Burn of the Everflame — Chapter 32

32

DIEM

paced the streets of Fortos City, gaze fixed on the sky. Storm clouds hadI rolled in with the dawn, painting the town in a dreary shade of grey.

Though the air was menacingly humid, not a drop had fallen. It seemed to

be waiting.

Just like me.

“You’re sure they plan to attack today?” I asked.

“I trust my source,” my mother said calmly.

“You also trusted Vance,” I muttered under my breath. “Look where that got us.”

Instantly, I regretted my harsh words. If today went the way I feared, they could be the last ones I ever spoke to her. I glanced at where she stood with Luther, Alixe, and Nidara. “I’m sorry.”

She offered a strained but gracious smile. “This source is different. If he says they’re coming, they are.”

My eyes swept across the lightless, soundless buildings. We’d arrived in Fortos City late last night to a contentious welcome. The Fortosians were reluctant to accept their first-ever Queen, especially one who led a jailbreak of the rebels a few months prior, but we were at war, and squabbling over hierarchy was a distraction. I gave the Emarion Army the same choice I’d given the soldiers in Lumnos: fight or flee.

Though a fair share of mortals took my offer to retire with a full Descended pension, my chest filled with pride at the many who raised their swords to fight. The Descended from the other realms were less enthusiastic. The details of Ophiucae’s attacks had left them shaken, and I

watched their numbers dwindle as most left to return home and guard their families.

For the Fortosians, there was nowhere else to go. A lifetime of army service was the only thing they’d been taught to want. I insisted they take the night to consider their choice. Come dawn, every last one gave me their grudging salute.

We searched the rubble of the prior attack and found the vault of godstone weapons the Fortos King had hidden. After arming as many as we could, we herded those who could not fight into the newly repaired Fortos prison, and we settled in to await the enemy’s arrival.

I glanced at Luther. “I don’t feel Ophiucae’s aura. Do you?”

He shook his head. “Unless he’s found a way to mask it, he’s nowhere near Fortos.”

Growling passed overhead as Tybold swooped across the city. I’d brought him along in hopes this might be a useful outlet for his angry energy, but he was even more restless here. I silently wondered if it had something to do with my choice to leave Sorae behind to protect Lumnos.

From the way I heard her howls all the way to the border, I guessed she wasn’t happy about it, either.

I beckoned for Alixe to join me as I strolled away from the others.

“There’s something at least one person should know,” I began when we were out of earshot. “Something I’d prefer to keep between us. When I was on the island, the Kindred appeared to me at the Temple.”

Her face went slack. There was little that impressed Alixe Corbois, but at the core of her warrior heart, she was a devout servant of her patron goddess. “The Blessed Mother,” she breathed. “You saw her?”

Saw her, spoke to her, nearly cussed her out.

“She asked me to stop Ophiucae. I agreed on one condition: no Crown will succeed me. I am the last monarch the nine realms will ever have—or at least the last one the Kindred will choose.”

Her eyes drifted up to my Crown as my words sank in. “That’s why you agreed to the governing council.”

“It was long overdue, but now it’s urgent. Once I die, the people of Emarion will have to find their own way.”

“You’ll have plenty of time, Your Majesty. Our soldiers know the plan.

We’ll handle Vance and his men.”

“And I’ll handle Ophiucae. Once the fighting begins, I’ll lure him away so I can . . .”

Talk to him. See if there’s any compassion left in his black, angry heart.

And if not . . .

“ . . . end this,” I finished. “If I don’t come back —”

“You will. Powerful Descended like him always rely too much on their magic. Rarely are they as skilled with their sword as you. Once you face him, I’d bet all my coin he doesn’t walk out of it alive.”

My heart heavied, but I forced a smile. “I know serving me hasn’t been easy for you. I see the strain it put between you and the others. I’m grateful for your loyalty. And your friendship.”

“The honor is mine. Don’t worry about the others. To be honest, other than Luther, I was never close to anyone in my family. There are certain things expected of female royals and, I’m . . . well, I’m something else.”

She shrugged. “I don’t mind it. All the people I admire were different, too.

No one becomes a legend by fitting in.”

Something in me healed a little, hearing those words from her, someone I admired. Being different could be a lonely road to walk. It was nice to be reminded that path could lead to exceptional places.

“There’s something I need to share with you, as well,” she said. “Teller has asked to join the Royal Guard. He said he wants to do something useful.”

I frantically shook my head. “Then he can be my advisor, or—or my historian. He can run the palace library.”

“You wish me to reject him, then?” She hesitated, then added, “I watched him spar with the other applicants. He’s a good fighter. And we all know he’s very clever. He could have an impressive career.”

“Teller doesn’t want a career in the army. We discussed it countless times.”

“War makes us all do things we never wanted to do.”

I could not argue with that.

“And the Royal Guard is not the army,” she went on. “He will stay at home in Lumnos, protecting the people he cares for. After all he’s been through, perhaps that’s what he needs.”

I tried to push reason past my panic. Teller was unhappier than ever.

He’d missed too many weeks to return to school, and he had little to do but

mope. He needed a challenge to pour himself into. “I know you’re right, Alixe. But if anything happened to him . . .”

“If he’s anything like his sister, I’m more worried for anyone who crosses him.”

Tybold let out a sudden hiss, his eyes on the Ring Road to the south.

Someone was coming, but I still couldn’t feel any sign of Ophiucae’s aura.

If he’d somehow discovered how to hide it . . .

I frowned. “Get everyone ready.”

Alixe ran through the streets, giving orders to the soldiers we’d hidden in the damaged buildings. The plan was to lure the enemy into the heart of Fortos City, where our soldiers would surround them and, hopefully, convince them to surrender. The Guardians had been stationed by the prison in the hopes that Vance and his men would not be willing to kill mortals to get inside.

Luther jogged to my side, his expression visibly darkening at how I tensed in his presence. “Do you feel him?”

“No. You?”

He shook his head.

I turned away. “I’m joining the first battalion. Stay here.”

“Like hell,” he muttered, following behind me.

“That was an order, Luther.”

“Then arrest me. Put me in chains.” His hand grazed my back. “I quite liked it the last time you tied me up.”

The mating bond purred at his touch, further prickling my temper. He kept close as we walked toward the Ring Road. The Fortos landscape was flat grey rock as far as the eye could see, the perfect natural defense against an ambush. Sure enough, the moment I passed the front lines, I saw a distant horde approaching from the south.

“Not as many as I expected,” Luther said.

Lonard, the mortal I’d elevated to commander, nodded. “A fraction of what they brought to Lumnos. Odd, considering how fortified this city is.”

“Didn’t they arrive by boat in the other attacks?” I asked. “The sea is to the east.”

“Maybe they hit Faunos first,” Lonard said.

Apprehensive energy tingled through my blood as we watched them approach. I’d spent the morning eager to confront my sire, but now, I wasn’t so sure. My fingers curled around the hilt of Sorrow’s Edge. Is this how his

mother had felt, in those moments before she cursed him—a glass heart balancing on a wire, gazing at the rocky ground below and fearing the only way down was to shatter?

Tybold scorched a blackened scar across the road in warning. I sensed his reluctance, too. I wondered if I’d been wrong about his desire to unleash his rage in battle. After centuries of bloodshed at his masters’ command, maybe it was the violence he hated most.

Protect my people, I sent across our bond. Take no lives unless you must.

In the sky, his gaze swung to me with a slow, appraising blink.

And do not come to save me, I warned him. My life is my own to defend or to lose.

Beside me, Luther unsheathed the Sword of Corbois. Once again, he’d refused a godstone weapon, handing each one I gave him to another soldier until no black blades remained. Noble as it was, my heart hammered with fears of what that selflessness might cost him.

“Take a weapon off them the first chance you get,” I snapped at him. “If you end this battle with that gaudy thing in your hands, Luther Corbois, I’ll never let them touch me again.”

He leaned in, voice dropping low. “That’s all the motivation I need.”

My blood heated. I broke away before I gave the Fortosians a whole new reason for thinking me a scandalous Queen.

“Your horse,” I commanded to a mounted Descended, an older man who’d been scowling at me all day.

He climbed off the mare but held the reins out of reach. “She’s no docile pony,” he warned. “She bucks hard, and she’s got a hell of a bite.”

“Just like me.” I snatched the lead from his hands and swung onto her back, easing her feisty spirit with a pulse of Faunos magic and prodding her into a gallop. Behind me, Luther’s snarls joined a crackle of light magic as he clashed with a man less obliged to give up his horse.

The group was almost close enough to see their faces. To my surprise, quite a few were female. I couldn’t remember more than a handful of women in Vance’s camp, and never in battle. He and his kind had more in common with the Fortos Descended than either side would ever admit.

That was the part of this war that infuriated me most. Vance and his men didn’t want to end the world’s injustice, they just wanted to control it for

themselves.

“Halt,” I shouted down the road.

They continued to advance.

I reached out a palm and raised a massive, glittering shield. “Halt,” I shouted again.

They yanked their horses to a stop and bowed their heads together in discussion.

“Leave now,” I yelled. “Whatever you’ve come to do, you won’t succeed.”

The two in front—a petite woman with a raven-black bob and a brawny man with a full head of hair that could never be mistaken for Vance— dismounted and walked toward us.

Even more strangely . . . they were holding hands.

Luther nudged his horse forward. His head was cocked, his stare focused. “Release their magic.”

I balked. “Magic? They’ve got Descended with them?”

He nodded. “Release them from the Forging spell.” Our eyes met.

“Trust me.”

The Forging magic rose up within me, my soul responding to those two words in an instinctual way. Just as he’d suspected, it sensed the presence of foreign Descended among them. I hesitated, but when Luther sent a plume of his shadows spiraling toward the clouds, I gave in and set their magic free.

In the distance, several suddenly sat taller on their horses. The man in front lifted his arm, and ropey brown roots shot up from the rocky soil, mirroring Luther’s shadows.

“An Arboros Descended?” I asked. “Working for Vance?”

Luther dismounted and sheathed his sword. He strode toward the edge of my shield without explanation, for once leaving me behind to catch up.

“Luther, wait,” I shouted, scrambling off my horse. “They could have

godst—”

“Diem!” the woman called out, waving.

I stopped in place. “Runa? What in the Flames are you doing in Fortos?”

I dissolved my shield, and Runa ran to me, wrapping me in a crushing hug. The color in her skin and the curves of her hips had blossomed since I’d freed her group of Guardians from the Fortos prison. Over her shoulder, I caught Luther clasping forearms with a green-eyed Descended I almost

didn’t recognize as Enness, the emaciated inmate whose mangled legs and broken spirit I would never, ever forget.

“Your mother and I have been exchanging hawks,” Runa explained.

“She told us to gather everyone we could to join your army.”

Enness nodded. “When we got word that you’d be in Fortos, it felt like a sign from the Blessed Kindred—”

“The Old Gods,” Runa said, wrinkling her nose.

“—right, them, too. We were always going to join you, we just needed, uh . . . a little time to ourselves.” He grinned and tugged her closer, and her cheeks flushed as they exchanged a knowing look. My heart skipped in recognition: Runa and Enness were in love.

“We kept our word and stuck together until everyone got home safely,”

Runa said, nodding toward their group. “Somewhere along the way, we all got to be friends. Your mother said the Descended were welcome to join us —I hope that’s okay.”

I struggled to respond, speechless at how the people I once had to beg to work together were now allies, friends, even lovers.

“We’re glad to see it,” Luther answered for me. “Come, we’ll take you to Auralie. She was hoping you’d make it.”

I’D BEEN SO focused on what might happen when the attack arrived, I’d failed to consider what might happen if it didn’t. As the hours passed, the army soldiers grew restless. They wandered out of their hiding spots, casting me annoyed looks as they mingled in the streets. It was bad enough that I’d welcomed the prisoners they’d once guarded. If I’d turned their city upside down for nothing, my already fragile leadership in Fortos would take a critical blow.

While Runa and Enness caught up with my mother, I paced through the city, trying my best to ignore Luther as he matched every step. I’d been moved to learn that he’d helped my mother arrange their arrival, then annoyed that neither had told me—not that I could blame them, since I’d been avoiding them both.

With the storm clouds thickening and the sky growing dark, Luther pointed out a watchtower, suggesting it might give us a better view of the city. We were greeted at its top by a trio of unhappy-looking Descended soldiers, who sluggishly saluted me between yawns.

“Why don’t you three take a break,” Luther told them. “Her Majesty and I can keep watch for a while.”

The soldiers looked to me for confirmation.

Suddenly, I doubted that Luther had wanted to come here for the view.

“This is an important post,” I said quickly, “maybe they should st—”

“How long have you been here?” Luther asked them.

“Since nightfall,” one answered.

I balked. “Do you mean nightfall yesterday?”

“Yes, Your Majesty. Our replacements were sent to escort the mortals you brought instead. We were ordered to stay here.” The soldier beside him stifled another yawn, the third struggling to keep his eyes open.

Luther smirked, his triumph barely suppressed. Their exhaustion made them useless as lookouts. I had to let them go, and he knew it.

“Find my High General, Alixe. Tell her the tower needs reinforcements.” I swallowed. “Hurry.”

The moment they were gone, Luther’s posture changed. The tension unwound from his muscles, and his shoulders eased into a casual slope. He untied the leather cord binding his hair and roughly ran a hand through it, then leaned against the door to the stairwell. He propped up a leg, dipping his chin in a way that goaded me: ignore me now.

No one ever saw him like this. No one but me. When anyone else came around, he had some uniform to wear: the protective brother, the older and wiser friend. I doubted he was even conscious of the subtle shifts in his face, his stance, his language, each adapted to transform him into whatever others needed him to be.

Lately, he’d started doing it with me, too. For me, he crafted an image of unwavering strength, tucking away his own fears and frustrations, dedicating every moment to attending to mine—and it broke my heart.

“You look like you’re considering jumping off this tower to get away,” he said.

“If I jump, then you’ll jump,” I joked half-heartedly. “Alixe has enough to do without cleaning up that mess.”

“No, Diem. If you jump, I’ll fly. I’ll never let you fall.”

In the storm-darkened horizon, a splinter of lightning danced through the clouds. I walked to the stone railing and scanned the miles of empty, crackled flatlands. “What if this was a trick? Vance could be attacking Lumnos right now.”

“Taran and Zalaric are there. They’ll send messenger hawks if there’s any sign of trouble.”

“What good is a hawk? The whole realm would be dead by the time we return.”

My fingers drummed against Sorrow’s Edge, my thoughts on the gemstone embedded in its blade. The Kindred used the heartstone to travel worlds and curse souls. Could I use it to get a glimpse of my home realm?

If I did, would it steal my vision to pay the cost?

“Before we left, I showed your mother the reports detailing how Vance’s men tortured their victims before carving them up,” Luther said. “I told her, ‘If your source betrays you, this is Taran and Zalaric’s fate.’ She swore she would not risk it if she was not sure.”

“How can you have so much faith in her when I do not?”

“Because I see you in her, and I see her in you.”

He held out a hand in wordless invitation. Veins rose on his forearm, as if he was fighting his own body not to do more.

This is a bad idea, I thought. Such a bad idea.

I walked to him and placed my palm in his, allowing him to pull me closer. He lifted my hand and studied it with a pensive look. “If we were to marry, what kind of ring would you wear?”

My mouth went dry. “Luther,” I choked.

“That’s the mortal custom, is it not? Exchanging rings at the wedding

ceremony?”

“Yes, it is, but . . . I—we—”

“The Descended have nothing like it. Those who mate have their marks, of course. Those who marry exchange gifts, but nothing like this.” He brushed a thumb across my finger. “I quite like the gesture. It says to the world, They’re mine.” His eyes rose to me. “Try to take them at your peril.”

My heart skipped.

Pull away, I thought. Pull away, pull away.

His fingers grazed my cheek as he tucked a curl behind my ear. “You told me your feelings for me had not changed. Is that still true?”

A fat raindrop splashed against my arm.

I nodded. This time, he showed no relief at my admission. I was confirming what he already knew—what I’d tried, and utterly failed, to suppress.

“You told me once that you weren’t certain you ever wanted to marry. Is that still true?”

My resolve wore dangerously, terminally thin.

“Say yes, if that’s how you feel,” he said. “I don’t wish to change your

mind, only to know it.”

My heart raced.

I couldn’t answer. If I did, what came out would not simply be a no, it would be a confession that marriage was only the beginning of what I wanted from him. With him.

He set my hand over his heart, then laced his fingers behind my back to draw me in. “I’ve been thinking about what kind of ring I might want. My first thought was something covered in jewels to match my sword. You would despise it, of course. You’d tease me for it every day. You would be vicious.” He watched me with a soft smile. “It would be worth it, to know I

could always make you laugh.”

My heart stumbled.

Another raindrop hit my nose, then another on my hair. Dark spots rose on his shirt where more rain absorbed into the fabric.

Neither of us moved.

“Then,” he went on, “I thought I might use my magic to burn a scar around my finger instead. By evening it would heal, and each morning I would burn it anew, so that you would know our marriage was not a choice made once, but a vow that I swore to you again and again. A promise made, and kept, every day for the rest of our lives.”

My heart soared.

The rain picked up just in time for the drizzle to mix with the tears forming on my lashes. Luther pressed a kiss to my temple, breathing his words into my skin. “Diem Bellator, I would marry you today, if you’d let me. I’d dig out roots from the soil and tie them around your finger if we could find no other ring. Anything to call you mine.”

I am yours, my soul screamed. I will always be yours.

With a rumble of thunder, the clouds unleashed, and it wasn’t long before we were both soaked to the bone. On the ground, soldiers scurried

indoors to avoid the downpour, leaving the streets empty and the city quiet except for the patter of rain.

Luther pulled me against him, and I didn’t fight it, burying my face in his chest. He set his chin atop my head. “I finally have you back in my arms,” he said, his voice rough with emotion, “but you feel so far away. I worry there’s a part of you still trapped on that island, and I don’t know how to bring her home.”

My soul cracked open, my body shuddering as tears spilled in torrents down my cheeks.

Between the rain and the tears and the crashing waves of emotion flowing from his heart and mine, I felt submerged. Each ebb and flow of the tide sent us colliding together before violently ripping us apart. I was drowning, and I was pulling him down with me.

“You have to let me go,” I pleaded.

“I will deny you nothing, if you truly desire it. I’ll never be seen in Emarion again, if that’s what it takes to bring you peace. But it won’t, will it?” He took my face in his hands. “This distance is hurting you just as

much as me. I can feel it.”

He leaned in closer.

“I don’t know why you’re doing this, but if it keeps us apart, it cannot

be right.”

Closer.

“What’s right is this.”

Closer.

“Us.”

His mouth lowered to mine, the space between us no thicker than stardust—but it was still space. A choice, and a promise to take nothing from me that I wasn’t ready to give, even though his body quivered with raging desire to do so.

There was so much more on the line than a kiss. After our tryst in the ballroom, I knew that if I let my resolve shatter again, there was no going back. This push and pull had forced us both to our limit, and one way or another, something was going to break.

Our faces were so close, my tears dripped to his cheeks, a warm caress amid the chill of the rain. I wasn’t sure whether it was strength or weakness that caused my body to lean in, my hands to grip his chest, my eyes to close, my lips to . . .

“My fate is yours,” he breathed. “And your fate is mine.”

It was the wrong thing to say.

So very, very wrong.

I jerked back so abruptly, it took Luther a moment to realize what had happened. Old habits ran deep, and before I could help it, my sorrow turned hot and forged into something pointed and sharp. My hands balled into fists, features twisting into a glare. “I told you there were parts of me I couldn’t give. You said you understood.”

Luther frowned. “I do.” He pushed off the door, walking toward me.

“But . . . in Sophos, it seemed like you—”

I yanked back again. “Sophos was a mistake.”

He stopped still. “You don’t mean that.”

“I do.”

I wasn’t even sure if it was a lie. The days we’d spent together in Sophos were the most cherished memories I had, but they made doing this, hurting him, the lowest I’d ever felt.

I called on the cold, apathetic darkness to consume my spirit, turn my tears to dust, and bury my tortured heart. “This was exactly what I feared would happen. I don’t need—” I bit down. Some lies were too cruel to speak, even for me. “What I need isn’t something you can give. I can’t be what you need, either.”

“You’re everything I need,” he insisted. “Nothing else matters.”

“And how pathetic is that?” I shouted back. “You’ve spent your entire life waiting to serve a grey-eyed Queen. You put everything aside for that.

But you have friends, Luther. You have family that loves you. You have passions and goals you won’t let yourself even consider because you’re consumed by mine. I can’t be your vessel for experiencing life. I don’t want that for you.” I wiped the tears from my face. “I don’t want it for me, either.”

It might have hurt a little less if it weren’t a little true. Whether I survived this war or not, I had to make Luther see that there was more to him that mattered than what he could do for me.

“There has to be a Luther without Diem,” I said. “And right now, I have to be a Diem without Luther.”

He stared down at the tower floor, rain streaming down his skin in rivers and clinging to the ridges of his scar. I felt no emotion coming from him over the bond. The mark on my chest had never felt so cold.

“I was not aware,” he said quietly, “that you found me so . . . pathetic.”

I winced. “That’s not what I meant.”

He turned for the stairs. “I’ll check with Alixe about the lookouts. Then I’ll find someone to replace me as your guard.”

“I don’t need a guard.”

He paused with his hand on the door. “What do you need, Diem?”

More time.

A way out.

You.

He huffed a harsh laugh at my silence. “Right. Space.” He closed the door behind him, leaving me standing alone in the rain.

I slumped over the railing, trying to pull air into my lungs that wasn’t full of falling water and misery. My stomach threatened to empty, as if my body was trying to expel the noxious poison of knowing how badly I’d hurt him. I stared at the base of the tower and waited to see him, some selfish part of me hoping he might storm back up and refuse to leave my side.

Something appeared—but it wasn’t Luther.

It was hardly anything at all. A shimmer here, a shadow there. An odd ripple in the air, almost as if the rain was bouncing off . . .

A shield.

Luther appeared in the exit, and my blood turned to ice.

I opened my mouth to scream a warning as the tower exploded in a cloud of stone and flame.

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