by Skye Horn
She dug her fingers past the snow and into the solid ground beneath just as it began to shake. The ability to control the elements was still within her. The Goddess couldn’t take it away completely. She just had to learn to get past the block that Ainé had put in her mind.
Obey me, she growled as the earth fought against her as hard, if not harder than the tendrils of dark magic. It was as if they’d been against each other for so long that they no longer knew how to mesh together.
“That’s it,” Morrigan said. She sounded closer now, but Thea didn’t dare open her eyes. “Hold onto that rage at my sister, but balance it with your love for the others. That’s the key to mastering this.”
Thea panted against the building pressure of the magic, feeling her body giving out on her. This was too much. She couldn’t hold all of this magic under her control. It would devour her, and everyone she loved would be lost forever. Her kingdom would be lost forever, and she would have failed at everything her mother sacrificed herself for.
“I can’t,” Thea sobbed, collapsing under the pain. The magic snapped in around her instantly, consuming her until she was fully drowned in its endless depths.
Adrian had been about to shut his chamber window to try and sleep again when he saw the black mist rising from the gardens.
Don’t, he had told himself just as the unwelcome worry began to creep beneath his skin, but no matter how hard he tried to ignore it, his body did not listen. He launched out the second-story window, commanding his Fae sense to allow a gentle landing as the soles of his feet hit the earth. The impact spread through him evenly, leaving only a dull ache as he sprinted toward the gardens.
The magic tasted like rust on his tongue, a remnant of a memory he wished to forget. The flash of his sister’s azure eyes widening in fear; the pulse of uncontrollable power within his veins—he couldn’t afford another mistake like that. Pushing his way through the vacant gardens, he could hear the rush of wind growing louder the closer he drew.
“Thea?” Adrian called out, turning the bend of the path to find Morrigan with her back pressed to a tree by a mass of dark shadows. Her face twisted into a grimace as she glared in the opposite direction, and as Adrian followed her gaze, he froze. Thea crouched not far from him, wings protruding oddly as if someone had bent them in opposite directions. Blood dripped from the tips of the angled feathers and her breath rose and fell in heavy pants. The air around her trembled as shadows burst from her fingertips into twisted tentacles that lashed out toward both Morrigan and himself.
“Command it!” Morrigan screamed, eyes bulging as another shadow reached for her neck. He’d never seen the Goddess look so weakened. Sweat dripped from her brow and her long nails dug deeply into the bark of the tree. Adrian watched as roots of that tree wrapped so tightly around her ankles blood would have been drawn on a normal being; fury blazed across the Goddess’s features.
Another agonized cry came from Thea as she stumbled toward him, forcing him to unfreeze from the stupor he’d become victim to.
“What do I do?” Adrian asked of the Goddess, but she was too busy fighting off Thea’s magic with her own. On instinct, Adrian conjured the darkness within himself and sent forth a blast of crimson lightning toward Thea, coiling it around the shadows of darkness. The burst of magic did not touch Thea’s skin, but it did break her from whatever spell had taken control. Her jet-black eyes flicked toward him as she regained her control. “What is wrong with her?”
“It’s the magic; she’s completely lost control of it,” Morrigan growled, coming toward him. Whatever distraction Adrian had provided Thea with had been enough for the Goddess to regain control of herself. She stalked past him toward Thea, who looked ready to pounce. An animalistic hiss spread from Thea’s lips, but it barely lasted as Morrigan’s hand lifted, sending Thea to the ground with a cry of agony.
Adrian immediately lunged forward, unable to control his actions as he threw his own body between Thea and the Goddess.
“Move,” she glowered, but Adrian crouched low, lightning striking the spots around him in bright red warning.
“Stand down,” he demanded, not knowing where this sense of urgency was coming from. He could hear Thea whimpering behind him. The shadows had disappeared from around them, but Morrigan’s eyes still burned with anger.
“I’m not going to hurt her, you fool.” Morrigan’s shoulders tensed, and Adrian didn’t move. “I need to heal her.”
Adrian hesitated, eyes darting behind him to where Thea lay in a pile of crumpled feathers. Blood soaked into the snow around her, but her eyes were now closed. Her chest rose and fell in a slow rhythm.
She appeared to be unconscious.
Slowly, he relaxed his stance, letting the magic trickle away from him. He immediately wanted to reach for it again, feeling its loss, but forced himself to let it go despite the shaking pain it left inside him.
All the while, Morrigan watched him with subtle interest that made him want to retreat out of her way.
“What happened to her?” Adrian asked, watching as the Goddess knelt beside Thea. Thea recoiled and he fought the urge to pull Morrigan away. That would surely get him killed, and why was he acting like her protector anyway? She’d be telling him not to if she were conscious.
“She lost control.”
“Obviously,” Adrian said before he could stop himself. Thankfully, the Goddess was too busy with whatever she was doing to Thea to strike him down for his quick tongue. “I only mean what happened to her?”
There was a sickening cracking noise that lifted every hair on Adrian’s body and then complete silence as Morrigan’s shoulders fell in a slow breath. The Goddess stood and stepped back enough that Adrian could see Thea curled up on the snowy ground.
“There is an untamable darkness within her that I didn’t foresee,” Morrigan said, sounding exhausted. “And tell me, who taught you to use such magic?”
The Goddess’ eyes fell on him, but he did not retreat. He was too worried about Thea to be smart enough to avoid Morrigan’s questions. He could have told her the truth—possibly—but then what if she wanted him to teach others how to use the magic? He’d only learned it by accident, and now he wished he hadn’t.
As if sensing he wasn’t going to respond, Morrigan sighed, apparently too tired to press the issue. “Just be careful. That type of magic is unstable.”
Adrian furrowed his eyebrows, staring down at Thea. Her eyes were still closed, but her body was curled up like that of a child against the blood-stained snow. Her features had slackened from the previous grimace, and without her usual guarded expression she looked vulnerable. Adrian noticed that her wings had returned to their normal shape, but healing or not, he imagined she would remember that pain for some time. “And this darkness that you say is within her… how did it get there?”
Thankfully, the Goddess looked at him with a sad smile and let her attention shift back to Thea rather than him. “My own jealousy. Long ago I acted in haste to punish someone who hurt me. I cursed him for his betrayal, and now Thea is paying the consequence.”
Thinking back to everything Adrian had learned from Caden in their many adventures through the Royal Library, he tried to pinpoint a curse in their history but could only come to one conclusion. He had never much liked reading, but Caden was obsessive about it. He’d once told Adrian that history was rich with stories of war, death, and love, which all seemed to coexist in everything they did.
“But she’s not your descendent…” Adrian spoke with hesitation. He wasn’t sure how public the knowledge was of the Goddess of Death having a part in the Fae line.
“You’re right; she’s not,” Morrigan said, watching him expectantly as if this answered every question. He thought back over the story with difficulty, trying to remember just what Caden had told him.
He’d said that Morrigan’s only son had been the original king of Blackmire. That was why they worshipped the Goddess. However, if the legends were true, the original king h
ad fallen in love with the Queen of Ivandor, daughter of the Goddess Ainé, Morrigan’s sister. Their union had infuriated Morrigan, just as Ainé had predicted when she made them soulmates, and Morrigan had punished the king for choosing Ivandor over his mother.
Because of his betrayal, Morrigan had cursed her son and every first-born son thereafter with an all-consuming darkness that would manifest at the conception of his child. None of that explained why Thea was the one experiencing this kind of magic, unless—
“Kieran is her soulmate.” The words flew past his lips in a single breath. He recalled the reaction he’d received when he asked Thea about Kieran and everything clicked into place. Kieran must have been Morrigan’s descendent. A curse like that couldn’t just disappear, at least not according to anything they’d witnessed in the past centuries. Magic like that had to be removed delicately. If it wasn’t, it would have latched onto someone else, like perhaps the lingering soul of the bond.
“Kieran was her soulmate,” Morrigan corrected. “My sister controls him now.”
“But if the curse has manifested itself in him and now lives in her... does she know?”
Adrian stared at Thea’s crumpled body on the ground, fighting the urge to go to her. All at once she became a different person to him, no longer infuriating and hot-tempered, but vulnerable and alone. The one person who’d probably meant the world to her had been ripped away and now she was left in an enemy kingdom with her basic instincts likely telling her she needed to survive. How could he not understand that completely?
“No, she does not know.”
“But you did…” Adrian turned on Morrigan full of accusation and froze. The Goddess’ face was clouded with a regret so deep that he nearly took a step back. “What is it?”
“If I allow the magic to continue to manifest in her, she may lose the baby, but if I don’t, she may lose against my sister.”
“Are you telling me that you’re risking her child’s life without even telling her?” Adrian’s mind was racing, and he felt as if his eyes might bulge out of their sockets at any moment. Thea didn’t have a clue that she was with child. It made sense that she wouldn’t. She’d grown up with humans, whose pregnancies lasted only nine lunar cycles. Fae pregnancies were different; he’d witnessed that with his mother when she’d carried his little sister for a total of thirteen lunar cycles. She’d told him every pregnancy was different when he’d asked her how long she’d carried him for.
Everything in him was screaming that this was wrong and that Morrigan was crossing a line, but what could he do about it? She was a Goddess and he was a soldier. The darkening emotions across her face told him that she knew what she was doing was immoral, and yet, she’d forced Thea to practice magic today, for what? To punish her sister at the cost of an innocent life?
“I do not care if the babe lives or dies,” Morrigan said, face clouding over with a mask of resolution. “And if you tell her what I’ve told you, I will make sure you’re never selected for the King’s Guard.”
Adrian’s mouth fell open in surprise, but no words came out. Thea was pregnant and didn’t know. He was supposed to keep it a secret. Why had Morrigan even let him figure it out? Why hadn’t she just told him to leave when he’d shown up?
He felt the blood rushing to his face and tried to remember how to breathe. Could he lie to Thea about something like this if it meant she would lose the baby she didn’t even know she had? A piece of her soulmate lived inside her, even though he apparently was lost to her. How could he live with himself if he became responsible for the death of an innocent child?
The arguments continued to scream inside him, including one which said that perhaps Morrigan had told him because she wanted him to tell Thea, but regardless of the moral consequences, he found himself lowering his head in obedience.
“Good.” Morrigan removed her eyes from him long enough for the regret to sink its claws into his abdomen, twisting his insides into horrible knots. “Now take her back to her room. She will not awaken until dawn.”
Adrian watched as Morrigan strode away from him without a backward glance. He imagined that the guilt tore at her the same way that it did him as he lifted Thea into his arms, careful to maneuver her wings into a comfortable position, but with the torturous realization that the Goddess wasn’t changing her mind, he carried his unconscious burden home.
Chapter 9
Chaos echoed through the halls of Grimwalde. A cold sweat dripped down the side of Kieran’s face, sticking his hair to his skin as he swung his sword through the air toward one enemy after another. The Goddess moved elegantly at his side, a sword in her hand. Her silver armor glistened beneath the moonlight which shone from the throne room’s skylight as they burst through the double doors.
They were expected, of course. They had known they would be. The first line of soldiers ran toward them, and Kieran caught the hint of a smile on the Goddess’ lips as she raised her bloodstained sword. His attention was diverted, though, because beyond the line of soldiers, he’d caught sight of Haven kneeling beside the king’s throne. She had a large bag slung over one shoulder, and her chestnut wings were folded against her back. The king was motioning her toward the back exit to the throne room, and Kieran could see the tension of the muscles in her neck as she shook her head to say no.
The clash of a sword against his own drew Kieran’s attention back to the battle, but he knew without hearing a word that the king was sending Haven away, or at least attempting to. His attacker swung again, but this time, Kieran was ready. He spun around ramming his elbow directly into the side of the soldier’s helmet. It sent a painful reverberation up his own arm, but his opponent immediately crumbled to the ground.
Kieran swept his eyes back to Haven, who had risen to her feet and was withdrawing her own sword now. She was trained to protect at all costs, and Kieran knew the depth of that loyalty. There was no way she was about to flee from a fight.
He lifted one of his palms to the group of three soldiers coming toward him from the left and focused. With a quick exhale, a gust of wind burst around them, sending the incoming soldiers back against the wall, and leaving him a clear path to the king.
But Haven was already ready for him.
Kieran recognized the blade in her hand before he got close enough to face it—it was Thea’s sword, the one he’d had specially crafted for her. Why did Haven have it?
A smirk crossed her lips, and he realized he’d stopped walking.
He refocused, searching for Ainé in the room.
She ended the lives of each of the Fae she’d been fighting before returning to his side without a hair out of place. Kieran had watched her face enemy after enemy in the outer courts and knew even without magic, the Goddess was lethal. On the other hand, he was still trying to catch his breath. Their army had been fighting its way through the walls of guards for hours. Once the protection runes had been broken by the Goddess, it had just been a matter of fighting to the heart of the castle.
Most of the enemy soldiers were down now, leaving just the king and Haven. Kieran tasted blood on his split lip and ran his tongue over the gash. His left eye felt swollen from where one soldier had knocked him with the hilt of his sword, but aside from that and exhaustion, Kieran felt ready for the next part of their plan: capturing the king.
He took the lead as they approached the throne, catching the end of the king’s sentence to Haven.
“Your role is too important in this, Haven. Please, go.”
Despite wanting to know more about this role Haven played, Kieran saw that Ainé was not going to wait and find out. Her footsteps had quickened as she approached the throne, and when she cut her eyes toward him, the liquid gold flashed. The power that pulsed off the Goddess was archaic, but there was something about it that terrified him, lifting the hairs on the back of his arms and quickening his heartbeat.
“Get the girl,” she demanded.
For one moment, the king’s misty gaze locked onto Kieran’s an
d a sad smile tugged at the corners of his lips. A small wave of panic rolled over Kieran, but then he heard the Goddess’ voice again, this time in his own head.
This man sent you away when your heart was broken. He didn’t want you near his goddaughter, remember? He is not your friend.
The words resolved Kieran’s worries and his shoulders relaxed. Haven was watching him closely, eyes shifting from hopeful to confused, to absolutely furious. Kieran expected her to lunge at him, but surprisingly, she squeezed the king’s hand and headed for the door behind the throne. He immediately sprang into action, following her without a backward glance at Aragon and Ainé. He didn’t know exactly what the Goddess had planned for the king, but he could imagine it wasn’t pleasant.
As soon as he rounded the corner of the darkened corridor a bony shoulder rammed into his upper chest, sending him flying hard into the wall. He growled as Haven swept a foot around the back of his leg, aiming to cause him to lose his balance. Even though his eyes hadn’t quite adjusted to the complete darkness yet, he managed to stay upright. For a moment, they struggled to disarm each other in the small space. Kieran threw most of his body weight against her arm, trying to knock the sword free, but that left his abdomen open. A second later, Haven was throwing a left-handed punch directly into his gut and he was keeling over.
As his vision adjusted to the surrounding darkness, her golden hair became more clear, followed by her furious round eyes and pursed lips. Her cheeks were red, and beads of sweat stuck to her temples.
“Nice to see you again,” Kieran coughed, taking back the breath she’d knocked out of him. Her stance was ready to keep up the fight, but her eyes hesitated, so he swung first.
Sparks erupted around them as his sword hit the stone wall behind where Haven had just been. She’d ducked to the right and was now smirking at him infuriatingly.
“Too slow,” she mocked.