Chapter 26
Lavellin’s eyes narrow in seething resentment, its low growl the only sound for a second that seems to last eternally.
But the fae doesn’t take Dunmail’s outstretched hand.
It ignores the neatly filed nails, the glittering rings.
It rises from the ground on its own, glaring, as Torver’s world shatters.
“You’re King Eveling?” He stands up, splays his trembling hands and pushes Lavellin as hard as he can. The fae stumbles, but doesn’t fall.
Lavellin gives him a pathetic look. “Do you really think that?”
Torver pauses, breathing hard. For a second, he doubts himself and his eyes flick between the fae and the Forever King.
“Do I?”
Lavellin shakes its head, glancing at Dunmail with a venomous expression.
“I’m obviously not King Eveling, Torver,” it says. “We look alike because…it sired me.”
Torver throws his hands to the air. A rage overtakes him as Bassen and Winander scramble to their feet. Bassen puts her hand on his shoulder, like that can do anything to soothe the anger, the confusion, the fear—all the emotions that are muddling him so entirely.
“You’re King Eveling’s child?” Torver looks into Lavellin’s pale eyes, but its gaze is directed to the ground. “Why didn’t you tell me?”
Dunmail’s eyebrows raise upward, towards his crown.
“King Eveling’s child…” The Forever King nods slowly, his jaw jutting forward like he’s chewing on the information. “Interesting. I did think it was odd for the fae king to bear the marks of disgrace.”
Lavellin’s hand reaches up to brush the scars either side of its mouth, the silver lines that stretch into its jawline.
“Disgrace?” Torver growls. “What does that mean? Lav, what’s going on?”
“What’s going on,” Dunmail tilts his hand in a fluid motion so that his palm is facing upward. The air above it shimmers until a coil of iron chains appears. “Is that you are the heir of Rheged. And there is a space in my Citadel torture chambers that will fit you perfectly.”
Lavellin meets Torver’s eyes at last, panic painted across its delicate features as Dunmail throws the conjured chains to the two closest Meddera. Thwaite and Eskett scramble to grab the chains that clank like armour, then Eskett’s mouth parts in a sickly grin, eyeing the fae like a predator.
“Wait, torture? No—you can’t—” Torver protests, but it’s too late.
The men descend on Lavellin and its screams fill the air as they pin it down and shackle it with the iron restraints. Torver rushes forward, trying to pull them off it, but Eskett uses his strength to fling him across the cavern.
Torver is weightless as he flies through the air.
He lands hard, and the contents of the pack on his back crash into his bones with a force that knocks the wind from him.
Gasping on the ground, he struggles to suck cold air into his lungs.
His hip and ribs shoot a thousand small agonies through him and his entire body screams in protest as he drags himself from the rocky patch he’d landed on, running with a limping gait back to Lavellin.
His heart races around the cage of his ribs, as if trying to get out.
Bassen and Winander run to meet him, holding him back by his bruised arms before he can get near Dunmail. He struggles and flails uselessly against them.
“Torver, please.” Dunmail shakes his head.
“You’ll do yourself a mischief. Of course I have to take the heir to my dungeons in the Citadel—there’s a fae army massing across the border, don’t you know?
I doubt torturing a disgraced heir would be enough to convince them to retreat.
” Dunmail’s face splits in a wicked grin.
“But I suspect it might be worth a try.”
Burned by the iron, Lavellin’s screams fill the chamber, reverberating from the bones of the Beast that watch on impassively.
The Meddera have it tied by both wrists, the skin beneath audibly sizzling.
The scent of burning flesh, both Conise’s and Lavellin’s, is thick in the air.
Torver can’t swallow, can’t breathe, can’t think.
Lavellin’s teeth are bared in an agony he can’t imagine.
His hands pressed to his bruised ribs like he can hold himself together, Torver looks to Bassen. Their eyes lock, an unspoken and desperate conversation taking place. But it’s as if Dunmail can tell what he’s asking of her.
“Irton, conjure an aged rowanwood cage for our friend, would you?” Dunmail doesn’t even look at him. His rapt attention is centered on Lavellin, who is now whimpering, shedding tears onto its shackles.
Before the confusion even has time to register on Bassen’s face, Irton, his dark moustache with its twisted ends quivering, has conjured thick planks of wood. The sturdy beams push Winander and Torver away, and Torver loses his balance once more, tumbling into mud that already coats him.
The dark planks form a cage for Bassen and she bolts in panic; she twists and slams her hands against the walls of it.
Winander makes an incoherent sound, throwing himself at Bassen’s prison, trying with all his frantic might to prise the thick wooden planks apart.
Irton watches, laughing softly in amusement.
Face red, eyes wide, Bassen stops and fixes her gaze on Dunmail.
“Let Lavellin go and let me out of this cage!” She tries to shout the words but her voice catches, wavering on her last syllable. The air temperature drops.
But nothing happens.
“Oh, is that you trying to kill me?” Dunmail laughs darkly, looking at her over his shoulder.
“I can feel a little tickle on my neck.” He strokes the offending spot knowingly.
“You won’t get far, deathmancer. You don’t live a thousand years without learning what nullifies magic.
Why do you think I separated knowledge into sanctioned and unsanctioned? Some things are only worth me knowing.”
He watches smugly as Bassen shrinks, her face twisting in confusion as she looks at the rowanwood rising around her.
“You would have to put the knife in my heart yourself,” the Forever King continues. “And do you think my Meddera would just stand there and watch? They’re the most powerful wielders of magic I could find after I disposed of the last lot of them.”
As if in response, Thwaite, Irton, Eskett, and Lineth encircle Lavellin closer, dragging it to the King’s side. Dunmail leans close, examines the scars on its face with the tip of his finger.
A low growl escapes Torver’s clenched jaw.
“Let it go.” Torver’s fists clench at his sides and everything is on fire inside him.
Dunmail shakes his head, laughing as if at the antics of an amusing child.
“Here’s a deal for you, dragon rider.” He suddenly takes Lavellin’s scarred chin in his grip, his nails digging into its skin as he pushes its face around, assessing each side.
“I take what I want, but I won’t kill you.
” He says it simply, as if he’s a merchant, offering deals on apples.
“Although,” he smirks. “Although, you may kill yourselves trying to get back out of my maze without your fae guide. Human senses are terribly weak, you know. I imagine there’s a few pits you might fall into…
or who knows? Maybe there’ll be a bird of some kind in there that might claw your eyes out. ”
Torver scowls, pulling lamely against Winander’s hand now gripped tightly on his shoulder.
“And in return for not killing you, you won’t kick up a fuss about our lovely fae friend here, hm?” His eyes glint in the torchlight as he spits on Lavellin’s face. The wet glob slides down its quivering cheek and drips from its scars, its marks of disgrace.
“Why not just kill us?” Torver’s voice is hoarse.
Dunmail shrugs.
“A thousand years ago, if things had gone differently… I would be dead and that dragon,” he points to the time-bleached skeleton that looms over them, “would be your bonded mount.”
“And?”
“Perhaps I owe you some modicum of respect, rider.” Dunmail readjusts his cloak. “Or perhaps you’ve entertained me and I want to see what else you’ll do. Either way—no one will believe you, even if you do get out of here.”
Torver blinks. A shudder moves through his body.
“They will!” Winander protests beside him. “They have to!”
Dunmail shakes his head, the movement making the rubies of his crown catch the torchlight, sending glittering flashes across the Beast’s skull.
“Do you think you’re the first people to learn of me?” he says. “There have been others over the centuries. They were called crazy. Most of them were executed. And none of them were mourned.”
And without another word, Dunmail makes a sign with his hand and Eskett begins to drag Lavellin away.
Blinding panic rises inside Torver and he bucks against Winander with all his strength, breaking free. Winander and Bassen shout his name but he can barely hear them over the rushing of blood in his ears, over the pounding of his breaking heart.
“Torver!” Lavellin shouts, yelping as the iron chains rag against the pulpy, red mess of its wrists. “Don’t chase me—I won’t have you hurt by this man!”
Its voice is a broken plea, hoarse and harrowed.
Torver doesn’t listen, the thought of losing it, of it being taken away and tortured for sport, is unfathomable. He shatters into pieces as he runs at the King, at the Meddera. His fists are clenched to fight, mind blank with sheer desperation.
But before he can strike—Lavellin shouts his name again.
“Torver.” His name in its mouth sounds different—compelling, enchanting. Its opal eyes cloud over. “Stay where you are.”
Torver’s legs are instantly heavy. So heavy that he’s frozen to the spot, so that he can’t move no matter how frantically he tries.
Panic and anguish fog his mind, his heart pounding violently.
“What have you done to me?” He tries to move his legs again but his traitorous limbs won’t obey.
He wrestles with his body, pulling at his useless legs. The Meddera drag the fae further from him.
“What have you done to me?” He roars the words again, drunk with panic.
Tears streak down Lavellin’s face, its clouded eyes rimmed in red.
“A fae magic,” it croaks. “One I never told you about. I can command beings I have a connection with, using their true, mother-given name—I’m sorry. Just—Torver, don’t—”
“You’re doing it again!” Torver howls. He blocks his ears with his fingers pushed frantically inside.
Dunmail signals to the Meddera to stop, that they have reached a position he’s happy with, far enough away.
Torver is still screaming when the Forever King draws a large circle in the mud around them with his finger.
He screams for Dunmail to let Lavellin go, for Lavellin to let him go.
He screams for the Meddera to see reason, for Bassen to kill them all.
He screams wordless sounds that scorch his throat.
Dunmail finishes his work—the circle closed, he straightens.
“How nice,” he muses, leering at the fae’s clouded eyes. Torver, still rooted to the spot like a tree, vocalises incoherently, and Dunmail seems genuinely touched. Then his features darken. “Though I assure you, you won’t feel nearly so generous when I’m done with you.”
The Forever King steps inside the circle and raises both his hands, his palms facing forward.
In a rush of swirling air, they are gone. Spirited away, faded into nothing.
Lavellin’s magic releases its hold and Torver falls to his knees, gasping.
He curls into a ball in the cold mud, barely aware of commotion above him. From the corner of his eye, Winander batters Bassen’s cage with a stone in each farm-strong hand until the planks break.
She rushes to Torver. She holds him in her arms while he sobs, the ache inside him like a knife, twisting. Because fae are tricksy, beyond his understanding.
Lavellin had the power to control him with his mother-given name this whole time and it kept that information from him. It was the child of King Eveling, heir to the throne of Rheged, this whole time and again, it kept that from him, too.
He should never have hoped to understand Lavellin, to trust it at all.
And through the sobs that rack his body, he realises that this ache will last forever. Because he can’t save it. Because they will die here, lost in the maze of Dunmail’s cairn.
Because despite it all, he is in love.