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Chapter Twenty-Seven

Remy didn’t realize how cold the dungeon was until they dragged her from the belly of the Northern Court castle. Another day had passed with only one meal and a couple skins of water. Her injuries were healing, but slower than the normal fae speed because of her exhaustion and lack of food. She couldn’t seem to sleep enough to fully replenish her red magic either.

She expected sunlight, but darkness greeted her as the two guards dragged her into the throne room. Her dagger’s sheath poked into her side as the two guards dropped her into the middle of a grand celebration. People gasped from all around her. The string band stopped their playing. Remy smelled the warm scents of a banquet table of food to her left and the strong aromas of honeyed mead and wine. They had dropped her in her filth into the middle of a party.

From her periphery, Remy saw a crowd gathered in their finery. They wore velvets and furs lined in satin, appropriate for the cold climate. When Remy had imagined the Northern Court, she had imagined it being cold and bleak, and it was . . . but the people. She had never pictured in her mind that there would be a court of people celebrating with a monster like the Northern King. She had never considered that others had supported him in his quest to destroy her family.

Scanning their faces, she could not find Bri. The warm celebrators stood in stark contrast to the fear twisting in her gut. Remy peeked to her side through a strand of greasy hair. White silver braziers sat at the bottoms of alabaster columns, lighting the throne hall in cool, pale streaks. The braziers’ flames cast dancing shadows across the walls’ banners. Between each banner sat a stone pillar, dripping with white candles.

Through her tousled, knotted hair, Remy saw Hennen Vostemur, the Northern King, lounging on his throne. It was striking silver, topped with an inlaid golden Northern crest, and rested on stubby legs made of pure white stone. Plush, cerulean velvet cushions kept his large body from feeling the icy sting of the metal. Three large wooden seats adjoined the throne. One must be for Renwick, Remy mused, but for the other two she could not think of who would sit on them.

A grand silver chandelier highlighted a long, thin table behind the throne upon which sat two golden crowns. Remy knew those crowns. They belonged to her parents. Beside them lay a blade, its ruby hilt gleaming in the light. The magic emanating from it was so powerful that it bent the surrounding air, like looking through a distorted windowpane.

The Immortal Blade.

It sat right there behind the Northern King. If only she could get to it.

The white marble tiles of the dais sparkled in the light. Something about it looked so familiar to Remy . . . she blanched when she realized it was because she had seen it before. They were the marble slabs stripped from her own court’s throne room.

Remy glared at the King in the eyes as he smiled down at her, knowing full well her train of thoughts. Not only had he taken the High Mountain crowns, he also was heartless enough to recreate the dais where he now sat.

Vostemur held a goblet of wine, his cheeks rosy, as he sat casually presiding over his party. He toyed with the pendant of his necklace: a red stone. It was the amulet of Aelusien.

“Welcome to the Northern Court,” he grinned, “Princess Remini.”

The crowd gasped in unison. Their faces lit with astonished delight. Remy scowled at them.

Where was Hale? She hadn’t seen him as she left the dungeons. She couldn’t see him in the crowd. Panic gripped her. She prayed he had escaped already. She couldn’t see Bri either.

“Do you know what today is, Remini?” King Vostemur glared down at her, mirroring the snake on his crest above him.

“Fourteen years since you slaughtered my family and our whole city.” Remy spat at him. The crowd gasped in excitement, like she was the evening’s entertainment.

The King laughed in a gratingly unpleasant way, as though they were talking about the spring weather and not a massacre.

“It has been fourteen years this night since I became the most powerful ruler in all of Okrith.” He barely got his words out before his court erupted into cheers.

They were cheering. The wretched sheep were cheering for a deranged monster and for his desecration of an entire court. Remy lifted her eyes to them, trying to stare each one of them down. Their laughter cooled from the look in her eyes, as if her look alone could curse them. Thinking to how Hale said her mother could command a room with one look, Remy painted her face in a smirk. She would not let them forget who she was.

Remy put one hand in her pocket as she sat back on her heels. Her fingers brushed over the ring. Poised to slip her finger through the ring, she watched to see if the guards standing on either side of her unsheathed their swords.

Even in her grimy state, barefoot on the floor, she tried to hold a regal pose. She sat with a casualness that matched the King’s own. She knew it would infuriate him.

“You don’t know how to use that necklace, do you?” Remy nodded to the amulet of Aelusien around the King’s neck. If he could use it, he would have shown off, but the fact no red power emanated from him told her he had not learned how to summon the magic.

Vostemur’s eyes sharpened on her. He was not used to having someone speak down to him.

“I think my guests might be able to help with that.” His face twisted into a sadistic grin as he nodded to someone at the great wood doors behind Remy. “Let’s bring them in, shall we?”

Remy heard the doors opening, and five guards herded in five hooded red figures. She couldn’t contain her gasp.

They had captured five red witches and were parading them through the throne room. They marched across the floor, forced to stand between Remy and the King. The guards turned them to face Remy and, one by one, kicked them into a kneeling position. She heard the soft cry as one hostage’s knees crashed into the floor.

The tall, helmeted guards partially obscured the King, only visible from the shoulders up, wearing a violent grin.

King Vostemur looked off to the right of his dais, where heavy blue curtains covered large archways on either side of the throne. Five more soldiers wearing full armor stood in front of each curtain. Remy looked to the back of the great hall. Another ten guards lined the rear of the throne room. They peppered even more around the periphery of the elegant fae crowd.

There was an army in here. Remy’s stomach tightened. The dagger at her hip would not be enough to save her.