Chapter 36
Samkiel
M y father’s hand landed in the middle of the table.
“And focus on other things besides the spoils of flesh. You are king now, Samkiel. You must use something else besides brute force to accomplish your means. Knowledge, my son, is more powerful than what head you can cleave from its shoulders or spear you can drive through your opponent. Always try peace. If you strike first, you can never take it back.”
My head tossed from side to side. Some force was keeping me here, keeping me trapped in my dreams. I felt the tiny, serrated fingers digging into my brain, pulling memories from my skull.
I was in a room where water dripped off the walls, a thick musty scent filling the air.
No, not a room. A cave? I spun, my feet hitting the jagged rock floor.
I stepped toward a hollowed-out doorway, an opaque orange glow emanating from it.
Beyond, I heard the slam of metal against metal—another battle.
I shook my head, the voices calling to me, trying to take me from here.
More loud banging came from the hall and the smell of… iron.
I promise not to leave your side...
Dianna. I spun toward her voice and left the dark cave room.
I appeared back in Dianna’s room at the Vanderkai’s mansion.
She sat on the lounge, her red gown flowing to the floor.
I had made her that dress, and she took my breath away.
She was looking up at me, playing with her fingers. It was a nervous tick of hers.
I lifted my hand and extended my pinky. “Promise?”
Pain flickered over her features. “I thought you didn’t want to promise anymore?”
“I am allowed to change my mind.” I nodded toward her hand, and she smiled. Yes, that’s what I wanted. I just wanted her to smile at me again.
She dipped her head and held out her pinky.
I grasped it like a lifeline. Stay with me, I begged, even though I knew my growing feelings for her were wrong.
When she was mad and not speaking to me, it was more than I could bear.
My emotions were new to me and slipped my control.
I knew she felt the small bolt of electricity just as I did, and I felt it to my core.
“Yes, I promise.”
I took a step forward. I just wanted to see Dianna again, hold her, and talk to her.
“ It takes four of my best to hold him.”
I stopped. Hold me? That wasn’t a part of my memories with her.
My nostrils flared, and my jaw ticked. Who would dare threaten to hold me?
That voice filtered through my brain. It was one I’d never heard before.
The scene around me melted away, and then I was halfway across the world in another room.
Only this time, Dianna was backing away from me, her hand slightly raised.
My own voice caught me off guard. I turned, seeing myself stride in.
He walked right through me, the memory playing out.
“You slaughtered hordes of Ig’Morruthens,” Dianna whispered, and I saw the one thing I never wanted to see from her: fear.
“Yes.” I nodded slowly, but couldn’t she tell? Didn’t she know by now that I would never hurt her? Didn’t she know I would allow no one to harm her? She was everything to me. How could she not see?
“Is that what you would have done to me in the beginning?”
My eyes searched hers, my heart aching. Had I fallen so far? I couldn’t lie to her. Maybe in the past. “If it were necessary.”
“Is it necessary now?”
“No.” It felt like she had slapped me. I would have preferred she’d attacked me. “How could you ask me that? You are not a monster.”
Not to me, never me.
A thick buzz filled my mind. My hands went to my head, and I gritted my teeth. Pain, sharp and icy, hit my subconscious, causing the room to shake. Power I had never felt before burrowed deeper into my skull.
“A thousand plus worlds he has seen, yet when he dreams, he dreams of you.”
That voice again. Who was in my head?
I focused like I had been taught, breathing deep and slow.
The room still shook as I concentrated, but my body twitched.
It was a brief escape, but I was back in my room.
The images were blurry, but I saw the four creatures above me.
The hollows of their mouths were wide open, and their hands hovered above me.
Dianna walked toward me, her eyes glowing red.
She had gotten out? How? I jerked, trying to force my body awake.
I needed to move, to get up, but I only managed to turn my head to the side.
A figure with a hat stood on the other side of the room, but it was the one next to him that had a familiar feeling rushing over me when I looked at him.
Roccurem.
Yes, he had shown up in my room and tricked me. My head hurt once more, the pain forcing my eyes closed, but I could have sworn Roccurem looked at me with a knowing expression. His six eyes appeared, all opaque white, all glowing, yet no one moved. It was as if only I saw them.
“Not a monster, god king, only broken,” Roccurem whispered in my head.
I was thrust back into my subconscious so fast that it felt like I was falling.
I landed on my knees in some dark, empty room and heard a scream so loud, so painful, and full of grief that it shook the world around me.
It was every nightmare and fear I had, from Rashearim to Dianna leaving and back.
It all bled together, creating a void inside me.
I covered my ears. The screams were ancient and all-consuming, with such despair that they filled up every inch of the hollow space inside me.
I screamed along with it, trying to release the pressure.
It felt like my brain was attempting to escape my skull, but I kept fighting against the creatures that held me.
“What’s happening to me?” I shouted to the swirling room.
“They are called the Baku, god king.” Roccurem’s voice was far away and distorted as if he hid from them too. From her. “A race evolved from the Deskin, the dream eaters.”
“How can they hold me?”
“They cannot. I am helping them keep you detained.”
“Why?” I shouted, the lights beneath my skin beginning to hum. I felt them rising toward my eyes, my power, thick and heavy, threatening to consume them. I would kill them all.
“For her.”
The lights died, and the room stopped shaking. I looked around the dark empty space, the screams and howls ending.
“For her?”
“I need her to see and feel before the One True King comes. Otherwise, there will be no realm left, even for you.”
My head throbbed as I struggled to my feet. I didn’t see Roccurem or those six milky white eyes. I saw nothing but darkness. One True King? I ground my teeth, the power threatening to rip me back into the nightmare.
“Where is he?”
I would tear Kaden limb from limb for what he had done.
“She is close to finding him.” Roccurem solidified, regarding me and the room curiously.
My heart thrummed. “I need out of this. Dianna can’t fight him alone. Not a King of Yejedin.”
“If she chooses the wrong path, I am afraid she will fight many battles alone, god king.”
Fear ripped at my gut, and my throat constricted when I realized Roccurem would not help me. He was going to let this happen. “Why are you doing this?”
“She must choose for herself without intervention, or her purpose will not be pure.”
“What does that mean?”
“Let her choose, god king.”
“Choose death?” I nearly shouted. “She will die if she fights him. Die, Roccurem.”
“Perhaps.”
Icy fury swept through me, sharper than steel. “Let me out of here, Roccurem.”
“I cannot.”
“If she dies, I will shred you to atoms.”
“I am aware.” He glanced up as if listening to another world. “There is a mortal saying. If you love something, set it free. If it comes back—”
“I do not have time for riddles or technicalities. Release me. ”
Roccurem’s six eyes opened, and he looked at me.
“Love is such a dangerous and powerful emotion. The gods curse it, for it has power. Empires have fallen for it, reduced to sand and scriptures. Worlds have burned for it, and they will once more. Love has the power to touch even the untouchable. Use it.”
His form shimmered and vanished. I roared in frustration, power hot and blinding shooting from me, lighting this darkened room in shades of silver and white.
I dropped my hand and saw that I’d had no effect on this illusion.
Fuck. I scanned the space they had trapped me in, searching for a way to escape.
I needed to get to her. My breathing became erratic as I ran from one area to the next.
No walls, no door, just an endless empty expanse and haunting pieces of memories.
Fuck. I was going to lose her. Fuck. I had to think, had to try.
I took a breath, drawing air in slowly, then releasing it.
“Do not run off emotions, Samkiel. It makes you careless. Think. Think,” I murmured to myself.
Then it hit me. Dianna’s voice floated through the thick of them. A memory. A way out. Something she had said months ago.
“I believe with enough pressure that anything can break.”
I had already attempted to use my powers to no avail, but maybe I hadn’t used them all.
“Love has power. Use it.”
My hands brushed across my chest, right above my heart.
The slightest flicker of flame glowed within me, and I reached for the light.
A kernel of power danced across my palm, a small precious piece of her fire.
It was the part of her that had crept past every defense or curt word, the part that held me during feverish nightmares.
The part that warmed me, forcing me to live again.
Her. It was the piece of her I clung to, filled with the hope of what could be.
I unleashed it.