Chapter 33 Lore #2
With the power and confidence he exuded, he would no doubt know how to throw his weight around in the bedroom.
A spark ignited in his eyes, a glint that suggested he’d followed each of my dark musings and was eager to meet the challenge in any way I wanted.
There was something about him that stirred a distant memory, a familiarity I couldn’t quite place. I knew him but I couldn’t remember how.
It seemed an important distinction, but I couldn’t grasp it.
His gaze remained unwavering and intense, like a hunter sizing up its prey. He hadn’t spoken a single word, somehow sensing I needed time to adjust.
Or maybe he knew the silence was captivating.
The longer it stretched between us, the more the atmosphere hummed with tension.
If his plan had been to gain my full attention, he’d succeeded.
My entire focus narrowed onto him.
He extended an arm toward me, inch by inch, as if he knew any sudden movements might provoke a dangerous reaction.
His scent hit me as he closed in. Leather, parchment, and spice.
A bolt of awareness traveled down my spine, my senses sharpening with each careful step forward he took.
My body coiled tightly as he moved nearer, ready to respond to a threat at any moment.
He clocked the tension in my rigid posture, his mouth pressing into a firm line as if my response disappointed him somehow.
His attention finally relinquished mine only to fall to my lips instead. It lingered there, heating, laying claim to them without uttering a single word.
He must have a death wish; no one ever dared to stare at me so boldly.
My mouth curved despite my better judgment.
I remained perfectly still as he reached over and softly brushed his thumb across my lower lip.
The moment his skin touched mine, warmth spread through me, and my carefully constructed mental shield began to fracture.
My magic recognized him a beat before I did, my shadows dissipating back to the ether without my direction.
It took another minute for my thoughts to settle, for my mind to clear.
“There you are,” he muttered softly, his thumb still gently caressing my lower lip before he finally let his hand drop back to his side.
His touch had grounded me, like an anchor mooring a ship during a storm.
I drew in a deep, steadying breath, letting it fill my lungs before slowly releasing it, and blinked up at Prince Sloth.
His expression was set in a careful, unreadable mask now, but I caught a flicker in his gaze—a flash of something I’d never expected to see.
I had the strangest impression that he was… afraid. Of me.
I glanced around the forest, feeling disoriented.
I must have fallen out of a tree or hit my head on a branch. I felt like I’d lost a few hours and had no recollection of what had happened.
Dawn was rising, birds were beginning to wake from their slumber, and I had a splitting headache that wouldn’t quit.
“What happened?”
I rubbed at my temples.
The prince searched my eyes. “You don’t remember anything?”
I shook my head and grimaced, silently cursing the invisible sledgehammer pounding against the inside of my skull. The pain was close to blinding now.
“I remember being angry. I think. But I can’t remember why.”
He was quiet for a beat. “Do you remember the attack?”
I cast my thoughts back as far as I could remember. There was a void I couldn’t slip past. The harder I tried to think, the worse my head felt.
I pressed the heels of my hands against my eyes and squeezed them shut, focusing on breathing in and out slowly.
Gods. It felt like I’d downed all the Fae Fizz from…
I couldn’t remember the title of the book, possibly because I was suddenly caught up in how odd the name “Fae Fizz” was for the strawberry-lime spritzer I’d made my brother re-create for my twenty-second name day.
Looking back, it was not the greatest choice to serve. Members of my book club had snorted and turned red every time they had to ask for more fizz.
Was it possible to die slowly of embarrassment years after the fact?
I guess I’d find out.
“Lore…”
I took a deep breath, allowing the cool air to fill my lungs, and let my hands fall to my sides.
“I—”
I started to speak but stopped short, blinking in surprise as I slowly turned around. The dense canopy of the forest had vanished, replaced by towering stone walls and an expansive arched ceiling.
Sloth moved closer, his arm brushing mine as a wave of apprehension washed over me. I had not shifted stories; I knew that with certainty.
The Liber Noctem must have brought us here.
Or maybe, another fear whispered inside me, maybe we’d been here all along. Maybe all the other stories were built in this arena.
I took in more details of the vast chamber around me.
At first glance, I thought it was an ancient temple.
But at the far end there was a raised dais with something that looked suspiciously like a throne. I couldn’t see it clearly from this distance, but the dark, gleaming stone didn’t look very inviting.
There was something menacing about it, something sentient. Like it was watching me with interest.
Clearly, I was in the midst of another mental break.
Thrones weren’t ancient sentient beings of doom waiting for their masters’ return. I exhaled. I didn’t know any temples that had royalty, so that ruled this chamber out as being strictly used for worship.
It wasn’t just a temple or a castle; it was a grand fusion of both.
Tall arched windows lined the walls, their stained glass reflecting prismatic colors across smooth stone floors that shimmered like a clear night sky.
I paused on the design; a giant golden phoenix blazed from the central panel, its wings outstretched in a burst of fire and feathers.
This phoenix was not a symbol of beauty; it was rendered for an angry god. It was sharp, angular. Every plume was bladelike, each feather catching the light like polished metal.
Its eyes were twin voids of obsidian glass, set so deeply into the design they seemed to follow me across the chamber.
Flames curled up its wings, but the fire was the same golden hue as the rest of the bird.
The phoenix rose from a pile of charred bones that looked like they belonged to a single figure.
Rebirth, but only after complete ruination.
Honestly, it was beautiful in that stark, Gothic horror sort of way.
The prince moved in my periphery, his attention skimming over every corner of the chamber, as if he expected someone to suddenly step out from the shadows. To be fair, I kept looking for that too.
I rubbed my hands over my arms. It definitely felt like we weren’t alone, but I didn’t see or hear anyone else.
I glanced up, my gaze tracing the towering columns that flanked us to form an aisle that led to the dais where the throne sat.
Each carved pillar featured grotesque figures writhing in agony with shadowy creatures rising behind them, then slowly morphed into landscapes engulfed in flames the higher the columns stretched.
Amid these cheerful images, there was the occasional dreamscape.
A babbling brook flowing under a luminous crescent moon, or winged figures dancing in a meadow of wildflowers.
Dreams and nightmares forever immortalized in stone.
My attention shifted to a tapestry on the nearest wall, and I wished I could erase it from my mind. It was worse than the columns.
Images of mortals being flayed alive, their blood running down in ruby rivulets and splattering over a snow-covered ground, made my stomach clench.
Then the scene moved.
Not with the illusion of motion, but with slow, deliberate pulses that gave the impression that the tapestry breathed.
Each scream captured in the thread seemed to cry out faintly, as if the fabric had absorbed every sound from the people who’d inspired the artist.
I wasn’t sure what kind of magic was at play, but it wasn’t pleasant.
Shimmering snowflakes fell, melting as they touched the blood. Behind them, shadowy figures stood watching.
Cloaked, faceless, unmoving. There was something about them that drew me, but I couldn’t quite figure out why.
I glanced around, rubbing my arms again.
The prince had gone nearly as silent as I had. I understood why.
This place was horror in physical form.
I took a few careful steps down the aisle, stopping at the next set of columns.
They twisted up like broken spines. They were carved with human faces, open-mouthed and eternally screaming, and realistic enough that I wondered if they were truly made of stone, or if the figures encased inside them had simply been turned to stone as one of their deepest fears.
It was terrifying to consider.
The floor beneath my feet resembled obsidian, but it pulsed faintly with a heartbeat that didn’t belong to me or to the prince.
Fear was not just an emotion here; it was a presence.
Alive. Intelligent. Watching. And the longer I stood there, the more it felt like it knew my name.
A name I hadn’t been called in eons. Which was an odd thought, considering I’d never set foot inside this place before.
I shivered in place.
Wonderful. I’d always dreamed about a nightmare castle confusing me for someone else.
My attention was drawn back to the columns themselves.
Ignoring the horrible images carved onto them, they weren’t very wide, and it seemed like the slightest bump could send them tumbling to the ground like dominoes, crushing anyone unlucky enough to be standing nearby.
I subtly edged away, not wanting to be the one to send them crashing down.
Shadows danced across the room, swaying more frantically than before, and my pulse raced impossibly faster until I saw it wasn’t my magic somehow leaking out against my will.
The shadows were the result of several large flames that burned in bronze bowls scattered across the chamber floor.
I stared at them for a beat.
It was strange that I hadn’t noticed them right away. That odd sense of being watched prickled my spine. I glanced around again, searching for who was nearby.
No one but me and Sloth. Still, the unease grew.