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CHAPTER

ONE

Oralia

The library was quiet. Familiar and yet foreign.

I stood only a few paces from the door with my hand wrapped around one of the chairs scattered around the large hearth. The tang of copper slid across my tongue, the inside of my cheek throbbing as I bit the skin raw. At my back, armor groaned as Hollis, one of Typhon’s guards, shut the door with a click.

But I found I could not spare a glance for the soldier at my back, not at the sight of the wings hanging upon the mantel. The afternoon light shimmered off silver talons, catching on the membranes stretched and pinned against the white backing. Nausea roiled within my stomach, and I dropped my trembling hands to my sides to hide in the skirts of the lilac gown I’d dressed in the moment I stepped into my old rooms.

My king’s, my mate’s wings, hung like a trophy above the roaring hearth.

I had not lied all those weeks ago when I’d told Ren they were beautiful, night black, and terrifying—like him. Now, I wanted to shatter the glass, to slide my fingers across the velvet skin and send them back to Infernis to reunite with their master. And though I could sense his magic within me, the soft slide of his power shifting against mine, I could no more call his face to my mind than his body into my arms.

No, I could only recall him in the abstract. His dark wavy hair and the way it tangled in his long lashes in the ever-present breeze of our kingdom. The pale glow of his skin, the curve of his lips, the sharp planes of his cheekbones. How his rumbling voice sighed with contentment as his hands slid through my hair, as he buried himself deep within my body and my soul. I ached for him as I had never for another in my two-and-a-half centuries of life. He had been reunited with the lost pieces of himself, but I feared what would happen in my absence. Would he lose the warmth and compassion he had only recently regained?

My magic shimmered and, reluctantly, I turned as the door swung open, banging against the far wall. More and more, my power was growing, alerting me to changes in my surroundings or flexing beneath my skin like an animal ready to protect. Armor glinted in the sunlight, temporarily blinding me before a helmet clattered to the floor and a soldier fell to their knees in front of me.

No, not any soldier.

“Drystan…” I murmured, grief catching in my throat.

His head bowed, the tightly woven locs of white hair messy around his crown, but he merely pressed his hands to his face, the exhale of relief so loud in the room my ears rang with the silence before weeping slipped through his fingers. My palms tingled with the urge to comfort him, to draw him into my arms, and yet the divide gaped between us. I was no longer the lonely god I’d been before I left Aethera, but I could not show it. And so, I dropped to my knees as well, clutching my hands to my chest and leaning to catch my guard’s eye.

His words were harsh as if ripped from his throat. “I failed you.”

Shaking my head, I gave him a watery smile, heat pricking at the corners of my eyes. “You did no such thing.”

Drystan, my guard for as long as I could remember, let out another sob before sliding his hands over his head. The blue-black skin of his cheeks glimmered in the light as if the sun made a mockery of his pain. “I abandoned you in my fear. I did not protect you at the hour in which you were most in need.”

I hated that I could not embrace him, I wished I could gather him in my arms and reassure him all was forgiven. My hands clenched tighter around each other until I was sure the leather of my gloves would rip. Gloves which had once been my salvation and now were a reminder of the prison I had willingly walked back into.

“I do not blame you,” I breathed, cutting across him when he made to retort. “Listen to me: I do not blame you, and you did not fail me. What has befallen me is in the past, and we cannot change it.”

And I would never want to.

My guard blinked with shining gray eyes, his thick brows pulled together in confusion. Striking, his resemblance to Dimitri—Ren’s second-in-command—down to the freckle beneath his left eye. But he wiped at his face, heaving another sigh.

“You are unharmed?”

I nodded, sliding my hands over the bodice of my gown, the high neck tight at my throat.

Drystan’s lips pursed as he gazed upon me, assessing. “Unharmed…but changed.”

Biting the raw part of my cheek again, I exhaled slowly. “Time changes us all, regardless of if we wish it.”

And how true it was. The last time Drystan saw me I had been full of anger, bubbling over with rage, my power volatile. I had been unable to control myself or my emotions and was so fearful of what I might become if I gave in. Now, my power roiled within me, and, though I had moments of uncertainty, I did not fear.

The darkness nourishes, the darkness strengthens, the darkness protects.

I pushed myself to my feet, unable to resist glancing up at Ren’s wings on the wall. Drystan rose as well, his armor groaning at the movement. Shimmers reflected onto the white marble of the hearth.

“Hollis, you may go,” Drystan commanded, turning toward the red-haired demi-god stationed at the door.

“I am under orders to keep Oralia safe, lest the Under King return to take her once more,” Hollis answered, his voice a hollow monotone.

I turned, brows furrowing, but it was Drystan who stepped forward, swiping his helmet from the ground. “She has been under my protection since she was a child, well before prime. I do not—”

Hollis’s blue eyes flicked to me with an obvious dismissal. “The king requires a word with you, my lady.”

Drystan let out an indignant scoff, but I did not look at him. Instead, I dipped my chin. “Of course. I would not want to keep His Grace waiting.”

My fingers tangled together in front of my gown before picking at the edge of one of the frayed cuffs of my gloves. It was a tic that had once been subconscious, one I’d found soothing in times of great stress. Now it was merely a distraction from the satisfaction roiling beneath my skin, another piece in the charade I had to play.

Both men tracked the movement before Drystan came to stand at my shoulder. Hollis opened the door, turning in a swirl of his white cloak to guide us from the library and through the halls. Strange to be back in this castle, the only home I’d known for so long. Foolishly, when Ren and I had made plans for me to return to Aethera, I believed it would be easy to slip back into this role. Now that I was here, however, I found it was much like slipping into a once-beloved garment only to find it two sizes too small.

The dining room was the antithesis of Ren’s, with its long rectangular table and gleaming throne at the head. Gold dripped from every surface, threading through the white marble beneath our feet. Typhon sat at the head of the table, knife cutting an apple into pieces and white wings flaring to allow him room to lean.

Mecrucio and Aelestor were seated on one side of Typhon, the former’s chestnut curls clean and shining around his face, the latter’s copper curls plaited back behind his shoulders. On the other sat Caston, Typhon’s heir, outfitted in his travel armor, the muted gray of Aetheran soldiers across our borders with the sun sigil bright across his shoulders.

Hollis and Drystan stayed back as I approached, the three of us lowering with practiced movements to our knees to press three fingers to our brow.

“My king,” I murmured, the title ash upon my tongue.

Silence stretched throughout the chamber, save for the rustling of Typhon’s feathery wings as they stretched when he rose to his feet. My knees ached with the echo of the pain of childhood, the memory of the countless days and nights on the throne room floor crawling up my spine like a chill I could not shake. The helplessness, the fear, had been a constant companion. Now, it settled like a hand around my shoulder in comfort.

I was no longer so weak, no longer a slave to the fear I believed would keep me safe. And though I rounded my shoulders and dipped my chin as the light reflected off Typhon’s golden skin and hair, I was anything but small.

I am a wolf within the flock , I reminded myself. I am the thing that weaker men fear.

“Why did you run, Lia?” Typhon’s tone was measured—a mere whisper of the fury which lived within him, as volatile as the sun fashioned in his image.

With a steadying breath, I gazed down at my tangled fingers. “It was not a choice, Your Grace. Merely instinct. I fled in horror of what my power had wrought…”

The image of the night I’d left Aethera flashed within my mind, so clear when Ren’s face was not. Caston’s intended mate face down on the table, blood trickling from his ears. The human servant sprawled upon her back, eyes wide and blank in death.

“And yet you did not stop when my men called out to you.”

I licked my lips, searching for an answer.

“Any god would be frightened of a battalion of soldiers barreling down upon them, Father.” Caston’s voice rumbled through the room, punctuated by the thud of a goblet on wood.

Typhon hummed, running a hand down his beard as he gazed down upon me. I flushed, chin dropping to gaze at the floor.

“You lost control.”

Anger prickled at the back of my neck. I had found control from my time in Infernis, but those words would once have scratched the old wound within my soul. My brows drew together, mouth tightening, however I did not respond, only allowed a soft flare of shadow across my shoulders as they might have come when I lacked understanding of my magic. Typhon merely nodded.

“Tell me what happened.”

I took another deep breath, eyes fluttering closed against the memory of Ren in those woods. The cold mask upon his face, the slither of his shadows across my skin. He had been my enemy then, one I’d believed was there to bring about my destruction.

“The Under King was waiting on the other side of the boundary line,” I explained slowly, fighting back the curl of my lip at Ren’s title within Aethera. “My power had taken over, cutting a path through the wards, and he…he did the rest. Before I could turn and run back to the castle, he compelled me to sleep and…”

My voice trailed off, gaze sliding to the trunk of the tree the far wall had been built around. The wide branches of the oak caressing the ceiling shivered at my look. I heaved a sigh, heart heavy with longing and I hoped Typhon would read it as fear. Because Ren had shown me kindness when I had expected cruelty—he had wrapped me in power when I’d thought I would be wearing chains.

“I woke in a chamber meant for my mother, and there, I remained.”

Typhon gazed at me with an expression similar to the one Drystan had worn, yet without the paternal affection. Once I would have said it was due to the burden upon his shoulders. I was a physical reminder of the loss of his wife, a constant source of pain. Now, I knew better. It was a monster who stood before me in the guise of a king. A murderer who paraded as a savior.

“You do not remember the journey to Infernis?”

I shook my head. “No, Your Grace. One moment, I was outside the wards, and the next, I was in a bedchamber.”

A muscle ticked in Typhon’s jaw. “And the Under King, what did you see of him?”

Images of Ren flashed before my eyes, clear and strong. The ice cold expression which cracked with time, warming until there was heat within his midnight gaze. His lips softening each day into a smile, curving around the letters of my name.

And if I want you until the end of time?

Then it will still not be enough.

My heart ached, reaching out within our soul bond that had only recently been threaded through our magic. I thought I could find the tang of pomegranate upon my lips, the language of Infernis heavy on my tongue.

“Once he was satisfied I knew nothing of consequence, I rarely saw the Under King. But he is exactly as you said, Your Grace.”

Typhon raised a brow biting down on a piece of apple. “And what is that?”

I lifted my chin, the words leaving my lips an assessment of the god before me:

“The king is a murderer, a tyrant, a monster.”