Chapter 30
When they exited the study, the halls were no longer empty. Gwen rushed up immediately, wrapping Ceridwen in a tight hug. Kent stood nearby, a broad smile on his face. Even Jackoby looked pleased.
“Oh, we’re so glad you’ve returned,” Gwen said, nearly squeezing the breath from her lungs. She drew back to look her up and down. “I’m so terribly sorry about what happened before. I worried you’d never forgive us.”
In truth, she hadn’t, not fully. They’d lied to her. She understood now that they’d done it to protect their lord, the one they’d served for years in some cases. However, their defense of him did not fully erase the slight against her. Not that they owed her anything.
“It hasn’t been fully decided yet,” Drystan said, saving her from a response. “Though if Ceridwen agrees, Miss Bronwyn will be visiting us more often. Perhaps you could give her a quick tour of the manor while I talk with Ceridwen?”
Gwen switched to fussing over Bronwyn, much to her sister’s discomfort, and led her off with the rest of the group. Drystan didn’t say the destination he had in mind, but once they stepped into the spiral staircase, Ceridwen’s suspicions were confirmed. Her chest rose and fell, one deep breath after another, as she willed herself onto the stairs. Thick silence hung between them, full of so many unsaid words and emotions. They continued up the steep stairs, past his living quarters, to the top floor of the tower.
The mess and destruction his monster had wrought were gone. Likely cleaned by Drystan’s own hand unless he’d decided to finally let others in the tower. The stone altar sat empty. Orderly shelves lined the walls. The grand desk had been organized, and the shattered chair had been replaced with a new, slightly finer one carved to illustrate vines and plant life. A winter breeze stirred through the windows, though that wasn’t what made her shudder and hug her arms about herself.
Ceridwen waited for the monster to reappear from the shadows, to leap at her, and try to tear out her throat. Logic did nothing to calm her fear as she hesitantly stared at Drystan. His eyes did not change, nor did his body shift and bend. He was simply Drystan.
For now.
“Ceridwen…” He reached for her, but she stepped away.
“What did you want to tell me?”
He sighed and walked to the opposite side of the altar. “I promised to explain, to tell you about the monster and what happens to me.” He paused, placing his palms on the stone. “It’s a side effect of my magic. When the Goddess gifted some of us with it generations ago, she did it in two forms. Light and dark.”
Ceridwen nodded. Everyone knew the lore, at least anyone who bothered to read and learn it. Though even if they hadn’t, everyone had heard stories of the former dark king who wielded darkness and how his son, King Jesstin Ithael, and Jesstin’s queen, Manon, used the light to overthrow him. Goddess grant them peace. The Ithael line knew such extremes. Powerful darkness, but also powerful light.
“The magic that most everyone knows is the power of light. It heals, protects, strengthens, and many other things. But darkness…” Drystan continued. “It offers strength and power far beyond the light. But it’s hard to control—the Goddess’s punishment for giving into temptation, I suppose. When someone uses dark magic, it can become wild and control them—take on a life of its own.” His eyes held a solemn truth he refused to speak.
Ceridwen’s legs shook beneath her. Oh Goddess… Her hand flew to her mouth, holding in the horror threatening to crawl up her throat.
Somber resignation flashed across his features before he clenched shut his eyes. “And that’s why I wanted to tell you before you agreed to stay.”
She stumbled forward, gripping the edge of the altar for support. “Why?”
“I didn’t want to deceive you into staying again when—”
“No.” She shook her head. “Why use the darkness?”
He looked away and sighed. “I need the power it offers. Light magic alone isn’t enough. But using dark magic stirs the monster within me. I could wake it on my own, give myself over to it to satisfy the dark urges under my skin. I do sometimes. But if I don’t, and I dip too much into the dark ways, the monster wakes whether I want it to or not.”
“But why do you need it?” He was a noble already. Powerful. Wealthy.
“Revenge.” His gaze turned steely, hard as the frozen ground. “My family was murdered. My reputation destroyed.”
Her heart skipped a beat. She hadn’t known, had no idea. But it made sense—the terrible kind that stirred a desperate ache deep within. Why else would such a young lord hold the title himself rather than his father or another more senior relative? Why would he be here with only servants for company if any close family were still living?
Drystan looked away, out at the wintery landscape beyond the window. “I intend for the one responsible to pay dearly, but the power of light alone will not be enough. They wield the darkness, and only with the power of darkness and light can I hope to craft the blade that can kill the demon lurking in the capital.”
Darkness in the capital, like the rumors said. A shiver racked her. “Surely the king…”
He turned to her, his features grave. “He knows.”
Her legs would no longer hold her. Ceridwen slid to the ground, her back against the stone as his words threatened to drown her, to unseat everything she thought she knew.
The king knew…and did nothing. Bad enough that he taxed the people to death, but to bless the use of darkness and the death of innocents at its hands? Unthinkable.
“Ceridwen!” Drystan crouched before her, his hands on her face. “I’ll take you home. We can discuss the rest another day.”
She placed a palm over his hand, holding it to her cheek and sending a little shudder through him that she couldn’t miss.
“No.” There was no turning back. No running from this. “Tell me now. All of it.”
“Are you sure?” He stroked her cheek again, and despite all that she had learned, her greatest wish at that moment was to continue to feel his skin against her own. His nearness sparked a fire deep within her more terrifying than the truth he shared. It threatened to burn away everything else until only they were left.
“Yes.” Whatever else there was to hear, she needed to know it.
Drystan nodded and withdrew his hand. “If I don’t destroy the one leading the darkness, it will spread. It has too much already. Disappearances. Murders. Victims missing blood. I can’t let that happen. I won’t.”
The cloud of darkness spreading from the capital was a real one, and no one tried to stop it, not even the king. No one, except possibly the city’s very own monster.
“That’s why you’re going to the capital at midwinter.”
“I’m required back anyway. But yes, once I’m there, I’ll end this or die trying.”
Tears burned the corners of her eyes, blurring her vision. “I don’t want you to die.” Her truth. “Stay.”
He wiped away a tear that slipped free to trickle down her cheek. “Every time I look at you, I want to.” He gave the smallest hint of a smile that didn’t quite reach his eyes. “But the things I’ve done… They’re unforgiveable already. Even more so if I were to run. I couldn’t live with myself.”
What had he— But she didn’t need to ask. She knew. His monster had killed. She’d seen it with her own eyes.
Grief surrounded her, a familiar, if unwanted, companion. Her actions had led to a death, her mother’s, and the guilt of it plagued her every day. How much more did the death he’d caused with fang and claw haunt his steps?
Guilt was a wicked burden on both of their hearts.
“Blood fuels magic. My own”—he lifted his hand, reminding her of the scars that marred it—“and others. And dark magic…” He pulled back from her, sitting on the ground a foot away. “It’s not enough just to wield shape and blood. True dark magic requires something more. The consumption of it.”
His words did not immediately register, the thought so foreign and strange. When they did, bile burned the base of her throat.
This time, he didn’t reach for her, but the feeling of his eyes on her never faltered, despite the panic threatening to rip her apart.
Blood.
He drank blood.
Like some beast or wild animal. No one knew. She’d never heard of such a thing. Or had she? Somewhere in the back of her mind, a song called to her. Familiar, but just out of reach. In her panic, she couldn’t think, couldn’t sort through the memories to find that lyric.
“It’s not wine that you drink in your study, is it? Even this morning, you and Malik…”
He nodded.
“Does he become a monster too?” One monster unnerved her enough. If there were a second… She shivered.
“Not that I have seen. But that doesn’t mean much. I haven’t seen Malik paint or cast a spell in years, but his father… He favors the darkness. It seems likely that influence may have spread to him.”
Ceridwen squeezed her eyes shut. Another wielder of darkness. One who’d set his eyes upon her sister. Just when she thought she couldn’t dislike him more.
The cool stone behind her back gave odd comfort. Of all the men in the kingdom, she’d fallen for one who became a monster, one determined to die for his revenge.
Running would have been easier. Or shunning him and never looking back.
But somewhere along the way, she’d unwillingly given him a part of herself. Never seeing him again would mean losing that part forever.
A tear leaked down her face. “Can you win?” she whispered.
“There’s always hope.” His voice reflected little of it.
“What can I do?”
“Your music helps me. I can’t explain it, but it soothes the monster. If you play for me, I might be able to control it long enough to finish the blade.” He rose, movement stiff as if his very body ached, and crossed to one of the shelves.
The object he selected did not stand out among the rest. Others held more sparkle and grandeur or more sense of mystery and macabre. The blade he carried to the altar lacked any adornment, all gray metal without shine or frill. The blade itself was shorter than Ceridwen’s forearm, with a simple hilt crossing perpendicular to the blade just above the grip wrapped in plain strips of brown leather.
“The Gray Blade.” He laid it with reverence upon the altar as she rose to stand near his side. “Or it will be, if I can complete it.”
In this position, she recognized the blade from the last time she’d stood there. Then it had been encircled in patterns of blood.
“You need magic to complete it? I think you were working on it when I came here last.”
“Yes. If I can finish it, the blade should nullify the magic of anyone it pierces, though no one has seen a completed one for an age. It’s my best hope.”
She nodded numbly, examining the blade. “What if I played for you while you work?”
“No.” The refusal was quick and definite, shaking in the air between them. “It’s too dangerous. If the beast were to emerge anyway—” He shook his head.
But he was almost out of time. Her family had always looked forward to midwinter. The darkest and coldest of days. Once it passed, they would begin the countdown to spring, half the winter gone by. Despite the long night, the day gave hope to people far and wide that warmth and sunlight would bless them once again. But what was a joyous day for most wouldn’t be to him. It was a deadline. An ending. Possibly a deadly one.
Lightning zipped up her arm when he closed his hand over hers. “I won’t have your blood on my conscience too.”
She placed her free hand over his, where it still rested on her other. “And I won’t have yours on mine.”
It was her choice, her life and fate. She’d stay. She’d help…as best she could.