Chapter 44 Violet
Violet
Adar was already running for the stables the moment Bronwen vanished.
One second he was in her room and the next he was gone, boots pounding down the stone hall as he headed straight for the fastest horse in the Night Realm.
I stayed where I was.
Crouched beside Sebastian.
Wave after wave of pain tore through him, folding his body inward. Each surge stole the breath from his lungs and sent his shadows spiraling violently around us. They lashed through Bronwen’s chambers, snapping against the walls, the floor, the air itself.
The pain never hit me.
That was the worst part.
I felt the pressure of it through the bond—the strain, the violent pull against the connection between us—but none of it crossed fully into me. It was like standing beside a storm you knew should be tearing you apart, yet somehow it was only shredding the person next to you.
I understood the calculation immediately.
If she crippled one of us, the other would stay.
We wouldn’t leave each other behind.
She was right.
“Bash,” I whispered, rubbing slow circles into his back. “I’m here.”
His body was rigid beneath my hand, muscles locked tight as he fought not to scream.
“I am going to—” His breath hitched violently as another spike tore through him. “—make that bitch pay for everything.”
Sebastian froze. His shadows stopped thrashing.
“It’s gone,” he whispered.
I barely had time to process the words.
Before I could ask how he felt, his arms wrapped around my waist and pulled me tight against him as the world folded in on itself.
The castle disappeared.
The ground slammed back beneath my feet a heartbeat later.
We landed hard at the edge of the realm. Fog curled thick and cold around our legs, and ahead of us, the boundary shimmered. It pulsed softly, almost lazily, like it was aware we had arrived.
“Come out!” Sebastian roared into the veil of mist, his voice cracking with fury. “I know you’re listening.”
The sound ripped through the fog and echoed across the treeline before dissolving into the quiet hum of the barrier.
I scanned the forest instinctively, my gaze moving along the dark line of trees, searching for movement.
At their speed, Bronwen and August could already be close, but the woods showed nothing except shifting branches and the slow curl of fog across the ground.
“Bash,” I said urgently, stepping closer to him. “We need to help Bronwen.”
“He’s coming this way,” Sebastian snapped.
His eyes were fully black now, shadows writhing around his boots. Rage rolled off him in waves, thick and suffocating, the kind of anger that usually meant someone wouldn’t survive the next few minutes.
“She was stopping us from getting him long enough for him to reach the border. She wanted us here.” He faced the mist again, throwing his hands up. “So here we are. Stop hiding and come out, you old, controlling bitch!”
Then he turned back to me.
For a brief moment the storm behind his eyes softened, as if he had realized how he spoke to me. His hand lifted and settled against my cheek. “I will stop him when he gets here,” he said.
Before I could answer, the fog ahead of us stirred. Sebastian’s shadows reacted instantly, snapping outward in warning before slowly peeling back.
Figures began to emerge.
Guards came first. They stepped through the fog in perfect formation, tall and rigid in dark plate armor etched with sigils I didn’t recognize.
There were no colors marking allegiance, no banners or insignias tying them to any realm I knew.
Their helms were smooth and featureless. They didn’t belong to the Night Realm.
They didn’t belong to any realm.
More shapes appeared behind them, moving slower. At first I assumed they were fae being escorted forward, but the way they walked caught my attention. Their steps were uneven and hesitant.
Then I saw the iron.
Chains wrapped around their wrists, heavy links clinking softly with every movement. Their shoulders slumped beneath the weight of it.
And their ears—
Rounded.
Humans.
My breath caught painfully in my chest. I had read about them in old texts, heard fragments of stories that insisted they once existed here long ago, but I had never actually seen one.
Yet here they were.
In chains.
Their eyes moved across the woods with dull confusion and quiet fear, as if they had been dragged somewhere they didn’t understand and were waiting for whatever punishment came next.
Then she stepped forward.
Jewels dripped from her throat and wrists like drops of frozen light. A high collar framed her neck, stiff and immaculate. Her pale hair was braided tight against her scalp, every strand perfectly placed, not a single thread out of line.
Long gloves covered her hands, hiding them completely, as if she had no desire for the world to ever touch her skin. Her posture was perfect. Every movement measured, every step controlled.
My gaze lifted slowly to her face—and then to her eyes.
Green.
The same vivid, piercing green I had only ever seen on Bronwen’s face.
And Adar’s.
For half a heartbeat my mind tried to insist it was coincidence, but the truth had already settled into place before the thought finished forming.
Sebastian went rigid beside me, and I knew he had come to the same conclusion I had.
“I thought,” she said smoothly, her voice perfectly measured, “it was time I finally introduced myself.”
Queen Mother.
Her eyes locked on me—no, through me—and her mouth curved faintly, the expression almost indulgent. “There is no need for such formalities.”
Cold slid down my spine.
I knew—knew—I hadn’t said the name out loud.
“Please,” she continued smoothly, taking another measured step forward. The guards behind her remained perfectly still, unmoving statues of iron and silence. “Call me Evidannen. Or Evi, if you’d like.”
Sebastian moved before I could respond. He stepped directly in front of me, a solid wall of shadow and fury. “You don’t get to speak to her at all,” he said, his voice low and lethal.
Evidannen’s gaze shifted to him.
“Oh, Sebastian,” she said gently. “Still pretending you’re in control.”
The shadows surged, snapping forward like striking serpents—
—and then stopped.
Not because Sebastian willed them to.
Because she did.
The darkness froze mid-motion, trembling violently as if caught in an invisible hand. Sebastian’s shock slammed through the bond—raw disbelief followed immediately by furious resistance as he ripped his power back from her grip.
“You forget,” Sebastian said coldly, “that I am not a mindless follower like your other Sovereigns.”
Evidannen sighed softly, the sound full of quiet disappointment. “And that is precisely where the conflict lies.” She tilted her head. “You see, Sebastian—you were never supposed to exist.”
Sebastian went very still.
“At first,” she continued calmly, “I tried to handle the situation… ethically. I severed the bond between your parents. I compelled your father to take another bride and produce the next Sovereign. I even ensured your mother—and you—were kept comfortably. Safe. Fed. Every need met within the castle.”
Her lips curved slightly.
“But you couldn’t accept that, could you?”
The bond between Sebastian and me flared violently—rage hot and blistering.
“You felt entitled,” she continued. “So you killed your father and took the throne.”
I sucked in a breath.
That was not the truth.
“And when your true power awakened,” Evidannen said, her eyes glinting now, “that was when I realized you were no longer simply an inconvenience. You were a problem. You carry Sovereign blood that belongs to me mixed with blood that never should have touched it. You became something stronger than I intended. Something… nearly untouchable. So I decided to cut my losses and focus on the other realms.”
My chest tightened when her eyes locked onto mine.
“But when I learned your parents had mated and that they were having a child, I could not allow history to repeat itself.”
“You did that, too?” I whispered. “You killed my parents?”
“Oh no, Violet. I didn’t kill them.” Her smile turned wicked. “I made your father do it.”
One moment I was standing at the border of Queen Mother’s lands, Sebastian rigid at my side, shadows snarling at the air. The next, my vision shattered so violently it felt like the ground had been ripped out from under me.
For a disorienting second I thought I was falling, but the sensation was wrong. I wasn’t dropping—I was being pulled.
When the world steadied, I was no longer standing at the border.
I stood in the center of a village made of sun-baked stone and gold-veined earth.
The buildings curved instead of standing straight, their shapes designed to catch wind and sunlight.
Phoenix sigils had been carved everywhere—into doorframes, into archways, even into the ground beneath my feet like someone had written a history directly into the stone.
The Phoenix Village.
My chest seized as recognition struck me. I had never seen this place before. And yet I knew it instantly, the same way you know the sound of your own heartbeat.
Above me, the sky was alive.
Phoenixes wheeled through the air in blazing arcs of gold and scarlet.
Dozens of them cried out as they dove, wings burning so brightly they left streaks of fire across the sky.
Flames rained down in precise bursts, not wild or careless but controlled—tactical.
They burned through advancing Guards from other realms, armor melting where it touched the fire, bodies collapsing in the sand.
On the ground, fae fought back with equal ferocity.
And at the center of it all was him.
My father, Daemon.
I knew him immediately from the painting. His expression was fierce with focus as he moved through the battlefield like a weapon honed by years of war.
The air bent to his will.