Chapter 32
DIEM
Ipaced the streets of Fortos City, gaze fixed on the sky. Storm clouds had rolled in with the dawn, painting the town in a dreary shade of grey. Though the air was menacingly humid, not a drop had fallen. It seemed to be waiting.
Just like me.
“You’re sure they plan to attack today?” I asked.
“I trust my source,” my mother said calmly.
“You also trusted Vance,” I muttered under my breath. “Look where that got us.”
Instantly, I regretted my harsh words. If today went the way I feared, they could be the last ones I ever spoke to her. I glanced at where she stood with Luther, Alixe, and Nidara. “I’m sorry.”
She offered a strained but gracious smile. “This source is different. If he says they’re coming, they are.”
My eyes swept across the lightless, soundless buildings.
We’d arrived in Fortos City late last night to a contentious welcome.
The Fortosians were reluctant to accept their first-ever Queen, especially one who led a jailbreak of the rebels a few months prior, but we were at war, and squabbling over hierarchy was a distraction.
I gave the Emarion Army the same choice I’d given the soldiers in Lumnos: fight or flee.
Though a fair share of mortals took my offer to retire with a full Descended pension, my chest filled with pride at the many who raised their swords to fight.
The Descended from the other realms were less enthusiastic.
The details of Ophiucae’s attacks had left them shaken, and I watched their numbers dwindle as most left to return home and guard their families.
For the Fortosians, there was nowhere else to go. A lifetime of army service was the only thing they’d been taught to want. I insisted they take the night to consider their choice. Come dawn, every last one gave me their grudging salute.
We searched the rubble of the prior attack and found the vault of godstone weapons the Fortos King had hidden. After arming as many as we could, we herded those who could not fight into the newly repaired Fortos prison, and we settled in to await the enemy’s arrival.
I glanced at Luther. “I don’t feel Ophiucae’s aura. Do you?”
He shook his head. “Unless he’s found a way to mask it, he’s nowhere near Fortos.”
Growling passed overhead as Tybold swooped across the city.
I’d brought him along in hopes this might be a useful outlet for his angry energy, but he was even more restless here.
I silently wondered if it had something to do with my choice to leave Sorae behind to protect Lumnos.
From the way I heard her howls all the way to the border, I guessed she wasn’t happy about it, either.
I beckoned for Alixe to join me as I strolled away from the others. “There’s something at least one person should know,” I began when we were out of earshot. “Something I’d prefer to keep between us. When I was on the island, the Kindred appeared to me at the Temple.”
Her face went slack. There was little that impressed Alixe Corbois, but at the core of her warrior heart, she was a devout servant of her patron goddess. “The Blessed Mother,” she breathed. “You saw her?”
Saw her, spoke to her, nearly cussed her out.
“She asked me to stop Ophiucae. I agreed on one condition: no Crown will succeed me. I am the last monarch the nine realms will ever have—or at least the last one the Kindred will choose.”
Her eyes drifted up to my Crown as my words sank in. “That’s why you agreed to the governing council.”
“It was long overdue, but now it’s urgent. Once I die, the people of Emarion will have to find their own way.”
“You’ll have plenty of time, Your Majesty. Our soldiers know the plan. We’ll handle Vance and his men.”
“And I’ll handle Ophiucae. Once the fighting begins, I’ll lure him away so I can . . .”
Talk to him. See if there’s any compassion left in his black, angry heart. And if not . . .
“ . . . end this,” I finished. “If I don’t come back—”
“You will. Powerful Descended like him always rely too much on their magic. Rarely are they as skilled with their sword as you. Once you face him, I’d bet all my coin he doesn’t walk out of it alive.”
My heart heavied, but I forced a smile. “I know serving me hasn’t been easy for you. I see the strain it put between you and the others. I’m grateful for your loyalty. And your friendship.”
“The honor is mine. Don’t worry about the others.
To be honest, other than Luther, I was never close to anyone in my family.
There are certain things expected of female royals and, I’m .
. . well, I’m something else.” She shrugged.
“I don’t mind it. All the people I admire were different, too. No one becomes a legend by fitting in.”
Something in me healed a little, hearing those words from her, someone I admired. Being different could be a lonely road to walk. It was nice to be reminded that path could lead to exceptional places.
“There’s something I need to share with you, as well,” she said. “Teller has asked to join the Royal Guard. He said he wants to do something useful.”
I frantically shook my head. “Then he can be my advisor, or—or my historian. He can run the palace library.”
“You wish me to reject him, then?” She hesitated, then added, “I watched him spar with the other applicants. He’s a good fighter. And we all know he’s very clever. He could have an impressive career.”
“Teller doesn’t want a career in the army. We discussed it countless times.”
“War makes us all do things we never wanted to do.”
I could not argue with that.
“And the Royal Guard is not the army,” she went on. “He will stay at home in Lumnos, protecting the people he cares for. After all he’s been through, perhaps that’s what he needs.”
I tried to push reason past my panic. Teller was unhappier than ever. He’d missed too many weeks to return to school, and he had little to do but mope. He needed a challenge to pour himself into. “I know you’re right, Alixe. But if anything happened to him . . .”
“If he’s anything like his sister, I’m more worried for anyone who crosses him.”
Tybold let out a sudden hiss, his eyes on the Ring Road to the south. Someone was coming, but I still couldn’t feel any sign of Ophiucae’s aura. If he’d somehow discovered how to hide it . . .
I frowned. “Get everyone ready.”
Alixe ran through the streets, giving orders to the soldiers we’d hidden in the damaged buildings.
The plan was to lure the enemy into the heart of Fortos City, where our soldiers would surround them and, hopefully, convince them to surrender.
The Guardians had been stationed by the prison in the hopes that Vance and his men would not be willing to kill mortals to get inside.
Luther jogged to my side, his expression visibly darkening at how I tensed in his presence. “Do you feel him?”
“No. You?”
He shook his head.
I turned away. “I’m joining the first battalion. Stay here.”
“Like hell,” he muttered, following behind me.
“That was an order, Luther.”
“Then arrest me. Put me in chains.” His hand grazed my back. “I quite liked it the last time you tied me up.”
The mating bond purred at his touch, further prickling my temper.
He kept close as we walked toward the Ring Road.
The Fortos landscape was flat grey rock as far as the eye could see, the perfect natural defense against an ambush.
Sure enough, the moment I passed the front lines, I saw a distant horde approaching from the south.
“Not as many as I expected,” Luther said.
Lonard, the mortal I’d elevated to commander, nodded. “A fraction of what they brought to Lumnos. Odd, considering how fortified this city is.”
“Didn’t they arrive by boat in the other attacks?” I asked. “The sea is to the east.”
“Maybe they hit Faunos first,” Lonard said.
Apprehensive energy tingled through my blood as we watched them approach.
I’d spent the morning eager to confront my sire, but now, I wasn’t so sure.
My fingers curled around the hilt of Sorrow’s Edge.
Is this how his mother had felt, in those moments before she cursed him—a glass heart balancing on a wire, gazing at the rocky ground below and fearing the only way down was to shatter?
Tybold scorched a blackened scar across the road in warning. I sensed his reluctance, too. I wondered if I’d been wrong about his desire to unleash his rage in battle. After centuries of bloodshed at his masters’ command, maybe it was the violence he hated most.
Protect my people, I sent across our bond. Take no lives unless you must.
In the sky, his gaze swung to me with a slow, appraising blink.
And do not come to save me, I warned him. My life is my own to defend or to lose.
Beside me, Luther unsheathed the Sword of Corbois. Once again, he’d refused a godstone weapon, handing each one I gave him to another soldier until no black blades remained. Noble as it was, my heart hammered with fears of what that selflessness might cost him.
“Take a weapon off them the first chance you get,” I snapped at him. “If you end this battle with that gaudy thing in your hands, Luther Corbois, I’ll never let them touch me again.”
He leaned in, voice dropping low. “That’s all the motivation I need.”
My blood heated. I broke away before I gave the Fortosians a whole new reason for thinking me a scandalous Queen.
“Your horse,” I commanded to a mounted Descended, an older man who’d been scowling at me all day.
He climbed off the mare but held the reins out of reach. “She’s no docile pony,” he warned. “She bucks hard, and she’s got a hell of a bite.”
“Just like me.” I snatched the lead from his hands and swung onto her back, easing her feisty spirit with a pulse of Faunos magic and prodding her into a gallop. Behind me, Luther’s snarls joined a crackle of light magic as he clashed with a man less obliged to give up his horse.