Chapter 1
Present Day
Elysia was falling. Her arms shot out to brace herself, and her knees cracked against the floor like dusty bricks. Pitch black and hours before dawn, she couldn’t see shit. She swore silently at the oversized muddy leather boot lying on the floor that had done its best to take her out. Never mind the pain flashing through her kneecaps, the damn thing was trying to get her caught.
Ever so quietly, she stood and carefully picked her way to the curved wooden door. Heart racing, she ignored the little thrill soaring through her. One hand on the iron handle, the other holding her shoes, she glanced over her shoulder at the prince.
A novice mistake, really, but she couldn’t help but steal one last look before she went. Blanket loose around his bare chest and one muscled arm pulled in close to his body, every single cell of her being wanted to crawl right back to his bed where it was warm and smelled like a woodland storm.
It really was too bad she had to run out like this all the time now.
She pressed down on the door handle.
The ear-splitting shriek of iron grinding against iron shattered the middle of the night silence like a bucket of water to the head. The prince shot up, his hand immediately grasping for the blade on the table beside him.
Elysia closed her eyes, head falling back in irritation. Spinning around, she kept her voice soft. “Go back to sleep. It’s just me.”
His chest deflated, one large hand rubbing his face while the other tossed the knife aside.
“By the gods, Elysia, you scared the shit out of me. What are you doing out of bed?” Topp’s eyes tracked her hand on the door, his brow pinching. His low voice caught on a rasp as he called her out. “Is this how early you’ve been leaving? All those mornings I wake up and you’re gone, and you make some excuse about meetings or work with your father?”
The sound of his sleep-laden voice did something to her that was entirely unhelpful right now. Ignoring the flush of heat begging her to forget her senses, she coughed lightly. “If you really want to know, you snore terribly and I’ve been leaving so that I can actually get some decent sleep.”
She crossed her arms and leaned against the door. The lies fell from her mouth with practiced ease even as the acrid taste of guilt was familiar on her tongue.
Topp tucked one hand behind his head, the movement defining the strong curve of his arm. A lazy grin slid across his face. “Come back to bed, Parker.”
Elysia acted as though she hadn’t heard him, sticking her feet into her boots.
“Seriously? Lys, you can’t go walking around Relaclave right now. The only people awake are the kind who would wear your skin as a coat.”
She stopped in the doorway, twisting so she could see him. “You’re a sick man, Topp Blatz.”
She heard the soft thud of his bare feet on the floor. A breath later, warm hands captured her face and green eyes drilled down into hers.
“I don’t like it.”
“Then quit snoring like a cressin.”
“A cressin?”
She tipped her head at the stack of books behind him. “I was reading your book on the creatures that used to live here. Before the Fall.”
His cheeks lifted and he shook his head, burying his lips into her hair. “That book was supposed to be burned with all the rest.”
She pulled away, moving out into the hall. “I can keep a secret.”
Topp followed her into the open doorway and caught her wrist, stopping her. His face indicated just how much he didn’t care for her gallivanting through the streets during the darkest hours of the night.
“Send word when you get home.” He dropped her wrist gently. “Please.”
Fond exasperation colored her response. “None of the messenger kids are going to be out at this hour.”
He gestured at his bed. “One of two options, Parker. Take your pick.”
Rolling her eyes, she wiggled her fingers in a wave and disappeared.
Hours later, Elysia was safe in her flat and the dawn still had not crested. The sky remained dark with only the shadows of clouds breaking up the blackened expanse of night. Her oil lamp was near its end, the light flickering instead of steady. She sat at her desk, thumping her forehead against the pages of a book. A singular page stuck to her face and she groaned.
The stubborn desire to stay alive and out of the gallows kept her searching through the forbidden text in front of her for answers to questions she couldn’t speak aloud. Her eyes itched and blinked with red, and despite the hours searching through the book, she had come no closer to discovering the truth behind the nightly invasion of her psyche.
She wished she could leave her questions behind. Pretend her curse wasn’t changing and that her life was exactly how it had been six months ago. Her life hadn’t been perfect—not with a curse from the undead gods and a blackmailing, manipulative father, but she’d been managing. She had a plan, and it’d been working just fine. But now, everything she’d ever hoped for was about to slip through her fingers. All because her curse seemed to be growing, and she had no idea how to stop it.
Every night now, she fell into some otherworld. The dark beauty of this realm haunted her past sleep and well into the waking hours. Much like the ivy in the Lovestone Woods, the essence of the dream wound itself around her mind. It clung ferociously to her thoughts, leaving a beautiful, ominous trail that left her no choice but to follow.
And so she did. Because she couldn’t seem to not.
Elysia rubbed her eyes and stared at the ceiling. A headache was on the horizon. The muscles at the base of her skull throbbed, tired and angry. Stress and no sleep tended to have that effect. She pushed away from her desk, stepping over a pile of clothes with her thoughts still spiraling.
She had business to attend to—both Crown and personal. A miscreant of a sister who she couldn’t quite tolerate lately. And a family that expected things.
But never more than she did of herself.
Then again, maybe that wasn’t true. Her expectations sliced through her mind like a blade while theirs silently pinned her down, stealing all her breath. She rubbed her chest. At least a blade could keep you alive. You were just dead without your breath.
She was Elysia Parker, and like the long line of Parkers before her, she could shove this unnatural dream with all its dangerous questions down so far within her it might just turn into a diamond. She could, she really could... So why wasn’t she?
Because she was curious. She had always been curious.
Her virtue and her vice.
Beyond curiosity, the threat of death loomed, refusing to be ignored.
Elysia walked into the kitchen and looked inside her metal tea tin, setting it down a little too hard on the counter when she found it empty. She only had tea when she stole it from the castle, and she’d been avoiding her family like a plague. Great, no tea. Her fingers smeared her face, stretching her skin taut.
It was no surprise she hadn’t made any progress delving into the arcane matter of her dreams. All those long nights she’d spent wearing down candle after candle reading had been fruitless. If she was honest, she knew the answers she sought would not be found within the old, crumbling pages of a book.
Because the answer was simple. There was no cure for the cursed. Even children knew that.
But she still had to look—she would drop to her knees and beg the undead gods who did not hear for an answer if it would stop the dreams. She could handle the secrets. Finding hidden truths was an invisible magic. Hard to prove. But what was happening while she slept? Next to the prince. That was going to get her killed.
Cursed to know what she should not, to find what she should not. And yet, the answers she needed eluded her. It was maddening. It was enough to make her question whether she knew anything at all. Of course, that wasn’t true. She knew plenty. The things she did know just seemed to be useless in this endeavor.
Here is what Elysia did know:
The hidden streets and tunnels of Relaclave as well as the freckle below her lip.
That she liked flowers better than most people.
Enough gossip to make you blush.
And how to slip through a crowded room without a soul noticing her steps.
She would have once told you that the last thing she knew in her carefully curated life was that sooner rather than later, she would find herself engaged to Topp Blatz, Crown Prince of Kava.
It was simple, really.
And it had all been going to plan. Her father’s plans. Her mother’s plans. Her underminings.
Her entire life she had known there were only two options for a woman like her. A woman who should have already been dead. The first was to hide away in obscurity and live a life so bland that no one ever noticed there was something different about her. A safe, boring life somewhere far from the whispers of Relaclave. Unfortunately, this had never been an option for the daughter of Jack and Georgia Parker. Born into the politics of the Crown, everyone knew her face and everyone knew her name. Running away was impossible. Her father would rather have her executed than let his prize bloodhound escape. This left her with only one path forward.
She pictured the king, Garrison Blatz, with his fawning crowds and golden crown atop his head.
She had realized one all-important truth as a child growing up in this magicless kingdom. The one who wears the crown can do no wrong. They become untouchable . She didn’t have any romantic notions of saving the land—saving the ones cursed like her. Her greatest and only ambition was to save herself. And if that meant marrying Topp Blatz and wearing the crown that would see her destroyed, then so be it. She had given up any naive ideas of morality long ago.
Until the dreams swept in like a tidal wave, destroying all she had once been so certain of in this life. All the work she had put in to ensure that her curse was undetectable. That she would survive this world where any false step could be her demise. That one day she would wear the Kavian crown and be safe at last.
Uncertainty and vexation were her constant companions now. She’d been navigating her curse just fine these last twenty-four years. Years of jobs for her father and no one was the wiser about her little predicament . A prickle of guilt gave her pause at the thought of all those jobs, but she stomped it dead. A hoarse growl echoed in her throat as she paced the length of her flat. She knew better than to dwell on the work she did for her father.
She stopped, bare feet cold against the wood floor, staring out the window at the wisps of smoke rising off of chimneys. Underneath her strivings, true fear pushed her, never allowing her to rest.
It was like someone had taken a seam ripper to the fabric of her life. Thread by thread, they plucked, snapping her fate in two. And no matter how she grabbed or clutched at the tapestry, she would not be able to stop it from unraveling in her hands.
Elysia threw herself onto a chair littered with clothes, still ruminating on her father and his demands. It was easier to focus on his smaller requests. The bullshit political maneuvering. The leverage that moved the scales. Because otherwise, she had to remember that her hands were covered in blood. That she’d traded innocent lives to protect her own.
When she was younger, she had liked to imagine that if she was careful, then perhaps one day she could find freedom and use her talents for something better.
Now, she harbored no such delusions or musings about if she’d use her curse for good.
All she wondered now was if the part of her that was a quiet, long beaten-down scream for vengeance would cry true. Truth be told, she knew it was equally likely the more pathetic side of her that still vied for her parents’ approval would win out in the end.
The metal plate of the mail slot clanked against itself, drawing her eyes and attention. A cream envelope poked through the slot, and she could already guess it was from her mother, given no one else was insane enough to be up in the middle of the night issuing a summons.
Leaving her morbid reverie behind, she stood, tossing the pillow she’d been holding aside to where her cat would once again claim it for its own. Hunched down in a squat, she attempted to pull out the envelope. Cursing, she yanked even harder, but the courier had somehow jammed the thick paper into the crevices of the mail slot and it wasn’t budging. Thinking it would be easier to pull it out from the opposite side, she opened the door.
Elysia stopped dead in her tracks. There was a package. Beneath the dim amber light of the poorly tended hall lamps was a small brown box with burgundy liquid seeping out onto the black-and-white tiled hallway floor. It was tied with a perfectly happy twine bow. Frozen, she stared down at the box, knowing she wouldn’t like whatever was inside.
A heavy breath filled her chest, sounding like the sea, and then practical resolve squared her shoulders. This mess wasn’t going to clean itself. She snatched the envelope out of the mail slot, damn near ripping it in half, and grabbed the bloodied box off the ground. Marching back inside, she dumped the box with a loud thump into the sink and hurried back to the front door to wipe down the floor with an old rag. The last thing she needed was the landlord on her ass about blood staining the tiles.
She opted for the easier of the two deliveries first. It’s not like the bloody box in her sink was going anywhere. Tearing open the cream envelope, she found a note from her mother, as expected.
Did other people’s mothers send calls to action at four in the unblessed morning? Elysia squinted at the honeyed demand for both her and Beatriz’s presence. The please and thank you were perfunctory. Georgia Parker did not ask her daughters, she told them, and she was telling them to be prompt and present for a strategy session regarding the upcoming Raven Ball.
She cringed at the idea of debating food choices and centerpieces, but when she thought about the possibilities of the Raven Ball, a flicker of excitement raced through her.
Yes, the Raven Ball was a feast for a girl like her. Every single important person in the kingdom and from lands beyond gallivanting in a bubbly, liquor-fueled daze. The work practically did itself on a night like that. If she was lucky, she’d be able to scrounge up enough dirt to hold her father off for months. She practically salivated at the thought.
The rancid smell of decay brought her back to reality in a hurry.
Elysia looked down into the sink, grimacing at the box. Knife in hand, her stomach rolled as she put off what she needed to do.
“Come on, Parker,” she chastised herself. “You’re made of stronger stuff than this.”
Wariness twisting her face, her knife slashed through the bow of twine before she could overthink it. Box flung open wide, a fresh bloodied tongue stared back at her, pink and red, with a film of white on the top. Elysia swallowed down the instant surge of bile in the back of her throat and grabbed the blood splattered note pinned to the top flap of the box.
Too bad you didn’t hold yours.
Elysia didn’t blink until the words on the note began to blur. She had zero questions about who this little love note was from—the disgusting creatures who had been stealing women and draining them of their blood. Ever since the Fall, a new illness had cropped up, and eventually your blood ran black with it. These con men were selling fresh blood to the desperate folks infected, but instead of finding willing donors for their harebrained scheme, they were murdering women.
The women were typically a specific demographic. Single, childless, and addicted to whatever street drug was the current trend. In other words, women who wouldn’t be held as credible or missed.
But they were missed.
These women moved in packs, taking care of each other the best they could, and the more of them who disappeared, the louder they grew. Brushed aside by the Crown, Elysia let her magic and curiosity carry her away.
She hadn’t expected to discover a bloodletting healing sham. Collecting enough information had only taken a few evenings, and then she’d anonymously dropped off a file of facts to the Crown’s investigators. They might not care about the women, but they did care about infected citizens guzzling blood like it was some sort of magic cure-all. There was obviously no logic in this action. Healers had tried transfusions years ago to no avail and putting blood in your stomach wasn’t the same as replacing what was in your veins. Elysia could only imagine the hopelessness that led to being willing to swallow down gulps of blood.
While there wasn’t technically anything magical or forbidden occurring, the unnaturalness of the situation was disturbing to the Crown. If people were willing to drink blood, then the next thing they knew they would be seeking magic. Better to snub it out immediately.
Given that she had basically handed the Crown a map to the bloodletters, she’d assumed they would take care of the guilty parties. Clearly, she had been mistaken. Someone had gotten away, and they seemed to be well aware of who had gotten all their scammy friends strung up in the square.
Elysia slowly lowered the note to the counter, feeling tired down to her soul. She should’ve known better than to get involved in this mess. As if her father hadn’t already punished her enough, now there was a tongue in her sink and death threats to contend with, and her day hadn’t even begun. Her mouth tightened. There was only one place for her to go now.
It wasn’t to the castle or her parents, and it definitely wasn’t to the bumbling Crown idiots who had let this person get away.
No, she knew a man who could fix this before the sun could so much as rise.