Why, why, why
Polly’s trying to gather crushed pieces of dew, I’m trying to gather myself, and then, the door suddenly swings open.
And in walks Midas.
Chapter 45
AUREN
Midas’s sudden presence puts a pin in my panicked confusion.
He’s dressed impeccably from head to toe, the stiff fabric ensuring not a single wrinkle exists, buttons shaped like golden bells going from pelvis to throat. He’s wearing his favorite six-spired crown upon his honeyed hair, the ends pointed like the tip of a claw.
Behind him, lingering in the doorway, stands Rissa, her blue eyes rapidly taking in the scene before landing on me.
Rissa...
There was something I needed to tell Rissa.
My thoughts contort and bend. I try to remember. I try and try...
Midas glares down at Polly, who’s frozen on the floor, and his jaw tightens. “What are you doing?”
Polly goes pale, her gauzy dress bunched up around her thighs as she freezes with bits of crushed petal in her hand. “My king...”
“I gave you one job,” he growls. “You were to bring her up here and watch her. The dew was to be given to her after the demonstration. Not before.”
“I...I’m sorry, my king. The favored was growing anxious, so I thought—”
“You are not employed to think,” he interrupts. “I’ll deal with your punishment later. Gather yourself and leave now.”
Polly’s blue eyes shine with tears, but mine widen.
Leave now.
My gaze flies over to Rissa. Leave. We had a plan to leave.
Thoughts and memories tumble like a weed blown in an errant wind. Bits and pieces break off, letting me gather up the scraggly branches. Every sharp-husked branch I grab onto stabs against my aching consciousness.
I’m at the ball, the dew that’s in Polly’s hand is coursing through me, and I was going to leave with Rissa. That’s why she’s looking at me like that.
The cloud of confusion tries to settle over me, but I wave it away, focusing, trying to gather broken branches and blowing dandelion seeds.
I was supposed to leave with Rissa. We had a deal. She wanted to get away on the night of the ball. But something is really wrong, I know that much. She needs to escape without me. Now might be her only chance.
Polly clutches Midas’s pant leg as she starts to beg and cry and apologize. It’s the distraction I need.
Leave, I mouth to Rissa. Go.
Her eyebrows jump up in surprise, and for the first time, something hesitant crawls over her beautiful face. As if she’s unsure. As if she doesn’t want to leave me behind.
It makes my heart squeeze in my chest, but I know I’m in no state to escape with her. Rissa is a survivor, though. If anyone can make it out of here, it’s her.
Midas knocks Polly away with a jab of his foot, which just makes her cry even harder. He shoots a look over his shoulder at Rissa. “Take her and get out of here. I don’t want to see her again. And make sure she doesn’t have any more dew.”
Polly wails, nearly loud enough to be heard over the music, but another memory sticks to my outstretched grasp. Take her and get out of here, Midas said, and I nod at Rissa in agreement. Take her, and get yourselves out.
Rissa hurries to pull an inconsolable Polly to her feet, while Midas walks over to the small table along the wall and pours himself a drink, expression rife with irritation.
I slump against the wall, feeling like there are thousands of torn bits of paper all jumbled up in my head, words slowly falling down into place.
Rissa maneuvers Polly, making it seem like they stumble, causing them to draw nearer. “Come with me,” she murmurs, and even though it seems like she’s talking to Polly, I know she’s saying it to me.
Tears fill my eyes. We were reluctant allies at best, and yet here she is, trying to get me to go with her, and I have a feeling it’s not just about the gold.
I shake my head, giving her a sad smile. “Go.”
I don’t dare say more than that, and neither does she, not even with the sound of Polly’s choked sobs drowning us out or Midas’s inattention.
Rissa gives me one more reluctant look before she turns away, steadying Polly at her side as they go. I let out a shaky breath, praying to the goddesses that she can make it out.
Please let her make it out.
I wish I could remember what I was supposed to tell her, but I lose my chance anyway when the door closes behind her. With a loosened breath, I rub at my temples, yet the music of the ballroom is so loud that it’s almost thick enough to taste the ballad on my tongue, to swallow the melody whole.
But even that doesn’t distract from this sense of dread wriggling in my gut. What else have I forgotten? What else has happened? There are gaping black holes in my mind that I desperately need filled in.
A bead of sweat drips down my neck. The salt trail slips down my back until it’s soaked up somewhere along the way, landing with a sting from a wound that shouldn’t be there.
My heart pounds in my chest.
Wrong. Something’s wrong.
A sense of deja vu crashes over me, because I’ve said that before.
More of my coherency starts to filter in drip by drip, like water drops from a cave’s roof, each one forming the stalactite of my memories. I rub at my temple again, chewing on another upbeat tempo that blares in my ears, only to realize that Midas is speaking to me.
“What?”
He gives me a careful look. I hadn’t even realized he’d come over to stand in front of me.
“It’s time for my announcement, and then I’ll need to make a demonstration. So I need you to pay attention.” He’s talking to me slowly, enunciating every word. “I need you to take off your glove and gold-touch the railing when I point to you. The sun is setting, so we don’t have much time. Alright?”
I stare at him.
I was leaving with Rissa. I’m at the ball. Someone gave me dew. My back hurts.
When I don’t say anything, Midas sighs. “When are you gold-touching the railing, Precious?” he presses.
“When you point.”
He gives me a tight smile. “That’s right. Don’t forget, okay?”
Forget… How much did I forget?
“Okay.”
After giving me another long look, Midas then makes his way over to the middle of the mezzanine’s curved balcony, a hand raised in a signal. Below, the musicians immediately cease playing, and the noise of the crowd dies down.
Blessed quiet.
“Welcome to our celebratory ball!” he announces, charm thick in his tone. His voice drawls, filtering in and out as my mind continues to drip. To collect. Dandelions and tumbleweeds and paper and stalactites…
Still keeping to the shadowed recesses, my eyes skim the crowd, stomach churning with every sweep as I search for answers, search for something, search for someone...
“The prosperity of Sixth Kingdom has bolstered Fifth, and it is my duty to ensure Orea’s northern kingdoms are strong and united.” Midas’s voice booms out, echoes, spins around. He presses a hand against his chest in a humbled gesture. “Even still, I have failed. By coming here to strengthen Fifth, Sixth Kingdom has suffered by my absence under the influence of the cold queen. Although the riots were a tragic, terrible thing, it was also good in a way.”
My eyes lift to the windows, to the dying light.
Something twinges in my back.
“It has brought about change,” Midas goes on. “I have heard the voices crying up from the people. That their labors deserve more from their monarchs, and I agree.” He lets that sink in, a lofty pride carried in the upturn of his chin. “The recent death of Queen Malina shows me that as a king, I must do more. That the people deserve a true queen who is beloved by them. That the kingdoms can be strengthened by unity.”
Murmuring spreads through the crowd.
> Murmuring goes on inside me.
And there—a dark, quiet voice.
Remember.
Midas’s palms rest steadily on the balcony. “There is one such beloved queen,” he says, gaze passing over the hundreds of people below. “In fact, she is here tonight.”
He motions toward the opposite end of the room, and everyone turns to look where Queen Kaila stands up from the throne, hand cupped as she gives a proud wave. She looks striking in a deep blue dress, yet with a glimmering gold crown on her head woven into the loops of her black hair. I squint my eyes, flicking my attention from the familiar crown to the fur shawl around her shoulders, to the shell necklace around her neck. All gilded.
The things Midas touched against my arm.
“I am pleased to announce that Queen Kaila of Third Kingdom and I have decided to wed!”
My brows pull together. Midas is remarrying, but...I knew that. I knew, and I didn’t care, because...because...
The crowd gasps and claps, the sound rustling in my head like running through dry leaves, every step another whoosh of air, another crinkle and snap beneath bare feet.
And those feet take me right to Slade.
My heart stops when my gaze lands on his dark presence standing in the middle of the colorful ballroom, like a pitch-black pupil in the middle of a multi-colored iris. He doesn’t see me, but I see him, and it’s enough.
It’s enough.
The wavering, drifting boat of my mind yanks to a stop, suddenly grounded by his anchor. My grip closes around dandelion seeds. The tumbleweed stops its roll. Ripped paper fuses back in place. A last drip of water settles at the tip of a stalactite.
A head of feathers lifts up in my chest, a beast of anger blinking both eyes open. And that’s when she turns, spreads her wings, showing me a tail full of feathers that stream down like golden ribbons.
Ribbons.
My breath catches. My back throbs.
I bring my trembling hands to come up and ghost over my back. My aching, empty back.
Remember.
I do.
Everything suddenly comes rushing in. It’s a barrage of rain that floods my mind and roars in my ears. Or maybe that’s the anger that just awoke, shaking off the groggy drug with a grind of a fang-filled beak.
Midas’s voice rises, competing with my own internal noise, and the crowd is eating up his announcement like sheep eating grain right from his hand. They don’t see that he’s no shepherd. They don’t see the predatory teeth. “I will bring the prosperity of my power, not only to Sixth and Fifth Kingdoms, but to Third as well. With the union of Fifth Kingdom and now my betrothal to Queen Kaila, we will take care of our people, and as the Golden King, I will bring Orea into a Golden Age!”
A clamor of applause breaks out, and Midas drops his hand at his side, pointing his finger covertly. His signal. The one for me to put on a demonstration to perfectly end his pretty little golden speech.
But I don’t move.
At the lapse of a second, his eyes cut over to me. “Gold-touch the railing,” he orders, speaking from the side of his mouth, but I still don’t do it.
Maybe it’s my fae heritage that allowed me to burn off the dew, or maybe it’s something else, but either way, I’ve cut through the last of the haze with a billowing breath.
Midas’s face darkens for a split second before he flicks a look back down at the crowd. He says something to finish the speech, making up for his lack of a flashy presentation of turning the mezzanine gold. They laugh at whatever he said, not noticing anything is amiss, but then, he’s always been good at charming a crowd. At charming me.
He used a silver tongue against a golden heart, and the glint of his lies dimmed every truth I knew.
Midas steps away from the railing, away from the crowd’s eyes. It’s only in private that he ever shows his true color, and it sure as hell isn’t gold.
The music starts up again, going along with the mingling voices and clinking glasses. There are hundreds of people down there. Slade is down there. But up here, in the shadows of the mezzanine, it’s just Midas and me.
Creases of anger line his forehead as he bears down on me. “What the hell was that, Auren? I explained what I needed you to do. It was fucking simple. You’ve completely ruined my golden speech!” he exclaims, brown eyes gone as dark as flooded dirt.
Hate is a visceral thing, a bloom unearthed in the background. I see it in his eyes, and maybe he sees it in mine too.
“You drugged me.” The accusation falls from a flat tone, as dry as prostrated plains. Even now, I can taste the viscid petal speckled with crimson dewdrops. It bled saccharine sweetness on my tongue. Saturated my mind. Syruped my limbs. Made me forget.
Even though it’s water that fills my eyes, it feels like fire.
“You drugged me,” I say again, stomach churning with an angry eddy. I want him to get swept up in it, to be pulled under. “You hurt Digby.” My second accusation tosses and seethes, like the sea beneath a storm, and I sail right into it with a brutalized back. “You cut off my ribbons!”
My voice cracks and crashes, the words grinding like the crush of gravel under a heel. My limbs tremble with rage.
Midas stares at me, and I can see his surprise that I’m so coherent, but my coherency is the least of his problems.
After a second, he crosses his arms and spreads his legs, plants his feet. “Yes, I did,” he admits with a terse tone. “You disobeyed me. Every punishment was deserved.”
Deserved.
Something prods in my chest, pounds against my ribs. The hammer of a blacksmith against an anvil, red-hot metal ready to be forged.
Midas lifts a shoulder. “Stop fighting me, Auren. This is your life. It’s time for you to settle back into it. You will take dew daily, and you will do your duty to your king.”
“It terrifies you, doesn’t it?” I ask. “Knowing that everything you are, hinges on me.”
Something dark flickers across his face.
“You speak about my punishment, but how about we consider what you deserve?”
I take a step closer to him, leaving just a foot of distance between us. To show him that I’m not afraid. To show him that even though he split me down the middle and stole pieces from my soul, he’ll never win.
My golden eyes burn as I look him dead in the eye. “I’m going to leave you, Midas,” I declare ruthlessly, enjoying it when his entire body stiffens. “I’m going to go where you can never find me again. You’ll search the ends of Orea for me. You’ll hear rumors, whispers of where I am, but every single time, I’ll slip through your fingers.”
At his sides, his hands tighten into fists, as if he’s already trying to close up the cracks.
“I’ll drag you along to every decrepit corner of the world, but you won’t ever find me. You’ll go months, years, decades searching in wild desperation.”
Chills scatter over my arms, like the goddesses are listening, a shiver of an omen kissed upon my skin.
“Your golden trinkets will dwindle. Your fame will turn to ridicule as your people turn against you. Your betrothed will abandon you, and the laws of this world will force the crown off your head, and still, you won’t find me. No matter how tirelessly you look. No matter how furious your search. And it will make you go mad.”
He can’t even blink, he stares so wildly at me, and I revel in it.
“You thought gold and power was your ascension, but it’ll be your downfall. You thought you could hoard me forever, but I’ll disappear right out from under your nose.” That pounding against my ribs hammers louder, shoots sparks off my soul. “You’ll be a laughingstock. Hated. Destitute.”
Midas flinches at that word. Physically jerks back, body rocking with the shock of my speech, and my beast and I preen beneath the delivered threat, celebrate the discovery of his worst fear.
“You will have no one and nothing to comfort you. You’ll die alone and poor, ruined by you
r own greed, and it will be exactly what you deserve.”
I land the last blow, watch him ring with it. Feel the reverberations as they tremble the air. As he trembles with it.
His fists unclench and clench again. His head shakes, like he’s trying to argue away my words or rattle them out of his skull.
“No,” he denies, though it comes out like an order. “You think you’ll get away from me? You think your monster commander will help you?”
“The only monster in this castle is you.”
Midas laughs, a cruel sound to poison the air. “I already have him, you know,” he tells me smugly, waiting to see how I take the news. “So if you think Commander Rip is going to come up here and rescue you, you’re going to be sorely disappointed.”
“I don’t need anyone to rescue me.”
My foot lifts as I take another step forward, and I enjoy it immensely when I see Midas take a step back. Satisfaction purrs from my gut.
“I’ll kill him,” Midas threatens. “I’ll kill that spiked bastard, and your guard too.”
Fury catches from the sparks, makes my eyes narrow in a squint. He expects me to falter beneath the threat, but instead, I burn hotter. “Touch them, and I’ll touch you.”
The threat pulls the blood from his face, his tanned skin going pale.
But right then, my skin tingles. A shiver travels down my tormented spine. Dusk hits, setting the sun and stealing my power with it.
Midas must notice, either because I let something show on my face, or his internal clock has become nearly as good as mine, because a cruel smile tips up his lips. “Colorful speech, Auren. Too bad you don’t have what it takes to back up those fiery words,” he mocks, making my eyes flash. “Be careful with that tongue of yours, hmm? We’re safe up here for the time being with the music and crowd, but Queen Kaila has a way of stealing secrets.” He glances over me appraisingly. “Though I have to admit, I’m surprised by this outspoken side of you. You’ve certainly come a long way since being the painted girl from Derfort Harbor.”
I blink. Something sharp scrapes my insides, blade angled just right. “What did you say?”
Gleam (The Plated Prisoner Series Book 3) Page 46