Page 35 of House of Embers (Royal Houses #5)

Chapter Thirty

The Denouncement

The dragons had already figured out the logistics, but she enjoyed watching them negotiate with Fordham and the war council.

Barron Laurent looked anything but pleased by the contingent of dragons who had just appeared.

He’d been eyeing Gelryn like he might jump on the dragon’s back and hope that it would be enough to force the binding, as if a Fae could choose a binding instead of the dragon.

Who the dragons would choose was a problem for after the coronation. She and Fordham were up late into the evening, helping the best they could with everything that would come with feeding and housing this many dragons.

It had been exhausting, and Kerrigan was feeling it the next morning, especially since she’d stayed up well into the early hours rolling around the bed with Fordham until neither could even lift their head.

Except he was gone in the morning.

The morning of his coronation.

Kerrigan approached their designated waiting room for the denouncement, but Fordham wasn’t there either. Everyone else was already filing into place outside.

“Delle, have you seen Fordham?”

Delle tilted her head. “He said he went to find you.”

Kerrigan froze. “Uh…he wasn’t with me.”

“Perhaps he is just running behind.”

But that didn’t seem like him.

“He wouldn’t leave,” Delle hissed to her mother, who had been apprised of the situation.

“It would be tantamount to abdicating,” Adelaide said.

Kerrigan leaned into their bond. There was no response to her warmth, but she had a general sense of direction, and it said down .

“He’s still here. I’ll go get him.”

She headed out of the waiting room and followed their bond. She could have reached out to him and asked him directly where he was, but something told her that he needed the space right now. That talking to him in person would be better.

The bond took her to a door with an eye etched into it. The pulse of their bond said here . She opened the door and then took the steps down, down, down into the depths until she came upon the open crypt door.

“Fordham,” Kerrigan whispered as she stepped across the threshold and into his family’s crypt.

She had only been here once before. Fordham came here to think, and today was one of those days.

“Hello, love,” Fordham said, glancing sideways at her.

He was laid out across the sarcophagus of his original Fae ancestor.

The black of his cloak was draped across the stone steps that led up to it.

He looked indomitable and every inch the broody Fae princeling she had fallen in love with.

And now he looked the perfect part of the king of the Dark Court.

She was glad she had left her pretty, silver dress back in their rooms for the coronation.

There was water dripping onto the floor, and it would have ruined the silky material.

She had refused to wear something so restrictive to the denouncement.

Not when anything could happen. Not when she was a fighter.

She was instead draped in a black-and-silver tunic and pants.

“Needed time to think?”

“Communing with the ancestors,” he said as he sat up.

“And do they think you’re ready to be king?”

He shrugged. “Fifty-fifty.”

“I doubt that.” Kerrigan came to his side and saw his face in repose mirroring the crowned Fae ancestor below him. “You are made for this moment.”

“This shouldn’t be how this happens.”

“How so?”

“We should be getting married instead of having the coronation.”

“You know why we can’t.”

“Those reasons are bullshit,” he snapped. “They’re the reason the House of Shadows has fallen in the first place.”

“You can’t change everything at once.”

He breathed out. “I know. I just get so angry sometimes.”

“I would have thought last night would have relaxed you.”

He smirked at her. “Well, yes. New morning means new anxieties.”

The joke had landed, but there was something dark in his eyes. Something else.

Kerrigan took his hand. “Is this about Iris?”

He flinched at the sound of her name. Iris had enslaved him and used him as a weapon. His power had not been his own, and he had murdered more people than Kerrigan was sure even she knew about.

“You don’t have to do this,” she reminded him. “This is your choice.”

“And if I do not, then I give up my throne.”

She sighed, jumping onto the stone next to him. She ran her fingers over the first Fae sarcophagus. “Would that be so bad?”

He gasped out a laugh. “Considering we need a standing army.”

“We have the dragons. That might be sufficient.”

“We’re not taking any chances.”

Kerrigan nodded as she traced the lines of the first Fae’s sword. “Have you killed anyone since the tournament?”

“No,” he said stiffly.

“Will it destroy you to do it?”

Fordham was silent a beat too long. “I don’t know,” he admitted. “I’ve killed. I’ve killed so many people. Even before we ever met, Kerrigan. It was never pleasant, but it was war. This is war.”

“But…”

“But what Iris did broke something inside me that I am still navigating.”

“So if you don’t want to fight today, then you don’t have to.”

“And what about the next battle?” he asked, clenching his hands. “And the one after that? I cannot run away from a fight or my duty.”

“I don’t want you to run away from what happened either though,” she said softly.

It hadn’t been that long ago that he wouldn’t even tell her what had happened with Iris, that he wasn’t sure if he could even have the mating bond.

She didn’t want that Fordham to return. “I want you to be safe in here.” She touched his chest.

He slid his hand over hers. “I have you now. We can weather this together.”

She kissed him and he sighed against her mouth, the bond a fire that burned between them. Neither of them was okay. Maybe they never would be again after what they’d endured at the hands of their enslavers. But they could keep going forward together.

Fordham jumped off the stone casket and held his arms out to her. She let him lift her off the stone. “I think I’ll go claim my throne now.”

“If you’re sure.”

Fordham kissed her again. “I’m ready for you to be my wife. The rest”—he waved his hand—“can keep.”

He drew her back out of the crypt, locking the door behind him. The peace he’d achieved in there carried up the halls until they were once more in the waiting room. Delle and Adelaide looked relieved to see him.

“Two minutes,” Delle promised and then shut them in the room alone.

They watched the ever-growing crowd overlooking the valley.

A knock sounded at the door, and Kerrigan expected to see Delle walk in again, but it was Prescott.

“Cousin,” Fordham said, clapping him by the forearm. “I thought I wouldn’t hear from you.”

“My apologies. I didn’t want to give myself away.” Prescott had color back in his cheeks, but sadness exuded from his person. He looked flustered and uncomfortable. What had Barron done to him? “I just came to tell you that Barron said he isn’t going to challenge you.”

“What?” Kerrigan asked.

“Why would he say that?” Fordham asked.

Prescott sighed. “It’s the dragons. He wants to bond with a dragon. That hadn’t been a possibility before. He thinks it’s better to get a dragon and go to war than to fight this civil war.” He paused a moment before adding, “And I agree with him.”

“We would never trust him with a dragon,” Kerrigan snapped.

“He thinks he can force a wartime bond. He read about it happening during the Great War. We have more to fear from him in that regard than with this denouncement.” Prescott backed up. “That’s all. I need to get going.”

“Cousin, I assure you no matter what happens, this is your last day undercover. I will remove you to safety after this.”

Prescott nodded and then he left.

Giving Barron a dragon would be as lethal as Bastian having one. It would be unconscionable to allow that to happen, a death sentence in its own way. No one would allow that. She’d have to tell Tieran.

“It’s time, Your Majesty,” Delle said.

They headed out of their waiting room to a round of applause from the assembled Fae from the House of Shadows. Fordham kept his head held high, shadows at the ready, as he walked to the valley floor.

On either side of him was a contingent of Fae from the Laurent and Blanchard families.

Viviana Blanchard was in a regal ornamental dress, her ears adorned with silver coverings studded with rubies and diamonds.

Jewelry dotted her wrists and fingers, and a heavily gem-encrusted necklace dangled low between her breasts.

She looked more like she was fit for a ball than what had once been a grassy battlefield.

Barron Laurent had no such qualms. He was in a general’s uniform, the black insignia of his family against his left breast and a string of silver cords slung up to the right shoulder.

A more formal cravat was missing, and instead, his shirt was buttoned all the way up over his pale throat with a high collar.

His stark-white hair was slicked back off his face, making him look even more severe.

His gaze was impassive as Fordham took his position as the highest rank there.

Adelaide stepped forward after a nod from Fordham. “Ladies, gentlemen, and all those assembled,” she began, her voice amplified by air magic, “thank you for joining us today for an official kathiria e sendera, the likes of which we have not seen in my lifetime.”

A roar went up as the Fae stretched for ages across the valley floor. Kerrigan wasn’t sure how many of them could even see what was happening. This would have been better in an arena, but there was no arena here.

“A denouncement has been called. Any who wish to issue an official kathiria e sendera to His Majesty Fordham Ollivier in combat for the right to his throne, now is the time to do so.” Adelaide was silent another beat.

“The fight ends when one of the contenders is dead. There will be no clemency given. Issue your contestation at your own peril.”

Then she stepped back to wait.