Chapter 29
Nelle
Idrifted within the abyss, slipping between realms as if the underworld was the darkness between stars. I was at rest. At peace. No more struggling to hide the secret of my wyrm. No more fear over my fate. I’d set myself free and saved my family.
But then…
Something tugged at me. A gentle pull. A careful nudge.
A pinprick of feeble light in the cold, empty nothingness.
Exhilaration flowed through me at the thought of the flaming Hellsgate opening to welcome me into its hallowed kingdom.
But…
Something wasn’t quite right.
Something was wrong.
I shouldn’t feel anything, yet awareness lapped at my flesh. Tiny sharp teeth nibbling, making me feel the barest of sensations. Heat.
Chaotic noises filtered through the abyss.
Male voices, spitting anger and resentment.
You pushed it too far demanding her to kneel!
I didn’t know… I didn’t know she’d try to take her own life!
You’re a fucking psychopath, Jett!
Thumping footsteps.
A thud. A crash. Glass shattering.
An oof. A strike of a fist. A groan of pain.
Panic rose at the thought our god of death didn’t want me, that the light I traveled toward wasn’t Hellsgate at all.
The dark material of the endless abyss shifted and altered, the pinprick of light expanding, glittering like a cluster of stars. Black brightened to muted gray with warm undertones.
This wasn’t an abyss—my eyes were closed, and beyond my eyelids was light.
A small, shocked part of me recognized that I was alive.
Another, darker part regretted being cheated out of death.
I stretched back into my body and swam toward consciousness. Warmth invaded my cold flesh. Pleasant for a heartbeat before it became fiery heat. And with the heat came pain.
Serrated heat tore at my throat as flames set fire to my chest and lungs. I tried to lift a hand, but my limbs felt heavy and unmovable, as if shackles bound them.
The last memories I possessed were a rapid flash of images, like flipping through a fistful of Polaroids, spinning through my mind.
The merciless squeezing of Furyos Bonefall.
Trapping Jett within my madness.
A siege of suited men and women warring against one another as anarchy exploded across the rooftop. My father struggling to reach me.
And me…
Such mind-obliterating wrath had incinerated my sanity.
I’d become nothing but a vessel of rage, a menacing need to destroy Jett, to force him to see and feel what awaited me at the Witches Ball.
And I’d achieved it. My last memory was Jett’s wide, haunted eyes staring back at me as I choked myself to death.
Except… I hadn’t died.
My eyelids twitched, but wouldn’t open. Slender fingers, their touch firm yet gentle, probed points on my throat. A knuckle brushed across my cheekbone. A thumb tilted my chin. And a relieved, authoritative female voice said, “She’s coming around.”
And indeed, I did. Surfacing sluggishly, it felt like a lifetime before I pried my heavy eyelids open.
The room was a blur of colors and images, like watercolors bleeding across quilted paper.
The world around me swelled with loud noise and slowly came into focus.
I lay on a chaise in one of the Emporium’s boudoirs, draped in seductive silks and painted in rich reds.
Against the noise and the blur of bodies fighting in the background, I stared up at the older woman half-perched beside me.
A frown creased the bridge of her nose as she spread the lotion over the bruising and the talon-wounds on my neck.
The crisp scent of aloe vera and a spicy hit of dark magic tickled my nostrils as she rubbed the excess into her hands.
When she saw me blinking, she murmured with a small smile, “Ah, there you are.”
Slender fingers plucked a penlight from her white blazer. As she flashed it into one eye, then the other, someone muttered nearby. She jerked around, pointing sharply. “No, not that one… The yellow vial. Yes, that’s it.”
I dragged in a startled breath and felt like I’d swallowed a hot lungful of shattered glass. I wheezed, hacking and gasping, my vision blurring as agony wracked my chest. Through the shimmering veil of tears, I heard the woman say hastily, “Thank you,” as she accepted something small and yellow.
Swiping away the tears, I eased in a painful breath. When I tried to push myself upright, a groan escaped me. My shaky fingertips brushed the side of my head. Ghastly tension squeezed my skull, pounding at my temples like a jackhammer.
The woman steadied me with a firm hand. “Easy.”
“I…” But nothing more came. I kneaded my burning throat as best I could, flinching at the feel of those pitted bone fingers, and disappointingly the coarse fibers of Zrenyth’s rope scratched my fingertips. Clearly, I hadn’t broken the Crowthers enough to earn the collar’s removal.
The other woman uncorked the vial. A curl of yellow vapor puffed from the tiny bottleneck. “Here. Take a small sip. It will help.”
The glass was warm beneath my fingers, and I pressed it to my swollen lips, tipping my head back to stare at the embossed ceiling as the concoction poured into my mouth.
Honey-coated, with a bitter twang of magic that fizzed on my tongue.
It slid down my throat and soothed it instantly.
Revitalizing energy flowed through my body.
And the weariness fell away like invisible binding slipping from my limbs.
I sighed, my lips twitching into a relieved smile.
The other woman was a lot older than me, with fine lines etched around her features.
She angled her narrow face to stare back while I slid my gaze to the man standing behind her.
The same man who had bid on me. His blue eyes were wide and fixed on mine, and he expelled a pent-up breath, his fingers tightening briefly on her shoulder.
Soft bedroom light brushed over her pixie haircut, teased into gentle waves, as she patted his hand with a smug, told-you-so smile.
“Sit down, my love. You’re far too big for me to handle if you faint. ”
“Who are you?” I asked sharply.
Her gaze sliced back to me, and she blinked. “I’m Mei, one of the Crowthers’ physicians.” She gestured upward. “And this is my paramour—”
“Paramour…?” he cut in, affronted. “I wish you’d stop calling me that.”
“Because it’s true and far too fun not to.” Mei grinned. “Besides, Os—”
“Oswin,” I interrupted, frowning up at the giant of a man. “The Crowthers’ gardener, right?”
He nodded, wary lines deepening across his broad, weathered features.
“The man pretending to bid on me,” I added snarkily.
A deep shade of guilt flushed his cheeks and pinked his ears. “Yes,” he croaked, about to say more, perhaps even offer an apology, but I didn’t want to hear it.
I flicked a hand, cutting him off. “I’ve seen you before, working on one of their gardens—”
The loud crash yanked my attention to the brothers.
The bedroom was a warzone. Furnishings were overturned and artwork hung crookedly.
Jett slammed into the wall, thrown bodily by Caidan.
The sheer force of it rattled the wall, upending porcelain statues.
Pain and wide-eyed fright etched Jett’s bloodied face.
He wheezed, scrabbling at Caidan’s hand locked around his throat.
Kenton grabbed Caidan’s arm mid-swing, cuffed the other, and hauled both behind his back, dragging him off their youngest brother. Caidan kicked out, wrestling futilely. “Let me go!”
Jett half-slid down the wall, wincing as he massaged his throat.
Fury slashed itself across Caidan’s features as he threw himself about and yanked an arm free from Kenton’s grip. He swung back toward Jett. Kenton scrabbled to keep hold of his other arm, trying to stop him from reaching their youngest brother.
Caidan jabbed a furious finger at Jett. “This was a sick ploy! You know neither of us wanted a part of it, but you went ahead anyway!”
“It’s the godsdamned Emporium, Caidan. We needed Jurgana’s attention. How else were we going to do it?” Jett protested, his voice muffled behind the blood-soaked sleeve he pressed to his nose. “We needed to break her to break Byron.”
Kenton let out a bitter laugh. Hair ruffled as he shook his head, disgust and disbelief mingling together. “Break her?” he scoffed. “She broke us!”
Caidan ripped free of Kenton.
Jett stumbled sideways, both fists raised to ward him off, but Caidan didn’t approach.
“Look at what we’ve become!” Anguish threaded through Caidan’s tone as he threw his arms wide—at himself, his brothers, the wreckage strewn around the room, reflecting the mess of them.
“We’re better than this!” The fight drained out of him, and his shoulders slumped, head hanging low.
“How did we end up here?” he whispered, eyes shining with bewilderment.
“How did scaring a girl like this become us?”
Kenton dragged a hand down his face, muttering, “We’re going to do worse at the Witches Ball.”
Caidan blinked, gaping as the truth sank in. He hitched a shoulder as if he were beyond all of this. As if he were at a loss how they’d arrived here, at this very point. “After we save her, Mom won’t recognize us. What we’ve become.”
“She’s the only one we need to think of!” Jett pressed against the wall like a wounded, cornered animal.
None of us noticed the door open until Valarie’s bitterly cold voice cut through the air. “ENOUGH!”
The brothers spun toward her.
Her cadre of bodyguards edged around the room, their sharp gazes sweeping the destruction. At her side was Ferne, her arm linked through her aunt’s.
Valarie’s lips thinned as she surveyed the broken furnishings and her bloodied nephews. Her flinty gaze slid to me on the chaise, then to the gardener and physician quietly packing up their supplies.
Caidan exhaled a shaky breath of relief when he finally took me in, alive and well.
But when Jett looked at me, emotion tumbled across his bruised face—conflict, guilt, wretchedness—in rapid succession.
He scrambled to shove off the bone bracelets, throwing them away as if he couldn’t bear their touch.
Pallid and shaken, he staggered toward the door, staring at me as if he’d seen a ghost. And he had. I was the ghost that haunted him.
“I—I—I’ve got to go… I’ve got to get out of here,” he rambled, and in a rush of speed, he was gone.
Valarie twisted around to face her nephews. “Go after him. Get him under control and return to the Keep.” Then, with a small, brittle smile. “And thank you. You’ve done your part tonight. The rest is up to me. I’ll speak to Byron.”
Kenton and Caidan exchanged a disheartened look before they left to chase after their youngest brother.
A pang of homesickness squeezed my heart at my father’s name on Valarie’s cruel tongue.
My father was still here. My mother too, I hoped.
Guilt throbbed beneath my palm as I pressed it to my aching heart.
Oh gods. I’d let them think I’d died. Not once, but twice.
Desperate longing to meet them both, to show them I still lived, strummed with urgency through my being.
Valarie studied me long and hard, as if seeing a strange creature she finally realized could bite back. Her voice softened, curiously gentle. “I imagine you’ve been desperate to see your father for some time now.”
I couldn’t help myself. Pure excitement to see my father barreled into me and lifted my spirits. I bounced to my feet. “I have,” spilled from my tongue fast.
“Well then, come along, Wychthorn. I’m sure he feels the same way.”
She turned, guiding Ferne carefully. I raised my sheer skirt, the bone-chains rattling as I hurried after them.
Lila Simonis escorted us through the Emporium once more, her thick, wavy hair a riotous cascade of blue as she strode ahead. Valarie’s cadre flanked us, as stoic and ruthless as their mistress.
We entered a quiet, unused corridor and stopped at a door. Lila opened it. Valarie led Ferne inside, and I followed. Her cadre fanned out as we moved deeper into the space.
It was a boardroom, less seductive and more refined elegance with the choice of furnishings and curated art.
And there were my parents standing across the room.