Queen to Ashes (Black Dawn Series Book 2)

by Mallory McCartney

  “That the one who can help us will resurface, and they will be our only hope. We open the channels and build an army not seen by their world. We start by bringing down our own tyrant. Before Morgan or Adair can hurt anyone else.”

  His world spun as he processed the information. He was white knuckled as the seconds passed by, the light of dawn starting to wash the room.

  “Azarius, are you with me?” She sauntered over to him, cupping his face, gently tracing circles. He felt like he was drowning. He snapped his teeth together, trying to find focus through his roaring emotions.

  A light clapping sounded behind him, making him jump as he turned around to meet the gaunt looking Nyx. Her purple hair was tied back messily, a bandage peeking out from her light shirt. Lana immediately stepped in front of him.

  “You, my dear, are supposed to be very knocked out right now.”

  Nyx gave Lana a cocky grin. “I didn’t feel like missing out on the fun. You give a very inspiring speech. Is it true, Lana Steethea, everything you just told him?” Despite her arrogance, a trace of hope lingered behind her words. Azarius realized Nyx was looking for something to hold on to as much as he was.

  Lana narrowed her eyes. “As true as you or me.”

  Plopping down in the nearest chair, groaning, Nyx sweetly said, “Well then, what’s the course of action, because the gods above know I need a good fight before Adair’s cronies kill me.”

  “Absolutely not.” Both women froze at his tone. Shaking his head, he stared at Lana. “Years, Lana. You lied to me for years.”

  Nyx’s lips pulled up into a grimace. “Welcome to the club.”

  He jabbed a finger in her direction, wind spinning jars in the kitchen. “Not another word from you. I mean it.”

  She grinned viciously but crossed her arms over her chest, complying as she watched.

  Lana stepped forward. “It was the only way. Before you, I didn’t know who I could trust. My mom had just died for the Faes. And they did nothing.”

  “Just like you have done until now.”

  Her face crumpled as if he had slapped her. “Azarius, please, I’m begging you.”

  He laughed darkly. “What, just to understand? Just to raise arms, to enter a war? For what?”

  Lana crossed the space between them. “Don’t you dare say I have done nothing. I have lost my home, my family, just like you. I gave up everything I am to go into hiding. I didn’t know that Morgan was alive. I didn’t understand the forces that were playing against us.

  “All I do know is that if you and I are lost to one another, then that’s it. It will have been all for nothing. I lied. I wanted to tell you a thousand moments, a thousand days and nights. But I fell in love with Lana the healer. A simple life, filled with a thousand moments together, with you. I was scared to lose that.”

  His hands shook, tears burning his eyes. He swallowed hard, the walls feeling like they were pressing together, cutting off his oxygen.

  “If not for me, then at least to kill Morgan,” Lana said.

  Nyx froze at her words, and Lana pressed on, “Azarius, I’m not asking you to understand everything this second. I’m not asking you to forgive me. I’m asking you to help me kill the one person who has taken too much from you.”

  He looked at her, the curves and angles of her features too familiar. “I will help with Morgan. But the rest... I need time.”

  Her hurt reflected in her eyes, but she curtly nodded once.

  Sighing, he started to pace. “First off, how do we trust her, when to the best of my knowledge, she is the reason half her rebellion was destroyed and taken by Adair in the first place? How do we know she won’t take the first chance to kill us all?”

  A heavy silence fell between them, and Nyx was as still as stone, assessing him to see if he was going to start something further. Lana also stared curiously.

  He didn’t move.

  Nyx suddenly jabbed a finger in his direction. “Let me clear this up for you now.” Her voice was a deadly calm. “Yes, I sought out Adair to bargain with him for our freedom. Yes, I gave him the one thing he wanted: Emory Fae.

  “What would you have done differently if for the past six years you were lied to, been with a man who was in love with the long-lost heir, which he not only brought back to bring Adair down, but kept safe while our world burned.

  “You don’t think that the weight of the deaths doesn’t stay with me every day? You don’t think that I tried to think of every other possible option before going to him? If Memphis would have followed through with his original plan, we all would have died. I didn’t know your group existed since you were just as well hidden as we were.

  “It was a last desperate act to protect my family, and the price was Emory. I made a mistake and trusted that Adair would keep his word. If you want to kill me for that, then so be it. But know this, I am prepared to go to any lengths to stop him, and for the first time since being a part of this doomed rebellion, I think we have a chance if what she says is true.” She took a shaky breath and didn’t break her stare.

  Lana was smirking from ear to ear as she said to Nyx, “You and I are going to get along, I think.”

  Nyx dipped her head toward Lana and then asked him, “So, Azarius, will you have me? I’m a trained, lethal woman with nothing more to lose.”

  What would you have done? Her words struck home, as he had thought of every option to protect his home, his family. He took lashes every day for protecting his people, his back a map of scars as proof. If he was in her position, going to Adair would be the last feasible option, but if he believed he had a chance, he would do it to save the ones he loved.

  The battered woman before him had given up everything, the hard glint in her eye a hollowness of a life she had to bury, due to the Faes, due to the Academy, due to Emory, due to this world. Maybe he could do right by her.

  He had allowed himself to hope Emory was the edge of the rebellion. In helping her, letting her in, Azarius had wished that despite hiding all these years, she would be the key to stop Kiero’s madness instead of adding to it. Nothing was black and white; they were on the brink of a looming storm, and it was their choices that would dictate it all. No more dealing with long lost princesses or promises from the past.

  It came down to moments.

  Running a hand through his flaming hair, he nodded. “Don’t let me regret keeping you alive.” He kept pacing, his mind spinning. Tendrils shot forward, connecting as a plan formed, and he asked Lana, “This Book of Old. What exactly do you know?”

  How could you lie to me for so long? About what you are—who you are? is what he really wanted to say, but he bit his tongue.

  Sighing, Lana nodded down at the map still illustrated on the table. “Many years ago, when the group was still being formed, my mother and my people’s leader took me to one of the meetings in Kiero. I was her second-in-command. We emerged here—” she pointed to the borders of the Risco desert “—from our channel and had to travel many weeks to reach the Academy.

  “During this time, my mother told me everything she knew about the group that was being built in Kiero and why. I didn’t understand then, but she was preparing me for the worst-case scenario, being this.” Sadness pooled in her eyes.

  “She brought me to as many gatherings as she could. In those days, peace was on the horizon between all the worlds, a promising future. Each meeting, one world representative would write something in the book, collaborating a log of sorts for the next generation of heirs to follow in their footsteps and be gifted with the knowledge of their ancestors. It was never supposed to generate evil.

  “I remember the day like it was yesterday, when the Oilean came. Those fey, if you can call them that, are much closer to demons, and they can appear as any form and have such a lust for blood being spilt. They came in the form of Daer’s heir and got as far as to condemn the Book of Old before Roque knew something was off. I don’t know exactly how, but they put a spell over it, to ensure whoever had it
in their possession would follow its will, and only that.”

  An icy silence fell between them and Nyx did a double take of Lana. “Wait. Exactly how old are you for you to have been there in the beginning? You don’t look a day over twenty. Also, are you saying that potentially, if Adair didn’t have the book, that maybe he wouldn’t have destroyed everyone we loved?”

  Lana nodded. “Power seeks power—of any kind. If the book didn’t exist, maybe it would have been different, maybe not. But even then, only he knows what truly happened.”

  Azarius sighed in frustration. “To kill Adair, we have a chance of survival, to end this Book of Old and its dark magic. We have a shot at a normal life.”

  “Exactly. And to answer your first question,” Lana said, raising her eyebrows at Nyx, “I’m immortal. I have lived a hundred generations... Besides, age is just a number.”

  His mouth hung slightly ajar, which only sent Nyx into a fit of laughter.

  Lana blushed and murmured, “We have our entire lifetime to learn about each other, Azarius, if we live through this. If the channels are opened, and we can go back to Langther, I have my kingdom waiting for me. My people’s abilities exceed Adair’s soldiers, and he won’t see us coming. We bring them back, and we have a chance. We can build an army and march on Adair. We fight for our freedom, for this world and every other one that has been cast in the darkness. We fight for our life together and for every life that has been lost.”

  Her eyes hardened. “But first, we have to start with Morgan.”

  They were insane and most likely were going to die. But even as these thoughts floated through his mind, an adrenaline he hadn’t felt in a long time coursed through him. His voice was gruff. “We kill Morgan and save my brother.”

  “And Memphis,” Nyx added.

  Lana agreed. “And Memphis. Then we find the person who can open the channels.”

  “And I know exactly who he is.”

  Nyx yawned as she said this, and both he and Lana froze.

  Tension sparked in the room as Lana said, “You just thought to mention this now?”

  “In my defense, I had to make sure you weren’t going to kill me first. The man you mentioned before, Damien Foster. In Black Dawn, our second-in-command was a shapeshifter named Brokk Foster. He is the one who brought Emory back. He opened the channel to Earth; I think the place was called. Though last time I saw him, I might have stabbed him.”

  “What?!” Lana and Azarius exclaimed in unison.

  She shrugged. “It’s a long story, but I had to make sure he didn’t follow me. I haven’t seen him since. He has healing abilities. I assure you it didn’t kill him.”

  Lana started to pace, her excitement contagious. “We will find him. We must. But first Morgan.”

  Settling, Azarius pulled a chair out, sitting down as Lana launched into how she thought they should bring down their leader, Nyx watching her every movement: Their plan formed, and as sunlight poured in through the windows, he tried to tame his anger, dulling it, instead of letting it consume him and incinerate what little trust he had left for the people he loved.

  Chapter Eight

  Brokk

  He needed to stop. The pounding of his heart and burning in his lungs seared through him.

  Soaring over a fallen tree, the scent of the forest filled his nose. Brokk was consumed by his rage. By his disbelief. By his grief. The ground thundered beneath him, and his ears pinned flat against his head. Stop. Shuddering against the thought, he shifted back into his human form in a single motion.

  The night was fleeting, the traces of dawn now tingeing the sky. The Ruined City was long behind him as he had transitioned through empty towns, forests, and grassy plains, all a blur as he followed their scents. Sweat slicked every inch of his body, and he paced, agitated. Emory is in Adair’s kingdom.

  The thought he was running from, the thought he couldn’t even begin to wrap his mind around had caught up to him. In the Ruined City, the scents he tracked didn’t lie. Emory had gone into Adair’s kingdom and had not come back. It was like being back with the Oilean, having his body dissected inch by inch, torn slowly apart, only to be put back together.

  How could he keep moving forward when all he wanted to do was turn back? To see her, to hear her side of the story. Why, after everything they had gone through, that her parents had done, would she throw it all away? Would douse their hope? How could he turn back? Brokk pulled back to his reality, only to hear the nocking of an arrow.

  Ducking, he contorted his body so fast it winded him. The arrow sliced through the air with a hiss before it lodged its sharpened end in the tree behind him. Four sets of eyes peered at him from the coverage of the trees, and he only had time to take in the midnight-black paint that smeared underneath their eyes before arrows rained down on him. Raiders. Shifting back, his adrenaline kicked in, and he snapped. Roaring, he charged forward, unhinged.

  He could smell their fear; it coated the air, thick and instantaneous. A low growl of approval ripped through his chest. He was exhausted, defeated. But rage bubbled within him, fueling his movements, and like a thousand times before, Brokk lost himself in the feral part of his soul.

  Barreling forward, his nails dug into the ground, flicking his gaze up to see the sharpened ends of the arrows glinting, hurtling at him. Muscles tensing, he pushed off with his back haunches and flew. Ten arrows thudded wetly, slicing through fur and skin. He snapped three mid-flight, splinters flying from his maws. He landed heavily, crashing into the tree line, right into the raiders. They scattered, curses flying from them.

  Moving lithely, Brokk charged with his sharpened claws and his teeth slicing through their clothes, their flesh. They were faceless men to him through his rage and empty heart: It exhilarated and scared him. The attack was over before it had begun, the young raiders full of life but inexperienced. Shifting back, his shirt shredded, blood slicking his skin, the injuries made his movements jagged.

  Vaguely, he remembered the gentle sounds of water bubbling over rocks and sifting through dirt, a river not too far from here. Move. The pain anchored him to his human form, each bloodied step through the forest reminding him that he wasn’t invincible. He could bleed just as easily. The ends of the arrows were imbedded deeply in his muscle, and he cringed as he felt his body try to heal, moving around the arrows’ sharpened ends. He was going to have to pull them out. Moving slowly and silently as a shadow, he concentrated on his breath, his lungs wheezing.

  But as he walked, Brokk couldn’t escape his demons, and he silently repeated their names aloud, his voice cracking on each one. “Memphis. Alby.”

  They were alive. And they needed him. As much as he wanted to curl into himself and let himself be defeated, he forced himself to keep walking.

  The landscape was rugged, the branches creating sharp corners and edges in his vision. Each time he passed a towering tree, he flinched, his imagination warping it to a slim figure with pitiless eyes, just waiting for him to let his guard down. Not real. They are dead. The Oilean are dead.

  Rubbing his eyes, his heavy lids constantly reminded him he needed to sleep. Pushing the thought down, Brokk took a steadying breath, his fear clawing away at him. He hadn’t slept properly in weeks, not since those nightmarish demons had chased away any sense of his life. He could still imagine those giggles in the dark, those sneering faces. The prick of the edge of the knife, slicing down and then up, whittling him away.

  The pain, the blood.

  “Enough!” His voice was hoarse as he yelled to the empty forest. He clutched his head, shutting his eyes as he steadied his tilting world. “Enough.”

  Trembling, his body begged him to shift back, to run, to get away. Lurching, the woods spun on its axis, but he held on. The heavy scent of rain filled his senses, and Brokk looked to the oncoming grey sky, starting to eat away at any sunlight. A low rumble sounded in the distance, and he shifted uneasily, the hair on the back of his neck standing on end. He had nothing to worry about; not
hing would come that he couldn’t handle.

  He trudged deeper in the woods, losing track of time. He followed his heightened sense of smell, trusting it would lead him true, and he allowed the deep ache in his shoulder blades to remind him he couldn’t stop, even though he was so tired. His legs gave out as he stumbled, feeling the mud underneath him as his reality bent and blurred together.

  “Brokk.” It was just a whisper on the wind, soft and delicate. Emory’s voice, calling out to him.

  “Em!” He walked faster. “I’m coming.”

  The scene before him dipped and changed, the soft forest floor shifting to a hard concrete. He took it in with uncertainty, and the temperature dropped to an icy state, his breath coming out in misty puffs.

  “Brokk, you need to stop.” Her voice dipped and echoed around him, and he paused as he looked at the floor caving in to reveal a small pond. The water was still, its smooth surface like a mirror, but steam curled up from it, looking like smoke. His consciousness tugged at him; wasn’t he supposed to be doing something? Heading somewhere? Moving in a daze, all he wanted to do was slip beneath those comforting waters and sleep. He would only take a minute.

  Each step he took, the clarity of the room sharpened. He ripped off his shirt, pain flaring from the movement. The broken ends of the arrows dug deeper into his flesh, and he reached behind his head, gripping the end. One. He sucked in a breath. Two. His blood had coated his entire upper back. He could feel it trickling slowly down his skin. Three. Ripping the arrow from his body, his vision blurred as pain overtook his senses. Steeling his nerves, Brokk repeated the action three more times.

  By the time he was done, a cold sweat coated his body, a sense of gravity pulling him down. Running, he discarded any article of clothing that was left and plunged his body into the water. Warm water filled his mouth, nostrils, and ears. Kicking his feet, breaking through the surface, he gasped. The water had turned pink from his blood, and blinking hard, he relaxed, tension melting from his core, his muscles.