A Kingdom of Flame and Fury (The Four Kingdoms, #1)

by Whitney Dean

Shifting into one of my other forms was as easy as breathing, and I was looking forward to letting one come out to play. Instead of my usual long, ebony hair, icy-blonde locks skimmed my shoulders. “Mm…” I pondered aloud, touching the glass of my mirror in front of me. Frost was typically my most favored form for public outings and the easiest to wield. I looked downright angelic, contrasting to the demon I’d rather be.

Blaze was brought out when I felt feistiest — and angriest — and my tongue would coat with the taste of blood. Blood I wanted to draw — which lately had been more often. But the festival was all about peace, so when I shook my head, I shifted once more into Terra. Mother Nature herself.

I raised my fingers to my hair and flicked my pointer finger, winding my now-violet hair up to rest on top of my head in a braided bun.

After dressing, I stared at myself and blinked my eyelids in a quick flutter, transforming my irises from dark green to golden with violet specks, completing my shift to Terra.

My eyes roved slowly over my kingdom. It was small in size and contained on a small island. My palace was situated on a tall mountainside, and sprinkled throughout the grassy knolls below was my village, comforting and quaint with the red rooftops of cottages and shops.

I liked to form into Frost when the boys would chase the other young girls around the festival, stealing their candies or torturing them with empty threats. I would blind them temporarily with tiny flecks of ice and keep them away long enough for the girls to hide.

At the end of the night, when some of the villagers retired home or were passed out drunk in the streets, I’d beckon Blaze and light up hay bales to keep them warm, spinning dirt around them with Terra so the fire wouldn’t spread.

Little did I know, as each year passed, I was being watched — by none other than the king himself. That was why, when I turned ten, I was stunned when royal guards pounded on the door of Isla’s cottage to move us to the castle. Isla knew of my abilities and helped me learn to control them, but she wasn’t truly my aunt. My birth and entire backstory remained a complete mystery. Dropped off on Isla’s porch in a basket with a single blanket and my name and birthday scrawled on a ripped piece of parchment, I was crying in the dead of night when she opened her front door to see an olive-skinned baby with a full head of black hair. It wasn’t even a choice, Isla always said — she would love me as her own until her last breath. If anyone ever asked, Isla t...

I wasn’t sure I had a bloodline. I, by all accounts, had absolutely no right to the throne. But, the king had no queen and no heirs of his own. He ruled over the kingdom by himself and left it in the hands of a ten-year-old girl who held deep secrets of her own.

Seolia was surrounded by three kingdoms: Reales, Thoya, and Perosan. Our island was situated in the middle of the three kingdoms. The three kingdoms depended on Seolia for passage through the channel to the other kingdoms and villages to trade crops and grains. At the same time, Seolia relied heavily on the domains for steel, fabrics, and furnishings. Each kingdom played a vital role in the survival of the others, and it had been nearly a century since the last war when Reales had tried to take control of Perosan and fought against Seolia and Thoya for it.

When the four kingdoms merged into one realm, people of every color escaped their villages and kingdoms from faraway countries to take refuge in one of the four kingdoms. The Circle of Peace was what villagers eventually named the kingdoms once memories of war started to fade, and I was determined to keep it that way for as long as I held the crown.

I knew I was dangerous, and sometimes I feared the ferocity of my magic. It was deep-rooted and old. I wasn’t sure how I knew that, but I could feel it.

It was said that before my time, whispers of dark magic made their way through the four kingdoms, and King Leonidas had blocked it off until his soldiers investigated. When some returned and the rest didn’t, the king pulled them out and never sent anyone back in. The blockages were removed, but even without them, villagers never wandered past the border.

But, it called to me. Nothing about being in the forest frightened me. It felt more like home than any place I’d lived, even my own wing of the castle.

The Black Forest was always where I’d go, spending hours playing with my elements, pushing myself to master each one. I had never broken my promise to him, and he had remained loyal to me. Over the last nearly fifteen years, we’d become inseparable.

I ran my fingertips along the wall where Cade and I had etched our names into it and smiled, shaking my head at the memories of our beginnings together in the castle.

Cade was attractive, and as a young girl, I had a crush on him, but he was eight years older than me, and an adult when we met. He was always with other girls when he wasn’t with me, so I outgrew it. But, he was easy to love and entirely too charming for his own good with his dark blond hair and enticing blue eyes. We looked like complete opposites when we stood next to one another, with my tanned skin and black hair against his creamy complexion and sandy locks.

Blaze could be controlled, but I remained cautious. Whenever I experienced any emotion lately, she was always the first to bubble up, and it took more willpower than usual to keep her sedated. When I was able to lure thieves or anyone who broke my laws into the forest, I did so that I could keep her sated. Continuously shoving her down felt like choking.

For this, I was just Raven. Or, well, Terra.

He had never warned me to be careful in my own kingdom. There was never anything to fear. He cautioned me for a reason, and I could have strangled him for choosing this moment to walk away after dropping that on me.

We both learned something else about me that day: I could freeze any internal organ, even my own heart. Though Cade’s sword didn’t cut deep enough to touch my heart, the adrenaline from the puncture had me quickly shifting into Frost to protect all of my internal organs. With the knowledge of being able to freeze internally, it stood to reason that I could set myself on fire, which was another reason Blaze had to be controlled. If my emotions ever reached a boiling point, I may be my own demise.

As I started toward the middle of town, I stopped abruptly at a pair of dark-gray eyes that were zeroed in on me from across the cobblestone road. I felt zoned in, trapped, and shivers danced across my bones. My tongue skimmed across my bottom lip as the gray eyes prowled closer.

If I believed in love at first sight, this would have been it. I took him in. Unapologetically. My sexual desires had never made me ashamed, and he was one of them.

His slicked back hair, black as mine, curled under his ears. With full lips and a chiseled jaw that looked like it could cut steel, I tracked the movement of it clenching and loosening, making my insides feel like honey.

Both of our chests heaved, and I could feel his heartbeat against mine, thundering in the same rhythm — like one heart shared between two, and all we’d done was kiss. “Who are you?” I managed to get out, though I wasn’t sure what I was asking. I put my hands on his muscular arms to try and get a better look at his face, but all I could see was the outline of a delicious jaw that I was sure could cut right through me, and I’d beg him to do it again.

I couldn’t offer him my name, and I had never needed to. I had never cared about any randoms I fucked here every year enough to ask for their name or think of a fake one for myself. But this man. This man. He was the devil; I just knew it.

“I’ll see you in my dreams, Zeke.”

I hadn’t breathed since I left Zeke standing there. Hard to get was never a game I played, but something about him made me not want to go, which meant he wouldn’t be someone I could have fucked for release. As hard as walking away from him was, and despite the sensation I still felt from his body pressed against mine, how his voice sounded, how desperately he seemed to want me… fuck, I had to stop. I couldn’t risk getting attached to anyone and wondering where he came from or if he’d be back.

“The orphan doesn’t belong here.”

“Stay with me. We’ll drink. Talk.” There was concern in his voice again. “Swimming? I’ll even let you drag me into the forest.” “Swimming? In winter?” I gave him a reassuring nod and patted his arm. “I really just want to sleep.” He didn’t move, pushing out his bottom lip. “Stay with me, Raven. We’ll sleep on the balcony,” he persisted. His fingers circled my wrist, and he started to swing it, tugging at my arm until I finally nodded. Staying with him would be better than the mental anguish I would endure alone.

“Sometimes I wish I could erase it — my history. Everything. Sometimes, I don’t want to be me. I am tired of having many questions every day and so much doubt about who I am and whether I should be here.” He shifted behind me and gently touched my shoulder, pushing me down to my back. “Look at me, Raven.” I opened one eye, and he chuckled, waiting until I opened both before speaking, “I never once doubted you and your love for this kingdom. I never want to hear you say again that you wish to erase our history.” The tip of his nose touched mine. “I don’t want to imagine a life without you. You were meant to be here, Raven. You will realize that one day.”

Tomorrow, I’d be the queen. But tonight, I was just the orphan given a palace — a palace I hadn’t earned in a castle that didn’t feel like mine.

“Lately, there’s been reports of someone spreading rumors about you. Only those rumors are true.” Could blood drain? That was certainly what it felt like. “Whoever it is has been informing villagers of your… abilities,” he finished in a whisper.

Suddenly the note made sense. Dark magic returning to the kingdoms had always been feared, and though we both knew I’d never harm anyone who didn’t deserve it, I was not prepared for anyone to know what I possessed.

“My queen, we’ve had our guards in the village for a week to listen for any information we can use. All they’ve come back with is that this person isn’t just telling those in our kingdom, but also the ones surrounding.”

“I fear for you, Your Majesty.” My brows crinkled, and I waited for him to continue with bated breath. Cade’s jaw was clenched. “War is coming, my queen.”

“King Leonidas worried about this, you know. Or do you? I supposed I’ve never mentioned it before.” My eyes narrowed at his sarcasm. “But when he presented his will to me many years ago as he lay on his deathbed, he made me swear to protect you against all doubters.”

“He muttered his final word to me, and I kept it to myself all these years, not wanting to break my promise to him. And do you know what that word was?”

“Magic.”

The entire kingdom was secluded on an island, and I’d been banished here for weeks to seduce their queen, whom I hadn’t met yet. I barely knew anything about her, not caring enough to learn her name.

I had scoffed when Mira pulled me aside to tell me of her master plan. I had to trick a queen into falling in love with me and bring her back to Reales as my fiancée. My fiancée. I had to make this woman my wife. I was thirty years old and nowhere near ready to settle down.

When I argued and attempted to convince Mira that my services were needed in Reales, she promised that they weren’t and then promptly reminded me that she’d keep my mother and brother locked away until I returned with her prize. Not that she was ever going to let them free.

exhaled a long breath as I recalled how I became part of Mira’s court in the first place. All thanks to dear old dad, informing Mira of my abilities long before our king became ill.

He was still breathing when she took over, anointing herself as queen two years ago. Since then, I’ve been at her side nearly every day, torturing prisoners and pulling memories from the recesses of their minds to threaten them, using what they love against them to do Mira’s bidding.

Our once bountiful town was now quiet and gray, our people afraid of being snatched up at random. When I didn’t want to play her twisted games, she sent soldiers in the dead of night to rip my mother and brother from their beds and imprisoned them in the castle where I slept.

The worst part of this, although unsurprising, was that my father was part of this plan, and I had to wait in the forest until he came to tell me it was time. He was Rudolf’s brother but had lived in Seolia since I was a boy, playing nice with the royals and pledging allegiance to their king instead of Rudolf.

It was as easy as breathing, hating my father since he wasn’t actually my father. He was my brother’s but adopted me as a young boy after falling in love with my mother.

was summoned to my newly appointed position as commander, training her soldiers during the day and doing her dirty work at night. More often than not, whoever we brought to negotiate with wouldn’t give in, and I’d have to kill them. It had become a sport, and I enjoyed it more than when they surrendered.

What they didn’t know, though, was that before Mira could find them, I did. In the middle of the night, when I could truly be alone, I hunted them and savored hearing their pleas for their lives to be spared. I never did, piercing their hearts instead.

Mira really decided to torture me on this excursion by sending Jeanine with me to inform kingdoms about the magic Seolia’s queen possesses.