Chapter 20
Lenna
Who Lenna didn’t expect to find in the rose gardens of the East House was Arabella fucking D’Arcy, Jake’s ex-lover and the panom who had taught Lenna how to use her magical powers simultaneously a few weeks ago.
Lenna approached her from behind, making a not-so-conscious effort for her high heels to resonate against the pavement, partly fueled by her genuine shock and suspicion.
Arabella’s blond, long hair waved as she turned her svelte body around majestically. “Well, well, well. Look who woke up early today.” Her green, clever eyes did not seem one bit surprised.
“Out of all places in Thyria, I must confess I was not expecting to find you here.” If there was a time and place in which Lenna was meant to be thankful for what Arabella had taught her, it would not be here nor now.
Arabella laughed briefly, the sound as sharp as the thorns of the roses around them. “Where did you expect to find me? Drowned in the Radel Sea?” Was it truly necessary for someone to grin showing every single white tooth so early in the day? Was it mandatory for someone’s skin to be so immaculate?
Lenna put the tip of her index finger on her lips.
“Perhaps? To be honest, we didn’t really have time to waste wondering where you could have gone once the sangins started attacking us.
” The image of Sasha and Brendon glimpsed in her mind.
They could have done with the help of another panom fighting aboard the navia, but Lenna was not going to admit that.
“Survival instinct has taken many people very far, darling.” Surely the patronizing tone in Arabella’s voice was enough to justify Lenna ripping her tongue out. “Experience teaches you to pick your battles. Fighting an army of a Queen? Excuse my manners, but it’s not a battle I’m willing to pick.”
“So here you are.” The forced smile on Lenna’s lips felt tight.
“Here I am.” Arabella smiled, fluttering long eyelashes.
Fuck, she was going to make Lenna ask. And Lenna was too worried about what reason had brought this woman to this House, when she belonged to the South House. Especially since the reason was most definitely silver-eyed and very muscled.
So Lenna bloody asked. “Have you lost anything here?”
Arabella snorted softly. “Other than my time? Not really.”
“Is that so?” Lenna’s golden eyes narrowed slightly, despite her significant effort at keeping her face expressionless.
“Indeed. For your information, there is still something inside him. It might not be love, but he is not as cold about you as he wants to sell.”
“And how do you know?”
“Because when I went to fuck him, he got all bloody intense.”
Intense? Intense was going to be Lenna’s punch in Arabella’s disgustingly perfect face.
Despite the storm building up inside her, under a controlled surface that could break any second, Lenna’s voice was a sea of calm and composure. “You went to…fuck him?”
Arabella hummed distractedly, pushing a wavy, blond strand behind her ear. “I know lately he was all over you, but he and I had a good time together decades ago, even if he was hypocritical and said he didn’t.”
“Do you think Jake is someone hypocritical, Arabella?” Lenna asked her.
“He might not be now. But believe me, once upon a time, he was a different man.” Arabella sighed, scratching the side of her hand.
“Anyway. He said his heart had been stolen by a goddess, but what he still had control over—his body—would only ever be touched by whom he'll never deserve again.” She shook her head as she pursed her lips.
“May the Fifth control the intensity of that man.”
“May the Fifth show you the way out of this House very fucking soon, Arabella.” Lenna was not smiling anymore. She turned around and pointed directly at the massive metal spears leading outside, only to see angry golden sparks jumping around her own hands. “It’s that way.”
Arabella’s green eyes stared at the golden sparks around Lenna’s fingers for a long time, and then she looked directly into Lenna’s eyes.
“Control that magic before it controls you,” Arabella said, and without looking back again, the sound of her heels vanished as she walked away.
To the East Cardinal’s credit, the East House was the building-personification of the Harming power. No wonder the goddess had countless scars on her face, and no wonder the Cardinal had thought Jake, impassable against pain of any manner or form, would be the most appropriate Ruler of this House.
During the five minutes of walking around the House trying to find said Ruler, Lenna had observed different people passing by, and noticed three common patterns.
No one established eye contact or made any type of reaction acknowledging another being a few feet away.
Everyone walked way too fast. Every person seemed in a constant-shitting-themselves state.
By the time she reached a double metal door with spikes that smelled strongly of Jake, Lenna had had enough of the House and fully understood, excused, and respected why every person living here must have centuries’ worth of trauma.
She didn’t bother knocking on the door; she just pushed it open with her palm, flinching as the spikes opened different wounds on her skin. She halted mid-step, her blood frozen when she saw the space in front of her.
The circular room was illuminated by wide, perpendicular lines of fire magically ingrained on the wall. It appeared as if the entire room was on fire, the flames illuminating the space in the middle with oranges, yellows, and reds Lenna knew all too well.
The last time she had been surrounded by fire, she had burned.
The last time she had burned, this crackling sound had been the last she heard.
The last time, it had been the man in the center of this room who had saved her.
It had also been him whose skin had scarred and who had refused for Lenna to heal him, so the scars would forever remind him never to take for granted how lucky he was to be with her.
I’m fire-cursed, she had said. You’re my fire-blessed, he had replied.
This is another man, she reminded herself. The man sitting on the metallic table in the center of the room had his arms crossed, his silver eyes narrowed, an eyebrow lifted, and very little patience.
“You’re a disgusting mess, Brachyan. What have you done?” he asked.
“Spears and swords randomly falling from the ceiling, arrows appearing out of nowhere and shooting from wall to wall, smooth floor transforming into a pool of shards of glass…” She crossed her arms, immediately regretting it as her open wounds flared with pain at the movement.
“What have I done? Or what has your aggressive House done?”
“Guests aren’t meant to give me work.”
Lenna resisted her jaw dropping and instead, bowed with a flourish. “Oh Ruler Gracious, my most sincere apologies for the misunderstanding. Worry not, your Very Busy Ruling Ass will not have to do any work.”
Jake took his sweet time staring from her toes to her hair, as if no further explanation was needed. “But I will. You walking around bleeding in so many places and with all your little clothes ripped open is going to make people talk.”
“I can sort myself out,” she snapped. When she looked at herself, she realized what a mess of textile, skin, and blood she was.
“You can’t. Not the Healing part, unless you Harm someone at the same time. Otherwise, you will end up fainting or dizzy—”
“And give you even more work.”
He nodded. “Exactly. This House has ancient furniture and relics. Guests are meant to look at the decorations, not touch the decorations.”
“Even if the decoration attacks me and is spiky as fuck?”
“Especially if the decoration attacks you and is spiky as fuck.”
Lenna let an exhale through her nose, looking at the fire-wall. “An ancient House full of hostility for a hostile, ancient Ruler.”
Still at the table, Jake made a circle with the open palm of his hand, and navy sparks floated to every open wound of Lenna, merging separate edges of skin together, drying blood up, fixing her broken body.
She pursed her lips. “Hostile yet displaying hospitality when he wants. Is that why you let Arabella enter your House?”
Jake shrugged distractedly, pacing towards her as his eyes were fixed in the ripped clothes exposing her breasts. “I wanted to see if she had anything interesting to say.”
“And did she?”
When he got closer, his nostrils flared, and after a brief pause, he clenched his jaw and his hand approached her face.
“No,” he growled. He lifted her chin upwards, the silver of his eyes glistening under the light of the flames as his eyes stopped staring at her exposed skin and finally met hers. “Are you jealous, Brachyan?”
Right now, she was many things more than just jealous. “Should I be, Ruler?”
“As long as you remember there is nothing between us, do and feel whatever you want. Why are you here, anyway?”
She swallowed, trying to keep her impassive expression as strong as she had managed until this point in the conversation.
“First, the librarian of your House, that tall, lanky guy who seems scared to death of paper, told me I need special permission from this benevolent Ruler to access the Forgotten section.” She saw him narrowing his eyes, so she added, “I need to access those books for my research. Please.”
She was here to conduct two researches: one, by using Of Eastern Petals and Twisted Pain, to find the hidden piece of the Cardinal Queen’s heart.
The other, by learning every word in dark magic books about death, dark rituals, goddesses, and broken curses, to make this man able to love again.
He knew about the first research. He didn’t have a clue about the second one.
“Permission granted. Anything else?”
“Yes, actually. There are about a hundred sangins hovering above your House, but they are just looking, not touching anything or anyone.”
“They are better guests than you, then.” The corner of his lips tilted slightly upwards for a heartbeat, before he stormed towards the spiky door. “The Queen sent her sangins to look for my sister, and they won’t find her here.”