Chapter 15
PROPHECY
Once I think I’ve gone far enough, I stop jogging before I choke on my breath or get a cramp in my calf. Yeah… I’m not built for running, and though any blisters I develop from endless days of walking heal almost as soon as they appear, I’m gasping before long.
Or maybe that’s just because I’m so worried about Thane.
Deep down, I know I don’t have to be. He took care of himself long before I arrived in Noctavara.
I’ve seen him, up close and personal, eliminate goldcaps and best other fae bandits with ease.
Even though there were two slavers left, he dispatched the third one so quickly, they’ll think twice about testing him.
Though I don’t think they will. Now when I compare the way they treated me to how quickly they were to listen to Thane, as though his reputation preceded him. They were careful to listen to him. Why? I don’t know, and it doesn’t really matter.
Not when the ‘P’ word is rolling through my head again.
Prophecy.
Prophecy.
Even worse, it has a name. The Prophecy of the Gilded Throne.
As much as I want to shake it off, tell myself that is has nothing to do with me, what are the odds that it doesn’t?
The queen sent a soldier to drag me from the inn.
And, okay, the slavers were lucky enough to find me with my skirts up, but they instantly decided that I was some fabled shadow demoness belonging to a Noctavaran prophecy.
Gilded Throne, right? It has to be a Noctavaran prophecy, but what about the one that Mom was freaking out to Dad about? I only overheard one line—and, whoa, am I regretting that now—but it mentioned my heart stopping to break a curse. No royal gold chairs included, as far as I know.
But a third prophecy? I… it can’t be. It’s bad enough that I fulfilled a prophecy when I was an infant, but to be marked by a second and possibly a third.
How unlucky can one halfling be? All I wanted to do was rescue Rafe, and as the days pass, I can’t help but think that he’s in even more danger, though I can’t see how he’s that far ahead of us.
If we’re taking the same path toward the Gilded Court, and he only was captured such a short time before Katrin told me what happened, he might still be journeying toward the queen on a slaver’s caravan.
Unless he arrived in a different part of Noctavara.
Unless he’s either at the Gilded Court already, or so far away that he’s been lost from the beginning.
Unless the slavers didn’t use chains after they recognized was a shadow demon male could be worth—especially since Thane admitted that the fae in this realm steal bonds from demons—and went with a choppy-chop just like Thane.
Thane…
I need Thane. I need him here in a way that I wouldn’t have believed a mere seven turns of the moon ago. He makes me feel safe, he knows the strange rules in this realm, and he’s the only fae I felt like I’ve been able to trust—though I’m beginning to think I shouldn’t have.
Binx rises up on his back legs, padding at my bare shin.
I glance down, looking past the ragged tear of my skirt, momentarily regretting the impulsiveness that had me slicing it off.
My soul-pet is sending reassurances down our bond as the same time as he’s checking that the slavers didn’t hurt me too badly.
The aches and pains from the way they grabbed me, slamming me around have faded.
No, it’s the idea that they won’t be the last…
that there is another prophecy that could possible be able me, and that it won’t be as easy as taking off with Rafe and running until I can open a portal to Sombra if all of Noctavara is waiting to see me do something…
yeah. There’s a pulse throbbing at the base of my skull.
In a self-soothing gesture, I reach up to rub my thumb along the edge of my thorn. Crud. I forgot. Thane’s glamour is so powerful, he has even me convinced that they’re gone.
I sigh, then crouch down, stroking Binx’s ear instead. “That was a close one, bud,” I murmur.
He trills.
“I know. Next time I have to pee, I’m bringing my sword. Promise.”
He pushes his head into my hand, demanding a pat.
I smile. “Yeah. Thane’s not so bad, is he? I’m glad you think so. I’m thinking about keeping him so he might be around a little longer.”
At least, I was determined to keep Thane.
During our travels, it really hit me what a gift it is for the gods to bless us with our one true mate.
I never thought that Thane was my soul’s match until I got to know him, no essence exchange required.
I’m attracted to him, and I like him, and though I know it’s soon, when I think of my bandit, I’m pretty sure I love him, though that could be the bond talking.
It probably is. But that’s how fated mates work. The gods lead us to our one true mate, the other half of our soul, and while it might not look like a match at first, eventually you accept that the gods… they rarely get it wrong.
I’m still not sure they have. But if he knew…
Binx interrupts my worries with a light-hearted chuffing sound that’s enough to steal a small laugh from me.
“Okay,” I agree. “If he misbehaves, you have my permission to bite him again.”
Binx lowers himself to all fours, turning so he can rub his flank along the side of my boot. I move my fingers to stroke him from head to tail when, without warning, he bounds a few steps forward.
My heart trips as Thane comes striding out of the trees in front of us.
His face is gorgeous, yet entirely expressionless. He doesn’t give anything away. Did he kill the slavers? Did he give them a stern warning and let the survivors get away to gather up more slaves? I can’t tell, but when I see the guarded look in his amber eyes, I know one thing.
He’s bracing himself to approach me. In that moment, I have my answer. What the slavers said… it’s true. Maybe the prophecy isn’t about me, but there is one, and the immortals in Noctavara who know I’m an outsider in their realm believe I’m the subject of it.
Goody.
I could pretend I didn’t understand. I could push forward, telling him we have to go, because rescuing Rafe is more important than anything—and it is.
So I’ve been enjoying myself with Thane.
That doesn’t erase the worries, the fears, and the nightmares…
I’m still determined to do whatever it takes to save my best friend, but if this prophecy could risk my ability to pull that off…
No. I have to know.
I have to ask.
“What is the Prophecy of the Gilded Throne?”
For a moment, Thane is a beautiful statue.
The sunlight brightens his coloring, a slight breeze ruffling his curls, sending the hem of his cloak swaying by his boots.
I wait. I don’t know what I’ll do if he refuses to answer—or gives me one of his non-answers—but he must figure that it won’t be pleasant because he sighs.
“The exact wording is lost to much of Noctavara,” he begins.
After getting a peek at the look on my face, he runs his fingers through his curls, leaving track marks in their wake as he amends what he was saying.
“The only soul who knows the full prophecy is the queen, and it makes sense why she won’t share it.
But over the centuries… enough of it has leaked that the lower fae whisper of it with reverence while the nobles do anything to quash rumors of it. ”
“But you knew enough.”
He doesn’t pretend otherwise. “Yes.”
“Enough that, when you found me in the Shadowed Woods, you thought I might be part of it?”
Say no, say no…
“Yes.” He thins his lips. “I knew when I saw the butterflies.”
It always has to do with the godsdamn butterflies.
I swallow roughly, trying to hold onto my control. Losing you temper won’t help, Alana. Answers first, throw your boot at him later. “Tell me.”
“Alana—”
I keep my voice calm and steady. “Tell me, Thane. What does the prophecy say?”
“You should understand where Noctavara came from,” he tells me. “Not the stories the Court tells. The truth.”
I open my mouth, and he holds up his hands to stop me. “Please. The history first, then the prophecy. It’ll help you understand.”
It better.
I fold my arms over my chest. “Go ahead.”
“Queen Celeste wasn’t born here,” he begins.
“Millennia ago, she was just another Seelie in Faerie. A high fae, to be sure, but one that was different from the others. In Faerie, the Seelie belong to the Summer Court, full of light and warmth. Then there’s the Winter Court, the Unseelie.
Shadow magic belongs to the Unseelie, and Celeste…
she was a member of the Seelie Court who was born with shadows.
” He casts me a significant look. “She could wield them, mold them, and eventually she could use them to rip portals through the veil.”
Just like I can.
I’m colorless to begin with and still I pale. I told Thane… I explained how I got her, and how I planned on bringing Rafe home. He knows… “She’s like me.”
“In ways,” is his careful answer. “But her differences meant she didn’t belong in either court.
” Just like how, as a halfling, I belong in both of my parents’ home world, I belong in none.
“Once she found a realm she could tame, one that suited her, she fled Faerie.” He pauses.
“She welcomed refugees from other realms. From Faerie, from other fae worlds that had split… from the mortal planes, too.”
The butterfly, I think. Somehow, the monarch butterfly came here the same way Rafe and I did… and who knows who else.
“But she made a fatal error when she fled Faerie,” Thane continues. “She abandoned her mate.”
That stops me cold.
“In Faerie,” Thane continues, voice steady but stripped of charm, “mates are rare. Sacred. When Celeste rejected hers because he hated her shadow magic, he appealed to Titania. And Oberon. The true kings and queen of Faerie. And they listened.” His expression shadows over.
“It didn’t matter her reasons. They cursed her. They cursed us.”
Oh, Thane…
“Any fae who pledged loyalty to Celeste,” he says. “Any who followed her into Noctavara and swore themselves to the Gilded Court… they would never know a fated bond. Never feel it on their own.”
On their own… but what someone else can have a bond? What if someone else is their fated mate? Suddenly, I understand why the price for demons is so high. If a loveless fae can convince a demon to bond with them, if they can finalize a claim, then they would feel it.
Right?
I don’t ask. I don’t get the chance. Not when Thane is still trying to explain—
“She built this realm to prove she didn’t need love,” Thane goes on.
“And then made sure no one else here ever could, either. Because few of the fae in Noctavara in this age left Faerie with her. Instead, we were born here, and the only way to survive her wrath and her reign is by pledging loyalty no matter how much we’d rather see her toppled from the Gilded Throne. ”
The Gilded Throne…
I lick my lips, suddenly nervous now that we’re back to that. “And the prophecy?”
“It was a visiting seer who wasn’t afraid of the queen, though she should’ve been.
She saw Celeste’s future, saw that an outsider made of flesh and shadow, someone forbidden to this world…
they would arrive, heralded by crowned wings.
And when this outsider… and the seers swore it was a female she show…
when she arrived, the Gilded Throne wouldn’t survive. ”
“That’s why,” I murmur. “That’s why the guards came for me.
Half flesh, half shadow… that’s me.” I lift my fingers, gesturing over my head.
There aren’t any monarch butterflies hovering nearby, but there have been too many to ignore.
“Crowned wings. The butterflies. That’s why she thinks I’m the outsider in the prophecy. Somehow she found out—”
“Seers,” Thane confirms. “She had the one who saw the prophecy executed, but she’s kept countless more since.”
Great. So she definitely knows I’m coming.
“That’s why she’s using her magic to keep me here. It’s close enough to mine to control it,” I say, musing out loud.
“She’ll do anything to keep her throne. If you’re the one who is destined to take it from her, she’ll stop you before you can try.”
My stomach ties itself into a knot. “I don’t want her crown, Thane! I just want to rescue Rafe!”
His expression closes over again at the mention of my friend.
“There’s another reason she wants you,” he adds. “And why the slavers would bring Rafe to the Gilded Court to fetch the highest price from the nobles.”
Deep down, I already know the answer. Still, I demand: “Say it.”
“Because demons still bond, and she can’t stop that. Neither can the curse. It’s a loophole, and proof that Fate will still has it’s say in Noctavara. Of course, the nobles twist that, too. A little glamour, a little charm… and the demons will bond to any fae that buys them.”
Anger flares hot in my chest. For the first time in days, my shadows surge around my feet. “So the slavers steal us.”
“Yes.”
“All so they can have something that should be given freely. Bonds are… they’re—”
“I don’t know what it’s like to feel a bond,” Thane admits.
“Wouldn’t recognize it if I could, and have spent my whole existence avoiding love when it would only end in tragedy.
I don’t think the fae can love in this realm.
That’s the point of the curse, Alana. To make you stop looking for something you’re never allowed to have. ”
The underlying sorrow in his tone is like pouring water on a flame.
It disappears with a whoosh and, suddenly, I’m staring at him.
And, okay, I’m usually staring at him, but now I’m seeing him.
I’m not looking at the fae bandit, the impressive swordsman, the charming thief…
no. I’m paying attention to Thane Aurex, my mate.
The male who hid in trees so he could lookout for danger while I slept. The one who earned the trust of my soul-pet. The one who kissed me, then kissed me once again.
The one who has saved me countless times…
“I see,” I say quietly, because I do. “In that case, I know I’m not supposed to thank the fae, but I appreciate you telling me all this. To make it fair, I think there’s something you should know, too.”
He waits.
“I do have a fated mate,” I say. And then, in case it isn’t obvious, I give him a half-shrug. “It’s, um, you.”
The silence that follows makes it absolutely clear that it wasn’t obvious. Not to Thane. Not to a fae bandit who spent a hundred-and-fifty years believing he could never love… but then his lips quirks up, my heart jolts, and the bond between us gets that much stronger.
I only hope it’s enough.