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CHAPTER FIVE

T here was no sign of Kaiser beyond the door, but there was only one way forward so I delved swiftly into the tunnel, the cool air skimming over me and making goosebumps skitter across my skin.

Following him might have been a death wish on any other day - especially since I’d learned what happened when you were captured by the Fury - but Kaiser had made clear the importance I held to him now, and I couldn’t help but think of Mavus’s speech about holding value in the world.

It had likely saved the rogue trader’s neck more than once, and I was banking on it doing the same for me, because with this Nightfire in my veins, there was no guarantee I could conjure the power that had fought off Kaiser before. But I could take a beating if necessary; I wasn’t new to those.

The sound of my footsteps remained concealed within my silencing shield and the pressing quiet was an indicator that Kaiser had cast one too.

The floor abruptly fell away to a flight of stairs and I cursed as I lurched down the first one, my hand slapping to the wall to keep my balance. As I circled down the tightly packed stairway, a flicker of firelight finally called to me up ahead.

My mind ticked over ways I might hand Kaiser to the Reapers if I caught him doing bad deeds, but every way I looked at it, I would be implicated too.

Perhaps if I dug up enough dirt on him and managed to feed that information anonymously to the Reapers, I could secure his execution.

If it was iron clad, they wouldn’t even bother with Cyclops interrogation to confirm it.

Then I would be free. It wasn’t as pretty a picture as my dagger in his chest, but I was down to few choices now that he had cast his wicked magic on me.

So I needed some new sin of his, one that he had no idea I was a witness to, and it looked like he might be about to commit one.

The Nightfire shivered in my veins as if the nearness of Kaiser had awoken it, the flames no longer burning but warming me through. They urged me on as if they sensed Kaiser was close and wanted me to reunite with him for some cause I didn’t even want to guess at.

A sneer lifted my lips. I would never answer to that wretched call in my blood; this was a plot to rid myself of my captor for good.

A heavy clang of metal jolted me out of my murderous reverie, and I slowed my pace as I reached the bottom of the stairs. Firelight danced against the walls, the thick shadows cowering from the orange glow.

I chanced a look into the chamber beyond, my heart stalling at what I found there.

Chained to a brutal throne of iron was a Fae I recognised from the attack on Never Keep.

The Vampire had been a member of the coven of five who had followed us below ground.

He was devastatingly beautiful, his long copper hair like strands of shining metal and his eyes a striking hazel colour that seemed bluish-green one moment then gold the next.

There was a cold weight to those eyes which spoke of a grim emotion contained behind them and it set a chill deep in my skin.

He wasn’t just furious, he was wrathful.

The Vampire wore heavy metal gauntlets over his hands that glinted with magic, seemingly subduing him and I had to be thankful of that. I’d witnessed the carnage his kind could reap, and I had no appetite for being subjected to it twice.

Kaiser stood over the captive, his arms folded as they spoke within his silencing shield. A growl of frustration left me but with a snap of power, that dark, writhing magic coiled from me, cracking through Kaiser’s shield and letting their words spill out for me to hear.

I tensed, expecting Kaiser to turn and find me there, but he didn’t seem to notice what I’d done though the magic I’d wielded ebbed away faster than I could hold onto it, fickle as always.

“-and why would Mirelle Brimtheon send her latest street urchin to me?” the Vampire demanded, his voice a forceful baritone that made the air quake.

He definitely knew power in whatever life he lived, and I doubted many could tear it from him.

Even in those chains with bloody gashes across his body and the mark of imminent death upon him, he seemed almost as calm as Kaiser was.

“She did not send me,” Kaiser drawled.

“So it has a mind of its own, does it?” the Vampire sneered. “I hear she cuts out those orphans’ free will the moment she takes them in her door to suckle on her teat.”

“You know nothing of her,” Kaiser said, an edge of warning to his tone. “And if you speak of her like that again, I will ensure you regret it.”

“Regrets are for far weaker Fae than I.” The Vampire leaned back in his seat, head tilting up and a dark confidence oozing from him.

“The Matriarch may offer useful trades with my Coven, but if you think I will ally with a creature who stands at the helm of a sinking ship, throwing her children overboard so that she might breathe another ounce of air, then you-”

Kaiser punched him hard enough to crack bone and the Vampire’s head whipped sideways, a snarl tearing from his lips as the Fury slid his hand around his throat and squeezed. Kaiser’s power stirred the atmosphere and my hackles rose at the sense of his Order awakening.

So, The Matriarch was trading with Vampires? It didn’t entirely surprise me that the ruler of Pyros was that corrupt, but what could she possibly be offering them that appeased those bloodsucking creatures? I’d never heard of such trades, the Vampire Covens far too volatile to make safe deals with.

“Let’s find out what a parasite like you fears in the dead of night,” Kaiser growled and the Vampire began to jerk in his seat, limbs tensing and a breath of horror leaving him.

“ No ,” he gasped. “Stop!”

Whatever the Vampire could see under the will of the Fury’s power set his hazel eyes alight with a wild anger and an even wilder terror.

Kaiser stepped back, his head cocking to one side as he observed the man he was torturing inside his own mind, wielding his inner fears against him.

The Vampire thrashed against his chains, eyes roaming, seeing a reality outside of this one and I had to wonder what could possibly stoke terror in a beast like that.

It made him appear far too Fae for my liking.

Obviously I knew that was what the Vampires were, but their feral violence and the way they lived on the fringes of our lands made them seem entirely other .

The brutality and sheer bloodlust I had witnessed from them last night didn’t marry with this all too feeling creature.

“Enough,” the Vampire rasped, a low plead to his voice and Kaiser’s power dissipated from the air.

“The Reapers plan to execute you this very day, Lazarus Astrophel, they may be coming for you already,” Kaiser said, and my brow furrowed as I tried to work out what he was angling at. “How long did the Cyclops interrogation last?”

“You think I’m not well versed in the invasion of those bastards?” Lazarus scoffed. “They stole from my mind what I allowed them to see and nothing else. If you’ve come here thinking you might get more from me than those fucking maggots with your disgusting power, then go ahead and try.”

“Big words from a Fae who was pleading with me just moments ago,” Kaiser taunted, although there was no true emotion to his tone. It was clear he knew how to play these games, but I doubted he ever cared about the ego trip he could have secured from his moves.

“I do not plead,” Lazarus seethed.

“All Fae plead eventually, I assure you. But I am not here to interrogate you,” Kaiser said, stepping closer.

The Vampire raised his chin and I held my breath as Kaiser drew a short blade from within his coat.

I expected him to strike like a viper and kill the beast in his shadow, but he did something that shocked me even more when he jammed the blade into the lock on the Vampire’s chains and snapped it open.

The binds fell away and Lazarus rose to his feet, his broad shoulders rolling back and suspicion veiling his gaze as he stood eye to eye with the Fury before him.

“If you take the passage behind you, it will lead you to an underground river and a path to the sea,” Kaiser explained in a cool tone.

“I suggest you do not stop to reap any more blood along your path. The Cardinal Reaper himself has arrived at Never Keep and if you value the breath in your lungs, you would be wise to flee swiftly.”

Lazarus stared at him in fascinated confusion while I stared at him in abject shock.

“Why?” the Vampire gritted out, asking the question that was haunting me too. Lazarus had refused Kaiser’s bargain; it made no sense to release this monster.

Kaiser said nothing and the Vampire released a breath between his teeth.

“Fool,” he spat, then he shot away in a blur of speed and disappeared down the passage Kaiser had directed him toward.

My throat thickened at the thought of that creature loose in the Never Keep passages once more, but I’d seen the flicker of trepidation in his eyes when Kaiser had mentioned the Cardinal Reaper. It was more likely that he’d take his chance at freedom than wage another attack.

Before the Fury could turn and find me lurking in his shadow, I ran, sprinting up the stairway and racing for the exit from these accursed tunnels.

This memory was mine to keep and he would not sully it by finding me and condemning me too.

I could leave a note for the Reapers to find that would ensure he was interrogated.

Then the Cyclopses could pull the truth from his head and secure his bloody execution.

An event I would be attending with a front row seat.

With a twisted glee, I made it to the hidden door, shoving it open and slipping out from behind the Centaur statue. I melded quickly into a crowd of Raincarvers who were filing out of the Refectory, their conversations clamouring in the air about the arrival of the Cardinal Reaper.