Chapter Twelve
Kade
T he book slammed shut, dust billowing from its yellowed pages as I rubbed my bleary eyes.
Weeks of research and still no solid answers on how to break whatever hold or enchantment someone might have used on Emelyn's mind. I had shuffled through every book in here and had come up empty-handed. And if it was that woman in the throne room that day, my shadows had searched high and low for her and hadn’t been able to find her.
I needed to dig deeper. My father had a war meeting that afternoon, so I decided to take the opportunity to sneak into his office and check for anything in there.
I doubted I’d find anything, but it was worth a shot.
He had that room enchanted so no one could wield in there, but I was sure I could get in without being noticed.
I’d spent my whole life sneaking through this palace.
My chair scraped against the floor as I got to my feet to head that direction.
Slipping through the corridors, I let the darkness embrace me.
Guards stood vigilant by my father's door.
A slight nudge against a candelabra down the hall sent it toppling, the clatter diverting their attention long enough for me to glide past, unseen.
Once I was inside, I gently closed the door with the softest click.
My gaze swept across the room, over every meticulously placed object.
I rifled through the drawers, finding nothing but mundane records and trinkets.
Cursing under my breath, I sat in his chair, rubbing my palms over my eyes.
I was so fucking tired of dead ends. I grabbed his desk to get to my feet when I felt something.
A false bottom against my fingers, revealing a slender drawer nested beneath the top of his desk.
My heart pounded in my ears, but I opened it quickly and withdrew the contents: a handful of books and a map, the latter depicting a ship crowned with a strange orb floating above it.
Its purpose eluded me, and I needed to know why he wanted Emelyn alive.
I set it aside, my focus narrowing on the texts—one on soul sacrifices.
I’d never heard of such a thing. The other was on Celestial Fae.
Flipping through the first, I absorbed the words with urgency because I didn't have much time. The book offered little I did not already know. A Celestial Fae could indeed warp your mind, bending them as easily as one might fold a sheet of parchment. Yet why would such a being aid my father? My mother, Rhet, and I shared their lineage, noticeable due to our affinity for shadows, but very few people knew where she was and our power had been diluted by our father’s bloodline.
Sure, Valla, with her fire that she’d eventually honed into lightning, possessed power to rival many, but the subtler arts of darkness were ours alone. What could my father possibly have to command a Celestial's obedience?
The question wormed its way into my thoughts, gnawing at the certainty I held about my father's impenetrable mind. How had he erected such defenses that not even our kind could breach them?
I barely noticed the soft thud as a map slid from between the pages of the book.
It was intricately marked, lines converging and diverging, but one path had been traced with an urgent, jagged insistence.
It led to a solitary point in the northern reaches of the Ember Mountains—a remote place.
My eyes lingered on that deliberate mark, my mind racing.
What compelled my father to send his men into such empty terrain?
Could he have found some Celestial Fae to do his bidding?
Was he protected from them as he was from my abilities?
My mind circled back to that woman in the throne room again.
I had never seen her before and I hadn’t seen her since.
Everything about that night had been wrong.
She’d had something to do with this. I just knew it.
With a sense of dread tightening around my heart, I turned my attention to the next book. The leather cover was old, the binding cracked. I skimmed through the pages, the words searing themselves into my understanding with sickening clarity.
A soul could be offered, not to some god or otherworldly power, but as a shield for oneself.
It was a ritual most profane—linking another's soul to an object of one's own, thereby rendering the victim a husk, devoid of will, enslaved to the whims of their murderer.
The pieces of this puzzle began to click into place, each revelation more horrifying than the last.
Could it be that my father had done the unthinkable?
Had he sacrificed a Celestial to render himself untouchable, even to us, his own kin?
To protect his mind against my mother or to guard against any future betrayal from me?
It was a strategy as cunning as it was abhorrent.
But in doing so, he would nullify one of our greatest strengths and would be on a more even playing field by only being able to use weapons and elemental bending.
That had to be why my shadows couldn’t do anything to him.
The text suggested that the more powerful the soul, the stronger the enchantment.
It would make sense for him to want a Celestial, but was his plan to do this to Emelyn as well?
She was the most powerful. Did he want her alive to sacrifice her and then bind to his will so she lost all sense of herself and he could use her against his enemies?
Rage coursed under my skin at the thought.
If that were the case, it meant my father would be able to wield the power of the Peacebringer.
Fuck. I wouldn’t let him get Emelyn. I kept reading until I found my next answer to my next question: how could we stop it?
Pages fluttered in my haste, and then there it was: to sever the enchantment, we had to destroy the vessel or object that housed the tethered soul.
My pulse hammered against my temples, my mind a mess of dread and determination.
If my father had done this, he wouldn’t just leave the object lying around.
He wasn’t stupid. He would probably have it on his person at all times. A ring or a weapon maybe?
My fingers trembled at the thought of trying to destroy something of his that he kept on him, but there was no time for hesitation. If it was keeping him safe from our powers, then I must find a way and then kill him quickly. Maybe I could end this before he invaded.
I glanced through the window and noticed the dying light. The day had slipped between my fingers like sand. Ace—shit, I was late. I needed to check on him today and bring him dinner. Maybe we could come up with a plan together.
I shuffled the books back into their hidden drawer, my movements precise, leaving no trace of my intrusion.
With one last, sweeping glace to ensure everything appeared untouched, I slipped from my father’s office.
Ace needed me, but then, maybe I’d be able to end this and get him out of there.
My feet carried me swiftly through the winding corridors.
Valla could have visited while I was away, inflicting who knew what torments on him.
The thought made me blow out a breath. I was tired of watching him go through this, of seeing him in pain because of her, but week after week, he assured me he didn’t want to go until I figured out why my father wanted Emelyn alive.
Now that I thought I’d finally had something, I was a little hopeful for the first time in a long while.
I burst into my chambers, memories of Emelyn flooding back.
Her laughter when my shadows would play with her, our time together at the light festival, how I would catch the way her eyes would sparkle when she admired me from a distance.
If only I could hold her, love her freely without this damned war tearing us apart.
I shook myself, going into the bathroom and reaching for the medical kit I always kept prepared.
My shadows writhed around me, feeding on my eagerness to get to the dungeon.
The familiar peace of my Hollow enveloped me as I stepped through.
Moments later, I emerged in the dank cell where Ace was kept.
My shadows probed the darkness, confirming we were alone before retreating completely.
The stench hit me first. Blood, charred flesh, and something far worse. As my eyes adjusted, bile rose in my throat at the sight before me.
"Ace," I choked out, rushing over to him and dropping to my knees beside his broken form. "No . . . ," I murmured, my voice cracking with emotion. "No, no, no."
His body was crumpled, the worse I’d ever seen it, blood and burns littered about. Every inch of exposed skin was blackened and bruised, but that wasn't the worst of it. My gaze traveled to his back, and I felt my world tilt.
Where his wings had stretched, there were now only gaping wounds. The acrid smell of ash assaulted my nostrils, and my eyes fell upon a small, dark pile on the stone floor. The remnants of his wings, reduced to nothing.
I choked on a sob, my hands hovering uncertainly over Ace's battered body. But I didn’t have time to let my emotions swallow me. I had to save him. I needed to touch him, tend to his wounds the best I could, but fuck, I feared I’d only cause him more pain.
"Ace," I whispered, my voice trembling. "Can you hear me?"
No response. My heart hammered in my chest as I gently pressed my fingers to his neck, searching for a pulse. It was there, but weak, too weak.
"You stubborn bastard," I hissed, blinking back tears. "Don't you dare give up on me now."
I fumbled with the medical kit, my usually steady hands shaking as I tried to assess which wounds needed my immediate attention. There were so many, each more horrific than the last.
"I'm sorry," I murmured, even though he probably couldn’t hear me.
"I should have come sooner. I should have . . .” As I worked, applying salves and bandages where I could, my mind raced.
I had to get him out of here. I was out of time and refused to lose Ace.
I continued helping him as best I could, trying to stir him awake.
"Fuck, Ace, talk to me," I growled, my voice raw with desperation.
"You don't get to die on me, on Emelyn. I refuse to send you off.
You have to live." My voice broke on the last word.
Ace and I had never been close friends, not really.
But these past weeks had forged a companionship between us I couldn't deny.
And that was on top of the emotions I felt from Emelyn, how much she loved him, how much he meant to her. He was all she had left.
Anger filled me. I pressed a cloth against a particularly nasty gash on his side, wincing as blood soaked through almost immediately. "Come on, you insufferable prick. Open your eyes," I whisper-yelled. Nothing. Just the ragged, too slow and shallow sound of his breathing. “Please,” I begged.
My hands moved methodically, cleaning and binding wounds to the best of my ability.
But there was so much damage, so much pain etched into every inch of his broken body.
And his wings . . . Gods. It looked like Valla had wanted it to be a slow death because she’d cauterized some of the wounds, but she hadn’t done it fully.
He would have slowly succumbed to either blood loss or infection.
I checked his pulse again. Still there, but weaker than before. Death's cold fingers were reaching for him, and I was losing the battle of keeping them at bay.
Once I got him bandaged enough to move him, I gathered Ace's broken form in my arms as gently as I could manage.
His head lolled against my chest, blood from his wounds already seeping through the bandages and smearing across my clothes.
Heat from a fever was already starting to radiate from his skin.
"Hold on," I murmured. "I’m taking us home."
My shadows rose up around us like a dark tide. The familiar chill of the Hollow washed over me as we slipped between worlds. Ace's breathing hitched, growing more labored in the suffocating darkness. His body seemed to hate the Hollow even when he was unconscious.
"Almost there," I said, willing my power to move us faster. I stepped through my shadows, and from the look my mate gave me, I knew she would never forgive me. She might even kill me, and I would fall to my knees and let her because I knew I deserved nothing less.