Page 49 of A Kiss of Hammer and Flame (Fated for Hael #1)

In Luminaux, Cahra watched the King and Queen rush out the palace doors onto its steps, looking like they’d been roused from fitful sleep.

Day was breaking, pale light leaking from the eastern skies, the kingdom’s mountain peaks curled defensively around the castle city.

Cahra and the others hadn’t rested either, her exhaustion weighing heavy as a high-born quilt as she dismounted, offering an arm to Thelaema.

But before she’d taken two steps, a shrill voice rang out across the courtyard. Delicia, skirts bunched in her hands, dashed to them.

‘Where is Raiden? What news of Thierre?’ Then Delicia spied Cahra, her lemon-jade eyes narrowing.

‘ You! ’ the woman cried, thrusting a decorated fingernail at her.

Cahra stood, taken aback by the woman’s distress.

‘Where is Thierre? I know that you know something! What is between you and my fiancé, you bucolic little—’

Wyldaern opened her mouth, Delicia shushing her with a manic hiss.

‘ Lady Delicia. ’ Thelaema stepped between the women, the warning unmistakable. ‘You will not utter another syllable to the Scion, or by the All-seeing, I shall have you thrown in a dungeon cell for the next twenty-four hours. Do you heed me?’

Delicia spluttered incoherently. ‘And who, by the Oracles, are you?’

‘I am the Oracle, girl,’ Thelaema said, amethyst eyes positively blazing. Then she tromped off towards the King and Queen.

Wyldaern just smiled at Delicia and withdrew.

But Cahra saw in the noblewoman what she saw inside herself. The feeling she was numbing in order to keep moving forwards. Fear .

So she said nothing, holding the woman’s hateful gaze, before trailing Thelaema inside Luminaux’s palace.

Back in the den of war, Cahra’s name for the room was apt.

Thelaema announced herself and recounted their story, evidently no stranger to royals.

At first, Luminaux’s King, Queen, General and Commander were stunned.

But as news of Thierre’s predicament sank in, King Royce’s leash on his fury and fear for his only son slipped its restraints.

Then Raiden and Siarl returned from their interrogation in the caves, the warrior woman’s face smeared with blood.

Somehow, Cahra didn’t think it was her own.

‘What in Hael happened?’ King Royce bellowed at the Captain.

He winced before replying, ‘I aided Thierre in disobeying your decree.’

‘And who are you, to harbour such designs?’ The King snarled, spittle flying, the blame for Thierre’s plight all over his face. As it had been on Delicia’s.

Cahra felt like screaming, not at the King or Raiden, or even at Delicia, but at herself. If only she’d stayed here, Thierre would be safe. She leapt to her feet, desperate to move.

‘Compose yourself,’ Thelaema counselled King Royce as she nursed her teacup, but Cahra suspected the sentiment was for her as the Oracle flung a charged glance her way.

Queen Avenais placed her hand upon the King’s. ‘There is no fault here, dearest. Thierre is wilful and has been since he was a boy.’

‘Oh, there is fault ,’ the King seethed, navy eyes like churning tides as he locked them squarely on Raiden. ‘You are my son’s protector, not his friend. You are his protector, and you have failed him in your duty. Just as you have failed your King.’

Raiden flinched like he’d been slapped, eyes dropping to the floor.

Cahra started, ‘Now, wait just a second—’

But King Royce flashed her a look that would have silenced a noble twice her size. ‘Enough.’

She ceased her pacing at the room’s rear, looking down at King Royce at the head of his fancy wartime table, questioning, ‘You’d silence me?’

To her shock, he swallowed then shook his head. The acknowledgment was slight, but it was there.

Cahra had just rebuked a King of the sister kingdoms. To his face .

She sat, trying to stop her body shaking, and went on. ‘Something obviously happened to Thierre either before – in which case, you’ve got a problem – or after he passed through the gatehouse at the entrance to the kingdom.’ Cahra turned to Tyne. ‘So which is it?’

The Commander’s lip curled. ‘After. One of the guards on rotation knew that Thierre was approved to enter and exit the gate, so the Prince used the man to slip through.’

Cahra nodded at Raiden and Siarl. ‘What did you learn in the caves?’

But Raiden seemed not to have heard her, his crestfallen eyes trained on the floor.

Siarl responded in lieu of her Captain. ‘That Kolyath and Ozumbre have our Prince.’ Her deep brown eyes creased, pained by the words.

Thierre’s parents stiffened, their worst fears confirmed. Queen Avenais gripped her husband’s hand, her lashes dampening with tears.

But Raiden lifted his head to Tyne. ‘It’s worse.’

King Royce looked positively murderous. ‘How could it possibly be worse?’

‘The longsword is gone. I believe Thierre took it.’

By the Seers…

Cahra knew what anyone with knowledge of the prophecy would think upon seeing that sword. She closed her eyes, remembering Jarett’s ugly threats to Lumsden:

‘If you do not hand over that brat, I will make short work of you… Who was this weapon commissioned for?!’

And the fear in the little master blacksmith, not for himself, but for her. Cahra’s stomach twisted, like it was caught in a clamp back in the smithy.

Then something else occurred to her. Raiden was right, it was so much worse.

‘Raiden,’ Cahra said, ‘Thierre has been to Ozumbre before, hasn’t he?’

‘Yes,’ Raiden conceded. ‘He has.’

‘And did he use the same identity as in Kolyath?’

Raiden breathed his next word. ‘No.’

Commander Tyne caught on. ‘So,’ the man began through gritted teeth, ‘if Thierre’s in joint custody of our enemies with the sword, at best they’ll think he’s the omen-bringer. And at worst…’ He rubbed his furrowed face with both hands. ‘He’s a tri-kingdom spy.’

Though she knew the room had fallen silent, Cahra couldn’t hear anything over the rush of blood in her ears.

Sylvie, who’d secreted herself in a corner, arms folded across her silver breastplate, pushed off from the shelves she was leaning against and strode for the room’s strategy table.

‘Thierre was taken outside our walls. That’s no small job.

If it were me, I’d send my finest.’ The General glowered at the map as if she might terrify its pieces into talking.

‘That means Kolyath’s Commander Sullian, or Ozumbre’s Commander Diabolus, and their elite units.

’ Sylvie began cross-checking reports with the map’s red and grey figures.

‘I will find them,’ she growled, brows as ferocious as her father’s.

A pause, before Wyldaern finally ventured, ‘And yet, Thierre is not the omen-bringer.’ She exchanged a glance with Thierre’s sister, then looked to Thelaema.

Commander Tyne exhaled. ‘Exactly. Therein lies the problem.’ He eyed King Royce. ‘If they interrogate him, he won’t have the answers they’re looking for.’

‘Not about the prophecy.’ The King’s words, like his eyes, were hollow.

If they interrogate him. They mean if they torture him . The bottom fell from Cahra’s stomach. And she was falling with it.

Raiden stared at his Commander, asking quietly, ‘Will he endure it?’

Thierre could die. The thought spun endlessly in her mind. King Royce had been right. This is all my fault.

Thelaema’s glare – the Oracle’s thought – hit Cahra like a fired arrow. Hardly. Thelaema turned her scrutiny back on the royals.

Commander Tyne’s face was grim. ‘Thierre was trained.’

Something in King Royce shrunk at the word, deflating him. Trained – as in, to withstand torture? Cahra bit the inside of her cheek. Surely they didn’t mean…

Tyne stood defiant. ‘He will endure.’

The dark place inside Cahra surged again and she knew it wouldn’t be long until her eyes glowed like a meagre imitation of Hael’s.

Would Thierre really be able to withstand torture?

Kolyath’s Steward had a spymaster, that she knew, but the ruler’s twin Commanders were just as accomplished at violent coercion.

The idea of a Kolyath soldier – or Ozumbre, given their reputation for butchery – breaking his fingers or pulling his teeth to get Thierre to talk quickly turned her mouth to ash.

‘They won’t kill him,’ Tyne said into the silence. ‘Thinking he’s the omen-bringer makes him valuable. They’ll wait for the Key.’

Cahra reached into her pocket. ‘Which will never be bestowed,’ she said softly, producing the black velvet pouch.

‘You have it?’ King Royce leapt to his feet. ‘The last omen approaches! Go, girl, to Hael’stromia! Summon the weapon and save my son!’

Cahra glared at Thelaema. Like I said.

Wyldaern cut in, frowning. ‘And if Cahra is attacked by Kolyath and Ozumbre’s allied forces on her way to Hael’stromia?’

Queen Avenais turned in desperation to the Seers. ‘Is there nothing that you can do? We have herbs, all the divination herbs that—’

Thelaema laughed mirthlessly. ‘We thank you, however, herbs will not aid that which I cannot see, when such things are veiled from even my aged eyes.’

The room descended once more into a heavy silence.

‘Unless…’ It was Wyldaern. Cahra’s body tensed, her heart pounding as she listened. ‘You cannot see the Prince, but perhaps I can? Or at least, gain us information, some clue as to where they may have taken him. By focusing my sight outside the gate…’

Cahra said slowly to Thelaema, ‘You said your visions aren’t blocked with Wyldaern. Maybe she’s not hampered by whoever is blocking yours?’

Considering, the Oracle nodded to her apprentice. ‘Do so,’ she said.

Wyldaern sat back quickly, cross-legged, in her armchair, and shut her eyes. The royals leaned forward as the Oracle sipped her tea. Then Wyldaern frowned.

King Royce, voice hoarse, said, ‘What is it?’

Wyldaern gave a slight shake of her head, her words floating to them as if from far away. ‘That is just it. Nothing,’ she said, then jerked. Sylvie started, stepping closer.