Brimstone (Fae & Alchemy, #2)

by Callie Hart

I didn’t love this realm, but it had produced someone I loved with a fierceness that took my breath away, and I was not going to leave this place worse off than when I had found it. For Saeris’s sake, I would protect it.

“Stop talking, Carrion,” I rumbled. “The grown-ups are about to strike a bargain.”

I had no control over fire; it wasn’t my element to command. A part of me suspected that it might be Carrion’s, but he was in no fit state to try conjuring unknown magic.

“You’re telling me she is Fisher’s mate, and she doesn’t even know who I am?”

I don’t like it when you call me… Your Highness.” I snorted. “You are the true heir to the Winter Throne, are you not?” “All right. I’ll start calling you Lord Cahlish, then, shall I?” “Not if you want to keep your fucking tongue,” I growled.

I knew Merelle didn’t blame me for her death. She would have had every right to, but she hadn’t. She had chosen to bind her soul with my blade, to remain a part of the Lupo Proelia and stay close to those she loved.

When I looked up, Carrion was watching me. “Go on,” he said. “Ask.”

“Are you in love with her?”

“No,” he said simply. And then, immediately, “Yes?” Heat flared up inside me, making my throat close. “It’s not a simple thing, Fisher. She’s… well…” “Spectacular,” I whispered. The smile that spread across his face was sad. “Right. Exactly. She always has been. When other people are full of the kind of fire that burns inside her, it eats them alive. It hollows them out until there’s nothing left inside them but the fire. They burn everyone around them with it, until all that remains is scorched earth. But not Saeris. Her fire keeps others warm in the cold dark. It is her strength, not her weakness. Being around her reminds you that you’re alive.”

No, I couldn’t blame the male for seeing what was obvious. I could only pity him that she wasn’t his and be fucking thankful that she was mine. “I could have loved her. Truly,” Carrion said softly. “But this place broke me centuries before Saeris was born. I made the mistake of letting myself fall for a human once, and believe me when I say that once was enough.

So yes. I love Saeris Fane, because she’s electric, and fierce, and loyal, and being around her brings the world back into focus. But I’m not in love with her, Fisher. I tried. But my heart was just too full of sorrow to make room for her.”

His lips brushed the shell of my ear as he spoke, and a shiver ran up my body. He let out a suggestive rumble of laughter at that. “So responsive. I love how your body reacts to me, Little Osha. It lets me know that you’re mine.”

Holy shit. I was so fucked. Every single thing this male did made me want him. Made me want to scream. Made me want to— “Haven’t you learned your lesson yet, Osha?”

“Your heart’s racing, Saeris Fane. Why might that be?”

This male. This. Fucking. Male.

I looked up at my mate in amazement. “What the hell was that? Did I just give you a tattoo?” He smiled, arching a dark brow at me. “Looked like it.” “I thought… wait, so that doesn’t only happen when we’re having sex?”

“No, it won’t happen every time, Osha.” His smile grew in size, despite his visible efforts to leash it. “It’ll only happen when you’re thinking”—he ran his tongue over his bottom lip—“very bad thoughts.”

“You’ve existed in my mother’s drawings for most of my life, but you were never real to me before. I didn’t believe…” His eyes were wide and full of awe. “I had no idea what you would mean to me. I had no idea what I would do to keep you safe. When I close my eyes, you are all I fucking see, Saeris Fane. I could be dead in the ground five thousand years and the frosts could have taken my bones, and still no other male will ever have loved another female the way that I love you.”

“What kind of mate would I be if I didn’t tend to all of your appetites?”

“The sign of a shunned vampire,” he explained. “The court rips out their fangs if they won’t swear allegiance to the crown. It’s a dark judgment, being consigned to a slow and miserable death. Without fangs, a high blood can’t feed. At first, they starve. And then they go mad.

“Why does Ren hate him so much? Tal?”

Everlayne was in love with Taladaius once. They were betrothed. And the night before they were due to be married, Tal fled the Winter Palace, against his father’s wishes and his king’s command, and he knelt at the feet of Sanasroth’s throne.”

“Why does any male act recklessly, Saeris? He did it because he was in love with someone else. He did it for Zovena.”

Carrion threw the cloth he was holding onto the table beside him. “The injustice! You dream of your girlfriend, you’re healed by her, get laid, and wake up brand-spanking-new. Meanwhile, I dream that I’d been turned into a goat, and I wake up with a mouth drier than the glass flats, covered in suspect pox marks!” “She isn’t my girlfriend, Carrion.”

I spent a full second feeling sorry for Carrion, knowing how uncomfortable he must be, but then I remembered how annoying he was, and my pity went away.

Something had bitten me. No, something had cut me. The source of the injury became apparent as the sound of rustling paper filled my ears.

“What? You want something?” I asked it.

The stargazer flew right at me.

The bird’s momentum carried it forward, through the library’s door—where it fell out of the air, dead.

I cradled it in my hands, suddenly feeling terrible. It had wanted something from me. Wanted that something bad enough that it had left its sanctuary to get it, and it had lost its little spark in the process.

“He might not be happy to see me,” Carrion muttered into his own scarf next to me. I tried not to laugh. “Really? I’m shocked.” “Y’know, sarcasm is a form of humor. The lowest, basest form, yes, but it still counts. If you’re not careful, I’ll start to think I’m rubbing off on you.” “Don’t use the word rub and then refer to me in the same sentence, please,”

“Oh, please,” the smuggler drawled. “You are not my—” He craned his neck, scanning the crowd over the tops of their heads. “Ahhh, fuck. He’s gone. I think we lost him.”

“You might have,” I said. “I don’t lose people. He ducked down here just now, right before you were about to lie and say I’m not your type.”

“Take this one,” I whispered,

I had been telling Hayden… Been telling Hayden… I gasped, a sudden, sharp, shooting pain at my temple. It was there and then gone again. Wait. What had I just been thinking about?

I had traded a memory, but for the life of me I had no idea what kernel of my past I had given up to facilitate the exchange.

My blood hissed when it hit the bottom of the crucible. That was new.

Slowly, a stream of smoke began to rise from the creator’s bony fingers. The relic I’d just created was burning it. The Hazrax almost seemed chagrined as it placed the relic down on the table.

“The quicksilver is greedy. You give it whatever it desires. Songs. Jokes. Memories,” it said. “Your mate wishes you to create many thousands of these relics, and yet you bargain for each one that you make.

“Do those runes on your hands need to be sealed? Does your mate need to be wary of new faces? Do you need to create thousands of relics, so that you can whisk the weak and the small away from this place? Does the black rot spreading throughout this land need to be stopped?

“Tell me, Elroy. How many promises have you made to Saeris and then broken?” The human’s eyelids shuttered. “None.” “Me either. And I plan on keeping it that way. Make no mistake. I will burn worlds to keep my word to her, old man. There isn’t a single person in this realm or any other that I wouldn’t sacrifice to make sure I don’t let her down. I promised her that I’d bring her brother home. Will you test my resolve in this?”

I’ve known about the Fae my whole life.” He nodded at Carrion. “I’ve always known about him, too.”

“Look, I’m sorry, okay. But I wasn’t supposed to tell you I knew, anyway. There were rules I was supposed to keep, and—”

“Don’t tell anyone about the Fae. Don’t talk to Carrion about the Fae. Don’t tell anyone about any magic users I came across. Things like that.” “And who made you promise to observe these rules?” “My father,” he said. “And his father made him promise. I’m a forge master, warrior. The son of forge masters. The Swift family wasn’t the only bloodline that was charged with a task they handed down through the generations. Gracia and her lot watched over the boy. Me and mine were given a different job to do.”

Finally, his eyes went to the huge, recessed pool at the center of the cavern…

Save yourself now, Saeris. You’ve got this. I stopped fighting it. Magic zipped along my nerve endings, and there it was, like a tangible, pliable thing at the ends of my fingertips: raw, divine energy. Opening my eyes, I expected to see it there, visible to the naked eye, but my fingers looked normal. My shield flared with blue-white energy as I reached for the quicksilver and summoned it. It was as easy as breathing. I decided that the portal was open, and suddenly it was. The difference was astonishing. It felt right.

My name is Saeris Fane— Your name is ruination, the voice snorted. Blight. Curse worker. You do not deserve to live. I do! There are others more worthy. None of them stand before you now! It roiled in my chest: the anger of a lifetime, condensing into one white-hot point. I had been told every single day in Zilvaren that I was worthless, that my life meant nothing, that I didn’t deserve to live. Madra’s disdain for my people ran so deep that even the residents of the Third had started to believe that they didn’t matter. Well, I wouldn’t believe that. Not. Any. More. “I stand before you.” I spoke out loud this time, no longer afraid. “I am worthy.”

Every Alchemist must have something they are afraid to lose.

This pathway is clear, the speaker declared. Receive this gift all in fear and trembling. In the end, it will be your end.

Until recently, this was all just individual pieces of metal. Separate. But when Saeris was taken, the metal turned to liquid. That’s when it fused together and became this.” He gestured to the massive body of quicksilver. “I knew Saeris had something to do with it.