King of the Flame

by Elizabeth Frost

  He’d tell her everything about this trophy room and more. Then, maybe, she’d let him out of the jar.

  4

  Why the hell did faeries always have to make her life so difficult? The Autumn Court couldn’t be in the human realm like the rest of the magical creatures in the world. Of course not.

  The faerie king had to make himself a new home. A better home. One that could only be reached through a magical portal that could only be created by people who knew how to use magic.

  Lilith hated magic.

  It tasted like burnt toast on her tongue and smelled like singed hair. The worst smell and taste in the planet and then some.

  Already she could feel the back of her throat closing up as she etched runes onto the ground beneath the bridge. They didn’t look right to her eyes. Not quite Nordic, nor were they pagan. They were something else and squiggled when she tried to peer at them.

  The faerie in the jar pounded on the glass. “Not that long! Shorten that mark a little.”

  “Care to tell me how short it needs to be?” She waited for the creature to figure out length.

  “About the size of a candle flame?”

  Because that was such a common measurement. Lilith bit her tongue and shortened the mark by an inch, then waited.

  “That’ll do!” The faerie clapped his hands. “Pick me up! Let me see your work one last time. If you did it wrong, the magic will cut you in half.”

  Lilith was well aware just how badly this could end for her. She’d insisted the faerie check everything over multiple times. This was the eighth rune circle they’d made together.

  She sighed and walked over to his jar. Lifting him high above her head, she waited.

  “Hmm.” He marched from side to side in the jar. “Hmm.”

  Long heartbeats passed before she gave the jar a shake. “Well? Did we get it right this time?”

  “We?” He snorted. “You are the one making a rune circle to the trophy room. The King of Flame will kill you on the spot. That’s just what he does and I want you to say I had nothing to do with it.”

  If the king found her, a huge if, she would tell him exactly the faerie who helped her. She didn’t have to keep this little guy alive for any reason. Besides, he was the one going against his own court to save his ass.

  Thankfully, unlike faeries, she didn’t have to tell the truth. “I’ve already told you, I’m not going to tell the king anything about what happened. I found the runes in an old book, blah, blah, blah. That’s how I ended up in the trophy room. But he won’t catch me.”

  The faerie chuckled. “Oh he will catch you. Your rune circle is perfect this time, though. You’re good to go.”

  She dumped the jar onto the ground and made her way to the circle. It already glowed a deep red, waiting for blood to activate the spell. It pulsed, thrumming with starvation and knowing food was so close. Close enough to catch if she would take just one more step. It would trap her and drain her dry if she didn’t activate the spell first.

  “Yeah, I know the feeling,” she muttered as she dug a claw into her wrist. “Eat up. I’m not feeding you again.”

  The first drop of her blood hit the runes, and they lit up like the sun. Lilith threw an arm in front of her eyes, hissing at the brightness that burned her retinas.

  Damned faerie magic.

  “Hey!” The faerie shouted, pounding his fists against the glass again. “We had a deal!”

  She supposed they did, and there was nothing faeries valued more than deals. If she didn’t hold up her end of the bargain, who knows what kind of curse might fall on her head. Even though the faerie was little, his magic might pack a punch.

  Lilith leaned down and picked up the jar. A quick twist of the wrist and the top was off. The faerie darted up into the air and spun in a circle, wings spread wide around his body before he floated down in front of her face. “Good luck, you crazy bitch.”

  The faerie disappeared in between blinks. Apparently he didn’t want to hang around and see if she made it through the portal alive.

  “Thanks again,” she grumbled. “Let’s hope this wasn’t an elaborate trick.”

  The portal still glowed behind her. The thick magic made her nose ache and blood pound in her ears. Of all the things in the world, she didn’t want to step through a magical portal. They sucked. Everything about magic like this sucked.

  Was she really going to do this?

  She shouldn’t be jumping headfirst through a portal to a faerie realm where a pissed off fire faerie would singe her immediately. But she also couldn’t just hang around assuming the Primus would forgive her for killing a bunch of vampires from her original Brood.

  To be honest, they had it coming. If they thought they could hunt her down and kill her because she renounced their familial ties, then they would get a stake to the throat. End of story. But the rest of the vampire broods wouldn’t see it that way, and Lilith would be the first person to die if anyone found out.

  And the Primus would find out. He always did.

  She took a deep breath and sighed. She didn’t have a choice in the matter. If the Primus wanted that blood and would forgive anything and everything to get it? Then Lilith would be the one to lay the blood bag at his feet.

  She’d hidden her travel pack in the mouth of the sewer drain. She marched over to the algae covered surface and yanked it free from the top of the metal grate. The bag had seen better days, but the leather was waterproof and kept all her tools safe from rust.

  Swinging the backpack over her shoulder, she marched toward the portal and told herself to woman up. Sure, she’d feel like someone had stepped on her and then mashed their heel into her spine. She still had some human blood in her system. She’d heal.

  Fuck. She really didn’t want to do this.

  Lilith let out a deep growl before she stepped into the center of the portal. All the molecules of her body fractured, split open, flew in a thousand directions before they slammed back together with all the force of an earthquake.

  She hit the ground hard on her hands and knees. The travel had taken all of a few seconds, but it felt as though she’d been fighting with a giant for days.

  A groan erupted from her lips before she could grind her jaw shut. Silence was key here. She didn’t know what traps the faerie king might have set, and that meant she had to keep her damn mouth closed.

  But she couldn’t even force her fingers open through the agony. Curling into a ball on the floor, she breathed through her nose until the pain subsided. All that lovely, hard earned blood filtered through her limbs, trying to heal something that wasn’t actually hurt, just knitting back together. Wasted.

  When she could finally focus on something other than the blistering pain, Lilith opened her eyes and sat up.

  Trophy room? This looked more like a torture chamber.

  The walls glowed with flames and fire. Heads of faeries were mounted to the wall, some of them preserved by magic, others rotting where they were nailed. Most stared down at her with shock in their eyes. She couldn’t tell if that was because a vampire had somehow managed to portal herself into the Autumn Court’s best kept secret, or because that was the expression they’d died with.

  She liked to think it was because she’d done the impossible. Her ego enjoyed the thought.

  Podiums and small tables underneath each head held magical items. A few faerie wings plucked from the specimens. A fancy looking crown. Even a vial of swirling mist, likely from the Air Court. All of these were powerful, but not what Lilith was interested in.

  Swaths of crimson fabric hung down from the ceiling in curtains pulled back next to the individual heads. She wondered why he’d ever want to cover them. Maybe he brought foreign dignitaries here? That would make sense. No one wanted to be caught with all their heads on display.

  Ba dum tsh.

  No one else stood in the trophy room with her. At least she hadn’t portaled in when the faerie king was staring at all his... what? Trophies? Head
hunter memories? She didn’t know what he was doing with all these specimens, but she hoped like hell he wasn’t some mad scientist.

  Either way, the room was pretty barren other than the heads and curtains. She’d at least expected a mound of gold. Wasn’t that what trophy rooms were filled with, after all?

  She stood up and let the pack fall onto the floor. Nothing in it would help her find the singular thing the Primus wanted. Blood was her main game. She knew what to do next.

  Use her nose.

  Vampires could smell blood from a mile away, and Lilith was no exception. So she tilted her head back, inhaled deeply, and let her senses do what they were best at.

  Blood was in this room. Blood in every head on the wall, but none of that was appealing. It had long since congealed and that was the worst kind to sip on. Besides, faerie blood tasted horrible. Like cotton candy gone stale and it always made her head feel fuzzy.

  Another scent hid beneath the others. It smelled like dark chocolate, deep and rich and incredibly potent.

  She took another deep breath. This time, all she could smell was that lovely scent. It was beautiful and wonderful and it made her head spin with hunger.

  If that was the blood the Primus wanted, then he needed to be more careful of who he sent. Lilith had learned how to control herself a long time ago. Blood didn’t send her into a tailspin of rage and hunger like it did new vampires. But even she was having a hard time keeping her cool.

  The scent made the animal in her breast awaken. Her fangs slid out unbidden and her stomach clenched with hunger like it hadn’t since she was just a baby vamp. Whatever magic lay in that blood made her want to tear off all her clothing, howl at the moon like a monster, and hunt until her entire body was coated in blood.

  She shook her hands, then her whole body. “Get it out of your head,” she muttered.

  But she couldn’t. The scent stayed in her nose even when she stopped breathing. It stuck to her lungs and her hands and the air she kept still in her body. It wouldn’t let her go.

  She was stronger than this. Lilith could follow the line of scent back to whatever was in this trophy room. She could hold herself accountable. The desire for blood didn’t control her. She controlled it.

  What had her master said all those years ago?

  “A vampire is only as strong as its thirst.”

  Well, her thirst was mighty strong right now. Lilith lifted her pack. She clutched it in hands that had suddenly turned to claws and marched to the end of the room.

  A podium stood flush against the back wall with a black velvet pillow at its top. A knife sat on the cushioning but it looked boring. Just a Damascus steel blade and a simple handle. Nothing ornate or eye catching.

  And yet, the scent was all around the blade. It was the reason she couldn’t calm the animal inside her.

  “Better not touch you then, hm?” she muttered, reaching into her pack for her leather gloves.

  She knew better than to let a cursed object touch her skin. And this was definitely a cursed object. What else could it be? Nothing smelled like that unless it was seeped in black magic.

  Properly covered, she reached out for the hilt.

  “Please don’t kick back. Please don’t kick back,” she repeated even as her fingers closed around the handle.

  She squeezed her eyes shut and held on for dear life. Sometimes magical objects didn’t appreciate being picked up. Once, she’d tried to steal a Djinn’s precious gemstone, and the thing had thrown her across the room.

  Maybe she had a history of stealing things from people. So what? The magic of being Lilith was that no one got all that angry at her for trying to take something that wasn’t hers. They just assumed she was always stealing and had stopped inviting her to things.

  She opened one eye. Nothing happened yet, and that seemed suspicious. The blade had been luring her closer so why wasn’t it fighting when she tried to take it? It couldn’t want to be picked up.

  Unless that’s exactly what it wanted.

  She lifted it and let the light gleam on its wicked edge. This was a damn sharp blade if she’d ever seen one. Clearly, this wasn’t meant for the kitchen. This knife was meant to slice at a person’s throat and let the blood well out.

  In between the dark waves of steel, red glowed. Deep red like blood that had been outside the body for too long. Narrowing her eyes, she peered closer. “Oh you’re a hungry one, aren’t you?”

  The blade didn’t answer.

  Then all the torches went out.

  5

  Drake felt the moment someone appeared in his realm like a bullet fired next to his ear. He always knew when someone new popped into the realm. And he also knew exactly where they landed when they arrived.

  This one appeared right in the middle of his trophy room. All the flames in the realm wavered, suddenly afraid of what he would do. Because he could do anything.

  Why were people so foolish?

  Only the dumbest of people would appear in his realm without permission. Let alone trying to sneak into his trophy room with the clear intent to steal from him. Why else would they be in the trophy room?

  He sighed and turned away from his work. All he wanted was one day when everything went the way it was supposed to. All he asked for was a couple hours of peace and did he get it? No. Instead, he got a thief in the middle of the day when he was supposed to be tending the lava fields.

  Clearly, this person had no respect for the King of the Autumn Court, the Master of Flames, and the Bringer of Death.

  Drake lifted a brow even as he raced to the trophy room. He quite liked the last name, and that was something he’d come up with off the cuff. Maybe he’d try that out the next time he saw the other nobles in his court. Perhaps they’d like the new name. He should get them to call him the Bringer of Death more often.

  “Seems a little on the nose,” the elemental grunted.

  Maybe. But it would ward off any thieves who thought to steal from him. The person in his trophy room would be the first to learn of his new nickname and why the title fit him so well.

  His thundering footsteps echoed through the fortress until he got close enough for the intruder to hear him in the trophy room. Then he slowed, ensuring he was silent and his position remained secret.

  He oiled the door every week. It slid open on silent hinges so he could get a look at the fool who dared steal from him. Anger wasn’t commanding his body just yet, but he was certain it would soon enough. He’d never been able to control his temper. Nor did he want to.

  The magic inside him fed on anger and rage. It liked hatred best of all, but he had little to hate these days. So it feasted on his dark emotions and performed the most wondrous of spells when it was furious and well fed. Sometimes he even threw fireworks off his body.

  He liked that kind of anger the best.

  Drake fed the emotion as he glared at the thief in his vault. He could tell it was a woman from where he stood, but she was too far away to see any other details. Just that she wore black, held a backpack she likely wanted to shove full of his prized possessions, and that she was reaching for his knife.

  The one thing in his vault he wouldn’t let anyone touch other than himself.

  Yes, there it was. The anger welled in his muscles and desired to burn her alive. It boiled at the surface of his skin and wanted to devour. To consume. Oh how badly he wanted to let it loose. Just not yet.

  Drake lifted his hand and pulled all the flames to him. They zipped through the air, leaving the torches barren and smoking. All light fled to his hand. He lifted his palm to his mouth and swallowed the flames, leaving the trophy room in nothing but darkness.

  “Do you know how many people have tried to steal from me?” he asked. His voice was filled with bitterness and rage.

  He could see in the dark where so few could. A benefit from the elemental inside him who didn’t need light to see when it was the embodiment of fire.

  The thief stood in front of the podium with t
he knife still in her hand. She didn’t move at the sound of his voice, instead, she stood very, very still. Like she could somehow fool him into thinking she wasn’t there as long as she didn’t move.

  Drake clasped his hands behind his back and stepped into the room. He closed the door behind him, locking them in the darkness. “I know you’re here, thief. I know when anyone steps foot into this realm.”

  At that, she moved. She tucked his knife, the most precious of all his possessions, into her bag. Her dirty leather bag. “I’m no thief.”

  “Then why did you just place something of mine into that bag of yours?”

  “I think you’re mistaken.”

  Lies. He hated lies. They made his mouth taste like rotten fish and he knew exactly what kind of creature could lie like that. “How did a mortal woman like yourself get into the Autumn Court?”

  Someone must have helped her. Someone from his own court had let her into his home and he would track them down. He’d take their heads and smash them into the black stone of the fortress until he didn’t know what part of the remaining liquid belonged to what body part.

  “Mortal,” she repeated with a soft sound. A laugh? “What is it with you faeries and thinking everyone other than your kind are mortal?”

  He blinked and then she was gone. Disappeared.

  Magic? No, he couldn’t feel any power in the air. Just that she was no longer where he had thought she was. Which made little sense. Humans didn’t appear or disappear, and there was no portal on the ground where she’d been standing.

  He frowned and spread his magic out from his hands. Long tendrils of light speared from his fingertips and stretched across the room to find her. She wasn’t on the floor, as he expected, but he detected the faintest of heartbeats on the wall.

  He flicked his gaze up. Even this close, he could only see the faint outline of her form. She sat atop the head of a giant, legs wrapped around the creature’s ears and hands planted firmly on its forehead. Did she think she could hide from him? How in all the realms did she even get up there without him seeing?