Chapter Thirty-Six
Alaya
My fingers brush across the gown where it hangs ready for me in my dressing room.
The black satin sighs beneath my touch, cool and slippery as midnight water.
Golden threads of thorn vines twist through the bodice, catching in the Faelights until they seem to pulse with a heartbeat of their own.
I should be dressing for our evening meal, but I’m finding it hard to concentrate, confusion and worry clouding my thoughts.
I gasp as my eye catches a familiar skirt sticking out from the back of my wardrobe. As I pull it out, a waft of emotions floods over me.
My wedding dress.
The sight of it hits me like a physical weight, dragging me back to the day I felt the purest ecstasy and paralysing terror.
I fold back the hem near the neck and stare at the tiny golden moth, and memories of my mother engulf me.
Her words, spoken from mother to daughter, before fate played its hand, come back to me now:
‘Alaya, one day you will meet someone who makes your heart feel both safe and wild at once. It won’t always be easy, my darling.
Love never is. There will be days when you question everything, when the weight of it feels too heavy to carry.
But if it’s true love—the kind that matters—it will endure.
Not because it’s perfect, but because you both choose it, even when it’s messy and complicated. ’
Kiernan is my true love. I need him to be.
I want to believe it with the same certainty I once felt, before everything became so messed up.
When I look at him, I try to see only him—not the shadows of them that haunt my quieter moments.
His smile still lights something in me, his touch still sends shivers down my spine.
It has to be enough. I’m choosing it. Choosing him, just like my mother said.
Especially when it’s messy and complicated.
I walk back into the lounge and lean on the wooden doorframe, observing him in silence.
Kiernan doesn’t look up from his book, just turns a page with a soft whisper of paper.
Firelight casts sharp shadows across his face, shoulders rigid beneath his white shirt where he sits in a chair beside the fireplace.
The flames pop and hiss in the grate, each crack echoing against stone walls that swallow the sound whole.
The weight of our unspoken words hangs heavy between us.
Since his meeting with the King yesterday, Kiernan’s gaze seems to be fixed on some invisible point beyond the castle walls.
At the evening meal, he’d barely touched his food, his fork scraping the same piece of meat across his plate for twenty minutes.
I placed my hand on his arm and whispered, ‘What happened with your father?’ He shrugged my hand away and straightened his shoulders, his jaw tightening.
Then he turned away, ending any conversation before it had begun.
“I can feel you standing there watching me, Alaya.” His words finally penetrate the silence that has hung suspended between us since he came in from his afternoon training session. He looks up from his book, eyes gleaming with interest, lip twitching into an almost grin.
“I wasn’t sure if you wanted to talk; you’ve been so distant since yesterday,” I reply, noting as he closes his book and lays it down beside the chair.
“I’m sorry, my love. I’ve been distracted by reports of the Equitae spotted not far from the castle again.
” The corners of his mouth lift as his gaze travels down the length of my body, lingering on my black underwear.
He settles deeper into the chair, the wood creaking beneath him.
His palm makes a soft thud against the fabric covering his thigh as he pats it.
“Come,” he murmurs, voice dropping to a huskier tone. “Talk to me.”
I sigh with relief, crossing the room and settling into his lap, my arm draping around his strong shoulders. His hand rests lightly on my thigh.
“The Equitae?” I ask, desperately trying to keep any emotion from my voice.
Fingers tighten to a grip where they rest on my leg and waist, his chest constricting with a sharp intake of breath. “Yes, those fuckers don’t know when to give up. Though the King seems quite pleased with himself after this recent encounter.”
“Has he never considered trying to stop The Corruption rather than destroying a whole Fae race?” I ask.
The origins of The Corruption remain a mystery, yet I’ve never understood the King’s reluctance to seek its source.
In my mind’s eye, I can still see the Whispering Glade as it once was, emerald canopies filtering golden light.
And the forests surrounding Heartwood alive with birdsong that seemed to dance on the breeze.
Wouldn’t finding a way to heal our dying kingdom serve Kaladia better than endless bloodshed?
Kiernan’s chest rumbles. “The King was lost to any logic years ago, his own greed for control fuelled by vengeance that”—he sighs, then continues—"is less about rationality and more about love.”
A soft, barely audible “Love?” escapes my lips, sounding more like an expired breath than a word. “He doesn’t seem to hold much regard for love.”
“He did once, for my mother.” A finger traces idle patterns on my thigh.
I stroke his rough stubbled cheek, and he looks down at me, eyes gentle. “You’ve never mentioned your mother,” I reply, low and soothing.
“I don’t know much about her; she died when I was young.
I do know their love burnt brighter than the sun, and when she was killed by the Equitae his darkness consumed him like The Corruption itself, until all that remained was his vengeance.
” My hand pauses as I watch his eyes fill with a cold, flat darkness.
“That is what love does to you if you let it.”
I freeze in his unblinking glare, the air around us motionless, as if holding its breath.
Is that what’s happening to me?
The thought strikes like a physical blow, sent with enough force to make the kingdom tilt.
Am I being consumed by loving too many, by wanting what I can’t have?
My mother said love endures when you choose it, but what happens when your heart has already chosen more than once?
I squirm to break free from his tight grip on my waist, but it doesn’t loosen. His lip curls as I feel his cock stir below me.
“We will be late for the evening meal if you keep doing that,” he says, breaking the awkward silence with a slap to my thigh as he rises and places me back on my feet.
“Go cover that beautiful body before we start something we have no hope of finishing in time.” He leans down, brushing a kiss to my lips and pushing me towards the bedroom with a pat on my rear.
He turns and leans on the mantel above the fireplace, staring into the dancing flames as I walk into the bedroom to put on my dress.
Once I’m ready, I glance in the mirror of my dresser.
My fingers drift to the wooden box upon it, almost of their own accord.
I lift the lid and inside rests the horse figure beside the golden dagger, each groove worn smoother from touch.
I press my thumb against its flank, remembering how Domanikk felt between my thighs as I rode his Horse Form.
My chest tightens, and I swallow hard, closing the box with a soft click before turning to leave.
Kiernan fills the doorway, shoulders rigid beneath the black-and-golden robe he has now put on. His jaw twitches once, twice, a muscle pulsing at his temple. The temperature in the room drop as his gaze locks with mine, pupils constricted to pinpoints.
“We should leave.” The words are clipped, final.
The evening meal is as uncomfortable as the previous one. Kiernan doesn’t say a word the whole way to the Great Hall, just glares ahead, striding so fast I have to run to keep up.
The Great Hall’s stone floors echo with the click of jewelled slippers and the rustle of silken garments as we arrive.
Fae Nobles huddle in clusters, their voices rising and falling punctuated by bursts of too-bright laughter.
Along the walls, Thorn Guards stand motionless in their obsidian armour, thorny vines etched across their breastplates.
Their presence casts long shadows that seem to reach across the floor towards the Fae, who glance nervously in their direction.
I shiver, their forms stirring a deep fear inside me, remembering the night of my kidnapping.
“Father.” Kiernan nods a greeting once we get to the table, without even looking at the King, his jaw set tight and his eyes fixed on some distant point across the room.
He pulls out his chair with a deliberate scrape of wooden legs on the cold stone floor, the sound echoing through the tense silence.
He sits rigidly, his back stiff and his arms crossed over his chest, every line of his body radiating barely contained anger.
Never once in all our years together has he broken royal etiquette. He has always ensured I am properly escorted to meals, my hand gently draped over his forearm. He has always pulled out my chair, waiting until I’m seated before taking his own place. But not today. Not now.
My heart hammers wildly in my chest, each beat feeling like it might burst through my ribs. With trembling hands, I reach for my own chair and pull it out myself, the scraping sound loud in the oppressive quiet. I sit slowly, feeling the weight of every eye in the room upon me.
The King throws back his head, his cackle slicing through the silence like a blade against stone; the sound carries no joy, only malice, sharp and cold as splintered glass.
“Trouble in paradise, Kiernan?” he asks, reaching over and pouring Fae Wine into the glass in front of his son. “You look like you need something a little stronger.”
Kiernan sits forwards, pulling his chair in further, and takes the glass, tipping the wine back until it’s empty.
He extends his glass back towards the King, jaw clenched.
“Everything is well.” The crystal catches the light as the King tips the decanter.
Red liquid pools at the bottom, rising. “The last thing I need,” he says, voice low enough that the King must lean forwards to hear, “is your advice.”
A cold rush of dizziness washes over me, making the room swim and tilt. A prickle of unease needles at my skin.
The King waves at the wait staff and golden platters appear that smell delicious, but my appetite has left me. Each time I dare glance up from my plate, the King’s dark eyes catch mine, the corners of his mouth curled upward.
Kiernan finishes first. His back straightens, not with stiffness, but with a settled, deep-seated sense of purpose, and he rises.
As he passes the back of my chair, his hands rest lightly on my shoulders.
“I’m sorry, Princess. There’s something I need to do.
I’ll be back in a while.” He leans down and whispers in my ear, “Try not to piss him off.” He chuckles, giving me a quick kiss to my cheek.
I can feel the King’s gaze on me intensify, and a faint flush of heat crawls up my neck, settling high on my cheeks. He leans towards me, just a fraction, a small movement that nevertheless makes the Great Hall feel like it’s shrinking inwards towards me, crushing.
“He knows,” he says, voice utterly devoid of emotion, just the chilling, indifferent pleasure of a powerful man demonstrating his power. “Your husband knows how much you really ‘suffered’ with the Equitae. What a hardship for you, fucking both of them.”
My lips part, trembling, but I remain quiet, the magnitude of what the King has just said severing the connection between my mind and voice, my heart squeezing so tight I feel like it may just stop.
My entire focus narrows to the distant, oblivious figure of Kiernan across the Great Hall where he talks to his friend Liff.
My head falls forwards, a silent admission of my unworthiness, a horrifying revulsion at what I had done. Tears slowly track down my cheeks, dripping into dark blooming patches in the lap of my dress.
A warm hand lands on my shoulder. My body jolts, the chair legs scraping against stone.
I look up into Kiernan’s face; his brows draw together, and his jaw tightens.
The pressure builds behind my eyes until more tears spill down my cheeks, leaving cold trails in their wake.
His gaze shifts to his father, eyes narrowing to slits of green fire.
Without a word, his arm slides around me, fingers pressing into the silk of my gown. The Great Hall stretches before us, endless stone and watchful eyes, as his boots strike a sharp rhythm against the floor, pulling me towards the heavy oak doors.
“I’m sorry, Kiernan,” I start. “Your father told me—”
“Don’t say anything, Alaya,” he hisses. I realise he’s not heading for our suite.
“Kiernan, why are we going to the Throne Room?” I ask, wiping the tears from my face with the back of my arm.
“Something we need to do if we are ever going to be truly free to make our own choices,”