Chapter 20 Rae #2
The king doesn’t order him to sit; in fact, he isn’t looking at Jai at all.
He’s looking at me. “Lady Rae.”
Unease coils in my stomach. “Majesty?”
“Lady Rae,” he says, now glancing around at his guests, “bears our mark on her wrist. She has joined forces with us in our mission to open the gates. To return home.”
I jerk. What is he saying?
A shocked murmur winds through the guests, and I recall that there was a good reason they left their homeland. The Last Reversal all but destroyed it. Now he’s asking them to go back, and it seems to be news to them.
Hasn’t he ever told them of his plans? What did they think he wanted to open the gates for?
“We thought he wanted Athdara to control the dragons, give us an advantage against finnfolk,” a fae lord hisses. “I thought he wanted to open the gates to bring the dead back. Not to leave!”
“Our home world was rotting,” a lady whispers. “This world is fine. Why leave?”
Exactly my thoughts.
Mera gives a dry laugh but I can’t spare her a look.
Painting me a traitor to humanity doesn’t matter so much, not when only two humans are left of the twenty-four. Though, who knows if these two will join forces now to take me down?
Announcing that his mark is on me certainly isn’t doing me any favors, and when I poke at my feelings about this show he has put on… I find disappointment and sorrow condensing into a blade, slowly piercing my mind.
This isn’t what I’d expected. Nothing so far is.
The king’s smile hammers the blade deeper. “A face from the past, returning. A power yet leashed that we will explore together. My beloved, with hair like ebony and eyes like the night—”
“What?” Jai jerks back as if stung. “What are you saying? Where did you—?”
“—my beautiful thorn,” the king goes on, “my—”
“Stop!” Jai roars and throws his goblet to crash against a wall, spilling wine. “Just fucking stop.”
The fae gasp as the shadows ripple and rise, then rush over the table, snuffing out flames and sweeping the dishes to the floor. A noble cries out and pushes his chair back as dark tendrils wrap around the candelabra, lifting it, then throwing it off the table.
I open my mouth to speak but can’t find any adequate words as Jai’s shadows start to spin around him, shrouding him in darkness.
Jai…
“Stand down,” the king hisses.
“No,” Jai says, his hoarse voice rising, his eyes blazing in his pale face, “you don’t get to do that. To use what you stole. Fucking thief.”
The guards rush forward, but the king lifts a hand, forestalling them. “Stand down, Athdara.”
“So this is how you did it,” Jai seethes, his teeth flashing, fists rising. “You made me doubt everything, you…” He shakes his head, turns to me. “I need you to answer me one question. Were you born finnfolk?”
I gulp. “I…”
“Answer me this,” he says quietly and there’s a catch in his grave voice. “Were you?”
“No,” I breathe.
“I failed you.” Sparks glint in his eyes. “Fuck.”
My heart is thudding in my ears. What just happened?
The king says, “Beloved, come to me, come—”
“You don’t speak to her,” Jai growls, his hands curling into fists, his gaze still locked on me. “You don’t steal my words and you don’t steal her. You’ve taken enough already.”
A deadly silence falls over the room, broken only by more guards approaching the dais and the strange contest taking place in front of me. The guards lift their spears, some even draw their swords, waiting for the king’s command to attack.
“She has my mark,” the king says.
“You can’t have her.” Jai’s voice drips pain and blood. “You can’t fucking have her.”
I stare at him.
The king’s hand, still lifted, is now wreathed in white mist. “I said, stand down, Athdara. This doesn’t concern you.”
“The hell it doesn’t. Nothing concerns me more than this. Than her. I said, you can’t have her!”
“And why is that?”
“Because.” Jai’s dark gaze finds me. “She belongs with me.”
His voice rings deep and true, and the conviction in it shakes me to my core.
My throat closes. What is he doing? Why does it affect me so much? Stupid. I’m so stupid to let it grip my throat like that, grip my heart like a fist.
And he’s stupid to say things like that to the king—but the warmth in my chest is almost as if he’s touching me, cradling me in his arms.
The shock that ripples through the fae is a wave splashing from one side of the room to the other.
For the first time, their true nature shows.
Their magic unfurls just as branches unfurl from their heads and shoulders, leaves and berries sprouting, blossoms unfolding.
Creatures of the earth and air, they transform into weird shapes.
Their base form. Not human. And yet the king had said they had been once like us…
“You don’t have a say in this, Athdara Dikerotes!” the king booms, his eyes flashing like pale flames. “Even if you succeed in controlling Phaethon, I have marked her, and so your plans fail. You can’t touch me without touching her.”
What?
“She comes with me tonight,” the king continues and unfurls a regal hand toward me. “Come, beloved. We retire to my rooms now.”
In the middle of the banquet? Confused, I glance around at the shocked faces of the fae nobility and find Mera’s still amused smirk and Amaryll’s outraged look both trained on me.
“Rae. No.” Jai lifts a hand toward me. The shadows still clothe him in night. “Don’t go with him. Come with me.”
How does he suppose I can choose? This is the fae king. I can’t refuse. Though I still find it odd that he’d ask to talk now.
“Rae,” Jai says more softly, and my throat closes. “Makhair. I know the truth now. It’s me you need to talk to, not him.”
I open my mouth to reply, my instinct telling me to follow Jai, to say yes…
“She is coming with me,” the king says. An imperious gesture directed at me. “Rae. Now.”
The command strikes me like a blow. It elicits a knee-jerk reaction from me. I step toward him even as I try to resist.
“No,” Jai growls. “Don’t do that to her. Fuck.”
My mark stings. Before I can give it more thought, I find myself gathering my skirts, preparing to walk around the other guests to reach the dais where the king is now standing, his guards close behind him.
But Jai snarls, his hand curling into a fist, and the dark shadows flare around him, knocking over the rest of the candelabra, shoving at the guests, their chairs crashing backward. The fae shout, hitting the flames with their napkins.
I stop, unsure of what to do as people scramble to get up from the floor. Wine spills. Flames dance.
The king lifts a hand and air slams against the shadows, knocking them back. A silvery mist slithers over the table, smothering the flames, turning the spilled wine into crackling icicles that catch the light.
The shadows snap back—toward the king. They curl around his neck.
They tighten.
Even as I watch this happening, I gasp, lifting a hand to my throat, because… Skies! I can’t breathe. My air is cut off. I choke and bend over.
What in the hells is going on?
As I gasp again, desperately clawing at the invisible noose around my neck, Jai whirls toward me and goes very still, eyes widening. All color leeches from his face.
“The fuck,” he breathes, stumbling backward. “What the fuck is…? What are you doing to her? Stop it.”
A smirk plays on the king’s mouth. “You want me to play fair?” he rasps. Gasps. His fingers fly to his neck, mirroring my gesture. “You thought you could win this? Against me?”
“Stop.” Now Jai starts toward me. “Stop choking her.”
“I’m not the one doing it,” the king manages. His face is darkening, eyes bulging. “Don’t you understand?”
Jai stops again, glances between us.
The king wheezes.
I wheeze.
The king stumbles against the table.
I stumble, too.
“Damn you.” Jai slams his hands on the table and bows over, eyes dark, face white.
“What is this magic?” He lifts his head and goes utterly still.
“It’s the mark, isn’t it? The goddamn mark you put on her.
You…” He shudders. Then he raises a hand and the shadows lift off the king’s neck. “She’s not collateral, dammit.”
Air flows back into my lungs, and I start coughing. Breathing in. Coughing some more.
The king starts to laugh, a harsh sound. “She’s not collateral? Too late to start using your brain, Athdara.”
“You don’t touch her.” Jai closes his eyes. They look bruised. “Don’t fucking touch her.”
And with a muttered curse, he spins on his heel and limps out of the hall, taking the shadows with him.