Prologue #2
With a sharp breath, his eyes popped open and he looked up at Reeve, completely sober.
Reeve grinned. “That’s quite a party trick.”
“I happen to have access to the world’s best alchemist.”
Reeve gestured ahead as they began their walk around the coliseum.
“I’ve heard the Mavros girl is quite skilled. Seems the rumors are true.”
“She’s incredible,” said Abraxas. “She’s the Maeve of potions. Creating new concoctions all the time.”
“Like your little pick me up?”
Abraxas nodded and laughed as they walked down the pale crystal steps, venturing deeper into the Celestian Palace. “Yes. Though there’s far more she’s capable of than that.”
The open corridors let in the salty breeze coming off the Black Deep.
Reeve pulled a small box from his pocket. He opened the ornate tin and offered Abraxas one of the white cigarettes. Abraxas took it with a sly grin.
“High Lord,” he said with a shake of his head. “I had no idea you were this sinful.”
Reeve pulled one out for himself and placed it between his lips. “I’m immortal,” he said with a shrug.
“Must be nice,” said Abraxas as he lit both their tips with a gentle snap of his fingers. “My mother would become positively mental if she saw me smoking this.”
In unison, they took a long drag and stared out over the Black Deep.
“Now,” said Abraxas with a sigh, “I know you did not bring me here to smoke in secret. My cousin’s current state plagues you, does it?”
Reeve placed his elbows on the bannister and pulled on his cigarette. “My concern is for your Prince. As rulers of this realm, it’s wise to be concerned about my friends across the sea.”
Abraxas laughed and turned back towards the palace. He leaned against the railing. “Goodness, Reeve, I thought we were friends. And here you wound me with such lies.”
Reeve looked over at him. “The Dread Hand is so good at detecting them, hm?”
Abraxas looked down at him with a knowing expression. “The Dread Hand sees everything, High Lord.”
“And what do you see this evening?”
Abraxas sighed and chewed his lip. “I’ll give you the truth, Reeve, despite the fact that you remain playing games with me. I see my two best friends each doing their best to ruin everything I am working so hard to create.”
“Ruling and romance don’t always complement one another.”
“Yes,” muttered Abraxas. “Because the pair of them simply being the crown and the sword worked so well the first time. I’ve never seen Mal so distraught. And I shared a room with him for four years at Vaukore.”
Reeve scoffed. “You mean to tell me she denied him?”
“For a time.”
“Hmm,” said Reeve with a soft smile.
Abraxas looked over at him with a satisfied smirk. “You're holding your deck awfully low, Reeve. I can see that royal flush.”
“If my hand of cards is visible to you, Rosethorn, it is because I do not care if you see them.”
Abraxas’ brows flicked up as his cigarette was at its end. The butt end vanished after his last drag.
“Jealousy is a hard emotion for Mal to swallow. Thank you for not pursuing her.”
Reeve’s defensive and jabbing reply slipped from him before he could stop himself.
“There are many reasons I do not pursue your cousin. Fear of him isn’t one of them.”
“No,” said Abraxas, looking away from him. “I imagine not. You stay away from my cousin for her sake.” He smiled sadly. “You are speaking to the one other person who knows just how hard it is to watch them be together.”
Reeve’s face dropped at his honesty. He paused as he realized the hand of the Dread Prince had just confessed his affection for the Dread Prince himself. “Does he know that?”
Abraxas paused a moment and then shrugged. “It doesn’t matter.” A genuine smile spread across his face. “I am happy it’s her.” He pushed off the bannister and faced Reeve fully. “Thank you for the cigarette, High Lord, and such wonderful hospitality.”
Abraxas turned on his heel and retreated into the palace, back to the festivities, leaving Reeve alone. A chorus of thunderous applause echoed down the chamber where Abraxas was heading.
Reeve didn’t follow right away. The party would last long into the night.
Reeve fought his desires to see her for a time.
As the duels continued and the wine flowed, he retreated to his chambers in solitude.
But he desired to explain, even though he knew the Magic holding his tongue wouldn’t allow such truth.
Perhaps it was the raw and honest way Abraxas spoke to him that drove him across the Black Deep and onto the balcony outside Maeve’s chambers at Castle Morana. He knew he shouldn’t be there. It was only a matter of time before Malachite grew tired of entertaining and would return to the castle.
It was only a matter of time before Malachite, or the darkness dwelling in his mind, would see the Magic between Reeve and Maeve.
But Reeve stood, nonetheless, and faced her, prepared to answer her questions. He folded his arms across his chest as the glass-paned doors slipped open and she appeared.
“How are you in my head?” she demanded without a greeting.
She did not leave the doorway and he didn’t look at her.
The green hazy mist surrounding them trailed by at a crawling pace.
How could she stay here? So stifled and dark.
Sinclair Estates had suited her, despite her brooding and dark temperament.
The sun kissed stone and vibrant garden blooms complimented her essence.
This place was a tomb.
“You know how,” was all the Magic holding his tongue allowed him to say.
“No,” said Maeve sharply. “That’s ridiculous.”
His eyes darted over to her at last. “Is it any more ridiculous than the charade happening all around us?”
She tensed. Her jaw clamped in tightly.
Her next words were the ones that nearly stopped him from coming at all. He readied his indifferent and deflecting lie.
“How long have you known?” She asked.
“That doesn’t really matter.”
She shook her head and looked up. “I must be a joke to you.”
She leaned against the frame of the doors.
He turned towards her and took her in at last. She had changed from her posturing uniform as the Dread Viper, and now wore casual clothes.
At least, as casual as attire for a Sinclair got.
The neckline of her sweater was embroidered with golden floral vines.
“Is that what you think?” he asked quietly.
She provided no reply. A chilling breeze picked up across the balcony, and she hugged herself tightly as the constant haze of the Dread Lands moved to cover the moons.
The space around them darkened.
“It doesn’t mean anything,” she said.
He ignored the unfamiliarly insecure tone of her voice.
“I know,” he said calmly.
“I choose Mal.”
Reeve cursed himself for coming.
She continued. “I have faith he will pull through this.”
“I know that, too.”
She fired quickly once again, “You aren’t owed me because of some ancient—”
He interrupted her gently. “I never said I was.”
Silence, painful silence, settled between them. He watched her defenses drop as she stared at him. Her heartbeat slowed to a calm and steady pace as he felt each and every slow breath she took.
“I can’t tell him this,” she said softly.
More fear.
“I can promise I don’t need your protection from—”
“Oh shut up,” she snapped.
Reeve’s Magic slammed to attention and he fought a smile as she continued.
“This isn’t just about you or me.”
On that account, she was correct. Still, he found himself unable to repress his desire to protect her. Since Ambrose’s death, her Magic only called to him more.
Just as it had that night he returned to Earth after years, just in time to watch Malachite duel. He hadn’t been expecting to come face to face with the Dread Descendant that evening. He had merely grown tired of wondering how she was.
Wondering if her Magic had manifested in the ways her mother’s had. In all the ways Ambrose feared it might.
Wondering if she was beginning to remember all the things she altered where he was concerned.
But, despite the way her Magic called to him, none of the things he worried over had come to be the problem.
It was this damned place yet again that threatened Magic’s existence.
It was Shadow. He was nearly certain of it.
“Things are changing, Maeve,” he said.
Her eyes whipped up at him, as though she nearly forgot he was there.
Reeve continued. “I know you can feel the darkness that is growing here.”
She tossed her head back slowly and closed her eyes. “Shut. Up.”
Reeve ignored her and continued speaking over her. “I can feel it all the way across the Black Deep.”
“Did you not hear me say shut up?”
“No, I did,” he snarled. “But say it again. I love hearing the hatred you harbor for me singing off your spoiled fucking tongue.”
She pushed off the doorframe and closed the gap between them at last. The usual look of disdain she held for him was amplified.
She smelled addictively wicked.
He hated that.
He bent forward until their noses nearly touched and smiled at how easily he riled her up. “You’re too easy.”
She hesitated a moment and then stepped back from him. “How did this even happen?” she asked with a huff. “I thought you already had a mate. I’m not even an Immortal.”
Leandra’s face shot across his mind. Her golden hair and dark eyes. He lingered on the thought of her for only a moment, grateful the image of her was a pleasant one, and not his final memory of her broken and lifeless body.
“She was not my mate, despite the love that we shared,” he said.
Her brows pulled together, not in anger, but in empathy.
His chest tightened as the soft side of her he so rarely was allowed access to slipped through.
“But I thought. . .” she began with a small shake of her head. “I asked you about her.”
“You referred to her as my mate. I did not correct you. I loved her, yes,” he continued. “Despite no Magical fated bond, I loved her fully. Painfully and achingly so. The way you love your Dread Prince.”
Her lips parted. “You’ve known this whole time,” she said softly.
He couldn’t lie to her further. Not when they were piling up higher than his liking. So he ignored the truth that he’d known about their bond for many years, and deflected entirely.
“I won’t say anything,” he said, hoping to calm the panicked way her heart was still beating.
“To anyone?”
He paused a moment and then was brutally honest with both himself and her. “It is not in my best interest to announce to the world that my mate is Malachite’s Dread Viper.”
She looked away from him and ran her fingers across the stone bannister. “It is not, nor it cannot come to good.”
Reeve looked down at her and attempted to smile, but it quickly faltered. It was becoming harder to pretend for her. “You read Hamlet?”
She avoided his gaze, but he could have sworn the beginnings of a playful smile pulled at the corner of her lips. “You gave it such a glowing review.”
His own smile naturally flourished then. “And?” He prodded.
Maeve shrugged. “It was. . .”
Malachite’s Magic appeared close by, Reeve felt his incoming presence at once. Maeve inhaled sharply, having felt it too. Her eyes slid to a close at once as her grip on the bannister tightened.
Reeve didn’t hesitate.
He left her on the balcony before Malachite could find them, and returned to the Celestian Palace.
The opening celebration continued across the crystal halls, where Reeve was certain Eryx and Drystan were providing too much Aternian Absinthe to Abraxas and Alphard.
He proved himself right when moments later he joined them in his study, and Alphard’s eyes were barely open as he tried to look at the deck of cards in his hands.
“Look alive,” said Reeve, clapping him on the shoulder. “My men are trying to take all that Mavros gold.”
“He’s got plenty,” said Eryx with a smile as he upped his wager.
Abraxas groaned and threw down his cards, a light shade of green on his cheeks. “That’s it. No more Aternian Absinthe. Not one drop.”
With a triumphant smile, Eryx pulled the stack of gold (and Abraxas’ rather expensive watch) towards himself from the center of the table. Reeve watched the Commander of the Senshi Warriors enjoying himself more than Reeve could remember having seen him do in ages.
He wouldn’t tell Eryx and Drystan about Malachite’s changing eyes until the morning. Nor about the familiar and haunting Magic he felt on Maeve’s balcony. The one that lingered in the air and drove him to desire to steal Maeve away from such a place.
If a part of Shadow remained in the Dread Lands, despite his defeating her three hundred years ago, then it wasn’t just Maeve Reeve had to worry over.
It was the state of all seven realms.