Chapter 32
Between one blink and the next, the labyrinth was gone.
The bodies and the blood and the cold stone corridor had disappeared.
Ryn, too, was nowhere to be seen, and Xavi found he had somehow returned to that round room with no windows or doors.
It had grown again, and not only in circumference. Above his head, the ceiling soared upward into darkness, and beneath his feet swirling lines of blue light flared and dimmed by turns.
An ice-cold certainty coiled around his heart as he felt magic pressing against his skin, thrumming in the air, and threading through the very walls.
It might appear that the room was empty, but he’d fought and survived too many battles not to know when he was being watched. The fae witch, perhaps? Observing what her curse had wrought?
It mattered little. If Ryn was dead, the fae would not escape.
No matter her power, no matter the consequences, he would see her bleed out on the edge of his blade.
Like the storm cat, he could be a patient hunter, so he made no move and gave no sign of his fury—only read his surroundings and held the last shreds of his magic close. Waiting for the right moment to strike.
“Xaviel ven Arazul.” The fae woman’s voice cracked and echoed around the chamber, resonant with power. “The trial of the labyrinth is now ended.”
Xavi said nothing. Sometimes, silence was the simplest way to convince the enemy to reveal themselves.
“You have survived, but because of your refusal to relinquish your feelings for the human woman, you must now make a final choice.”
He was not here to make choices. He was here to protect, to defend, and to kill if necessary. That was his whole life. His whole world. Never once, even as a child, had he envied his friend Kel—for either his power or his position—precisely because of the brutal decisions he’d been forced to make.
“I am neither the king nor his fated bride,” Xavi said flatly. “Such choices are for them to make, and Kel knows I will abide by his sworn word.”
“And yet the moment is coming when you must choose. Choose where your heart and your loyalty are ultimately given.”
How could he have forgotten? This was not a test, it was a torment. And if the fae knew how deeply he’d come to care for Ryn…
“There is more than one way for this curse to end,” the fae announced. “More than one way for you to be free.”
More than one way for him to be free… but what about her?
What about Kel and Ryn?
This was not where he excelled—not anymore.
He was out of practice and out of patience, longing for an enemy to confront head-on.
This fencing with barbed words and wrestling with an invisible foe…
This was Ryn’s gift. And he did not know whether Ryn was dead or alive, which meant his thoughts were clouded and tinged with red. Begging for vengeance.
How could he possibly defeat this fae at her own game without Ryn?
So he made no further reply, hoping that the wretched enchantress would somehow reveal her plans. Show her soft underbelly and give him a place to strike.
In response to his silence, Xavi heard a chime of laughter echoing softly from the walls.
“Shall I tell you of your choices? Shall I tell you of the torment that now awaits you?”
She would tell him no matter what he said or did, because this was how she gained her power. He could only refuse to be baited and wait for an opening.
Suddenly, the air before him began to shimmer and then to glow, spreading gradually until the glow coalesced into two arched doorways—connected to nothing and showing no hint of what lay beyond.
“Beyond each door is a path that will lead you to the end of this road. Both have their prize and their price, but it is up to you to decide what path you will take.”
Cold certainty turned the blood in Xavi’s veins to ice, but he could show no fear, no hesitation.
“Tell me, witch. What are my choices?”
“The curse demands a bride,” she said, her voice soft and sweet as a child’s. “But it does not say your king must be the one to bond with her.”
Rage surged through his limbs, hot and potent, as the import of her words sank in. She was suggesting he betray Kel. That he plunge a knife into the back of the man he would gladly die to protect…
He caught himself. Bound his fury in iron chains and locked it away once more. He would give her no more of his pain than he had to. Especially when he realized what she had just admitted.
“Ryn is alive.”
“She is,” the voice confirmed. “And her fate now rests in your hands.”
No. He would have no part in taking her choices away. Not when he’d promised she could choose her own fate.
“Through the leftmost door, you will find the king’s chamber, where he is even now stirring in his centuries-long sleep.
Choose this door, and the human will join you.
Keldreth ven Rianor will be awakened in truth by the presence of his fated bride, thus releasing us all from the demands of the curse. ”
Once, Xavi would have stepped forward without hesitation. Once this would have sounded like a gift. Now, he saw it for the trap it was. If the fae was aware of his friendship with Ryn, she was also aware of his promises. She had to know that he’d sworn Ryn would not be forced to be Kel’s bride.
He could not possibly choose that door, and the fae knew it well. So why make the offer?
“And to the right, yet another potential end to these centuries of suffering. This door will return you and the human to the Valley of Mists, where you may bond with her in your king’s stead and both be free from the power of the curse.”
Somehow, he remained steady. Contained his fury long enough to ask the question she’d left burning in the space between them.
“And what happens to Kel?”
The voice turned oddly sharp. “His fate would no longer be your concern.”
He could play the silent predator no longer.
High, wild laughter tore from Xavi’s throat—the bitter laughter of Lesh, set free from all restraint.
He laughed and laughed until his rage was once more under control, and then he stopped.
Tilted his head to the side and let his magic swell beneath his skin, bringing a vicious glow to his eyes and needle points to his teeth.
“It was all a lie, wasn’t it?” he said softly.
For once, the voice did not answer.
“You were never trapped by this curse.”
The prickly silence seemed to grow thicker until it felt like knives against his skin.
“Everything you did, everything about this curse was because you wanted him to suffer. You cursed him with a bride because you hoped I would betray him.”
“You are not quite right,” the fae revealed in a dark, silky tone.
“It is not your king who I needed to suffer. Nor did I lie. He should have recognized the value of what he was offered. But it was you who showed me a better way than I first intended. An opportunity I could never have dreamed of, even had I plotted for a thousand years.”
Xavi refused to flinch in response to her taunt. “We know this was never about proving that Ryn was worthy to be Kel’s bride. You’ve been gaining power from our memories. From our pain and uncertainty. Even from our regrets.”
The fae cackled with evident amusement. “Perhaps you are not entirely the fool you appear. Indeed, you have played my game even better than I had imagined possible.”
A game… That was what their lives were to her.
“You see, when I sent you and the human through the doorway together, I only planned to torture you both separately. Draw power from your individual suffering.” The voice paused.
“But my enchantment worked all too well. You did not merely endure—you cooperated. Grew to understand one another. To care for one another. So that even now, I can see the torment this choice is causing you.”
Torment? What did she know of torment? There were but two people left in this blighted world for whom Xavi would gladly choose to die, and she was asking him to choose one to betray. It was not merely painful—it was impossible.
“I don’t know what you’re talking about.” It was not a convincing lie, and it was answered by laughter, threading through the air to coil around him like invisible chains.
“Oh, no? Then you are claiming you feel nothing for the human woman? That it would be a simple matter to betray your promise to her?”
“Her name is Ryn,” he growled, and heard only more laughter in reply.
“There, you see? Do not try to pretend. I know you are thinking of what she means to you even now.”
Of course he was thinking of her. He thought of her with nearly every breath and every waking heartbeat.
Her face never left his memory—whether pale and bloodless as he had seen it last, or brilliant with the joy of discovery.
He had memorized her smile, her upturned nose, the haphazard knot of her hair, and even the way she bit her lip when she was thinking.
The indomitable spirit that shone through every part of who she was—every choice, every step, every wide-eyed moment of passionate curiosity.
But before he could respond, the mocking voice of the fae enchantress seemed to surround him with condemning accusation.
“Confess the truth, Xaviel ven Arazul. You are not merely thinking of her. In your heart, you have already chosen her. Given your true allegiance, not to the king you swore to save, but to the woman you have known only a few short days—the woman your dearest friend is counting on to free him from this curse.”
Xavi recoiled inwardly, rejecting the traitorous implications of her words at the same moment he acknowledged that some part of it was true.
He had been thinking more of Ryn than of Kel…
but only because it was Ryn’s life that had been in danger.
That did not mean he no longer cared what became of the brother of his heart.