at the grand entrance to the chamber, which is hung with bat emblem banners and guarded by carved lions.
It is like he is waiting for something…or someone.
In the uncomfortable silence, I know that everyone in the Blood Court is looking at me, or possibly, glaring at the enemy masked fae who is standing next to their King.
On the moon, can I blame them?
They sent their King off to end a war and seal it with an arranged marriage, only for it to turn out to be trick to assassinate him.
I swallow.
It’s lucky that they still don’t know that the fae is King Daire, the killer of their last Alpha Queen, or that I am secretly the Fang Queen who survived their massacre of Orm Court.
I shudder.
An Omega must look on the bright side sometimes, however, unless they want to totally freak out.
For example, I’m wearing new clothes, ones that I didn’t even have to steal.
When I woke up, having slept through most of the day in exhaustion, I found a matching linen ivory robe with a sun design created with brilliant orange carnelian gemstones on the front.
A bat design had been added in onyx circling the sun, as if worshiping it.
A warm feeling spread through me at the inclusion of the bat. Did it mean that we were officially part of the royal nest? Or did it represent Lanlin himself — the moon — circling his new mates?
Loving them?
Now, Daire and I are the only two suns in this nighttime court.
The second reason to be cheerful is that we are finally clean of the ash and sand.
When I first woke up, I found myself tangled in Daire’s warm arms, but Lanlin was missing.
I froze, scanning the dark bedroom in alarm.
I could hear pretty, distant harp and flute music playing from rooms deeper in the palace.
It reminded me that we weren’t alone, safe in this nest. An entire nighttime court was awake and ready to meet us.
I crept out of the cool linen nest and padded across the floor in search of somewhere to clean off the dead of White Lotus from my itchy skin.
When I peered through the archway that led off from the chamber beside the desk, I smiled.
The royal vampire nest opened into a bathing chamber, which was filled with steam and lit by bronze lamps that hung from the ceiling by rope. The walls were covered with beautiful murals of blue fishes, seahorses, and mermen.
Were the Bloods allied with the vicious Shadow Mermen?
Was Lanlin?
I stepped further into the bathing hall, beginning to undo my robe. I wafted the strongly lotus perfumed steam out of my face, along with the curling incense smoke.
Then I froze in shock.
Lanlin was already sitting in an alabaster tub, surrounded by lotus petals. He was leaning back with his arms on the sides, and his neck was bared in a way that an Alpha’s never should be.
Did he truly trust Daire and me this much?
My chest tightened.
I hadn’t seen Lanlin without his makeup, jewels, and clothes before.
He appeared to need every inch of his skin covered, but now, he was naked. And he was every bit as beautiful as I imagined in my dreams — and nightmares — he would be.
I should look away.
I couldn’t.
I should turn and walk away.
I couldn’t.
Instead, I stood rooted to the spot.
Mesmerized.
This is why vampires were so deadly. This was what they did to their prey.
My mouth was dry.