I smirked: mummy was home.
I twisted, clambering up to stare at the dais on the far side of the room and the woman on the giant throne built of dove grey and violet feathers.
Plucked from fallen enemies, Drake had told me, and traitors.
My kingdom built upon the dead.
‘Lass didn’t kneel, Queen Miniel,’ Braids muttered with a hard Glaswegian twang, scuffing her foot against the floor, her wings drooping. ‘Just wanted to teach her some manners.’
‘You will, Supreme Commander Battle. But not before I talk to my baby bird. And why would any daughter of mine kneel?’ The Matriarch’s thin mouth twitched.
One long finger beckoned.
Yeah, like I do beckoned, any more than I do summoned.
I took a breath, before sweeping towards the platform and the woman Rebel and Ash, the blokes who’d risked death to fight by my side, had tried to protect me against.
Why hadn’t they wanted me to come to Angel World?
The Matriarch’s ash-blonde hair, the exact shade of my own, cascaded all the way down to the tips of her crushed diamond stilettos: definite ballbuster. Feathers were woven tribal into the strands.
Hell, my mum’s cool beauty made me crave to prostrate myself and kiss her toes.
Her dress shimmered pearl-like and perfect. I clutched at the ripped shoulder of my dress, pinning the flaps, before letting them go. They gaped obscenely. This was perfection Rambo-style.
But then, I hadn’t been expecting an audience with Queen of the Assholes.
My mum who’d ignored me for sixty-two days...
I swaggered closer.
A kneeling angel with short strawberry blond hair bowed before me, his cheek and wings pressed to the freezing floor; his back vibrated with tremors.
I’d craved respect?
Maybe I wasn’t pure angel enough to get off on his terror.
I nudged the kneeling angel with my foot, and he shot up, his bent wing raising between me and the platform like a step. There were already bloody footprints pressed into his feathers.
I stroked my fingers through the bloke’s hair. Then I boosted off his wing onto the platform, and he flinched.
A rich scent, like Drake but darker — not frankincense, but myrrh — wrapped me in its velvety hold.
I flung myself down on the only other throne on the platform: a smaller copy of the Matriarch’s in feathers of the slain, next to hers. I booted my legs over its arm and crossed my arms behind my head.
This time it was me sniggering at the collective outraged beating of the Glories’ wings. ‘Now I’m in your yard, so let’s parlay.’
The Matriarch didn’t even turn to look at me. ‘In truth, you reveal with your words what you wish to hide. My, what my little one has to learn.’
‘You’re twenty-one years too late, bitch.’ I bit my lip. She was right. And one thing these angels were good at? Hiding: truth, pain, love… ‘So, bust me open. What do you see?’
The Matriarch’s lizard eyes blinked. ‘Sister. Lover. Enemy.’ I winced, and finally, she turned to scrutinise me. ‘And slave.’
The only other time I’d met the Matriarch — sixty-two feathers in a cupboard ago and on the first day I’d been brought to Angel World as Drake’s spoils of war — I’d trembled in front of this platform.
The throne room had been emptied then, apart from the Matriarch and me, with Drake beside her grotesque feather throne.
It was lucky I wasn’t the heart-warming reunion sort. The most I’d raised from the Frost Bitch had been a quirk at the side of her lips.
But fam is fam, yeah?
Drake had curled into a ball at the Matriarch’s feet, tucking his hands and wings underneath himself, as if expecting her to break them.
The Matriarch had pulled Drake up to his knees, petting his curls. He’d blushed all the way to his chest, shooting me a mortified glance.
The Matriarch had run her hands over his wings, from the base to the tip. He’d arched away from the touch, but she’d pressed deeper. Then her eyes had suddenly fluttered.
I’d sensed the memories torn from Drake’s mind into the Matriarch’s by her invasive touch.
The violation.
Were the blokes not allowed to cover their wings, so they’d always be exposed? Unable to conceal their status, Fallen, falling, or Broken? Or to shield themselves from another’s attack on their mind?
Drake had keened, but the Matriarch had only yanked on a curl, until he’d fallen into a shaking silence.
Her gaze had flickered to me. ‘Baby bird, this is going to be wild.’
I’d clasped the pouch around my neck, which held my sister’s crystal necklace.
Jade had still been missing, like all the disappeared kids of Hackney. Until I’d found my sister, queen or not, my mum would have to wait.
‘Let’s get to the bonding crap later.’ I’d taken a step towards the Matriarch. ‘Where’s my sister?’
‘Interesting.’ She’d yanked Drake’s curls again, and he’d whined. ‘Somebody, by the Glories, needs to learn patience.’
And I’d learnt it. For sixty-two bastard days.
Now the Matriarch lifted her hand, and a streaky brown Merlin falcon, with a shrill ki-ki-kee, dodged low across the throne room, through the kneeling angels, rapidly beating its pointed wings.
I narrowed my eyes. ‘My sister—'
‘Patience: have you not learnt it?’ The Matriarch shifted, as the Merlin landed on the arm of the throne.
‘Anyone told you that your parenting sucks?’ I tilted my head. ‘You play the absent card, then when the powers hit me like a freaky second puberty, you’re all authoritarian because I said so. Why do you even want me here?’
She cooed, stroking the Merlin’s black tipped feathers, as it folded back its wings. ‘Good girl, Caron.’
‘Enough with the Bond villain routine. If you won’t tell me about my sister…’ Rebel’s despair ached like a phantom limb. I couldn’t save everyone, not at once, but I could save the punk. Was I making a mistake to trust him again? ‘I’m only kicking it back with you because Rebel saved me. He also betrayed me but he’s why I’m a huntress.’ I swallowed. ‘He was a good Custodian.’
Through my bond with Rebel, memories hit as hard as emotions, forced across my retinas like a 4D movie.
…A glade speared by oaks behind a witches’ house, as I trained with Rebel, pinning him against a tree, his hands between mine, whilst snowflakes fell around us like confetti, and my mouth ghosted his…
Was Rebel sending me a message? After all, his Angelic Power was memories. Or was it the bond uniting us? Could Rebel feel it too?
Hell, please let him feel it too…
I jerked, awake to the throne room again, as the movie faded.
My throat was too tight to swallow.
‘Good Custodian?’ Battle sneered to her audience of angels.
Titters, guffaws, giggles.
I flushed, clenching my teeth so hard my jaw hurt.
Boom.
The throne room rocked and shuddered.
The sunlight sparked, before bursting to blackness at the explosion.
Screams and whimpers.
I shrank back against the feathers, drawing my knees to my chest.
A single spear of light cut across the Matriarch. She towered, her hair flowing as if it was alive; flashes rainbow-flickered across her body.
Caron perched on her shoulder. She stared down at the angels, who — male and female alike — lay on their faces in the dark at her feet.
Even Battle.
Who’s kneeling now, bitch?
‘You dare laugh at my daughter? Did I not make clear to do so was to court the dark?’ The Matriarch demanded.
Silence.
‘You wish to laugh some more?’ She raised one pale eyebrow.
Why is it when you know you shouldn’t laugh, you’re hit with the nervous giggles? I almost wanted to snigger at myself.
‘One da
y without light. My, aren’t you silly children. As to the Addict, Zachriel?’ She shrugged. ‘He receives what he deserves. And you, baby bird, deserve better.’
I leapt off the throne.
Rebel deserved the dark? I deserved captivity? These angels deserved to cower at her feet?
I yearned to claw off my mum’s superior mask. And I remembered Drake’s dare. What nobody else would risk: to ask this psycho queen about my dad.
After all, I’d always been nobody…
Sometimes, in the swirl of my rage, I forgot my street smarts.
‘Why do I deserve better? I’m a monster, yeah?’ My lip curled. ‘Unless my dad’s stashed under your skirts.’
I hadn’t reckoned the silence could get even deeper.
I was wrong.
The Matriarch calmly settled herself on her throne, rustling behind her for something brown and wriggling, which she threw into the air.
Caron plunged, catching the creature in her beak; she ripped into leathery wings, before pinning it with yellow claws on the Matriarch’s shoulder as she tore into its furry body.
A live bat.
The Matriarch didn’t flinch.
I shuddered, but looked away, as Drake was dragged by Battle into the throne room and to his knees below us at the bottom of the platform.
Did that mean Drake was Battle’s Wing?
I winced.
The Matriarch knew.
About the dare. Our game. Drake’s manipulation.
Hell, one of us was dead.
Drake was ashen as he peeked at me from underneath his eyelashes; I experienced a twinge of guilt.
Strange, it didn’t feel right to be looking down on Drake, or to see the glee in the Matriarch’s eyes at his trembling fear.
When had I become a player in her twisted sports?
‘Your father,’ the Matriarch replied, still studying Drake and not me, ‘was one of the Fallen. Did you truly wish to learn that he forced me?’
‘Don’t…’ Drake tried to sit up, but Battle shoved him back onto his heels.
I blinked, my hands convulsively clutching the arms of the throne. What vampire had the strength to force anything on the Matriarch?
The angels were lost in the darkness of the throne room, swallowed by the silence. But they all knew now. Daughter of the Fallen. Daughter of…
I choked on a sob.
Not here. Not in front of these strangers.
‘That’s why I’m… Why you abandoned me?’ My cheeks were wet but numb, I couldn’t even work out why.
‘Gracious, you truly do not perceive.’ Her expression gentled. ‘I did not abandon you; I saved you, precious girl. You’re my greatest achievement. Weapon. You’re death to the Fallen. You’re destroyer, saviour, and—’
‘Where’s my sister?’ I hugged my arms around myself. ‘I want Jade.’
‘The Wing has a snake’s tongue. You’re all for truth, do you wish to know another?’
‘Please, don’t,’ Drake’s voice was low and sad, ‘not now.’
‘Lies, lies, such pretty, bloody lies,’ the Matriarch’s smile was sharp enough to shank, as she leant across her throne to mine, conspiratorial. ‘The naughty boy made it up, like as Santa to a child. A happy myth to believe in and entrap you. Your sister was never here.’
My mum broke me then, shattered in slivers on the stone floor.
I slid onto my knees.
And I’d said I’d never kneel…
J was right: I was one deluded bitch.
My blazing gaze met Drake’s.
He slumped, defeated before both mother and daughter.
The ancient powers roared inside, rumbling for justice and crimson pain: righteous wrath.
The side of the Matriarch’s mouth quirked. ‘Oh, you shall play with blood, pain, and feathers. The Wing has been a bad boy. He’s your pressie for the night.’
Drake’s eyes widened. He cast me a horrified glance. His wings fluttered back and forth, vibrating violently.
My sister wasn’t in Angel World. I’d lived all these months, desperate to find her. Yet it’d been nothing but a false dream. And now I was trapped on Angel World with no way to save her.
Because of Drake.
Yeah, Drake should be a trembling mess. Even if I knew we’d been played gang style. And the only winner was the Matriarch.
Truth or Dare: the game was dangerous.
Nothing mattered, however, but the lies Drake had told and the pouch with Jade’s crystal necklace swinging at my neck.
I leapt from the platform, violet zinging through me.
Drake pulled himself up.
In this game, we’d both be savaged bloody.
4
Pain was the mate, which blossomed beautiful from my years growing up as the freaky kid with eyes that didn’t match and no parents.
Pain was the mate, which pressed in the shank and blazed fire under me, until I was the swaggering Bitch of Utopia Estate.
Pain saved my life because I learnt to never let it control me. Even though it was inside me.
Powerful.
But was my name Pain?
The Matriarch’s chambers were maze-like caves, each smaller but more ornately decorated than the last. As I swaggered through them, it was like being swallowed by a honeycomb.
Dripping myrrh scented candles fizzed in niches, and I choked on the winding scent.
Outside the walls, the harsh patter of rain meant the chambers were close to the edge of the mountain, as well as near the top.
I caught my boot on a goat skin rug, and the Matriarch’s cold fingers caught my wrist before I could trip.
‘Cheers,’ I shrugged out of her grip. ‘When are we slaying the Minotaur because that bitch has it coming?’
The Matriarch laughed: a dark Tinkerbelle.
I cringed.
‘Drake’s not the monster, baby bird.’ She pressed against me. ‘He’s the damsel, tied up for us dragons to gobble up. My Wing is yours to play with or punish, indeed he has been since you arrived. Do you think I’d entrust my precious to anyone less?’
I gaped. ‘The Commander is your Wing?’
And you’re the monster he serves?
I hadn’t realised I’d been backing away, until I hit the wall.
Crunch.
I grimaced and shifted.
Crunch.
The emerald metallic wall, striped in blue and red, fluttered in the light as if alive.
I pushed my arse against it again.
Crunch.
The Matriarch eased away from me. ‘Rainbow beetles. Dead? Their casings are mine. A perfect beauty. Alive? Their troops swarm our walls in glory to my tune.’
Dead bastard beetles?
I lunged away from the wall, puking onto the goat skin rug, like an offering.
I clutched my guts, sweating.
Yeah, too many chocolates.
‘Sorry…’ I waved at the mess on the rug.
Princess? Dragon?
Who was I kidding?
The Matriarch scrutinized me like I was the beetle. ‘By my wing, you’ll become mine again, just as Drake is my pretty boy. Then you’ll see there’s only perfection in the cycle of life and death.’
I wiped my hand across the back of my mouth, before pushing myself up onto shaky legs. ‘Let’s focus on the life.’
‘And life is dark amusement.’ When the Matriarch brushed her knuckles down my cheek, I was caught between recoiling and leaning into the touch. I huffed with frustration. ‘A show put on for me alone. And now? For you. Even the war is a dance; every battle is a step. Do you know my Angelic Power?’
Psycho freakery?
She leaned closer. ‘I corrupt love,’ she whispered, ‘I poison it: pain with pleasure, obsession with adoration. I control with love. I rule with it.’ I shuddered; her lips were against mine. She dragged me by the elbow into the next cave, which was lined with oak chests. Her diamond stilettos clacked. ‘And now, my daughter, so do you.’
My eyes widened.
Drake: my pressie for the night.
I remembered how Drake — our enemy — had hunted Rebel and me in Hackney Cemetery.
How he’d tormented Rebel, kissing his wings and touching the hardness in his bondage trousers.
How he’d pressed the base of Rebel’s neck until he’d screamed.
Then how he’d wept for Rebel.
I shook my head; I also hadn’t forgotten Drake’s predatory smile.
The bastard who’d lied about my missing sister. Tempted me here to Angel World with false promises. Dared me to expose a truth about my dad, for which I couldn’t help hating myself.
And wasn’t that screwed up?
Worse? Drake had done it, just when I’d allowed myself to believe maybe he had my back.
But Drake wasn’t smiling now.
Like the rainbow beetles, his wings were stretched out and pinned either side by steel pitons hammered through their tips into the wall.
I winced.
Of course, the Commander had been stripped of more than his title, and now was bare arsed. Tear tracks stained his face, and his curls covered his eyes.
The candy-floss of his blood buzzed through me, even over the mask of the myrrh.
I bounced on my tiptoes; my tongue swiped at my lips.
Damsel and the dragon?
I craved to sink in my teeth and devour the bastard, almost as much as something inside begged me to save him… Yet how could I escape this mountainous world without wings?
Even though I shook, remembering the lash marks on Drake’s creamy back, as well as the times he’d limped to my room with multi-coloured bruises, burns, and broken bones.
How I’d held him quietly in my nest, stroking his curls. Although, we never spoke about it afterwards.
Pretending — everything a mask.
A game.
And the Matriarch was Queen of the Circus.
Then I noticed the leather straps wound round the cave roof, which held Drake suspended on tiptoe, just as leather straps bound Rebel’s left wing down in his cell, breaking it…
My gaze hardened. ‘Pain with pleasure, yeah?’
Vampire Princess Page 3