Chapter Sixteen #12
My mind twisted into knots putting the scale of her manipulation together. “You! It was you in the square! You sent the mob here?”
“Nope, that was my daughter. Firstborn,” she explained.
“She was born six hundred years ago, and has lived with her father outside of Lumenfell, and the curse. My first husband also hid and protected her, so she’d never be forcibly bound.
Fortunate for she grew into a prodigy. She claimed the gift I gave her, and then surpassed me. Truly, she is a wonder.
“Anyway,” she breezed, still sounding like we were having a fun conversation about Elvan beaches. “I told her she had to keep sending people until she was sure she sent you. Thankfully, you caught on quickly.”
“And the flowers?” Alisdair barked. “How did you get so many of them!”
“Those flowers can pop up farther than you know when you perform great magics, my lord. Whenever you missed one, or more, I helped myself.” She shrugged.
“Never knew when it may come in handy, and this time it did.” She beamed.
“Lit a fire under our lady and she—voila!—broke the curse! Huzzah, huzzah! What a great day for Elva.”
Every soul in the room gaped at her in disbelief.
“Treasa,” I said slowly. “I don’t think I like you very much.”
She laughed heartily. “I did ask you if you were willing to accept the consequences of spreading the curse faster. I do regret the lives that were lost today,” she said, losing her smile.
“I never wanted that, nor do I take it lightly, but freedom is everything. There is no life without it. So, thank you, Queen Callidora Cursebreaker, High Lady of Wind and Wild. You saved us all. Long may you reign.”
“I—”
“Queen Callidora Cursebreaker.” Foalan dropped to his knees. “I pledge my fealty to you. Long may you reign.”
“Foalan, you don’t have to—”
“Queen Callidora Cursebreaker, I pledge my fealty to you. Long may you reign,” Bradach grunted out. “I won’t kneel, if you don’t mind, keva. Can’t inflate that ego too much.”
Bradach never ceased to send my eyes rolling.
“Queen Callidora Cursebreaker.”
“Queen Callidora Cursebreaker.”
All over the room, everyone dropped to their knees, and pledged their respect and loyalty to me. The poor girl from the Gutter. The stolen princess. The queen of nothing.
The cursebreaker.
Amidst it all, Treasa ducked out of the village entrance—floating her babies behind her. She sent me one last wink as she disappeared.
“Um... I...” My jaw stuck forming words as I turned back. “Call me Calli?”
Alisdair laughed. “How could they call you anything else, my beauty?” He planted a searing kiss on my lips, scrambling my mind. “My little bird, my nightmare, my queen. My wife.”
“Till the end, my love. Forever and always.”
“Aww, now isn’t this a pretty portrait.”
I froze. That voice. I know that voice...
A figure crossed the threshold. “But you’re kneeling before the wrong person. I am your queen,” Emiana announced, smiling upon us all. “It is me who will have your undying fealty for forever and a day, as your high empress.”
“Meya, take it!” Alisdair shouted, shoving me behind him. “What are you doing!”
His shock was real and necessary. It wasn’t the surprise of the long-lost princess. It was what she held in her hands.
Emiana clutched the glass case to her chest, and within it, the glowing, dark rose.
“Put that down! Get away from it!” Alisdair bellowed.
“Hmm, I think not, husband.” Emiana’s smile was nasty. “Why would I do that when this tangled ball of ivy is going to give me everything I want—”
“Stop prattling and find me,” someone snapped. “Find me!”
I frowned. Peering around Alisdair, I searched for the owner of the voice.
“I want to thank you, little whore.” Emiana fixed on me.
“You were only supposed to be a little distraction that gave me time to search for the soul in peace, as well as saving me from the bed of a beast, but then you did so much more!” She laughed—delighted with her fucking self.
“You broke the bindings and destabilized every town, village, and city from Quatassa to Sarabai. It’s total upheaval, and what they all need now, is for their true queen to rise to her throne.
I will bring order.” Her smile tinged around the edges.
“On my father’s bones, I will rise higher than a son of his ever could. ”
“—me,” someone shouted. “Find me now!”
Who is that? Where is that coming from?
“Aww.” Emiana mockingly pouted. “You look confused, little whore. Need me to explain it all? In simple words you can understand?”
Alisdair growled, launching off the dais at her. I shot in his path, holding him back. “Don’t,” I hissed. “Something isn’t right. She’s goading us for a reason.”
“Oooh, well, aren’t you the clever one.” Emiana was losing her sweet tone fast. “So clever, you tricked yourself into thinking you earned everything I handed you! Wealth, riches, power, magic, and the handsome king falling at your feet. All of this belongs to me! Their fealty belongs to me. Get off my throne, whore! You won’t be told twice! ”
“I won’t need to be told twice, but I’ll tell you once, nothing here belongs to you,” I said lightly.
“You’re not very subtle, Emiana. And even if you were, it was all right here.
” I tapped my temple. “In your head. You spoke about running away with your true love, and living a simple, quiet life in a cottage in Rajadom.
But those thoughts were never in your mind.
Kaelan was never in your cesspool of a mind.
He was so insignificant, he never came up at all.
“Not like your hatred for your father, or your obsession with taking back the power he ripped away from your mother, and then from you. I had a feeling we’d be seeing you sooner rather than later, but this!
” My calm broke gesturing at Constance’s mangled soul.
Just its nearness sucked the warmth from the room “That’s the desperation of a madwoman!
“So let us end this right now.” I yanked up my sleeve, revealing my runes. “You are no queen, Emiana.”
Her eyes flashed.
“Find me! Find me!”
“The runes that bound us in marriage were inked on our souls, not our bodies. I am Alisdair’s true mate and the queen of Wind and Wild.” My smile was just as wide. “And you are not welcome in my kingdom.
“Arrest her,” I announced, “for theft and treason.”
Foalan, Keefe, Bradach, and our soldiers sprung to action, narrowing on her.
“Carefully,” Alisdair barked. “Don’t break the glass—”
Holding my gaze, Emiana opened her hands, letting the case slip through her fingertips.
“Noo!”
Alisdair sliced the air. A fallen throne cushion shot across the room, slipping beneath the falling rose. It landed softly on its bed—glass intact.
Foalan and Keefe seized Emiana’s arms, dragging her back and away... just as her kick connected.
The case flew off, shattering on the floor.
Boom!
The soul burst free, blowing us off our feet. We crashed into the walls—Emiana and her captors included. None were safe in its path.
Alisdair collapsed on top of me. Through his arms, I saw.
The rose petals ripped free of the stem and swirled around the room, summoning a whirlwind maelstrom of malice and magic. It was as if the whole of the howling, cursed forest was brought down on our heads.
“Calli, we have to run!”
Chilling, whipping winds tore at our clothes, hair, skin, and his shouts—trying to rip away and smother them.
“We have to run now!”
We both tried to stand and were blown back, pinned to the wall.
“What”—wind rushed down my throat, ballooning my cheeks—“is it doing!?”
“It’s looking, Calli!” An emotion I’d never seen in his eyes before, terrified me to my core. “It’s looking for her.”
The swirling roses descended on Eadaoin, swallowing her and her screams. They flung her away, soaring across the room and dumping my friend still and unmoving on the floor.
Shadi tried to run but they were too quick for her. Lifting her into the air, they threw her away just as fast—bouncing her body off the stone.
“Stop!” I screamed. “Stop it!”
The petals were flying toward the entrance and the stairs, when they veered sharply off course, and came straight for me.
“No!” I thrashed against the wind—fighting to run. Fighting to move! “Stay away!”
The petals loomed over me, a dark, ominous cloud of screaming, tortured souls—that veered away again.
They slammed into Aeris’s chest, tearing her from Bradach’s arms. She screamed—kicking and flailing as the petals lifted her into the air... and poured into her gaping mouth.
“No.” My voice lost to the wind. “Please...”
Aeris shrieked, her body jerking, twisting, and contorting as she changed. The woman I knew melted away before my eyes.
Hard, unsmiling mouth.
Dark eyes.
Severe cleft chin.
Sharp cheekbones casting their own shadow over gaunt cheeks.
Raven hair falling in wisps and tangles around her shoulders.
I’d seen her once before... in a painting locked in a tower.
“Constance.”
Her head snapped around, those dark eyes latching on mine. “Callidora,” she mocked. “Are we on a first-name basis? I don’t remember bestowing you the honor.”
My skin crawled. This was not Aeris. Not her face, not her voice, not her kind, stern smile.
Constance floated down to the dais, her foot touching the platform just as the wind died down.
Alisdair grabbed me and ran.
“Not so fast!”
Invisible hands seized and ripped us apart.
“Calli!”
“Alisdair!”
She threw us clear across the room, slamming us against opposite walls. I didn’t have a chance to think before golden manacles surrounded our ankles, wrists, and throat. Alisdair and I weren’t going anywhere.
Alisdair roared—the veins in his purpling face bulging.
Constance clicked her tongue, mock-pouting. “Ah, my poor love. Not so easy to fight me when you don’t have my own magic to use against me!”