Page 13 of Kingdom of the Two Moons

Melody

I don’t know what happens after the jump. After hitting the ice-cold water that seems to drain all life from me. After the darkness pulls me down.

All I remember is the sensation of freefall. That I am underwater, but that I am still able to breathe. That the cold is too bad to bear.

And then the darkness claims me, and I think that’s what dying must feel like.

***

My skin feels raw and feverish when I wake up, curled up into a ball, my head still numb, as if someone drugged me. And… iron handcuffs around my wrists. I jolt upright, pulling my legs up to my body while I wait for my eyes to adjust to the darkness. Where the hell am I? What did they do to me? Maybe they did drug me. Maybe they glamoured me?

It is dark. Dim. Cold. The floor underneath me is ice-cold and biting. I get up shakily, the ground still a little unreliable as I look around.

I’m in a cellar… or some sort of dungeon. The single door is barred by huge, broad columns of steel. A cell.

I am trapped. In an iron cage. Manacled .

Locked away, again.

Reflexively, I run toward the bars. I put my fingers around them, yanking them hard as if I can somehow tear them apart, make them budge at least a tiny bit.

But nothing. Of course nothing.

Tears stream down my cheeks. My breathing comes sharp and fast. Not again. Not again, please.

It is too much. Too much like my past. I shudder against the feeling of the walls closing in on me like they always do. Of the feeling of too little air.

Of being trapped in darkness.

At least I knew Lyrian wouldn’t let me die.

Breathe! Just breathe . But I seem unable to get down enough air.

I sink onto the floor, my bare shoulders leaning against the cool walls. I cry until my tears subside. My body is still shaking from fear or cold or desperation, I don’t know anymore. It doesn’t matter. There is nothing left in me, not even hope, just a never-ending, gaping void.

Something catches my eye in my peripheral vision. I jerk my head up.

Gleaming crimson eyes watch me—a demon in the night.

I reflexively swivel backward, as far away as the tiny cell will allow, only to bump against the other wall.

The High Lord of Darkness. The color in his eyes flickers slightly, the red like burning embers as they take me in. I try hard not to think of where the red comes from.

How did he get in here? The cell door is still locked.

He takes a step towards me. He is huge, I realize. Taller than I, which is saying something since I am well over average height for most women. But his stature is towering in the tiny cell. I shift even further back, as far away from him as possible, until my left shoulder hits the opposite end of the cell. I wish I could melt into the wall. Hide. Turn invisible.

There is nothing left in me to pretend I’m not scared to my very essence .

My heart startles as he takes another step toward me. I look up at him then, into those mesmerizing eyes, too numb to remember that Kyrith warned me to never look him in the eye unbidden. Too numb to remember that I am a slave now.

But once more, I find myself unable to look away.

Shadows limn his face, casting his cheekbones and his soft, sullen mouth into stark relief. Even with his red eyes, he is mercilessly beautiful. The kind of beauty that hurts when you look at it.

Only after a while do I realize that he’s holding something out to me. A glass bottle with clear liquid in it.

As if he can feel my suspicion, he says in his deep, sensual voice, “Water.”

I just gaze at his hand. At those elegant, pallid fingers and the tattoo that stretches up from his wrist almost to his fingertips. Tendrils of ink mixed with gold form strange symbols I’ve never seen before. They seem to move… or is it just in my mind?

I focus back on the bottle.

I wouldn’t dare take it from his hands if I wasn’t so thirsty. But I am. With one last glance at his face, I take it and unscrew it. I gulp the water down so greedily that some of it runs over my chin and down my collarbones, seeping into my dress.

I hadn’t realized that those iron shackles around my wrists had dissolved, or when; leaving only deep, angry rims in my flesh.

Only when the bottle is empty do I glance back up to him. Again I find him watching me in return. I get up when he takes a last step closer. This time, I stand my ground, although it takes all my willpower not to shrink back.

Don’t show fear . No tears. No fear.

I repeat that over and over in my mind, but it doesn’t prevent me from flinching when he lifts his hand. I blush, hating myself for it. For shuddering when his fingers raise my chin. Now, so close, I avoid his eyes, trying to concentrate on a point past him in the darkness. My thundering heart blocks out every clear thought.

I stiffen when his fingers brush back my long hair, away from my neck, as gently as if he were my lover .

When he bends slightly down to me.

“You need to relax, or it will hurt,” he whispers right into my ear, his breath on my neck.

He’s going to drink my blood. How much? All of it? Will he kill me? Suck me dry? Every inch of my body goes taut as the meaning of his words echoes through me.

Such nonchalant words. As if they mean nothing. As if I mean nothing.

To him, I probably don’t. I’m nothing more than a slave, and who the hell knows what these vampires do with their slaves?

I turn rigid as his fingers around my chin tighten ever so slightly, as if to lock me into place. His lips brush against my vulnerable skin then. I try not to think of his fangs as I brace myself for the pain.

But he doesn’t bite me.

Instead, he waits, suspended, his breath over my feverish skin, his fingers stroking my cheek now. His voice is nothing but gentle when he says, “Relax.”

Why is he so patient with me? Why not just get it over with?

As if to answer my silent question, he straightens, lifting my chin again. When I glance up, I’m surprised to find his eyes no longer that aggressive red, but a bright, calm blue that makes him look entirely different. Not so scary anymore.

How does this work? Can he change his eye colors by will or is it influenced by something else?

If it works like auras, he probably can’t control it.

Suddenly, I wish to ask. To know. Those glittering blue eyes are the most beautiful I have ever seen. Just what the ocean must look like under a full moon. Silver ripples where the light meets the waves, oscillating like a thousand diamonds, surrounded by the darkest of nights.

Only when he says, “I’ll be careful. I won’t hurt you,” do I realize that I’m shivering so hard that my whole body trembles.

He won’t hurt me. All I manage is a shy nod. He waits a moment longer before I feel his lips there again, right on my pulse. I close my eyes, force myself to believe him, to trust him. I have no other choice anyway.

His fangs pierce my skin then and my whole world narrows down to the feeling of them in me.

It doesn’t hurt when they penetrate my flesh. Instead, there’s a strange heat rushing through my body, as if every cell has been set on fire. I shudder as he drinks me in, but no longer from fear. I barely register how my fingers dig into the fabric of his shirt, that he has moved even closer, his huge body pinning mine against the cold wall, pressing hard against me.

Then, all too soon, I feel him pulling back, only absently feel him running his tongue over the wounds his teeth have left. He takes a step back from me, the red blood in his eyes intermingling with streaks of burning gold.

I look at my blood dripping from his lips. And despite all instincts, I find myself wishing that he would carry on. For a brief second, I have the sensation that he… might be feeling the same.

Desire glitters in his aurum eyes. Before they widen slightly, and he looks at me with some kind of… horror.

His features harden involuntarily, the gold in his eyes giving way to a vicious black as he regards me now, spreading through the red-like tendrils of ink.

As if I... disgust him.

Despite my fear, I blush with shame. Maybe it’s my blood? Or my… appearance? I don’t want to know what I must look like to him with my wet, half-torn dress and uncombed hair. Filthy. My eyes red-rimmed from crying. How could I ever think that he…

I can’t finish the thought. Can’t think it without dying of shame and confusion and exhaustion.

I am a slave. Food for him, nothing more.

I don’t know why it matters to me. It doesn’t, I tell myself. It’s a lie.

I can’t look back at him. I keep my head lowered, willing my hair to fall all over my face to hide from him.

When I look up again, he’s gone. Vanished into thin air.

** *

I slump against the wall, my heart pounding too fast, as if it wants to break free of my ribs. My head’s still hazy from what just happened, my thoughts diffuse, my body just so cold.

There’s the solid jolt of a bolt.

I look up to find a spindly woman with ashen-brown skin and long, silver hair that reaches almost down to her hips standing in the open cell door. She wears a long, kaftan-like dress that shimmers in shades of deep-sea colors, setting off eyes smooth and bright as river pebbles.

“Melody,” she says as if my name is a foreign word for her, her voice laced with an accent I’ve never heard before. “I am Nidaw. I have been sent for you. Please, come. The Dark Lord told me to take care of you.”

The Dark Lord. I slowly get up, silently following the woman through the corridors of this dungeon that undoubtedly serves as a prison. As I walk, I try hard not to peek into each cell we pass, try not to listen to the weeping or hushed whispers in foreign tongues somewhere in the cold, dim darkness, desperation so thick in the air it’s palpable.

At the end of the corridor is a flight of stairs. I brace myself for what might come next. I’m still barefoot, but so is Nidaw. When we reach the top of the stairs, the uneven cobbles under my naked feet end abruptly, and my soles touch onyx marble, which is occasionally crisscrossed by golden veins, the stone surprisingly warm under my feet. So is the air. A gentle, warm breeze envelops me as we walk on, carrying the faintest smell of jasmine and wisteria as if wafting in from a nearby garden—the total opposite to the underground.

I look around, wide-eyed. Everything is dipped in a soft light from backlit alabaster plates that stretch from the ground up to a ceiling so high I can’t see the apex.

Despite the horrors of that dungeon, I can’t help but marvel at the design. I have no idea what I expected, but more likely a medieval castle matching the underground prison than… this . Definitely nothing so modern. So… tasteful.

It looks like a designer complex, where an architect was allowed to live his dream, and money was clearly no issue.

Nidaw leads me down the hallway and pauses in front of a huge, beautifully carved double-winged door made of some dark wood I have never seen before.

There is the metal head of a creature, half lion, half dragon, adorned with curled horns, embedded in the wall next to it.

When Nidaw steps closer to it and says, “I am here to bring Lady Melody on behalf of the High Lord of Darkness,” its dark eyes sparkle blue with sudden life.

It answers, “Be welcome, Nidaw. And you too, Melody.”

I stare at the head, which has gone back to slumber, no sign that it had just spoken, its eyes two holes again.

Nidaw takes me by the arm. “Come now, girl,” she says gently, ushering me into a vast hall, the ceiling a gold-painted dome.

The floor here is forest-green marble, polished to perfection. Embedded in the middle is a huge rectangular pool, several steps leading down into steaming, perfumed water. Candles burn in every corner, providing light, but at the same time offering more privacy than lamps would have.

Before I can take everything in, four more women who look similar to Nidaw have stepped up to me and started to roll my loop dress down my body. I try to wriggle out of their reach.

Nidaw mutters something like, “Human modesty,” before she looks straight at me with those serious riverstone eyes. “You will get fresh clothes, girl. But first, you need a bath.”

The way she says it makes me self-conscious all over. The servants’ long fingers with sharp, dark nails start to tug at the fabric again, impatiently now. But this time, I don’t resist. I must look bad.

I let them undress me, too exhausted to argue, although there is something unnerving about being the only naked person in the room. I let them guide me toward the bath and down the steps into the hot water. They enter with me, still in their tunics, which they have knotted around their very slim bodies. They start to scrub me and wash my hair with lavender and golden soap. I let it all happen, I’m too tired to do otherwise.

I let them lead me out again when they deem me clean enough, wrap me into a towel, and eventually guide me over to a marble table with a mirror where Nidaw already awaits me, perched on a velvet stool.

Those bony fingers push me down onto the stool next to hers, and she starts to detangle the mess of my hair with a golden comb shaped like a swan.

I meet her pale eyes in the mirror. “Where are we?”

“In the Twilight Kingdom,” she answers tersely.

“No. I mean—where is it?”

Nidaw pauses, looking me up and down as if to size me up. “You are from the human world.” She grimaces a little at the word human , as if it is an insult.

I nod, but Nidaw keeps looking at me in that strange way before she resumes brushing my hair.

“How long was I asleep?” It’s bothering me, not knowing what day it is and how long I’ve been away . More than I let on.

Nidaw just chuckles lightly, an unfamiliar sound, like the hum of bees, before she says, “An hour, maybe two. Not long, don’t worry. It’s the magic that makes you so tired.”

“Magic?”

Nidaw laughs again at my incredulous tone, as if I made a joke. “You don’t have magic in the human world, I forget that. Magic is everywhere here. It’s just another form of energy. The human world has no magic, and we can’t use magic in the human world except if we bind it to objects. But here, everything is held together by magic.”

I look at Nidaw’s long, claw-like nails, and at the beautiful but strange color of her skin. Her pointed ears are shaped slightly differently than Riven’s, I notice. Hers are pointed too, but have one more curve instead of a straight arch, which makes them look almost like the spiraled silhouettes of beautiful seashells .

“Can you perform magic? Like a witch?”

Nidaw shakes her head once. “No. I am only a river siren. We can just ask nature for magic, or plea to magic itself for help. But the high elves and the witches can.”

“Are you also… a slave?” I dare to ask the question.

Nidaw angles her head at this but doesn’t meet my eyes. “I am a servant, not a slave,” she states eventually, but not unkindly.

“So you are here out of your free will.”

Nidaw’s slim eyebrows raise in question. “You make it sound like that is so unbelievable.”

“No. Maybe… It’s just… The Dark Lord and his men are very frightening,” I admit quietly, looking down.

She stops brushing my hair. It has already been dried by a warm, balmy wind.

Nidaw clicks her tongue once. At that, two of the four sirens who washed me, who I assume are also sirens since they look like Nidaw, emerge from the shadows, a bundle of black fabric in their hand. At another tongue-click from Nidaw, they put it down and disappear as soundlessly as they came. Nidaw gestures for me to pick it up. Clothes. Neatly folded and incredibly soft, made of silk and cotton.

I carefully step out of the towel and slip into some wide, long, black trousers and a loose, black shirt whose sleeves reach my elbows, with a cut like that of a kimono.

Nidaw sizes me up with her ancient eyes and then nods once. “Very well. Come now, I will show you to your room.”