Chapter Five #3
Inky eyes trapped me, sucking me down into bottomless depths where the sun never shone. Shocking, haunting, unnatural—but that wasn’t what cowed me. From one look, I knew why the curse struggled to touch more than his eyes.
Even it knew to mar such a face was a crime against Meya and nature.
Hawk nose; rock-hard, dimpled chin; long, black locks framing an unblemished face; and that smile. He had a smile like he’d just done something naughty, and no matter what it was, he was going to make you do it too.
The second-most handsome faeman I’d ever seen, solidly throwing Kirwan from the spot.
“We welcome you to Lumenfell, Your Great and Wonderful Majesty.” He bowed deeper, his forehead touching the wet tile. “I am Bradach. This is Foalan.”
Say hello to number four, Kirwan, you ugly bastard.
Foalan tipped his head to me, and silver strands fell over his golden eyes.
I didn’t know where to direct my stare. At the wolf ears perched high and alert on his head. His rounded, almost snout-like nose. Or his broad shoulders; trim, masculine beard; sharp, glass-cutter’s cheekbones, and full, cherry-kissed lips.
How did the curse choose their animal? Why was Foalan becoming a wolf, and Bradach becoming a raven? Was it even polite to ask?
A deep, soothing baritone rolled from Foalan’s throat. “It is a pleasure, my queen.”
“It is our pleasure to serve you,” Bradach said from the floor. “We are your royal back scrubbers. At your service.”
My eyes bugged. “Really? You are?”
“Fuck no, keva.” He popped up, dropping that subservient tone so fast, I looked for it on the floor. “Damn, they say you Lyricans are a pampered, high-nosed lot. Royal back scrubbers? What’s wrong with you?”
I gaped at him—both for plopping down next to me bold as day, and calling me a keva—otherwise translated from High Fae as strange person, odd, or freak. “I didn’t say that, you did, and— Hey!”
Bradach tugged on my bucket, making me cling on for dear life. “Why are you hugging this? They need it to wash you.”
“I’m hugging this because two strange men just walked in on me taking a bath.”
“What? Where!”
No word of a lie, Bradach and Foalan both spun around, clutching their hilts and looking for the strange men.
“I meant you two,” I hissed through gritted teeth. “Please, leave.”
“Us?” Bradach’s brows snapped together. “Why?”
“Because I’m naked.”
“Oh, that?” He waved that away. “We don’t mind.”
“I do.”
“Do what?”
“Mind!”
Understanding finally dawned on his handsome face. “Oh, I see. Forgive us, my queen. Aeris told us to study your customs, but we thought this one was a joke,” he said. “Lyricans can only be naked in the same room if everyone is naked.”
“Oh, right.”
“Of course.”
“I can’t believe I forgot,” Aeris cried. “Queen Ana, please, forgive me. No wonder you’re uncomfortable.”
Bug-eyed and slack-jawed, I didn’t have words as they all stripped off their clothes, leaving me and my bucket in a room full of naked faeriken. What was even worse... Bradach was right. It was socially acceptable in Lyrica for me to be naked in a bathhouse with other women—
The key word being women.
Bradach sprawled across my stone chaise, making himself comfortable. Foalan sat straight-backed and crisscrossed beside me. I sat like a folded-over pretzel, using all of my limbs to cover all of my parts after Aeris finally wrestled the bucket away.
“Once again, introductions,” Bradach began. I hyper-focused on his face and didn’t let my eyes drift an inch lower. “Foalan Volk. He is commander of Lord Lumenfell’s army.”
“Lumenfell?” I broke in. “Who is Lord Lumenfell?”
“Who is Lord Lumenfell?” he repeated slowly. “He’s your husband. You married him a few days ago, keva. Don’t you remember this?”
My face flushed from more than steam. “I wasn’t informed that he... went by another name.”
“As in, you thought his subjects referred to him by the insulting, blasphemous slur, Shadowsoul?” Foalan growled. “To even let that title leave my lips is offensive.”
“Oh, I didn’t mean—”
“He is Lord Alisdair Lumenfell here,” Aeris said in a kinder, more patient tone. “A name as fitting for him as it is for our kingdom: the land the stars forgot.”
I hummed quietly. Strangely, I agreed. Lumenfell did suit the dark, brooding figure I was coming to know too well. A man forgotten by the stars, the light, the radiance and wonder of the world. Outside was mesmerizing beauty, but inside... was darkness.
“As for my true title,” Bradach continued. “Why, the list is endless. I am Bradach Arasu, my lord’s right hand, his most trusted advisor, his sage counsel, his closest companion, his truest comrade.”
I stilled, alighting on one word: companion.
“Oh,” I breathed. “I see.”
Aeris heaved a sigh. “Bradach, how you overreach.” She had moved on to washing Emiana’s hair. Long, glistening red strands sluiced off the chaise, and hardened my heart. I dropped my hands and legs, sitting up bold and straight. Why was I being protective of a body that wasn’t mine?
“There is no overreach.” I stretched out my legs and Bradach immediately slid away. Was he avoiding my touch? Did faeriken dislike their normal fae counterparts as much as we disliked them? “My lord trusts me. He confides in me. I am his friend.”
“Preposterous,” Foalan spat, drawing my eyes, then blowing them wide. I’d never seen such fury on someone’s face, but then, no one I knew had fangs. “I would never presume to claim such titles, but if my lord were to bestow them on anyone, it would be me.”
“Do you think so?” Bradach’s grin was smug. “Then tell me why my lord asked me personally to stay behind and protect Lumenfell while he traversed the summerlands to acquire his bride?”
“He asked me, you fool,” Foalan replied through gritted teeth. “You were merely in the room.”
“You are recalling that incorrectly,” Bradach breezed. “One too many hits to the head with a sword hilt will do that to an old man.”
Foalan’s lips peeled back from his teeth. “A mere two weeks ago my lord threw his favorite coat in my direction, entrusting it to me.”
“Ah, but the day before he tore off my coat to wipe his bloody sword,” Bradach shot back, “entrusting me with the care and cleanliness of his weapons.”
My gaze bounced between them, brows high in disbelief. Was this real? Were they truly fighting over the cold and withheld affections of that cruel man?
“Last moon an intruder broke into the castle, and my lord had me flogged only a hundred times, instead of the thousand I deserved,” Foalan said, smiling his triumph.
Bradach smiled wider still. “When my lord arrived this eve, he told me to have a meal prepared and sent to his study because he was... hungry.”
Two attendants gasped.
Aeris halted sudsing my hair. “What? He said this to you? Truly?”
I pulled a face at the lot of them. “Is this a jest? Surely it doesn’t matter that—”
“No,” Foalan sliced in. His expression was terrible. “The jest is that I believed myself higher in my lord’s esteem. Bradach has bested me. My lord has never shared such intimate knowledge of himself with me. Clearly, I have displeased him.” Foalan hung his head.
It was like looking upon a man in mourning, but the one mourning should be me. What kind of person was so closed off, it was a shock and delight for him to tell you he’s hungry?
My husband—that was who. I would never get a being such as him to fall in love with me. Which was why my only option was to run.
“So it’s true.”
I flicked up to Bradach, but he wasn’t looking at me. Following my gaze, I saw one of the attendants carrying a large, blue crystal bowl. She waved her hand over it and it filled with white, milky liquid.
I was so shocked, my brain froze—senses fading out.
“...true. My lord honors his bride with the full and true mating ceremony,” Aeris said. “The ceremony is nigh.”
“Fuck it to Meya, Princess,” Bradach cried. “Lord Alisdair intends to bond with you and make you his eternal mate? What’d you do to piss him off?”
If anything could’ve torn me from the miraculous sight of a woman performing magic, it was that. “Eternal mate? What are you talking about?”
“She rejected the marriage vows and plunged his own sword through his chest,” Aeris dropped.
Bradach whistled. “That’ll do it.”
“Excuse me? Hello,” I said louder. “What does that mean? What eternal mate?”
“The ceremony they’re getting you ready for.” Bradach moved aside as two women approached me with towels. “It would seem you’re to be married again. Properly, this time.”
“Properly?”
“The faeriken respect the old traditions of marriage and bonding.” Aeris’s voice reached me from underneath the vigorously rubbing cotton. “Your people threw those traditions away to allow for the travesties they commit against their wives and women. Vows of fidelity? I think not.
“Our lord honors you, Queen Ana,” she gushed. “He means to make you his mate and bonded for eternity. Only death will separate you.”
I whirled on Bradach. “If this is such an honor, why did you speak of it like a punishment?”
Bradach shrugged. “Because when my lord left, he made it clear in no uncertain terms that he planned to leave you at the altar. This whole arranged marriage nonsense was obviously a brazen attempt to get a spy across our borders,” he said, black eyes pinning me through. “You.
“He played along, signed your worthless treaty, accepted the many crystals, jewels, and money bestowed upon our kingdom as a wedding gift, but in the end, there was to be no marriage between Lord Lumenfell and Princess Emiana of Lyrica. But then—”
“I put a sword through his chest,” I whispered, lips numb.
“Exactly, keva.” He made to clap me on the back, then stopped—pulling back. “With one simple, insane move you proved beyond a doubt that you are no spy. In fact, you have no subtlety at all. There couldn’t be a worse spy than you.”
I choked. “And for that he went through with the wedding? For that, he ripped me from my home and dragged me from the faelands!? It is your precious Lord Shitsoul that’s insane!”