Chapter 9
It was her second day in the palace, and her favorite time. Kehemol was quiet in the early morning after the drunks had all gone home or passed out in the streets beyond. Not a soul was in sight, nor a sound heard beyond the wailing wind and rain.
Beams of shadows streamed in through the palace windows, hiding the cracks in the marbled floors as Imani’s boots clomped against them with each step.
She paused and stared down at the crude map she’d drawn on her hand.
“It must be this way,” she muttered to herself and turned left down another winding, dizzying hallway.
She slowed to a stop and raised her palms to the door in front of her. Was this the library?
Testing the doorknob, she found it was locked, like all the others.
Frustrated, she recast her invisibility illusion just in case her emotions loosened it then started off in the opposite direction.
The palace wasn’t built in a neat rectangle, like Stralas.
However, it was everything Stralas was and more.
Extravagant beyond compare, there seemed to be black diamonds and glass everywhere.
It was rumored to be spelled by Kiran himself against theft.
While made of cold stone, the palace was anything but drafty. Sumptuous rugs lined the halls and rooms, and servants managed to keep fires going almost constantly.
She wandered farther down the hallway, which followed no obvious pattern.
Some corridors were wide and straight, others curved, slanted, paved in brick or stone or some combination of the two.
Imani wasn’t surprised, as resources here were rumored to be dwindling, and she didn’t think there were any quarries this far south.
The castle was old—far older than Stralas—and it showed.
It had likely been built bit by bit, perhaps mauled down during the wars before the kingdom’s split and rebuilt differently after.
Some would argue all fortresses should be built in such a way.
It made them less susceptible to attack when there was no clear path in or out.
Another step forward, and she paused. A tickling sensation spread from her chest to her limbs. She checked that her shadows were hidden. They were, but Imani’s signature pushed her in a direction that didn’t feel natural.
What was this?
Shoving the feeling away, she consulted her handmade map again.
Still, it persisted until, finally, without any other better options, she decided to follow her instincts. They were stronger in the darkness of this place. Her shadows liked it here.
Her magic led her to a sweeping staircase that appeared to head to the north tower. She slowly made her way up, but at the top, a voice stopped her dead in her tracks.
At the corner, she peeked around at the sound of his voice, startled to find Kiran.
Pressing her back against the wall, she debated for a moment what to do. Before she could think about it further, however, she tiptoed into the hallway after him.
Invisible, she followed beside him, fascinated by everything about him.
From the way the muscles in his back flexed as he walked to the way servants pressed themselves flush against the walls to let him pass.
Despite the salacious talk and the demeaning treatment he endured regularly from his family, everything about him exuded power.
Unfettered desire ripped through Imani.
A horrible thought—one she never dared say out loud—was that even after the cruel blackmail, dangerous taunts, and physical violence, she still couldn’t bring herself to stay away.
The inner workings of Kiran’s mind were still a rare chest of treasure to her that she desperately wanted the key to unlock.
It was that morbid curiosity that drew her deeper into his swirling pool of darkness, and she wondered if she might someday drown in it.
A small part of her even respected him, enjoyed their sparring. It made her feel less alone.
Not that she was forgiving him any time soon, but she could admit the truth about her feelings to herself.
Besides, this was a chance to unravel more of those secrets.
Kiran walked down a small nook with one door, not even big enough for the two of them. She stayed hidden around the corner with her head craned around to watch.
Fisting his hand, he knocked on the door.
Unbidden, a flash of him bedding someone crossed her mind in strikingly vivid detail.
A divination vision? She saw perfectly filed nails digging into his back; long, creamy legs wrapping around his hips; soft groans of pleasure escaping as he rhythmically thrust. A dark feeling slithered through her at the thought.
Real or not, Imani ground her teeth together.
A woman emerged from the room. For a beat or two, Imani couldn’t catch her breath.
A Norn elf. She was beautiful, like all elves, her hair elegantly coiled around her head, and she wore a lovely gossamer gown that highlighted her blue eyes.
Eyes that looked like Imani’s.
Icy fear doused her from head to foot, and numbness took her fingers. Shadows pushed at her mind, edging her vision, making her thoughts cloud.
Still, the elf had some imperfections. Her nose wasn’t quite symmetrical, her lips not quite as full, nor her lashes as long and thick. Her eyes were a duller shade of blue and not large. All Imani could feel was a soul draw, and a fairly modest one at that, but no magic.
This was a common-bred Norn elf.
It was a small comfort.
“Kiran,” the Norn elf greeted.
“Ayla,” he replied.
Imani studied her intently. Did this elf’s breath catch in her throat? Did she lean forward like she wanted to come to him?
No, these imaginings are in my head. Imani pressed her fingers to the bridge of her nose.
They stood chest to chest, the woman’s head bent back so that she could meet his gaze.
For a myriad of reasons—none of which she wanted to examine—the scene kept her rooted to the floor.
Imani felt full of something she couldn’t explain, some unknown emotion that wavered between murderous and painful. It wasn’t like seeing Esa with Kiran. It was far worse.
Lifting his chin and glancing out at the hallway, Kiran narrowed his eyes.
Imani covered her mouth with her hand and froze herself in place and out of sight.
Her emotions had gotten the best of her, and her invisibility illusion must have fallen.
Shadows immediately ensconced her body, covering her in the corner’s darkness. Was it enough?
“What are you looking for?” Ayla asked.
“Shadows.” Kiran left off the obvious—that the shadows belonged to a witch. He said nothing of the fact that it was dark still, and everything was shadowed.
The woman looked at his face, the hard mouth, and Imani read what she could from that, which was suspicion.
“Not regular shadows?” The female elf wasn’t stupid. Ayla waited for him to explain and got nothing. Typical for Kiran to offer no more than what was asked.
Kiran’s attention turned away from Imani.
He hadn’t seen her, she was sure of it—his awareness on her would have been like a lightning bolt. She would have felt his magical signature.
Imani thought about casting the illusion again, but that would mean whispering out loud, and she couldn’t take the chance.
She decided to risk one more look before she left, her mind intent on torturing herself. Inching barely around the edge of the wall, she swallowed hard at what she found.
Within half a second, the two women made eye contact, and the female elf’s piercing gaze promptly speared Imani. Despite having little magic, her shrewd eyes and pinched mouth made her far more threatening than her appearance suggested.
Saints, the other Norn elf was not a woman to feign happiness with a polite countenance. Indeed, she was glaring at Imani with one small fist propped on her hip.
Something passed between them. The woman smiled—it wasn’t kind. Imani narrowed her eyes in a pointed glare.
Magic swelled within Imani on instinct. She was shocked by just how much was building inside of her. Imani had that same on-edge feeling she had in the last assessment and on the road with the bandits. Only this time, she knew for a fact what was happening to her.
More aware than ever of the destructive power she held when threatened, she crammed it all back inside her signature, forcing it with a strength she didn’t know she had.
The whispers quieted, her heartbeat even more erratic now.
This new magic was proving volatile. Why couldn’t she just get a handle on it? It frustrated her to no end.
The other female elf’s eyes slid down her body, tossing her a sneer before turning back to Kiran with a smile. She carried on like Imani wasn’t even there, as if she couldn’t care less. As if she welcomed it.
Imani clasped her hands together to keep from lashing out and continued listening.
“I must say, everything has come together nicely while you were away. Any Norn elves traveling with you that we should be concerned about?”
He gave her a suspicious look. “There is one female—a high-bred. My father will want her to join the court for that reason alone. It won’t be a concern, though.”
“But our arrangement still stands, right? Magnus knows what I can offer … what can she offer, if anything?” she interjected.
Magnus? This woman was on a first-name basis with the king?
“She can’t offer the Draswood, like you.”
“I never promised the Draswood. I promised to show you the way into the city and an audience with Ellisar—nothing more.”
Fire burned inside Imani’s chest. This elf was a traitor.
“Well, this elf’s a poor, bound witch from the Riverlands with no family or connections to the Draswood. I order her to do something, she obeys. She’s a high-breed, but there’s nothing except a beautiful face that she can offer us. She’s not tempting.”
Imani wanted to burst forward and grind them both to a pulp on the ground.
Magic be damned, Imani wanted nothing more than to beat them senseless with her bare hands.
This woman was going to betray Essenheim to Niflheim.
Gaining an audience with Ellisar wasn’t exactly an accord, but it was far more than the high sentinel was offering the Essenheim leadership.
Ellisar hadn’t been seen outside the Draswood since he’d taken power several years ago.
Attacking the two elves now would make her look weak around Kiran. Weaker than she already looked. Imani needed to appear strong, and there was only one way to do that. She needed to stay quiet and sneak away unnoticed.
“Excellent,” the female purred, sliding her hands over Kiran’s chest. “And they have announced that you are already promised to another, correct?”
He removed her hands for a moment and gave her a hard look.
“No. But I’m confident my father will tomorrow.
Like I said, he will want the high-bred female to join the court, will want to see how he can use her, but she can’t offer what you can.
He may play with her himself—you know how he is with elves. ”
“Good,” the other wood elf purred.
Imani turned on her heel and left, unable to bear another second in that corridor.
Muttering the spell for the illusion again, she went invisible and fumed as she walked back to her rooms. She tripped going inside, twisting her ankle, but her shadows pulled her back up. She growled and tugged off her gloves, tossed them aside, then did the same with her boots.
Her shadows whipped around the room, easily breaking free of the tenuous hold. She’d barely kept them inside on the walk back. It was only when she was threatened that they misbehaved. How was she being threatened right now when no bodily harm was imminent?
She sighed, dragging herself down to the floor, her back against the wall. She wanted to wake up from this nightmare.
Every movement hurt as her chest radiated pain, but her breath wouldn’t slow. It was then she finally admitted to herself, in the cold, dark reality of the morning light, the despicable truth of it all.
There was no denying it―she wanted Kiran—and when she wanted something, she would obsess over it until she got it. Maybe if she could just give in once to the animalistic desires splitting her from the inside out, she could gain some semblance of control back.
But Kiran’s words splintered her. Imani wasn’t tempting?
They would see about that. The other beautiful female was a traitor to her own kind, and tomorrow, Imani would rip away as much glamour as she dared and bring the full force of her looks and magic to bear. Kiran’s warning to be careful around his father be damned.