Burn of the Everflame — Chapter 12

12

LUTHER

uralie kept hold of my arm as we followed Alixe, Eleanor, andA Cordellia in a sprint through the palace halls. Frantic Corbois and members of the Crowns’ delegations scurried around us in a frenzy.

When we spilled through the front entrance, the same invisible force I’d felt earlier crashed against me. I swore at myself for not recognizing it sooner as Ophiucae’s aura. My senses had been distracted by so many strong Descended in one place, but out in the open air, it was clear—Diem’s

sire was close.

And getting closer.

Alixe ran to speak with my father, who had gathered with the Crowns in a cluster around a blood-soaked soldier at the base of the front steps.

“W-we were on the dock,” the man stammered. His hand was clamped over a gash on his arm, his expression dazed. “The water seemed too still— like it wasn’t real. Then . . .” He shook with a full-body flinch. “They were everywhere. Appeared right out of thin air. They cut down half the battalion before I realized who they were.”

“Illusions,” I guessed. “If Diem can use every realm’s magic, Ophiucae must be able to do it, too. He used Lumnos magic to cloak his army until they arrived.”

Meros stormed toward me. “Did you do this?” he demanded, white- capped orbs of water at his palms. “Was this all a distraction so he could slip in unseen?”

“He’s coming to kill my family,” I growled. “You think I’d welcome that?”

Auralie edged between us. “The Crowns called this meeting, Meros, not us. For all we know, you lured him here to force our hand.”

Meros held my glare. Sophos set a palm on his chest and pushed him back, then shot a glance at the Ignios gryvern, who was pacing the palace walls. “Tybold isn’t burning you alive, so I assume Ignios lives?”

I nodded. I’d left the Ignios bastard behind for now. His consequences would come soon enough.

“Then we can forgive what happened. The cease-fire is unbroken.”

They looked at Auralie. “You have to help us.”

“No.”

Her flat tone stunned everyone—including me.

“You killed my daughter,” she said.

“That was Ignios!” Sophos argued.

“You played a part in it, too.” She gazed around at the other Crowns.

“For every Descended life a Guardian took, you made the mortals pay a hundred times over. Now you will learn what it means to suffer for the crimes of another.” She set her jaw and faced Cordellia. “Tell our people not to intervene.”

“What about your demands?” Arboros cried.

Auralie’s brown eyes, still wet with tears, smoldered in response.

“Here’s my new demand: destroy your thrones. End the Descended reign in

Emarion. Forever.”

Slack-jawed stares returned in answer.

“The Crowns are offering you a truce, woman,” my father hissed. “You said yourself that he’s a threat to mortals, too.”

“I fought him once and won. I like my odds.” She snapped on her heel, striding for the palace. “I’m going to get my son.”

I ignored the indignant look my father turned on me and moved to follow her, but Alixe caught me by the arm. “If Diem is dead, shouldn’t there be a new Lumnos Crown?”

I shoved her away. “I don’t fucking care.”

“Luther, look.” She pointed up at the royal terrace, where Sorae was perched protectively at Teller’s side as they watched the chaos unfold.

“She’s still obeying Diem’s orders. If Lumnos has a new Crown, why hasn’t its gryvern left to find them? What if the Ignios King is lying about—”

“I saw it, Alixe,” I said bleakly. “Teller did, too. We watched him stab her.”

All these weeks, I’d been trying to ignore what I’d seen, but the Ignios King had no reason to lie—his revelation made things infinitely more difficult for the Crowns.

Alixe’s cobalt eyes filled with sorrow. “It doesn’t matter,” she said, shaking her emotion away. “Until Blessed Mother Lumnos reveals a new Crown, I serve Diem’s orders.” Her piercings glittered as she pointed her chin in challenge. “Do you?”

I stalked away without an answer. I couldn’t bear to let her see my agony. I caught up to Auralie in the foyer, and we walked with Eleanor through the vacant halls. Every guard had either run outside to defend the palace or fled to save themselves.

“What happened?” Teller asked when we found him on the royal suite’s balcony with Taran. He looked at his mother and stilled. “Were you

crying?”

“Lu, what’s going on?” Taran asked.

“Ophiucae’s coming,” I answered grimly.

Taran swore. Teller paled.

“Go back to camp,” Auralie told her son. “You’ll be safe there. They’re not targeting mortals.”

She reached for him, and he jerked back. “I’m not running to safety while everyone else is in danger.”

“Teller, this is no time to argue.” Her voice was firm but hoarse from the still-fresh loss. “Go back to camp.”

“Father didn’t teach me to turn my back on people who need help.

Neither did my sister.” His tone turned sharper. “Until today, neither did

you.”

Auralie flinched.

“Where’s Lily?” I asked him.

“She left when I tried to speak with her.” He looked around in a panic.

“She could be in danger. I have to find her.”

“The cousins were told to gather the children and flee through the canals,” Eleanor said. “I’m sure Lily went there to help.”

My stomach dropped. Months ago, Diem confessed that she’d shown the secret canal entrance to Henri, her then-betrothed. Though she might have seen good in him, I had not. If there was any chance he’d joined Ophiucae’s army . . .

“The canals can’t be trusted,” I said. “Go to the dungeons instead. Use shadow magic to stay hidden.”

Eleanor and Taran exchanged an alarmed look.

“We can’t,” she said. “The dungeons are full.”

“Those Crown-wearing pricks arrested half of Mortal City,” Taran growled. “Locked the mortals up without charges.”

“Your father tried to stop them,” Eleanor rushed on. “The Crowns said the cease-fire only applied to mortals who confessed to being a Guardian, and none of them did.”

Her ashamed expression spoke the words she didn’t: We failed her. We promised to protect them, and we failed her.

I knew the feeling.

“Take the children to my chambers,” I ordered. “The doors are fortified.

Lily’s blood will open the bloodlocks.” My stare cut to Teller. “So will yours. Find my sister and keep her safe.”

He ran to the other room and began gathering hidden blades from beneath cushions and under tables, then darted into his old bedroom, reemerging with an armored breastplate and a few more knives. My heart reeled. It was just like his sister—perhaps even her doing.

Taran’s brows rose high. “Lu, your room . . . are you sure?”

I’d always been intensely private about my chambers. There were too many secrets hidden there that could destroy me. Even Taran and Lily had

never been invited inside.

No one had.

Not until Diem.

Thankfully, I’d hidden everything incriminating before I last left Lumnos. I knew I might never return, and the secrets I kept risked more lives than my own.

I nodded to Taran. “Get the children to safety, then you and Zalaric find Alixe. She’s going to need every strong Descended she can get.”

Taran grabbed some knives from Teller, and they ran from the suite with Eleanor following closely behind. Auralie and I remained on the terrace.

Her gaze stayed fixed on the palace gates, mine lurking in the skies. Though his aura was approaching, there was still no sign of the man that had fathered my Queen.

His soldiers, however, were impossible to miss. They emerged from the trees in a wave, cloaked in his shield. Their numbers had grown

exponentially since the battle in Sophos. The handful of men we’d faced that day had become an army, and more were still arriving.

Auralie’s eyes narrowed as she scanned their faces. She paused periodically to shake her head or let out a short, disappointed sigh. “I didn’t realize how many of my Guardians had chosen to join him.”

“He’s offering them what they’ve always wanted—revenge.”

“That isn’t the Guardians’ goal. We want an end to the Descended’s reign, not a slaughter of the Descended themselves.”

“Would you feel that way if Diem wasn’t one of us?”

Her features tightened at Diem’s name, but she didn’t answer.

Ophiucae’s men surged forward and clashed with the soldiers at the exterior gate. Immediately, our guards began to fall. Ophiucae’s shield was strong, even more than it had been in Sophos. Too many of his soldiers— and too few of ours—carried godstone weapons that carved through our defenses like butter. It made us look helpless, and it made them look invincible.

For a gut-wrenching moment, it looked like the palace would be breached in a matter of seconds.

Beside me, Sorae’s muscles twitched beneath her skin, her pupils black and wide. Lumnos was the only home she’d known for centuries. Even without Diem here to protect, she looked troubled at the prospect of

watching it fall.

“Go,” I told her.

The sun cast a rainbow gleam over her dark scales as her focus shifted to me. A sapphire glow built with a rumble in the back of her throat.

“Protect the palace.” My chest burned. “It’s what she would order.”

A sadness seemed to pulse from within her before igniting into a monstrous rage. She shifted her weight onto her haunches, then launched into the air. Her shrill howl was swallowed up by the pale blue flames that shot from her jaws. Ophiucae’s shield crystallized into a wall of ice, effective at protecting his men from her dragonfyre but equally effective at blocking their progress. She took a sharp bank, targeting the rear to create a rift in their lines.

I yelled for Alixe, but she had already spotted the opening and moved to exploit it. She thrust a palm toward the sky to drape Sorae in magic that cloaked her from sight while using the other hand to cast a false illusion of the gryvern approaching from a different direction.

Though Ophiucae’s shield could sense the deception, his men couldn’t.

They saw a wall of ice on one side and a fire-breathing beast on the other, and they panicked, scrambling in every direction.

A peal of laughter—fucking laughter—pulled my attention to the palace steps, where the Crowns were watching the fight unfold from safety. Even that piece of shit Ignios had found a pair of guards to load him in a chair and carry him outside to see the show.

“What are you waiting for?” I roared from the balcony. “You’re the most powerful Descended here. If you won’t defend your people, why should they defend you?”

Their amusement faded as they exchanged guilty looks, yet none moved to join the soldiers.

I glared at Sophos. “You owe my Queen a life debt, Doriel. Get on your damn gryvern and fight.”

Their expression hardened. “Vexes, come,” they shouted into the sky. A plump, slow-moving creature flew in from the forest and landed long enough for Sophos to mount. Meros called his gryvern and joined them, then Faunos and Arboros. Ignios held back, demanding his guards carry him back inside and barking orders for Tybold to keep anyone from following.

“He’s got days to live, and still Ignios puts his life first,” Auralie muttered. “The Crowns don’t deserve our help.”

I cocked my head. “Auralie, are you certain of your choice?”

“You defend them now, after all they’ve done?”

“No. It’s just not what I expected from you, that’s all.”

“Because you think me weak?”

“Because you raised the most compassionate person I’ve ever known.”

My palm found my heart, an instinctive salute to my Queen. “If Diem were here, she would be the first in battle, truce or not.”

With the help of Alixe and Sorae, the Crowns succeeded in pushing back a large swath of Ophiucae’s men, but not all. Some had fought their way through, and neither the Emarion Army soldiers nor the Lumnos Royal Guards were experienced at battling such impervious shields. The enemy advanced with frightening speed and a trail of dead bodies.

My fingers inched toward my sword.

“Why haven’t you joined Ophiucae?” I asked her.

“I don’t trust him.”

“More than you distrust the Crowns?” She glowered in silence, so I pushed a bit harder. “What’s the real reason?”

She chewed on the answer as if testing its taste to decide whether to spit it out. When she answered, her voice was strangely small for a woman so mighty. “When I became pregnant, I knew I would do anything for Diem.

I’ve made mistakes as a mother, but everything I’ve done, everything, has been for my children—to give them a future they can be safe in. Andrei felt the same way. Diem wasn’t his blood, but he . . .” Her voice faltered.

I set a hand on her shoulder. It felt like a lie to comfort her over a death I felt so responsible for. A loss I’d sworn, and failed, to prevent.

“I saw him with Diem while you were away,” I said. “It was clear how deeply he loved her.”

“I thought Ophiucae was the same. He and I spoke of getting off the island and making the world better for our child. Then Diem was born.

Instead of protecting her . . .” Her pain heated to fury. “He held her tiny body and put a blade against her skin. He wanted his freedom. Everything else came second.” She pointed to the mass of gryverns swooping through the clash. “I have much to criticize the Crowns for, but I don’t believe they’ll kill their own people to save themselves. Around a man that will . . . no one is safe.”

The battle grew messier. Smoke scented the air, while blood trickled in a scarlet maze between the cobblestones lining the path to the gates. Some of Ophiucae’s men had figured out Alixe’s illusions and shouted at the others to press forward despite the gryverns’ flames.

Shrewd as always, Alixe adapted. She darted through ranks of army soldiers, issuing commands for them to use their magic in creative ways: light and shadows to blind, ice and water to slick the path, rocks and roots to catch on marching feet. Not as weapons, but as obstacles—the same strategy Diem had used to stop Vance in Sophos.

The Fortos Vice General seized her by the arm and yanked her back. He barked at his men to ignore her orders. He might not be killing his people out of selfishness, but his ego was about to do it for him.

“Do you really think Diem is dead?” Auralie asked.

My godhood answered first, pulsing so strongly from my chest it almost knocked me to my knees.

But I could not give her hope, nor the closure she sought. I wouldn’t rest until I held Diem in my arms, dead or alive.

“Go to the camp,” I said instead. “Keep the mortals behind the shield.”

“Where are you going?”

I pulled my sword free. “To serve my Queen.”

BY THE TIME I ARRIVED, Ophiucae’s men were at the gate. Although Alixe had locked it closed, one man had begun to scale the ornate iron scrollwork.

I held out my palm and midnight shadows rose to meet it. A swirling bog tumbled over the cobblestones and through the gate, rushing forward like an angry, ominous sea. With each enemy it found, I wrapped their shields in a veil of churning obsidian that left them whirling and blind— including the Vice General, who found a patch of black vines clamping over his mouth.

Alixe caught my stare. Her answering frown was deep with judgment, but she wasn’t a fool. She turned to the soldiers. “More obstacles!”

The mortal atop the gates stared down at the dark void of my magic, hesitating at the prospect of leaping into the unknown. I fixated on the godstone sword in his hands. One weapon was all I needed. One glittering black blade, and even Ophiucae’s shield wouldn’t stop me.

I pulled the shadows in a shroud around me and crept forward just as the man threw his leg over the gate and began to descend. “Alixe,” I hissed through the bars. “The key.”

She squinted into the darkness. “Luther?”

“Give me the key to the gate.”

She tensed, edging back.

I pulled aside my magic just enough to expose my earnest stare. “My sister is in that palace, Alixe. For this battle, you and I are aligned.”

She pulled a key from inside her leathers and pressed it into my palm.

“If they get through the gate . . .”

“I know,” I said darkly.

She turned her back to me, shouting, “Soldiers, tighten ranks. Forward —attack!”

The Lumnos Royal Guard obeyed, and with the Fortos Vice General muzzled, the Emarion Army soldiers followed suit. The lines met in a crush,

and cries rose as godstone weapons found Descended flesh. Alixe had bought me time—but it had a lethal cost.

I crafted light magic into the image of a closed gate to hide my plan, but with my skill at illusions so inexperienced, the ruse wouldn’t fool them for long. I unlocked the gate and shoved it open. The mortal atop it lost his balance, though he managed to keep hold of a wrought iron swirl and dangle off the side.

My focus sharpened on his sword as he fumbled to sheathe it at his waist. If I had any hope of getting to it, I needed to get it beyond his shield.

I hurled my weight against the gate and sent it swinging in an arc and slamming against the exterior wall. The mortal grunted as he collided with stone. A second later, I heard the clatter of a sword falling to the ground.

The mortal scrambled to climb down, and I jerked the gate back. His grip slipped with the sudden movement, and he fell, disappearing into the fog.

With my magic draping the palace grounds, neither of us could see the sword or each other. I got only fleeting glimpses of pale skin and ginger hair as we both crawled in an urgent search for the fallen blade.

But I had spent a lifetime lurking in the dark.

And the shadows always had a story to tell.

Find it, I told my godhood.

Find her, it sneered back.

“She ordered us to save her people,” I growled aloud. “Obey your fucking Queen.”

For the length of a single breath, my consciousness snapped free of my body. My senses bloomed like ink through water, hearing and smelling and tasting all that my shadows touched. I was no longer bound by bones and

flesh.

I was night immortal.

I was the darkness itself.

In my storm of obsidian vengeance, I felt each life that hung in the balance. I felt their hearts hammer with the thrill and terror of the fight.

Scattered among them, I felt pieces of something else. Something angry, something wrong. In the midst of all this teeming life, these were shards of inimitable death.

And one of them was right in front of my hand.

The air rushed from my lungs as I withdrew back into flesh and blood.

The shadows parted to reveal the fallen godstone sword—and the mortal man.

We both lunged. My fingers brushed the blade, and it took everything in me not to recoil. The mere touch of the poisonous substance brought everything back—the grief, the hopelessness, the self-loathing, the rage, every miserable emotion that had consumed me in Umbros. Though everyone warned of the physical pain of a godstone death, it was the way the toxin had turned me angry and cruel, even toward Diem, that haunted me most.

My godhood abruptly withdrew at the godstone’s touch, and my magic dissipated to mist. The sudden disappearance of my shadows distracted the mortal, and I seized my chance.

My hand closed around the hilt, and I yanked just as the mortal dove to grab it. The blade tipped up and slid clean through his shield . . . then his torso.

He choked, staring down at his opened gut. Though the godstone’s toxin wouldn’t hurt a mortal, this was a lethal blow by any blade. I shoved the sword deeper, and the man gave a wet cough. Another sharp jerk through

his ribs, and his body went still.

“Gate’s open!” a voice yelled.

My stomach flipped. When my shadows vanished, so had my illusion.

The wide-open entrance was now a bright, shiny lure.

The ground began to rumble. From the edge of the surrounding forest, more mortals were emerging. Scores of them. Hundreds.

And they were led by a scowling, one-armed man. His eyes met mine and crinkled with a smile. “To the palace,” Vance shouted. “Kill every Descended you see.”

The mortals raised their weapons with a cheer. I managed to shove the gate closed before they crashed into our lines, but as I reached for the key, the impact knocked it ajar. I tried once more, and a crowd of bodies pushed me further back.

I raised the godstone sword, and I let the bloodlust consume me. My blade flew through shield, skin, and bone, freeing heads from necks and emptying entrails from gaping, bleeding torsos. Liquid scarlet painted me in carnage as I hacked at every brown eye I met.

Deep down, I knew my Queen would despise this, perhaps despise me for doing it, but something inside me had cracked. The darkness I’d been harboring since that cursed island had grown too monstrous, too unmoored, and I could not leash it—not even for her.

Black blades targeted me in return. Whether they struck, I could not say.

I knew only my wrath and the death in its wake.

As mortals met their end at the tip of my blade, their godstone weapons fell abandoned to the ground. Alixe grabbed two for herself, then shouted orders at her best fighters to arm themselves and join me. Our numbers grew, and soon the mortals’ faces had turned from triumph to terror.

We pushed them back far enough to close the gates, and as I turned to lock it, my eyes again found Vance. His stare rose to the sky—to a splash of black against the sunny blue, bobbing in a steady rhythm and getting closer.

Ophiucae had arrived.

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