The King's Knight (Royal Blood Book 5)

by Kristen Gupton

  “Danier has been missing for long enough to throw his entire takeover into jeopardy,” Marique said, one of his gold and jewel-covered hands gingerly accepting the letter. “There has been an all-out rebellion in Takrah in his absence. You will be pleased to hear that the Onawa and the other tribes have what is left of Danier’s forces in retreat.”

  Etras leaned forward, eyes wide. “Are you serious? That is wonderful news!”

  “Quite,” Marique replied, carefully unfolding the note he’d been handed. He read it over in silence before smiling and shaking his head. “I didn’t imagine Emperor Betram would let the credit he has on account for a year’s worth of grain to go unfulfilled for long.”

  The Sadori’s brows rose. “Surely, he isn’t ordering it sent across the river to Takrah without being there himself.”

  “Not at all.” Marique refolded the letter and set it down on the table before him. “He’s ordering it all shipped upstream to Tordan Lea to repay King Keiran’s hospitality. An unusual display of generosity from our little friend, isn’t it?”

  Etras collapsed back into the plush cushions around him and laughed. “Good thing you’ve received that letter before he’s found out that Danier is gone, though, he’s something of a changed man after being driven out of the Sador Empire.”

  “Things tend to happen for a reason, Etras,” Marique replied with a smile. “I will send a ship up to Tordan Lea to bring our dear Emperor Betram back home before some other fool tries to take over in his absence.”

  * * *

  Garhan sat before a painting, putting the finishing touches on his brother’s likeness. Mari was sitting before the fireplace, smoking a pipe of meadow wort as had become her nightly ritual.

  He heard her draw in a sharp, fearful gasp, and before he set his brush down and turned, he already knew Baden would be there.

  The younger vampire lingered near the door to the room, his hands clasped behind his back. “Sorry for the fright.”

  Mari was on her feet, her pipe having fallen to the floor when she’d jumped up. “What do you want?”

  Garhan stood up and went to stand at his wife’s side, putting his arm around her shoulders. “Baden, I was wondering if you were ever going to come see us.”

  “You were expecting him?” Mari asked, looking up at Garhan.

  He gave a nod, not letting his gaze move from his younger brother. “Mari, he may just be able to help your pain.”

  Baden gave a nod and let his hands fall to his sides. “I cannot promise anything, but at the very least, I would like to have a look at you.”

  Mari turned slightly, frowning up at Garhan, slapping him in the middle of his chest. “It’s not bad enough that you discuss my issues with Keir, but now you’ve talked about it to him?”

  Garhan let his arm fall away from her, looking down into her eyes. “Why don’t you let him have a look at you just to see, Mari? What do you honestly have to lose?”

  Her scowl remained and she huffed, but her resolve faltered as a sharp twinge of pain ripped through her from the sudden rise to her feet just moments before.

  Garhan reached out and braced her as she stooped forward. “Mari?”

  With her cheeks burning red from her pain and frustration, she hissed between her teeth. “Fine, he may look, but I consent to nothing else.”

  Garhan gave her a nod and guided her over toward the bed. Mari moved away from him and gingerly crawled onto the mattress. With her inhibitions dulled from her drug use, she tugged off her shirt without regard to Baden’s presence before lying on her stomach.

  Baden raised his brows and looked at Garhan, waiting for permission to approach. Garhan looked over at him and gave a small nod.

  Baden went and sat on the edge of the bed. He looked down at Mari’s well-muscled back. She was incredibly fit from the amount of riding she did, and he smiled to himself before glancing up toward Garhan. “She is quite beautiful, you know.”

  Garhan raised a brow, his expression otherwise deadpan. “Focus, Baden.”

  Mari snorted and rested her cheek against the bed. “The poor boy must not get out much.”

  “I don’t, but I was being honest,” Baden replied, slowly reaching his hands out and placing them against her back, closing his eyes. He held perfectly still for several moments, and then he felt one of the ropey structures under her skin slither and shift.

  On cue, Mari tensed and drew in a sharp breath.

  Baden opened his eyes and looked up at Garhan. “Just as you said.”

  He gave a nod, having seen the tendril move.

  “Just as he said what?” Mari asked, lifting her head and straining to look back over her shoulder.

  “Your pain is being caused by something moving inside your back,” Baden replied.

  “What?” She twisted her neck, looking up at Garhan.

  The elder vampire sat down beside her, opposite to Baden and reached out to touch her cheek. “Remember how I said I felt something move in your back before?”

  She gave a small nod, feeling a knot of tension rising in her stomach. “You were just seeing the muscles cramping…”

  Garhan shook his head. “Mari, those aren’t muscle spasms. When I pulled the knife out of your back, it was stuck into one of those things, and it pulled out. I saw it, Mari. They’re like roots.”

  A wave of fear washed over her at the thought of something foreign living within her. “Garhan, that doesn’t make any sense! Where did they come from? What in the hell are they?”

  “That’s what I’d like to know,” Baden said, feeling one move along her spine again.

  Once more, Mari cringed in pain, reaching out her arm and seeking one of Garhan’s hands. “Get them out of me!”

  He took her hand, holding it in both of his while he looked at Baden. “Can you do anything about it?”

  Baden shrugged and thought for a moment. “I can accelerate the healing of wounds, but these…these have to be pulled out. Perhaps our father would have a more elegant solution, but…”

  Mari gave a pained sob, her fear worsening. “Do whatever it takes! I want it out! If those have been hurting me this much over the last year, I can’t keep living with it!”

  Garhan looked absolutely dangerous, his fangs visible when he finally addressed his brother. “Baden, I’ll give you permission since it’s what she wants, but if she doesn’t recover…”

  Baden lifted a hand and waved it toward Garhan. “I know, I know. You’ll kill me, and you’ll hardly be the first to want to do so.”

  He gave a nod and then leaned down, getting closer to Mari’s face. “Are you certain?”

  She gave a weak nod, tears in her eyes. “I can’t live with this pain anymore. I can’t!”

  “I just don’t want to lose you,” Garhan whispered, bringing one of his hands to her cheek.

  “Finding you again and getting to be with you since has fulfilled all I ever wanted out of this life,” she replied quietly. “If this can free me from the pain, Gary, I’m willing to take the chance.”

  Though he didn’t like it, he nodded and straightened up, looking at Baden again. “All right, do what you think you must.”

  Not breaking eye contact with his brother, Baden reached down and pulled a raven-handled dagger from his belt. “This will hurt her—a lot.”

  Garhan sighed and forced his stare back down toward Mari’s face, seeing her eyes clamped shut. “All right.”

  Baden looked at her back and waited for one of the tendrils to move again. He parted the fingers of his left hand and pinned the writhing structure between them before placing the dagger against her skin and making a quick slice.

  Mari cried out at the pain, but refused to move. Her grip on Garhan’s hand cinched down to the point of being painful. She went tense, clenching her jaw, her breaths frantic.

  Baden was surprised that Garhan didn’t reach over and strike him, but so far, his brother seemed to be keeping his focus on the woman. He pulled the cut open by pushing down on
either side of the wound, seeing the top of the root within. Baden frowned and set the knife aside before reaching into the incision and hooking his right index finger under the tendril. He tested how much resistance there was by pulling on it gently before adding more force to begin drawing the root from her back.

  Mari growled out, feeling a strange tugging in her back traveling in multiple directions from the cut Baden had made into her. An unnatural tingle raced through her left arm and leg, but it was short lived.

  Baden felt the root start to move freely, and he kept his pull on it steady and smooth as it emerged from the incision. Just as Garhan had said, it very much looked and felt like a tree root, though it seemed more flexible.

  Garhan looked at the root being pulled from his wife’s back, morbid fascination taking over. “Good God…”

  Though it was agonizing, there was almost a sense of relief within Mari as endorphins were dumped into her blood. She could feel whatever it was being physically removed, and she turned her head, biting the blanket on the bed and holding it between her teeth.

  Baden continued to pull, until one end and then the other emerged. The thing continued to writhe slowly in his grip. Once it was out of her back, it tried to curl around his wrist and forearm and he instinctively threw it toward the floor.

  Garhan got up from the bed quickly and went around, pinning the tendril against the floor beneath his boot. “What in the hell is this thing?”

  Baden looked down at it and gave a shrug. “It looks like a tree root, as you said.”

  “I want to see it,” Mari gasped, lifting her pale, sweat-soaked face from the bed.

  Though Garhan wasn’t keen on touching it, he reached down and grabbed the root before lifting it up into her line of sight.

  Mari’s face screwed up at seeing the blood-covered thing wriggling in her husband’s grip. “That…that is what has been hurting me?”

  “One of them,” Baden replied, seeing another moving on the opposite side of her spine from where he’d removed the first.

  “Throw it into the fire!” she ordered, her months of pain being traded in for furious anger. “Kill it then do the same for any others!”

  Garhan gave a nod and moved toward the fireplace. The root seemed to sense some manner of threat and one of its pointed ends jabbed into his wrist as it tried to force its way into his arm.

  He grit his teeth and grabbed it with his other hand, ripping it away and casting it into the fire.

  The root curled in the flames, its wet body sizzling as steam poured from it. Whether it screamed or it was just the vapor escaping, Garhan couldn’t tell. Soon, the root was in flames and very much dead.

  He looked down at the hole it had left in his wrist and frowned. Though it would heal within moments, it still hurt. He looked one more time to verify the thing was well on its way to becoming nothing more than ash before returning to Mari’s side.

  Baden picked up his dagger again and went for the second tendril on the other side of her spine. He repeated his actions and got the second out quicker than the first, more confident.

  Mari again bit the blanket, her breaths coming in quick order. Still, she remained brave, wanting nothing more than to have the alien creatures out of her once and for all. As with the first, her limbs again tingled, but this time on her right side.

  Baden carried the second one to the fire himself and cast it in. “Garhan, do you see any others?”

  He looked at his wife’s bloodied back and gently placed a hand against her, but nothing felt out of place, and there were no more unusual ridges or bumps to be seen. “I don’t think so.”

  Baden returned to Mari’s side. Surely, the writhing tendrils had done a fair amount of damage within her during their stay, and he wasn’t certain just how much he could heal her.

  “Are they all gone?” Mari asked, looking up at Garhan. “Are you certain?”

  “It looks like it,” he said, claiming her hand again.

  She visibly relaxed and let out a long breath.

  Baden placed his hands against the two incisions he’d made and hung his head, doing his best to channel his energy to help close the wounds. While he was nowhere near as adept at it as his father, he managed to get the skin over the cuts to heal if nothing else.

  While it had only taken him a few minutes, by the time he pulled his hands away, Baden was physically exhausted. “There…that is all I can do.”

  Garhan leaned forward and inspected her back. Though it was still bloody and bruised near the cuts, the openings themselves were gone. Two symmetrical lines of silver scar tissue graced either side of her spine.

  Mari let out a shuddering breath and slowly rolled over. Though she was sore, there was something very different within her. The constant sense of pressure in her back was mercifully gone. She stared up at the ceiling, wondering if that would really be the end of it.

  Garhan was more conscious of her bare chest than Mari was under the circumstances, and he quickly stood up, pulling the edge of the blanket over her. He reached over the bed and smacked Baden in the shoulder, noticing the younger vampire’s stare.

  Baden’s eyes went wide and he looked over at Garhan, lifting his hands slightly and looking apologetic. “Temper, big brother.”

  “Thank you, Baden,” Mari whispered, pleasantly drifting in the relief of having the procedure over.

  Chapter 12

  Athan’s automaton of Kayla was running again, the Talausian warlord sitting before it, a drink in hand. Though he wouldn’t admit it to anyone still living in the castle, he’d felt lonelier than he could ever recall since Sabetha had gone missing. Despite her shortcomings in the ways of personality, she really had been the closest thing to a true friend he’d ever had.

  Everyone eventually betrayed him, however. It shouldn’t have come as a surprise. Perhaps she’d even been compelled to leave against her will by Baden. That thought brought him some level of comfort, though he realized it wasn’t likely the case.

  “And you were the start of all the trouble,” he growled to the machine before him.

  Athan pushed himself up from his chair and started to pace around the room. He’d spent far too much time traveling in the harpy’s absence, doing his best to keep an eye on the outside world and trying to track Baden down. There had been no progress on the latter, however.

  He’d already discovered Danier’s disappearance. While no one seemed to know what had happened to the Sadori, Athan had his suspicions. The short-lived emperor had been too impulsive, ultimately.

  He’d certainly met his end, or he wouldn’t have allowed Betram to reclaim power in the Sador Empire without a fight. Whatever Danier’s fate, it was a disappointment, but not one Athan thought insurmountable.

  Keiran may still have been bent on taking down Talaus and stopping him from going into the Northern Wastes, but he had no means of doing so. The young vampire hadn’t done anything of interest since Athan’s visit that spring. Now, nearly six months later, winter would soon be upon them, and the Tordanian and the rest of his country would again go dormant for the season.

  Though the elder vampire had passed through Tordania, he’d not spent any significant time in the castle. Keiran had been too busy throughout the summer trying to set his country up to survive the coming winter to be of any real interest.

  As Sabetha had said before, boring, all boring.

  Athan moved to the control mechanism of the automaton and clicked off the switch that allowed it to run. A smile came to his lips as Kayla’s unnaturally smooth motions slowly drifted to a halt, her eyes fixed down toward him.

  “Next year or perhaps the one following, Kayla, it will be finished, and I will come for you,” he said, meeting the machine’s unseeing stare. “I won’t be alone forever.”

  * * *

  Mari sat on the end of her bed, staring down at the small silver box in her hands. It had been months since she’d needed the meadow wort within. In fact, she’d only continued to smoke it after Baden
had removed the roots from her back out of habit. She’d been sore at first, but it was a far cry from what she had previously suffered. That soreness had soon faded, however.

  The pain was simply gone.

  Garhan was working away as usual, his back to her, though he could feel the swirling emotions surrounding her. “Problem, my dear?”

  She sighed and looked over at him. “I think it’s time to throw the rest of this meadow wort away.”

  He turned and looked back at her, giving an honest smile. “You’re finally feeling confident that the pain isn’t going to return?”

  Mari reflected his expression. “I really am. Though I have aches and pains as I always have, I’m fine. Here, get rid of it.”

  He stood up and cracked his neck, stiff from working over the previous hours. Garhan lifted the silver box from her hands and opened the lid to look down into it as he turned toward the fire.

  A gust of wind came in through the open window. Several of the tiny leaves rustled within the box, a few of them fluttering out. Garhan flipped the lid of the box closed before too many escaped, however.

  He got to the fireplace and knelt down, only then opening the box and dumping its remaining contents within. While the air of the room was immediately filled with the sickly sweet scent of the meadow wort, the bulk of the smoke went harmlessly up the chimney.

  Garhan turned back to face her, tossing the empty box back toward his wife. “Done and gone.”

  She caught the box easily enough, sighing. “Thank you. Now, what shall we do?”

  Though he caught the hefty tone of her last words, Garhan shook his head and returned to his painting. “I only have a small bit to do with this. Let me finish and then I can entertain you, Mari.”

  The courier pouted, but it was short lived. “All right. I’m going to go check on the horses.”

  He heard her depart the room and picked up his cup of wine, tipping it to his lips, not seeing the few meadow wort leaves that had fallen within.

  He continued to work on the finishing details of his current painting, but a strange sense of disconnection was slowly taking him over. Garhan gave brief thought to whether or not the meadow wort smoke had intoxicated him.