Contents
Chapter 1
Chapter 2
Chapter 3
Chapter 4
Chapter 5
Chapter 6
Chapter 7
Chapter 8
Chapter 9
Chapter 10
Chapter 11
Chapter 12
Chapter 13
Chapter 14
Chapter 15
Chapter 16
Chapter 17
Chapter 18
Chapter 19
Chapter 20
Chapter 21
Other books by Debbie Cassidy
About the Author
Copyright © 2020, Debbie Cassidy
All Rights Reserved
This book is a work of fiction. Names, characters, businesses, organizations, places, events, and incidents either are the product of the author’s imagination or are used fictitiously. Any resemblance to actual persons, living or dead, events, or locales is entirely coincidental.
This book is sold subject to the condition that it shall not, by way of trade or otherwise, be lent, re-sold, duplicated, hired out, or otherwise circulated without the publisher’s prior written consent in any form of binding or cover other than that in which it is published and without similar conditions including this condition being imposed on the subsequent purchaser.
Cover by Luminescence Covers
1
The grand double doors to the ballroom stared at me challengingly. Shining ones from all the courts waited beyond those doors. Waited to ogle the human who’d killed their champions in the Regency Games. I was the only human who’d survived the carnage, and the atrocities visited upon my brethren by their kind.
Rage and disgust swirled in my chest, forming a prickly ball that made my eyes sting.
“Winter’s Blade doesn’t cry,” Aspen, the bastard prince, said.
What? I touched my cheek to find it wet, then swiped at the tears, angry at the show of weakness.
This was no time for tears, no place for them.
Survive, Killion had said, and that was what I’d do.
Seven days.
That was all I had to find Nina before Killion came for me. Seven days to somehow get my family to safety, away from Middale, the capital of the shining ones’ rule.
But first, I needed to endure this ‘celebration.’ This parading of the sole human survivor and unwilling Winter’s Blade.
The doors of the ballroom swung open to admit us, and with my arm hooked through Aspen’s, I allowed him to lead me into the den of beautiful vipers.
We glided onto a polished floor that gleamed with a metallic sheen. In fact, the whole room was metallic, a combination of dull and shiny silver. Deep darkness hovered on the periphery of the room, and balconies rose up on either side of us, lit from within by amber light to make up several floors of Tuatha and Danaan, sipping from slender flutes as they watched us enter. We were, after all, the entertainment for the evening.
The high ceiling was domed but rose to a point. It was decorated with strange striations as if someone had raked the metal with a hot blade. My gaze dropped to the wall ahead of us. The whole structure shimmered like it was made of water, as if a pebble striking it would cause it to ripple outward.
My brain struggled to take it all in because the vastness of the chamber squeezed the breath from my lungs and made a knot form in my belly. This was fear. This was anxiety, and it had to stop.
I pushed my shoulders back and lifted my chin, battling against the weight of the many eyes on us.
No. Not on us.
On me.
The Tuatha regard was needles pricking my skin, intent on drawing blood, and I felt my hastily gathered bravado slipping. My head drooped as if too heavy for my slender neck.
“Head up,’ Aspen said, low and smooth for only me to hear. “You’re a warrior, a survivor. You are Winter’s Blade. All you need do now is accept your official title once the king pronounces it.”
Fuck. He really wanted that name to stick, didn’t he? What was his game? Because he had one—I could feel it in my gut. My knotted, twisted gut.
No. Aspen’s motivations weren’t my concern. I needed to focus on my own goals.
The silver wall at the far end of the room rippled, then a window appeared a couple of meters off the ground. Several figures were visible, sitting on fancy seats with a table laden with food set before them. A male with arched brows, a haughty expression, and silver-blond hair spilling over his pecs perched on a high-backed seat, slightly higher than the rest of his company.
My heart beat faster. I knew who this was. I’d seen his face in magazines and promotional pamphlets for years. A face that didn’t change and didn’t age.
The face of an ancient.
The face of the Winter King.
This was Palamon and Aspen’s father. Calling him an ancient felt contrary, considering he looked no older than thirty. To his left sat a woman with crimson hair piled high on her head in a mass of curls, and to his right was an older woman, maybe late sixties, with a mouth set in a scowl that could probably curdle milk.
There were more of them, silver-haired, pale, with eyes all shades of blue. These were the Winter Regency. I spotted Palamon perched on the edge of the company. His amethyst eyes were fixed on me, When he caught my eye, his throat bobbed, and he inclined his head a fraction in greeting. He was all dolled up in Tuatha finery, hair slicked back, looking nothing like the whiney, cowardly prince I’d rescued a day ago.
This was his rightful place, amongst the Regency, these cold, unaffected-looking creatures who stared at me like I was a specimen under a microscope.
The wall shimmered again as we drew closer, and another window opened up above the Regency one, revealing a fresh group of Tuatha. These shining ones were older, more in line with the ancient title they liked to claim. The majority were in shadow, but one stood out, lit by a beam of light, probably strategically placed.
I knew this fucker too. Hated his smug pointy face and his condescending tone. This was the voice of the council and the Regency.
This was Minimus Lowland.
Minimus looked down his nose at me, his lips in a firm, straight line—no doubt unimpressed by Winter’s Blade. How I’d like to see fear in his eyes. I’d like to see him bleed. Hell, I’d like to make him bleed.
Aspen drew us to a halt several meters away from the windows, but he didn’t release my hand.
“Your Majesty and the high council.” He inclined his head, stag horns gleaming in the silvery light cast by the windows. “Allow me to present Winter’s Blade.”
A wave of exclamations echoed across the vast chamber.
Minimus’s nostrils flared, and the corners of his mouth turned down as if he disapproved of the title, but he didn’t contradict Aspen.
“Come forward, Blade,” the king said.
His voice was deep and gravelly, totally at odds with his delicately beautiful appearance. “Come into the light.”
A beam of silver light appeared a meter away from me, lancing down like lightning from some point high above.
Aspen released me. “Go,” he said softly.
I stepped away from him and entered the light. It kissed my form, settling over me like a gauzy blanket. Then a screen appeared above the council window, and I was on it, larger than life. Except I didn’t look like me.
The cut of the outfit Aspen had dressed me in made my shoulders look broader, and my thighs seem more powerful. The severe ponytail Blossom had pulled my hair into made my cheekbones stand out like razors, and the kohl she’d rimmed my eyes with made them seem intense and searing. I looked defiant, confident, and lethal.
I looked like an assassin, and the gasps and murmurs that lit up the chamber told me I wasn’t the only one that thought so.
“Danika Khatri,” the king said. “You are the sole human survivor of the Regency Games and the protector of Winter. Your family will be given homes in the bosom of Middale, and you will have the honor of serving your crown.”
The honor? Servitude more like. I kept my expression impassive. Fuck him and his title. I’d be gone soon, and when I returned, it would be to bring them all down.
The king sat up straighter. “I now pronounce you—”
“I object!”
The beam of light bathing me winked out, and so did my image on the screen. It was replaced a moment later by that of a male Tuatha with hair like autumn fire and eyes like a gathering storm. His coloring told me all I needed to know.
This was the Autumn Court.
The woman beside the Winter King sat forward, eyes wide and fixed on the man on the screen. “Brother, you promised you would not do this.”
Brother?
“Hush, my love,” the Winter King said. “Let the Autumn King speak.”
My love? The crimson-haired beauty was the Winter Queen and sister to the Autumn King.
The Autumn King’s jaw was tight, and his chest heaved like he’d just completed a sprint. “You claim this human slaughtered our champions. You claim she survived with no aid. In fact, you claim she protected the crown prince, and you expect us to simply take your word on the matter?”
I glanced at the Winter King, waiting for him to respond, but it was Minimus who spoke.
“We do not expect you to do anything but accept the outcome of the games,” Minimus said haughtily. “Lord Aspen is witness to events that transpired, as is the crown prince.”
“And both belong to the Winter Court,” The Autumn King pointed out. “Both are sons of the Regency.”
Murmurs started up and grew louder by the second.
“It’s true,” another voice said.
The screen split and a golden-haired female appeared, dressed in gold and sky blue. Summer Court, no doubt.
“The arena was constructed by Winter,” she said in a high, reedy voice. “We cannot be sure there was no foul play. There is no evidence to corroborate your account of the turn of events. You present us with this human and expect us to accept that she was able to best our champions?”
“This will not stand.” A third Tuatha appeared on the screen. Dark-haired and dressed in mossy green. Spring Court. “We refuse to accept the outcome of the Regency Games.”
“We demand a new Regency Games,” Summer said. “A new arena will be built, monitored by representatives of all the courts.”
“Ridiculous!” Minimus scoffed. “If you had objections to the design or any procedures laid out for the games, you had plenty of time to put them forward prior to the event.”
“We trusted you,” Spring said. “But this outcome is preposterous and frankly unbelievable. It is a lie, and we can only conclude foul play.”
“We demand a new Regency Games,” Summer reiterated. “And in the meantime, the capital will pass to Autumn for safekeeping.”
I glanced up at Minimus and noted the tick of his jaw, then down to the Winter King, who glared at the balcony where the Autumn King sat.
On screen, the Autumn King’s lips curved in a smug smile. And it hit me that this objection had been planned. He’d liaised with the other courts to invalidate the outcome of the games. He’d arranged for this, to take control. But what had he offered Summer and Spring to back him?
This was a coup on Winter.
The whole room was in uproar now, and the king glared daggers at his wife, who looked like she wished the ground would open up and swallow her.
If Autumn took over, what the fuck did it mean for my family and me?
Aspen’s arm brushed my shoulder as he came to stand beside me. “I have a solution.” His voice carried over the others, even though he didn’t raise it, and the cacophony ebbed. The light lanced down on us, and we appeared on the screen side by side. “A solution to satisfy us all,” Aspen said. “We will allow Winter’s Blade to prove her skill.”
Minimus smiled, thin and deadly, and my pulse skipped a beat as the implication of what Aspen had said settled in my mind.
“What do you mean?” The Autumn King asked.
“Your objection lies within your disbelief that this human could best your champions,” Aspen said. “You wish to see evidence. So, allow Winter’s Blade to give it to you.”
No, no, no. What the fuck was he doing?
“Each objecting court will prepare and host a blood trial for Winter’s Blade, streamed live using drones…for evidence.” He smirked.
The screen cut to Minimus and his smug smile, but blood rushed in my ears because…
No. Hell no. I opened my mouth to object, but Aspen grabbed my wrist, squeezing hard enough to rub my bones together.
“Quiet,” he hissed.
The word was a command, sending a prickle over my skin and locking the words in my throat.
“You have forty-eight hours to prepare your trials,” Minimus said. “Winter’s Blade will undertake a trial per day, and when she is done, you will retract your objections.”
“And to prove her worth,” Aspen said, commanding the screen again. “Winter’s Blade will be permitted to take only one weapon of her choice with her into each trial. And when she is done, as penance for your false and unfounded accusations, you will concede Winter’s claim for a century.”
The Winter King sat forward, eyes gleaming with triumph, and Minimus sucked in his cheeks. My pulse raced, heart battering my ribcage in a desperate bid to break free because this was my life they were bartering with. My fucking life. And the need to scream, to object, to do something, was now trapped in my throat by some kind of magical command that threatened to give me a fucking aneurism if I fought it.
“Do you accept?” Minimus asked.
The Autumn King’s eyes narrowed, and his gaze dropped. It took a moment to realize what he was looking at, then heat crawled up my neck as it hit me that he was looking at me.
Sizing me up.
Judging me.
Refuse. Please refuse.
I couldn’t do it again. I couldn’t kill and not lose the remnants of my soul.
“Answer!” The Winter King snapped.
I held my breath.
“We accept,” the Autumn King said.
2
Aspen opened the door to my room and jerked his head, indicating I get inside. The dancing and eating part of the damn celebration was postponed till after the blood trials, and it was time for me to get back in my box.
Words of rage burned my throat, desperate to shoot out and leap off my tongue, but Aspen’s command to be quiet kept me mute. It had stopped me from protesting to his insane plan, and it stopped me from venting at him right now.
All I could do was glare daggers at him.
He rolled his eyes. “If you want your voice back, then get in your room.”
Fucker. I stalked in, and he followed, closing the door behind us. The room felt too small with him in it. His antlers took up too much space, and his powerful, broad-shouldered form was forbidding as he approached.
I backed up on instinct.
”Sit,” he ordered.
My body complied, butt kissing the mattress. I glared at him harder, eyeballs aching as I poured every ounce of anger and hatred I had for him into that one look.
He whispered something, and the tightness in my throat melted. My limbs were my own once more.
I took a shuddering breath. “Don’t ever fucking do that to me again.”
“Or what?” he asked.
Or what? What could I do to him? Nothing right now. I closed my eyes, reining in my rage. Think, Danika. Be smart about this, and ask the right questions.
“Why are you doing this? Why did you suggest the blood trials?”
“I would have
thought that was obvious,” he said. “They need evidence, and we will give it to them. You killed their champions in the arena, and you will do it again, and this time, the whole world will see it.”
“You think it’s that easy, huh?”
“You managed quite well in the arena.” He shrugged. “You were quite formidable.”
Formidable. He had no fucking idea what the bloodshed had done to me or of the nightmares that lingered at the back of my mind waiting for sleep to take me.
But he was a shining one. He didn’t care about that. He couldn’t understand the emotional impact of death because he had no fucking emotions.
“What the fuck makes you think I can pull it off again?”
“Because, Danika, you’re a survivor, and you’ll have no choice but to survive. You will kill their champions. They will see it, and they will be afraid.” His smile was thin and calculating.
A possibility niggled at the back of my mind. “Did you know this would happen?”
Aspen tipped his head to the side. “Know?”
“That the other courts might object to the outcome of the games?”
“I make it my job to know things, Danika.”
“And what do you know about my sister?”
His smile evaporated, and his face was a mask of indifference. “Nothing.”
“I thought you made it your business to know stuff?” I mimicked his earlier tone.
His mouth tightened a fraction, the only indication that he was displeased with my impudence. “There are things even I’m not privy to, Danika, and the fate of the taken is one of those things.”
But he’d known about the sword. He’d said that, if it belonged to me, it would find me, and it had. Did he know I had it? He had no clue about Killion. At least, I didn’t think he did, and I couldn’t risk that line of questioning. I couldn’t risk him finding out I had the sword and taking it from me.
Feel My Power: The Iron Fae book 2 Page 1