Chapter 2 #2
I turned with him and hid my grimace as I spotted my sister at the fringes of the battle with the small army we had brought with us, darkness pouring off her as she cut her way towards me, anger flashing in her silver eyes as she pinned them on me.
A male with snow-white hair cut a path towards us from my right, wearing the same displeased expression as my sister. Rhyn’s younger brother, Fallow. His second in command.
The two groups reached us and we broke apart, each joining our own forces to lead them as we drove the remaining seelie back, now outnumbering them.
I glanced at the ring that matched the one I gave Saphira.
Despite the colder part of me that whispered I did not need her, I found it impossible to take my eyes off it, found myself constantly checking it as I battled the seelie, cutting down another of their number.
Some foolish part of me dared to hope it would not change, and that she would remain, even when I knew deep in my heart that she would leave.
Because she must.
Her pack were in danger.
Her family were in danger.
Held in the vile grip of her fated one.
My heart clenched, no longer hollow and cold as it was before I met her, before she had brought light and warmth into it, restoring some long-dead part of me to life.
Fear like I had never known it lanced me, born of the thought of her returning to her mate, a male who had wielded such power over her despite the distance between them and the fact he had rejected her.
Wolves shared deep bonds with their fated ones, and I feared the power of that instinct would sway her into returning to him, that he would use the power of their fated bond to sway her into forgiving him.
Even when I knew how angry she was with the wolf alpha.
And how deeply she desired his death.
I shredded a seelie male with my claws and glanced at the ring again.
Daring to focus on it this time, willing the opalescent stone to change colour to reveal her location to me.
It shimmered and then transformed into a beautiful, clear amethyst.
For Lucia shadows.
She was still with me—
It shifted again.
Becoming emerald.
I paused, a heavy feeling settling on my chest as everything went silent.
Chills skittering down my spine and arms.
Emerald for the mortal world.
She was gone.
Gone.
Something deep within me snapped.
I roared as darkness engulfed me, as I sank into the shadows and unleashed the pain that tore through me in a shattering wave of magic that carved great grooves into the sands of the Wastes, coming close to striking some of my allies.
Rhyn was quick to leap to one side, his brother moving in the opposite direction as a crevasse opened between them, sparkling grey sands sinking into it.
That sand became shadows that tore through the seelie, and I became one with them, became darkness and wrath as I carved them up, as the stars whirled above me and the ground shook.
Black talons ripped through the males before me, spilling rivers of blood, but the twisting darkness within me demanded more, pushed me deeper into my shadows as all I saw was that glittering green stone in the ring that burned into my finger.
She was gone.
I bellowed as I dragged the stars down to me, as I slammed them into the males now running from me, hurling some through the air with the impact while crushing others beneath the glowing orbs that sizzled on the sand, turning it to glass.
Several seelie leaped through the portal that shimmered ahead of me and I growled as I sprinted for it, as shadows tore through the sands at my sides and burst from my shoulders in great wings to propel me forwards.
Hands gripped those shoulders, pulling me back.
“Kael!”
I snarled and snapped sharp teeth at the one who dared to cage me, ordering my shadows to cut her down to remove the obstacle between me and my prey.
Only they refused to obey.
Refused to hurt their own as softer shadows wrapped around me, gently pinning me in place, and her arms followed them, crossing over my chest as her head came to rest against my nape.
“Kael,” she whispered, the fear in her voice shattering the hold the darkness had on me. “Do not.”
I stared at the portal as it flickered, beginning to die, and the darkness urged me to shed this female who dared to hold me back and leap through it, but instead I released all the breath in my lungs and let it fade, because she was right.
If I crossed through that portal, everything I had worked towards would be over. I would cross from unclaimed lands into a seelie court, breaking the accord between our species. I would bring the wrath of my high king down on my court.
Jenavyr’s right arm tightened around me, pressing her closer to my back, and as she skimmed her free hand down my arm to mine—to that ring that felt so heavy on my finger—she whispered softly, “You did the right thing. You need to focus on the seelie now and she was a distraction. These seelie will return.”
I felt Saphira was still a distraction, perhaps more now than ever.
I could not stop thinking about her with that wolf—Morden—or the alpha she was bravely marching towards, on a warpath of her own.
Had I taught her enough in our short time together?
Would she survive the coming battle with her mate?
By the Great Mother, I prayed that she would.
And that she would return to me as threatened.
I would gladly go to my knees for her if she would only come back to me.
I closed my eyes, savouring my sister’s hold and the warmth of her a little longer, slowly severing the connection I had summoned between myself and the lands, letting all that power leach from my bones.
Leaving me on trembling legs that threatened to buckle beneath my weight as fatigue rolled through me.
I sensed the eyes on me, the curious gazes of Rhyn and Fallow, and lifted my hand to my sister’s where it gripped my chest, placing it over hers and squeezing it to let her know she could let go now. I would not do anything foolish.
She reluctantly released me and straightened her armour, picking her sword up from the dark glittering sands and sheathing it, and then she walked with me to the portal, as if she did not trust me. But I could not blame her. Had our positions been reversed, I would have done the same.
It was not as if I did not have a track record of breaking the rules of the courts, and was not the reason why the accord between the two sides of Lucia had been formed in the first place.
Rhyn and Fallow joined us before the portal, the paleness of their appearance and attire making them appear as light to our darkness, when the darkness ran deepest within Rhyn.
He glared at the shimmering oval before us, blue eyes as cold as the ice he wielded, and I knew the path of his thoughts as frost glittered on his clenched hands. He wanted revenge against the Evening Star Court as fiercely as I craved it against the Summer Court, and it had just been denied him.
“They will return.” I made those words a vow, a promise that he could unleash some of his pain on the court he held responsible for taking his seelie mate from him, and he nodded.
And thankfully said nothing about my outburst.
I held my hand out to the portal, sensing the power humming in it. I summoned the tattered shreds of my strength as I closed my eyes and used it to carefully navigate the weave and weft of it, trying to decipher the magic that had been used to form something that should have been impossible.
A portal into a land so steeped with residual cataclysmic magic that it should have been ripped apart the instant it appeared.
Yet it was stable.
My eyebrows pinched as I followed one thread of magic deeper into the heart of the spell.
“The high king will want to know about this.” Rhyn’s deep voice echoed through the twisted ribbons of the magic to me.
I nodded as I withdrew, returning to him, and frowned at the fading portal as it slowly closed before us, whatever magic had formed it reversing, most likely due to someone on the other side of it.
“Ancient magic.” Like nothing I had ever seen before, or even read about. “We will report it to the high king and form a new battle plan, and I will have my best scholars scour the library for any mentions of such magic.”
I ignored the pang that lanced my chest at the thought of the library.
Of the little wolf who had made it her home.
Who had left a pile of books beside the chair she had made her own, and might never read now.
And focused back on the portal, on the magic that had formed it.
Magic that was dangerous, a threat to my breed and the unseelie courts.
Because my gut said that this was only a test.
A test to see if they could open a portal directly into this side of Lucia.
And if we did not find a way to protect against it, they would be opening portals directly into the courts next.
Igniting a war.
A war part of me would have welcomed once.
I glanced in the direction of the Shadow Court.
But no longer.
I would stop them here, before their hubris endangered my people.
I would show the Evening Star Court that I had earned my name.
I was Kaeleron the Wrathful.
And delivering their deaths would be my pleasure.