by E. M. Knight
And Raul is there, positioned on top of me, looking as if he’s never seen me before.
I can’t help it. I smile. He sees the smile, looks taken aback for a moment…
Then drops his head and embraces me with all he’s worth.
“I thought I’d never see you again,” he whispers in my ear. “I thought that when Morgan got you, that was the end.”
I push him up, away, so I can look into his eyes. He blinks, seeing my face, and then swoops down and kisses me on the floor.
A moment later he’s helping me up. I rise onto wavering feet.
I am surprised to see a ring of guards circling the Queen.
Phillip turns on us from their midst. There are peculiar flecks of black in his eyes. But he speaks normally.
“The Queen is dead,” he announces.
A shocked silence takes the room.
Phillip motions to the discarded half of the Narwhark, and he looks straight at me. “You will explain what happened here.”
It’s not a question. Rather, an undeniable command.
“Morgan summoned the demon,” I say, not brining my eyes to her corpse.
Yet in my head, I wonder, She’s dead? I didn’t have time to kill her! And what about the oath?
“She used magic to cut it in two. Then she drank the blood, and made out of herself… whatever you see is left.”
Raul stiffens at my side. “She drank the demon blood?” he asks.
“It was hideous,” I confirm. “Horrible. The transformation that took her...”
I shudder.
Quickly, Phillip commands his guards to throw a cloak over his mother’s body, then pick it up and carry it out.
I feel suddenly drained. There was no victory, no sense of satisfaction. As I watch them carry Morgan’s remains out, the most emotion I can muster is an awed shock.
“I didn’t think I’d killed her,” I mumble to Raul. The promise I made to the three witches sears into my head. I am beset by horrible guilt. “I didn’t want her dead.”
Phillip approaches us. Raul takes a protective stance in front of me.
“It was not your fault,” Phillip says. “I knew that when you two were locked in here, only one would emerge.”
Suddenly, I remember Phillip’s role in getting us to this point. My hackles rise.
Something is wrong, I think.
Phillip reaches into his jacket. He takes out a beautiful, diamond-studded tiara. He holds it out with both hands. He bows his head and presents it to me.
“This is now rightfully yours,” he intones. “You are The Haven’s Queen.”
I just look at him. I don’t take the crown. All of this feels wrong. All of it feels rotten.
Raul steps in the way. “Where did you get that?” he demands.
“Doesn’t matter,” Phillip answers. “It is hers by right.”
“Just like that?” Raul questions. “After your role in all of this, after all you subjected her to, just like that?”
Phillip glances at his brother. “The Captain Commander answers to The Haven’s Queen,” he says. “That’s the part you did not realize before. There can only ever be one rightful Queen. She gives orders. I obey.”
“You obeyed and threw me in a cell. You made Eleira Morgan’s prisoner!”
“All things that were necessary at the time,” he responds. “But I’m not a fool! Our coven’s strength comes from the very top. It flows down through the rest of the ranks, through Incolam and Elite alike. Morgan is gone. Eleira remains. She is the one I answer to now.”
“Curious, how you change sides so easily,” Raul observes.
I feel a spark of anger jolt through Phillip. Wisely he keeps it at bay.
“I have not changed sides,” he growls. “I was, and ever will be, loyal to the Queen. What Eleira was put through was a test. The Haven needs—it deserves—the stronger ruler. Morgan pitted herself against Eleira. Morgan lost.” His words have a sense of absolute finality to them. “To see it any other way would be ludicrous. Now take the crown, Eleira, and make it yours! Our vampires were promised a Queen tonight. When you emerge, you will be that!”
I sneak a look at Raul, hoping for guidance. The shock of what’s happened has not yet worn off. Morgan, dead? The Queen who’s ruled this coven since inception, really gone?
Why aren’t Raul or Phillip mourning the loss as they should be? Even if she did go against them, she was still their Mother. She was still their blood!
“How can you both be so stoic?” I whisper.
Raul grunts. “Necessity makes you immune to pain.”
Phillip scoffs. “Eleira, the Queen opened my eyes to enormous power.”
To demonstrate, he extends one hand.
A streak of white flame shoots from his palm and sears into the cavern wall.
Shock takes me, and I take an involuntary step back. “You can do magic?” I say.
He looks up. His eyes latch onto mine. The dark specks are flowing across the whites in an angry current.
“Yes,” he says. “And my powers are now at your disposal, if only you would take the crown.”
I reach out for it. Raul makes no move to interfere.
My fingers touch the edge. A sharp zap shoots through me, like static electricity.
I wince but do not take my hand away.
Phillip lets go. The tiara is lighter than I can believe. That shooting feeling intensifies. The diamonds in it start to glow.
My eyes widen in alarm as I realize I cannot let go. I don’t have control of my hands, of my fingers, of my arms…
As quick as it began, the sensation stops. The crown abruptly gains weight. It becomes three, four times as heavy.
“It’s bound to you,” Phillip says. “Now only you can activate the glow of the diamond. That is how others know you are the rightful Queen.”
I look to Raul. “Is that accurate?”
“I only saw Mother wear it at ceremonies,” he hedges. “And yes, every time she had it on, the center diamond was lit. No time else.”
Slowly, I raise the crown above me, then lower it onto my head A chill washes over me as it sits in place.
I certainly don’t feel like a Queen.
Raul steps back. “It’s glowing,” he says.
I nod. Then I shudder and take it off and shove it back at Phillip. “If your Mother only wore it at ceremonies, that is what I intend to do.”
It feels so absolutely surreal to consider Morgan dead.
It’s almost as if Phillip reads my thoughts, because he says, “Mother did not die by your hand, Eleira. It is the demon blood that killed her. Some things even vampires cannot recover from.”
I nod. I want to say something about what Morgan told me she was meaning to do—about why she found it necessary to drink the blood—but it’s something I only feel comfortable confiding in Raul.
“A proclamation must be made,” Raul stirs. “All our vampires felt that shockwave. All of them know something transformative has happened. They were waiting for the succession. They must know that the ceremony is moot and the transfer of power done.”
“Is it really so simple?” I wonder. “The way I thought of it… I thought the ceremony would be what gave me Morgan’s powers.”
“Her powers were bound to the crown,” Phillip says. “And the great throne torrial. There isn’t anything more. The crown is yours. The throne will be when you first direct magic through it.”
“And I’ll be linked to it forever,” I whisper. “Bound to the borders of the coven’s land for as long as I live.”
“We need to go,” Raul interjects.
“Wait,” I say. “Phillip, the magic you’re wielding is dangerous. It corrupts.”
He sneers in contempt but manages to hold his tongue.
“I need to know I have your loyalty. Raul may have forgiven you for what you did on Morgan’s orders—”
“I haven’t,” Raul says. “But I see the need for cooperation. Especially between kin.”
“You see why it’s easy to question you,” I tell Phillip. “You’re not yourself. I want your word. I want a vow, that you give yourself to your Queen.”
“Of course, I do,” he says haughtily. “The monarch’s might is absolute.”
“Then seal your word by taking my hand and swearing to me.”
I hold my palm out.
He almost—nearly—rolls his eyes. But just when I think he’s going to refuse, he surprises me by latching his hand to mine.
“As your Captain Commander, I swear to always abide by your rule, to always surrender to your law, and to follow your every command.”
As the final word falls from his mouth I open my mind to the Elements and weave the most delicate, intricate net. Before he releases my hand, I cast it over him.
I see it settle into place and harden into eternity.
Phillip hisses and draws back. “I felt that!” he accuses. “What did you do?”
“I bound you to your word,” I say simply. I don’t know where knowledge of the spell came from, only that I knew it instinctively. “For as long as you live, Phillip, you will be bound to that oath. I hope you took it seriously. You’ll find that you can never break it.”
He stares at me, with venomous, hateful accusation in his eyes.
“I’ve never heard of such a thing,” Raul mutters. “A spell that makes a promise unbreakable? That’s… fascinating.” He turns to me.
“But also wrong.”
The reprimand takes all the wind out of my sails. “Wrong?” I ask. “How do you figure it’s wrong?”
“An oath given should be upheld by honor, not force,” Raul says. “Lest it become a prison.”
“Undo this thing,” Phillip growls. “You’ve chained me like an animal!”
I square my shoulders on them both. “I will not. You have not proved yourself to be worthy of trust. Before, maybe, yes. But Morgan corrupted you. You sabotaged us in the hall.” I motion to Raul. “If you think I’ll simply let that be water under the bridge you are wrong. You will need to earn trust again, Phillip. Otherwise, I’ll make you a real prisoner, like you did to Felix.”
I step forward. Now I’m feeling a little bit more of my strength. “You will take me to him now. He did nothing wrong. There was no conspiracy. He will be released.”
Phillip glares at me. I can see him straining to say something against that.
But the spell works exactly as it should. He bows his head, turning away, and mutters, “As the Queen commands.”
Chapter Fourteen
Raul
The stronghold
I walk with Eleira toward the room where Felix is being kept. Phillip leads us.
I do not agree with Eleira’s choice to bind him to the oath. Not at all.
But my objection is not on moral grounds. I’m opposed to the spell because it allows Philip to walk free, without suffering any recourse for what he did to us.
I couldn’t say that directly, though. I could not say that out loud. I wanted to see the necessary justice done on my brother, and I wanted him to have the chance to repent.
Without that opportunity, I will never know if he’s truly gone or not.
Because the vampire walking in front of us now is nothing like the Phillip I grew up with. Whatever Mother did to him, it changed him. Completely and utterly changed him.
It’s almost like there’s a different person inhabiting Phillip’s skin.
And mother is dead.
She’s dead. Phillip said so. I saw the crown take to Eleira with my own eyes. That confirmed it—the former Queen’s link to the artifact was broken.
Why do I feel no remorse?
Maybe it’s an extension of the vampiric darkness that pervades my soul.
I’ve never lost a vampire relative before. The way Mother treated me and treated Eleira, and transformed Phillip for the worse almost makes me glad she’s gone.
I grit my teeth in irritation. Am I so hardened now that I can rejoice in my own Mother’s death?
Phillip reaches the door. He takes the ring of keys from his belt and opens the lock.
A bloodied and bruised Felix lies slumped against a rock pillar in the middle of the floor.
His wounds are healed, of course. The vampire essence would see to that.
Still, he looks to be in horrendous shape.
He lifts his head on our entrance. He sees Phillip first and scowls.
Then he takes in me and Eleira, and his expression lightens.
“Release him,” Eleira commands.
Phillip moves almost robotically to undo the silver chains.
Felix stands once the chains are off. He manages to still look dignified despite his present condition.
It’s the precision of his movements, I realize.
“What happened?” Felix asks. “When you were taken—”
Eleira waves the question away with one hand. “Do you still swear loyalty to me?”
Felix bends at the waist in a sharp bow. “Of course. Always. You are the one set to inherit rule.”
“Will you give me your guidance and let me rely on you in the pursuit of our enemies?”
Felix straightens and nods. “Yes, if you so wish.”
“Do you have any grievance against either Raul or James?”
“Against Raul? None. We’ve sparred in the past but always from positions of respect. James—I cannot say. I don’t know the full extent of what he’s done.”
“You’ll be told, in time,” she says.
I look at Eleira. What’s she working toward?
“You were the Queen’s keeper of certain torrials,” she continues. “Do you still have access to them?”
“I… would not be able to say, Eleira,” he answers honestly, shifting his gaze to Phillip. “Much could have changed in the short time I was imprisoned. The Queen could have—”
“The Queen is dead,” she interrupts him. “I am the ruler now.”
Felix’s eyebrows go up. “Dead,” he murmurs. “I did not think that was possible.”
“The plan she hatched to steal the succession from me backfired,” Eleira says. I’ve never seen her so confident. “You once told me that you knew witches from long ago, from before this coven was made. Is that true?”
“I’ve never lied to you.”
“Then I call upon you to renew those old alliances.”
He blinks. “I’m sorry? Eleira, the witches I knew were all human. They are long-since gone from this Earth.”
She gives a thin smile. “From this Earth, yes,” she says softly, “but not from existence.”
Felix frowns. “I don’t know what you mean.”
Eleira glances at me. Just for a second, just for a moment.
But that one look is enough for me to know the girl I love is right there. That she hasn’t been lost, only… hardened. By the experience she just had.
By the responsibility she now bears.
“If I told you to find the remains of the witch settlement you once knew,” she continues. “If I told you to go there, for me, and report back on what you find, would you do it?”
“Certainly. But I can tell you now, there won’t be anything left.”
Eleira rolls up her sleeve and shows him her forearm. She concentrates.
After a moment, a glowing rune appears etched on her skin.
“Mon Dieu!” Felix whispers. “It cannot be.”
I can’t remain quiet any longer. “What?” I ask. “What is it?”
But Eleira compels me to silence with a raised hand.
“You recognize this marking?”
“Of course,” Felix says in a hoarse voice. “It is the brand of the Forsaken Sisters. It’s not been sighted in… in millennia.”
“But you know it, somehow? You were not alive when they were free.”
“No,” he says. “But there are records… scrolls, I saw, at the old settlements.”
“That is where you will go for me. And see what more y
ou can uncover. The Forsaken Sisters—” she seems to stumble over the words, for whatever reason, “—are not dead. And they wish to be turned into vampires. For that, I gave them my word.”
Felix shakes his head very slowly. “I don’t understand...” he says. He shifts his gaze and meets Eleira’s eyes. “But I will do everything you ask.”
“And for it, you will be rewarded,” she promises. “When you return, I will make you my new Captain Commander.”
Phillip chokes.
“The current one has exhausted his utility to me.”
Chapter Fifteen
Dagan
The Crypts
Every breath I breathe, every step I take, proves an exercise in absolute agony.
Riyu may have stopped the corrosive poison from leaking into the rest of my body. But that does absolutely nothing for the pain I feel under the tortured flesh.
The demon’s venom razed through all my vampire defenses. It ruined me. Even now, limping after the smaller vampire, every motion fills me with extreme pain. With horrible agony.
I did not think I’d ever experience a failure of my body as bad as I did from the severed connection with the magic blade.
But this is in many ways worse. I’ve been alone in the room with the demon many times before. Each of those times I felt the hatred emanate from it… but it never attacked.
I consider myself a fool for getting close enough for it to hurt me. I did not know it could spray venom. And somehow, it bewitched Riyu to make him try to free it.
Maybe this is the best possible outcome, given the situation. Riyu would have unleashed it onto The Crypts had I not stopped him. I did my duty, as it’s bound to the vampires of our coven.
But the ruined flesh on my back reminds me of the immense sacrifice that took.
Riyu turns a corner. He runs forward, then stops and looks back at me.
“Quickly!” he presses.
I grit my teeth to stop from exploding at him. I’m going as fast as I possibly can!
He runs back and makes as if to help me. I push him away before he can humiliate us both.
“I’m still standing,” I say in a menacing growl.