13. The King’s Wrath and the Crimson Hunt
Chapter thirteen
The King’s Wrath and the Crimson Hunt
Cyrus
The Spade court was a cavern of shadow, a monument hewn to cruelty.
Firelight licked the onyx arches of the hall and only sharpened the bone-hard angles of chains and gilded steel.
Cyrus sat like a dark heart at its center—wine at his wrist. His crown had dark jagged edges with deep sapphires.
The leather chest plate he wore was aged with time and battles.
His expression was hard to read, but the room responded immediately whenever he moved.
The doors slammed open. A guard stumbled in, panic carved into his features, and dropped to a bow so low, his forehead nearly kissed the floor. “My king… we have located Prince Ace, and… Maddox and Arley have been tracked to the western mountains. The Heartland Heiress, she is with Prince Ace.”
Cyrus’ eyes found the guard and held him still. The court inhaled as one; the air grew thick. A small, deliberate smile eased across Cyrus’ mouth.
“Finally.” His voice was a rumble, distant thunder folded into silk.
He rose, every movement precise and predatory, and let the silence do the rest of the work.
“They dare defy me. My son thinks of seizing her now, after failing to bind her with marriage. Maddox and that vermin Arley think to shield her. And she—that untamed, foolish heir of the Heartlands — believes she is strong enough to simply take a crown now that she has tasted the Crimson Deep and remembers her claim.”
With a sharp gesture, a map of the western mountain ranges unfurled on the table, routed in coiling shadows.
Valleys and passes glowed like open veins; Cyrus’ finger traced the peaks with a surgeon’s care.
“Strike them now. Cut them off before they can reach the Heartlands. Leave nothing alive to tell the tale. No mercy. No quarter. Maddox and Arley first. Break them, burn them to ash before her eyes. Let her see what happens when she mistakes awakening for entitlement—when she believes strength alone makes a queen.”
The guard swallowed and nodded, voice thin. “Yes, my King.”
“And Ace.” Cyrus’ tone snapped. “Bring my son to me. Dead or—” He paused, the threat hanging cold.
“—alive, if he begs for it. His weakness is intolerable. He has spat upon treaties, desecrated my name, and placed his heart above the order of the Spades. Let him beg. Let him burn. Let him learn obedience.”
He paced the obsidian tiles; each footstep rang like a verdict.
“The Crimson bloodline, the Heartlands, the Fifth Throne of the Deep—all weakness dressed as power. I would sooner watch the Crimson Deep turn to ash, than bow it to anyone but me. Seraphine played a foolish game and failed to follow through. Her daughter, however, will have no other option.”
A murmur ran through the nobles; they shifted like animals sensing a storm.
Cyrus’ gaze swept the room, a blade finding purchase.
“Hear me: every quadrant in Underland will kneel once again to the Spade’s Dominion.
Every throne, every court, every wretched city from the Verdant Wilds to the Guilded Spires and the ash of the Heartlands will bow or burn.
If Scarlett still draws breath when my legions reach her, I will see her broken.
I will make her cower.” He let the pause widen, venom pooling in the silence.
“Then, I will decide if she lives to see another sunrise —or dies crushed beneath the weight of her defiance. Her mother was too weak to keep control of her, but I will not be.” His grin was as wicked as a snake that’d unhinged its jaw.
He turned to the generals, voice rising without losing its control.
“Prepare the mountain passes. Deploy archers, patrols, cavalry, and shadow-magic traps. Cut off all avenues of retreat. Leave them no path, no mercy. Bring Scarlett to me alive—but let Maddox and Arley die in the snow. Let Ace tremble at my feet. If the Deep must burn, let it burn. I will not tolerate weakness or insolence any longer. I will not allow anyone to claim what is mine by conquest, blood, or destiny.”
The nobles flinched. Cyrus returned to his throne, lifted the wine, and let the thought settle into him: Scarlett trembling, Ace unmade, Maddox and Arley bled dry under his will. Firelight danced in his eyes like twin blades.
Outside, wind chased mountain mist over ridges. Far beyond the Spade walls, Maddox, Arley, and Scarlett were unaware of the storm unfurling toward them. Inside the shadowed throne, Cyrus sat and imagined the Heartlands as crimson ash—and all of Underland kneeling before him.
He watched them go, then let the court dissolve into the obedient hush that followed a verdict. And for a breath, alone with his wine and the embers, something colder than wrath settled behind Cyrus’ eyes.
She humiliated me, the thought came, not a whisper but a splintering roar, cut down to a neat, private line he could wear like armor.
The memory of that ruined wedding—Ace’s hesitation, Scarlett’s insolent blade of a smile, the way law and pageantry had been made a mockery—gnawed at him.
It was not merely an insult; it was an affront to order, to the claim he’d carved from blood.
His son had failed him. Ace had been given a map: marry her, bind her blood to the Spade throne, fold the Heartlands into his hand like a closed fist—and he had let desire and pity knot his limbs. Weakness. Betrayal.
Yet, beneath that boil of fury, a second, quieter voice—shrewder, far more dangerous— If she lived, bound and broken, she could be harnessed: a queen in chains is a tool more useful than ash.
Her claim, her magic, the loyalty of the Crimson Deep could be folded into the Spade order if he bent it with the right laws, the right humiliations.
Use her, he thought with a predator’s patience.
Destroy her will, then bind her power. Let her face be the sigil of my reign.
The temptation to turn her into his crown jewel was as intoxicating as wine.
His hands tightened around the goblet until the stem creaked.
There was a strategy even for his rage: a spectacle of punishment to teach the courts, a private binding so clean no rival could undo it, instruments of shadow-magic that would sever her from whatever allies still loved her.
Yet he knew—intellect clawing at the edges of ire—that brute force could kindle martyrdom.
Let Scarlett die in the snow, and the Heartlands would rage until the Deep itself shook; let her live, and she could still be a blade turned inward, sharper for being honed against him.
So the plan nested in him like a seed: Make them suffer enough to learn, but leave the option to pluck the fruit.
He would make Ace rue his softness, make Maddox and Arley an example.
He would watch Scarlett’s spine crack beneath humiliation—then decide whether to harvest her power or bury it.
The thought pleased him, and he smiled wickedly again, a thin, surgical smile.
Cruelty, he told himself, was not merely appetite. It was governance.