Chapter 28 #2
I didn’t know if it was possible to escape Harthon, who would undoubtedly hunt Jac the moment Stefano woke up. But willingly returning to the Citadel was the equivalent of sending a dagger into his own belly.
“I have been with Harthon since he was a boy. I owe it to him.” There was pain in the confession. “And I know that, despite how I’m betraying him, he will ensure my family is safe.”
His betrayal would cut Harthon, and he knew that. It was just another layer of pain and harm piled onto this situation, and there was nothing either of us could do to soften an ounce of it.
We rode in weighted silence until we reached the woods of the hill I’d scaled with Harthon just two days ago. There, Jac produced a vial from beneath his cloak, popped off the cork, and handed it to me.
There is no choice, I reminded myself, and I tipped the vial between my lips.
“I’m sorry, Etarla. You’re braver than most,” Jac said solemnly, watching the emotions that were no doubt splayed on my face as I swallowed the syrupy liquid, sealing my fate.
I took a deep breath and glanced one last time at the city center behind me. “I’m not brave, Jac. I’m desperate. Like you.”
* * *
“Time to wake up, darling.”
The cheery tenor sliced through the heavy mud weighing me down. All at once, my memories came flooding back in a torrent. The revelation about Harthon, the note, drinking the draught Jac gave me—
I opened my eyes, already knowing what I would see.
The icy blue irises and mean, perfect smile were no surprise, but they still sent dread racing through my veins—a visceral reaction I couldn’t stop.
Smooth alabaster skin stretched over the angular planes of his narrow face, everything about him sharp and biting.
“There they are,” Koerlyn crooned, looming above me.
He wore no crown, but those heavy gold chains hung from his neck, nearly touching my nose as he braced himself on hands that caged my head.
An iridescent gold tunic was draped over his shoulders, gaping open at his chest. I was lying on something soft, a bed, my arms fastened to the headboard.
I was clothed, thank the Domus. He leaned closer, his heavy floral perfume threatening to choke me.
I was Koerlyn’s prisoner again.
Run. Fight. Get out.
This was a nightmare. My worst fear, come to life. But I’d brought myself here.
“Where is she?”
His smile vanished. Instinct had me tensing my hands, readying a defense. Only I couldn’t move them. Not that I’d expected him to leave me free.
“There is a way I expect to be greeted, and that is not it,” he clipped.
I hadn’t used his title.
I stared at him, hatred in my gaze. The last time I’d made that mistake, he’d whipped me, and I’d all but crumbled.
Koerlyn reveled in power. In making others feel helpless.
I wouldn’t cow to him, not like I had before.
I was a prisoner, and he could hurt me. But I also had something he needed: knowledge.
So I said, “And that’s not an answer to my question.”
I tensed, preparing for his strike. I wouldn’t be able to block him, but I’d learned how to take a blow over the past few weeks. I could handle what he dealt.
He froze for a moment, and then he kicked his head back and laughed. I caught a flash of a plain, stone ceiling above him. The crackle of a fire leaked through his delicate chuckles. I wasn’t in a cell, but a room of some sort.
Finding composure, he grinned down at me. “My, how you’ve changed since I saw you last.” Koerlyn spoke as if we were old friends.
The easy demeanor was more terrifying than his anger.
Swallowing my fear, I repeated, “Where is she?”
He pushed away from me, and I took in the rest of the room.
It was small and plain, sparsely furnished with a washing space and mirror.
Koerlyn was too pretentious to have plain rooms in his home.
This felt more like the inn I’d stayed at in Carmen.
If we weren’t in Koerlyn’s city center, maybe we were somewhere close to Harthon’s border.
It was all I could hope for.
“She isn’t your mother,” he stated, watching me curiously.
I didn’t respond, and silence stretched for a long minute. It was a tactic to make me uncomfortable, or test my resolve, or show that he was too great to be pressured by awkward silence.
Whatever the reason, it was obnoxious.
Finally, he spoke. “But you came all the way here at a moment’s notice because she was threatened. How interesting is that?”
I blinked. “I have something you want. You have someone I want. Where is she?”
He tilted his head and cooed as if I were a baby. “It’s precious, how you’re trying to be tough. It’s almost like Harthon made you think you can play in our world.”
The patronizing words made my chest itch with anger. Never had I so greatly wished to punch someone in the mouth. It was his intent to make me feel this way, no doubt. I relaxed my jaw, refusing to satisfy him with a reaction.
“How was your time with him, darling?”
“I was there against my will. How do you think?” I said, willing truth into my tone. Convincing Koerlyn I wanted nothing to do with Harthon could help me. It might help him see me as less of an enemy—less of a threat. He wouldn’t expect me to run back to Fourth.
My poorly conceived plan was quickly dashed to pieces.
“You’re adorable, really,” he said, condescension thick in every word.
Then he lifted his arms as if holding a dance partner, and began to waltz around the room, his steps graceful and dainty.
“I hear your dance with Harthon at Ellan’s party was precious.
I’d never have thought Harthon would be such a delicate instructor. ”
He twirled, as if he had not a care in the world.
Spies. He’d had spies at Ellan’s party.
Something must have shown on my face, because he abruptly stopped his show and approached the bed. “You do know he was responsible for your parents’ deaths, no?”
The bastard. Hurt lodged anew in my chest at the reminder.
Don’t let him rattle you.
I shrugged as best I could with my arms above my head. “I’m aware of the role he played.”
“Did you find out before or after you gave him your precious little heart?”
The question hit like a slap. I’d had feelings for him, sure, but I hadn’t given Harthon my heart. It wasn’t like I’d been in…in love or anything. Besides, how would he know? No one had ever seen us kiss.
Koerlyn was simply playing games with his words.
“I don’t see the relevance of this.”
“After, then,” he concluded pleasantly, and then he planted his hands beside my head again.
He watched me for a moment. “I don’t know,” he said in that same amiable tone.
“Don’t know what?”
“Where she is. Your non-mother who you treat as a mother. What’s her name?”
I stared at him in confusion. “What do you mean?”
“I asked what her name is. Is that what you need me to explain?” he answered, playing dumb.
“Where is she?” I demanded.
“I don’t know. But hopefully that’ll change soon.”
Aggravation gave way to apprehension. “You have her but you don’t know where she is, or you don’t have her at all?” Tendrils of despair bloomed, wrapping around my throat as I asked the question.
“The second one.”
I’d known this was a possibility. I thought many times that Koerlyn could be playing me—leveraging my love for Merelda, luring me to him with a lie. Maybe Jac had known, or maybe he’d been fooled too. Not that it mattered now.
What mattered was that I’d willingly walked myself into Koerlyn’s hands for nothing. My limbs began to tremble at the realization.
Regret filtered in, and I quickly squashed it. I couldn’t be upset with my decision to come. I could never gamble with Merelda’s life. Koerlyn had simply guessed as much.
Hatred for him, raw and caustic, welled, and I strained against the ties at my wrists, wishing to wrap my hands around his throat and squeeze until he could no longer taunt me with his words.
“But don’t worry,” he assured, giving me a consoling look. “It’s not all a waste. We’ll find her soon, and we’ll use her to ensure your cooperation as we move forward. In the meantime, though, where is the path into the Domus?”
I shook my head, fighting the urge to spit in his face. “I can’t tell you.”
“Can’t or won’t?”
“The magvis swore an oath not to tell anyone the path. That transferred to me.” I didn’t even know the path, but Koerlyn didn’t know this.
“Hmm. I’m aware of the oath. But perhaps you just need to…try.”
“It’s a magic oath. Trying doesn’t change a thing. I can only show someone the path.”
“But telling me would be so much easier, don’t you think?”
Was he daft? “Should I explain what an oath is to you? That’s not a possibility.”
“We won’t know unless you try.”
“I’ve tried.”
That sharp gaze traveled around my face before landing back on my eyes. In a flash, his easy smile vanished. It was as if he’d pulled off a mask, revealing something mean and horrifyingly cold. Evil.
Instincts roared to life, recognizing danger. I stilled, prey trapped by a predator.
“Not hard enough, you haven’t,” he said, and then he stepped away. “Bring them in!” he called out, and the door swung open.
Two young men and a woman, all close to my age, their hands bound and dirt marring every inch of skin and clothes, were shoved through the door. Guards shuffled in behind them, forcing them to their knees just inside the entrance.
And I knew.
Skies, before Koerlyn even hinted at what was to come, I knew.
Panic surged, just like he wanted it to. I didn’t care. I couldn’t pretend to be calm any longer. There was no control for me to have. There were no empty threats—Koerlyn would do this.
“Don’t do this,” I said. “Please, they have nothing to do with this.”
Koerlyn withdrew a dagger from the sheath at his side. The hilt glinted with blue gemstones. “Then tell me how to enter the Domus.”
“I can’t. It doesn’t matter how much I want to. I’ll tell you anything else, but I can’t tell you that.”
“You’ll give me other information in due time.
But you know what I want right now.” His eyes slid to the man closest to him, and I remembered the bodies he’d massacred when he first took me.
The way he’d turned insides into outsides, not sparing women or children or the old.
He’d reveled in it every time. This would be nothing to him.
It would be everything to me.
I began to plead. “I can’t tell you. You know this. There’s an oath, for fuck’s sa—”
Koerlyn stepped into the man and jabbed the blade into his throat with brutal efficiency. The man gurgled, choking on blood that spurted across the floor, before falling on his face. The other two prisoners cried out, the woman struggling against the guard who held her on the ground.
This—how—how could he do this?
I yanked on the restraints. “Stop! Stop. Let’s talk about this. This won’t do anything!” Just like that, I was no longer Etarla, the fake magvis, but Etarla, the scared village girl Koerlyn had taken weeks ago. The one who was out of her depths. The one who held no power.
Impervious to my pleas, Koerlyn walked to the second man. He was moving too fast, allowing no time for reasoning, for discussion.
“No! I’ll—I’ll tell you! Just stop!”
I had nothing to tell him, but I would make it up, I would—I would spin some story, something that sounded true to buy time. It was the only way to make him stop—
Still, he slid the dagger into this man’s neck, just as he had the last.
My breath caught, and Koerlyn spun around. A thin eyebrow arched. “You have something to tell me?”
Abdomen trembling so violently my teeth nearly chattered, I searched for words that could sound convincing. “You’ll spare her life,” I croaked.
“Tell me the way into the Domus,” Koerlyn replied simply, as if he weren’t murdering people before me.
“I-it’s to the south. Through Sixth. There’s a village by the Domus, and a river beside it.
Beside the river is a cluster of five boulders.
The tunnel begins there,” I rushed, hoping the lie was specific enough to sound real.
I was tempted to say it was located in Harthon’s Territory, but Koerlyn would see right through the ploy.
Aric’s Territory was the next best thing.
Aric was our ally, and he could stop him. Kill him, maybe.
Koerlyn hmphed, and I held my breath, the woman’s sniffling the only sound in the room. She’ll live. She has to live. I told him. Please, let her live.
“Now, you wouldn’t just make that up, would you? Because if you did, I’ll cut your Merelda into a hundred little pieces when I find her.”
I slowly shook my head. Koerlyn shifted his arm, as if moving to sheath his dagger.
At the last second, he stepped toward the woman, and with a violent thrust, shoved the blade into her eye instead.
She didn’t even have the chance to make a sound.
My lungs compressed as I watched her body slide to the blood-stained stone, horror making me lightheaded.
Koerlyn wiped the blood from the dagger on a guard’s sleeve and calmly returned it to its sheath.
“Why did you kill her? I told you the path,” I choked out, watching blood pool on the floor. Three lives, gone, just like that.
Koerlyn’s lips curled as he looked to me. “You never used my title to address me, and I couldn’t let that go unpunished, could I?”