Page 1 of House of Embers (Royal Houses #5)

Chapter One

The Throne

This was the wrong dress to take down an empire.

But it would have to do.

Kerrigan’s emerald eyes were haunted as she stared at her wan expression in the trifold mirror.

She was under a mountain again. Inside the House of Shadows.

Safe. For now. She should have felt confident, ready, anything other than the melancholy that had descended as she stepped inside Ravinia Mountain in preparation for Fordham Ollivier to reclaim his throne.

“You look like you’re going to your death,” Darby said as she stuck another pin in Kerrigan’s bright red hair in an attempt to control the unruly waves.

Kerrigan forced a smile for her oldest friend in the world. “It’s been a long day.”

Darby met her eyes in the mirror. “A long year.”

She looked like she wanted to say more. Like she wanted more than the barest explanation of what had happened to Kerrigan in the land of the gods, but Kerrigan didn’t feel ready for that. Her mission was most important. She’d deal with everything else later.

“This is step one,” Darby reminded her. She reached for another pin on the vanity, her onyx skin highlighted in the flickering candlelight. “You just have to survive today, and then you can go back to beating people up.”

That earned a real laugh from Kerrigan. “I don’t want to just beat people up.”

“Don’t you?”

Kerrigan grinned. “Maybe a little.”

She had turned to politics to fight for the humans and half-Fae who didn’t have anyone to fight for them. But she was not a natural at it. She had always preferred to let her fists and magic talk for her. It would be better to leave the rest of that to Fordham.

Soon she’d be on her dragon’s back again, flying into battle. Soon, but not yet.

“I think that’s it,” Darby said as she shoved in a final pin.

Kerrigan twirled in a circle, feeling the black-and-silver silk slide around her legs.

The dress had been prepared for her the last time she was in the House of Shadows.

Since there had been no forewarning about their arrival, she’d had to make do with what was available.

Namely an out-of-date dress with a corset that pushed her breasts up nearly to her chin and poofy layers that extended past her hips.

It wouldn’t have been her choice, and she definitely couldn’t fight in it.

“You look ridiculous.” Clover appeared from the balcony, dressed down in pants and a fitted tunic. She took a draw on her cigarette as she eyed Kerrigan’s dress with skepticism.

Kerrigan turned to her friend. “Tell me about it.”

“Don’t smoke that in here!” Darby said as she headed for her girlfriend.

“Loch isn’t even illegal here,” Clover said as she puffed a circle of it into Darby’s face.

Darby waved her hand in front of her face. “But we’re in short supply.”

Clover frowned at that. She had a chronic illness with debilitating pain, and the only thing that had ever helped had been the illicit substance. Now that they were out of the city, it was going to be hard to get more.

“Don’t fight,” Hadrian called from the balcony.

“She’s decent,” Clover said on a relieved exhale. “You can come in.”

Hadrian appeared then. His light brown skin was nearly the same color as Clover’s, but it was the blue of his hair that made him stand out. He wrinkled his nose at Kerrigan when he walked in.

Hadrian shrugged. “You look…” His hands widened. “Uh…classy?”

“I know. I know,” she said to the trio. “It’s not the best dress.”

“They’ll like it though,” Darby said, folding into Clover’s arm. Hadrian wrapped an arm around Clover’s shoulders.

The trio still baffled Kerrigan at times. In some ways, it made perfect sense. Darby and Clover had always had a thing for each other. Hadrian and Clover had always been at each other’s throats. The fact that it worked for them to be together was amazing, and Kerrigan was happy for them.

“Let’s hope a fight doesn’t break out,” she grumbled.

“The only time I’ll ever hear you say that,” Clover said.

“Well, wish me luck.”

Hadrian chuckled. “You won’t need it.”

With that vote of confidence, Kerrigan headed for the door.

It swung open on a breath, and there stood Delle.

Her mother, Adelaide, was Fordham’s chief attendant under the mountain, and Delle was to be his attendant while he was at Draco Mountain for the Society.

Since that wasn’t happening any time soon, she had been reassigned to Kerrigan.

“Mistress Kerrigan,” Delle said with a short bow, “don’t you look lovely?”

“Thank you, Delle. Is Fordham ready?”

Delle stiffened at the informal use of Fordham’s name, but Kerrigan didn’t care about formalities anymore. Not after all they had endured together to get to this point. Delle should be glad Kerrigan wasn’t calling him by his shortened nickname, Ford—or worse, princeling.

“His Majesty awaits you at the entrance to the throne room. I am to escort you.” Delle hesitated. “Are you sure you would not like a look at the crown jewels?”

Kerrigan remembered the last time she was here.

How all the full-blood Fae had been festooned in gemstones, with them dripping from necks, wrists, fingers, and even attached to the sharp points of their ears.

She had been left bare, an ornament herself to the crown prince.

She was still a half-Fae to them, her mere presence anathema to their beliefs.

She had enough shock value today without adding jewels to the mix.

The only jewelry she needed was her mother’s gold bangle. One of the most powerful magical artifacts in existence and a way for Kerrigan to portal between locations.

“No thank you, Delle.”

Though she looked concerned, she said nothing, just gestured for Kerrigan to leave the residence.

Kerrigan pulled Darby in for a hug. “I’ll see you on the other side.”

“Chin up.”

Then Kerrigan was breaking from her friend and following Delle down the corridor toward the throne room.

Until her father had deposited her on the doorstep of the House of Dragons for the crime of being half-Fae, Kerrigan had been raised as a princess.

Kerrigan Felicity Argon, first of the House of Cruse, destined for the Bryonican throne.

She knew the drill. Even if she was walking into a pit of vipers, she had to appear unaffected.

So she lifted her chin and walked straight to her waiting beau.

She felt Fordham before she saw him.

The weight of the mating bond was a taut rope between them. After having fractured into pieces, it was pulsing and alive, and she was still unaccustomed to its presence, even though it was the most natural thing in the world.

At the slight tug on the bond, Fordham turned around.

Her breath caught. He was without a doubt the most devastatingly beautiful male she had ever seen.

The first time she’d seen him had been across the dragon tournament arena, cloaked in black shadow, radiating sinister energy.

She had thought him beautiful then, and as they went from enemies to allies to lovers to mates, she had found him more compelling every time.

He wore a black suit with silver stitching and a black cravat against his pale throat.

His body was long and corded with muscle from years as a soldier, then as a dragon rider, and finally as a gladiator.

His shoulders were broad and his waist narrow, the suit a touch tighter on him than when he’d last been here.

His last six months of training had erased the final vestiges of youth and bulked out his immaculate figure.

Despite that, the hollows under his eyes were a bluish purple that spoke of a soldier still haunted by memories of those he’d slain and the torment he’d endured.

But when his liquid-silver eyes lit on Kerrigan, that all slipped away.

And it was just a besotted man before the love of his life.

“Kerrigan,” he breathed, his eyes traveling the length of her.

“You look…” they both started at the same time.

He laughed. “A vision.”

“As are you,” she said, straightening his cravat. “Are you ready to speak to your subjects?”

“Not quite.”

She raised an eyebrow. “We’re doing the right thing.”

“I know.” His eyes dipped her to mouth and resolutely back up. “But I have been doing this all wrong from the beginning, and I don’t wish to mess this up.”

“You aren’t going to mess this up. You are the rightful king.”

“Not that,” he said.

Shadows appeared around his hand, and for a second, he slipped his hand into them. Kerrigan’s eyes widened as he removed a small, black velvet box.

“What a party trick,” she whispered.

“Ollivier trick,” he said with a wink. Then he opened the box to reveal a ring.

Her ears were ringing as she realized what he meant—that he had not been talking about his throne or his people or the upcoming war at all. He had been talking about her.

“I’ve loved you since the tournament. I loved you as a rider.

I loved you in another world, among the gods, as a gladiator.

You were the only thing that kept me going all those long months.

I promised you that I would do this the right way, that I would court you properly.

” He smirked with a small shrug. “But nothing with you has ever been proper, and I have found that is just the way I want it to be. Here with you, my mate, in my arms, in my life, as my queen. So will you, Kerrigan Felicity Argon, do me the honor of being my wife?”

“Yes.”

The word flew out of her mouth before conscious thought returned.

“Yes, yes, yes,” she gasped.

She jumped into his arms, and he twirled her in place.

When he finally put her back on her feet, he removed the ring from the box and slid it onto her ring finger.

It fit as if it were made for her. At the center of a gold-filigree band was a large diamond with smaller diamonds on either side. It looked like an antique.

Well, this jewelry she would wear.

“It was my mother’s,” Fordham explained.

Kerrigan’s heart clenched. “I love it.”

Fordham’s fingers moved to her chin, lifting her head to look up at him. “I love you.”

Then his lips were on her, hungry and inviting. A promise of what was to come. A cleared throat was the only thing that kept them from indulging.

“Your Majesty,” Adelaide said behind them, “they’re ready for you.”

“Of course,” Fordham said.

He turned to face the double doors. Kerrigan slid her hand into the crook of his arm, putting the royal engagement ring on full display. They both straightened as the doors slid open, and displayed before them was the House of Shadows court.

Fordham moved first, walking them down the aisle toward the waiting throne cast in solid black granite that towered over the rest of the room.

A smaller black-and-white marble throne was positioned next to the first throne.

A queen’s throne. Kerrigan resisted thinking about that just yet.

There would be more time to consider the implications after their positions were more secure.

A gasp rang up from the assembled peerage as they got a good look at Kerrigan.

The House of Shadows had notoriously hated humans and half-Fae, and seeing her on the arm of their king had to be a shock.

An engagement ring on her finger must have made them enraged.

The murmuring grew louder as they continued down the bloodred carpet to the dais.

Neither of them said or did anything about it. They let the news spread like wildfire until all assembled knew what was before them. Their king and his half-Fae queen—soon-to-be at least.

Fordham assisted her up the steps to the dais and let her sink into the queen’s throne.

Fordham’s sister, Wynter, was resplendent in black and silver, the Ollivier colors.

She was seated next to his cousin Prescott in a place of prominence.

He shot Kerrigan a reassuring smile—one of the only friendly faces in the room.

A choked gasp came from the woman next to them. Kerrigan got her first look at Viviana, the former queen, who had negotiated such a poor treaty for her subjects after being defeated in battle by the Society. The woman looked askance at Kerrigan sitting in what she must have considered her place.

Kerrigan had better things to do than flaunt herself on a throne.

In fact, this was the last place she wanted to be, but it made the most logical strategic sense.

A handful of rogue resisters weren’t going to win against the Society full of dragon riders, not even with Kerrigan and Fordham and their new powers at the helm.

They needed power, and the House of Shadows had a standing army—not to mention a hatred for the Society.

It was something she had in common with Fordham’s subjects, as the Society was currently being run by Kerrigan’s former mentor, Bastian, a power-hungry dictator who despised humans and half-Fae and had seized control of the government by murdering all dissenters…and stealing Kerrigan’s magic.

Now she was back in Alandria with magic to spare, and it was time to end this thing once and for all.

Fordham took a seat on the black throne.

“I, Fordham Ollivier, king of the House of Shadows, head of the Dark Court, leader of House Charbonnet, the rightful ruler of all of Alandria, hereby declare war against the Society.”