Chapter 57
CHAPTER FIFTY-SEVEN
Blood, there was so much blood.
Helaina continued to hold her as men shouted and searched.
All that beautiful golden hair, stained with carnage.
Then everything went black inside her empty black room, safe inside the darkness.
Alone, where she belonged.
Helaina woke up screaming. Her eyes shot open to see the faint light of the blazing sconces.
Elkron.
She was safe belowground.
That dream, that memory . . . The past weeks she had felt a chance that maybe she could get back to who she used to be, that maybe she could be put back together. She was beginning to wonder if her pieces would ever fit the same again.
Deep down she knew. All along, Dolion was part of the force beyond Ash Cliff. She just didn’t want to believe it. That she could have been that stupid for so much of her life, trusting and loving him.
Her train of thought broke as the slightest creak sounded from outside the door.
She reached under her pillow, pulling out a dagger. She pointed it toward the door, her heart beating rapidly.
“Who’s there?”
Her look of dread melted as Theo came over the threshold, holding a tray of neatly arranged items, including what looked to be chocolate and colorful fruits.
His hair parted down the middle, fanning over his shoulders. He wore a simple thin shirt with a deep cut revealing the definition in his chest. His jaw tensed as he took in a deep breath, setting the tray on the floor.
Any apprehension she had felt left her body. He had come for her. Time and time again he had come for her.
I would massacre entire kingdoms to keep you from her.
“What do you want?” It came out crueler than she meant it. She was still so rattled, the shock of things hadn’t settled.
Theo’s thick brow arched, like she should have known the answer. “You were screaming,” that low voice replied. “And I thought you might be hungry when you woke up.”
She looked to Theo, then back at the neatly arranged items. “It’s been you, hasn’t it? Sending food here.” Even when they had been gone, the trays still got delivered.
He didn’t hesitate to answer. “How I first saw you . . . I never want to see you that way again.”
She leaned off the edge of the bed, crossing her arms to wrap her fingers around the opposite shoulder. He had cared since the beginning, in his own way. She realized that now.
“Do you want to tell me? What you saw in your sleep?” he asked gently.
“It wouldn’t help to say.”
He nodded, leaning his back against the farthest wall, keeping such a distance when all she wanted was to be close. He palmed the back of his neck.
“We gave Balor to Manos. There’s . . . a lot to discuss.”
Callum had told her about the twin brothers Dolion kept in his company. Benon and Balor were infamous for carving up their victims. Even when the poor souls cracked, their skin hanging off their own bodies, they didn’t stop.
“The ring, Helaina.” Theo was doing a poor job hiding the trembling fierceness in his voice. “I have to know.”
She instinctively held her palm to her chest, touching that brand. It felt like fresh fire, cutting as deep as the day he gave it to her.
“Tell me.” It was a plea, not a demand.
She didn’t want to, but for some reason, Theo being here made the words easier to pull from her throat. The same way it was easier to pull her own power from her body when he was near.
She finally revealed everything, telling the full story she had never shared with anyone.
Of the man that had inserted himself so fully into her life, the future he had promised her.
She told him of the fateful night when Krysta had come to save her.
She unfolded the new details of her uncle’s betrayal and how Dolion had ruined Adriel.
Rage corrupted Theo’s entire body as she recounted the years of treachery.
She stroked the raised skin on her flesh. “‘You will always be mine.’ That’s what he said after he gave me this.”
“I’ll kill him,” he whispered to himself, forming tight fists at his sides. They both stayed silent for a beat. He opened his mouth like he wanted to say something else, then thought better of it.
She took the opportunity to change the subject, to talk about anything other than this. Anything other than him.
“When you said he ‘found it,’ what did you mean?”
He closed his eyes. “The blood crown.” He sighed the words out from his too-perfect lips.
“What is it?”
“Another godly relic, made by the same creator as the bone dagger. The two are connected, but I fear the crown is the stronger of the two.”
“What can it do?”
“It brought her here.” He pushed off the wall but did not move closer.
“Lynor was made to unify the gods, in a time when all they could do was lust for power and war among themselves. Brahm proposed a common goal to bring peace through worship and prayer. He built a neutral realm where they could create instead of destroy. Things were perfect here . . . but it didn’t last.”
He spoke of the early ages like they were yesterday.
“Why not?”
“Drayella.” Theo said her name like it was salt on his own tongue.
“She created malevolent beings with a hunger for mortal flesh. We were hunted back then; her beasts were rapidly multiplying, plaguing Lynor. The other gods beseeched Brahm to eradicate them, to protect the lives and land they had worked so hard to build. Valhoor and Drayella were quick to swear an oath of destruction if any of her creations were harmed.”
Helaina leaned in closer, taking in Theo’s version of events, a version she had never known before today.
“Some of the other Hell Gods sided with them. Brahm couldn’t risk another war in the immortal realms. So he raised these mountains, creating the barrier you’ve always known and giving the east to Drayella’s creatures, the west to the mortals.
But the death toll was already too high.
The other gods retaliated further, combining their power to banish Valhoor and Drayella from Lynor to spend eternity secluded in their own realms. The only way Drayella could possibly override that kind of immortal magic was if the blood crown was used to summon her. ”
Helaina listened, not fully understanding. “So the dagger holds the power to bring us to their realms, and the crown can call the gods here?”
“The crown’s magic is something I don’t fully understand.
I just know it’s the only item powerful enough to overrule their banishment.
I also know the crown cannot be destroyed, like the dagger.
I assume that’s why the gods’ brilliant plan was to hide it where no mortal would dare to go, in the eastlands, surrounded by Drayella’s creatures.
Dolion must have spent years searching for it after he left here. ”
Theo’s jaw tensely worked, but his eyes were full of remorse.
“I should have killed him when he tried to steal the dagger. Dolion is her descendant, Drayella’s.
It’s my fault he was free to roam the east, searching.
My only guess is that those monsters recognized he shared blood with their immortal mother and let him wander unharmed until he found it. ”
If she hadn’t been disgusted with herself before, now her gut truly ached for the closeness she had created between herself and a descendant of one of the most feared goddesses in existence.
“Any mortal can just wield an artifact like that? All Dolion had to do was find it?”
“It’s not that simple. Artifacts like these require payment, they don’t perform for free.
Just as the bone dagger claims your mortal life, the blood crown also has a price.
The entity who wields its power must offer blood in exchange.
To use the crown to bring back the Hell Gods .
. . the debt must have been astronomical. ”
He wiped his eyes with his thumb and forefinger, fully displaying his frustration.
Like he should have connected these pieces long ago.
“All the disappearances . . . they weren’t just feeding their undead, they were feeding the crown.
Giving it the blood it was due in exchange for its dark magic.
He brought her back. She rewarded him. He is undead, but she also imbued him with her own divine magic. ”
Helaina palmed her clammy hands over her sweat-soaked face and smoothed back her hair. “Why didn’t she come for me in the very beginning? Why wait until now? Surely fae magic is nothing to her.”
“Because she had been banished, Helaina. Do you know what that does to a god? Having all of those immortals work together to cage her? The combined magics drained her power and locked her in place, preventing her from traveling. Even if that binding is broken, regeneration would take years, decades even. She’s been busy rebuilding her strength and making an undead army.
When she grew strong enough, she gave Dolion the order to take you, to hold you in the east until Valhoor returned for you.
So he could unlock your curse before Ures.
If he did that, you would be their most powerful pawn. ”
“I thought Ures was the only one who could grant me power? I thought that was the whole point of all of this? For me to attempt his trial.”
“You carry Ures’s blood, Helaina, but you also hold Valhoor’s curse, his shadow, his mark. He would not create a weapon if he did not have the ability to wield it.”
Dread sank deep in her gut as silence passed between them. She didn’t want to talk about this anymore. She was scared; she’d be a fool not to be. And even though so much had been discovered, she only wanted one thing.
“Theo . . .”
He bristled at his name on her tongue.
“I’m sorry,” she said.
His shoulders drifted down, like he was relieved of an imposing weight. “You owe me no apologies.”
“I do, though. I thought so many things about you in the beginning, about everyone here. I let so many fears mislead me . . . You were never the cause of my anger or grief, and yet you’ve been the one paying for it since I arrived.
You were just trying to mend things that you had no responsibility to fix. ”
“No responsibility?” She was grateful he interrupted her ramblings.
He began approaching her cautiously. When he was above her, he offered his hand. Without any hesitation, she took it, and he brought her up to stand.
“I would give anything to heal every wound you’ve ever endured. Whether I caused it or not is of no consequence.”
She gripped his hand, not ever wanting to let it go.
“You’re a survivor, Helaina. That’s a power no one gave to you—you earned it. Through terrible loss and heartache, but you earned it all the same.”
She wasn’t crying, but it was the closest she had been in a long while.
His eyes took on a somber note. “Come with me?”
She nodded.
He led her out of the room.
They walked until they took a path she was familiar with. He escorted her up those stone steps, to that smoothed and polished cave.
The mysterious blade of bone lay untouched. The power from it was humming; it almost echoed all around them. The dagger was most definitely alive in some way.
“I have to ask something of you,” Theo began. “And I’m sorry I have to ask it.”
She turned toward him. He didn’t have to say it.
“You need me to use it now, don’t you?”
“If Drayella is here . . . if Valhoor is coming—it changes everything. If he has the chance to imbue you before Ures . . . they’ll use you against us, then they’ll kill you too.
” His throat bobbed as he took her hands.
“We’re out of time. We need every advantage, and I can’t risk them somehow getting to you in your mortal body . . . I can’t . . .”
Looking into his devastated eyes, she felt something there, something he longed to say.
“Can’t what?”
“I can’t lose you. Even if you hate me, I can’t keep protecting this world knowing you’re not in it. If I knew another way, I would choose it . . . but it has to be this.”
She believed him. She pulled her hands from his and began lightly brushing her fingertips over his shirt. “All the hateful things I said . . . none of it was true.”
He inhaled deeply, steadying himself. She never thought her touch could cause such a reaction in another. “My words were no better.” He placed his fingers behind her neck and caressed under her chin with his thumb. “I meant none of it, you have to know that.”
She leaned into his touch.
“Hearing what he did to you will haunt me forever. I wanted to take him alive back there, to get any information we could, then let his body rot in pieces in the dungeons. The next time we meet, he will not escape that fate, I swear it to you.” His voice rang so tenderly despite his vengeful words.
He brought his forehead down to meet hers. She didn’t shy away.
“Even when I didn’t know who or what . . . or where you were, that power called to me. It desires me, it matches mine completely.”
The tips of their noses brushed against each other.
“You will never be his, Helaina, because you were always meant to be mine.”
He pulled her up as she wrapped her legs around him.
She gravitated toward his lips, and they locked in the most passionate kiss.
His mouth on hers was raw and claiming. His kiss felt essential, like the need to take in air.
Her nightgown bunched around her hips as she pressed her body to his growing hardness.
She pulled away breathless. “Take me somewhere, anywhere. Make me forget, make me feel. I want you to be the last memory of my mortal life.” The longing ache in her eyes seemed to strike him down.
Even with the threat, he would not deny her.
His eyes went wicked as they roamed her neck, her lips, and he swept her hair back behind her ears in languid strokes.
“I can do that.”