Page 41 of A Flame of the Phoenix (An Heir Comes to Rise #6)

CHAPTER FORTY

Tarly

T hey weren’t allowed to leave this room. Tarly couldn’t really complain—his makeshift bed of a sack of flour and an empty burlap sack was far more tolerable than the icy stone and prickly dead hay of his previous cell.

Jakon and Marlowe had each other and seemed to have made the best of what they had over the many weeks they’d been here. Tarly massaged his stiff good shoulder as he sat up, finding the humans already awake and chatting quietly to each other. He could eavesdrop, but he decided against it.

Then there was Reuben…a man who’d lost his sanity to Marvellas, cowering to himself in the corner, often muttering nonsense as if his thoughts were of a different person. His brown eyes darted all over the room, with no attention on his true surroundings, as if he were in a darker place none of them could comprehend.

Some of the things Tarly caught from his incoherent ramblings were mentions of the ruin and Faythe and how terrified he was—for himself, for her, for the world. Little made sense. Reuben often asked Jakon and Marlowe about Aurialis’s ruin, convinced they knew where it was. While Jakon was growing frustrated with him, Marlowe kept so patient and kind, making sure he ate from their small rations and kept warm. Unlike them, Reuben wasn’t made to stay in this room under watch—he just chose to some days and nights.

Tarly’s bad arm was numb. It had frightened him the first time it had happened, and he hadn’t alarmed Nerida at the time. Throughout the morning, feeling returned to it, but he wondered if there would be a time it would stay lame, and he would no longer be able to even use his bow.

He was becoming more useless by the day.

With that thought he stood, righting his clothing and slipping back into his position on the bench. He’d been here a week at least. Callen hadn’t come back. They were given food and water and escorted to relieve themselves or bathe under watch, but otherwise, they were locked in here. Tarly glanced over the table and the counters filling up with red vials of Phoenix Blood, but to his other side, Marlowe had only achieved another dozen, spelled for its intended use: to amplify the magickal abilities some fae already possessed.

“Does it hurt?” Marlowe asked gently. “It’s not until long past afternoon you start using that arm.”

The numb hand rested over his lap, while his other worked more intensely to compensate, grinding the herbs he needed, mixing the liquids, chopping other things. It had become routine now, and he didn’t mind it.

“There’s a dull ache. I have a pain-relieving tonic.”

From Nerida, and it was running low. He’d watched her make it and knew how to replicate it, but he didn’t have her magick to add to it, which he feared was the only thing strong enough to relieve his pain.

“I’m still trying to understand you,” Jakon said, less hostile than the beginning of the week but still holding his suspicion of him.

“You don’t have to understand. Come on—we have work to do.”

He watched them exchange a wary look.

Over the week, he done a lot of observing them, trying to understand their motives here. One thing he couldn’t shake was how well Marlowe appeared at times. Jakon would make her laugh, or she’d wander around the room in a picture of health. Then, other times, especially when the guards would bring food or escort her out, anyone would think she couldn’t keep this task going for long before it killed her.

Tarly’s next move was a risk, but he scribbled on a piece of parchment, leaving it under a bottle he handed across to her. He didn’t make eye contact, keeping as disinterested in them and as focused on his task as possible.

They were always alone in this room, but maybe that was the security Callen wanted them to believe they had to watch them slip up and reveal an ulterior motive. He kept vigilant.

Tarly waited all day for her to respond, but a message never returned to him.

At night, when they retired from the duty, Tarly spent his last hours crafting arrows. It was more for distraction than enjoyment. His bad arm gave him enough functionality to whittle the scraps of wood he found, and he had a pouch of arrowheads. He didn’t tell anyone he’d taken negligible pieces of the Phoenix feather, only wanting to add something special to the fletching of his next craft.

A soft knock sounded on the door, and he exchanged a puzzled look with Jakon and Marlowe across the room in their sleeping corner. No one ever bothered to announce themselves. After a pause, when no one answered, a head shorter than he expected slipped around the door as it creaked open.

“Oh, sorry. I didn’t realize how late it was.”

She was a younger dark fae with long black hair, and for a second, he thought of Zaiana in her youth.

“You’re Amaya,” Marlowe said warmly.

The dark fae nodded. “Maverick said I’m to keep an eye on you. He’s left.”

Of course the dark fae who were born had once been young, children with the same complete innocence as anyone else. Amaya was at least seventeen in human appearance, but there was something about her that had retained a harmless nature.

When Amaya’s eyes slipped to him, her brows lifted, and excitement sparked in her eyes. “You’re an archer?” She crossed to him without hesitation. He didn’t answer, but when she spied his bow behind him she gasped softly. “Your bow is incredible.”

Tarly didn’t see the harm in showing her. In fact, it was unexpected to have such enthusiastic company for the skill.

“It’s made from silver oak,” he said, passing it to her. It was too big for her to use, but her entire expression lit up tracing the craftsmanship.

“From Fenstead?”

“Yes. It was a gift from my father long ago.”

He didn’t know why he’d added that second part. The memory lashed him—a time when his mother was alive and his father had loved him. Now, after the passing of his mate, Tarly had become nothing more than an object of his sorrowful resentment for resembling her so much.

“That’s pretty,” Amaya said, her dark eyes fixed on the arrow he’d finished in his hands.

Tarly smiled, considering the arrow, which had red woven into the regular pheasant feathers he’d stored.

“I’ve been saving this one,” he said, holding it out to her. “Use it when your fear is strongest and your aim threatens to waver. Even the greatest archers will face those uncertain moments. This arrow won’t miss.”

A tale crafted of hope was not a lie, and watching the darkling’s eyes widen with wonder over the ordinary arrow he’d crafted, it was worth it.

“Why are you giving it to me?”

Tarly shrugged. “I have a feeling you’ll make better use of it than I will.”

He didn’t know why his attention drifted to Marlowe across the room. She watched them with an endearing smile. In her eyes was something that broke a shiver over Tarly, as if she saw something in the exchange he couldn’t begin to comprehend.

Amaya started talking about her archery, and Tarly was glad for the distraction of a topic he was well experienced with—more than anyone he knew for once. It wasn’t an uncommon skill, but there was a specific mastery, so many tricks and styles that very few took care to learn beyond the primary purpose of aim and hit.

The dark fae wasn’t the only intruder that night.

“I heard there was a party in here.”

Tarly didn’t immediately recognize the brown-haired fae, but when he turned to look down at him, the facial resemblance to Kyleer Galentithe and matching eye color quickly gave him away. Izaiah, he recalled his younger brother’s name. Who was followed in by a blond dark fae male.

Izaiah whistled low, swiping up one of the Phoenix Blood potions. “You’ve been busy. How many of these are spelled?”

“Around five dozen,” Marlowe said.

Izaiah set the bottle down with a click of his tongue. “That can’t be satisfactory for Dakodas.”

The room was littered with hundreds of unspelled potions.

“She’s starting to pick up speed,” Jakon added.

“The war is all but won in their favor with these,” the blond dark fae said. Though it should be a triumph for his side, Tarly detected a hint of fear. “The dark fae with human blood were already a force Faythe would struggle to contend with, but now…if all the fae with abilities have amplified magick, she doesn’t stand a chance.”

A dark, sinister tension settled throughout the room. As if they should all celebrate the fact, considering right now they were on the side with the most power, and they could keep it that way if they wished.

“Why are you here?” Tarly asked Izaiah.

“Curiosity and boredom. This calm before the break of either side has me jittery in no pleasant way,” Izaiah said, taking up a lean against one of the counters.

“What is Dakodas doing?” Jakon asked.

“Who knows? I rarely see her, in fact. Perhaps she’s exploring our lands, seeing what she’ll lay claim to when Marvellas conquers it all.”

“So Zaiana, Maverick, and Dakodas are gone from the castle?” Tarly concluded.

“Seems so, but I wouldn’t get comfortable with the fact. They have many spies, and Malin is losing his sanity by the minute. I can’t tell what he’ll do next,” Izaiah said.

“It’s the Phoenix Blood. He’s taking too much to keep his mind ability,” Marlowe said.

“Didn’t you say Nikalias has kept the effects of a potion for months? Why can Malin only use it for a day?” Izaiah wondered.

Marlowe shrugged. “Nik is more powerful.”

Tarly knew Nik’s ability was strong, but still he wondered if Marlowe had imbued more magick into the potions she’d made for Nik, unwittingly or not.

“Why is he taking it so often?” Tarly asked.

“It’s helping him twist the minds of suspicious council members or reluctant generals. He’s slipping his control. He’s been taking these potions almost daily,” Izaiah answered.

Jakon said, “So our only concern is Malin right now. None of us have access to his council to know what he’s been planning throughout Rhyenelle, and to gauge the extent of his tarnishing of Faythe’s name with them.”

“You’re speaking as if we’re all on the same side here,” Tarly said apprehensively, with a deliberate glance at the two dark fae in the room.

It was Marlowe who said, “We can stop pretending we aren’t. I’ve seen it—that’s all I can say. We don’t need to know the specifics of why, but none of us have switched allegiance.”

“You’re bold to admit that with us here,” Tynan said.

“No, I’m still right. Your allegiance has always been to Zaiana, and you know there’s been a shift coming with her, even if it hasn’t fully locked in her mind yet.”

No one objected to that statement. Everything he’d heard about the notorious dark fae, including his short encounter with her, told him the opposite of Marlowe’s judgment. But what did he know?

“Where has she scuttled off to?” Izaiah asked Tynan curiously.

The dark fae pursed his lips, clearly in turmoil if trusting the people in this room was disobeying an order from Zaiana—or helping her.

“All I know is that she discovered our still hearts are a curse, and she wants answers.”

It wasn’t the whole truth, and everyone knew it. Tynan knew exactly where Zaiana had gone to start looking. No one pressed further on the answer that was satisfactory enough.

“The threads of Marvellas’s lies and manipulation are starting to unravel, it seems,” Izaiah said.

“Once you achieve what you need here, you need to go to High Farrow,” Marlowe said.

“What does High Farrow have to do with any of this?” Izaiah asked.

“Everything. It’s where it all began, and it’s where it has to end.”

Her words lingered an ominous foreboding between them all.

Izaiah said, “Can we get a when, all-knowing oracle?”

“Don’t mock her,” Jakon warned.

“For all we know, she’s standing there with the answers to all our problems.”

“It doesn’t work like that.”

“It’s fine, Jak,” Marlowe said.

“It’s not,” Jakon snapped, silencing the room with his anger. “None of you have a damn clue what her ability even means or how it works, so instead of pointing accusations, work on your own plots to get out of here alive.”

“You can achieve it,” Marlowe said, her sight fixed on Izaiah. The fae’s jaw shifted to an answer no one else knew the question to. “But even if you conquer power, the bigger challenge will be not to lose yourself.”

Izaiah pushed off the bench. “Thanks for the advice,” he grumbled, nearly setting Jakon off again.

Tarly stiffened when Marlowe’s gaze shifted to him. “You’ve been deceived as meticulously as the dark fae have about their hearts. I think you know it too. You just have to figure out how.”

Tarly’s chest thumped wildly. She couldn’t mean… No. His mind scrambled, not fully present for her next words.

“There are infinite ends to this war, and few of them are triumphant in Faythe’s favor. She is the one, and if she falls, we all fall. But she cannot rise without us.”

The tale of Faythe Ashfyre was certainly one to rival fiction, but he was somewhat honored to be written into the story, however small. It was why he had to leave Nerida, but also why he was determined to return to her for however many days he had left by the time he reached her. All he could hope for now was to make it to the end, just to see a glimpse of the better world promised by the most unlikely of people.

It had been some hours since the dark fae and Izaiah had left, but Tarly couldn’t sleep. He tossed against his awkward arrangement on the sacks for some time before he sensed he wasn’t the only restless mind tonight.

“Are you awake?” Marlowe whispered softly. She’d crossed to him with careful silence.

“Yes.”

She didn’t say anything else before she came all the way over, and when she sat against the wall next to him, Tarly got up too. They sat side by side in a strange silence for moment. He couldn’t place what was wrong, only that his gut was unsettled as if he were bracing in the calm before a storm.

“It’s terrible, isn’t it, feeling death’s touch grow warmer but never knowing when it’ll claim?”

Tarly’s chest sped a little. He couldn’t fathom her gift of being an oracle. In fact, he didn’t think “gift” was an appropriate term for the burden of knowledge she carried.

“Do you speak of yourself?” he asked carefully.

“What I see is not always so clear.”

“You knew I’d come here.” He’d suspected it. At first, he’d thought her kind reception was just her nature, but over the week, he’d caught glimpses of her that had felt more accurate than that.

Marlowe didn’t answer. Tarly stiffened when she took his hand, only briefly, to place something cool into his palm. He knew what it was before he looked down at the bottle.

“I have no use for this,” he said.

“You’ll know what to do with it,” Marlowe said, her voice so soothing he didn’t know why it inspired sympathy for her.

“If you’re planning something?—”

“I’m not.” She cut him off.

Tarly pursed his lips, fiddling with the vial of Phoenix Blood.

“You must have a plan to get out of here, but what are you waiting for?” Tarly asked.

“I don’t have any plan, but I wondered if I could ask something of you.”

“If I can grant it, I will.”

“Make sure Jakon gets out when the time comes.”

His head turned to her, and an urge to protect her filled his chest. “You’re getting out together.”

“But if something goes wrong, he’ll need someone to force him to leave even if I have to stay.”

“Marlowe…you have to tell him this?—”

“I can’t. You’ve seen how he is, fiercely loyal and so brave. He’ll fight no matter what, but I fear it might get him killed.”

She choked on the last word, and Tarly’s whole body flushed cold. Had she seen a vision of her husband’s death? Tarly couldn’t fathom such a burden; was sure he would go insane if he harbored a possible fate to pass where Nerida could die.

“Please,” she whispered at his silence.

“I promise,” he said. He had to. “I’ll look out for both of you.”

She smiled, her shoulders relaxing a fraction. “The most silent warriors can make the greatest impact, Tarly Wolverlon. I hope you never forget that.”

Tarly mustered a small smile, but his gut was unsettled with a need to protect the gentle human. He just didn’t know what from.

“You’ve had the ability to make these potions far faster all this time,” Tarly said, not leaving it to question.

“Yes. I’ve been buying time.”

“They’ll punish you when they find out.”

Marlowe said nothing at that. Instead she shifted to her knees, facing him fully. She was so delicate in her human beauty it was hard to imagine the depth of her troubles. How someone so kind and hopeful could be tormented with such vicious visions.

“It was Faythe who suggested you come here, wasn’t it?”

Tarly nodded. Faythe hadn’t asked him to, but she’d placed the option into his hands to abandon course with Nerida and seek his own salvation, to offer what he could to the war efforts instead.

“She told me where the Light Temple Ruin is—I just need to find a moment to try to retrieve it.”

“Izaiah knows too.”

That sparked hope in his mind. If the Galentithe brother was still on Faythe’s side, all he had to do was get him to retrieve it while he had free rein of the castle. Then Tarly could make his escape. Until Tarly realized, with a drop of uncertainty about Izaiah’s loyalty…

“Why hasn’t he fled with it himself?”

Marlowe’s face pinched. “He’s trying to use the power within for himself.”

Now he really was concerned about Izaiah’s allegiance. He was already relaying all they’d spoken of earlier, which would be condemning if he took it to Dakodas.

“I don’t trust him,” Tarly said.

“Marlowe?” Jakon interrupted them, pushing himself up. Tarly could see his accusing frown through the dark at finding his wife all the way over here.

“We couldn’t sleep, and you were out cold,” Marlowe teased.

She went to him, and they talked quietly to themselves. Jakon draped their blanket around her and hugged her to him. Tarly had to look away, settling back down.

He couldn’t shake the tension Marlowe had left in her wake.

Tarly stayed awake, reeling over how they would all escape. Faythe was right—they were all threads of fate, and somehow, he knew they were important.

He wouldn’t be of any use if he wasn’t well and rested, so he forced his eyes to close. In the confines of his mind, he found peace, pretending for a while that no matter where he went, it would lead him back to Nerida one way or another, and he couldn’t wait for her to reprimand him for leaving.