by K. A. Linde
Killian easily lifted to his feet. “As you wish, Domina.” His eyes swept back to Dean’s. “The offer is always on the table.”
Dean bowed deeply and then escorted Cyrene out of the room.
Once they were far enough away from Killian to not be overheard, a bubble of laughter erupted out of her chest. And then she was laughing so hard that she could barely contain it.
Dean impassively looked at her. “And what is so funny?”
“The king of Tiek just propositioned the prince of Eleysia and had no idea,” she said, snorting.
He shook his head at her. “You are outrageous, you know this, yes?”
“Oh, come on. You’re never going to live this down. Every time you get serious, I’m just going to remind you of Killian offering to sleep with you to gain his army.”
“Well, I wouldn’t have let you do it.”
“Hey,” she said, suggestively nudging him. “I don’t share well either.”
He raised his eyebrows. “And what exactly does that mean, Cyrene?”
Her voice dropped to a whisper. “I think you know what it means.”
“Hey, sometimes, a guy likes to hear it.”
She laughed at him mirroring her words and then threaded her fingers into his. “I like this. Us. I think there should be an us.”
And Dean smiled the most brilliant, perfect smile she had ever seen. “Glad you’ve caught up. There’s been an us for a while.”
30
The Alliance
“You need to push him for the paperwork to be completed today,” Kaliana said as they walked toward the throne room the next morning. “It’s just like him to promise the world and not get anything in writing.”
“Yes, we’re well aware of that,” Dean muttered behind her.
“You should have just slept with him,” she told Cyrene.
Cyrene rolled her eyes. “For one, that’s not happening. And two, you were the one who said that I should make him chase me.”
“He’s the king. He doesn’t chase that hard.”
“Yeah, well, that isn’t me,” she said with a chin tilt.
Kaliana rolled her eyes. “Please, everyone in the castle knows that you were sleeping with Edric.”
Cyrene stopped in her tracks and grasped Kaliana’s arm. “I never ever.”
But Kaliana just looked wary. “Cyrene, it’s okay. It was a long time ago.”
“I am serious. It never happened.”
“But you were on his barge for procession,” Kaliana whispered.
“Ever,” Cyrene reiterated.
Kaliana seemed to look at her with all-new eyes. “Truly?”
“I swear it. We were never together. Not Kael either,” Cyrene told her. “Those were all just rumors. I was very young and incredibly naive when I first came to court, Kaliana, but I was not stupid. Don’t you remember me asking you to leave court? I did not want what was happening to me. I wanted adventure.”
Kaliana blinked a few times. “You truly wanted to leave. I just…I thought that you were posturing, testing my limits, or trying to trick me. Like I would send you away, and then you would run to Edric to tell him that I was sending you…” She trailed off as she must have realized the absurdity of it all. Then she pulled Cyrene into a hug. “I am sorry that those Dremylon boys and my pride ever kept us apart.”
Cyrene returned the hug, amazed that they had gotten to this point at all. She would have never guessed this two years ago.
“All right, let’s move it,” Dean said, gesturing for them to keep walking. “We need to focus on the task at hand.”
Cyrene and Kaliana broke apart with a laugh and then continued toward the throne room. Cyrene knew that last night hadn’t gone how she had planned with Killian, but she was sure that they were close to that alliance. They just needed to decide on an amount and what to do about the port, and then she would have succeeded here with the Tiekan army. All thanks to Kaliana.
Then, they stepped into the throne room, and all the air was sucked out of the space.
Kael Dremylon stood like a black cloud of energy before Killian.
Cyrene’s eyes widened in shock. She should have felt him. Should have been able to tell that he was here by the sheer weight of the bond. He stood a couple of dozen feet away from her, and yet…she felt nothing. Nothing at all.
“Hello, Cyrene,” Kael said, caressing her name. “Oh, how I have missed you.”
Kaliana stumbled backward a step, falling into place behind Cyrene and Dean. His hand had gone immediately to Shadowbreaker, half-withdrawing it to ready himself for an attack.
Cyrene readied her own magic. And though she felt none of the bond that tied them together, she knew it was there. He’d just masked it somehow. She didn’t know how. But what she could feel was the overwhelming immensity of blood magic flowing through his veins. The diamond had given her the ability to sense magical strength and elements. But what Kael accessed was raw energy, not elemental. It was a stolen magic that corrupted a person and drew power from the soul. The more it was used, the less human a person became.
From the amount of power Kael was harnessing, she wondered if he had a soul at all. If Malysa had tightened her hold on him so completely that he was a hollowed-out shell underneath the sharp black clothing and billowing black cloak. If that beautiful face and dark brown hair and mesmerizing blue-gray eyes were but a mask for the true evil underneath.
And this was the monster that her sister was trying to save. Preparing to marry.
“What, you haven’t missed me?” Kael asked. He hungrily took a step forward. Madness gleamed in those eyes.
“What are you doing here, Kael?” she asked darkly.
Kael gestured to Killian, where the pretty blond king sat like a statue between them. “Did not the king tell you that he invited me?”
Cyrene’s face fell. “Killian, you didn’t.”
Killian opened his mouth as if he was going to respond and then shook his head. He glanced between them—at the crackle of magic from Dean’s fingertips, the black energy that ran up Kael’s arms, and the glow that Cyrene didn’t even realize she had unleashed around her body. He looked at them all as if he had not quite believed all the tales he had heard and was just now realizing how very, very wrong he was.
“Well, what do we have here?” Kael assessed their party with detached amusement. “Even more than I bargained for—a prince of nowhere and a queen of even less.”
“Leave them out of this,” Cyrene snarled at him, taking a step forward.
“Don’t tell me that you aren’t glad to see me,” Kael said with a smirk.
Cyrene narrowed her eyes, but when she spoke, it was for Killian. “He is everything you have heard about him and worse. You have made a grave mistake in calling him here today. You will be lucky to leave with your head.”
“Is that a threat?” Killian managed to get out.
“Not from me,” she said. Her eyes slid back to Kael, who hadn’t moved an inch and was just looking at her with barely contained desire. “But absolutely from him. He killed the true king of Byern—his brother, Edric. He killed the king of Aurum. He massacred the entire island of Eleysia. He is a murderer and will not think twice before taking off your head.”
“That is one bold accusation,” Killian gasped.
Kael just smiled. “It is, isn’t it? Would I have come as a royal envoy if I wanted you dead? Would you be alive right now if I wanted anything but an alliance?”
“He’s toying with you,” Cyrene spat.
“Oh, come now. We’re all friends here,” Kael said with a twitch of his lips that said he thought the entire thing was funny.
“No, we’re not,” she told him.
“Is that why you didn’t say hi when you visited Byern?” Kael asked. “Tried to convince your sister to leave and failed. I would like to know how you hid in the walls though.”
Cyrene froze at his words. That was the message that she and Fenix had worked out ahead of tim
e for when he would see Kael. He had to know why Cyrene had been in Byern, and it was better to feed him a half-truth. But it meant that Fenix was back in. Message delivered. Good.
“How do you know why I was there?” she asked.
And, while he went on a rambling, arrogant tirade about how he knew everything that went on in his castle, Cyrene burrowed deep into her well of magic. She found the bond with Sarielle and tugged. The awaiting response was nearly instantaneous. Then she fed instructions down the bond. She could practically feel the smile from her dragon through that link.
“You’ve spelled her,” Cyrene said when Kael had finished.
“Is that jealousy I detect?”
“Hardly. I know that Elea would never marry you otherwise.”
Something like anger flickered in his features. “I have never had to be anyone else when I’m with Elea. Perhaps you’ll join us for the wedding.”
“Might be busy. I guess my invitation got lost in the mail. You know it’s really not reliable,” she said, keeping him talking.
“Consider this your formal invitation then,” Kael said with narrowed eyes.
“Hmm…I think I’ll pass. You once said we’d be married. Who knew you were so inconstant?” Cyrene tapped her lip. “Oh, wait, I did.”
Kael narrowed his eyes. The darkness growing with each passing moment. “If it wasn’t for your little prince…” He threw his hand out to Dean.
“Oh, right. You thought forcing my magic and making me blood-cursed like you would spell happily ever after,” she snapped at him. “All according to plan, right?”
“I’m not so little anymore,” Dean snarled.
Kael laughed at Dean. The rest of them forgotten as he took in the magic thrumming through his veins. “How exactly did you come by the fire show?”
Dean arched an eyebrow. “I was worthy. Where you never could be.”
Cyrene cut between them before either started throwing that deadly magic around Killian’s throne room. “You’re outnumbered, Kael. Now would be the time to go…before we make you.”
“But we’re having so much fun, Cyrene,” he said her name like a prayer. “Plus, it appears you have something that I want.” His eyes moved to where Kaliana stood behind them.
“You stay away from her,” she told him.
“How is our daughter, Kaliana?” Kael asked.
Killian gasped from the throne. His eyes were glued to his sister in disbelief. Word must have reached him that she’d had a royal baby, but no one, save the people in this room, had ever known it was Kael’s and not Edric’s. Daufina had even taken that news to the grave.
But Kaliana didn’t back down. In fact, the mention of Alessia straightened her spine. Her words were a snarl. “You’ll never find her.”
“Such hostility,” Kael said. “I preserved your life and hers. I could have turned you both out in the cold. And this is the thanks I get?”
“You killed Edric!” Kaliana screamed. “Your own brother!”
Kael shrugged. The darkness taking over those blue-gray irises. “He had grown beyond his usefulness.”
Killian gasped from his throne. As if he couldn’t believe it was actually true.
“We’re not fools, Kael,” Cyrene said, her power humming. “But you are if you stay here.”
The last thing she wanted was a showdown with Kael in the middle of the Tiekan throne room. But she wouldn’t hesitate if it came to that. If their great battle was supposed to happen today, then so be it.
“I would, love, but I’m under orders,” he said with that same smirk. His eyes seemed to zero in on her necklace that had started to glow as more power flowed into her. “Interesting choice.”
“Don’t you just love being a lapdog?” Cyrene said, trying for diversion.
“I’m no one’s lapdog,” he snapped.
“Because we all know that she’s controlling the magic that’s in you. That’s her domain. You’re blood-cursed, and that curse comes with a long leash, but you’re still collared.”
“If I am, then you are,” he said with an arched eyebrow.
“I am of the light,” she told him with conviction. More than she had ever felt before this moment. “I shunned the darkness that you so cling to.” She raised her chin. “And the light will always drive out the darkness.”
“We’ll see about that,” Kael snarled.
Then he threw that first wave of unbreakable darkness toward them.
It was the moment she had been waiting for. She had been nudging him along, anticipating the moment that her words hit home. When he would throw the first punch. She didn’t want to start the fight, but she sure as hell would finish it.
Cyrene whirled, snatching Shadowbreaker out of the sheath from Dean’s hilt and ripped a long tear through the middle of his attack. Her sword that was immune to magic cleaved straight through it, rending it in two as if it were nothing more than fabric. She hadn’t even had to use her magic to deflect the blow. But she felt Dean obliterating what was left of the darkness.
Cyrene straightened. Shadowbreaker alive in her hands. The ruby glowing to match the golden hue surrounding her figure. Her eyes were leveled on Kael’s. The surprise evident on his face, though he tried to mask it.
He’d thought that she would be a weak opponent. That she would roll over. The last time they had fought, he had just been training her with her powers. She had never bested him while practicing. He had always had the advantage. And, only when she had had the element of surprise, she had been able to knock him unconscious and escape Byern.
But that was in the past. She had accepted her powers and mastered spirit. She’d spent months training her powers for combat and had Shadowbreaker forged out of pure Tendrille. She was the Domina. She would not back down.
She raised her eyebrows at Kael. A look of defiance laced with her own brand of arrogance. She had spent two years waiting for this moment. If it ended here, then it ended here.
31
The Treaty
“Stop,” Killian demanded from his throne. “I command you to cease fighting.”
But no one was listening to him.
No one even looked to him.
All eyes were riveted on Cyrene, Dean, and Kael. The magic brimming between them. The unthinkable power that radiated from them.
Cyrene’s magic at the ready, a sweet, blissful relief. So deep that she couldn’t find the bottom. Plus, with the honeycomb center of her ruby full, she could go even further. The diamond at her throat a reminder of not just what she was, but who she was. The legacy she had been born to protect and preserve.
“You’ve been busy,” Kael said. He had no sword at his belt. He didn’t need one. He built a blade out of solid darkness, hard as steel and twice as deadly.
But he had to know it wasn’t as formidable as Shadowbreaker. Not with its natural immunity. If he didn’t yet, he would.
“As have you,” she taunted, matching the circular steps he was taking.
She recognized the movements for what they were. Practiced sword stances. Specific footwork that Fallon had tried to drill into her head back in Kinkadia. Though he only had a theoretical knowledge, and she was no swordsman. But she was Doma, and that was always enough.
Kael lunged forward with all the precision of a prince who’d had the best trainers in all of Byern. Dean would have been better for this. He was the swordsman. He was the trained captain of Eleysia. A prince in his own right. But it wasn’t his fight. It was hers.
Their swords matched. Tendrille meeting the darkness of his own. Then her blade rent his sword into pieces. She whirled, moving like water, letting her magic guide her steps. Sinking deep into her magic, deep into that diamond. Her footwork coordinated and on target.
He flung magic up to deflect the blade, but it wasn’t enough.
He needed a real blade. And she saw the moment he realized it.
That he had been counting on his magic before his earlier training with steel and fists. A lesson that A
voca had drilled into her head time and time again.
Then she felt it. In her moment of distraction, his mind touched hers.
So gentle, so coaxing that she hadn’t noticed it at all.
An invasion.
One she should have expected.
One that he had trained her in.
She slammed a wall down around herself, but it was too late.
He was in.
Shadowbreaker clattered out of her hand. It hit the marble floor with a satisfying clunk. She gritted her teeth and forced her way through his machinations.
This was his domain. Malysa’s domain. She had spent thousands of years learning to work her way into people’s minds. Spreading that festering evil through the world. Keeping Doma magic from resurrecting. A disease. A dilution of the pure Doma magic to enter the bloodstream of useless humans. And now, Kael was using that same power to lock down her body.
He stepped forward, and his fingers grazed the diamond. “I know someone who has been looking for this a long time.”
“You will have to take it off my dead body,” she spat at him as he held her hostage.
“I have never wanted you dead, Cyrene. I have always protected you.” His voice was low, coaxing. “Join me. Choose the right side.”
“I…already…have,” she got out.
Kael laughed and bent to retrieve Shadowbreaker. “Always so stubborn.”
And then the smile was wiped off of his face as a bolt of electricity shot into his side. He barely had time to deflect it before he was thrown backward, colliding with the wall.
His grip slipped, and Cyrene wrenched back control of her own body. She slammed a shield around her mind. A shield made of Tendrille that no one could hope to penetrate. She would never let him in again. Not ever.
Dean appeared at her side. “I thought you had him covered.”
Cyrene rolled her shoulders. “Thanks for having my back.”
“What I’m here for.”
They stepped together as a unit. Kael rose to his feet. Shadowbreaker still clutched tightly to his fist. She wanted that damn sword back. She had not faced all of Kinkadia and fought for Sarielle just to have her prized blade in the enemy’s hands.