Chapter Forty-Five #2
Retracing the same steps she had taken months ago, Aemyra felt as though history was repeating itself as she threw open the doors with a blast of furious fire. This time, she would not fail in saving her husband or freeing her territory.
But this time her husband wasn’t lounging across her throne, he was restrained on his knees at the base of it.
She skidded to a stop as the whip cracked.
The sound was violently loud, and Fiorean’s next scream shattered Aemyra’s heart as the skin of his back split apart.
Chanting priests lined the walls, a half dozen Covenanters surrounding the throne.
Blood dripped from the lines on Fiorean’s back, his shirt hanging in tatters, tendrils of auburn hair falling from its knot.
Aemyra could have burned this whole caisteal down at the sight of it.
Once again, with the people he loved threatened, Fiorean had dared not fight back. Her husband had done the unthinkable in order to save her, and was now making an offering of his body for his queen.
Aemyra burned with rage as she stepped into the room and the priests ceased their chanting.
Alfred still held the whip in his hand, and the wet strands painted the floor at his feet with splatters of blood.
The promise mark burned hotter than ever before as Aemyra made ready to fulfill her oath.
It was fitting that it would happen here, in the very same room where she had made the promise.
Alfred had been marked for death for months.
Her fear still lingered, and Aemyra suspected it would never fully go away, but she wouldn’t let it control her.
“Get your hands off my husband,” she growled, summoning every dreg of magic she possessed until her arms were coated in golden flames.
Aemyra had once imagined torturing Alfred for weeks, peeling his skin away from his flesh with a blunt knife and burning his lips until they flaked off his face.
Now she just wanted him gone.
There would be no lengthy, gloating speeches, no drawn-out torment. She had suffered for months because of what this man had done to her.
They all deserved to be free.
“You like whips, priest?” she hissed, drips of flame cascading from her right palm to form a lash of fire unspooling at her feet. “You have much to atone for.”
“Your magic? How—”
Aemyra smiled, allowing the whip to coil tauntingly around her wrist. “Your Chosen priests aren’t the only ones capable of conducting experiments. Except we don’t torture people in order to get results.”
She looked at the priests gathered in the room and began to preach. “Whoever pursues righteousness and kindness will find the Savior’s light, for in everything, you must do unto others as you would have done to you.”
Alfred puffed up in indignation. “How did you—”
Aemyra smirked. “The little black book Elizabeth lent me was most instructive. I do believe you have turned your back on the word of the very being you claim to care so much about.”
Priests began scrambling for the exit, and Aemyra let them go. They would meet their ends in the jaws of a chimera soon enough.
Delicious heat snaked up her spine, and it was a struggle for Aemyra to rein in her magic as Alfred dropped the whip and began to tremble.
“But why don’t you ask the Savior yourself what he thinks of your methods?” Aemyra asked, lashing the whip with a satisfying crack and a scattering of embers that had more priests fleeing the room.
“Stand your ground! She is but one woman,” Alfred yelled, holding his pendant before him. “Her infernal magic cannot be used against us.”
Then Fiorean spoke, eyes on the blood-splattered ground before him, his voice weak. “M-my queen, my l-light.”
Raising her gaze to the golden throne she had never sat upon, and the magnificent stained-glass wall beyond, Aemyra plunged into her magic.
She was Aemyra Daercathian, daughter of Draevan Daercathian, and Queen of Tìr Teine. She had slain one dragon and Bonded another.
Finding a way around Alfred’s pendant was child’s play.
Aemyra pulled at every shimmering thread of magic she possessed.
“What are you waiting for?” Alfred cried out, shoving one Covenanter toward Aemyra. “Cut her down where she stands!”
Eyes fixed on the stained-glass wall, Aemyra lit herself up from within.
Shining like a miniature sun, she harnessed her entire gift until she became radiant with power.
Light surged through her veins, visible through her skin.
She could feel Fiorean shielding from her magic as every ember of her power pressed to be let loose.
Aemyra was standing before Alfred and she was no longer afraid.
She thrust the light away from her and it refracted off the stained glass behind the throne. Aemyra closed her eyes just as the brightest flash seared across her eyelids. Screams met her ears as Alfred and every Covenanter was blinded.
Chest heaving and legs shaking, Aemyra released her hold on the magic and the brightness dimmed.
“What have you done?” Alfred cried from beside the throne, arms out in front of him, groping blindly in midair.
“You wanted to walk in the light, did you not?” Aemyra asked, gasping for breath from the immense use of magic.
Eyes open once more, Fiorean swiped the discarded knives from the floor and spun on his knees. The Covenanters who had been restraining him both fell as he sliced the backs of their legs in a spray of blood, then rose to plunge the blades into their necks.
Aemyra had never seen anything so glorious.
Without hesitation or remorse, Aemyra pulled back her whip of flame and lashed it around Alfred’s neck.
His skin began to sizzle and blacken, the priest scrabbling at his throat.
Aemyra strode up the steps as Fiorean forced Alfred to his knees.
“Let go of me, you heathen swine,” Alfred hissed, clawing at Fiorean. “Get your unworthy hands off me.”
Suddenly, Aemyra had more to say.
“You should use the proper tone when you address the king consort,” she hissed down at the priest.
Alfred stopped struggling.
“You think that your people will accept him?” A bubble of blood burst at the corner of Alfred’s mouth as he laughed. “Fiorean is damaged goods, tainted by both sides. He has no place.”
“My place is by the side of my wife,” Fiorean said. “Aemyra is my blood, my soul, from now until the end of our days.”
Alfred stopped struggling, his unseeing eyes wide.
“Vengeance is yours, my queen,” Fiorean said.
Aemyra bent at the waist to ensure the priest heard her words, letting the whip fizzle out.
“I pray you never know peace in death. I will restore every temple you destroyed, Dùileach magic shall flourish, and the might of dragons will once again fill the skies above Tìr Teine,” she said, every word dripping venom as Alfred fought Fiorean’s hold.
“A woman now wears the crown, and you have failed.”
Alfred let out a garbled cry he never got to finish as Aemyra nodded at Fiorean.
Her husband was swift with his deliverance as he looped a hand around Alfred’s neck and burned his throat away.
He was owed this vengeance as much as any of them.
Together they watched as the Athair died, the strangled cries of his melting vocal cords harmonizing with the grisly snarls of the chimeras who had finally gotten into the caisteal.
Aemyra gasped as her palm began to itch and the promise mark faded. Her oath to Brigid was now fulfilled.
Fiorean threw Alfred’s body away, blood weeping in rivers down his back, and Aemyra caught him with a grunt as his knees gave out. Intense pain shot through her abdomen and exhaustion tugged the edges of her vision.
Fiorean rested his sweat-soaked forehead against hers.
“I am well,” he mumbled.
The sounds of rallying soldiers came from the corridor, and Aemyra hoped it was Sir Gavin coming to their aid.
“You’ll be lucky to escape blood fever this time,” she said ruefully, feeling the open flaps of skin on his back.
Almost delirious with the pain, Fiorean clasped Aemyra’s face and kissed her full on the mouth.
“Good thing I’m married to a healer then,” he murmured against her lips.
Having to support his weight, Aemyra staggered slightly. “If you die now, my father will make your afterlife a misery,” she threatened, a sob choking up her throat.
Heavy footsteps preceded Thear and Brodie’s return to the throne room, and the chimera warrior skidded to a stop at the scene before him.
Even his bronze complexion paled as he beheld the extent of Fiorean’s injuries.
The warrior’s voice was low but insistent. “We must move. My trodach and the city guard can overthrow the Covenanters, but it will take time. And a more defensible location.”
Brodie palmed two fighting knives. “The rebels have been using the temple catacombs to hide and have joined the fight.”
Biting her lip, Aemyra was shocked when Fiorean pushed himself to a standing position. Either he had regained a little strength or his pride wouldn’t allow him to look weaker than Thear.
Struggling to support Fiorean’s weight, Aemyra muttered, “Brigid spare me.”
The sound of a fight between the royal guard and the Covenanters reached them from two floors below and Aemyra tensed. “We make for the kitchens.”
Another pain rippling through her, Aemyra turned to Thear. “Can you carry him for me?” she asked, knowing her husband was in no condition to walk to the kitchens.
“I would rather be whipped again,” Fiorean drawled as Thear’s lip curled. “You carried your father for half a mile—you can’t carry me down a flight of stairs?”
Muttering expletives about the ridiculousness of men, Aemyra grasped Fiorean’s wrist and curled one arm around the back of his knees. Hoisting him over her shoulders, she had a sneaking suspicion that her husband was smirking at Thear behind her back.