Page 34 of Queen of Ever (Curse of Fate and Fae #2)

Chapter 34

Tarian

‘T his way!’ Ethan called out to me as he crouched on his hands and knees, scratching at the rubble ahead.

I’d been trying to dissolve the rock across the tight, cramped tunnel we found ourselves trapped in, and every time I pressed my hand to the stone and removed another layer, my head swooped sickeningly. But I couldn’t stop. We had to get to the surface. Panic wrapped tightly around me, so consuming I hardly even noticed the myriad of injuries I’d sustained from our fall through the earth. We were just lucky we hadn’t fallen too far. I was scraped, bruised, bleeding, but alive. But every moment I’d spent down here, crawling through rubble and looking for a way out, was a moment Imogen had been facing whatever was at the surface without me. I needed to get the fuck out of here.

‘I can see sunlight!’ Ethan’s voice was a croak. The fall hadn’t done him any good.

I dropped down next to him, trying to see what he could. ‘Where?’

‘Are you blind? There.’ He jabbed a finger into a crevice.

I squinted. ‘Are you sure?’ I couldn’t keep tapping into my magic indefinitely. I wasn’t long from pushing myself too far. The idea of knocking myself unconscious deep underground and leaving Imogen to face the legion at the surface alone was… I couldn’t even consider it.

Ethan groaned, pressing his hand against his stomach. ‘Just hurry up.’

I drew the magic forth, gritting my teeth against the sharp pain that lanced through my head. The rock crumbled, shifting and cracking enough that for a moment I thought I’d caused another cave in. But a beam of sunlight cut through the darkness like a knife, illuminating the thick, swirling dust in the trapped air, before the entire wall slumped down with a crash, and I was hauling Ethan to his feet as we stumbled through into watery daylight.

Immediately, we were beset with a wild, clawing wind. Around us the scene was a mess of bodies, blood and shattered magic. Scattered Seelie forces clustered in shifting groups, but none were looking in our direction, their attention fixated on something ahead. As I watched, a handful of them turned and ran for their lives.

‘Go find Imogen!’ Ethan yelled over the wind. ‘I’ll see if I can help any others out of the ground.’

He didn’t have to tell me twice. I crossed the muddied earth, weaving between those distracted soldiers.

But there weren’t just soldiers to watch out for. I could see what they were running from.

A wide circle of space ahead was cleared of any soldiers, patrolled instead by what I could only call beasts . They prowled in circles, canine in appearance, though closer in size to horses than dogs, but their bodies weren’t quite solid. They seemed formed of shadows and smoke, shifting and whirling, their edges fading in and out of clarity, except for sets of bared teeth which looked like jagged shards of ice. As I watched, one of them fixed its attention on a Seelie soldier who had raised his hands, turning eyes that looked like pits of midnight on him. It launched itself at him, setting upon him in a whirl of snarls and ripping teeth, shredding the screams before they could leave his throat as more than a gurgle.

And then I released what they were protecting.

Imogen was crouched in a ball, arms around her knees, head tucked in tight, trembling violently. Before her, Solas lay sprawled in a pool of what looked like his own blood, eyes wide open as he stared up at the stormy sky.

‘Imogen,’ I called. Several of the shadow beasts turned their eyes on me. Imogen didn’t look up. The beasts were hers, I realised. They weren’t going to let anyone near her. But I was going to have to get to her, or the magic they were feeding on would burn her out completely.

I moved forward, keeping my steps steady, my eyes locked on the closest shadow beast. It growled, a deep, guttural sound that reverberated through the ground. The air around it seemed to warp and bend, as though reality itself was giving way.

‘Imogen,’ I called again. ‘You have to let go.’

No response. The wind howled louder. The beasts closed ranks around her, their eyes narrowing as I approached, but they didn’t attack—yet. One crouched low, slinking towards me, shoulders rippling, a warning growl rumbling from its throat.

‘You created them,’ I said, edging closer. ‘You can control them. Let them go.’

The beast opened its maw, snarling as I approached, but still it didn’t strike. I wanted to run to her, but I didn’t. I kept my pace slow and measured, creeping around the suspicious creature. Its black, bottomless gaze never left me as I rounded it, slipping through the vanguard, picking my way over Solas’ body. He was riddled with puncture wounds, like he’d been shredded by a dozen blades flung at speed.

Another step.

When I stretched out a hand towards Imogen, a cacophony of growls rose around me.

‘Imogen?’ I said, touching a hand to her shoulder. ‘I’m here.’

She let out an audible gasp, her grip on her knees slackening. The wind calmed. The shadow beasts quietened, then began to dissolve, their forms dispersing like fog. I slipped an arm around her as she began to pant, her chest heaving as she took fast, desperate breaths. Her whole body was trembling violently, and she was so cold. She raised her head, revealing a face drained of all colour, except for the streaks of scarlet from where her nose had bled. Her eyes were shot through with red, glassy with exhaustion, and she clapped her hands over her head with a groan.

‘It hurts,’ she whimpered.

‘We have to get you out of here.’ I tried to help her to her feet, but she cried out, the sound terrifying me enough to lower her to the ground again. I scanned her frantically, looking for injuries. ‘Where are you hurt?’

‘All over,’ she rasped, her teeth chattering. ‘My head. ’

‘You’ve used too much magic.’ My gaze flickered towards the soldiers milling around, edging closer now that Imogen’s creatures were gone. She was going into shock as the effects of magic wreaked havoc on her body. I needed to get her somewhere safe. If that meant I had to leave the rebels behind to fend for themselves, then so be it.

‘Tarian, darling. Hasn’t this gone far enough now?’

For a split second, I closed my eyes and wanted to pretend that I hadn’t heard the voice, even while my mind began sprinting through choices, weighing options and potential consequences. None of them looked good.

‘I’m unimpressed that I had to leave my borders to clean up this mess,’ Moriana continued. I drew a breath, brushed a kiss across Imogen’s head and released her. Her hand reached after me as I left her, and I had to turn away so I wouldn’t see the confusion and the suffering there. I had to draw myself up, put some ground between us, leave her shivering in the mud alone and hope Ethan or one of the rebels was paying attention. I had to pray someone would come and get her out while I drew my mother’s attention.

Moriana stood with her arms folded, dressed in the sort of clothing that suggested she never intended to see any fighting herself. I would have bet she had been waiting a long way off, watching from beyond her border until she could see which way the battle would swing. She’d only come now that she’d seen Solas fall.

‘What do you want?’ I demanded as I approached her from an angle, circling so she’d keep turning away from Imogen, reaching for what flickers of magic I could access. It was faint and unreliable. I’d never catch her at a distance like this. And she’d strike me long before I got close enough to touch destruction to her skin. ‘Your soldiers can fight without your presence here.’

She wore a cold smile, her head slightly cocked as she considered me. ‘But then I’d miss the spectacle. Isn’t it glorious?’ She spread her hands, encompassing the battlefield, the dead and dying rebels scattered around us, the sounds of more casualties as High Fae forces attacked those still fleeing from the collapsing tunnels. ‘If I’m to weather the embarrassment of you defecting to a lesser fae rebellion , of all things, then at the very least I should have the pleasure of seeing it all fall apart around you.’ She strode towards me, pausing only to peer at a groaning fawn who lay sprawled in the mud. Reaching down, she turned the creature’s face towards her, pointed fingernails digging into his chin. He whimpered as she knelt beside him. ‘Such mindless fools,’ she crooned. I took the chance to glance back at Imogen, who was still where I’d left her, arms locked around her knees again. A splitting scream drew my attention back. Moriana dropped the fawn, who slumped back to the ground, now silent, before wiping bloodied hands on her skirts and rising again.

‘Now, let’s get to the matter at hand,’ she said. ‘I’m getting bored of you defying me, darling.’

I took a few small steps backwards. Could I lead her further away somehow? Give someone a real chance to reach Imogen? ‘Then don’t toy with me and deal whatever punishment you’ve come to issue. You know I don’t go in for your games.’

Her eyes narrowed, but she didn’t come closer. ‘I’m also terribly bored of being underestimated. If you think I don’t know you’re trying to distract me from that little ball of fear and weakness over there, then you’re stupider than I’ve given you credit for.’ And suddenly she wasn’t facing me anymore. She was heading for Imogen.

I jolted forwards, but almost as soon as I moved pain tore through my body, ushered in by a careless flick of Moriana’s wrist. She didn’t even look at me to do it. Pain devoured me, consuming my strength, my vision, my senses, clamping around me in a cascading cacophony of spasming muscles and screaming nerves. When it cut out, I was on the ground, lying on my stomach, vision spotted and limbs shaken with tremors. It didn’t help that I was already weak with magic use. It hit me so much harder. I pushed myself up on my forearms to catch sight of Moriana leaning over Imogen, taking hold of her hair and yanking her head up. A pair of Seelie soldiers seemed to rally, perhaps finally realising their loyalties now lay with the woman the Unseelie Queen was threatening, but there was an Unseelie vanguard beginning to form around us all now, protecting their own queen. Cutting off all possibilities that someone of more use to Imogen than me would somehow reach her.

‘I know I can’t compel you both at once,’ Moriana called as I struggled towards them, half stumbling, half crawling. ‘But I can hold one of you immobile while I ruin the other. The only dilemma is which I’ll keep alive to watch the other die. You know I’d prefer it to be you alive, Tarian dear, but since Aurelia is the new Seelie Queen, it had better be her.’

‘Get off her!” I snarled, but she just felled me again with a flick of her wrist. The pain was wilder this time, sharper, feral. It chewed its way into my head, incinerating my thoughts and reasoning until all I knew was hot, blinding agony and I just wanted it to stop . My heart was sluggish with pain as it pumped heavily in my chest, stuttering and starting, torment squeezing me so tight I couldn’t breathe, and of all the ways I’d thought I might die, it had somehow never occurred to me that I could be tortured to death. Then the pain faded away, awareness of my body waning even as my heart squeezed in an aching shudder.

A few moments later, I was blinking my eyes open to grey, roiling sky as I gasped back into consciousness, crashing down into my body again, with all its lingering suffering. But Moriana’s magic had released me.

A shadow passed overhead. Wind stirred my hair. A deafening roar smothered all other sound, drowning the cries of battle and death. I pushed myself up as those around me ducked down, cringing close to the ground or scurrying out of the way. Enormous wings were consuming the sky, blocking out the daylight as they buffeted the air, working hard to keep a huge, sinuous body aloft. A wave of searing heat hit the air as the beast spewed a stream of fire towards the ground, sending High and lesser fae running, screaming, burning; fleeing back to the relative safety of underground. Some shot blackfire arrows in retaliation, but they were no match for that scaled hide.

I didn’t even attempt to run as the beast landed with a great shudder of the earth, snapping at a water wielder who had been mad enough to think she could freeze a dragon. Her bones snapped easily in his powerful jaws, scream cutting out. The enormous head swivelled, yellow eyes finding me as smoke curled from his nostrils. ‘ Prince.’

I just nodded at him, relieved he hadn’t decided to send any of that fire in my direction.

The dragon’s head turned, his neck snaking away as he sought something, sending soldiers scurrying as fast as they could out of his notice. Locking on a point amidst the chaos of fleeing fae. The Unseelie Queen, standing rigid and completely still, focus entirely on the dragon. A low growl rumbled out of Ruisin’s chest, sending more smoke puffing out of his nostrils.

‘Moriana.’ This time, the voice seemed to boom through my mind, and I cringed against the force of it. Several of the remaining Unseelie soldiers ducked down, clapping hands over their ears as though they could somehow block the dragon out. ‘You’ve left the protection of your lands. I’ve been waiting a long time for this moment.’

‘You shouldn’t be alive.’ Her attention had left Imogen entirely as she stared at him with an expression entirely stripped of the malice and calculation that usually twisted it. She was wide-eyed. Afraid. But she was moving towards the dragon.

‘ Is that really what you expected when you exiled me in the Whisper Wastes? That I’d simply lay down and die?’

‘But I cut out your heart,’ she spluttered. ‘I held it in my hand! You should never have lived!’

‘You cut out one .’

The dragon began to pace towards her, and as he did his scales rippled, his body shifting, shrinking, limbs shortening, wings retreating into a muscled torso. When he stood before her, he was as a man—huge, bearded, entirely naked and seemingly unphased by that. I scraped myself off the floor, pushing up on shaky arms, stomach roiling, focus immediately on Imogen, who still lay immobilised.

‘Tell me, Moriana,’ Ruisin continued as I crawled towards Imogen. ‘Your heart must be as cold as the moon now, but it wasn’t in those days. Did you weep for me?’

Around me, others who’d been felled when he’d lashed out were stirring, drawing themselves up, crawling or staggering away as fast as they could. And still Moriana didn’t seem to notice, her focus entirely fixed on Ruisin.

‘I had no other choice,’ she snarled.

‘No, you made your choice. You took the secret I trusted you with and chose to use it to destroy me. And I’ve been waiting a long time to repay the favour.’

That seemed to jolt her into action. With a scream, she flung out both of her hands, wild-eyed as she threw the entire force of her magic at the dragon. He dropped to the ground just as I reached Imogen, touched her cold skin. Ruisin groaned, low and deep, as he convulsed. Pain would be raking through his body. If he knew her, knew her magic, knew this was how the encounter would end, why had he come? At best, he’d engaged her full attention, lifting her hold from the rest of us. At best, it might give us time to run.

‘Imogen,’ I murmured. Her eyes were closed, her skin pale, lips beginning to turn blue. I tried to gather her up in my arms, but they felt weak and slack and I staggered, almost dropping her. Behind me, Ruisin’s groans fractured, becoming higher-pitched.

‘You’re nothing.’ Moriana hissed. ‘You meant nothing. It was only that I was weak when I left you alive. This time, I’m going to make sure you’re really dead.’

‘Lyrathis.’ The word was a whisper flitting through my mind, leaving behind an oily shudder. ‘ The name . My magic is gone with my heart . I can’t use it. But you can.’

And with a sudden clap of clarity, it all fell into place. I’m going bet that it has all played out exactly the same as every pair of lovers who have ever come before you , Moriana had said when she stolen Imogen’s name from me. I lay Imogen back down, galvanised by the realisation, blood pounding, as I turned towards the Unseelie Queen. Her back was to me, her entire focus narrowed in on the man convulsing and moaning on the ground at her feet. My vision seemed to darken around the edges as I approached her, as I walked the blood-slicked ground between us, until I was standing behind her. Ruisin’s chest was straining as his back arched, the long scar down its centre standing raised and pale against his skin. If you are to do something so unnatural, Dhrigada had said, the payment must be in blood on your hands.

‘ Lyrathis.’ The word, the name, was sharp, bitter against my tongue. ‘Kneel.’

Her body seized up even as Ruisin’s stilled, his chest fluttering with fast, panting breaths. And Moriana, Queen on the Unseelie Throne, purveyor of pain and terror, my lifelong tormenter and the woman who’d born me, sank slowly to her knees.

I circled her, each footstep connecting with the earth decisively, the battle still raging around us fading to nothing in my awareness. She glared up at me and I could feel the power gripping her, feel the way she wrestled against it. But there was an iron-clad certainty in the heft of it, in the way it held her will the way it had always bent mine.

Hatred burned through me, so caustic and biting I could hardly tell it from magic, devouring and twisting as my heart pounded, remembering all the pain she’d caused Imogen, all the cruelty I’d suffered at her hands. Magic was out of the question—I’d already used too much of it. But there was a discarded blade a few paces away. That would do.

‘Prince.’ Ruisin’s voice called out to me as I bent to take the hilt of the sword, sweeping it up. He was pulling himself off the ground, rising to stand. ‘You owe me a favour.’

‘You can name it. As soon as I’ve dealt with this.’ I returned to stand before Moriana again. Hefted the blade in my hand, considering where I’d aim it.

‘My favour is that you spare her life.’

It took a few moments for the meaning of the words to register. When they did, I turned on him. ‘ What?’

He wasn’t looking at me. His gaze was fixed on Moriana. ‘I want her alive. But demeaned. Powerless. I want her to suffer the way I have suffered.’

‘She’s too dangerous—’

He focused his yellow eyes on me. ‘I call on the favour I am owed. Spare Moriana’s life. Imprison her in the Drowned Keep.’

I stared him down, as if holding his gaze long enough would make him change his mind. But he didn’t back down. He looked calm, resolute. And I had bound myself to that favour.

As I turned back to the kneeling queen, I raised the blade. Aimed the point of it at her throat. Fear crossed her eyes, but she remained motionless, bound to obey. There was no fighting against it. No one knew that better than me.

‘ Lyrathis ,’ I said, the word thrumming with magic. ‘Relinquish your crown and the power tied to it.’

I could see the rage, the hatred, burning up at me. I knew exactly what that felt like. But she seemed to accept the pointlessness of her resistance better than I ever had.

‘I relinquish my claim to the Unseelie crown and the magic that binds it,’ she spat, her tone venomous. Her hand shook as she raised it, slid it against the blade of the sword aimed at her throat. Her palm opened, blood welling as she reached higher and lifted the crown from her head. Slowly, she lowered it, her blood weeping onto the silk-fine silver. ‘May the land accept my sacrifice.’ She laid it at my feet.

For a moment, nothing happened. Then tendrils of darkness began to stir, like wisps of smoke from an unseen fire, slipping across the ground to wrap around her wrists. White frost began to climb up her arms in glittering crystals, spidering across her bodice, running down the skirts of her dress, and a shudder ran through the ground beneath us. The temperature seemed to drop, coaxing forth a writhing, churning fog as the frost continued to spread, climbing her throat, her face, her hair, turning her breath to mist. The power of the Unseelie Throne—cold, ancient and unforgiving. Those wisps of shadow swirled around her, growing denser, darker, until they converged in a flash of movement. She released an ear-splitting shriek, and she slumped to the muddied ground.

The shadows turned their attention to me. They circled me slowly, tendrils reaching for me, leaving bites of cold and frost wherever they touched, accompanied by a chill, bitter swirl of wind, like the breath of winter, until without warning they surged. Magic burned along my nerves, up my hands, up my arms, crashing together at a point somewhere in my chest that hurt like I was having my fucking heart carved out of it. I staggered, but didn’t fall. The pain settled, though my very bones felt cold. Like I’d been sitting all night in a snowdrift.

But then my awareness widened again, the trance of retribution suddenly shattered, and I was immediately seeking out Imogen. Ethan was with her, patting her cheeks and talking at her. I went to them. Dropped to my knees. Took her cold hand in mine.

‘Don’t freak out. She’s just used too much juice,’ Ethan said when he caught my eye. ‘She stirred for a minute there, but she’s drifted off again.’

I examined her closely. She was smeared with mud and soot, but breathing easily, I noted with a flutter of relief.

‘Tarian.’ Ruisin’s baritone rumbled, and I looked up to find him holding the Unseelie crown. ‘I think this is yours.’

Blowing out a breath, I plucked the bloodied crown from his grip, tossed it from one hand to the other. ‘You could have just given me her name when I came to see you.’

‘You’re lucky I gave it to you at all. I never planned to until I saw you siding with a lesser fae rebellion.’ He bobbed down next to me to peer at Imogen. ‘This one belongs even more to the Seelie Court now than she did when you saw her through my portal.’ He leaned closer, touching fingers to her forehead. ‘She’ll be alright. Rest is what she needs. And food when she wakes. Lots of it.’

Ethan cast a pointed look at Ruisin. ‘You’re very naked, you know.’

‘Would you prefer me to shift back?’

‘There’s two fae legions milling around who don’t know whose orders they’re supposed to be following anymore,’ I said. ‘It would be helpful if you shifted. Keep them afraid until this is all untangled. Where’s Sylara?’

‘I haven’t seen her surface,’ Ethan said, his voice a little more strained. ‘I think there are a lot still underground.’

Gathering Imogen up in my arms, I lifted her from the mud. She muttered unintelligibly before settling against me, and the relief of that small sign of life filled my throat. ‘Let’s go and find them.’

‘What about her?’ Ethan nodded in the direction of Moriana, still lying slumped on the ground.

‘Can you watch her?’ I asked Ruisin.

Scales were already rippling down his arms, over his chest, hiding the white scar Moriana had put there. ‘With pleasure.’ His prowl away from us was accompanied by a fresh scattering of soldiers, a few more screams as he shifted forms, his footsteps shaking the earth, neck snaking through the air as he surveyed the remains of the battlefield.

‘So… want to tell me how the fuck he’s tied up in all this?’ Ethan asked as we began to walk. We needed to find a way back underground. I had no idea how much of it had collapsed.

‘He was Moriana’s mate.’

‘Come again?’

‘She cut out his heart to break the bond, so he’s got a score to settle.’

‘Right.’ He said nothing else for a moment. ‘Okay, I need you to tell me that again. But with more context. And, like, slowly.’