Page 51 of Daughter of the Dark Sea

They strolled in silence all the way to the Emerald Forest surrounding the Citadel. As if some fresh air would somehow rectify everything between them. Kora had heard legends of the forest’s mysterious nature. People would go missing here, and when their friends and families searched for them, they’d hear their screams echo from the trees instead.

As they walked, breathing in this supposedly required fresh air, the forest expanded, thickening from a mix of light greenery into dark pine trees and weeping willows. Shadows between trees darkened, and the bark became twisted, roots breaking through the ground like hands reaching for saviours.

She shuddered, carefully navigating the claw-shaped roots.

“Natives buried the dead here,”

Blake broke the silence.

“This stretch of forest was barren land the Devanians used as a burial ground. After some time, trees grew from the buried bodies . . . creating life.”

Kora peered at him curiously. He never cared for tales from the Devanian era, yet here he was, speaking so casually, as if he knew all about it.

“I can’t tell if that’s beautiful, or horrific,”

she murmured.

Keeping her bandaged hands clasped at her front, she jumped over a log, following his charging presence through the winding forest. Her palms stung from the shards of her dagger, and she wished they were out at sea, surrounded by the only environment she thrived in. If her magic still worked, she could heal herself with water. But they were so far from the ocean now, she couldn’t hear the waves, or see the glistening, blue horizon.

“Sometimes, the most beautiful things are also the deadliest. Despite this land once being barren, used as a dumping ground for death, it took what it’d been given, and turned it into something . . . more.”

Her mind flickered to the Galen moonstone chest, full of beautiful yet deadly weapons. Those recovered chests were locked deep in Stormkeep Fortress’ vaults. Never to be seen again.

Blake stopped by a tree. Its branches hung down, cascading around them like a clawed, green hand. He gently brushed a leaf, rubbing it between his thumb and forefinger. The tree groaned and she jerked beside him.

“It’s just the wind.”

He almost chuckled.

“Are you sure it’s not the dead?”

She knew the sound of the wind, and that wasn’t it.

Their eyes met. His smile dropped.

“Do you think we can do the same?”

“Groan like trees? I don’t have the lung capacity.”

She hoped the joke would ease the trepidation cresting within her, but looming shadows writhed in the corner of her eye and her pulse raced.

“We’ve been dealt a shitty hand, just like this land.”

He took a step forward and she retreated one.

“Can we . . . can we salvage this? Turn it into something more, something great?”

She swallowed. Hard.

“You tell me.”

“You know what I want.”

His gaze darkened as her back brushed against the nearest tree.

A small clearing laid before them, circular with mounds of thick grass and scattered, moss-covered rocks. Thick, dark trees rimmed the edge, their roots clawing across the ground to the centre, where the smallest beam of sunlight pierced the canopy.

“Do I?”

She arched into the tree as Blake halted, his body so close she could feel the tensity vibrating from him.

“Apologies if I’m confused, but you’re the one giving mixed signals. You were sat with Bree at the council meeting.”

His jaw twitched and his fists clenched. Not a good sign.

“I couldn’t find you, and she requested me to sit with her. I couldn’t deny it in front of the admiral.”

“You cannot deny her quite a lot, it seems.”

He leaned forward, until his hot breath blew in her face.

“I cannot deny you. I cannot live without you. I’ve told you many times, you are my everything. You are my reason for existing, my reason for life. Just like this forest, I would be barren and dead without you.”

Oh, shit.

“I know I’ve made some bad decisions,”

his fingers brushed the column of her throat, his stare narrowing on the bruised flesh.

“I know I’ve made mistakes,”

his hands swept to clasp her shoulders.

“I’ve broken promises,”

he placed a kiss on her neck, and her body unforgivingly shivered.

“I’ve not listened to you,” his kisses trailed up her neck, and across her jaw.

She trembled with resistance, her willpower slowly evaporating. If this male continued, she wasn’t sure what she would do. Her heart felt broken, and her mind was a pool of chaos, but her body . . . gods, her body was ready to be a traitor and surrender to his touch.

“I’ve waited for you for too long. I need you before I lose you,”

he whispered against her ear before capturing her lips in a harsh kiss, and he instantly parted her mouth with his tongue, exploring her with urgency.

“Tell me we’re real,”

he moaned.

“Tell me this isn’t over.”

He cupped her face, pulling her towards his tall frame as he fisted her hair, tugging her head back to angle her mouth better. Well . . . she couldn’t answer with his tongue in her mouth. But she didn’t pull away. Her heart cried for him, for his touch, for his warmth.

“Kora . . .”

Hearing her name on his lips sent an untenable shudder through her. It somehow felt more intimate. He repeated her name like a prayer, his touches growing desperate with urgency as his hands explored down the lengths of her body.

“I need to know, my Kora,”

he whispered against her ear before nibbling at her lobe.

“Are we real? Does this feel real?”

More kisses followed and she gasped, her body trembling with deep buried desire that’d been suppressed for so long. Months—years—of always being just out of reach to each other, at the precipice of falling for each other, but never quite taking the leap of faith.

“We never said those words,”

Blake’s mouth parroted her thoughts and she quivered beneath his tightening grip on her waist, her hips—gods, it felt like his hands were everywhere. Leaving a trailing sensation of wicked hot flames.

“I—”

He cut her off, and she startled as she was sucked into him. The scent of petrichor mixed with the earthy forest made her dizzy, and her footing stumbled. She grabbed onto Blake’s chest, making him groan.

“Blake, I—”

“It’s okay, asterya. I’m sorry for how I’ve acted. It’s all been . . . a lot.”

For a moment—just a moment—she was back on Hell’s Serpent, kissing her first mate, the sea breeze encasing them as they passionately embraced on the deck. The promise of forbidden love driving their desire towards each other. A simmer bloomed in the pit of her stomach.

Blake’s moans cut through her sizzling heat. She wasn’t on her ship, and this male was no longer her first mate. He was a stranger. Who Bree was clearly infatuated with. And Barron had just declared war. On everyone.

Kora pushed him back until he leaned against a branch. He lazily smiled as he attempted tugging her with him, but she fumbled out of his grasp, whipping her hand up to create a barrier. His face dropped, the glisten in his green eyes fading.

“We need to talk.”

He groaned, running a hand through his hair.

“That’s never good. How about, less talking, and more kissing?”

He reached for her, but she slapped his hand away.

“Stop distracting me with all . . . this.”

She gestured to his body.

“You just gestured to all of me.”

He cocked his head, his lips curling.

“You said you’ve not listened to me, I’m asking you to listen to me now.”

Her heart squeezed as he straightened. She wasn’t sure where they stood, and what she said next may disrupt this new dynamic.

“We need to stop Barron,”

she declared.

“What do you mean?”

“I’m going to appeal the war. We can’t—he can’t declare war on everyone.”

“He’s not?”

Blake absentmindedly brushed the length of the branch with his hand.

“He’s being proactive. Taking the war to our enemies.”

“And who are our enemies?”

“Galen, of course,”

he shrugged, and relief flooded through her. Perhaps she’d been wrong. Maybe it was only Galen that Barron considered a threat and—

“And Prince Eli,”

Blake said it so formally that Kora had to really look at him to make sure the words were coming from his mouth.

“He’s our enemy, too, and we need to protect ourselves from all threats.”

It was an echo of Barron’s speech, and a blow to her rising emotions—that he considered Theron his enemy. They’d been chummy together a matter of days ago.

“What . . . you . . .”

she exhaled, steadying herself.

“How can you think that?”

Blake nodded, his obsidian hair falling across his eyes.

“He infiltrated our islands under false pretences. He wants to continue the tyranny of the Stagharts. He’s one of them. He’s a clear spy, his skills in the desert prove that.”

She gaped. What in the gods was happening?

“Now is our time,”

he continued.

“We need to show the admiral what we can do. If we win this war . . . we could get everything we want. No more forbidden relationships. No more hiding in cabins and forests.”

She hesitantly stepped away from the branches.

“You want the war,”

she whispered.

“And you don’t?”

He followed her, his face downright petrifying. Pale and sharp, and his eyes ablaze against the dark green backdrop of the forest.

“You said so yourself, you want to eradicate all pirates from our lands. This is how to do it.”

Not a shred of his familiar persona remained, and the scorching heat that’d burned between them frosted. His tone was so . . . cold. So detached, and she struggled to comprehend the stranger before her, her heart and mind at war with each other. What the fuck was going on?

“I don’t want a war against Azaria—against all the islands. We will lose. We can’t fight a continent that large, not with Galen at our backs.”

“You’re thinking too small,”

he waved a hand, dismissing her fear. She glared at him.

“Barron has his weapon, and with it, we can do anything. Be anything.”

Kora took a step back for every advancement Blake made, until the sharpness of a boulder in the clearing scraped her leg. The groans of the trees echoed around them, and she closed her eyes blocking out how they sounded like the moans of the dead.

“Do you even know what this weapon is?”

“No. But I have full faith in our leader to restore the lands.”

She was going to be sick.

“This isn’t right. A war won’t win me.”

She edged around the boulder.

“Do you even hear yourself?”

“You’re wrong,”

he snarled, and Kora startled at his venom, tripping against the flat edge of the boulder. Blake grabbed her arm, dragging her to him until their bodies collided, his arm snaking around her waist.

“I’ve worked so hard to get us to this point, Kora. And I will not let you jeopardise it.”

“What’s that supposed to mean?”

The ground rumbled beneath her, and his grip moved to her shoulders to steady her as trees creaked, their leaves falling, coating the clearing in a suffocating wave of nature.

“You’re impulsive. You can’t control your emotions, and you let them get in the way. Today was a prime example, attacking the guards to rescue a traitor. We are so close to the end now, and I want you there beside me.”

“The end of what?”

she snapped, pushing against his hands. His body was immovable, rooted to the spot as she resisted his grip.

“You’re not making any sense! This war will destroy us!”

“There you go, with the emotions again.”

He leaned in so close that she stilled.

“Listen, my asterya,”

he placed a kiss on her neck. This time, she didn’t shiver. Hot flames didn’t lick her skin. She was repulsed.

“You will do as I say moving forward,”

his tongue followed.

“We will rule these islands, and the scum will weep at our feet as we destroy them. Together.”

Revulsion roiled through Kora. She was not a mindless killer. She refused. She may have committed a heinous act in the desert, her soul marked by their deaths. But she wouldn’t destroy her home. Apparently, Blake had no issue doing that.

Her mind won the war within. Despite those dregs of feelings clutching onto his image, this was not the same male. And she wouldn’t lose the home she’d so carefully curated, over Barron’s stupid war.

“Get fucked. I want nothing to do with this, or you.”

Rage consumed his face, and regret filled her as the ground shook. The Emerald Forest screamed, and she plummeted to her knees, covering her ears as the cries of the dead roared, ravaging her hearing.

Grass writhed around her knees, clutching her leathers. The forest was alive.

“Run,”

the voice pierced through the cries and groans.

“Run now, get away from him!”

“I can’t!”

Kora cried as her body seized.

She collapsed on her side, her skin tightening, and when she looked down at her hands . . . her body was withering. Her fingers rapidly decayed until they were just skin on bone, and her throat burned, her insides turning dry and hollow. The pain was immeasurable.

The groans increased, and tree roots shot up from the ground, breaking the surface in human-like clawed grips. She was turning into a corpse. The forest was claiming her.

“You need to get out now!”

the voice was panicked.

“Use your magic, you’re going to die!”

“I can’t!”

she repeated, whimpering, her voice hoarse and cracked. Her lips sagged around her mouth, bloodied teeth falling onto the ground.

“Help me!”

she begged the voice.

“I can’t . . .”

the mirrored words were so painful to hear.

“I can’t do anything!”

It was full of despair.

Blake crouched, his brow furrowing as he swept her thinning hair away from her face.

“Who are you talking to?”

he asked curiously, studying her calmly, with no shock or surprise that she was desiccating.

“Did you . . .”

Kora coughed out the words, her mouth like sandpaper.

“Bring me here . . . on . . .”

“Purpose?”

Blake cocked his head like a predator. “Yes.”

Death was so near. She could feel its cold, numb embrace waiting for her. She commenced her prayers to Thanos in her mind, readying herself to be spirited to Umbra. Sweet, dark relief.

“My asterya. I would have followed you to the ends of the earth. I would have made you my queen. If you won’t do as I say . . . perhaps the forest can change your mind to stay with me. All you have to do, is ask.”

She whispered her final word. “Bree.”

Fuck you. He’d tricked her. Those apologies and kisses had been double edged, laced in beautiful, deadly lies. He’d distracted her, just as he always had. And Bree wouldn’t be in love with him, proposing marriage to him, for no reason. He would have done something to make her think she had a chance.

He sighed.

“You need to let this obsession with Bree go. She’s nothing compared to you. You’re special, Kora. As I said, I want you by my side—not her. She’s just a diversion until we win the war. Then there will be no obstacles between us. Just ask me. Ask me to stay. Ask me to be your everything again.”

As Kora’s last kernel of life held on, her body so dry and tight, a shell of what she once was, she released a puff of a scream as her skin sagged, entering the stages of decomposing. She’d rather die than submit herself to another second with him.

The earth beneath her cracked open.

Blake sprinted back with a surprised yell as a wide tunnel of water shot up from the ground, cracking the boulder and enveloping Kora. She gulped it down as it cocooned her, soaking into her crusted, withered pores. The small kernel in her chest exploded into a river of power as her water beast returned in full force. In the process, something snapped within her mind, and silence wrapped around her skull.

She emerged from the shooting vat of water, to discover Blake with a toxic smile and a knowing glint in his eyes. Her body was invigorated, her life restored, as well as all her injuries healed. She was distantly aware of her hair floating, as if she were submerged in water. Her hands glowed blue as she raised them.

“This war isn’t happening. You lied to me about Bree, I know you did.”

“You also lied,”

he gestured to her glowing form.

“Don’t forget that, asterya.”

He paused, observing her power.

“You don’t recognise me.”

“Don’t call me that,”

she snapped.

“I don’t know you anymore. You’re a stranger to me now.”

Shooting a line of sharp water, it sliced his shoulder and he fell, blood gushing from the wound. Her heart lurched and she hurried towards him, her hands hovering over his shoulder. He was going to bleed out. No, no, no. She couldn’t have done this again. She couldn’t have another life on her hands.

Without thinking, Kora summoned her power, washing it over the deep gash. His blood mixed with water, pouring into the muddied ground as Blake hissed with pain. He gazed up at her in wonder as she healed him, her hands convulsing. Mud caked their clothes, and she slipped on the wet ground as she knelt over him.

“I’m sorry,”

she whispered.

“Emotions,”

he replied softly.

“Don’t let them get the better of you. Please remember that.”

He reached up, tucking her hair behind her ear before running his thumb across her lower lip. A cold prickle followed, but her arms felt too weak to push him away. The stench of petrichor and bitter soil made her head spin.

“You’re the best thing that ever happened to me. Tell me, Kora, were we real?”

“You sound like you’re saying goodbye. We can . . . we can be friends.”

What was she saying.

“Maybe not . . . now you know I’m . . . a mage.”

She’d just signed, sealed, and delivered her death sentence.

Blake’s jaw clenched as his wound stitched itself together. A slice of pain ripped down her side and she tumbled, gasping. Her vision shuddered as she crumpled beside him, and he leaned over her, frowning. He touched her shoulder, and she cried out in agony as his hand came away dripping with blood.

Exhaustion crept in as the blue glow evaporated from her hands, and the vat of water shooting from the cracked earth reduced to a dribble. Cold mud slicked her palms, coating her hair, and Kora shivered beneath his warmth.

“The most interesting mage I’ve ever met,”

he murmured.

Blake’s dark smile was the last thing she saw as her magic ceased to a tiny wisp.