Chapter 37
LANA
M y throat was on fire, pain clawing angrily through my body as I released my scream.
My father, my King, fell to the ground.
My knees shook, almost taking me down, too, before I stumbled forward into the room. Kade held the dagger in his hands, still plunged into my father’s heart.
Kade. My Kade.
No. He wasn’t my Kade. He’d never be mine. Not now.
“What did you do?” I crashed into him, shoving him backward away from my father. “What did you do?” I yelled louder, crawling toward the king’s body.
“Wake up, Father. Wake up. Do you hear me?” I shook him before falling over his chest. “Wake up.”
His chest barely rising and falling, his eyes remained closed. They wouldn’t open.
This couldn’t be happening. I couldn’t do this again. I couldn’t be here at the side of another person I loved being taken from me. “Please, you can’t leave me.”
“Lana, we have to go.” Kade’s voice thrummed, and I jerked my head in his direction.
“I’m not going anywhere with you. I trusted you.” Although Kade momentarily stole my attention, I refused to let go of my father.
I turned and forgot about the treasonous bastard in the room with me. His time would come. But right now, I needed my father.
The light nature had given me to push the vines off of me might still be inside of me. The light which pushed Andras. If I had light, it could help me bring him back. It had to.
Hovering my hands over my father’s body, he coughed once. “You’re okay. You’re going to be all right,” I chanted a few times, focusing everything I had into my hands and pleading with nature.
Light exploded out of me, and I was so overcome with joy, I laughed hysterically. This had to be magic. A temporary, insane level of magic nature had given for a falling kingdom. It had to be enough.
“Please be magic,” I begged. “Please.”
Nothing happened and I screamed, staring at the ceiling as if I could see out to the sky itself. “I’ve never demanded anything of you,” I continued shouting. “Heal him . Heal him right now .”
My gaze flitted back and forth over the king’s fading body, and another burst of light poured from my hands. “I’m to be Queen. I’ve lived in hell and never demanded you give me magic when you cursed me to have none. I have sacrificed enough in the name of nature, so listen to me and heal him!”
The light pouring out of me flickered, then disappeared. When I looked down at my father’s face, his eyes fluttered open.
“Lana.” Kade’s voice held a warning, but I refused to look at him.
My father looked at me with so much love. When he turned to face Kade, his head lolled like he nodded. “He will not hurt you again. I will not let him,” I soothed.
My father shook his head. “You don’t understand, my heart.” His voice came out scratchy and not his own.
His eyes rolled back, and I gripped his shirt, pulling his head onto my lap. “No, No,” I said. “Stay with me. Father, please,” I begged. “Stay with me.”
Blood trickled from the side of his mouth as his lips curved into a small smile. I held my hand to his face, giving him a tear-filled smile of my own.
“There’s much I need to tell you?—”
“Shhh,” I cooed. “Save your energy for healing. I’ll find someone. Someone more than me. Someone who can save you.”
My father moved his head back and forth twice. “There is no one more than you, my heart. And I will love you into whatever beyond awaits. Always.”
His hand loosened in my grip, but I held it to my face, refusing to let it fall.
“Please don’t die,” I whispered.
He exhaled, a slow torturous sound as the air rattled from his lungs.
Shouting approached closer now, but I didn’t care. I didn’t care if dark ones themselves took over the room, I didn’t want to leave him.
“Be strong now, my child. It will hurt, but it’s you—you who will save us.” His breath rattled in a raspy whisper, and this time, when his chest exhaled, it didn’t rise again.
I screamed.
Kade cursed under his breath and his shadows snaked toward my father. “What are you—” I started to ask.
The shadows snapped my father’s neck.
An anguished sound I didn’t even recognize as my own tore from my lungs.
Arms snaked around my center. “We have to go.”
I twisted my body, pushing Kade away. “Get off of me. Don’t touch me. I will kill you.” I gripped onto my father’s tunic, hoping he could somehow survive Kade’s shadows, knowing deep down it was useless. Still, I silently pleaded with anyone listening for this to be a dream. His blood pooled beneath him, forming a puddle around his too-still body.
I cried, letting everything out of me I’d tried to hold back. I wasn’t enough to save him.
Someone else ran into the room, and Kade’s shadows moved away from my father.
“What did you do?” Ian cried, stumbling toward the king just like I had. His knees hit the floor, not caring that he fell into blood as he checked my father’s pulse and looked up at me, sorrow etched across his bloody face.
With no warning, I was forcefully yanked from my father’s dead body. I banged my fists on Kade’s arms as they wrapped tightly around me. “Let go of me.”
He didn’t say a word as he fought to contain me, whipping his shadows out.
“Ian,” I sobbed and struggled to get out of Kade’s grip so I could run to him.
But Kade was stronger, and his shadows snatched me to his chest, holding me there despite my fighting. “Get your hands, shadows, and everything off of me.”
Kade ignored me, instead focusing all of his attention on Ian. “I don’t want to hurt you.”
Ian drew his sword from his side, his face a mask of rage. “Then get your hands off of her.”
Storm bolted into the room next. “We need to go.”
“I know,” Kade shouted. “Having a bit of trouble.”
Storm glanced at the king, then back to Kade. “What the fucking hell?”
“I’ll explain lat—Behind you!” Kade shouted.
Storm spun on his heels, knocking the dark one behind him off balance. He lit him on fire and shoved him from the room. In seconds, the Fae turned to ash.
My eyes widened in fear. Storm and Kade were so much more powerful than they ever let on. We’d stupidly trusted them, bringing them into our inner circle.
I seethed, taking Kade by surprise as I turned into his arms instead of trying to get away. “Murderer. Is it why you fucked me?” I shoved at his chest, reaching down into my boot for my last dagger. “You wanted to get close to the royal family you've been criticizing since we met?”
“This isn’t what it seems, Illiana. Stop!” His voice was firmer now, but nothing he said would make me listen to him.
Nothing.
“We will not hurt you,” Storm said behind me, moving toward Ian, who turned his sword from Kade immediately on Storm.
Ian snorted. “Right, but you murder our king?”
Kade lunged, wrapping his arms around me again, shadows tighter than before.
I renewed my vigor in struggling, stomping my foot on Kade’s. He grimaced, but didn’t budge, or even flinch in his hold on me. “I hate you,” I wheezed out, my strength fading.
What was happening? My body weakened, and even though it slackened, Kade still held me.
Storm started talking in low, hushed breaths to Ian, his hands in front of him. The second Ian let his guard down, Storm wrapped his arms around Ian’s neck.
“No,” I shouted.
Storm’s lips were moving next to Ian’s ear, and then, his eyes rolled back.
“Ian!” I cried, something irrevocably breaking inside of me. I was trapped. Trapped in a hold like I was trapped in a cell all those years ago. Trapped while I watched Ian die. With nothing to do to save him.
“Shhh, it’s all right. He’s not dead. I swear it. We would never.” Kade’s shadows stroked my hair, and I could hear his voice, trying to reassure me in my ear. But I didn’t trust anything he’d tell me.
Not ever again.
“I don’t believe you.” I kicked my leg out and fell, Kade picked me up, while his shadows kept my arms tightened to my body.
“I’m so sorry,” he whispered. “Please forgive me and know all of this is for your own good.”
One of his shadows danced closer to my face and shoved a vial of liquid into my mouth. I knew this bitter taste. A sleeping draught.
“I’ll hate you for the rest of my life,” I managed to whisper.
My body sagged into the solid muscles of the man I thought I was falling in love with, and the pain and torture my heart had just gone through faded into oblivion.