Chapter 3 #3
Without thinking, I dropped Arion’s reins and lurched up the stairs after him. “Your people have vanished. All of Lonmire, two hundred people, gone in a single night. Two survivors brought us the news this morning.”
Wroth didn’t stop me from following him, but not even a fiend could stop me now. I kept my gaze on his broad shoulders, ignoring the beauty of the Great Hall of Owlhorn.
“They were children, Lord Wroth. They’re in shock, and I’m not entirely sure they were…fully aware of what transpired. They spoke of pale faces watching through windows. No sounds, no smells, but everyone disappeared from their beds, no bodies left behind.”
He kept walking, leading me through a torchlit corridor where the floor was mother-of-pearl, gleaming with flashes of violet and mauve and seafoam underfoot.
“Their parents and infant brother are among those who vanished. The boy told me of a lai passing through, a nobleman who paid him with this.”
I pulled the chthonium coin from my breast pocket, darting around to stop Wroth in his tracks, and shoved it towards him.
“Chthonium,” I said breathlessly. “Fae metal.”
“I know of it.” His eyes moved the coin to my face, nostrils flaring, and then he shoved past me.
I gritted my teeth at his reticence. How could this fiend be the Lord of the Rivers, and not give a damn about his own people?
“We have the children in custody on our estate. I, and several of my family’s men-at-arms, made the journey to bring you this news, and there is still more trouble to be spoken of.
The…the watcher of Iselaine Blind. It was strong during our crossing, much stronger than usual.
My oldest man-at-arms advised me to tell you to close the road immediately.
We may have lost a man to its influence today.
My golem prevented him from entering the water, but… the damage may well be permanent.”
Wroth shouldered his way into a bedroom. I followed without shame. I would curl up on his pillow and shout in his ear all night if it meant he’d do his damn duty—
I stopped, looking around in a daze. The room was so…
much. Frilly taffeta bedding in shades of orchid and gold competed with vases of peacock feathers for the eye’s attention.
Pillows were piled everywhere, including on top of a saddle rack that had no business being in a lady’s room.
The scent of clashing perfumes burned my nose, as though someone had drenched the expensive Serissan carpets with several bottles.
“Lord Wroth, I do regret interrupting your wedding night, but this is life and death. The chthonium alarms me deeply, but we can’t rule out the possibility of slavers. Lonmire lays on the River Nicla. Easy access for pirates, if they came up from the Serissan coast.”
He tore open the doors of an elaborately carved wardrobe and began digging around in the vast froth of rich materials. “God forbid it be my wedding night.”
I paused, nonplussed, before carrying on. “I will say, I don’t believe it was wargs. Anto—the boy—didn’t describe warg-sign. But it is suggestive that he and his sister survived the night, because they slept behind a forge in a smithy, covered with bits of iron.”
He held up a brocade coat, scoffed, and tossed it aside.
The fury I’d been violently suppressing came boiling forth. “Are you even listening to me? Your people may be dying as we speak!”
Wroth plucked something from the tangled mess and threw it at me. Unaware that he’d meant for me to catch it, I was caught off-guard, and a pair of leather breeches—soft doe-skin, dyed a deep blue—slapped me in the face.
They fell to the floor, and I stared at Lord Wroth.
The Lord of the Rivers. My liege.
Who had just listened to me speak of two hundred of his people missing—possibly dead, possibly enslaved—and slapped me with fucking breeches.
It was a disgrace. A travesty. I knew vampires didn’t care for us, but this was too far.
We owed our loyalty to…this?
Before I could say a word, he flung a silk shirt after it, followed by a velvety black cloak, trimmed with azure fur.
“You can find the socks and, er, other undergarments yourself,” he rumbled, flicking a finger at the dresser. “They should fit well enough. Wipe off the sweat, change into these clothes, and be in the Great Hall within the hour. One of my people will bring you something to eat.”
“What?” I blinked at him, still holding the cloak, the only article of clothing I’d managed to catch.
“Clean yourself.” He enunciated each word, as though I were an infant. “Put on dry clothes.”
“I meant what as in, are you coming with me? Do I finally have your attention? You were listening that whole damn time?” I bared my teeth, wanting to bite into him.
The arrogance of his kind. It was breathtaking.
“Cute, but you have nothing on me.” The fiend chuckled at the sight of my flat human teeth, but his smile quickly faded.
“You’re covered in sweat and you’re about to ride all night.
You know of chthonium, which makes you a Master Artificer, and I can’t risk the only Artificer at hand being laid up with saddle sores or chafing or whatever other illness you fragile little things drop dead from. ”
He paced closer and I stood frozen in place, suddenly and intensely aware of just how massive he was, how those jaws could fit around my head with room to spare and squeeze…ever so gently…until my skull popped like a grape and he could suck out my blood at his leisure.
Fury burned like white-hot diamonds in those brilliantly blue eyes. He stopped several paces short, his clawed fingers curled into loose fists at his sides.
“I need you to be functional. Get the damp garments off, stretch, and you should have time to eat before we head for Lonmire. You can sleep in the saddle.”
I gathered the clothes as he spoke, and almost backed into the male bloodwitch, who blocked the doorway behind me.
Wroth’s eyes focused on the man. “Bram, send a legion to the Iselaine Blind. No travelers are to cross that route until we’ve sniffed around for ourselves. I want six knights ready within the hour. And get a fresh horse for fel Arron, here. Hers is blown.”
“My lord.” The bloodwitch bowed to him, gave me a fish-eyed sidelong glance, and swept from the room.
I stared at Wroth, shame burning in my cheeks.
“I thought you didn’t care,” I said in a small voice.
Wroth bared his teeth, less of a grin than a threatening display of the thousand fangs in his leonine snout. “Of course you didn’t. Beast, creature, lowly animal that I am, it never crossed your mind that I was listening to every word. Humans. Your arrogance never fails to astound me.”
That clear gaze cut right through me. I knew, truthfully this time, that no matter how tired, sick, or careworn I was, I could’ve handled this better.
He strode out, leaving me standing in his dead wife’s bedroom, with an armful of his dead wife’s clothes, feeling like the smallest person in the world.