Chapter Twelve
Daxton Aegaeon
Home, I was somehow home in… Silver Meadows.
I awoke to the familiar sensation of the plush chaise fabric beneath my palm.
The smell of books paired with the wild mountain air through a cracked window settled my center, mending what was broken and torn apart in the dungeons beneath Aelius’s keep.
The sunlight, glorious, blazing sunlight, skittered along my lap as I sat up and gazed across my library.
It was quiet.
Warning bells sounded in my head, cautioning me of a looming doom hiding within the silence. I needed to investigate what was going on. I blinked, teleporting myself outside the palace, scanning over Silver Meadows below.
Tilting my chin upward, I detected the faint scent of smoke in the breeze. Spinning around, my breath stilled, witnessing the blazing scene unfolding before me.
The Summit was burning.
Screams echoed across the grounds, with countless fae frantically running, trying to stop the ravenous flames from burning them alive.
I reached for my ice magic to contain the destruction, but when I called, nothing came. My magic, my well of power, went silent. I could not call upon my father’s gift to save my people.
How was I going to stop this?
“Dax!” Castor called from inside the flames.
“Daxton!” Gunnar’s scream erupted next.
“No!” I lunged forward into the flames, disregarding the threat of the smoldering walls collapsing around me. “Cas! Gunnar!” I shouted, coughing as I pushed through the thick clouds of smoke.
I sprinted through the burning entryway.
My arms brushed against the sweltering flames, but not even the pain of the burns could stop me from reaching them.
I frantically ripped away the fabric along my arm, realizing this fire was magically conjured and hot enough to cause our stone walls to crumble.
My skin bubbled and blistered, but I forced that matter aside.
“Cas!” I roared again. “Gunnar!”
This fire could not be doused by water or smothered by dirt. It burned until the source was extinguished, or the caster was killed or drained. I knew of only a handful of fae or mages capable of this type of magic, but they were nowhere in sight.
“Dax!” My brother’s scream roared from the staircase.
Forgoing my own safety, I ran as fast as my feet could carry me toward the sound of his voice.
Smoke burned my lungs as my vision began to blur. The heat of the flames was hot enough to melt the surrounding stone. Skidding to a halt at the bottom of the broken stairs, my stomach dropped.
I tilted my head toward the glass skylight. The ceiling had shattered from the swell of gathering heat. The Summit was crumbling to pieces before my eyes.
“Daxton!”
At the top of the steps, I scarcely recognized the silhouette of Castor leaning on Gunnar’s shoulder through the rising smoke. I sucked in a sharp breath as the fumes began to clear, revealing how badly their bodies were blistered and burned.
I watched in horror as my brother’s eyes turned black.
Gunnar’s head tilted to the side, sensing Castor’s magic, and it only took a breath for him to understand.
“No! No, no, no!” I screamed as Gunnar’s stare met mine.
He bravely gave me a nod, not a single ounce of fear in his eyes, as the ground beneath them collapsed and erupted in flames.
“Castor! Gunnar!” I screamed. “No!” I roared, crumbling to my knees, uncertain what to do or think.
“Your Highness!” a male exclaimed, grasping my smoldering flesh and forcing me to my feet. The pain from my burns brought me back. “You need to escape! We can’t lose you, too!”
I blindly followed his lead, retreating to the main doors and jumping through the fires once more to the Summit entrance.
My heart shattered as the vision of Castor and Gunnar replayed inside my mind, a well of sorrow and regret drowning me on solid ground. The chasm of grief tore through me as a dark void settled in my center.
My brother and Gunnar were…
I couldn’t breathe.
My brother was dead. Gunnar was dead.
“Witnessing this is far better than anything I could’ve hoped for.”
Anjani…
I would eradicate her existence in this life and the next if it was the last thing I did.
Without warning, the sound of a blade slicing through flesh and bone rang out, followed by the muffled screams of death and a stream of crimson flowing toward my feet. Turning, I gasped in sheer horror at the sight of Adohan and Idris’s headless corpses splayed across my own steps.
“The twins are already handled,” Anjani said.
White-hot rage clouded my vision as I looked up to see none other than Anjani with a blood-soaked blade, with Rhett and Seamus standing on either side of her.
I lunged for them, summoning Valencia to my hand as I charged forward.
“Fool.” Anjani laughed as she snapped her fingers.
My eyes sprang open, and I vomited across the cobblestones. My limbs convulsed uncontrollably as I struggled to remain upright.
I half-heartedly glanced at the burns along my arms. The pain of my wounds was the least of my concerns.
“Dreams can become reality when properly enticed within the confines of your mind,” Anjani said in a low voice.
Rhett and Anjani were both inside the cell, but I couldn’t muster the strength to attack. My chains were latched to bolts in the rock, and I was still shaken from the illusion, unable to right myself just yet.
Fucking hell, I watched them all die.
Everything about her illusion somehow seemed so real.
How?
“You record everything we needed?” Anjani asked Rhett. “The tonic seemed to help strengthen my magic.”
I glanced sideways at the scroll keeper. My eyes burned with disgust and swirling rage.
“It was masterful,” Rhett said with an all-knowing grin, jotting notes on parchment. “Losing your hand has not hindered the cunning nature of your magic, it seems.”
Anjani scowled at Rhett, retrieving the torch that aided in the burns coating my arms. She walked to the door of the cell and held it open for her companion to pass through before locking it behind them.
“Oh, just wait,” she purred in delight. “Wait until I add your pretty little mongrel of a mate to these illusions.”
I growled at her, baring my teeth, unable to restrain my wrath.
“Protest all you want. You won’t even know it’s happening. This was a mere stop in our journey to break you from the inside out.”
“You can… try,” I rasped, forcing myself to sit upright.
“You do see the irony in this. Don’t you?” Anjani asked with an inquisitive grin.
The silent, desolate stare of Silver Shadow was my only response.
“You didn’t claim her.”
Even Rhett tilted his head in curiosity at Anjani’s words.
“What?” I rasped.
Anjani laughed wickedly as she tapped the base of her neck.
“You didn’t claim her according to shifter customs. And then you sent her straight into the arms of another male who would do anything to have her.
” Her piercing laughter mimicked the deafening screech of nails scratching against stone.
“Into the hands of a powerful alpha who would love nothing more than to mark her as his chosen mate. Perhaps Gilen will believe this is fate finally turning in his favor. The Gods allowing her to return without a claiming mark.”
“Skylar would never—”
“Never what?” Anjani challenged as she sucked her teeth. “She would never make a sacrifice to save those she loves? She would never trade herself to the alpha in exchange for the dagger in order to successfully complete the trials?”
My world stopped.
Anjani’s wicked smile only grew, witnessing my reaction. “You didn’t claim her!” she taunted, tapping her neck. “You didn’t claim her! You didn’t claim her!” She laughed again.
My stomach plummeted as despair wound its way through the cracks of my breaking heart. My chest ached. My center shredded apart as if my very soul was on the verge of fading into nothing.
“No,” I rasped.
Rhett and Anjani exchanged smug glances before turning on their heels and leaving the prison cell, driving a fictional death blow straight through my bleeding heart.