1. Chapter One Xander
Chapter One: Xander
One week later
I squeeze my eyes against the hot water that pelts my face, letting it wash over me like it might wipe away all of my sins.
But those stains mark deeper than skin, deeper than bone and marrow.
They’ve corrupted my very soul, twisting my actions from things I once believed were justifiable in the name of the collective good to something darker.
Something truer. Dropping my chin, I blink against the heat as my fingers flex at my sides.
Yes, I had bore witness to unspeakable things, used my own hands to dole out punishments that were indefensible. I had been whatever was expected of me, and I will continue to do so for as long as I need. For as long as we need.
Sighing, I push my hair away from my forehead, water slipping from the strands and trailing over the uneven skin of my back.
Shutting the shower off, I wrap a towel around my waist and step out, my feet slapping against the cold tile as I walk to the counter and brace my hand along its stone edge.
In the mirror that hangs above it, I trace the outline of my features in the reflection and search for anything that reminds me of my mother.
I find that I bear too much resemblance to the man who sired me.
Similarities hiding in the curve of my jaw and the shape of my nose.
The slope of my shoulders and the tightness that settles on my lips.
My gaze bounces to the dark hair that falls on either side of my face, and I relax a little.
Her hair was the same color—a rich onyx that rivaled the night sky.
My eyes close as I picture my mother sitting at a small table in the spare bedroom of our last home, hunched over piles of fabric and velvet ribbon with a sewing needle in hand.
Her loose braid hung over her shoulder as she worked, soaking up rays from the sun that shone in from the small window behind her.
She looked up at me, eyes so deeply brown that they nearly matched the black shade of her pupils.
“What is your book about, my scholar?” she asked, pausing her sewing.
I sat on a small uncomfortable wooden chair. Legs crossed in front of me while my knees hung off its edges, a book splayed open on my lap. “It’s about a knight who slays a dragon and rescues the princess from its cave!”
She had laughed, looking back down as she resumed her work. “Tell me all about it.”
I force my eyes to open, letting the memory fade, and return to scrutinizing my reflection.
I map out the edges of the scars that peek out on the flesh at the back of my arms and over my shoulders before they travel the expanse of my back in crisscrossing patterns.
As much as I’d like to avoid seeing the man who gave these scars to me today, unfortunately, that isn’t possible.
A group of King’s Guardsmen is due to arrive back at the castle any day now, either with the escaped princess in tow or an excuse that would likely make King Dolian kill another advisor.
I had been ordered to clean up the aftermath of that tantrum shortly after the princess escaped.
The king has been more than irritable while waiting to see if his guards would return with her—his obsession with the princess one I only realized ran so deeply when I became one of his Trusted, granted closer access to him and curious of what the princess would be like on my first visit to the tower.
Following King Dolian up the many spiraling steps, I had braced to see a woman broken by grief, one who chose to keep to herself secluded in the tower because of her parents’ deaths.
It’s what we had been told by the king himself.
But as we entered the tower and Princess Rhea came into view for the first time, it immediately became clear that, while she was certainly trapped within the confines of that stone structure, she was not lost to sadness.
Life sparked behind those bright green eyes, the color an exact replica of the portraits painted of her mother—the former queen, Luna Maxwell.
But as quickly as I had seen the glint of spirit in her expression, it was nearly immediately snuffed out by the king.
He circled her, the tension in the tower rising as he also taunted her with his words.
It wasn’t so much what he said, but how he said it.
How his gaze lingered a little too long and his smile grew a little too cruel.
My hand had clutched the hilt of my sword, the hard metal biting into my skin as I watched the lust form over his face.
For his own godsdamn niece. I had thought that was the worst of it, but then I saw him hit her.
Watched him beat her until she was barely conscious, all because she ventured to say something he didn’t like.
I hadn’t dared to move, even if every part of me screamed that what he was doing was wrong.
But to act against the king was a death sentence at best. And if I were to act against him?
He’d make me wish for death. Nearly every visit I accompanied him on ended with her on the floor and the king casually walking out of the tower and on to the next item on his agenda as if beating the princess was just an item to be checked off a list.
Then, two weeks ago, she and a guard named Flynn escaped the tower, and with their chaotic departure came what I hoped were only rumors—even if, deep down, I suspected they were true.
Three loud knocks drag me from my thoughts, sending my heart pounding behind my ribs as I cross my small room. It relaxes when I pull the door open to reveal Grayson, his hands bracketing his hips and brow lifting in question at my appearance.
“Get enough beauty sleep?” he asks, an annoying amount of mirth in his voice.
I snort and step back to let him in, shutting the door and meeting his light brown eyes.
Deep circles color the skin beneath them, and I take in the rigid way he crosses his arms over his chest, his golden vambraces clanking together.
“You can get dressed,” he says, jerking his chin in the direction of my closet.
Already on edge, I move quickly. “Everything alright?” I ask once I’ve entered the closet, tossing my towel and grabbing my undergarments.
“We’ve gotten the newest numbers of those afflicted with the Cruel Death. The death totals are even higher than last time.”
Buttoning up my black pants, I then cinch my belt around my waist and exhale roughly.
The cure for the Cruel Death has eluded our finest healers, and it’s one of the only things that King Dolian hasn’t been able to buy or bully his way into solving.
Each passing week brings a higher toll of men and women claimed by the sickness that emaciates their bodies until only bones remain, and the Cruel Death does not discriminate.
Stepping up to the stand that holds my armor, I buckle my cuirass on first as Grayson continues.
“Anderson is working on sorting the data to give to the king, but it doesn’t look good.
Nearly twenty guard members were taken out last month, and another ten are already sick with symptoms. And that’s not to speak of the handful of women in Vitour, one of whom is also pregnant. ”
I pause at that, a small seedling of sympathy rising. I let it linger for a moment before squashing it back down. Finishing, I step out of the closet and back into the room, meeting Grayson’s gaze where he sits in a chair at the edge of the bed.
“While horrific, I can’t imagine that is the only reason you’ve come.”
He forces a crooked smile. “It isn’t.”
At the hesitation in his voice, my shoulders tense.
Grayson has never been one to mince words, certainly not with me.
Taking me under his wing when I was a child and the king forced me to join the guard as an apprentice, he was kind when others were not.
But though the decades that separate us show their wear in the gray in his hair and beard and the wrinkles on his forehead, I still trust the man to defend my life as well as anyone my own age.
My fingers curl around the edge of my helmet where it rests in the crook of my arm. “What?”
He sighs, eyes moving to the closed door on the other side of the room as he drops his voice. “The second group of guards just arrived.” I suck in a sharp breath, my feet already carrying me in the door’s direction when Grayson jumps up and lays a hand on my shoulder. “Xander wait—”
“I need to see if she is with them,” I bite out, turning to look at him. “Princess Rhea—”
“She’s not with them.”
The tension coiled within me releases slightly. “You’re sure?”
He nods, letting me go and waiting until I turn to face him fully. “I confirmed with one of the returned guards. Neither she nor Flynn were the one they apprehended.”
I pause at the mention of the man who aided in Princess Rhea’s escape, Flynn.
He had raised concerns to his commander about a longtime tower guard named Alexi leaving his post in the middle of the night.
Of course, all King Dolian had focused on was Alexi going inside the tower and coming out an hour or so later, but he didn’t question why Flynn was watching in the first place.
I had, though. Following him out of the throne room that day, I had demanded to know what he was doing near the princess’s tower to begin with.
His was a quickly given answer; something about overhearing a suspicious conversation between Alexi and an unknown castle worker, but though he gave the story confidently, there was something about him that I didn’t trust. My instincts proved true when Flynn later caught me off guard and attacked.
Bound at the tower’s base, all I could do was watch as he and the princess fled.
“You have confirmation that he went with her?” I ask, setting my helmet down and tying the top half of my hair back with a leather strip.
Grayson nods, even as suspicion narrows his eyes. “They cornered Princess Rhea and Flynn at the Mage Kingdom border.” He rubs a hand over his jaw, opening and then closing his mouth.
“Spit it out, Grayson.”
“Our men surrounded them and should have easily taken both into custody. Except they were attacked when Flynn produced magic.”
A choked sound leaves me. I had my suspicions about the princess truly being mage.
Or at least harboring magic. There were three Trusted killed by her and Flynn during their escape, and while one was felled by a sword, the other two were disfigured.
Their skin blackened as if by disease, pockmarks of bone peeking through.
I had no idea mage magic could do such a thing, and to know that Flynn might also possess the same power?
An ache begins to form between my temples. “Where are they now?”
“According to the guard, they both passed through the Spell and disappeared into the Mage Kingdom.”
“So Flynn is mage,” I begin, my mind turning over everything I’ve learned. “And for reasons unknown, he infiltrated our guard pretending to be mortal. Now he and Princess Rhea—who has magic despite being born in this kingdom—have escaped to the Mage Kingdom. Does that cover everything?”
“Seems about right,” he answers, scratching the back of his head. “And though the guards are oathed not to speak about anything they see, they now know that mages can pass through the Spell and live. They also have questions regarding the princess.”
That isn’t necessarily a bad thing, though I doubt King Dolian won’t try to keep that knowledge as quiet as possible.
“I need to find out what the king knows about Rhea Maxwell.” Is he aware that she possesses magic?
Did it come from the Maxwell side of the family?
From her father, the late King Conrad? Or was her mother, the woman who Rhea looks remarkably similar to, secretly mage?
Wait… “Grayson, if Rhea and Flynn got away, why did you say they apprehended someone?”
At that, he smirks. “I thought you’d never get to that little detail.” I send him a bland look, fingers curling around the hilt of my sword. “Did you know that Princess Rhea was traveling with a white fox?”
“I did.” The creature had been a surprise discovery when I caught the princess attempting to escape the first time—before she left with Flynn.
“They caught her.”
I snort, mentally going through a checklist of things I need to do today now that I know the princess isn’t with the King’s Guard.
“For what purpose? Is their intention to interrogate an animal?” A few long seconds pass before Grayson sighs again and begins heading towards the door. “Where are you going?”
Turning the handle, he pulls it open and gestures for me to enter the hall. “The dungeon. I’m afraid the answers to those questions are better shown than explained.”