Chapter 26 #3
Mordred was just as surprised as the rest of the court when he opened his mouth and said, “I choose the whip.”
The hall reverberated with gasps and giggles, sighs and shouts.
Oryane watched him carefully, some distant emotion ghosting her face.
Rumors said she had loved a mortal, once.
It had ended badly. It always did. But then she nodded, gesturing to the guards.
Mordred held his ground and began to calmly unbutton his aketon.
His hands should shake, he thought. But his fingers were steady as he dropped the garment to the ground.
Two Eyes approached from either side, one reaching for his arms.
“Unhand me,” Mordred snapped, lunging toward one of the Eyes, who immediately took several steps back.
Just as he pulled his tunic up and over his head, the guards returned from the vault, carrying something wrapped in a gossamer-thin, bloodstained shroud.
Ah. The Cut. Another old faerie weapon, handed down among court regents, enchanted to deal incredible amounts of pain with even the lightest of lashings.
Pain comprised so much of Mordred’s world. What was a little more?
He stood utterly still as Ragrshydan and Oryane engaged in some kind of power struggle over who was granted the gift of humbling the last of the Tuatha de Danann that walked this godsforsaken world.
And then Ragrshydan stepped forward, the bloodstained shroud falling away to reveal something that almost looked like the long, serpentine tail of a creature long-gone from this realm.
“Kneel,” Ragrshydan commanded, enjoying every moment. “Yet again you choose the filthy mortals.”
“Yet again,” Mordred replied, “you have failed to inspire me to choose my own kind.”
Ragrshydan snapped an order, and four Eyes pushed Mordred to the ground, shoving his face into the cracked mosaic tiles.
He had barely drawn in a breath to prepare when the first blow came, searingly cold and horrifically hot all at once.
His eyes watered and his lungs stung, but Mordred refused to give his king any satisfaction.
Two more blows came in quick succession, and then the Cut’s bite was no longer novel, no longer new.
Just more pain to ignore. And that was precisely what Mordred did, shutting off any part of himself that could feel anything at all.
“I will end this now if you hand over the sorceress,” Ragrshydan said in his ear, breath sour with wine. “You have a bargain with her. Sell me her debt.”
Mordred raised his head to meet Ragrshydan’s gaze. “You talk far too much,” he replied. “Three more blows, my liege. Do me a favor and get on with it.”
The High King slammed Mordred’s face into the tile so hard that he tasted blood.
The Cynosbythrae reached for Ragrshydan’s Threads, its deadly, nimble fingers grabbing an easy hold.
With excruciating effort, Mordred pulled the power away from the faerie king.
The Cynosbythrae would drown the entire court in a single swipe of its claws, an ink spill on vellum.
And besides, any Fey who had sworn fealty oaths to the throne was only able to kill their regent if they sought to gain the throne for themselves.
Mordred had no desire for the throne, but he wanted this pathetic king to suffer.
He wanted Ragrshydan to see him coming and know with terrible certainty that there was absolutely nothing he could do to save himself.
And, most of all, he wanted the High King to never so much as think Nyneve’s name ever again.
Most of the court already hated or envied him for his power, and so when Mordred rose to his feet, clammy with sweat but conscious, he was fairly certain it did not improve such tensions.
Wide eyes watched without a word as he pulled his tunic back over his head, the pain so incredible he nearly blacked out, and then grabbed his aketon from the ground.
“Are we finished here?” Mordred asked, raising his eyes to Ragrshydan’s burning gaze.
“I cannot fathom what purpose you serve,” the king said angrily, his knuckles white on the arms of the throne. “There was no need for a vessel. The Morrigan could have given all that power to me. I was the court’s best warrior.”
Mordred shrugged, spitting out blood. “Evidently, She found you lacking.”
He turned and walked away from the dais.
No one stopped him. Fingers tightened around hilts, and Eyes shifted their weight, but no one was actually fool enough to step into his path.
So, Mordred made his way through the empty corridors, his vision hazy around the edges.
If the courier said anything to him when he walked back out through the door, he could not recall it by the time he reached Rook, who awaited him in the woods.
The kelpie watched him approach silently, curved ears pricked.
Then he cursed in the native tongue of his people and ran to Mordred.
With uncharacteristic generosity, Rook lowered himself to the ground on one knee.
Mordred grabbed ahold of his long mane and hauled himself onto the kelpie’s back with a strangled groan.
“What do I even do with you?” Rook muttered, mostly to himself, it seemed.
“Or’Afon,” Mordred murmured into the kelpie’s mane, so quietly he never thought Rook might hear him. “Take me to Nyneve.”