28. Caldamir
All was not wellin the Mountain Court.
It hadn’t been, not for a long time. Not just since Mordrigal’s return, but from long before that.
All had not been well in Avarath since before the first war, and now that war was once again upon us, it was not going to be right for a long time, still. Not as long as Mordrigal had anything to do with it.
Nearly a month had passed since I lost my court to the high king. A month of agony, of numbness of the mind, of bouts of blackness from which I only seemed to awaken after I’ve been made to do something terrible. It was five hundred years since Mordrigal had his hold on me, but never for a single moment did I forget what it was like to be held under his rule.
Or, at least, I thought I hadn’t forgotten—but some things fade with time, as much as we don’t wish them to.
Others didn’t fade as much as we might wish they would.
We’d grown too used to our freedom, the Mountain Fae.
Perhaps I’d not forgotten what it was like to be under the high king’s rule. Perhaps I hadn’t grown soft in the years since he left. Perhaps he’d just grown more twisted. More cruel. More calloused.
Mordrigal had lost his court, every last one of the High Fae, to Delphine’s power.
He had only the Mountain Court now, though the rest of the courts were quickly falling into line. But he showed no love for us, not even the slightest regard. As far as he was concerned, we were like the humans he’d once wished to enslave now, too. We were insects to him, mere tools and pawns for him to use in pursuit of his own desires.
Desires that didn’t stop with Avarath and Alderia as we’d feared, desires that would have him reaching his fingers into every court of every realm until every creature—fae, human, and fiend—bowed to his will. It was a perversion of what Avarath stood for, of what the very glamour that shaped this world intended.
The high kings were set in place to rule in unison, to protect the realms from exactly what Mordrigal set out to do. With Delphine banished and silent and Deimos locked in the Afterworld, he was closer to accomplishing this than he’d ever been in the past war. At least then, the fear of Deimos had kept him from going on a rampage until the courts forced him into it. Now, the only thing stopping him was his own desire to keep any fae from entering the Afterworld so that Deimos regained strength.
It was a double-edged sword, this strategy of his. It meant that blood was not running through Avarath, yet, but there were fates he could condemn us to that were worse than death.
Fates that I and my kin were now being forced to carry out.
I felt dirtier this time around, doing his bidding. It was more than just the acts themselves, more than the loss of my own autonomy under the power of his glamour. At least in the last war, I was bid to act like a warrior, like my court was born to act. I lived by the sword at his past commands. Now he had me behaving more like a spymaster, a torturer.
All was not well in Avarath, but it was far worse within the halls of the Mountain Court.
This place had become a prison more than ever, and I, its jailer.
I felt the hum of Mordrigal’s power like a dull whisper in my ear at all times. More than that, his glamour wrapped around my mind, clouding certain parts of it, even from me. I might be the jailer here, but I was a prisoner, too. The plagues and famine that the loss of the glamour had brought might be gone, but it had been replaced with a far more pervasive kind of tyranny.
Those who had sought shelter in my court were now prisoners more than any. Though the other courts had rebelled against their princes, they hadn’t yet fallen completely in line with Mordrigal’s power, a fact that infuriated him more by the day.
I’d spent little time in my court in the months leading up to Mordrigal’s return. What had once felt like home now felt more like a mausoleum, a maze of hallways and passages filled only with the haunting memories of a time before.
“Caldamir, I wondered if I might find you here.”
My sister’s voice pulled me back to the present, a sound that might have once brought me joy to hear again, but now only filled my stomach with bitter bile.
I stood, but not fast enough.
“Avinthe …”
Her eyes told me everything I needed to know.
“I’m sure she’s safe, Caldamir.”
I sank back down onto the bed as my sister came to sit beside me. I was too tired to be embarrassed that she’d found me here, yet again, and in the state that I was currently in.
I wasn’t in my own quarters, the prince’s wing. I was in a sick bed that had last been used by a human girl in the midst of turning into a half fae. I’d slept here every night since I returned, every night that Mordrigal didn’t have me doing his bidding, and spent every waking hour trying to avoid it, unsuccessfully. Delphine had spent only a short time here as my prisoner, but the memory of her haunted this space as if she’d spent a lifetime between these walls.
I couldn’t escape her memory, even if she’d escaped Mordrigal.
I should be happy she’d gone from Avarath, but I couldn’t sleep not knowing she was safe. There’d been no word from Elysia, no news of her from the other courts. If she was hiding in that Starlight realm, I couldn’t blame her. I’d be happy she was safe. Even if that meant I was never able to see her again, even if Mordrigal conquered every other court and took the human realm for himself, too, as long as she remained outside of his reach—out of my reach now, too—I’d at least be able to live with myself. As long as she lived, I could too.
But not knowing, not knowing if my failure to protect myself from the high king of Avarath had caused her harm, it ate me from the inside like nothing else. To know I’d brought her to this fate, that I was the one who fetched her from the safety of the human realm and had thrown her into the path of fate, dragged her to the altar and had drawn my sword against her myself…
“Caldamir …”
My sister’s hand reached out to touch mine, but I pulled away.
“Hiding in here isn’t going to protect her, you know. It certainly isn’t going to bring her back.”
Her words failed to stir in me the reassurance she intended. Anger surged inside me, an emotion I’d grown all too accustomed to in my long life. That rage had served me well as a commander, it had strengthened the swing of my sword so many times against my enemies, but now I felt it simmering only for myself.
“The last place I want her to be is here,” I growled, eyes fixed ahead.
Avinthe started reaching for me again, the purr of her voice, soft as mine was made of gravel, building in the back of her throat. I didn’t want to hear the pretty words she’d prepared for me, so I cut her off.
“Not because of Mordrigal, because of me.”
She paused for a second, understanding dawning in the eyes that matched mine. “You wouldn’t harm her, Caldamir.”
The anger in me dulled a little, at her words.
I let my head fall forward into my hands, and this time when she reached to touch my shoulder, I didn’t shy away. Her touch soothed me in the way only she could. She’d had a way of dampening my anger ever since we were children, taking away the very worst of my rage with a simple graze of her hand. It was part of why I pulled away from her when she tried.
I wanted to feel my rage, my anger, my bitterness. I deserved it.
But now, as the cloak of it fell away, I was forced to feel everything that anger was hiding underneath.
“I can’t resist him, Avinthe. None of us can.”
I fixated on my naked wrist, where the bracelet that had protected me from succumbing to Mordrigal’s glamour had become a fixture. It had been difficult even then, not to let the high king’s command, even from afar, overpower my own will. Resisting it had taken every ounce of my strength, and yet here I was. Resisting had been futile. Perhaps if I’d given in, then Armene and the others would have been forced to dispense of me long ago. At least then I wouldn’t now serve as the greatest threat to the one thing, the one person, I loved the most.
“You never know what you’ll be able to do, when it comes down to it.”
Just as quickly as that anger dissipated, it reared its ugly, spiked head again.
I resisted the urge to lash out at her. My sister had spent long enough on the brink of death, I should have found nothing but gratitude to be sitting by her side, to see her returned to health—even if her mind was as susceptible to Mordrigal’s twisting words now as mine.
I focused, instead, on the wall, on the ceiling, on the notches in the bedposts that Delphine must have spent hours staring at herself. Would she still love me the same, look at me the same, knowing I no longer answered only to myself? Would she respect me the same, knowing I was not master of my own fate, but pawn to another’s?
I didn’t want her understanding any more than I wanted it from Avinthe. What I wanted was my power back. I didn’t need to defeat Mordrigal, to hold my place as prince in this realm. I just needed to make sure that the human-turned-fae girl that I’d brought into this world was safe. From me. From whatever other forces might try to harm her.
I felt a stirring in the glamour, and for a second, that nudge of something like horror pulled at my insides. I saw my sister’s head turn too, but as we waited to see what Mordrigal bade us to do next, it faded. No command came.
For a second, I felt relief flood through me.
Then, as realization hit me, true horror replaced it.
If it was not Mordrigal who had stirred it, there was only one other force left in the living realms that could have done it.
I was on my feet in an instant. My hand went instinctively towards the sword strapped at my side, but I paused, wondering who it was I planned to use it on. Myself? Mordrigal? Either one of those would be the best bet to protect the fae that had just entered this realm, this court.
Because the only thing that could have disturbed the glamour like that was another high king, and with Deimos trapped inside his own realm, that left only one other.
Delphine was no longer missing.
She was here.
After a month without word, without sign, without so much as a glimpse of her, she wasn’t just back in Avarath. She was in my court.
If Mordrigal hadn’t felt it too, if he wasn’t already preparing to issue the command that would have every one of my Mountain Fae rushing to attack her, he would soon.
Panic overwhelmed me in a way it never had before. Countless times I’d gone into battle and I’d never felt this before.
Delphine was here. She was here.
That panic clouded my mind, my judgment, as surely as any command from Mordrigal.
Before I had the chance to make up my own mind, however, the door flew open with a sound like thunder, and Tallulah barged inside. Her face was flushed, her eyes bright, more alive than any pair of eyes I’d seen in my court since Mordrigal stole everything from us once again.
I felt something spark in me, but then I felt it falter when I saw why—the light in her eyes was not simply from the stirring that I’d felt. No.
Because my own faithful guard had not come alone. She was breathless as she tugged in the familiar silver-haired fae, shoving her forward so she could slam the door behind her, but not before checking outside to either side to see if they were followed.
“I found her wandering the halls, just…wandering.”
I stood frozen to the spot as Delphine lifted her eyes to meet mine.
I should have been mad. Should have been scared. Should have felt the same overwhelming panic at the sight of her as I had at the mere touch of her presence as it sent ripples across the realm. But the moment I laid eyes on Delphine, all was right in the world.
Just for a moment.
But then, just as quickly, everything was wrong.
“What do you think you’re doing here?” I snarled. “Are you mad?”
Delphine’s dark eyes looked up into mine, and for a moment, we were lost together.
“I think I am,” she said, at last, breaking it.
She took a half step back, looking over me before glancing between Tallulah and Avinthe.
“You aren’t attacking me.”
I felt the slightest tug on her glamour, and winced—doubly, because of her words.
“Don’t do that,” I hissed at her, stalking over to her side and grabbing her wrist to pull her further away from the door. “Whatever you do, don’t touch your glamour while you’re here. Mordrigal will feel it if you do, for sure.”
“If he hasn’t already.”
Tallulah stood close to the door, her shoulders—broad as any male fae’s—blocking the way. There was a certain amount of unease to her, however. Her hands didn’t grip the sword she’d unsheathed to place before her with quite the power she once might have, but I understood why. I too felt the same dissonance, unsure of whether I should be protecting Delphine by keeping her close, or by sending her as far away from myself as I could.
The answer would be simple, were she not already this deep in the belly of a court filled with fae the high king could command at any moment—fae who could just as easily kill her as I could, and without any of the same qualms. They might feel guilty for a day, a month, a year. I’d feel guilty well into eternity, well into the Afterworld. If I laid a single hand on Delphine, I’d never be able to forgive myself.
Fear and anger surged in me again, my eyes blazing as I took Delphine’s shoulders between my hands and gripped her so tight that it was her turn to wince.
“Tell me this is a mistake, Delphine. Tell me you have a plan to get out of here, and to get as far away from here as possible.”
My eyes flickered up to the door for a moment. “The others, where are they?”
“I came alone.”
I looked back down at her in concern.
“Tell me, what happened to the others? To Seren? Armene?”
A small, almost indistinguishable sigh escaped her lips, as if she was sorry for what she had to say next.
“They don’t know that I’m gone.”
At first, I felt relief that the others weren’t loose in my court, alerting every fae in these halls to Delphine’s presence, but then the anger just resurged again. How had they let her out of their sight, out of their reach, even for a second—let alone long enough to come stumbling into the most dangerous place in all the realms for her to be wandering. Did they not know how dangerous the world was for Delphine now, far more dangerous than it ever had been?
Maybe it was a good thing they hadn’t accompanied her. If Mordrigal didn’t kill them, I’d be all too happy to at the moment.
“What exactly happened? Where have you been?”
Delphine looked exhausted, not in the physical sense, but like there was something pressing down on her from the inside.
“We took Alderia.”
That answer truly shocked all of us.
The next question came out as a splutter. “How?”
Delphine went to answer, her eyes still holding onto that glazed over look, but Tallulah interrupted us.
“This is all fun and games, but the clock is ticking. If Mordrigal doesn’t figure out you’re here, soon, he’ll be calling us up to arms in some way. We can’t guarantee your safety once we’re under his command, Delphine, so get to the point. Are we killing the high king together, or not?” She glanced between the two of us. “That is why you’re here, isn’t it? Or was it just to gaze into Caldamir’s dreamy eyes?”
Tallulah’s abruptness was enough to shock me back to my own senses, finally.
“Tallulah’s right,” I said. “You need to get out of here, Delphine. We can’t help you. We’re under Mordrigal’s control now. This isn’t like when I was wearing the bracelet. I can’t fight it, Delphine. If Mordrigal calls on me to attack you, I’ll have no choice.”
“I—”
“And,” I continued, cutting her off. “If he asks me to tell him your plan, I will. I am not your ally anymore.”
Saying the words stung as surely as if I’d slapped her.
“I can’t be your ally, Delphine.”
My hands, still on her, softened their grip. Despite all my own fears, holding her in my arms, even for a second, felt like a dream. I saw her again as the frail human I’d taken from Alderia, the one whose quiet strength and stubbornness had seen her live in faerie regardless of my own attempts to end her life. She was not frail, anymore, I knew that. She’d survived attacks by princes, by high kings, by fiends, and humans alike. She’d transformed into a formidable opponent, one that even now as I held her, I knew had more than enough power to defeat me and all of my court, just as she had in the last battle when I stood by her side. Just as I could not stand against Mordrigal, truly, I couldn’t stand against her.
To my great annoyance, my words fell on deaf ears. Delphine looked away from our locked gaze to scan the room, recognition lighting on her face as she remembered her time spent within these four walls. It softened again as she looked at Tallulah, imposing presence and all, and then shifted as her gaze landed on Avinthe. I saw the way she took in the color of her curls, the brightness of her eyes, the softened version of my own features she found reflected in her face.
“I don’t need any allies today.”
Something about the tone of her voice chilled me.
I glanced up at Tallulah, at my sister, and against my better judgment, I made a choice.
“Leave us,” I said, to the two of them. I kept my gaze steady on Delphine’s face. “We need to talk alone.”
The moment we were alone, however, the determination that had taken hold of me wavered. I’d intended to get her alone to convince her to leave, but now that she was here, in my arms still, all I wanted was for her to stay. My court was the worst place for her to be in all the realms, my arms the most dangerous to be holding her. If Mordrigal so much as called on me now, whispered my name, I’d lose myself. But still, I was unable to stop myself, unable to force the words from my lips that I’d prepared.
Instead, I looked down at Delphine, at the fae that I’d plucked from Alderia and taken to Avarath with the intention of making nothing more of a sacrifice of her, and I kissed her.
I kissed her with sorrow.
I kissed her with pain.
But more than that, I kissed her with the all-consuming fire that had burned so long for her now deep and roaring within the cavern of my once empty chest.
Delphine’s lips moved against mine, soft and yielding, as they had before—but different all the same. There was a desperation now between us, an understanding of just how truly fleeting this thing between us was. Not the feeling, not the bond that tied us so close together that I felt even now was not close enough. That was unrelenting. That was forever.
This moment, this tenderness, that was what was fleeting.
Because any second, I would turn on her.
Any second, and I would betray her.
Knowing that should have driven me away from her, but instead, it drove my hands into her hair, my grip tightening as much as I dared and then some, crushing her to me.
“Caldamir,” she gasped against my lips, her hands finding their way to me in a futile attempt to push me away. I couldn’t blame her, not when I’d just warned her to stay away, warned her that I was dangerous and couldn’t control myself if Mordrigal called on me, but I couldn’t control myself now, either.
I couldn’t bring myself to push her off, to do what was right and put the distance needed between us for her own safety. Safety, hers or mine, was the last thing on my mind at the moment. Not when Delphine was right here, in my arms, her scent enveloping me just as her heat radiated through the fabric of the dress that damningly separated our bodies. Even through the fabric, I could feel her body alive with an energy that hadn’t yet coursed through her veins the last time we got this close. My hands skimmed down her back, over the curves of her frame that made my body flood with heat and my fingers dig with the hunger of a starved man as they reached her waist and pulled her even tighter. She fit against me like she was made for me, every inch of her that touched me setting me further ablaze.
Her own hands moved from pushing me away to fisting in my shirt, fingernails digging in as she pressed herself more fully against me, finally giving in.
So, we gave in, together.
I kissed her deeper, drawing her lip between my own and biting it—hard enough to make a soft moan escape between her own—before dragging my mouth down her jaw and to her throat.
It was not enough.
This was not enough.
I needed more.
With a groan that died in my throat as my cock strained against the confines of my pants, I picked her up, and she went willingly. More than willingly. Her heart raced in my ears, her skin grew hotter, her grip on me tightened. I scented her desire increasing, and with it, so did mine. Her legs looped around my waist, her pelvis pressed to mine, and I nearly dropped her then and there. As it was, I still stumbled back a couple steps, caught off balance by the feel of her in my arms, so soft and warm, the weight of her held so close to me overwhelming my senses so that they were completely consumed by her for a moment. My back collided with one of the walls of Delphine’s once-prison, and I didn’t even care as I slid my hand up her dress higher and higher until I found the source of her desire.
Delphine arched into me, and I growled low in her ear.
All of my senses came flooding back to me with more intensity than ever, and in three strides, we were at the edge of the bed. I tore Delphine from me and threw her onto it, a gasp escaping her as she sprawled out before me. The air had been knocked from her lungs, but even as she gasped for her next breath, her hands were already at the ties of her dress, tearing them apart as she met my eyes with a fervor that matched my own.
“Stop,” I said, the command firm in my voice, stilling her hands as she reached for the next set of laces. “We don’t have time for that.”
With hands that shook, I reached for the laces of my own breeches, tugging them down and taking myself in hand. She was wet for me, I could smell it on the air like a hunter near prey, and it took every ounce of restraint left in me not to slide into her right then and there. As it was, my cock throbbed with need as I crawled on top of her, hitching up her skirts and pinning her down beneath me.
My hands crushed hers beneath me as I devoured her with another kiss, her hips arching up to close this new space between us, heels digging into the mattress.
“Say it,” I growled, pulling away from her lips just enough to form the words. “Say that you’re mine.”
She moaned out her submission, her face flushing deeper. Her lips parted again for mine, and I took them in my own, drinking in the sound of her need as I pressed inside her only enough to feel her start to stretch to fit me. She clenched around me, hot and slick, dragging a low growl from my throat.
“All mine.”
She moaned again, her hands straining against the hands that still held her firmly in place as I pushed fully inside her. She took all of me that she could fit, until our hips were nearly pressed together, her body clenching tight around me.
“I’m yours, Caldamir.”
The sound of my name on her lips as I looked down at her like this, felt her like this, it was the sweetest sound I ever heard.
It was all I needed to hear.
With another growl, I pulled out of her only to thrust back in, harder this time. Then again. And again. Delphine arched up to meet me with every thrust. She was so wet for me, so tight around me that even my deepest fae instincts were near downing in the heat of her body around me as we moved together in a feral rhythm. My name fell from her lips time and time again between gasps, each one only pushing me closer to the edge. I held on as long as I could, imprinting crescent shapes into the tender skin of her hips until I couldn’t take it any longer.
My chest tightened as my release crashed over me and into her until the very world around us seemed to shudder, fading away in the moments that followed, until it was just the two of us.
For just one moment, long enough to look into Delphine’s face and see, truly, the future that we’d never have together, it was just the two of us.
But then the door rattled, tearing my attention across the room in an instant. A snarl clawed its way up the back of my throat as I prepared to lash out at Tallulah for interrupting us, but it was not her armor-plated figure that burst inside.
It was Lilliope.
The moment her eyes landed on me, and then Delphine, I knew what was coming.
I sprang to my feet, unsure of whether or not to reach for my sword or my breeches first. That moment of hesitation was my greatest mistake yet.
I’d spent far too long carrying on a tryst with the female before I met Delphine, far too long entertaining her with no intention of making anything of it. I’d hurt her, and now as her lips pulled back and her eyes darkened, I knew she was determined to hurt me, too.
“Stop her!”
The command came too late.
Lilliope dashed from the room before Tallulah’s already startled hands could catch her. My guard chased after her, the sound of their footsteps echoing in the hall long after they were gone. Tallulah was many things, but she was no match for the wily Lilliope. She’d slip out of Tallulah’s grasp, evade her, and even if she didn’t, the disturbance would surely draw the attention of the one I’d so greatly feared.
He’d surely felt the stirring before, and if he hadn’t found its source then, he would now.
I turned to Delphine, eyes wide as they met hers, her hands already tugging tight the laces she’d undone at the neck of her dress. She knew, too, in a way, what was to come next.
“I’m so sorry,” I whispered.
Her eyes widened too. “For what?”
“For this.”
No sooner had I said it than I felt that dreaded stirring deep inside me. I felt the pull, the ache, the call that I could not ignore. I tried to fight it, tried to pull on my glamour, to wrap my own power around me as some kind of shield, but there was nothing to fight. I was made, formed, shaped to answer the high king of Avarath’s call.
I had no choice but to answer it when it came.
I took in the sight of her, sure it would be the last time I laid eyes on the creature of beauty and strength before me. I drew my glamour tighter, pulled it like a thick shroud around me, fought with all of my might—but nothing stopped the blackness that fell over my eyes, nothing stopped the vast darkness from consuming my mind.