Chapter Twenty
She waited to hear the footsteps of the Mercurians brush past as they returned. Waited until it was no longer possible that Lura had been with someone else.
Waited—what she did best.
But waiting had not gotten her far.
Lunelle slipped from her room, falling into the shadows of the hall as she skirted toward the end of the Tether. Mirquios was with several other courtiers in one of the libraries, the silence settling heavily between them. Lunelle pulled the door closed behind her, but a hand in the crack stopped her.
Yallara slithered in.
“You two should get some rest,”
the king said, his eyes fixed on a pile of half-dust documents speckled with ash.
“Lura did not return,”
Lunelle said. She only looked at him. She only spoke to him.
“Lu,”
he breathed, rubbing at the back of his neck. “Shit.”
“I know where he keeps prisoners,”
Yallara offered.
“I can take you.”
Lunelle did not hesitate to follow Yallara, the Tether in her chest twisting and loosening as Mirquios gave his courtiers instructions to await his return and jogged after the women.
Yallara slipped between walls and let them into the servants’ corridors, pulling Lunelle gently along in the opposite direction from the stairs to the catacombs.
“They’ll be heavily guarded. One of the guards told me they brought back six rebels, four Plutonian. The other two he did not know.”
“They burned The Underground to dust,”
Mirquios said behind them.
“Bastard,”
Yallara muttered. She stopped at a sharp corner.
“They’re in the spire. I cannot take you further?—”
“I understand,”
Lunelle said.
“Thank you.”
Yallara patted her shoulder and faded back down the hall, her inky black waves melting into the shadows.
Lunelle listened to her slippers slow as she found her way back to her room.
“What’s the plan, Princess?”
Lunelle pushed her shoulders back, took a cleansing breath, and then charged forward into the spiraling staircase before her.
It took ages to climb, but she felt better with the king at her back. She followed the curve of the spire until they came to a lofted door, flanked by two Plutonian guards.
The first ignored them, the second arched a brow.
“We were informed our courtiers are being held here,”
Lunelle said, her voice even, flat.
She could feel the thrill in the Tether from Mirquios.
“Who informed you?”
the first guard asked, his deep onyx brows thick and overgrown.
“The prince,”
Mirquios said.
“We received word just a bit ago. I could return to confirm with him, but…”
The king leaned out from behind Lunelle.
“It’s a long way down, gents.”
They exchanged a glance, and the first guard stepped aside, pushing an ancient wooden door inward.
Two rows of cells lined the small room, five deep on either side. Lunelle darted between them, the bruised and beaten faces of rebels eyeing her as she searched for Lura.
“You cannot be here,”
Lura hissed from the final cell at the end of the hall. She sat up, her hands wrapping around the bars, shallow cuts bright pink around her knuckles.
“Oh, Lura, I’m so sorry,”
Lunelle sighed, crouching across from her.
“I failed you?—”
“You cannot be caught here!”
“Release her,”
Lunelle declared, rising and pointing to Lura.
The guards looked at her like she’d grown a second head.
“Princess, we cannot?—”
“I did not ask,”
she said, folding her arms across her chest.
“The Courts Between do not answer to the Living Courts. This is a Lunarian demigoddess you’ve tossed behind your bars and I will give you exactly one more moment to consider the repercussions before I let the queen know who is holding her most esteemed maiden.”
The guards looked at one another and muttered in a language Lunelle did not understand. The one who had ignored her earlier sighed, rubbing his temple. The second guard stepped forward, spinning a ring of keys around his fingers.
“Why don’t you send for her, Princess? We’d like to hear what she wants done with a most esteemed maiden who has the mark of the rebellion carved into her chest.”
Lunelle did not flinch as he neared her, hovering just a breath from her face.
“Let her go,”
a voice rumbled from the door.
Arcas leaned against the frame, his eyes heavy and framed by deep purple bags.
“Your Highness?—”
“It’s one thing to question a Lunar princess—bold, mind you—but another entirely to question me. Release the Lunarian.”
The guard sighed, slipping by Lunelle and shoving the key into the cell’s gate. Lura scrambled to her feet, looping her arm through Lunelle’s as the guard rolled his eyes.
Mirquios moved to leave, but Lunelle was not done.
“Release all of them,”
she said, holding the prince’s gaze.
His lip curled in a sick smile. He stepped closer, his boots scraping the stone flooring.
“Is that an order from the Courts Between?”
She released the tension in her stance, softening as he neared.
“It’s a plea, Arcas.”
He shook his head, waving his hands to the cells beside them.
“They’re a threat to your own power?—”
“They’re people who disagree with you politically. They’re only a threat to those who hold power that does not belong to them.”
Arcas scoffed, his sapphire eyes blinking slowly as he loomed over her. His gaze slid momentarily toward Mirquios, who looked as if he might lunge for his throat at any moment.
“I see one sister wasn’t enough for you, Mirquios,”
Arcas said quietly.
“You had to corrupt them both. Though I’m sure the Fire Queen makes for a much more entertaining?—”
Mirquios moved swiftly, darting between Arcas and Lunelle.
“You’ll watch your tongue, Arcas?—”
“No,”
Lunelle said, pushing Mirquios aside and closing the gap between them, coming chest to chest with the prince. “Finish.”
Arcas’s eyes narrowed. “Wh?—”
“More entertaining… what? Conversationalist?”
She stepped between his boots, her body pressing against his as he tensed. She laughed darkly, a sound she hadn’t thought herself capable of making.
“A more entertaining… fuck?”
She arched her brow, his lips pressing tightly together as she swallowed the rage back.
“That’s what you meant, right?”
“Lunelle,”
Arcas whispered, his breath grazing a loose tendril of silver hair.
“You find yourself in this position quite frequently, Prince. Backed against a wall by a woman you seem to keep in a very small box when other eyes are around. I’m good for an accessory. Pleasant to look at. But in the dark of night, when we are alone, whose name do you call out? Who do you go to your knees for, the moment the eyes of the courts are off you? Moreover, who do you look for when things get even a little difficult, begging for my wisdom?”
Arcas teetered forward, the pressure between them suffocating.
“Princess,”
Mirquios said, clearing his throat.
Lunelle clenched her teeth.
“I cannot be both your priestess and plaything, Arcas.”
Arcas exhaled slowly, agonizingly slowly, his gaze burning so far into hers she thought she might combust.
“Release them,”
he rasped.
“All of them.”
The guard bristled. “Your?—”
“Now,”
he demanded, never breaking his hold on Lunelle’s eyes. The cells popped open, one by one, until the remaining five rebels were released, their quick steps echoing off the stairs in the spire.
“Leave us,”
Arcas said, turning to Mirquios and Lura.
Mirquios shook his head, his fingers pushing into his chest.
“It’s okay,”
Lunelle said quietly, nodding toward Lura.
“The king will escort you back.”
“Lunelle—”
Mirquios protested, but Lura’s clutched hand around his arm stopped him, shoving him through the door. The guards stepped behind them, slamming the door with a heavy thud.
Arcas turned back to Lunelle, her eyes still locked on his, unwilling to release him like the prisoners.
“Thank you,”
she said, her tone flat.
“It wasn’t a favor.”
Her head tilted.
“I see your allegiances have shifted significantly since your arrival.”
Lunelle shook her head. He was still so close.
She bit.
“My allegiance has always been to my people, Arcas. Perhaps that looks different than I thought a few weeks ago?—”
The prince snorted, his eyes darkening as he grinned.
“Whatever you need to tell yourself, Lunelle.”
“Why put them down? Why not work with them? I don’t understand?—”
“Exactly!”
Arcas rushed her, pushing her back a few steps into the cold stone wall between cells. The jagged surfaces of the stones pulled at her dress as she gasped under him, his chest flaring in waves of fury.
“You do not understand. You haven’t understood from the moment I met you—how fragile my situation is. How dangerous it is to overturn an entire court on the brink of war! You cannot just wipe the slate clean, there are real consequences for everyone here without clear order and rank.”
Lunelle squeezed her eyes shut, trying to think, but he drowned her in that strange chemistry once again.
She placed a hand on his chest in an effort to put something, anything, between them.
“You would not be alone, Arcas. You would have me, you would have hundreds of people across the courts ready to help, ready to work. You carry this entire court on your shoulders, but you do not have to?—”
He placed a hand on the wall beside her, moving into her once more, softer this time.
Slower.
“I would have you?”
he asked, the ire in his question undeniable.
She nodded.
Arcas leaned closer, his lips brushing her ear, her jaw, sending a cold shiver over her spine. Lunelle swallowed, her chest seizing in an unholy blaze. It was the wrong kind of burn, but a burn nonetheless.
It was something.
“By your side, as the Lunar king?”
She moved her hand from his chest to his neck, her pale silver melting into his sky blue. His sapphire eyes flared as they found hers.
“Arcas, I?—”
“Oh,”
he sighed, pushing away from her.
“Do not back out now.”
He paced between the cells, the anger rising back into his throat.
“I’m not?—”
He stopped and pivoted toward her.
She saw it—the madness unfold, the desperation as it overtook whatever small piece of him might have wanted to do good.
The desire to maintain his grip over a power he was quickly losing. The way it erased whatever passion he might have kindled for her personally.
“You will marry me, Lunelle. And you will do so happily because if you do not, I will make sure your queen knows exactly which rebel marched into my prison and demanded her contemporaries be liberated.”
Lunelle’s face flushed, the feeling in her body dissolving into the ether as her blood rushed in her ears.
“Arcas—”
He towered over her again, hands gripping her jaw as he pushed through clenched teeth.
“And if self-preservation is not enough motivation,”
he growled.
“I will happily go straight to the Court Above and let the gods themselves know their monarchs are folding to this rancid rebellion. Because you know what comes after your throne falls, don’t you? They’ll never be satisfied until the heads of the gods themselves roll. And I think they’ll all find it fascinating which Lunar demigoddess sold them out.”
Lunelle pulled away from him, shirking his grasp as her lips snarled in disgust for the boy prince before her.
“I thought you were ignorant, Arcas, but I hoped you were at least redeemable.”
She stomped toward the door, heaving it open as she spun on her heels. Lunelle inhaled sharply.
“There is no saving you from yourself.”
Arcas caught her hand, pulling her back into him, venom pooling on his tongue.
“Careful, starling. You know how much it turns me on when you hurt my feelings.”
Lunelle wrestled against his grasp, her rage boiling under his fingers.
“That’s not you,”
she spat.
“But you’re so afraid of yourself, I can taste it.”
She did not give him another chance to grab her, moving swiftly into the hall and down the first set of stairs.
Arcas called after her, “I will be Lunar king, Lunelle! Or I’ll be sure to let the gods know who bound you into the rebellion in the first place.”
Lunelle froze, her heart shattering as the words snapped from his mouth.
She did not look back before running down the remaining stairs, hardly able to grasp her breath as she felt her entire world start to crumble for not the first time since she stepped foot into this godsforsaken court.