Chapter 10 #2
The heat gathering inside me confessed louder than any words.
“Why do I want to kill any man who dares look at you?” he whispered.
“Like the men you’re parading me in front of?” I hissed back at him.
He said nothing. Just kept tracing fire across my skin, and I—stars above, I wanted more.
“Why does my crystal rage when we’re apart?” His fingers brushed against the edge of me, not entering, just resting. Teasing. “And why does it shine brightest when I touch you like this?”
“I…” I shook my head. Because I had no answer.
Only panic and heat and the urge to scream.
My silence betrayed me.
I couldn’t let myself believe it. Because if I did, I’d already lost.
“Please…” I whispered. “Stop.”
Don’t make me want this. Don’t make this real.
After a pause, he pulled away. Relief instantly washed through me, but then it vanished, chased by a longing left by his touch. And that was the worst part. That I missed it the moment it was gone.
I pulled my arms into myself, curling in as much as I could.
I was already losing this battle. It would only be a matter of time before I surrendered to him.
How could I possibly resist someone the gods had fated to me?
It didn’t matter that I hated him. It didn’t even matter that we were enemies.
Our crystals proved we were meant to be.
Even without mine, I felt it pulsing in my bones — this bond between us that was carved from starlight, merciless and unbreakable.
“Gate ahead!”
I flinched at Emerias’ voice. Shadowmane halted as the others followed suit, hooves crunching on the frostbitten road.
Sapphire lights flickered ahead. Thousands of them blurred behind a veil of fog that covered the land.
Luthrin’s Gate rose above it like a sleeping giant perched at the edge of the realm, its breath blanketing everything in mist. As the torches came into view—and with them, the pale blue gleam of Moonstone armour—Shadowmane snorted, red smoke pouring through his nose, and all the other horses halted behind him.
An iron bridge stood between us and the entrance.
I tipped my head back, but the wall was so huge that even the top of it disappeared into the fog.
Emerias pulled up beside us. Daigen gave him a silent nod. Several Bloodstones followed him across the bridge. Their king did not. Daigen stayed with me. Unease curled beneath my ribs. Why were we the only ones at the Gate? Where were the other travelers?
“Why have we stopped?”
Daigen adjusted the reins, then pulled me against him, locking me in place again.
“You’ll see.”
I wanted to climb out of his hold, but I didn’t. I focused on Emerias approaching the Gate and the blue lights that flickered towards him. Two Moonstone guards stepped into view, their blue torchlight warping across their silver armour.
“Who goes there?” one of them called.
Emerias didn’t answer. He reached into his cloak and tossed something.
A bag of coins hit the ground. Someone picked them up.
“No one passes,” the guard said, but kept the coins. “We’re under orders to let no one through.”
The Sunstone stayed calm when he responded: “Why is that?”
“’Cause we fuckin’ said so,” the other sneered. “So why don’t you and yer mutts fuck off back to the Tree ‘til the Stargala’s over. Unless you came here lookin’ for a fight?”
The guards held out their weapons, and I could sense the Bloodstones bristling beneath their cloaks.
Emerias held out a hand, signalling for them to hold back.
Although the wall was covered by fog, I had no doubt the Moonstone guards patrolling it were ready to attack at any second.
We needed to get through the Gate undetected but I couldn’t see how that was possible. Yet Emerias’ tone didn’t falter.
“We don’t want a fight. Just what was promised.”
“Are you fuckin’ deaf?” the shorter guard spat. “No one gets through this Gate until the Stargala’s over!”
Emerias’ horse shifted, and the Moonstone guards lifted their bows.
“Go on,” the other warned. “Give me a reason to shoot that sun-fucked face of yours.”
My grip turned white on the saddle. So this was the path the Bloodstones rode, every corner just another blade waiting to be sharpened on them. I knew how that felt.
“What say I buy you and your captain some ale,” Emerias called back, “and some serving wenches to keep you warm for the night?”
There were no traces of hostility in his voice. The perfect negotiator.
One of the guards looked straight at me. His expression suddenly changed, a look I knew too well and made me shrink back against Daigen.
“Didn’t know you already brought one to keep us warm. Bring ‘er back ‘ere and we’ll see how she—”
He fell silent when Daigen moved behind me.
The air changed as soon as his boots hit the ground, crackling with magic, and something dangerous that even sent a shiver through me.
“Who the fuck are you?” the guard barked.
Daigen just looked at him while slowly removing a glove.
Then he lifted a hand.
The crossbow turned, pointed at the guard’s companion, and fired.
The arrow shot through the warrior’s throat, and the guard just stood there, watching as his comrade died.
“Tell your captain,” Daigen said, very slowly, “that if he does not open this Gate, I will raze his walls to the ground and string garlands of his men from the ruins. Tell him King Daigen waits for no one.”
“K-King?” the guard stammered. “I – I didn’t know!”
“You never do,” Daigen said with a sneer. “Until it’s too late. Now crawl back to your captain like the little rat you are.”
The guard scrambled away without looking back.
The gate groaned open merely seconds later, the chains reeling it in slowly.
The mist breathed and then parted, revealing the way through to the tunnels that lay beyond.
Daigen’s magic laced the air again. A protective ward spread around the Bloodstones, shimmering like moonlight against water.
He glanced at me, his face expressionless, except for his eyes which burned with hate.
“Do you see them now, Narya? Your people.”
His voice tasted as bitter as the bile on the back of my tongue.
The rest of the horses moved aside to let us through.
Shadowmane held himself tall as he walked to Daigen’s side, his red mane tossing when he came to halt beside him.
In one swift movement, Daigen climbed onto his back, and once more wrapped his arms around me.
Once the Gate finished opening and Shadowmane moved through it, Daigen whispered into my ear.
“You’re about to see who the real savages are in this world.”
I said nothing. I couldn’t. Not too long ago I’d believed the rumours about the Bloodstones. Now I wasn’t sure what to believe anymore. Maybe the savagery wasn’t born from the Bloodstones after all.
We passed through the tunnels quietly. Sapphire torches flickered on the walls, casting light over merchants who didn’t speak and guards who barely blinked at us.
Children chased after the horses with stones but none of the Bloodstones retaliated.
Not even when a guard spat at Emerias, or one of the merchants dumped waste across their path.
But when a stone ricocheted off Daigen’s magic, the air went razor-thin, and all the light seemed to bend towards Daigen as he turned to the child.
He lifted his hand once, and the stone that struck the ward rose from the ground and shattered against the wall.
"Next will be your heads,” he warned them, and they dropped their stones.
Even the merchants went pale and the guards lowered their weapons as the children ran off screaming.
Was this really how Bloodstones were treated outside their kingdom? How their king was treated? No wonder there was hatred between the kingdoms.
And yet, it was no different from how I was treated back home.
Although the Moonstone children never threw stones at me. They just used whatever they could find in the market compost bins.
But this… this felt so much worse.
I was a nobody. Daigen was a king.
No wonder he hated my kind.
A chill settled over me as we emerged from the tunnels.
The blue torchlight faded behind us, replaced by the golden flare of Sunstone fire burning in the guards’ hands.
Beyond them, pale white trees with gold leaves shimmered beneath the Sunstone crest. I had crossed the border into another kingdom, but the line I couldn’t uncross was the one drawing deep inside me.
The quiet shame that had stirred awake before we entered the tunnels and was now growing stronger.
“Is it always like this?” I whispered, ashamed to even look at him.
“This is the real world, darling,” came his bitter reply. “Now you’ll see the cruelty your people play in it.”
According to our teachings, Daigen’s men should have drawn their weapons and massacred those people.
Where was the barbaric, mindless savagery I’d grown up hearing about?
The lack of restraint I had anticipated even now?
Instead, it was my people who had been the uncivilised lot. A thread of shame swept through me.
I turned and met his eyes. “I’m sorry, I… I didn’t know it was like this.”
He said nothing. His arm just tightened around my waist.
I faced forward again, wondering what more my people had lied to us about.
The silence stretched between us while Shadowmane led the way again, broken only by the sound of hooves and the wind whispering through sun-scorched trees.
“What happens once we cross the border?” I finally asked.
Daigen didn’t answer right away.
But I felt it, the lightest brush of his lips against my hair.
“You’ll be mine.”
I told myself that would never happen.
That I would fight him to the bitter end.
But something inside me was already unraveling, and gods help me…
I longed for it.