The dragon roared.
And there was nothing in all of Kingdom that sounded quite like the roar of a dragon. They could move the heavens itself when they roared, but when an Earth Shaker roared, why...the earth itself would rip open.
The castle heaved mightily, causing her to stumble a step.
It was Owiot’s turn to latch onto her elbow, to steady her. And though she’d wanted nothing more than to feel his touch, she had far more pressing matters on her mind now.
Like why in the name of all that was holy had Button suddenly decided to make a showing in her realm?
Squashing her power to just the merest of trickles, she glared at the growing shadow, which was now massively huge and could no doubt destroy half this castle with one swipe of his golden tail should he be of a mind to.
She’d not seen Button in ages, and yet Fable recognized the ice blue of his eyes. Dragons, who’d been taken in as pampered and cherished pets, became what was known as familiars. Meaning they took on aspects of their keepers.
In Button’s case, he’d taken on Galeta’s blue coloration in his eyes.
“Damn that filthy fae to the very depths of the River Styx,” she spat heatedly.
If there was one thing in Fable’s life she was sure she’d never forgive, it would be Galeta’s cruel treachery.
Button landed gracefully on a turret that was, coincidentally enough, the proper size and length to handle the weight and mass of a dragon his size.
Ice blue eyes drilled intelligently into Fable’s heated ones.
“Well,” she snapped at him, knowing full well that the blasted creature hadn’t shown up here by coincidence at all.
Turrets weren’t made to support dragons. Which meant, grandmother had had a hand in this too.
She felt Owiot’s quizzical look on her face, asking without asking what in the world was going on. But it was never wise to turn one’s back on a fully-grown dragon. They tended to take the action as an insult and had been known to eat men for less.
“I come bearing news, dark queen,” he said in the thick dragonish burr of his kind. Like rolling sandpaper and the roar of a shifting tide all at once.
Owiot flinched; clearly he’d not expected the beast to talk. She wondered if in his realm they even knew what dragons were.
“Then, speak,” she snapped. “I’ve no time for your games today.”
He chuckled, and the tops of the mighty trees shook violently.
“Oh, come. Come. Queen. It was never I that had a grievance with you. Can we not be at least a little civil? We will be working together for quite some time.”
She curled her upper lip into a snarl. “Yes, and how is your bitch of a keeper today, eh? Dead, I hope.”
His chuckle caused the winds to slap against her face, pushing her back on her heels. She had to wrap her and Owiot in magic to hold them in place.
“Galeta the Blue,” he stressed, “is fine as ever. Thrust into the games with you, as I’m sure you know.”
“Oh, I saw her.” She rubbed her palms together menacingly. “Give her a message for me when you see her next, will you, darling?”
He lifted a scaled brow, ice blue eyes dancing merrily. Button had ever loved his verbal spars with her. “Anything for you, dark one.”
Her answering smile was full of hate and malice. “Tell her; I’ve not forgotten. And I look forward to my time with her in the ring.”
He chuckled. “I’ll make a note of that. But sadly, I am not here to chit-chat,” he said, snapping his corrugated and sharp as knives teeth back at her, “I come on higher orders today.”
“Indeed. Well, spit it out,” she huffed, crossing her arms and glaring hotly at him. Far as Fable was concerned, whether she and Button had ever shared grief was a moot point, he worked for the enemy, which made him her enemy too.
The way the lavender sunlight dappled along his scales was terribly pretty, though she’d never tell him so. Button gleamed like a polished marble of fool’s gold, casting radiant prisms along the stone walls of the castle and grounds.
“You know how the games work, so I am not here to lecture you further on that. What I am here for is to give you your own riddle to solve. Every contestant within the games has a quest particular to them. Yours is simply this, remember.”
She snorted. “Remember what?”
He shrugged massive shoulders. “That I cannot tell you, queen. Simply that you must decipher on your own what that might mean to you.”
“And if I don’t remember that nonsense?”
“Then you’ll be doomed to be apart eternally.”
She frowned. “What? Owiot and I? How is that punishment? We hardly know one another?”
~*~
Owiot
He looked at her curiously. She was still as beautiful as before, but there was an implacable coldness to her that he’d not seen while alone with her. A razor-edged hardness that she wore like a steel mask.
If he’d not witnessed the transformation with his own eyes, he’d have thought he’d gone insane. But the moment Fable had recognized the dragon; there’d been a subtle shifting in her appearance. Cold, foreboding, and...dark. He tasted that darkness in her now, like a disease of the soul it infected every inch of her.
Though he wasn’t afraid of her.
He was a god. She wasn’t. She had the blood of the gods running through her veins, and he tasted the strength of her will and power, but she could not harm him if he did not allow it.
But this woman...he did not like her as much. There was a cruelness to her that settled uneasily in his bones. He much preferred the woman he’d been with back in the Glen.
When they’d been alone, and she’d been unsure of the world around her. When she’d allowed a tiny sliver of innocence and pain to peek through the tightly controlled shell, she was used to wearing.
Why was she like this?
Owiot, because he rarely mingled amongst others, had become very good at one thing. Studying and seeing beneath the veneer others presented to the world. Even amongst the gods, he could recognize truth from lie easily.
And this...who she was right now, this was a lie.
But why?
The dragon chuckled deeply and again the very earth shook with the sound of it. Owiot had never been around such majestic creatures before, though he had heard of them, monsters that roamed the other realms. Intelligent, but deadly creatures that would raze an entire town to get at their treasure.
There was clearly history between Fable and this dragon, and none of it sounded good.
“I do not know why things are as they are, dark queen. I am simply the messenger.”
She snorted. “Well, message delivered. You may go now.”
He tsked. “Not yet, though I am sure you’d love nothing so much as getting me out of your hair until I deliver my entire message I cannot leave.”
Fable rolled her eyes. “Then get on with it and spare me further grievance.”
The dragon released his grip on the turret and held up one large clawed foot. Extending out each claw as though they were fingers, he proceeded to run through the litany of what would be required them in this race.
“The game is set to last a month. The only way to end your time here is to confess to true love. It cannot be a false confession as Aphrodite will know. If you do confess falsely, you’ll be penalized. Every few days you will be placed into a life or death match, pitted against one of the other queens trapped in this realm. The rules to winning are simple. Do whatever needs doing to stop your opponent.”
“Kill them? Is that what you’re saying?”
“If needs be.” He shrugged as though he didn’t care.
“Whatever. What else?”
Owiot frowned at her blithe and easygoing manner with which she’d said it. As though life meant very little to her.
“As you already know, though I feel I should stress the saying of it, the last couple to remain in the games will face severe punishment. So do not be
the last. Fall in love, which is the entire purpose of the games.”
Again she rolled her eyes and muttered something softly under her breath, something that had sounded suspiciously like, “whatever.”
He pursed his lips.
“The only other things of note is this,” the dragon pressed on, “when the day comes for the trial, it will be I that takes you there. And all familiars have been swapped.”
She cocked her head, looking truly concerned this time. “Mirror?”
The dragon nodded. “Yes, he is here.”
“Who is he with?” she asked quickly.
“That I cannot say.”
“Is he safe?” she rushed on, sounding almost breathless with fear.
It was the first time he’d heard such a sound come from her. And here...here he knew she’d let that hard shell crack just a bit to show the true woman once again. She was anxious, scared really, for someone or something other than herself.
And he couldn’t help but drape his arm over her shoulder and give her a soft squeeze, responding immediately to the pain in her voice.
She gasped, going completely still on him and glancing at him from the corner of her eye.
Intrinsically, Owiot understood Fable wasn’t used to contact. Probably of any sort. So he was surprised that rather than step out of his arms, instead, she rested her weight upon him just a very tiny bit. Though she hadn’t relaxed, she was giving him the cue that his touch wasn’t wholly unappreciated.
“No familiar may be harmed during the trials. Mirror is safe,” the dragon replied directly.
And she released a shaky breath. But then that armor went back up into place, and this time, she did step out of the circle of his arm. Leaving him to stare quizzically at her.
Her moods were as mercurial as the winds.
“You have two days time before the first trial takes place. A chance, no doubt, for all the couples to learn one another. When the time comes, I will return for you. Until then, you have this.”
He extended his neck, and for the first time, Owiot realized the dragon wore a necklace. Dangling off the necklace was a delicate looking, red glass pendant that gleamed like flame.
Fable snapped her fingers, and immediately the necklace had transferred from him to her. It rested on the palm of her hand and was in fact much bigger than it had at first appeared on the dragon’s neck.
Her lips set into a thin line. “A looking bauble, is that it?”
How she’d figured that out so quickly was beyond Owiot. He’d simply thought it jewelry.
The dragon nodded. “Aye. That it is. If you wish you, you may look inside of it and study which queen it is that you’ll be facing next. Though if I’m not mistaken, rumor has it you’ll be paired off with Baba Yaga first.”
“That witch,” she said with a clipped voice. “Lovely.”
And that lovely had definitely sounded anything but.
Owiot was almost tempted to chuckle at the pained look in her expression. He liked it when Fable dropped the mask; there was so much more to the woman than merely a beautiful façade.
Chuckling again, as the dragon often seemed wont to do, he shrugged. “Blame your family for that; I am simply the messenger. Now, I must bid thee adieu. Enjoy yourselves,” he said the last in singsong, and then with one final mighty roar that caused both he and Fable to grimace in response, the dragon jumped into the sky and flew off.
Leaving him and her alone.
Again.
And this time when she turned to look at him, her mask had fallen once more and instead of the imperious, frightful queen...what he saw on her face now, made him open his arms to her.
She didn’t say anything to him. Simply walked into them, buried her face in his chest, and curled her fingers tight to his back. And he knew then; he’d been right. The Fable the world saw was nothing but illusion; smoke and mirrors cast by an exceptionally talented witch, but one that seemed to drain the very life out of her each time she did it.
Owiot could hardly fathom the many sides and faces of this woman, all he knew was this...he was desperate to learn her.
All of her.
“This is not good, Owiot,” she said softly, “this is very not good.”
Chapter 11
Fable
They explored the castle quickly.
Moving from room to room with alacrity. There’d be more time to go in-depth later on, and for some reason, Fable felt the need to play hostess to him. Though she knew about as much of this place as he did. But the truth was, she needed this tour to end soon.
She needed to get away from him for a moment. She needed solitude, a place to hide and gather her thoughts without his eagle-eyed gaze following her every movement.
They’d barely gotten to half the castle when the need to flee overwhelmed her, and she rudely announced, “Pick your room. I’ve picked mine.”
Fable didn’t wait for him to respond. She snapped her fingers, and vanished to the one room she’d known from the start would be hers.
The tower. And this tower, it was identical to hers back home. Built of gray stone, with one tiny window, to let in sunlight, a small bed, a rug, hearth, and a workbench.
Stepping through was almost like coming home. The small space was comforting and familiar, and the shakes that had gotten hold of her while touring the damned place began to slowly ease.
Gripping the edge of the table until her knuckles blanched, she hung her head, closed her eyes, and tried to breathe.
Owiot was disrupting her equilibrium.
And that was happening with him doing nothing at all.
Except he had, hadn’t he? He’d touched her. Placed an arm around her when Button had appeared, and when the beast had left he’d opened his arms to her and held her tight.
Why?
Why didn’t he sense her capacity for violence and darkness? He had to; evil leeched from her very pores. She’d become one with it now.
She looked to the far wall, where Mirror would have been if this had truly been her home. But he wasn’t there. The corners of her lips turned down, feeling a strange, disquieting ache in the center of her heart at his absence.
Ever since coming to the above she’d never been long without her friend. Her only friend.
Moving to sit on the edge of the straw-filled mattress that would be her bed for however long it took before she could escape this nightmare, she gazed out the window with unseeing eyes and wondered if she’d made the right decision to come to this after all?
And as she wondered that, her mind inevitably returned to what she’d done. To Snow. To her people. All of them locked in the sleep of the dead, forever and permanently frozen in time should she never utter the incantation to break their curse.
She’d been justified in her actions.
Hadn’t she?
Sitting in this tower, looking out at the lavender skyline, she was no longer so sure of herself. Of anything anymore, really. She squeezed her eyes shut and tried to forget about Kingdom, about all the people who’d betrayed and hurt her through the years. She sank into the darkness she always retreated to when life became too much, but this time, the darkness wasn’t comforting her...this time, it pricked at her soul, trying to force her to acknowledge an unpleasant truth about herself.
But, just as she’d done countless times before, she quieted that still, small voice. Ignoring it’s unsettling truths, burying them deep in her consciousness, to a spot so black and void within her that she could get lost in it.
“Do not think,” she whispered, “do not think of this.”
And like she’d done so many times before she was finally able to let it go. But like a crowded closet, she knew that she was quickly reaching the tipping point before the doors were shattered and all that she’d hidden within came tumbling out. The day that happened, she had a horrible, sinking feeling that she might not survive it.
Fable had no idea how long she sat there in a trance-like pose until suddenly she grew aw
are of his presence. Owiot’s energy rushed through her like a shock of bright, white light. Scattering and clearing the dreck and shadows that lived within her and just as it had when she’d first seen him she took in a breath that didn’t hurt, that made her feel...free.
White magic didn’t mean the wielder was pure and faultless. What it did mean was that the practitioner tapped into the powers of nature rather than the forces of darkness.
She looked up, and his gaze was steady and oddly comforting. Even though she saw him, he rapped gently on the door as though to announce his presence without startling her.
“May I come in?” he asked in that same calm cadence of his that made her flesh tingle and her bones feel soft within her.
Twisting her lips, she waged an internal battle with herself. She wanted to send him away, demand he leave her alone. Because that’s what she always did. When life got too confusing or hard for her, she withdrew into her tight shell. Never letting anyone in.
So why weren’t the words coming to her now? Why couldn’t she seem to form the sentence together and say it?
Frustrated with herself and tired of always being so guarded, her shoulders drooped, and she muttered, “Whatever.”
He padded softly toward her, his footsteps so silent that had she not been watching him move, she’d have thought he hadn’t budged yet. His loping graceful manner reminded her of a wolf almost—predatory and powerful, but curious.
Her damned traitorous heart began to pound rapidly in her chest. Completely against her will, she found herself fascinated by this male.
Stopping only once he’d gotten to within a few inches of her, he knelt. So that he came eye level to her and cocked his head, causing his razor-straight hair to slide like a graceful mahogany wave across his naked shoulder.
“Have I done wrong, Fable?”
She frowned hard. “What?”
His deep chocolate eyes never flinched at her cold reply.
“Why did you run from me?”
She chuckled darkly. “Run? From you? You must be mad.”
“Stop that.” His voice was intense and serious. “Do not hide behind that mask with me. I won’t allow it.”
Gobsmacked, breathless, and also chagrined—all emotions she never handled well—she straightened her shoulders, giving into the rage that always simmered just below the surface with her.
The Dark Queen (The Dark Queens Book 5) Page 12