Chapter 9
MIRELLA
They’re far from the castle, safe, except that Marlak didn’t make it. Why am I seeing them? Why am I getting glimpses of that island if my brother’s not there?
“Come with me,” Zorwal says, his voice too calm, too controlled.
He didn’t even order any guards to try to find them, certain that they transcended away. And most of them did, in what is likely the most powerful display of transcending magic I have ever seen. Azur. Who could have guessed?
Zorwal leads me to the council room, which looks eerie and empty without anyone here, without even guards to open the doors.
Even if the castle’s intact, I feel like we’re walking into ruins of something that’s no longer true.
Ruins of my childhood, perhaps, those glimpses of happiness so far away that time has already dissolved them.
I face him and realize I’m standing at the edge of an abysm.
Perhaps I should have escaped while I could, but then I wouldn’t be here.
I wish I could fly again, feel only sky above me and land below.
That soothing, numbing nothingness. A silly, childish thought.
Peace will never find me while I don’t have my revenge.
Maybe it will never find me regardless—but I can’t falter.
He takes the highest chair in the room, which I suppose is his now, then stares at me with his beady, dark eyes. “So you’ve been keeping secrets from me, Mirella?”
I can still muster the voice of the child I was not too long ago, the sweet, youthful tone from before all those years with no talking. “What do you mean by secrets?”
He chuckles, then roars, “You found Marlak! Not once, twice. You saw him at the Jewel City, went there and found him. And now you intercepted him in this very castle. What is it?”
I sigh. “Sometimes… I have hunches.”
“Hunches. Where is Marlak now?”
“I do not know.” And indeed I cannot see him. All I see is an island, and he’s not there.
He leans forward. “You have absolutely no idea? Tell me one place where he could be. One hunch.”
I swallow. “In this castle. But I don’t have a hunch about that. It’s a possibility.”
“He got through our guards, our security. How did you find him?”
“I assumed he would come to the castle. To pick up something.” My father’s secret journals, to be precise, but I don’t tell Zorwal that. Instead, I look down as if embarrassed. “It… made sense.”
He steps down from his chair and stops in front of me. “Look into my eyes, Mirella.”
I do as he says. For some reason, my eyes are misty with tears, and I make no effort to hide them. “Yes?”
“Don’t you want to be queen? To safeguard your birthright?” His voice sounds melodious, calming.
For the first time, I hear it for what it is; compelling magic. Strange magic that can affect even a high fae. Strange magic that caught me in its web, that cursed me to a dreadful fate.
“I value my birthright. I always did.”
“Then Marlak must die. As long as he lives, the throne won’t be yours. The crown won’t be yours. His mother ensorcelled your father. Killed your mother. Don’t you want to avenge her?”
I don’t even need to try to use vague words or circumvent the truth. “Revenge is my biggest wish. It’s what wakes me up in the morning.”
“Then if you have a hunch, a vision about Marlak, even if you’re not sure, tell me. Can you promise it?”
“Yes. If I have a hunch about Marlak, I promise I’ll tell you about it.”
“Well, good. You don’t want anything standing between you and your crown.”
I nod even if my ears discern the power embedded in his words, the command, even if I’m immune to it for some reason.
All it does is stir that infinite pot of anger sitting in my insides, ready to consume everything around me. And yet I can’t let it explode. Proper revenge needs craftiness, patience, precision. My fury will have to wait.
MARLAK
The swirl pulling me rotates faster than ever in a dizzying, disconcerting spin. At least it’s quick. Not a second can be wasted, when so much is at stake.
When I feel the rocky edge of the island, I pull myself up, then see Astra running towards me with a relieved, happy, gorgeous smile.
My clothes are drenched, but I don’t care, I pull her towards me for a kiss. A long kiss full of yearning, desire, and love. For a moment, there are no problems surrounding us. The dark cloud is gone. There’s only me and my wife, my azalee, together in eternity.
Astra breaks the kiss and asks, “What happened?”
It’s when I notice curious eyes around me. My brother, Ferer, Lidiane, Ziven, and even Azur are standing nearby. Wait. Why is my brother unchained? No matter.
“Zorwal was distracted, so I took the opportunity to get to the secret compartment,” I say, and turn to Lidiane. “Your magic worked once they didn’t have their eyes on me. And I got the journal.” I smile.
Astra looks at my empty hands. “Where?”
I kiss her cheek. “You know where.”
She frowns at first, then gives me a knowing look. “Oh.”
I look at my brother. “I’ll be right back to discuss the contents.” As much as I don’t fully trust him, it’s true that he was the one who led me to the box, and he knows a lot about magic.
Renel narrows his eyes. “Don’t tell me you stuck the journal up your ass.”
“Some bizarre imagination you got.” I snort and pull Astra’s hand, then turn to the others. “I’ll be right back.”
Renel raises an eyebrow. “So you actually need privacy to get it out?”
“Exactly.”
Bemused, I head to my bedroom and close the door behind Astra and I.
She sits on the bed and whispers,“You worried me.”
I take her hand and plant a kiss on its palm. “I know. And I’m sorry. But it was then or never… and if this journal can help us…”
“I understand. Also… Lidiane brought a drop of Zorwal’s blood.”
I can barely believe her words. “Blood? How did she get it?”
“She pricked him with a pin. I licked it, to try to save Azur.”
Based on her tone, I can already guess it didn’t work. “And?”
“His magic can heal the physical body, but can’t reverse magical poisoning. I’m trying to use my light on him, but Zorwal’s power is muddling it, I think.”
I consider her words. “Do you think your light can heal him?”
“For now, I’m just hoping it can slow the spread enough to give us time to find a cure.”
“Two weeks is more than enough.” At least I hope so, and I don’t want to give any voice to the part of me fearing we’ll fail. “The Witch King should be dead by then.”
She shakes her head. “His fingers are all white. He has a day or two at most.”
I can’t manage to feel any worry for Azur, but I do worry about Lidiane, and my stomach sinks. At the same time, I think Astra might be right about her own magic. “Your light is powerful. It might work.”
She gives me a tense smile, then says, “Let’s get this journal, then. Do you want me to help you pull it from your behind?” At least she graces me with a lovely, playful chuckle.
“I’m wondering where my brother got that idea.”
“Pulled it right from his ass, no doubt.”
I chuckle, then close my eyes and think about the enchanted suitcase. When I open my eyes, the relic is lying on the bed.
Astra looks at it carefully. “I thought you couldn’t transcend objects to this island.”
“I wasn’t sure myself, but decided to try. I’m guessing it depends on the object.”
I open the suitcase, then take the journal from it. “That’s all that was in the box.”
Flipping some pages, I realize they’re handwritten notes—in my stepfather’s writing.
Astra cranes her neck to look at it. “Are you going to show it to your brother?”
“I should, right? He told me about this.”
She places a hand on my arm. “But you don’t trust him.”
“I don’t know. But then… I assume he wants to survive. And he’s trying to help—despite everything he’s done. And he saved my life.”
My words don’t even make sense to me, when a flurry of emotions battle in my chest. I swallow.
“I truly don’t know, wife. In one moment, I hate my brother for taking my throne, for allying with Zorwal, for everything I went through.
And then it all goes away and I understand that he had to make terrible choices, and that his life wasn’t easy.
But at the same time, he was there, pretending to be king.
Of course it was easy. There was a lot of selfishness in his choices.
He saved me, yes, but he also cast me away, where I could have been easily killed.
I was almost killed a bunch of times. Then I think about Mirella, and I’m so angry she had to spend all those years in that tower.
Angry that my brother didn’t even tell me where she was, that he let her go through this.
Oh, it was a curse, there was nothing I could do.
But it’s not like he tried. And then he kidnapped you and put me in that prison. ”
Astra runs a hand through my hair and I close my eyes, her touch so soft.
She says, “The contents of the journal are for you, and the coffer opened for you only. You don’t need to share it with anyone.
At the same time, if your brother wants to help, let him help.
It doesn’t mean you forgive him. And you don’t need to forgive him if your heart is not ready. These things take time.”
I pick up the journal, snap it shut, and get up. “We need all the help we can get.”
“We do.” Astra nods and gets up, and we go to the kitchen.
Astra sits at a table and I go outside to call my brother and my friends. Everyone comes in, except Azur, who’s still afraid of becoming an instrument of the Witch King. I don’t blame him. If anything, I appreciate that he’s not willing to hear our secrets.
I sit by Astra and open the journal, while my brother, Lidiane, Ferer, and Ziven sit at the table.
Renel glances at it. “Was this all you found?”
“Yes,” I say. “But it’s clearly meant for me.”
I open it and read it out loud.
Marlak,