Page 51 of Shadows and Flames (Twin Blades #2)
The desperate scent of Frenzy wafted off of her in waves, and I groaned, realization flooding harder than the waterfalls outside.
Mother of All, these Folk were born immortals.
Their blood would not sustain any Lylithan, nor any Vyrkos.
And even if she was able to choke down their rancid food, she was starving. For years.
In my own depression, I had kissed the edges of Frenzy in self-flagellation, but I had never witnessed this. Those of our kind who were for some reason without mortal blood to this extent were immediately taken in to heal or… put out of their misery.
How far gone was Francie’s Frenzy? Underneath her body’s survival instinct, turning her into this , was there still remnant of the person she truly was? Or would I be the one tasked with ending her pain?
These questions trampled my rational thought until the droning of this queen of bones made little sense. The petty requests of the Folk, for this and that, were just noise. A chorus underneath my silent screams for my friend, begging her to look, to know .
Elián’s presence and scent, still of cinnamon and burning oak, were the only things keeping me from storming the dais and plunging a dagger right between the bitch’s eyes.
Tana’s lavender lulled me toward a state somewhere adjacent to calm.
The true cool grounding of Rhaea’s Death was gone, as if the shadow, the one I’d been born with and had been in-step with all my life, had disappeared.
I was here, but my experience of this world was… incomplete.
“Your Majesty.” When had Blackwood stepped forward?
The rest of us hung back, allowing our employer this moment, as he’d commanded during our meeting.
“I come in the stead of Paschal Von Herron. The one you arranged trade with for our world. I wish to seek a similar arrangement. One that benefits the both of us.”
It was still unclear whether she was blind or not, but either way, she had no trouble tracking Blackwood’s slow advance to the place others had taken to address their queen.
We both flinched, me and Blackwood, when Francie released a scream so loud it transcended the gag over her mouth. She darted, making to leap at Blackwood, to drain him dry. But, of course, the collar around her neck halted her descent, turning her cry of hunger to one of fury and pain.
The queen was unperturbed, not even stirring as she held the leash, and I’d seen more than enough. I twisted, using the shock of the moment to slip out of Elián’s grasp. I dropped to a crouch and darted through the crowd.
He was running after me, and so was Tana, but the guards also reacted to my rushing the dais. As fast as any Lylithan or Vyrkos, they formed a wall in front of the royal family, Francie, and the sentient bear, swords pointed right for our throats.
I hissed, daggers drawn. “Francie! We are here for you. We will take you home to your mate.”
I heard the shudder of metal on leather, the others drawing their weapons, and I ran over our odds. We were still woefully disadvantaged, unaware of their strengths as well as their weaknesses. Hopefully, they were in a similar position.
I selected the guard I was going to take down first, the one standing directly between me and Francie, but Queen Sarya’s calm, commanding voice stopped that, too. “Guards. Fall back. I wish to speak to the Raouga.”
They did not hesitate, nor did I relax as I came face-to-face, near eye level, with the queen of this realm.
“I came for her.” I indicated my kind, sweet friend with a jut of my chin, another crack spider-spreading across my heart as I watched her cower and bear her fangs at me.
Us. Lylithans who, to her, were standing before the mortal, maybe staking claim on him.
The sharp points of the queen’s bone crown arced as she considered me. Her gaze was pinning and expansive at once, and her amusement had a razor edge, as sharp as her fangs. “May I have your name, traveler?”
A creak rang, from the shift of one of the royal children as they leaned forward in interest. The ones beside them looked just as hungry for my answer.
With narrowed eyes, I returned the queen’s stare and barely held myself back from spitting at her slippered feet.
I didn’t want such evil to know me at all.
For some reason, what came out of my mouth was, “You can call me Em.”
One of the children, the one who leaned forward, pouted, and the queen’s stained-glass wings fluttered, though her expression did not change. “Em. You travel from your land for my pet. The one who stole from me.”
I twirled my blades, and she did not miss the action. “Bullshit.”
A cackle bubbled up her throat, one she sent to the ceiling and sky beyond, and just to anger me, she tugged on the leash, pulling Francie by her neck and drawing a whimper from her.
“She has, despite the letter we left at her home. Ninety-four days passed, and I’ve yet to have what’s mine returned.”
Ninety—days? What was she on about? The only letter Whitley received, the one Francie’s takers left as they forcibly removed her from her home , was from three years ago.
“That cannot be. She is a teacher of orphaned babes in our world, and you have stolen her . You are either mistaken or a fucking liar.”
Gasps rang all around me, but Sarya silenced them all by raising her hand. Her voice dropped an octave. Twisted. “You call me liar?”
“Yeah, I’m calling you a liar and a sadistic fucking bitch.” I pointed the tip of my dagger right at her heart. “You torture her for nothing .”
The beating of air was my only warning, the only signal before she was standing right in front of me. Looking down at me whilst our toes were almost touching. I did not show weakness, and there was no fear left.
This queen of bones smelled of the wind through the trees. Icy morning dew. But when she grinned down at me, mouth splitting unnaturally wide through her cheeks, her breath smelled fucking rotten.
“I cannot lie, tiny Raouga. But the rest of your assessment may be quite true.”
I was about to jab her in her fucking throat. If I’d had access to my Death, she would be a hollowed husk already, as well as each of her sniveling children. But, no, Rhaea had left me once again.
“And what, pray tell, did a genial caregiver steal from you?”
The Queen raised a finger, one sporting diamonds and pearls, making to caress the edge of my face.
She did not make contact with my skin, but it was close enough.
I raised my weapon, landing the tip at the low cut of her gown.
The blade frayed a few fibers of the fabric, snapping like broken lute strings.
She hummed a pleasant note. “The Royal Bracelet of my mother, Queen Amitola, may she rest among the stars. It was stolen many years ago, and on its way back to me, it was stolen again.”
“All—you torture the wrong person, all for a piece of jewelry?”
That grin returned. “Yes.”
I cut my eyes around me in the span of a blink, assessing the guards ready to take me down, my cousin and lover behind me, and Francie cowering against the throne, cerulean blue eyes wide and wary. “You said that you cannot lie.”
She tilted her head, shifting the braids falling down her back. “Yes.”
Could I believe that? What choice did I have? “If I find this bracelet, if I return it to you, will you release my friend to me?”
Her eyes widened, and more of her white teeth showed. The stained-glass wings behind her fluttered.“You wish to make a deal with me, Em?”
Even the shortened form of my name on her lips slid down my spine like sludge. “Yeah. A deal.”
“Upon the return of my bracelet, you will have the return of your friend. My pet, here.”
The urge to slice open her throat for calling Francie such a word prickled beneath my fingertips. Where my Death should have been keen to enact the fantasy. “Yes.”
And the Queen giggled, lightly and musically, a sound that belonged in a choir. The joy removed the grotesque from her beautiful features. Her wings twitched happily, and my stomach turned to stone.
“Yes, tiny Raouga Em. It is a deal.”
She was going to have to stop calling me tiny—not all of us were spindly crones. “Then what does this bracelet look like. Where was it last seen?”
She hummed again, moving the golden leash in her fist, and I clenched my teeth with all of my strength.
We made a deal. “It is about this in width,” Sarya placed her thumb and first finger a small distance apart, “gold, with many purple stones of varying size and shade. Sapphires from our mountain.”
The stone of my stomach began to sink into the mud she’d been spewing at me. Yes, this could be any fine piece of royal jewelry, but… I had known a piece of that description. Stolen a piece just like it before returning to Nethras and giving Francie the coin I’d won. Had I—had I been followed?
“It was last accounted for on an island in your realm. It was stolen from here, then traded again and again. One of my loyal citizens had gone to retrieve it, but they never came back.”
I used everything I had left to keep my face impassive, but the queen of bones saw something within me.
My blade still rested upon her sternum, and she brushed the tip of her fingernail along the length of it.
“You know of it,” she surmised. And then, in a whisper like poison, she accused, “Tiny Raouga thief.”
Goddess-damn it all to hell. That trip to Dyna Island. When I’d fought in the rings, stolen the bracelet from the human merchant, and crossed paths with the male now at my back. He murdered my employer who was most likely the Folk she sent to retrieve the bracelet.
The thought of unwittingly working for this cruel female rankled.
Though, not as much with the realization that this was all my fault. Whoever followed me must have mistaken the exchange of money, my giving the coin purse to Francie as me handing her the bracelet. My attempt at helping her ultimately led her to be taken and tortured. For years.