45. The Nightmare Prince
Chapter 45
The woman did not know how to sleep after dawn.
I sighed, my cock already stiff, when she trailed slow kisses along the new flame over my chest, her fingers teasing the edges of my hips. “Woman. Do you ever take joy in sleeping?”
“Not when there is a washbasin large enough for two and not when my husband looks like you.”
I chuckled and draped one arm over my eyes. “You make a fine argument.”
She rolled out of the bed and covered her shoulders with her satin robe, pecking my cheek. “I’ll get the water ready.”
“Not at a boil this time.”
“I’ll settle for a simmer.”
“You will cook me alive, Wife.”
“I’ll make it worth it.”
I peeked out from beneath my arm. “I’ll hold you to that.”
Skadi squeaked in surprise, flashing me a heated stare, when I made an attempt to swat her backside before she disappeared behind the washbasin door. The woman had already arranged for heated buckets before I even woke.
With a bit of reluctance, I slipped out of bed, unthreading the laces on the thin trousers I wore during the night.
“Prince Jonas.”
I spun toward the bedroom door. My blood went cold. “Oldun? What the hells are you doing in my chamber?”
The woman trembled, holding another steaming bucket of water. She looked small when she placed it on the ground and removed a pigskin pouch from the pocket of her smock. Thin, linen gloves coated her hands and her fingers shook as she unlaced the pouch. “I knew you were in here, but . . . I’m sorry, My Prince.”
There was something wrong here. I took a step back. “You need to leave, Oldun.”
“I’m doing this to protect you.” Her voice cracked. “They need to take her back.”
For such a waif of a woman, Oldun moved like a spark catching flame. She ran at me, a handful of the powder in her palm, ready to toss at me, perhaps shove it down my throat. I dodged, but some of the dusky powder struck my face.
I wiped it away, waiting for a burn or bite of pain.
Nothing came but a bit of haze in my head.
Oldun steadied on her feet quickly and scooped some more. Tears dripped onto her cheeks. “You’ll understand in the morning. It is for your good.”
“Don’t.” Gods, I could hardly stand straight. There were moments of exhaustion that left me desperate to crawl into bed and sleep for the better part of a month. But my mind was alive enough to know there was no reason I should be feeling so sleep-deprived now.
But for the unknown elixir on my damn face.
I held up a hand. “I will make you pay, Oldun. I swear it.”
She sniffled. “I’m sorry. It’s for our folk, for you. I hope you’ll come to realize it someday.”
Oldun cried out, but the sound was swallowed in a cloud of damp, cold mists. Darkness devoured the woman until her look of terror faded into nothing but a swarm of stormy billows overhead.
“Skadi.” I steadied myself with one palm on the wall.
In the doorway of the washroom, my fire held out her palms, a look of vibrant rage written on her beautiful face. The only thing missing was the glow of her eyes.
“Skadi.” Her name came out in a rough rasp. “Don’t fall into it.”
“She tried to hurt you.” My wife spoke with an eerie calm. “I have never felt such a rage before.”
Wretched feelings—pain, greed, hate—it did something to Skadi’s affinity, it pulled her fire into darkness. I started to assure her I was fine, but whatever was ebbing through my blood drained strength with each breath.
“Jonas! Skadi! We heard a scream.”
Thank the gods.
Mira, clad in a thin night dress, shoved into our corridor. Aleksi was at her back, then Sander.
Dorsan, with a raised spear was tucked amongst them, but his attention landed on his princess and the swirling mists around her palms.
The endless flow of people kept stuffing inside our corridor. My mother and father were more like my wife, and always rose with the dawn. Daj was already dressed in his typical black, and my mother had a dagger in her hand.
If I was not lost in some bespelled exhaustion, if Skadi had not stolen a woman into her mists in anger and was fading from me, I might’ve embraced them all.
No questions, and every damn soul in this palace was ready to attack for our sakes.
“She needs to let her go.” I fumbled the words, but pointed at Skadi. “Oldun . . . came here . . . I don’t know.”
“Another woman came to you?” Mira’s mouth dropped. She looked from me, shirtless, to Skadi in a silky shift, then to the mists of her affinity still coiling near the washroom. My friend’s smile was nothing short of wicked when she looked back at Skadi. “I’m obsessed with her.”
“Mira.” Sander nudged her.
“It isn’t only men who wish to kill when the one they love is touched.” Mira shrugged one shoulder. “Keep your hands off her husband.”
“What is wrong with you?” I was almost certain the voice belonged to Heartwalker, I couldn’t see him, but the way Mira snarled in the direction of the voice was proof enough.
Sander came to my side. “What happened to you?”
“Oldun threw something on me.” I looked at my wife. “Skadi, let her go. We need to know why.”
“She hurt you.” Her flat expression found me, she blinked, like she might be recognizing me for the first time.
My mother worked her way into my room and placed a hand on my fire’s arm. “Let me speak with her. I’ll see it all.”
In other words, Maj would take the entire memory of whatever motivated Oldun to come into my chamber.
Another breath, another heartbeat, then Skadi’s eyes flickered and she closed a fist.
With a scream Oldun fell in a heap in the corridor. Frenzied, she swiped at her arms, as though the mists were still creeping along her flesh. She wailed and screamed again when she caught sight of Skadi so near.
“Don’t touch me! You’re . . . wretched and a creature of the hells.”
I was going to kill her.
Oldun backed into the shins of Aleksi. My fellow prince sneered down and took hold of her arms, hoisting Oldun to her feet as my mother approached. “Queen Malin. You must listen to?—”
“Did you try to kill my son?”
“What?” Oldun’s eyes jumped to me, then back to the queen. “No. I-I-I tried to save him. From her.” She pointed at Skadi. “She kills and doesn’t even know she does it. He told me all about her.”
“Who told you?”
Skadi hugged her middle, brow strained.
“I-I didn’t learn his name. But he knew things about her. She’s vicious, and dark, and a monster. She killed her own parents. Stole their life away as they slept.”
No. That wasn’t possible. If my mother did not throttle Oldun soon, I would.
At my first step, Sander pushed back on my shoulder. He jerked his head toward Skadi.
Dammit. Her eyes looked more like a somber storm, gray and dull. She backed out of the bedchamber, toward the staircase leading to her library. She was fading from me, she was slipping into the mask of frigid apathy the longer Oldun shouted fears and disdain.
“He told me if she no longer wanted the prince, she would leave.” Oldun slumped so Aleksi had to brace her weight to keep her upright. “He told me if I could give the prince the tonic, put him into a sleep, I could make it seem as though he’d chosen me, and she would leave us.”
“You went too far, Oldun.” The corridor darkened with a flood of my own mesmer shading my eyes. “I’ve slept beside her for weeks.”
Oldun looked stunned. “I-I-I didn’t know.”
“Because you have no right to know what goes on with me and my wife.” My voice boomed against the walls.
My mother cleared her throat and stepped in front of me, likely trying to prevent bloodshed. “Oldun Aela, you will submit the memory to me, then we will decide your punishment from there. Until then, you will spend your time in the cells under the palace.”
“My Queen, please.” Oldun was handed to some of the inner guards. “I only wanted to protect the prince.”
Her pleas were found wanting. There were few moments when my mother and father showed their regal side, but I was grateful for it now. Daj, in all his untamed rage, shouted for the woman to be taken at once to the cells below and for the rest of the guard staff to start hunting whoever gave Oldun the powder.
“Jonas.” Mira dropped a hand to my arm. “Are you steadier?”
I raked my fingers through my hair, nodding. The fog was leaving my skull little by little. Whatever the elixir was, it wasn’t enough to hold long.
“Good.” Mira pointed me toward the staircase. “Because your wife has fled.”
Dammit. I took the stairs two at a time.
“Prince Jonas.”
“Dorsan.” I wheeled on the man. “I am ready to kill the next person who tries to stop me.”
“Understood, My Lord.” He propped his boot on the step up. “You should know, what the woman said, well, it is a belief on Natthaven. It is why the princess has been so sheltered.”
“You mean shackled.” My lip curled. “None of you will ever know how breathtaking she is since her people never try to see her. You think one thing for all time about her magic, and it brands her as this . . . this frightening woman. But you don’t really know anything about her power.”
“Prince—”
“No. None of you ever take the time to see her.” My shoulders rose in harsh breaths. “She’s a woman who loves too much spice in her icing. A woman whose skin should be boiled off her bones by now for how hot she takes her bath water. Did you know she wakes with the sun all to read in the dawn’s light? I pretend to be asleep because I don’t want to disturb my favorite part, when she hums along with morning bird tunes.”
I laughed, a little delirious. “I don’t think she even realizes she does it. You lot don’t bleeding see that she would risk her own life to protect all of you, even though what she receives in return is fear and apprehension.”
I shook my head in a bit of disgust and turned to finish the journey to the library.
Dorsan gripped my arm. The mask of marble over his straight features cracked. “I agree with you on all counts. I protected the princess out of duty and a belief she had the ability to kill many if she desired. But I have seen her, as you say, since we arrived here. I was coming to tell you, I think the coldness might not last if you are there. I have never seen her more alive than with you, Prince. Pull her back.”
With a curt nod, I rushed to the library, determined to do just that.