Chapter 19
Father’s sick. His bones ache and I swear he’s losing his grip on reality. At least he managed to separate the bondslave, Emya, from my brother.
Emya was sent to her home island. That was Dagen”s only stipulation to my father”s request to end their relationship: Dagen promised to let her go if she could be free. He wants what”s best for her. He’s on forced date number six with his betrothed—a brunette from Zem. Kathreen. He’s doing his duty and giving Kathreen a chance, but if Emya hadn’t wanted to return home, Dagen would’ve fought to marry her.
Hiding the fact that my father just strangled me is a typical day in my life lately, and it feels like the worst kind of isolation.
I walk to the eastern wing of the castle where my tutor, Thaddeus, waits.
I never miss my studies. I need the place where my mind enters a book and ceases to exist outside of it.
There’s always an apology deep in Father’s onyx eyes when he hurts me, not that it makes it better.
When spots edge my sight, when lack of air burns my chest, I glimpse the man he used to be before the power and wine. Fear always bleeds into his expression when my head begins to lull to the side. That’s when he lets go.
Brunar leads me and my other guards through King’s Hall on our way to Thaddeus’s quarters. Passing mural after mural of dead Zarr kings, my eyes always gravitate to one portrait. King Dagen’s.
A flutter finds my stomach every time I pass his frame. Something about the small, menacing gauges pierced through his ears, or the overall smirk in his hazel gaze . . . it just does twisty things to my insides.
Thaddeus opens his door on the second knock. In his few months here, he’s turned his room into a makeshift library with more lamps than any other room in the castle. Spiritual markings of Scientia—the Zos’ favorite goddess—litter the room like a search and find activity book. Embroidered tapestries, sewn with the Zo symbol—two circles overlapping—hang from every wall, and books line every nook and cranny. All is neat, and everything is orderly.
Thaddeus leads me to a prepared study table with my new reading assignment resting on top of it.
“The King of Kings?” I ask, clearing my throat from the rasp my father left. “I”ve read that already. It”s an eighth-year book.” Even Tarella has read it.
“You haven’t read the original.”
I fight the urge to roll my eyes. Zos are meticulous. The original will be the exact same as the one I read years ago. “I have all of the King’s Laws memorized. Can’t we learn something new?” I need the mental disconnect that comes with immersing myself into a new topic.
He pats the book in his calm way and motions for me to sit. His gaze lands on my fingers that are still tinged with black ink, then up to me.
He scowls. “Clumsy with an ink pot, I see.”
I fold my arms to hide the faded ink. All of Preysee’s fancy soaps haven’t rid me of it, and the Zos detest clumsiness, or messes, or anything that does not fit in a neat, little box of perfect, logical sense.
His tan face remains flat, but his brown eyes are anything but—a world of knowledge behind dull walls. He runs his hand over the frayed, red cover.
“This book is not just codes and laws. It’s a riddle that’s never been brought to light. A prophecy.” He reverently scoops up the book, tucking it into his arm like a newborn baby, and stalks to a shelf. “But if you are not up for that, I suppose I could teach you about the rare energy gems inside the Zem mines. Quite interesting, those gems and their intricate uses.”
Behind his unbothered face his eyes twinkle.
I sigh, holding my hand out for the book. “What page?”
He sets it in front of me. “This page. What can you glean from it?”
“The cover?” I run my fingers down the front of it, noticing there is no author scribed on the front. ”Who wrote this book?”
“Scientia, of course.”
I glance over to one of the figurines carved in the deity’s honor. White, delicate faces displayed in front of black, inky walls.
He waves his hand over the dull, red book. “What do you see?”
“Just the title. The King of Kings.”
He waits in silence.
“What?”
A puff of air escapes his nose. “Use the brain inside your skull.”
I trace the black letters, smooth with age. “The King of Kings,” I say softly, “is a person? The riddle answers the question, who is the king of all kings?”
The corner of his lip perks up before pulling out three large, unfamiliar books. “I knew you were smarter than the average Zarr.” He drops a stack of books beside the red one in front of me. “These are lineages and memoirs of royalty from each of the three families. They”ll be your supplementary reading as you solve the riddle.”
I fold my arms. The motion is stiff from my sore body, but notably less than it was an hour ago. “How am I supposed to answer a riddle you claim has never been solved?”
He pats the stack of books. “I said it hasn’t come to light.”
“So, what if I solve this riddle? What’s so special about the King of Kings?”
He cocks a silvered brow. “The King of Kings is prophesied by Scientia to wield great power. Power that can bring crops to our soil and unity to the kingdoms.”
“The kingdoms are unified,” I say. After reading Lo’s journals, I can’t help but pry, and I know from my time in Zo that the quickest way to get unfiltered information from a scholar is to make a na?ve statement. “That’s why they’re practically neighbors.”
His jaw flexes. “Proximity does not equal unification. They are close out of convenience, waiting to pounce on one another like rabid dogs on furry rodents. They nip at each other because together, one of the three palaces guard something for the King of Kings when his time falls upon us.”
“What do they guard?”
His eyes slice to mine. “Too many questions is a sign of a lazy pupil. Read it and decide for yourself.”
My fingers twitch, wanting to dive into the stack of books so hard I wake up with pages stuck to my face.
“How long did it take you to solve it?” I ask.
“Who says I have?”
I level a glare at him.
His eyes light up. “Two months.”
Leaning forward, I smell old, crisp pages and glued binding, two of my favorite scents. “Then I will aim for less than that.”
Thaddeus almost smiles. “I’d be rather put out if you didn’t.” He stands from his chair and brushes his white Zo robes. “We have an allotted time of two hours. I’m releasing you to read in your own chambers.”
I take that as my dismissal and summon servants to haul the books that don’t fit in my arms to my chambers. Since my guards are above helping me carry books.
Useless cowards.
Once I reach my chambers, I clear my desk and read the first twenty pages of The King of Kings. It’s full of honor laws, procedures, and stuffy poems, the same dry content I remember from my first time through. I flip a thick, stale page. It feels older than the edition I read, like Thaddeus promised.
I’m in the middle of a rather bland sentence when he enters my room behind me, bringing the sensation of a cold, smooth abyss.
His dark-velvet voice comes behind me. “No quippy insults today?”
I turn the page, chills spreading down my neck. I swear, Zarr women would pay gold rens to listen to his voice.
“No responses for me either?” There’s a playfulness in his voice that wasn’t there last time. “Don’t pretend you can’t hear me, or that The King of Kings is so enthralling either. I’ve read it.” His dark presence circles around the front of my desk to face me.
“Go. Away.”
“Ah, the cruel thing speaks.”
“Yeah, and I said, go away.”
He looms closer, the depth of his power tugging my neck hairs up. “Why should I?”
“Because,” I say, fists clenching. “My bond spirit says you are dangerous.”
“Does that make me dangerous? Just because others think I am?”
A memory of Tian flashes into my mind because he was large for his age, and therefore labeled dangerous by the Zo scholars. He was shoved into the deepest levels of the Zo library and isolated for it; but he was kind, despite their whips, and he was my friend when I felt most alone.
I sigh, “No, it does not.”
There is a long stretch of silence before he speaks again, his voice thicker than before. “Then there is no harm in my visit. Is there?”
My jaw tightens then releases, acclimating to the deepening cold in my room. “What do you want from me?” I ask.
His spirit gravitates closer, his darkness a wave of frigid electricity zapping against my skin.
“I am alone,” he whispers.
“That does not answer my question,” I say, but my voice has already lost its harshness. He is alone. The memory of me and Tian in the library flashes through my mind again. Me, crying because of my father, and Tian wrapping his arms around me deep in the Zo library. Tian was my best friend when I felt most alone. And he is gone.
The dark spirit falls silent.
His power consumes the room, saturating every corner with invisible pennants of deadly ice. I stiffen. Liha’s warning about him courses through my mind, but what if this is how people feel when they see me? When those people are brought to the execution floor and look up at my smiling, ruthless face and see nothing but a monster.
I sigh. “You can stay if you just answer the question.”
He’s standing in the center of my desk, not the least bit distracting. “Yes,” he says. “I’m very good in bed.”
My knee jerks, smacking into the belly of my desk. A dark, invisible laugh caresses the air.
I glare at my open book, heat filling my cheeks. “That is not the question—”
“Isn’t that always the question in Zarr?”
I rub my knee, grumbling. “I suppose it is, Spirit.”
“You can call me Dae.”
“Fine, Dae. I will allow you to stay if you answer a question of my choosing.”
A smile curls in his voice. “And how do you plan to get me out if I don’t? Throw a shoe at me?”
I lift my chin. “I’ll pretend you do not exist for as long as I live. I’m very good at pretending.”
“Are you, now?” I can almost hear an eyebrow raise.
“I am. And I’ll let Liha chase you off every time you surface.”
“You realize I allow her to chase me off.”
I turn the page. “The effect is the same.”
“So much sass for such a cruel little beast.”
“I am not little,” I mumble, because it’s the only point I can argue, and I’m proud to be taller than most Zarr women.
“But you are cruel?”
I shrug. “Depends on who you ask.”
I give up trying to read through him and look directly at him. The dark air swirling in the middle of my desk tells me where he is.
“So, are you going to answer a question of my choosing, or should I start ignoring you?”
“Fine, Nizzara. Ask your question.”
I try not to linger on the way my name sounds in his smooth voice, spoken in a dimension only I can hear. “What do you want from me if I cannot offer you a bond?”
“Can’t? Or won’t? You can bond more than one spirit.”
His response trips my thoughts. Father said my vessel can only bond one spirit, and I wonder if this could be the subject matter he’s trying to hide from me. A cold rage pools into me. After he forced me to take one spirit, there’s no way I would take another.
My teeth clench together. “Does it matter?” I take a breath and talk myself down from my sudden surge of anger. ”Just answer the question before I start flinging shoes at spirits who I’m pretending don’t exist.”
A midnight laugh floats through the air. Then, after a moment, he says, “Tonight, I only want someone to talk to. That”s all I want.”
“And you choose me?”
“Not many casters can speak to spirits like you can, and it’s draining to project my voice to those who can’t.”
I wave my hand. “Then talk to other spirits.”
He pauses before saying, “They do not understand what I am.”
I want to ask what he is, but the depthless cold in his presence tells me I don’t want to know.
“So, you’re saying I’m your only option.”
If Liha knew I was entertaining this spirit, she wouldn’t trust me to be alone ever again. A sting pricks my chest at my small betrayal.
But if I was in Dae’s place, stuck in the spirit world with no one, I would wish to talk to someone too. I know what it’s like to be alone.
Then there’s the matter of his voice.
I like it.
He wanders toward my bed draped in silk comforters. “It is either you, or a spoiled brat in Zo.”
“What if I’m just a spoiled brat in Zarr?”
“Then at least you are much more pleasing to look at.”
I scoff. “You may have been good in bed, but your flirting is barely average. As a Zarr man I thought you’d be more skilled at spouting your mouth in pursuit of personal gains.”
There is a hint of delight in his tone when he says, “What makes you certain I’m a Zarr man? As a spirit, I could be from any of the seven realms. We can travel through realms, you know.”
I turn around in my chair. “Your accent is Zarr, and you’ve read The King of Kings. Don’t insult me.”
“I’d never.” His voice is a low, amused hum.
I roll my eyes. “You can stay until Liha returns,” I say, patting the open book. “But if you stay, then you have to be silent so I can read this blasted thing.”
“That’s an eighth-year book. Got held back in your studies, did you?”
I point to the door. “Be quiet or be gone.”
He goes silent, hovering over my shoulder as I reread the same lines over and over again, flustered by his towering, bulky presence behind me. Eventually, though, I slip into the world of books and his presence that’s impossible to ignore becomes the wall blocking out the rest of the world. He watches me for two hours, letting me read, and I swear I feel some emotion from his energy, something like intrigue.
I’m about to close the book when he disappears without warning, and the room is suddenly stifling in his absence.
A few moments later Liha returns.
She clucks. “Ice in your room again.”
“He only passed through.” I manage to pull my attention back to my book.
“Did it speak?”
I run my fingers over the page, noticing a misprint in the page numbers, where it jumps from page thirty to page thirty-nine, then back to thirty-one. I flip the previous page back, then forward again.
“Hmm?”
“I said”—Liha’s vibrant energy nudges my neck where the bruises from my father are starting to blossom—“did the product of damnation speak to you?”
I flip the page once more. “Why do you call him that?”
“Because. That’s what he is. He reeks of Baratrum.”
I look up. “The Lost Realm?”
“Precisely. Did he speak to you?”
I consider telling Liha about our conversation, but Dae’s claim that other spirits don’t understand him hums through my mind. If there’s one thing I’ve learned about Liha these past ten years, it’s that she is protective, snobbish, and jealous.
“I told him if he didn’t leave, then you would chase him off for me.”
“And he left?”
“Do you see him here?”
A little flick comes from my caster shield, as if to say, smart ass.
“So, where have you been this morning?”
A prick of excitement comes through our bond. I take this new development as a sign our bond is becoming stronger.
“You don’t think I would learn who your betrothed is and not check him out for myself, do you?”
A wave of fresh panic washes through me. “You saw him?”
She purrs like a cat. “I did, indeed. Just for a moment, but from what I saw, he is quite delicious.”
I roll my eyes. “You objectify men.”
She sniffs. “Let me live my death in peace.”
“Do you know when I will meet him?”
“I would guess within the next month.”
I study The King of Kings for another ten minutes until I can’t put off dressing for tax court.
“Try not to think about it,” Liha says as our power moves the formal, black dress and crown out of my closet. The long sleeve’s material brushes up my arm.
“That is impossible. I can’t not think about it. Our people are suffering, and tax court only makes it worse.”
“Just do as your father commanded you.”
The high collar of the stiff dress pulls tight, fastening around my throat. “And further their suffering?”
“It will keep you safe,” she says softly.
My jaw tightens as the matte-black crown descends onto my white hair, the spires tipped with red, like bloody daggers.