In the Ravenous Dark

by A. M. Strickland

  That isn’t why I do it. I do it because I can’t help it. I feel a need, a hunger so strong, that nothing, not even my own screaming thoughts, can stop me. I press his palm to my lips.

  Blood pulses into my mouth, warm, thick, and coppery rich. I drink.

  Kineas screams. But I choke off his throat with sigils until the noise is a mere rasp. I keep gulping. It tastes so good; it’s like his blood is filling a yawning void inside me.

  Satiating the darkness.

  “Rovan.” Ivrilos’s voice is soft. “What are you doing?”

  I spin to look at him almost guiltily, Kineas’s hand still pressed to my mouth. I have the misfortune of catching myself in yet another mirror as I do—how many mirrors can one person have?—and I see how I must look to Ivrilos, who stands in the shadows behind us. I actually look better, as far as the death rot, but my eyes are feral and red tinged, and my cheeks have a high, feverish flush. Otherwise I’m starkly pale underneath my sigils. Worst of all, I have blood running down my chin and neck.

  Ivrilos swallows as he takes me in. I can’t decide if he looks sick or … something else. Hungry?

  “You should stop,” he says. “You don’t want to kill him. Not yet.”

  Right. Taken with this strange craving, I’ve nearly forgotten why I’m here.

  I pull Kineas’s hand away with a wet slurp and wipe my mouth, unable to meet Ivrilos’s eyes or my own in the mirror. It’s easier to look at Kineas, who’s still making strangled noises, his face drawn with pain and terror.

  I clear my throat. “I don’t know why I did that.”

  “I have some idea,” Ivrilos says quietly. “I’ve heard stories of … of what death magic can inspire in a bloodmage. Of the hunger it creates. You can’t easily sustain yourself with the pneuma of others like a shade would, because you’re still in this world, of this flesh, but you can drink the substance that powers your blood magic. Do you feel better?”

  I nod, running my tongue over my teeth. Trying to savor it.

  “Good,” he says, “but it won’t last. If you reopened the way between us, unblocked our bond, I could still help you. I could help you focus. I could take back some of what’s making you hunger, or I could try to feed you in a way that’s not—”

  I shake my head. “No! I don’t trust you!”

  “Who else do you have, Rovan? You can’t approach anyone else like this! You’re…” He trails off despairingly.

  A monster, I think. “I don’t need to see anyone else. Just the king. I thought you wanted to get a glimpse into his inner sanctum?”

  My guardian cocks his head, going as still as a cat spotting a mouse. “That’s where you’re going?”

  When I gesture at Kineas, I’m pleased to see my hand no longer looks like it belongs to a festering corpse. It just looks freshly dead under the smears of drying blood and the sigils of my bloodline, but even my fingernails have grown back. “With him. I’ll get as close as I can, and then after that … I figure the king might listen to me if I threaten the life of his heir.”

  Ivrilos arches an eyebrow. “And you think Kineas will cooperate?”

  “Let’s ask him.” I release my invisible hold on Kineas.

  As soon as I do, the crown prince takes the opportunity to vomit all over the floor. I’m struck by the absurd urge to apologize, but I ignore it. It would be useless to say, I’m sorry for drinking your blood, but not for breaking your fingers. And just so you’re aware, your life is completely expendable!

  “Kineas, darling,” I say instead. He flinches away from me. I probably still have blood on my mouth.

  “Goddess, you’re a sick freak! Who were you talking to?” He coughs, flailing a bit with his damaged hands. “Are you deranged, or is that your guardian? If it’s him, I command that he stop you this instant!”

  “He can’t stop me, because I’ve shut him out. And this is all my doing,” I add, just in case Ivrilos wants to take up his revenge plan another time, if all else fails. “Are you ready to accompany me to visit your father?”

  Kineas is shaking. He holds both forearms crossed at his chest. “Why should I do that? If you wish to make an attempt on the king’s life, it’s my duty—”

  “You’ll come with me quietly, as if we’re on a lovers’ stroll, because if you don’t…” I use sigils to seize the part of him that will hurt the most. Down there. Kineas jumps and lets out an undignified squeal. “I’ll break other … things. Squash them to pulp.” Sweat instantly breaks out on Kineas’s forehead. “After that I’ll rip out your tongue. And I’ll still drag you to the king.”

  I’m unable to smother a grin. Drying blood cracks on my face. I must look demented. For good measure, I pick the dagger up off the floor.

  Ivrilos shakes his head. “Rovan, this cannot end well for anyone. I beg you, please. I can’t—”

  But I’m already using a spare length of peach cloth from the ground—a piece of one of the girls’ outfits, I imagine—to scrub the blood off my hands and face. I have more on the sleeve of my death shroud, but I fold it to where it doesn’t show. My outfit isn’t ideal for visiting the king, but I have to work with what I’ve got.

  “Kineas,” I snap. “Tuck your arms into your himation to hide your hands—yes, like that. Now practice smiling. If we run into anyone along the way, tell them everything is fine.”

  “No one is going to believe that,” the crown prince hisses as he adjusts his arms under the draping cloth. His grimace is the opposite of a smile. “My father is going to kill me,” he groans.

  I shrug. “What’s worse—that, or me crushing your balls and ripping out your tongue?”

  The smile he gives me is sickly, but it’s a smile.

  I gesture with the dagger toward the door before I flip it around in my hand, ruby pommel flashing, and tuck the blade up my sleeve. “Lead the way, then.”

  Ivrilos tries to stop me one last time, a tortured look on his perfect face. “Don’t do this.”

  I ignore him.

  Kineas walks ahead of me, stepping far more gingerly than his usual confident stride, arms crossed carefully against his stomach under the folds of his himation. Ivrilos stalks behind me, resignation sharpening him, one of his half-moon blades drawn. I keep up my shield against Ivrilos and a subtle pressure on the crown prince to remind him to behave.

  Even so, we don’t make it very far.

  There are about a dozen guards already outside, weapons drawn, as we step through the broken-in doors and out into the palace hallway. It makes sense: I left a mess at the entrance to Kineas’s apartments, not to mention the corpses of his guards, and the fleeing girls no doubt raised the alarm.

  “Oh, thank the goddess,” I say breathily, “and thank you for getting here so quickly! Someone attacked while the prince and I were chatting. We were waiting for reinforcements before we came out.”

  The guards all stay back, at the ready. The one in charge says, “We have a report that you attacked.”

  “That’s absurd! I’m the crown prince’s betrothed and a loyal subject.” I pluck at my death shroud. “I was just paying respects to Old King Neleus in the necropolis. Besides, my guardian would never allow that. Our attacker must be spreading these lies. Right, dearest?” I ask Kineas, increasing the pressure on him.

  He nods quickly, his face coated in a sheen of sweat. It looks like he has to stifle a gag. “Yes! Yes, that’s correct.”

  Subtlety is definitely not my thing. Marklos was right about that. If I see him again, I’ll be sure to thank him, especially for what he did to my father.

  The lead guard squints at the crown prince. “Are you all right, Your Highness?”

  Maybe it’s good that Kineas’s appearance is drawing all the attention. It distracts from mine. But he still needs to play the part.

  “I’m fine,” Kineas says, giving his sickly smile. I want to elbow him.

  “It was just a bit of a shock,” I say. “We’re going to go report to the king now.”

  “Th
ere’s no need for that,” says a commanding voice that traces a cold trickle down my spine. “I’m right here.”

  I hear footsteps approaching from down the hall. And then the group of guards parts down the middle, bowing their heads, to make way for the king.

  26

  Down a marble hall infested with gold and choked with flowers, King Tyros comes striding purposefully. A gold-embroidered, deep blue tunic drops heavily around his legs, and a gold laurel crown glints in his salt-and-pepper hair. He has even more guards in tow, led by General Tumarq and the Princess Penelope in bronze breastplates and leather pteryges. Lady Acantha, whom I haven’t seen since my trial in the Hall of the Wards, and Captain Marklos head up a few bloodmages, all of them in black and red uniforms and silver helms. I thank the goddess Lydea isn’t among them.

  I can see the guardians perfectly clearly. All in black, they look less like their wards’ shadows and more like looming captors, ready to bring them to heel—or even kill them—at a moment’s notice. A pox on flesh. And maybe it’s my strange eyesight, but the king is a dark stain at the center of them all, despite his bright embroidery, almost like a guardian himself. The worm in the apple.

  All of this death mixed with life, I think somewhat deliriously—in the end, all you get is rot, whether it’s in this city, in the outer blight-covered world, or even in my own body.

  My game is up already—I know as soon as I see the look of panic that crosses Kineas’s face when he sees his father. He’s more afraid of the king than he is of me. The loathsome squid won’t do what I say. Not even for the sake of his tenderest parts.

  But maybe his father will.

  I slide behind the crown prince, grab a fistful of his pewter hair, and bring the sharp edge of the dagger that was hidden in my sleeve to his throat. He tries to struggle, but the movement makes him nearly crumple in pain. Not only that, his neck gets nicked by the blade for his trouble. I try to ignore the trickle of blood.

  “Trust me, I don’t want to be this close to you, either,” I mutter in Kineas’s ear, and then I raise my voice. “One move and your heir will no longer be able to make heirs. And then I’ll slit his throat just for fun.”

  The blade is redundant, since I could splatter Kineas’s guts on the floor with little more than a thought. But it’s a good visual clue for the guards who might need to see the threat plainly to be dissuaded from any heroics. The ruby winks at them for good measure. And yet I’m regretting it because of the blood.

  I can smell it, and it’s like the scent of everything my body has ever thirsted or hungered for, all at once. It makes my love of wine seem like child’s play. Through an act of sheer will, I don’t drag his throat down to my mouth to lick it.

  Tyros halts in his tracks, throwing out a hand for everyone with him to stop. They do, with varying expressions of alarm. Tumarq is calculating. Acantha stares at me aghast. Marklos downright seethes. The king’s face remains stony.

  “What is the meaning of this?” he says, eerily calm.

  This man killed my mother. Or at least ordered her death and my father’s. The urge to throw Kineas aside like so much trash and fly at the king with sigils and dagger alike is almost as strong as my thirst.

  Because while killing Kineas might be one of Alldan’s goals, I don’t really care about him. The king, however … he’s mine. Alldan wants him dead, anyway. Ivrilos might want to stall to see where his brother is hiding, and I’ll help with that if I can. But if all I can do is end Tyros, that’s good enough for me.

  “I need to talk to you,” I force myself to say instead, nearly as calm as him. “Just you. And him out of necessity.” I nod toward Kineas without moving the dagger. “Otherwise he’s not worth the air he breathes.”

  It’s my only chance to get the king alone. And I need to get him alone. I’m not going to be able to get close enough to kill him if he’s surrounded.

  Tyros cocks his head at me, and for a brief second—very brief—he reminds me of Ivrilos with his predatory focus. The gold laurels in his hair flash. “Why? And why would I agree to that?”

  “Because I have a few things to say to you alone, and because you want your heir to live?” I pull Kineas’s head back harder, and he gasps as if on cue. “Or maybe you don’t care. Let me tell you now: I don’t care if I survive this, and so I’ll do whatever I must to get your attention.”

  The king’s blunt eyes don’t leave mine. And then he smiles, which nearly makes me shiver. “Trust me, you have it. But where is Ivrilos in all of this? Why hasn’t he stopped you?”

  Ivrilos is standing by my side, but of course Tyros can’t see him.

  “He can’t,” I say. “I’ve blocked him.”

  “You figured it out. Clever girl,” the king says. And then he blinks slowly. Once. Twice. “All right.”

  Tumarq and Marklos both look at the king in surprise, but it’s Penelope, in full fighting attire, hand on her sword pommel as if ready to cleave me in half, who says, “You can’t honestly consider humoring her?”

  Tyros doesn’t even look her way. “I’ll consider what I wish.”

  “But, Your Majesty—brother,” Penelope insists, “she’s wearing a death shroud. She may have been to the necropolis. What of Delphia—your daughter—or…” She doesn’t say the name, though Crisea is obviously her primary concern. Ever the warrior mother. “Aren’t you worried this girl is taking revenge on our family for the perceived wrongs against hers?”

  The king shrugs a single shoulder, barely. It’s like a boulder shifting. “Check the necropolis,” he says to Penelope, without taking his eyes off me. “See if anything is amiss. Report back and don’t dawdle.”

  She doesn’t look appreciative of his dismissive tone, but hers is unmistakably grateful. “Yes, Your Majesty.” She peels off, heading back down the hallway, a few of the guards accompanying her at her signal. I don’t miss the flash of relief on Tumarq’s face, even as worry flickers through me.

  Bethea, Delphia, Japha—I hope they’ll all be fine. That’s all I can do. At least Crisea should be safe, because she’s royal and not plotting to escape. As safe as she can be in the necropolis. But the king seems to mark how little he cares about them when he adds, “Marklos, go find Lydea. Guard her with your life.”

  I guess I’ll have to kill Marklos later, if I survive.

  The captain bows his head, flashing the sigils that climb up the side of his neck, and departs immediately, with only a glare for me. He doesn’t take anyone with him. He probably doesn’t need to. His bloodline is long and powerful enough to guard …

  Lydea. I hope she can still get herself out of the city. In making my move, I’ve drawn attention to her, too, not just myself, and now she has Marklos to deal with. Whatever the outcome, by attacking Kineas so soon I’ve betrayed her importance to Thanopolis. It’s not just Skyllea that understands it now.

  I’m still selfishly hurting her, even as I’m trying to give myself up. The thought makes me sick. I try to swallow the feeling.

  “Care to step inside with us?” I ask, as if this is a casual encounter in the streets and not a standoff in the royal palace—with the king, no less. I begin backing toward Kineas’s destroyed apartment doors, dragging the crown prince with me.

  Tyros follows slowly, step by careful step, his tunic’s gold embroidery glinting, his eyes unblinking. It’s unnerving. When Tumarq and Acantha make a move to follow, he waves them off. “Stay,” he says.

  Now I know where Kineas gets his tendency to treat people like dogs.

  I slip back into the outer room of the crown prince’s chambers, dodging debris. Ivrilos is somewhere behind me, but I face forward, holding Kineas and watching the king. Tyros traces my steps without looking down, like we’re dancing. Once we’re fully inside, I use some quick sigils to drag the doors closed and brighten the lamps.

  “Well.” The king smiles, holds out his hands, palm up, as if in offer. “What can I do for you?”

  “You can tell me why you killed my mot
her.”

  He doesn’t even bother denying it. “She had no use other than reining you in, and I believed we could do that well enough without her.”

  “How’s that going for you?” I spit, holding the knife tighter against Kineas’s throat. His indrawn breath is harsh. Frightened.

  “Yes, I admittedly overestimated Ivrilos’s abilities as your guardian,” Tyros says, unconcerned, folding his arms, “as well as underestimated your father’s influence. I didn’t end him quickly enough, apparently, before he could put ideas into your head.”

  I don’t glance at Ivrilos. “My father was cooperating with you! First for Cylla’s sake, and then for my mother’s and mine. And you betrayed him. You only wanted his bloodline.”

  “Cylla.” The king’s lips twist around her name. He seems to ignore everything else I said. “She deserved worse than she got.”

  “Father,” Kineas chokes, trying to look Tyros in the eye despite my fist in his hair. “You don’t mean that.”

  Even in the midst of everything else, this is the first thing the crown prince mentions? His mother is definitely a sore spot—I remember that from our betrothal ball.

  “You abducted her,” I add to the king, vaguely horrified to be siding with Kineas. “You forced her to marry you. She was the mother to your children.”

  “Yes, just as you were to be the mother to his,” Tyros says with a dismissive nod at his son, gold laurels glinting. “Warmth of regard isn’t necessary, as you can see.”

  “There’s something wrong with you,” the crown prince gasps against the dagger’s edge, surprising me yet again. “You felt sorry for Mother. You were always giving her gifts, trying to make her comfortable here. You loved her, even if she didn’t love us.” I hear the mixture of both yearning and disgust in his voice—how he both admired and pitied his father, how he both adored and despised his mother. Perhaps because Cylla both loved and hated Kineas, especially after he grew up to be more of his father’s child than hers. “You never denied it before. You’re different.”