Chapter 28 #2
The meaning behind his words had Ariadne’s chest tightening. Did he truly believe she would go through everything she had because she felt guilty about his unreciprocated bond? As though guilt alone would carry her through Algorath, the death of a dear friend, and marrying a deranged usurper.
Still, the more she thought about it, the more it made sense to have such thoughts. It was not as though she had not asked Azriel once if he had merely married her due to the obsessive bond that tied them through fate alone.
“Revelie does nothing that she does not truly desire.” Ariadne draped herself across her husband’s broad chest, laying her ear over his heart just to listen to its steady rhythm. “And neither would I.”
Tension seeped from Azriel at her words, so when he did not speak, she lifted her head and smiled. “I am here.” She kissed his chest. “I am safe.” Her lips slid across his throat. “I am yours.” And she pressed her mouth to his, letting him consume her as she knew he would.
Loren stopped visiting Camilla after her refusal to assist him and shifted his attention to the far more amicable Hyacinth Hooke.
How the young debutante had not been snatched up in the first weeks of the Season remained a mystery to Loren.
He found her to be not only attractive but a picturesque example of everything a Caersan woman should be: beautiful, quiet, and, above all else, willing to serve her King.
Perhaps a bit too willing.
Her eagerness to please him—a virtue he relished when it came to supping on the most luxurious vampire blood after so many years of Rusan women—teetered on the verge of inappropriate in the best of times.
Something he did not hold against her. No, Loren wished he could indulge in her in all the ways she subtly offered, likely at the behest of her family to ensure their own survival in the new Valenul.
But he had backed himself into a corner.
The pledges of love and loyalty to his abducted wife were now nothing short of irksome splinters that neededto be forcibly removed.
Only then would he be able to allow the ravishing Hyacinth to sink to her knees before his throne and pleasure him as she begged all too often.
Loren Gard was nothing if not the vampire with the strongest will to allow Miss Hooke, whom he once believed to be the reserved and timid type, to hum in primal satisfaction as he fed from her, then walk away without first riding him.
As it were, he sat on his throne, dabbing his mouth with a kerchief as Hyacinth Hooke departed from the throne room, hips swaying with each step. He watched her go, committing each sensuous motion to memory so he could later imagine it was her fingers wrapped around his cock, not his own.
“I want Ariadne dead,” Loren finally said after the doors closed behind his favorite member of his Court.
Summoned by his words, Nikolai stepped forward so he stood just within Loren’s periphery. “I believe you already attempted to make that happen not too long ago, and it went rather poorly.”
Just what Loren needed to refocus: a dash of cold water in the form of sharp words to bring him back to the present. He glared up at the King’s Sword, even if he knew that his friend was attempting to pull his thoughts back to the present moment. “I am well aware of what occurred that night.”
“Then you will do well to remember, Your Majesty,” Nikolai continued, “that to get to her…you must first defeat an army.”
“An army, I can defeat.”
“An army of dhemons like we have never seen before.”
Irritation prickled at the back of Loren’s mind. He curled his fingers over the arms of his throne, and he sat back. “We will crush them as we have done for millennia.”
Nikolai dipped his chin in acquiescence as the doors to the room opened and stepped back to his position just behind Loren.
In stumbled a disheveled Rusan soldier surrounded by a handful of others like an escort.
The man in the center blinked long and slow while he bent at the waist, pausing there for a beat as though working through his exhaustion to rise back up.
“Your Majesty.” The Rusan’s voice was rough and rasping as though he had not had water for days.
When he lifted his gaze, the soldier’s drawn face was dirty with dark circles beneath his eyes.
What must have once been a neat top knot now had too many loose hairs to be considered effective.
The crimson uniform, unlike the men beside him, was torn and dirty with scuffed boots, and, when Loren inspected further, dried blood.
As though summoned by his very thoughts, there was no doubt that this Rusan had come straight from a battle. Who had he fought? What news did he bring? By the desperation in the soldier’s eyes, he had the nagging feeling that the next words out of his mouth would not please him.
“Speak, soldier.” Loren leaned forward, his hair slipping over a shoulder and swaying into his face.
The Rusan pulled himself up tall and lifted his chin. “Monsumbra was attacked two days ago by the Dhemon King.”
A thrill shot through Loren like lightning.
He pushed to his feet, unable to contain the surge of adrenaline.
This is what he had been waiting for. This is what he had wanted.
To finally get the chance to stand before Azriel fucking Tenebra and take everything from him—his wife, his hope, then his life.
Because, yes, Loren wanted Ariadne dead.
Not right away, of course. But after she had made a fool of him before his guards, he would not stand for it.
He would take her from Azriel, and, after felling his army and removing his head, he would spend the next decade breaking her in every possible way before putting an end to her miserable, dhemon-loving life.
There would be no peace for Loren until he knew he had crushed her into nothing.
“What is the status of the city?”
Gaping, the Rusan’s eyes flickered over Loren’s shoulder to where Nikolai stood and back. “I’m not certain, Your Majesty. I was sent by Colonel Foster when their encampment was discovered east of the city.”
“They sent you before the battle even began?” Loren would need to have a talk with his officers if they believed this would be the type of information he would want delivered in his throne room.
“Yes, sir.” Now the soldier cast his attention to the floor at Loren’s feet, where it belonged. “I was told to inform you that they were under attack and—”
“What do they expect me to do two days later?” Loren glared over his shoulder at Nikolai and addressed his friend. “As though they believe me to be a god capable of appearing at their side at a moment’s notice.”
At that, the Rusan winced but said nothing.
There was no rebuttal, of course. As much as Loren fancied himself a god, he knew better than to place himself amongst the celestials with their endless power.
He was merely their weapon to be wielded—a sword for Keon to bear and send his horned offspring back to the Underworld where they belonged.
“Were there signs of dragons?” Loren asked after a moment, turning back to the Rusan.
Confusion flickered through the soldier’s eyes, and his mouth drew taut for a moment before he shook his head. “No, Your Majesty. I don’t believe so.”
“Were the images of them not shared with you?”
Hesitation, then the Rusan shook his head again. “No, Your Majesty. I…have heard of nothing of the sort. None of us has, to my knowledge.”
No common foot soldier, at least. A shame his officers truly did not know how to run their commands.
How were their soldiers meant to properly prepare or step into battle if they were unprepared to face the inevitable?
Even a seasoned soldier would stop short at the sight of their first dragon, and that would be all the beast needed to put an end to them.
“A large, winged lizard is the best way to describe them,” Nikolai offered from behind him. It was not often that the Sword spoke without permission, yet this seemed to be an apt time for such interruptions. “Did you see anything that meets that description?”
The Rusan paled. “No, sir, I didn’t.”
“I suspect,” Loren said, “there will be another messenger sent along soon enough with the results of this siege.”
At that, the soldier inclined his head. “Colonel Foster and the other officers were centralizing their forces in the city to prepare.”
The forces that Loren had just ordered to be moved away from the city and to the perimeter of the Province, as though they would not use their airborne cavalry to locate and avoid the greatest threats.
He had not anticipated they would hit Monsumbra first. In fact, he believed the outlying villages and commandments would put up more of a fight before letting anyone pass through.
A grievous oversight by someone who had spent too long, now, on a comfortable throne. Loren needed to have his hands in this fight a little more to keep his mind sharp and prepared for the inevitable battles to come.
Standing, he nodded once to the Rusan soldier before him. “Your report is appreciated. Rest and prepare for the journey back with new orders.”
“Yes, Your Majesty.” The soldier bowed low at the waist, swaying as he did so. Around him, his escorts surged forward, prepared to catch the exhausted man before he could hit the tiles.
“You.” Loren caught the gaze of one of the soldiers. “Fetch General Wintre immediately and have him assemble the war council. We must prepare for battle in Central Province.”
The man stepped back and bowed. “At once, Your Majesty.” Then he was gone, hurrying to relay his King’s message.
As the others escorted the reporting Rusan from the throne room, Loren turned to Nikolai. “They will have taken Monsumbra, but I will not have them lay siege to Laeton. Not again. We will meet them south of the Hub.”
“A wise decision,” Nikolai said. “Less civilian casualties.”
Loren lifted his lip in a sneer. “I care not for the civilians. I merely want the skies open so I can watch each of those fire-breathing beasts fall.”