Love, Blood & Fury

by Melissa J Kincaid

  “Please.”

  Arii’s reverie broke and her attention zeroed back to the woman.

  Had she just…

  “Please,” Sybell hissed again, her tone lightening ever so slightly.

  If Arii’s brows could continue rising on her forehead, they would have.

  She studied the woman, before nodding. “Fine, as you asked so nicely.”

  Sybell blew out a breath, as if the word had pained her. She heaved in a sigh and lifted the sword again.

  “Firstly, you are holding the sword wrong,” Arii pointed out, pacing over to the woman. She tapped the pommel end of Sybell’s sword with the tip of her blade. “Your hands are too close together; you need to grip it like this.”

  Arii lifted her sword and gripped the leather for her to see. “It gives you much sturdier handling and makes it less likely your sword can be flipped from your hands.”

  Sybell moved to mirror her.

  “Good.” Arii moved around her and tapped the back of the woman’s leg with the flat of her sword. “Legs further apart…”

  From the shadows, Hawke watched the women as they trained, his eyes smouldering with worry and his weathered features lined with exhaustion.

  “I can think of many more preferable tutors for the Princess, honestly,” Hawke glanced at Elijah as the man joined him in the shadows.

  “She’s so very stubborn,” Hawke sighed and pinched the bridge of his nose. “Just like her mother.”

  “But she is also strong, just like her father.”

  Hawke paused at that and glanced at Elijah openly. Elijah stared back, his expression unreadable as Hawke replied with, “Or perhaps she is a sad, lost fool, just like her father too.”

  Chapter Seventeen

  She would not admit it to anyone, but Arii felt surprisingly proud of the Princess’ eagerness to learn the art of combat. The young woman – despite not having a flicker of experience - had given it her all during their few hours of training. As they left the arena, Arii was nowhere close to winded or sated, but she felt a strange contentment drift over her. Unused to the feeling, she pressed it aside as she pulled shut the door to her room – weaving her damp hair into a quick braid before setting her sights down the golden hall.

  With the remainder of her day, Arii decided to visit the castle library. She was determined to find out more about the Herington family history.

  Pressing her palms upon the heavy mahogany doors, Arii entered the library. The room was bathed in afternoon light, amber tinged clouds drifting lazily beyond the domed glass ceiling. Her eyes drifted across the stunning room, noting that thankfully it was vacant. She thought the less people who knew what she was looking for, the better.

  Pacing past the still pool, she headed towards the first row of shelves, skimming her fingertips along the leather-bound spines of different coloured books. Neat golden plaques labelled each section, and as she drifted along, she noted the various genres.

  Fiction, Non-Fiction, Biography, Classic Literature, Horror and Mystery… the plaques and shelves seemed almost endless. Finally, she eyed the section she had been searching for.

  History.

  Arii paused at a stack near the rear of the room, passing her fingertips over the golden plaque as her eyes skimmed the spines, reading the titles. She plucked three books from the shelves and headed in the direction of a table by the window.

  Dropping her haul onto the wood with a thump, Arii plopped onto the padded settee nearby and coughed as a plume of dust rose from the books. She waved a hand in front of her face, before leaning forward and brushing the fine veil of dust off the papers. Well, it seemed no one had picked these particular tomes in some time. She fanned them out before her, surveying the titles before focusing her attention on one with a dark leather cover, the least dusty. She turned it over, brows furrowing as she surveyed the cover – embossed with gold leaf.

  The North: Past and Present.

  Arii gently opened to the page of contents, and eagerly thumbed to the first chapter. The book was thick, and she could tell that it was a fairly recent publication. Strange… perhaps it had been added to the stacks recently and slid next to its dirty library mates. Judging by the dust on the other tomes, Arii guessed the history section was not visited often.

  Leaning back into the padded settee and propping her feet upon the table, Arii settled into the quiet ambience – the gentle swish of turning paper and the constant hum of the distant waterfall beyond the only sounds.

  The book contained a lot of what she already knew of the North’s history, beginning two hundred and eighty years ago – the powerful Fae families who ruled upon each throne in the North, South, East and West, and the precarious yet short time across all four courts known as The Time of Peace. Her eyes roved an intricately decorated timeline of major events, and she surveyed the slow decline of the land. From the time of peace came The Time of Divide. Two hundred and twenty years ago, the rulers of the land began to see signs of unrest amongst their people. It began with small uprisings within the lowest notches of society – insignificant instances of crime that began to manifest into town square gatherings lead by outspoken individuals. Voices grew louder and fear began to bloom. Arii noticed that most of the unrest took place in the North, and all of that unrest was voiced by the humans. As the rulers upon the North throne grew stronger, so too did the uprisings. They warped from angry voices in a town square to violence and bloodshed. As she worked her way down to the main event of two hundred years ago, known as The Time of Darkness, Arii’s eyes narrowed.

  Humans began to rise up against the rulers of the Northern court, and slowly a strong population of Fae who lived amongst the humans became targets of violence and assassinations. Despite their strength and magic, the Fae became victims within their own homes. Neighbours turned against neighbours, servants against lords and the risings were swift.

  Steadily the Fae race began to wane, and the violence reached its inky fingers towards castle Viridya. The ruling family began to fight amongst themselves. Some believed the humans deserved better treatment than they were receiving, and many did not.

  Arii tapped her finger to her lip in contemplation.

  What had the northern rulers done to raise such violence from their human subjects? She had read of similar uprisings in the other courts, leading to a steady decline of Fae. She had heard rumours of mistreatment of human slaves by some of the wealthier Fae, but so far she had found it hard to find evidence of such.

  Her finger danced over a full-page illustration of a soaring, open mouthed dragon. The detail was impressive, sparkling magic flames swirling from its jaws, the spines of its back lit with sparks of lightening. She swore she could see the reflection of a burning city in its intelligent eyes. Finally, she noticed a hooded rider upon its back, nestled between the spikes of its shoulder blades – the figure’s arm lifted and brandishing a flaming sword.

  As she flipped back and forth between pages, scouring the dense paragraphs for further information, she noticed a peculiar section – pausing and running her finger along the dark ink.

  Some said the Northern rulers had more magic than what was deemed to be ‘balanced’, and some even believed the ruler at the time, King Corvus Herington – the great grandfather of Tyverus Herington – had shown signs of madness. With the loss of his dragon - Lysander – during The Battle at Twilight one hundred and seventy years ago, the King of the North vowed that he would find enough dragons to bind all Fae in the North. This was the beginning of the end of the Fae.

  She knew a little about The Battle at Twilight. The humans had amassed a significant army, and the first battle in many years had erupted on the vast expanse of space now known as The Wastes – just to the west of Viridya. Many lives had been lost – human, elf and Fae alike, bones scattered amongst the misty bogs that now resided there. A haunted place
, a cursed place – shrouded with acrid mist that was said to drive people mad. The event had been the true beginning of the dark times they now faced.

  Arii quirked a brow, quickly flipping to the forward of the book, surveying the small paragraph about the author. Thomas Clark, a human scholar, studied at the Great College of the West Court, who had then transferred to be a court scholar in the Northern Court.

  Huh, human.

  Arii wondered how diluted these notes had become after a few human lifecycles and considered grabbing another tome before she paused on a new chapter heading.

  The Death of a Royal Line, a new Age of Men.

  Feeling a rise in curiosity, Arii flipped the page just as a throat cleared behind her.

  It was not often that she was caught unawares, and Arii felt as if her skin almost leaped off her bones as she slammed the tome shut and sprang from her place, whirling to see Elijah leaning against a nearby bookshelf, arms folded across his chest and hood firmly in place.

  His lips held a hint of a smirk.

  “Decided to take my advice with the library, Miss Clearwater?”

  Heart thundering in her ears, she narrowed her gaze on the bodyguard as she hissed, “Elijah! Fuckin-”

  “What are you reading?” he interrupted before the curse could fully form and burst from her lips, his head inclining towards the small stack of books. “Let me guess… thriller? Romance, perhaps?”

  Romance?

  Gods no.

  “Do I look like the romance type?” she snapped, dipping to gather the stack.

  Elijah’s chuckle was low and deep. “I’d place my gold on a blood splattered horror – if your temper is anything to go by.”

  “Argh, what do you want, Elijah?”

  Elijah’s smile faded as he watched her slide the books back into their homes. “You did not attend training this morning.”

  Arii rolled her eyes dramatically before turning to face the man. “Uh huh, I had other commitments this morning.”

  “Other… commitments? You?”

  Her lips pursed as she strode towards him, her hands resting upon her hips as she glared up at his shadowed face. “That’s right.”

  She swore he leaned forward slightly as he growled, “You have one priority, one commitment and that – Miss Clearwater – is ensuring you are at your best to defend the King.”

  Gods, he made her blood boil. Or perhaps she was still jumpy from being interrupted.

  Then she paused.

  “Wait… I was in the training area this morning. Where the hell were you?!”

  A small flash of teeth.

  “I saw what you did for the Princess. Something tells me that kindness is not something you show often. Two acts of kindness in two days? Perhaps I haven’t been harsh enough in the ring.”

  Her lips twitched. “Perhaps not. Maybe the implementation of leather straps and cuffs is required? A little… you know -”

  “I never took you for a history buff,” interrupted Elijah, flipping through the pages of one of the books she had selected.

  She snatched the tome back, eyes shooting like daggers as she shoved it in its place. “Haven’t you a king to watch over?” she said, brows high as Elijah leaned casually against the bookcase, closer now. His hood remained; half of his face cloaked in shadow as his lips curled in his usual hint of a smile.

  “His Highness is in meetings all day. I was just on my way to return to him when I heard you humming. What were you hoping to find in those tomes?”

  Wait, had she been humming? Well, she supposed it was a possibility… she had been quite absorbed in her reading material up until her rude interruption.

  “Sometimes the best stories come from events of truth. The recruits were speaking of dragons earlier, I wanted to read more about them,” she replied, leaning her shoulder against the bookcase, mirroring his stance. She added, “What do you know of the history of this land, Elijah?”

  His smirk slowly dropped, bottom jaw sliding forward slightly as he pondered her words. “I’ll admit, I know basic history of the North, but most of my time has been spent training as a soldier, Miss Clearwater. I guess you could say I prefer to make my own history, and not relive that of others. The past is the past.”

  “Be that as it may, do you not see the state of the land we live in? It has been this way for a long time – at some point in history some people made some bad choices that began the slow decline of Fythnar. Courts once united slowly turned against one another.”

  “The King is doing all he can to-”

  “Bullshit.”

  The air slowly turned tense at her harsh word, and Arii straightened suddenly, hands balling to fists as her chin lifted. Was everyone in this castle so absorbed in its golden walls that they were unable to see what their land was becoming? She was not sure about the other courts, but the North was swiftly darting into ruin – and from what she has witnessed so far of Lorch and his royal advisers, none seemed to be doing anything about it. They just continued to hold their royal gatherings and splash money into places that did not need it.

  Elijah straightened also, mouth drawn in a deep frown, a twitch ticking in his jaw. Slowly he leaned forward, and she could feel the heat of him as he growled, “You’ll do well not to speak ill of our King in my presence, soldier.”

  “Oh, pull your head out of your arse, Elijah. Do you deny my words?”

  “I am not blind to the blights of our land, but Lorch is looking for ways to bring the North back to its former glory.”

  “Its former glory involved magic, Elijah. Is Lorch willing to consider its return if it means things may get better?”

  “You speak dangerous words, Miss Clearwater,” the man hissed; his voice low and laced with carefully compressed anger. His head tilted slightly to the door, as if checking that there was no-one to overhear them.

  She was not sure why, but she wanted to fight him. Her hackles were rising, her blood heating and her fingers tingled with the phantom tingle of magic. She knew she was treading dangerous ground, speaking about magic in the presence of someone who could hand her to the King for such talk. Elijah had the strength to put up a fair challenge – and she knew he had the best chance of putting her on her knees before the King.

  Lorch would believe anything that came out of his bodyguard’s mouth.

  Ever so slowly, she leaned towards him, until they were sharing breath as she whispered, “When have you seen me shy from danger, Wolfe?”

  The air became thick, charged between them. Anger, frustration – and something else she could not quite name - doused the air. She could smell it, the scent of his skin – the woodsy scent of pine and a deep mixture of leather and… male. Gods, even as they stared each other down, she could not help admitting that she wanted to touch him – even now. The insistent, annoying little tug formed between her breasts once more, drawing her to him like an irritable moth to a dark flame.

  Unbelievable.

  Then, before her eyes, she swore she saw the ghost of a smile, a hint of challenge in the barest flash of teeth.

  “Master Wolfe, His Highness is ready for you to join him now,” came a hesitant voice from the doorway. Elijah did not break her stare as he lifted a hand to the servant by the door, signalling he would be there soon.

  At the soft click of the doors closing, Elijah’s deep voice graced the static air between them.

  “We aren’t done talking about this.”

  “Until next we meet, then,” she grinned slyly, tapping her fingers against the buckle of his leather tunic and turning from him. She had to get away from him – before she did something she would later regret.

  As she breezed from the library, Elijah stared in her wake – his lips slowly dropping to a frown.

  ~~~

  She felt restless, sh
aky, itchy like eyes were watching her movements as she paced her bedroom that night. After her training session with Arii that day, Sybell had made her way to the castle feeling tired and surprisingly proud.

  The strange, dark eyed woman had shown her a few simple moves, like how to stand and how to grip the sword. She had also gone on to show her the best points to strike to incapacitate a man if he had hold of her, and where to aim if she was being held against her will. It would all take practice, but she felt a glimmer of hope in her chest as she stared down at her hands.

  One perfect rose-coloured nail was chipped, and for the first time Sybell did not care. She revelled in the imperfection, a little bit of proof that she could chip away at the expectations of being a Princess.

  Now though, she had the unsettling feeling that she was being watched.

  It was a feeling she felt most nights, particularly when she was alone and Ingrid was having a break for evening meal, or it was the middle of the night and the maid was sleeping in the room next door.

  Sybell had forgone dinner that night, feeling a strange mix of excitement at the prospect of learning something that she wanted to learn so badly, and the fact that she was so exhausted she could feel it in her bones.

  She had attempted sleep, but the feeling of being watched was still there, an ever-present shadow lingering over her shoulder.

  She had shot up in her bed, sweaty and clammy skinned, deciding perhaps she was indeed hungry after all.

  Slipping a cloak around her slim form, she headed silently from her rooms and headed for the kitchens, her feet barely making a sound on the marble floors.

  Pressing into the spacious room and lighting some candles, she set about making herself a plate of fruit, cheese and cold meats, humming lightly to ease the feeling of aloneness that hung about her.

  Perhaps she should have woken Ingrid, but the maid had been working all day and she thought it best to let her rest.

  Her hand paused as she brought a grape to her mouth, eyes fixing on the shuddering darkness just beyond the light of the candles.