The Crown of Oaths and Curses (The Mortal Fates #1)

by J. Bree

My croí is already buried deep in my heart, and I’ll prove myself to her, whatever it takes.

My little croí, whom I have longed for, the soft, melodic tones of her voice in my mind so deeply missed but never forgotten. I reach out one last time to reassure her that I’m coming, that I won’t take no for an answer this time with the Fates backing me, but when I encounter the barrier in her mind one more time, I don’t feel the despair that usually takes hold. The hours are counting down, and whether I can reach her now or not, nothing will ever part us like this again.

How she escaped notice is a concern. Maybe she was concealed by magic.

The idea of learning her name—the real one and not just some pet name of affection—shoots a possessive streak of fire deep into my gut.

Flanked by the mercenaries is a female about a foot shorter than I am, with her back to me. A black braid secured with a leather strap hangs down one side. At the commotion of the crowd, she turns to face me, and a few wisps of those inky locks tumble over her sun-kissed cheeks. There’s no hunger in the rosiness of her complexion or the curves of her body beneath the dark folds of fabric that cover her. Her face is unmarked and vibrant with good health, her natural beauty shining through as she stands before me. A smattering of freckles stands out over her nose and under her sooty lashes as she blinks, but my gaze is pulled down to the gag stuffed in her mouth. The tight fabric digs into her cheeks, and a bruise blooms at her throat.

The further down I look, the deeper into my rage I fall. Her hands are bound in front of her with iron, the thick bands clamped directly on the tender skin, and blood drips down her slender fingers and falls to the cracked cobblestones at her feet. The copper tang of her blood breaks through the assault of scents in the market and fills my lungs with the call of my mate.

The Fates scream within me, demanding I kill the males touching her and all those who look on, gouge out their eyes for daring to look upon what is mine and for me alone. My Unseelie nature kicks in, and my hand drops to the pommel of my sword, the sapphire there warm to the touch as the power of my ancestors lingers. Bloodlust blinds me for a moment before my senses finally return and, with them, the true horror of what stands before me. Staring back at me, with contempt in her undeniably silver eyes, is my Fates-blessed mate. A witch. Every inch of me rejects my reaction to her. My lip curls, a snarl bubbling out of the fiery pits of my gut, only for the wall in my mind that has separated...

A ripple courses through the crowd, and then it parts as the villagers scramble away from four high fae princes, each more beautiful than the last. Two centuries of living amongst the Seelie high fae in the Northern Lands has dulled the impact of high-fae beauty on me, but I hold myself rigid to hide my breathlessness at the sight of them.

I know a soldier when I see one, and this male stands like he’s prepared to take a blow. Which is good, because he’s clearly just taken the biggest hit of his life.

He might be every bit the gorgeous high fae, but a cold heart beats in his chest, one that has no room for warmth in it toward me.

“Tell me, Shyla, how does your father fare now that he has lost both of his hands to the war of the witches? Tell my Fates-blessed mate.”

Are you the Ravenswyrd Mother or just a scared little girl from the forest?”

“The goblins never stopped speaking to the trees. The Ravenswyrd has missed you for a very long time, and the sorrowful melody it sang for you reached far across the kingdom. I hope you return to the trees again soon, they have mourned your loss.” Tears prick at my eyes, unbidden, and I nod, unable to find words.

“The curse is broken. A high-fae baby has been born.”

felt the moment the curse broke—you’ve shared no secrets with me. You can take as much of the thistle as you can carry, but only you. The high fae have found no favor with the goblins and will get nothing from me. Tell me, witch, are you being held against your will? Let me offer you sanctuary here among my people. Ravenswyrd witches are always welcome on goblin lands.”

“Thank you for such a generous offer, but I returned to the Southern Lands to follow my fate, and I must now stay with the high fae.”

“My fate is Prince Soren. He is my mate, given to me by the Fates themselves, and our union will end the war. I have no option but to stay with them.”

The forest honors our work, the centuries passing the rest of the kingdom by but never touching this clearing, because the trees will never forget their Favored Children.

That illusion is lifted only by the fire-damaged huts and the arrows that litter the ground, fletched with the same wax-tipped raven feathers we pulled from Roan’s chest. A picture begins to form before my eyes, unsettling in its truths.

The fallen members of the witch's coven, her family, nothing left of them but a field of the most sacred flowers.

The force of her terror that morning had woken me and fueled my own fears for her safety, and though she wouldn’t tell me what had frightened her so severely, the waves of grief had been a crushing echo of my own. I knew she had lost someone close to her, I knew that it put her own life in peril thanks to the fear that lingered and the small snippets of information I could ease out of her, but I didn’t suspect something like this.

“The high fae forget that the first victims of Kharl's war were the witches themselves.” Reed stares at her, his mouth tight as he holds in a grimace, but her words just keep tumbling out. “Do you think the mindless raving masses want to be that way? Do you think they knew what he would do to them? When he first came to the Southern Lands, he gave them two options—join him, or die. Any witch who escaped him, fleeing their covens and ancestral lands, found themselves at the mercy of the high fae. Painted as enemies and hunted for nothing more than the blood in their veins and their silver eyes. All of the witches in the Northern Lands were there because they had no better option. I heard countless stories from them of the hunt for our people that drove us all from our homes and the trees that love us. That’s the truth of the kingdom you’re fighting so hard for. That is the truth of your war.”

“I think you forget that your grandson is alive because the witch broke the curse. He is the first full-blooded high-fae baby born in centuries, a whole generation of life to come, because that curse is gone. Accept that this castle is under my rule and my word is law, or leave. Make the journey back to Yris and the Unseelie Court with nothing but the guards you brought with you, but know that it's a long way home, Aura, and a miracle of the Fates that you made it here unscathed in the first place.”

If he hadn’t come to kill my coven, I would have never left the forest. I would have never become the witch I am now, the only version of myself who can fight Kharl and kill him. I would have never learned to hold a sword, the calluses still rough on my hands from decades of fighting in the Northern Lands.

“That doesn't look like begging to me. I'd rather walk until my feet bleed.”