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I’ve never been one to trust in the gods, but I choose to believe that all things come from the same place when life begins. I have hope that they return to the same place when it ends. I’ll be waiting for you there, Saeris Fane. F
Carrion grinned, all teeth and mischief. “I’m coming with you through that portal. I’m gonna help you save your asshole boyfriend. But first, I want one of those fancy swords.”
Lorreth fidgeted in his seat. “I don’t trust her. The witch,” he clarified before I could ask who he was referring to. “Dragon lovers. They’re the reason we’re in this mess in the first place. If it weren’t for them, there wouldn’t even be any vampires.”
“Carrion Swift, if you don’t wake up right now, I’m going to tell all of your asshole friends back in the Third that you were a shitty lay.”
While the coin toss was being decided, he wasn’t allowed to harm me or my brother.
“I play back,” Fisher spat. “It might not be today, but oh, I am coming to find you, Madra. Fear the shadows, bitch. I’m made of them. One night soon, I’ll climb out of one and slit your fucking throat.”
“You spayed my mate when she was a fucking child,” he seethed. “For that alone, I’ll make your undying existence an unending agony. An eternity of suffering the likes of which even your evil mind cannot comprehend. You’ll know no peace at my hands. I will destroy your empire and erase your name from the annals of time. When I am done with your legacy, Madra the Undying will never have existed. And you’ll live on at my behest, suffering for all of eternity. And no one will know. And no one will care.”
“I don’t like you, human. Something about you smells… off.”
“So many years, trapped here, Brother. Where did you sleep?” Lorreth whispered. “What did you eat? How did you survive?” Fisher hung his head. Now that he could talk about this place and everything that had happened here, he didn’t seem to know how to. He opened his mouth and took a deep, grounding breath. “I—” “He didn’t, did you, my love?”
“You really think you can kill me with a powerless sword? You can’t kill any of us with a mere blade. We are the Triumvirate, Dog. Three crowns sharing one source. To kill one of us, you must kill us all, and that is no easy task.”
“We might think Fisher’s an arrogant ass, but we’re not just going to let you kill him.” His tone was confident and devil-may-care, but I saw the way his hand shook as he pointed the tip of his sword at Belikon’s head. “We especially aren’t going to let him be killed by a bastard who’d hand over his own daughter to be tortured and enthralled by a fucking vampire.”
Carrion’s eyes flitted to mine for a second. They held all manner of unspoken words. Then he lowered Simon, gave Malcolm his full attention, and said, “Nothing’s stopping you. Go ahead, Leech. Bite me and see where it gets you.” “Carrion, no!” My shock registered like a slap across the face.
Carrion was deathly pale, but he grinned up at Malcolm like a lunatic. “You really should have let me finish introducing myself earlier. It’s rude to interrupt people.” Malcolm let go of him, shoving him away. Miraculously, Carrion managed to stay on his feet. “My name is Carrion Swift. But there was a time when I was known as Carrion Daianthus. Firstborn son to Rurik and Amelia Daianthus.”
A small favor, then, the whisper said. We will do it for a favor. And for a restoration of balance. And for love.
He forced out the words as if they left a foul taste in his mouth. “But the scent of your blood was much stronger. I couldn’t believe it. That he’d fed from you,” he sneered. “He wore that silver plate at his throat every day he was trapped here in this labyrinth. A gift from his mother, I believe. Pure silver imbued with some particularly nasty magic. I couldn’t have torn it off him if I’d tried. Edina always was such a thorn in my side. I promised to let Fisher go if only he gave me a taste. I promised to wipe Gillethrye from his memory, so he’d forget all about this place and what had
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He rounded on me, but I wasn’t where he’d left me. I was on my feet, hunched and losing blood, standing right beside him. And I had Solace in my hands. “Only the gods are eternal,” I told him. And I cut off Malcolm’s head.
Could he feel how weak I was right now? I could tell that his shoulder was injured. I could feel his exhaustion. I didn’t understand this connection between us, but it had grown stronger since I’d accepted my marks and acknowledged him as my mate. I knew that he was running. I also knew that he was afraid.
“I’m afraid she is,” Taladaius said solemnly. “It’ll happen soon, no matter what. The damage to her stomach and chest cavity is too great.” Fisher’s mouth thinned into a line. He raked a hand through his filthy hair, screwing his eyes shut. “If we don’t act, she’ll pass in the next few minutes,” Taladaius said with surprising care.
There won’t. I told you I’d never forgive you if you forced me to do something I didn’t want to do again. Never is a long time, Fisher. If you sacrifice yourself for me, I’ll reject our bond in this life and the next.
“Fisher, she’s fading. I have seconds…” I heard Taladaius speak, but he sounded as if he were underwater. A deep, dark blanket was settling over me. It was so warm and comfortable. It made the pain in my stomach melt away. “Tell me she fucking consents!” Taladaius yelled. The world faded away. Fisher’s voice was the last thing I heard. “She consents.”
“I swear to the gods, if she doesn’t make it through this—” Lorreth, fisting Carrion’s shirt, dragging him back. Fire, everywhere. Flames roaring up to meet the splintering sky.
His shadow gate was open, less than three feet away. All he had to do was turn and walk us through it. I grabbed the strap of his chest protector, alarm bells ringing in my head. “I’m sorry,” I gasped. “I—” I was ripped from his arms. “SAERIS!”
But when I consulted the fates long ago, I was very intrigued when I saw you, Saeris Fane. Not just you. Kingfisher, too. I saw an axis in the flow of things. A burning knot in the tapestry of all that would come to be. When I focused and saw the strength of the bond that connected the two of you together, I admit I attempted to sway the fates.”
“You were supposed to have been born Fae, in the same realm as your Kingfisher. So I separated you. Hundreds of years before you were born,
Every possible future where the two of you are together ends with the vast majority of this tree dying.
“These oaths mark you as my ward. They protect both you and Fisher from the unwanted attentions of my brothers and my sister.” “Protection from them?”
If you truly accept Fisher as your mate, then you must agree for the thread of your life to be severed from the tapestry of the universe. Once you do, none of us may affect your future.
“By transforming you into something that has never been seen before,” he answered cryptically. “The universe cannot focus on that which it does not recognize.” “But how?” “I’m not just the God of Chaos, Alchemist. I’m also the God of Change. I will it, and it is done.”
“A part of me feels like I should thank you for saving my life.” “And the rest of you?” “Wants to kill you for what you’ve done,” I whispered. The vampire nodded, studying his boots. “I felt the same way for a long time. There were whole centuries where I hated what I’d become, and I wanted to destroy Malcolm. I wanted nothing but to die and be gone from this world so badly.”
Gods, how interlinked this all was. Fisher’s father had been the one to secret the true heir to the throne out of Yvelia. A thousand years later, his son had been the one to bring him back.
“Human, Fae, or vampire. It doesn’t matter how long you live, Saeris; you will always be most sacred to me.” His smirk faded, though. “Did I do the right thing?”
“Zovena’s stirring up all kinds of trouble back at Ammontraíeth. Malcolm’s tasked me with tamping down her little insurrection before it can find its feet.”
Zovena was the reason why Tal found himself amongst the ranks of the Black Palace’s High Blood population in the first place. In a roundabout way, she was the reason things were always so tense between me and Tal, too. There were other reasons, of course. Too many to count, really. But Zovena was prime amongst them.
He registered the way my lip curled in annoyance at the sound of her name and laughed sadly under his breath. He said no more about her, though. Instead,
I’d stayed and let Tal exact his torture so that both of us could be done with it. I’d fought back. I’d hurt him as much as he’d hurt me. But hurting him had stopped making sense after a while. He had to hurt me. I didn’t have to hurt him. I didn’t want to hurt him . . .
My counterweight. The female I would love and scourge the worlds for. And she was beautiful. Breathtakingly so.
“You had better pull through this, Oshellith,” I told her. “For better or for worse, I get the feeling that you’re about to turn everything upside down.”
