Chapter Fourteen
THEA
T hea, Cal and Kipp stood before the rulers of the midrealms in the glass throne room of Vios. Crystal-clear floor-to-ceiling windows gave a full view of the mountains behind the floating domes and the great frozen lake.
The entire space was adorned with finery, furs and glimmering light. It was the embodiment of opulence, wealth, power. Beautiful, and yet… lacking. Thea realised she missed the Great Hall of the fortress back in Thezmarr, its simplicity, its unlikely warmth.
Although the cavernous space around her now was enchanted to keep the wintry air at bay, Thea felt cold to her bones.
Before her stood King Artos of Harenth, King Leiko of Tver, and King Elkan and Queen Reyna of Aveum.
All of them wore cloaks of thick fur, and intricate jewelled crowns atop their heads.
‘Welcome to Vios, Althea Zoltaire of Thezmarr,’ Queen Reyna declared, opening her arms wide in a grand gesture. ‘And of course, welcome to your companions as well.’ She dipped her head to Cal and Kipp.
The trio bowed low. It was not their first time before royalty, but Thea didn’t think it got any easier.
‘Thank you, Your Majesty. Your kingdom is every bit as beautiful as they say,’ Thea managed, daring to glance up at the dais.
Her training kept her reaction in check, but she nearly baulked at who she saw stationed nearby.
One of King Artos’ dungeon masters. She wouldn’t have recognised him but for the jewellery he wore.
Even a year ago she’d found it odd for a man in his position: a gemstone nasal piercing and a dozen bronze bangles on each wrist. He’d been there in the dungeons of Hailford when Hawthorne had interrogated those half-wraiths.
‘And as unforgiving, no doubt,’ the queen replied with a small smile, wrenching Thea’s attention back to the rulers. ‘We have you to thank for the capture and imprisonment of the fallen Warsword, Wilder Hawthorne, is that correct?’
Thea had been dreaming of this moment for a solid year.
Almost every night she had imagined the warm satisfaction that would pour through her with this victory.
Over and over she had fantasised about how all would feel right in the world again, how every hurt, every trial would have been worth it to see justice done.
And yet, not a flicker of those emotions came.
There was no joy, no sense of achievement, no pride at having fulfilled a duty.
Instead, she found herself suppressing the urge to fidget, to look around the hall for any sign of the man himself.
But she nodded. ‘Yes, Your Majesty. Along with my fellow Thezmarrians, Callahan Whitlock and Kristopher Snowden.’
‘The midrealms owes you a great debt, Guardians.’
‘We only did what honour and duty demanded, Your Majesty,’ Thea replied.
‘You have done us proud, Althea!’ King Artos’ voice boomed, and he strode down the dais steps and clasped Thea’s hands in his, his emerald eyes bright. ‘I knew you were destined for greatness the moment you saved my life at the feast all that time ago.’
Hawthorne’s words crept to the forefont of her mind. ‘It’s Artos, Thea… Artos is responsible for the blight upon the midrealms. He’s the one letting the reapers and monsters through the Veil.’
Thea hadn’t believed him, hadn’t wanted to. But something oily slid across her skin at Artos’ touch, and she resisted the impulse to pull her hands from his. ‘Thank you, sire.’
He didn’t let go. ‘You timed it perfectly. While we celebrate the ultimate triumph over darkness with the Moonfire Eclipse, you have indeed triumphed over shadow and brought a traitor to justice.’
In her periphery, Thea caught a blur of movement. Two towering figures standing by the farthest wall.
Torj Elderbrock, the Bear Slayer, with his war hammer strapped to his back… and Vernich Warner, the Bloodletter. The two remaining Warswords of Thezmarr. The last time she’d seen them, they’d both given her their blessing to hunt their comrade down.
The back of her neck prickled as she felt another pair of eyes settle on her.
Osiris, the Guild Master of Thezmarr.
‘Bring him Thezmarr’s justice… Do that, Althea Zoltaire, and his swords are yours.
’ His final words to her rang clear as bells in her ears.
She had done exactly that. She had both of Hawthorne’s scabbards strapped to her back, the weight of Naarvian steel somehow not as comforting as it had once been.
What if she didn’t want his swords? What if she wanted her own, as she’d always intended?
‘When is the trial?’ she asked, only just remembering to tack on, ‘Your Majesty?’
King Artos at last dropped her hands and turned to his fellow rulers. ‘We had not yet set a date, had we?’
King Leiko of Tver shook his head. ‘Let him rot a while, I say.’
It took all of Thea’s training to suppress the flinch that followed those words.
‘Queen Reyna?’ King Artos prompted the Aveum ruler with a respectful nod to her husband as well.
‘We shall deal with the details of the trial after the eclipse. The celestial event is far more important than the fate of a fallen Warsword,’ the queen answered.
Thea’s stomach churned.
‘Indeed, my love,’ King Elkan agreed. ‘We shall hear no more of his treachery until after the festivities. He has darkened our realms enough this past year.’
King Artos gave a nod of approval. ‘As our hosts wish it.’
Unease coiled tightly in Thea, but her attention was snatched to where Captain Barker lingered on the outskirts of the hall, not so subtly trying to catch King Artos’ attention.
The king beckoned him forth, and the captain approached, whispering something inaudible.
When he was done, he slipped away without ceremony, leaving King Artos to turn back to Thea.
‘My dear Guardian… First, you save my life in Harenth, now you have saved my daughter’s as well?
’ His voice boomed across the hall, full of pride and gratitude, commanding the attention of everyone in attendance.
The space radiated with his joy, his warmth.
‘Captain Barker has just informed me of your heroics on the road. Jasira has told him that were it not for you, she would be dead… or worse.’
A unified gasp echoed around the room.
King Artos rested a hand over his heart. ‘I will forever be in your debt, Althea Zoltaire.’
A smattering of applause followed, awed murmurs breaking out across the gathered crowd.
‘To have saved both king and princess? She’s a true warrior of Thezmarr!’
‘She truly is the Shadow of Death.’
‘Wraith slayer! A legend of Thezmarr in our midst…’
The whispers filled the hall, each one coloured with more admiration than the last. Once, Thea had dreamt of such praise and respect, had yearned for this very reputation as one of the midrealms’ elite.
But an icy shiver raked down her spine, like the scrape of a talon.
She glanced across at Cal and Kipp, who, like the rest of the court, were beaming all too brightly.
Gratitude and reverence shone in their stares – an unnatural display of feeling, she realised.
While she could no longer wield magic herself, her brief experience with it had made her familiar with such things, and now she recognised the strange emotional fog that had cloaked the room for what it was: empath magic.
But Thea was no fool. She bowed graciously, adding a flourish of enthusiasm. ‘We were merely doing our duty, Your Majesty.’
It seemed the line had become the unofficial motto of their quest, its meaning more blurred with every utterance.
King Artos looked pleased. ‘You are all to be honoured at tomorrow night’s masquerade ball, for your valour and endurance. And Althea, Princess Jasira has requested that you attend as her personal guest.’
‘It would be my honour,’ Thea said, bowing again before daring to ask: ‘And the prisoner? Might I see him? I wish to ensure that he is adequately secured after our efforts.’
King Artos gave a rich laugh. ‘Althea, you may rest easy now. He is locked away in Aveum’s most fortified dungeon, guarded by the best of all three kingdoms and Thezmarr’s own. You have nothing to worry about. There’s no need for you to go.’
Thea was quick to nod. ‘Thank you, sire. I only wish to serve the midrealms.’
Queen Reyna stood and gazed at Thea, her expression more distant than before. ‘And serve the midrealms you have, most valiantly.’ She descended the dais, her voice taking on an aloof tone. ‘Not long ago, I had a disturbing vision of a betrayal and an attack on our beloved kingdom —’
A wave of shock rippled across the court, and Thea’s own skin prickled with the queen’s admission.
‘But you,’ Queen Reyna continued, ‘you have saved us from a terrible fate. Darkness was coming for us, and you stopped it in its tracks. You faced the verdant stare of evil and put it in chains. For that, we thank you.’
Thea dipped her head, and when she looked up, Queen Reyna appeared to be herself again.
‘Now is the time to rest and recover,’ she said. ‘Prepare yourself for the celebrations ahead. We have arranged rooms for your stay. Nothing but the best for Thezmarr’s champions.’
More bowing and mumbles of thanks ensued before a flurry of servants came forth to escort Thea, Cal and Kipp away.
‘Thank the gods for that,’ Kipp muttered as they left the throne room, the thrall of empath magic apparently gone.
Thea agreed. She’d felt considerably more uneasy in that hall than she had fighting the wraiths on the Wesford Road. Her skin hadn’t stopped crawling since she’d entered the floating dome.
Verdant stare of evil… The queen’s words echoed oddly in her mind. The reapers’ gazes were ice blue… and Hawthorne? Thea had searched those silver eyes countless times, had peered into them enough to know beyond a shadow of a doubt that there was not a fleck of green in them.
Green.
That oily feeling was back, sliding across her flesh. There was only one green stare that came to mind.
She glanced at Cal and Kipp, who were alert enough to catch her eye as she raised a single finger to her lips and peeled away from the group. To their credit, neither Guardian broke their stride, continuing down the glistening corridor.
Thea ducked away, finding a small balcony and closing the curtains behind her.
The balcony didn’t lead outside, but looked out onto another hall, and Thea made quick work of climbing over the rail and entering the empty room below, unseen by the guards stationed around its perimeter.
It was not the first time she had needed to make herself invisible.
She was glad for all her years of training in secret – those skills had come in just as handy as any she had learnt as a shieldbearer or Guardian.
For the first time in a long while, Thea followed her instincts instead of her head, Artos’ emerald eyes bright in her mind, his words loud. ‘He is locked away in Aveum’s most fortified dungeon… There’s no need to go.’
When someone told her not to go somewhere, that was usually exactly where she needed to go. She had reasoned and reasoned, churned things over in her mind for far too long.
Now was the time to go with her gut, and it demanded that she see Wilder Hawthorne.