Chapter 23
Ever
A CHILL SKATES ACROSS MY skin, weaving its way in and out of the goose bumps that have taken up permanent residence across my limbs. I try to rub warmth into my arms, but it only seems to drain me of what little energy and patience I have left.
It’s cold in Four Tiers, even colder in King’s Keep with the higher elevation and the icy touch of the waterfalls.
I tilt my head back and rest it against the stone chair I’m perched in.
Through the high glass ceiling, I watch as the gray, listless clouds roll by and try to remember snow.
I played in it once, but I only remember kicking it around and marveling at the boot prints Enslee and I stamped around before our mother called us in for the night.
I’m sure there were other storms, other days filled with boot prints, red cheeks, and giggles, but they’re lost to me now, buried beneath mountains of dark sand and even darker desolation.
Moths scuttle about in my stomach when the sound of distant footfalls registers.
I sit up and expectantly look toward the raised balcony in front of me.
There are no stairs connecting my lower deck with the upper one, and the railing between the floors looks more like a footrest as opposed to something designed to keep people from falling.
A large stone throne sits front and center, and on each side of it a handful of mini thrones fan out in an arc toward me.
It’s a Hall of Justice—one of the smaller ones, anyway.
I recognize it from some of the recordings I watched of the sentences handed down after the sorcai and wyvern rebellion.
Drawing closer, the heavy tread is like a death knell.
Tension moors me to my seat, while my pulse ascends to the ceiling and starts tapping on the glass in search of a way out.
I’ve watched quite a few trials occur in rooms like this; it never ends well for the person sitting in my seat.
I gulp down my trepidation and hold my head high. I consider pulling my hair down from my messy updo to look more presentable, but dismiss that in favor of having my dragon mark visible from all angles. With a boom that makes me start in my seat, a door off to the side of the balcony opens.
Formidable figures file into the room, and I study them intently as they claim seats across the crescent balcony.
The four commanders I met in Thrasher Keep during my first official interrogation, disguised as a lunch, arrive one at a time.
Commander Ventis and Commander Drazyn move confidently to the far right of the throne, while Zeir and Galerus claim opposite positions on the left.
King Noctis’s second and third then arrive.
I haven’t met either yet, but I recognize them from the intel the Syphons have gathered over the years.
They split from the others and claim seats next to the commanders on each side.
Lorn appears next, followed by Aeson. Each of them is in a suit so dark it looks like it was made from the void itself and could start consuming souls and everything else in this room without warning.
Fur capes, dark as pitch, trail behind the scions, and the shiver that overtakes me isn’t from the cold this time; it’s foreboding now skittering across my nape.
My dragon unfurls in my chest, and the bond starts rattling the walls of the cage I’ve welded shut all around it. Aeson looks devastatingly handsome, and I’ve never wanted to punch him in the face more.
I anchor my response to anger and let Aeson’s regal air and apathetic stare roll over me like he couldn’t matter less. The hard line of his clenched jaw ruins his unbothered air, and I wish one hell of a tension headache on him before the day is through.
Lorn looks a little less fuck you , but not by much. He can’t seem to decide if he wants to glower at me or ignore me altogether.
“Hi, Ducky,” Commander Ventis greets, and I can’t tamp down the hint of a smile that flashes across my face or the warmth that courses through me at her use of the nickname. “You’ve looked better,” she teases, and I huff out a weak laugh.
“I’ve been better,” I concede, fighting off another shiver.
I can feel Aeson’s eyes trying to strip me bare in the way a wolf picks the bones of its kill clean. I haven’t seen him since he walked out of the caves, and it’s clear he’s cleaned up and probably had a nice hot meal, while offering none of the same to me.
Enslee was right—prissy little scions, indeed.
“King Noctis,” a herald announces, and everyone in the room stands and turns to the entryway as the Burner king enters the hall.
I don’t bow like everyone else does, instead choosing to try to get a read on the king.
His suit was obviously designed by the same Arc who dressed his sons.
I find it amusing to think of the three royals coordinating their outfits for various events.
The impact of the ensemble is undeniable though.
Nothing quite says off with your head like an all-black power suit.
“Insolence won’t get you anywhere other than put in your place,” Khalil, the king’s second, warns when he notices my lack of a deferential bow.
The Burner has abandoned his magenta scale armor in favor of an ink-black sherwani that falls to his knees, and a matching dhoti. His equally dark hair is slicked back into a knot behind his head, and it’s abundantly clear he finds my cheek far less amusing than the king does.
I keep my shoulders square and my chin up as I stare into his dark brown eyes. “I mean no disrespect, but I have not sworn fealty to King Noctis, and I will not bow to anyone who hasn’t earned it.”
Khalil’s stern stare becomes punishing, but before he can say anything else, King Noctis stands front and center on the balcony and raises a hand. His unreadable blue eyes find mine, and there’s no denying the power and presence of the formidable dragon before me.
“You make a good point, Scioness Tenebrae,” King Noctis observes. “Perhaps we should rectify that today.”
The challenge that flickers in his gaze sparks my own.
I stare at him and internally pull my insides back up from where they tried to plummet at his unexpected decree.
He hasn’t pushed me on this, and I know that’s not going to last forever, but I didn’t foresee today being the day we really went head-to-head.
“You can try,” I clip back, and a small grin twitches one corner of the king’s mouth before he flattens it.
Meanwhile, his second and third look as though they’re each trying to calculate how long it will take to close the distance so they can teach me a little respect.
A low growl rumbles through the room, and when I track it, I find Aeson staring right at me, and he looks furious.
I don’t know what the fuck he thinks I’ve done now, so I silently dismiss him.
The king sits and everyone else does the same, including me.
I study King Noctis’s face like I can decode what’s about to happen in the grooves of his laugh lines and the furrows across his brow.
It dawns on me that Iker and Kathal Noctis kind of look alike.
The light hair, the tan complexion, the large frame.
Their personalities couldn’t be more different though, and I can’t help but wonder who would win in a fight if the king couldn’t use his affinity.
“I must admit,” King Noctis starts, “I expected some trouble surrounding your discovery, Ever, but I did not anticipate this. You’ve exceeded all expectations.”
I dip my chin ever so slightly. “You’re too kind, Your Grace.”
A rumbled warning slips out of Khalil again, and I barely stop myself from shooting him the bird and telling him to lighten up.
“Now, let’s get down to business,” the king chirps, and my attention darts back in his direction.
“Scioness Tenebrae, this will be your one and only chance to defend yourself against the charges of treason, colluding to open the Fae Gate, tampering with the Fae Gate, and endangering the safety of Drameric and all of its citizens as a whole.”
I reel back, my eyebrows climbing into my hairline, and my mouth dropping open in shock. What the fuck?
Treason? Trying to open the Fae Gate? Endangering the citizens of Drameric!
My eyes dart to Aeson, as though he’ll explain what the fuck is going on, but his stare is blank and his features unmoved.
I take in the hard faces of everyone else before me and shake my head.
I expected them to hold me accountable for killing the Relacour Conduit, but I didn’t commit treason.
I didn’t tamper with the Fae Gate, let alone try to open it. I didn’t even go near the bloody thing.
Just as soon as that thought registers in my mind, something the Matron said when she was dying surfaces, and my heart and lungs collectively agree to stop working.
“ If you kill me, you’ll weaken the Fae Gate, ” she’d rasped, blood spilling from her mouth as I pressed my dagger deeper into her heart.
I thought she was just trying to stall. I didn’t believe a word out of her mouth because?.
.?. My head snaps to Aeson, and outrage builds to a bonfire in my chest.
“You lied to me,” I growl, digging my fingers into the hard arms of the chair to keep from leaping for him. “I asked you if she was connected to the Fae Gate, and you told me no.”
Fury flashes in Aeson’s sky-blue eyes, and he leans forward in his chair. “No, I told you it wasn’t the Matron who was specifically tied to the gate.”
“What the fuck does that even mean?” I demand, tossing my hands up in outrage.
“It means the blood of the Relacour line was connected to the protections on the Fae Gate. You know, the line you decimated when you killed their Conduit,” he callously snaps at me.