Lottie wiped the tears from her puffy cheeks, “but you’ll come back?”
“Nothing could stop me,” Klara gave her another squeeze and sent her back to her brother. “There are border towns in the south. You should be safe enough.”
Klara took the small leather purse containing what was left of her coin. She tossed it to Wolfgang who caught it in one hand with ease. “Make sure he spends it wisely.”
Lottie nodded going back to Wolfgang as the portal opened. “Don’t stay here, the portal opening will alert the patrol,” Klara warned as the slick skin of the portal wrapped around her.
The smell of blood forced her to wince. The storm had passed, but the rain had failed to remove the stench of battle. Bodies of fallen Creatures and two Giants surrounded her. The once crisp green grass was now stained and trodden with the fallen. Klara’s supporters and enemies lay side by side and would soon disappear into the mud together. Klara stepped over the fallen, their souls already with Kharon or roaming the Maze dazed and confused.
Klara saw him, pale and still. Klara landed on her knees. Her chest heaved as she placed a hand on his plated chest. “I’m so sorry,” Klara cried, pushing his hair from his eyes. They were still open, looking at her and she shut them. Praying that he had found peace, he didn’t deserve to roam Hell’s Maze.
A glimmer in the corner of her eye caught her attention, but before Klara could reach for her axe, her hands were shackled with iron chains. A piercing light disorientated her while hands gripped her paralyzed limbs as another flash of light rendered her unconscious.
◆◆◆
The stream of white light forced Klara to keep her eyes down on the white and grey marble floor. Klara lifted her head ever so slightly allowing her eyes to adjust. Five steps made of mirrors sat in front of Klara, and all sense escaped her. She was in the last place she expected.
Klara followed tall pillars of white marble wrapped in gold and green ivy vines to the glass ceiling where light poured in from a perfect pale blue sky. The steps reflected Klara’s image at her. What a muddied and bloodied mess I am. Her hair was stubbled, her cheek sliced, and her arm had a hole throw the centre, while her clothes had been torn in the fight. The iron in Mila’s weapons had slowed her healing abilities.
Klara tried to stand, unaware of the Guards behind her.
“Easy!” Klara barked as they shoved her to the hard-cold floor. They scoffed and forced her head forward as Klara tried to see their faces.
At the top of the mirrored steps, she heard the rush of water, and she sat back on her heels to get a better look. A waterfall poured from the rock wall into a small pool that surrounded a floral throne. Klara’s heart quickened as she realized whose clutches she had fallen into.
“Don’t you think we can talk about this? How about a bribe?” Klara said, peering over her shoulder. Before the pair forced her forward once again, Klara saw the light reflecting on their clear wings. Veins of colour ran through them, and the silver thread in their pale uniforms gleamed in the light. A hard slap greeted her, and Klara spat blood onto the marble floor. “Remind me to thank you for that later,” Klara said, wiping her split lip.
Klara bowed her head, knowing that struggling was futile, she pictured Frendall’s limp body lying on the grass. I’ll see you soon.
A burst of golden light shone at the top of the steps. Klara kept her eyes down as footsteps clicked down each step. Klara bowed her head deeper, preparing for the final blow. There was a deep sigh as Klara’s captor took in her battle-worn appearance.
“Josephine? My child, what has Lucifer done to you?” A hand lifted Klara’s chin. A soft wave of pure energy vibrated around them, and the Guards backed off. Klara’s captor helped her rise, and Klara saw a white silk suit with a deep V at the chest exposing deep brown skin. Klara kept her eyes down as she saw the throne of flowers and vines woven into a wooden throne. It was similar to Eve’s, but these flowers were grown not created. There was a vibrant purity about them that held Klara’s attention.
“Don’t be afraid to look at me,” a soft chuckle echoed from the Fae, and Klara looked up as Queen Aemella covered her mouth with a delicate hand.
“My name is Klara,” she politely corrected as Aemella’s unblemished hand grazed her cheek. The outline of Aemella’s translucent wings was clear behind her.
“Yes, both truths,” Aemella said, and Klara stared at the Queen’s pale blue eyes and long black lashes. They both studied each other in silence.
Welcome to Kalos,” Queen Aemella extended her arms, and the shackles disappeared from Klara’s wrists. Without the iron, Klara felt the ease of her magic trying to heal her.
“Thank you, Your Highness,” Klara’s response was greeted with a tilted smile. Klara tried to take a step, but the Guards pulled her back.
“Touch me again, and I will take those hands,” Klara said, and the Fae Queen smiled, and the Guards backed up. “Josephine, you wouldn’t take action against your kin, now would you?”
Ice white hair trailed down the Queen’s shoulders, Klara was taken aback by such pure beauty.
“I have no kin here,” Klara protested.
“You are not as I expected,” the Fae Queen rubbed her hands together.
“Just as stubborn as your Father.” The Queen was nothing like Klara had ever seen. Not in grimoires and certainly not among Malums’ Creatures. Klara’s legs grew tired while Queen Aemella studied her in silence. Not a slicked back hair out of place.
The floral throne blossomed as the Fae Queen took her seat and the scent of sweet flowers filled the space around them. The Fae Queen cocked her head to the side, “You seem tired, feel free to sit.”
Klara refused to let her legs betray her. Instead, she let the blood pool on the crisp white marble beneath her.
“You speak as though you know my Father?” Klara said, and the Fae Queen let out a soft laugh which seemed to sing off the walls. “How do you think your Father came to rule over Malum? I had to put the less desirables somewhere.”
“The treaty doesn’t mean you know him, stubbornness is the least of his issues,” Klara said, and the Queen’s pale blue eyes went wide. “Leave us,” Aemella ordered, and the Guards evaporated. “Palace Guards are awful gossips,” Aemella winked. “I’m sure Lucifer has never mentioned me.”
“Should he have? I didn’t realize you were so close.”
“We had a business arrangement on which he fell short.”
Fae and their words, nothing was ever definite. “He created Malum for you for your undesirables and what did you give him?” Klara felt her heart quicken, afraid Aemella’s cold stare would drain Klara of her blood. The Queen leant forward resting her pointed chin on her hands. Like a child studying an animal for the first time.
“Where are my manners we haven’t been formally introduced?” Queen Aemella rose and walked down the mirrored staircase her heels clicking.
“Queen Aemella of Kalos,” her white trousers trailed in Klara’s small pool of blood as they stood face to face.
“Klara Lucifer,” she introduced herself knowing to bow her head or lose it. Her words stumbled through chattering teeth. The Queen placed a feathered hand on her shoulder. “What did I give your Father? Well, I gave him what he always desired.’
Klara sank to the floor, unable to hold herself upright any longer. Mila’s iron arrows took more strength than she thought. “A three-headed dog?” Klara half-joked, knowing how much her Father loved Cerberus.
“You,” Queen Aemella smiled sadly. Silence surrounded them as Klara forgot how to breathe.
“You’re lying.”
Queen Aemella sank to her knees so they both sat at the same level. “Lying? Dear child, how could I? You forget what I am! Haven’t you been able to cross into my land without Guards waiting? There was a reason that field was empty.”
“You didn’t want to waste Fae,” Klara said, and Aemella ran a hand over her scalp. Locks of raven hair appeared down Klara’s shoulders.
“Why thin
k so little of me?” Klara was too busy picking up the lengths of hair to reply.
“I was waiting for you when Abadan’s scouts killed my Guards,” Aemella’s frustration was evident in her voice, she rose to stand above Klara. “A rib from him and my blood and ta-da you were born. Not the most romantic encounter but functional.”
Klara didn’t want to know about Lucifer’s or Aemella’s romantic encounters. She wasn’t sure if it was the excessive blood loss or the information making her head spin. Klara knew better than anyone that having someone’s blood in your veins doesn’t make them family.
“Bringing me here means you want something from me.”
Aemella’s eyes narrowed. “Your friends are being monitored as we speak. I can see there is not a bad bone in their bodies, but Lycaons have a habit of multiplying, Lycaon-Faes sound most fascinating, and I’m sure they’d make excellent warriors, but it’s up to you how I respond to them being here.”
“Up to me?” Klara asked. “What do you want?”
“I want you to kill your Father.”
“Why?” The room began to spin, and Klara tried to rise, but her legs gave out. “Stop struggling the protections in this room are stripping you of your magic.” Klara glared at Aemella. “The protections keep everyone in this room on equal footing.”
“I can’t kill the King of Hell,” Klara breathed.
“Lucifer took you from me!” Queen Aemella lost her calm demeanour. “I sent my Fae into Hell and not only were they slaughtered but he hid you in the very lands I once ruled. Raised you amongst those filthy Creatures,” Aemella raged, her pale blue eyes growing whiter. “Didn’t you ever wonder why you can’t hide your feeling? Because a Fae is plagued by the truth.”
Klara thought of the rebellion that had sent her to Malum. Demons hadn’t come for me, the Fae had.
“If I’m your child, why not come yourself?”
Klara thought of how Aemella had sent the Giants to aid her.
The Queen paced, her heels clicking against the marble.
“The treaty wouldn’t allow it. To cross the River Styx would have meant all-out war.”
“If I kill him you will allow Lottie and Wolfgang to live in peace?” Klara asked, trying to find her way out of Kalos. Once she was back on neutral ground, she couldn’t be touched even by the Fae Queen or held to ransom. Lilith’s grimoires would hold the answer to getting Lottie and Wolfgang back from Aemella’s clutches.
“Yes, and you will have a place in Kalos to live out your days in peace. A seat on my council, help those Creatures you’re so fond of.” The Fae Queen winced at the mention of the Creatures of Malum.
“And Abadan?”
“Kill her too. Being that you are my daughter, I’m gifting you Malum. Do with it as you see fit. Why you’d want anything to do with that rancid place is beyond me.”
“And who will rule Hell in Lucifer’s place?”
The Queen shot Klara a dark look, “Why would you care? You already abandoned your inheritance for my lands. You were trying to come back to me without even knowing who you are.”
Klara could see Aemella wasn’t after Malum or Hell, but Klara didn’t trust her intentions.
“Leave Hell to the Demons and worry about your own skin.” Aemella’s eyes narrowed in on her wounds, “as fragile as it is.”
“And if I refuse?”
“You won’t. On your Father’s orders, you lost someone on that field. I can smell your heartbreak. I wouldn’t have chosen a Commander for you. A daughter of mine could do so much better.”
Klara stared at her, wondering how she knew Frendall was a Commander. “Once the King is dead, we live as what? Mother and daughter, happily ever after?
“If you like. I would take Lucifer’s life myself, but he would sense me coming. I’m afraid you can’t hide from me. I can feel you plotting. We share the same gift, see what others try their hardest to hide.”
“Prove it,” Klara challenged, and Aemella rested a hand on her shoulder. Klara saw within Aemella’s mind.
There she was just a baby cradled in Aemella’s arms, her Father in the background reaching out to take her. As the image slipped away, she felt Aemella searching her mind. “Stop,” Klara said as Aemella reached deeper into her mind forcing Klara to see and feel hours and hours of Lilith’s ruthless training. The Fae Queen stepped back, and Klara took a deep breath.
It was true. Klara was part Angel, Fae and Demon. What she was suddenly didn’t matter to her anymore. All Klara could focus on was keeping Lottie and Wolfgang safe and taking revenge. Klara noticed the double doors behind the waterfall. If she wanted out of Kalos, she would have to agree to kill her Father.
“Deal,” Klara said. I’ll kill Abadan and Mila and worry about getting out of the deal later.
“Delighted to hear it, I knew we would see eye to eye but don’t try and trick me daughter if there is one thing that your Father and I have in common, it's how creative we can be with our punishments.”
Aemella cupped her face, and Klara felt a rush of strength as she saw another memory. The Fae Queen stood screaming as she stared into an empty basinet. Klara felt awash with pity as she felt the Queen’s sorrow.
“My people will be watching,” Aemella winked releasing her.
~19~
“You’ll need this,” Aemella said, tossing a coin in the air. Klara caught it, but before she could ask what it was for, she fell through the floor.
Klara landed in the filth of the battlefield and retched into the grass. Her body wasn’t used to portaling from different lands in such a weakened state. She pulled the grass out from the roots to ground herself.
“Kill my Father.” Klara tested the words out loud. A few feet away Frendall lay undisturbed. She crawled to him, exhausted and bleeding. The Fae Queen hadn’t spared a moment to heal her.
To think she was created from Fae blood and Lucifer rocked her very core. Aemella and Klara might share the same eyes, but her feathered wings contrasted with the Faes’ translucent wings with veins of colour.
There is no way Father would have kept it from me. What of the rebellion? Had it all been a lie? Klara tried to think of the day she left Hell, remembering the Commanders’ and Creatures’ heads hoisted on the Manor gate as a warning.
Klara reasoned that the heads could have been a glamour. Although if Lucifer wanted a cover-up, he would have made it as authentic as possible. Klara needed to look into his eyes and see the truth, but as she thought of Abadan’s claws in him, Klara knew it would probably cost her life.
Klara considered how the Queen Aemella had promised her a life in Kalos, and Malum. A position on the council. I could help those trying to flee from the inside. Improve the conditions for those who have already fled and are in hiding. More importantly, it means sanctuary for Wolfgang and Lottie. All it would cost is Father’s life.
Klara gazed down at Frendall’s body, knowing she couldn’t have taken his life, so how could she take her Fathers? Klara placed the coin in Frendall’s hand and wrapped his stiff fingers around it. “For your passage,” she said, hoping it wasn’t too late. And then, she cried as if her body wanted to rid itself of all water.
As her tears fell on Frendall, his body became hazy, and Klara could see the glamour.
“Son of a bitch,” she spat as the battleground disappeared.
◆◆◆
Suspended in pitch black, Klara tried to look around. Am I dead? Klara thought, but as she struggled to move, she felt the stone wall at her back. Iron shackles bit into her wrists as she hung from the dungeon wall. The familiar metal cot came into view, and the condensation from the damp wall dripped down the back of her t-shirt.
The Queens’ Castle. She pulled against the restraints until the pain in her side blinded her. Frendall’s body, they attached a portal glamour to him as they did with the portraits. Abadan knew she would go back, unable to leave him to rot. As soon as Klara’s revealing powers sensed the glamour, it activated Abadan’s trap. The restrain
ts wouldn’t budge an inch. The candle on the opposite wall offered little light. She looked around the dark cell seeing something shuffle in the corner.
“Klara?” Eve whined shuffling out from the dark corner. Klara pressed her back into the wall, but then she saw the bruises that marked Eve’s arms and neck.
So, this is where Eve has been. Klara had thought Abadan had left Eve to guard the Castle. Instead, she was here. Locked up.
“I don’t have much strength left, but you have to stop Abadan,” Eve rasped. “She corrupted Mila. Cursed her heart and now there is nothing left but darkness,” Eve cried, and Klara didn’t say anything. A curse? Mila has always been a little twisted, but Klara wouldn’t put it past Abadan taking any conscience Mila might have had.
“Let me touch you, and you’ll see my desires, let me show you I don’t mean any harm.”
“Let me help you,” Eve coughed. “Don’t touch me,” Klara said, pulling her wounded side away sharply. She hated herself for twisting so carelessly. Eve’s hand gripped her ankle and Klara couldn’t kick her off.
Klara saw Eve walking with Lokey moments before she had arrived at the toadstool den, the same patron with the newspaper sat at the counter. The scene flipped to show Eve trying to subdue Abadan as the High Queen ordered the burn out of the Lycaon caves.
“Why go after the Lycaons?” Klara panted as the images came hard and fast. “Lilith ordered them to find you, take you as far away as they could,” Klara could barely hear her through the visions.
Abadan threw Eve against the back wall of the throne room, and Klara heard Eve’s bones break as she landed on the stone floor. Mila looked at her mother in disgust as Eve tried to stop the Hounds from ripping Lilith apart. Klara kicked Eve away as she watched the skin being torn from Lilith’s bones and Lilith’s screams ran through her.
“Why didn’t you leave? Go to the King?”
“I thought by staying by her side, I would be able to cull her impulses, but Lucifer never intervened. Not once did he come. For centuries we lived in fear of the eyes he claimed to have in the Castle and the Forest but nothing. No Demons appeared, not even a warning.
Crowned A Traitor: A Hellish Fairytale Page 24