Page 1 of A Flame of the Phoenix (An Heir Comes to Rise #6)

PROLOGUE

Approx. 500 years ago

I t took seven Gods to create her, and one mortal man to break her. One might find her tale tragic, but she would come to make it her legacy. They would not win.

In her cursed immortal fae form, she had two paths of fate: submit to the dire choices she’d made and allow herself to succumb to a desolate, piteous existence; or take back all that had been stolen from her.

She stared down at the man she once loved. The man she’d given up her divinity for. The man who was nothing more than a pretty lie…

Her choice was already made, with the dull heart that had become a dead weight in her hand.

His hair, as dark as the black soul he’d parted with, was spilled like ink across his face. Strands touched his eternal glass eyes of horror, still echoing with the scream from when she’d taken her revenge. He should have known what was stolen was always bound to be collected. Nothing in this world was without a bargain. Though he’d reaped far more reward than she this time.

This was the last time she would lose.

From the gruesome sight of what was left of him, she felt nothing.

It wasn’t enough.

Not enough revenge. Or solace. Or triumph. Maybe nothing ever would be. But her choice wouldn’t end here.

Despite all the ways he had wronged her, hurt her, in such deplorable ways, never did she believe a mortal to be capable of conspiring…

She mourned for him.

For herself.

Unable to tear her gaze away, all her mind could torment her with was, Why?

Why, why, why couldn’t it have been real? Their love…it had once felt so real .

There was nothing more despairing than being fooled by one’s own weak heart, which she considered ripping out in the same manner.

Yet she couldn’t even if she wanted to. She could not die. She could not be killed by mortal means.

“You did this to me,” she whispered, letting the cold organ slip from her grasp.

Even in death, he’d won.

Her tears were hot against the ice that began to embrace all that she was.

Though it was his heart that lay torn from his chest, it was hers that would pay the price for his betrayal. For eternity.

Love was damning. Love was cruel. Love was weakness.

All she had now was time.

She looked down at the thick black stone bracelets. Pretty shackles to her power. Whatever dark magick they’d used to bind them, she would find a way to break them. That, she promised their damned souls.

Swiping up his sword, she found it was heavier than she anticipated with her weak muscles. She made it to the door and listened. She didn’t have her power, which could kill everyone in this wretched place in minutes, and she knew little of how to use the weapon tightly clutched in her grip. It was in that moment she dedicated herself to learning. To becoming death incarnate to track every one of those in Ceaser’s band who’d basked in the glory of capturing a Goddess and made a mockery of her name.

Then she would break her chains and save the world too. Of weakness; of human greed.

The scraps of fabric that covered her body were drenched in blood, but she wore it proudly as she left that room that would haunt her for the rest of her immortal days. Where she’d spent years in captivity. Used for her blood.

She’d made them what they were. It was her blood that Transitioned humans into fae.

“Marvellas.”

Her name had never been said in a breath of such horror and fear. She was used to hearing it chanted with laughter and triumph. The great Spirit of Souls, conquered by once mortal men.

She turned slowly, but her rage and her sorrow were like adrenaline coursing through her, so she couldn’t see the odds of three fae being a real threat. She recognized each one of them. Her hatred and her revenge flashed in her eyes, and she didn’t feel her steps advancing toward them, sword gripped so tightly her knuckles were white.

Steel sang as they armed themselves. Whatever they saw on her face widened their eyes, and wariness slowed their movements.

“How did you escape?” one she knew as Harris asked cautiously.

They didn’t see her as a threat. Of course they didn’t. Regardless, she was ready to cut them down like timber through sheer determination to be free.

As soon as she was, in her quest to find the key to break her manacles, she would spend every waking moment training to master the weapons she’d seen—the ones that had been used on her. Harris’s sword. Jaquard’s bow. Leon’s daggers. And many more.

“I told you I would kill you all,” she said, not even recognizing her own voice. For so long she’d used it to plead in cowardice; to beg with mercy. She was used to her words being empty.

The chuckle that came from Harris was a violent trigger. With a cry, she lunged, and his wide-eyed horror didn’t get the chance to take root before the slick feel of blood and flesh met with the end of the heavy blade she wielded. Right through his throat.

She let go and stumbled back. Harris choked, spraying blood from his mouth before he fell. Her pulse sprinted, surprised by her own swift movement, as her blade clattered to the ground. The two fae behind him stared down at their friend in bewilderment before anger firmed their faces. She’d seen their anger before. Felt their anger before. Fear took over, and she had no weapon now. Her trigger response to cry and plead burned in her throat, but she swallowed it down, determined not to become that frightened, captured prey again.

Never again.

Her instinct told her to twist and run. Run as fast as she could despite her frail body. Yet for the first time in her tragic fae existence, it was as if the Gods had finally heard her apology for betraying them so long ago and had allowed her to come to land.

The fae on the left barely managed a strangled cry before someone approached from behind, locking into position, and swiftly snapped his neck. The sound shuddered through her. Sickness rose in her stomach, but there was nothing to bring up.

Her savior twisted to the other fae, about to plunge his dagger through his neck.

“Wait!” she called, trembling to intervene when she might be next on his kill list.

He halted his attack, pinning the fae to the wall.

Hesitantly, she took steps toward them despite her desire to flee the opposite way now the opportunity had been granted.

She needed to know…

Her bare feet stepped through the cold blood pooling out from the one she’d killed. Her stomach was so painful with hunger and the need to retch.

“Tell me,” she whispered, her voice hoarse and afraid. Stopping a short distance away, she spoke to the last of her captors, lifting her wrists. “Tell me, how can I be free of these?”

The fae snickered, but it was cut off by the one who pressed his dagger tight enough to his throat to draw blood. She tried to catch a glimpse of her savior, but his mask concealed his face, and his hood cloaked him in shadow.

“You’ll never be free, witch ,” he sneered. She wondered what she’d done to earn such a name. “What you are should never be let loose on this world.”

She found the courage to step closer. Her anger and embarrassment were as cold as they were hot, battling an urge to submit and agree or to prove him wrong. “Then you should never have brought me to your land.” Her voice was ice. She hated him so much. She loathed them all for what they’d done to her. “Whatever happens next… you made me into this.”

Then her savior slit the fae’s throat. She flinched at the gruesomeness of it but felt nothing for him as he choked on his own blood, slowly falling to the ground before he stopped jerking.

Awareness of the dangerous assailant and his sharp blade returned. Fear struck her as her eyes locked on the lethal tip that dripped crimson to the wood floor. Her breath shuddered as she took a step back. She tried to catch a glimpse of his face, but it was futile in the dim hall.

She decided he was male from his height and broad build, but she couldn’t be certain he wasn’t just another person out to capture the ultimate prize while she was vulnerable. He held up his hands, but it did little for her nerves.

“I don’t wish you harm.” His voice held a smooth, silvery note.

She swallowed hard, but her throat remained dry. “You’re not the first to have claimed that,” she said, cursing her wavering voice as she took another step back. “They were all liars.”

Instead of answering, he flipped the dagger. She flinched with a gasp, anticipating a sharp plunge into her flesh. Yet the blade didn’t soar for her. She blinked at the leather handle—extended to her. A weapon offered, not used.

Having lived as long as she had by the rule of cruel hands, a broken piece of her wondered if the fear that had grown roots down to her very core, grown vines over every fiber of her being, could learn to trust again. She craved it. The trust of friendship she’d watched stem through all walks of life as a Spirit of the Realm. The trust of lovers who fell so surely for each other that they would bind their lives together. The trust of blood; family. The trust of neighbors and allies, and even the trust of enemies—equals.

All she was left with was the trust in herself.

The stranger took slow steps forward, and she locked eyes with him, not his blade. “I promise you, from this day, I am yours. To protect you.”

She could have spluttered at the blatant lie.

The male pulled down his hood, and he was striking, with hazel eyes and dark raven hair so long it was half-tied in a knot. It didn’t stop the strands from framing his firm face, his jaw shadowed with coarse hairs.

She shook her head. Having only just broken out of her cage, she couldn’t allow this male to fashion new bars around her before she’d tasted freedom.

“There is always a price,” she said.

“May you ask mine?”

“No.”

Her hand lashed out for the knife, slicing through his glove, cutting flesh. He clenched his teeth but made no sound or movement. Her stance was clumsy as she slipped through blood in her backward stride, angling the blade with false bravery.

He didn’t react in anger, though her pulse thrummed to brace for his wrath. He didn’t do anything but watch her steadily.

“What is your name?” he asked calmly.

She blinked. It didn’t seem arrogant to assume he would know who she was. Everyone did, or at least…

It was in that moment her world shrank so small that air became nonexistent. She had once been all-powerful. Her name had been a prayer; a blessing. Then she’d taken flesh, and when she’d been tricked and trapped here, the world had slowly forgotten about her.

“Marvellas,” she said, but her own name made her swallow with regret.

“Let me rephrase,” the male offered gently. Everything he did was in consideration of the spooked deer she clearly was. “What would you like your name to be?”

That question crumbled her anger. Stole all her revenge and pricked her eyes.

It was a chance to be free. To leave behind the tragic, fallen, humiliated Goddess she was. To be someone else entirely. Yet she couldn’t let go. Her failures were as much a part of her as her triumphs.

“Marvellas,” she repeated, sure now.

She wouldn’t let the vile greed of mankind make her shun her identity. Hide from it. No. She was Marvellas, the Spirit of Souls and Goddess of the Stars. And she would make the world pay in that name one day.

“Marvellas,” he echoed as though testing it against his tongue.

“And yours?” she asked with a confidence she could only credit to her defiance.

“Mikhael,” he said, the name accompanied by a twitch of his mouth that if held might have passed for a smile.

It was just a name. Just a word. Maybe it was the unhesitant way he offered it to her that made it settle like a token of trust as sure as his dagger.

“Mikhael Ashfyre.”