Page 18 of Brutal Fae King (Dark Faevea King #1)

I have never seen a man run so fast in full armor.

And Vicmar does it whilst dragging me by the arm. As we sprint, my mind whirls: how did an army appear so quickly?! How did those watching out miss an entire army approaching the castle?!

He keeps me close to his side as he runs through the castle, forcing my legs to paddle twice as hard as his as we run together. Sometimes, when we turn corners, he flies past them too fast for me to keep up, and he takes me into the air for a moment before I hit the ground again. Before long, we burst into the war room. At first, because of my servant instincts, I try to wait outside, but Vicmar pulls me in by his side.

I have never seen such a large group of military men on the edge of a screaming panic before. They shuffle and sweat, faces red, as they shout random orders at each other. Once Vicmar strides up to the head of the table, they straighten and quieten. The respect is palpable in the air, but it’s respect from fear.

Vicmar lets me go and gives me a look before he slams both hands down on the war table.

“Someone tell me, and tell me fast, how an entire army escaped every watchman!” h e snarls across the room.

His voice carries, bouncing like a skipping stone off the table to a ricocheting silence. Suddenly, the war counselors don’t want to say a word.

Vicmar slams another fist into the table.

“TELL ME!” h e roars.

One of the braver war counselors pipes up: “We don’t know, Sire! We are trying to figure it out and we can’t! None of our scouts in Murbyn Bridge spotted any armies approaching Eyston, and now… and now—”

“Well, give me some details!” Vicmar snaps back. “What is this army? Naga? Sirens?”

“They appear to be either humans or dark fae.”

I see the color drain from Vicmar’s face.

“Do you know what color their armor is?” he asks, a voice crack breaking his authoritative tone.

“Dark purple or black, we believe,” another says. “It has to be magical armor, Sire.”

Vicmar’s face is fully white now.

“It has to be him,” he says.

He says that one statement much quieter than any of the other things he’s said, but it somehow rings out louder than the rest of them. The entire room falls to piercing silence. But one by one, all the war counselors look to me.

Suddenly, I am under every one of their beaming gazes. Vicmar is the last one to look at me, and whilst his face is pinched up in a snarl, I can see the fear dancing in his eyes.

I hate to ask, especially in such a loud silence, but I have to:

“Who is him ?”

“Dralis,” Vicmar answers me immediately. “He’s the only one I can imagine who’s capable of materializing an army like this.”

My blood runs a little cold.

“The one working for Mischevil?” I ask.

“The same,” he says. “He’s got dangerous non-elemental powers—namely, the power to teleport. If he’s sourcing his power directly from a god, then he may be able to teleport an entire army. We’re lucky that the magical seals held firm enough that he wasn’t immediately on us.”

“But why is he here all of a sudden, Sire?” one of the war counselors asks.

Vicmar looks at me one more time and then says:

“Well, clearly, he has found the lost queen and wants her for himself.”

My throat closes. I swallow hard.

“How did he find her?” another one asks.

“I don’t know…” Vicmar answers. “The marriage, the spell around her, around the castle… it should have made it impossible for him to find her.”

My heart is sinking. I’m now gulping spit like I’m going to puke; I know.

Because as fast as we married, as fast as the spell was cast—it wasn’t fast enough. After all, he could teleport into my dungeon cell much faster than anyone could do anything…

It flashes past my eyes: a crooked, sexy grin… very dark eyes… long, silver blonde hair pulled back tight to his head… large insect wings resting wide…so muscular…

A soft touch taps between my shoulders. I flinch. A heat creeps up into my cheeks.

“Are you okay?” Vicmar asks. “You look flushed.”

“Oh, I… I’m worried,” I answer vaguely.

“Don’t be,” Vicmar growls. “He will never lay a finger on you. I will kill him with my bare hands if he tries.”

The snarling tones send another chill through me; I believe him. Vicmar looks back to the table of war counselors.

“What are our options?” he asks. “What do we have at our disposal right this moment to work with?”

“N-not, uh, not much, Sire. Most of our forces are tied up in Murbyn Bridge—we essentially have only the castle guards at our disposal right now.”

Vicmar sucks in a deep breath, then huffs it quickly.

“Is that it?” he asks. “Just the population of guards inside the castle right now?”

“Yes, Sire.”

Vicmar huffs out another stressed sigh, leaning on the table and hanging his head. He stays like that. No one dares say a thing for a moment.

“He must have known where Ebelor was for a while,” Vicmar grunts. “He was biding his time. He was waiting until we were at our most vulnerable before he struck.” He looks over at me. “If he realized Ebelor was starting to master her powers, he might have felt the pressure to make his move. After all, the lost queen is supposed to be Faevea’s salvation when she is at the side of the person trying to save Faevea, which means his defeat. He couldn’t let her master her powers entirely before he made his move; she’d be too much of a threat.”

I’m suddenly the focal point of the conversation. In fact, it’s almost like he’s talking entirely to me in this huge room of people for a moment.

“But we are married, and we are bound,” he says. “You’re inside the castle, and the castle has so many wards on it that he couldn’t teleport his army in here. Until those doors are broken in and the castle itself is sieged, it’s the safest place for you.”

“But what then?” I whisper. “The army is in the castle town right now. Surely, they’re going to break in.”

“They haven’t yet,” Vicmar answers. “We still have time.”

He looks at me, and then his eyes sharpen. He turns back to his war counselors.

“We still have time,” he says again. “If all we have in the castle are the castle guards, then that’s what we’ll have to use to defeat his army.”

He reaches forward, grabs a blueprint of the castle, and pulls it over to him.

“We do not have the raw numbers… we don’t even have the magic…” Vicmar says. “But we have the environmental advantage in the castle. It’s a stronghold of its own…”

He looks up at the war counselors.

“Tell the cooks to start boiling oil,” he says. “As much of it as we have. Bring all the available guards to the top of the castle. Any magic users will be brought to me, and I will place them and give them the spell I want them to cast. Tell all the other staff to work on barricading all entrances, except for the secret one into the moat. Have someone contact the witch and bring her to me—we may need her assistance. Once all the regular staff have finished their barricade, take them into the bowels of the castle for their safety.”

A few of the council bow their heads and scurry out of the room. I don’t know if they are the ones who are designated as the ones who do errands or if they snatched up the opportunity to get out of the way of Vicmar’s yelling, but they sprint off immediately.

He looks over to me, then looks back to the war counselors.

“Two of you accompany Ebelor down to the safe room,” he says. “She will stay there until either the battle is over or I give the signal that the castle is about to fall. Once I give that order, you both escape the castle with Ebelor, and you flee as far across Faevea as you can. From there, you are on your own, but your ultimate objective is to make sure this woman never finds herself in the grasp of Dralis.”

“Wait,” I gasp. “What about you?”

“I shall be on the front lines,” Vicmar answers. “I am the most powerful magic user currently here. My own powers are imperative to the success of our defense. Either I successfully defend this castle alongside my guards, or I fall with it.” He glares at me. “Either way, your safety is crucial for the survival of the entire kingdom. Mine isn’t. It doesn’t make sense for us to do this any other way. I may die here, and if Dralis has his way, I will. But the castle can fall, I can die, we can all die—as long as you make it out of here alive and not with Dralis, Faevea will carry on.”

“You expect me to just accept that?” I demand. “I thought you were just training me to become a warrior! I have lightning powers— are you telling me they’d be of no use whatsoever in this situation?! If we have so few options, then let me help!”

“No,” Vicmar answers. “If you are on the front lines, Dralis will find a way to pick you off. We can’t have you vulnerable, even if your lightning powers could theoretically be of use. Besides, you are hardly a master of them, and I think you’d need to be much more skilled before I’d feel comfortable with you fighting.”

“But I can’t just sit here and do nothing!” I insist. “Not whilst everyone else fights on my behalf! My explosions of power are probably what drew him over to begin with! I can’t let everyone die for me whilst I hunker down and do nothing! ”

“You are doing something,” Vicmar says. “You’re surviving. That’s what I need from you—what Faevea needs from you.”

“It’s what I need from you, too, but you’re on the front lines!” I’m suddenly begging.

He just gives me the saddest smile.

“I do not have the time to argue with you, Ebelor. I’m sorry,” he says.

He looks over my shoulder and nods. I’m seized at either side by both arms. I swivel my head around, but the two war counselors who have grabbed me are not meeting my eye. Sparks start darting around me, in time with the rage coursing through my veins.

“Vicmar, you can’t do this!”

“Take her away,” he says, looking back down to the blueprint. “Make sure she is in the safe room as quickly as possible. You have my permission to go to the armory and gather everything you need to defend her with your lives; her survival is imperative, even when I’m dead and gone.”

“Yes, Sire,” the war counselors on either side of me chant.

“Vicmar!” I howl.

They begin dragging me backward. I kick and scream, my heels scraping along the floor. My guards keep flinching as my electricity keeps hitting them, but they dutifully keep dragging. I realize that I’m crying when my screaming starts stuttering:

“VIC-VICMAR, IF YOU DIE, I SWEAR TO THE GODS I AM GOING TO KILL YOU!”

He just gives me the saddest smile over his shoulder.

“As long as you live,” he replies quietly.

Then the doors to the war room slam shut in my face, and I can’t see him anymore.