Chapter 45 Rae
CHAPTER FORTY-FIVE
RAE
Scales. Fangs.
The power inside me is tearing me apart. It’s a wild creature caught in the cage of my human body and it’s clawing at the bars, trying to escape.
Jai’s arms around me keep me from breaking into pieces. When I gave my power up, when I accepted the sea queen’s spell that shoved it so deep inside me nothing could detect it, no dragonbone and no telchin’s magic, it felt like a loss but there was no pain.
There is pain now as it cuts its way back up to the surface of my consciousness.
Now memories trickle back, memories I’d shoved deep, bursting out with the resurgence of my power. Memories of the pain I’d felt when the magic had first slapped into me back when I died.
A blade to my neck, and a shove from a cliff into the heaving ocean.
The world had winked out and I’d felt a measure of peace, but then life had returned to me and I had been changed. Turned inside out.
Remade.
I shake and shake, shuddering with every new memory returning.
I relive the pleasure of strolling with Mars on the river shore, of playing with my brother, having dinner with my parents.
Reading in the library, shopping for fine textiles and jewels from wandering merchants, sailing on the river to do libations and appease the sleeping Gods, watching from afar nokke and mermaids playing in the deepest part of the river.
I’m floating in the dark water and images twine around me, flashing like a heartbeat.
I remember my brother dying in front of me.
I remember my parents’ dead bodies.
Grief fills me, a mass of knives churning inside my chest, cutting me up inside. The grief was muted before. It’s agony now.
I see the fae king’s face. He’s grinning as I stand there, bathed in my family’s blood. I knew it for the truth when Jai told me, but seeing it, remembering it…
He did this.
He did this and then pretended to be my long-lost love, accused Jai of being the culprit, and Phaethon, damn him, played along and insisted. Lied to me. I…
No. I jerk in the dark. No, I don’t want to see anymore. No more pain and death. No memories of all the years spent in the ocean.
Not all is clear. In places, my mind has erected such thick walls to protect my sanity that bringing them down is all but impossible.
I drift in the blackness, swayed by the currents of the sea, and close my eyes.
When I open my eyes again, I’m disoriented. I don’t know where I am, and as the memories rush back in, I’m even more confused.
This is my room. How did I get here from the parlor where I was with Jai?
Then more memories return, vague and hazy, of Jai carrying me in his arms through the palace, placing me in my bed.
And now he’s gone.
Where is he? Did something happen? Is he okay?
Clenching my fists, I sit on the bed and take a deep breath. I look down at myself. No scales. No changes. No sign of my magic is visible on my body.
“Breathe through it, it’s all right, just breathe through it, makhair.”
I will my fear to dispel. He was probably summoned by the king while I was out. The need to find him is so intense, I’m on my feet, dizzy and disoriented, heading for the door.
But when I open it, I find Arkin there.
“Jai told you to guard me,” I whisper, clutching the doorframe for support.
“No, Jai… he had to be elsewhere and I know he’d want me to look out for you.”
I shake my head. “Look out for me. Is that what you did that night with the king? Looked out for me?”
His jaw works. “I already explained to Jai—”
“But not to me. How would you explain the fact that you and Tru blocked my way, and that later Tru…”
“Tru, what?”
I watch his face for any flicker indicating he knows what his friend did. That he almost killed me. But I only see curiosity and some confusion. He may be a great actor.
Or he may not know.
“Nothing,” I whisper. “So… explain?”
He’s frowning at me. Then he steps into my room, forcing me to take a few steps back. “I’m not supposed to be telling you this.”
“You’re not?”
“But maybe you can sway Jai’s mind now you’ve grown closer together.”
It’s my turn to frown. “Sway his mind?”
He closes the door behind him, glances around as if he’s expecting people to step out of the shadows at the corners of the room. “Nobody can know about this. The king can’t read your mind through the betrothal bond, can he?”
“I don’t know,” I tell him frankly. “But I don’t think so.”
The king hasn’t given any indication so far that he has access to what’s going on inside my head.
“Fair enough,” Arkin says. “Try not to let him find out.”
“About what?”
“Our plans.”
I blink at him. “Plans?”
“I know Jai told you that for a very long time we had a plan, Jai, Tru, and I, to kill the king. But it became complicated. Phaethon wouldn’t let Jai turn against the king. He needed the king to keep Jai sane. A suitable vessel.”
I nod.
“Getting close enough to the king to kill him proved nigh impossible. The king’s magic is powerful and getting past it wasn’t easy.
Jai was growing… despondent. Losing hope again.
We figured out that the king is vulnerable while he’s biting Jai, but when he does that, Jai is unable to summon his own magic.
And then the king started developing Jai’s powers.
Added to his existing powers, it made him even stronger, complicating things more. ”
“I realized.”
“We decided to try anyway. This year, this anniversary. Before the king’s powers grew stronger.
Before Phaethon found a way to open the gates.
Tru and I have been eavesdropping on the king’s conversations, looking for a loophole.
We called on the human rebels to amass and be ready to attack, to create a diversion during which one of us might be able to put an end to the king’s reign.
But now he put that mark on you, Jai has told me it’s over. He won’t risk your life.”
“Gods…” I close my eyes. “I came here to kill the king. The sea queen studied the prophecy and told me my water element was the key to ending him, but nothing worked out as I thought it would.”
“Why would you choose this mission?”
“I wanted revenge. For my family. And for Jai, whom I thought dead.”
His brows go up. “I wish Jai had explained this to me.”
“Would it change anything?”
“Perhaps. Are you really the woman he had once loved?”
Heat creeps up my neck, but the pleasure from hearing that is undeniable. “Yes.”
“The king keeps talking about the prophecy,” Arkin mutters. “He seems to think that now you are here, it will be fulfilled to his advantage. That Phaethon will take over and grant him his wish.”
“Why is he so convinced that ancient text foretells his victory? I mean, it’s long. Longer than the part the king recited for me…”
Who had told me that?
Lynn. Before the first trial. What else does the prophecy contain and would I find there the source of the king’s confidence that he will have his way? I have to find her, and I need to find…
“Jai,” I breathe. “Where is Jai?”
“I’d assume at his favorite spot,” Arkin says.
“The terrace?”
A nod.
“I’ll go talk to him.”
He frowns. “It’s already morning, human lady.”
“You mean finnfolk lady. And what does the time of the day matter?”
He looks chagrined. “Lady Rae. I meant… today is the ball. The third trial is tomorrow. Time is running out.”
“You think I don’t know that?”
“I’m just saying.” He shrugs broad shoulders.
“If you want to stop the king and convince Jai that this world is worth saving… now is the time. I don’t want you to die,” he says, giving me an even look.
“Both for your sake and Jai’s, I’d rather you remained alive, but what other option is there?
Between your death and stopping the king, wouldn’t you choose the latter? ”
“Your friend seemed to think the same,” I tell him coolly and leave him looking confused. Let him figure out which friend I’m talking about.
I have my own figuring out to do.