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Chapter thirty-seven

Elias Winterton

W hen I was five, I memorized every single crag and angle of my rocky bedchamber ceiling.

And then I spent every night thereafter tracing the edges and lines until I fell asleep.

For over twenty years, it worked, lulling my methodical brain to rest while I planned every detail of my future, of this war, of the life I would give to my wife. The queen.

Until those plans—my lifetime in the making—fell through, and she didn’t come.

Two weeks. That’s how long it had been since the Sinclairs, Ezra Hart, and Gemma Tremaine had returned without her.

Caz Sinclair, the poor bastard, without his leg.

He had been honorably excused from duty in my forces.

I made sure of that personally. An explosion of the temple in Tovick had done it, Finn had explained.

When I asked what the hell they’d been doing in Tovick, they’d looked at me like I was insane. Simeon’s orders, they said.

Tremaine had remained remarkably quiet—something I’d never known her to be. Given she knew the queen better than any of us— perhaps better than Elowen herself—her continued silence was unnerving.

Ezra Hart arrived fuming about some big, arrogant fucker named Smyth—Simeon’s last-minute addition to their group that I certainly hadn’t agreed to.

Apparently, this Smyth buffoon had taken it upon himself to drag my betrothed halfway across Nyrida, teach and train her, all without my permission.

Ezra said Smyth had forced my betrothed under his wing, followed her around like a damn guard dog, and did the gods know what else to her.

Gemma didn’t have much to say about him , either.

When I sat up in bed, the pretty blonde beside me stirred.

I ran my hands over my face and cringed.

Had forgotten she was even there. For months, I had resisted being with a woman out of respect for the queen.

Once I knew she was really coming, anyway.

But after no sign of her and no word from Simeon, I had… faltered.

My pulse throbbed in my ears from too much whiskey the night before.

I groaned at the crystal decanter shattered in pieces all over the maroon and gold rug my grandmother had gifted me for my twenty-second birthday.

It was expensive—imported from wool traders in southern Wymara—and matched the deep-scarlet bedding and upholstered sofa that sat before the dwindling hearth.

At least none of the red-oak furniture from Peradine had been destroyed during last night’s passionate spree. But that rug…

“Shit.” I pinched the bridge of my nose and rose to clean the mess.

“Eli?” A warm, thin hand brushed against the back of my thigh as I stood.

With a roll of my eyes, I sternly corrected, “It’s ‘Commander’ outside the bedroom.”

She reached for my hand, but I refused to turn around. No one was ignorant of my exploits, but the last thing I needed was anyone beneath me in rank thinking they could undermine my orders .

The husky sound of her laugh chafed my ears. I heard her shift in bed behind me. “Well, we’re still in the bedroom, Commander .” She snaked her hands around my waist and brushed her naked chest against my back. “But I’ll call you whatever you want if—”

“Get out.” I shrugged out of her touch and exhaled heavily through my nose. “Please,” I added, cringing at the harshness of my tone. Last night was nice. Hot, wild, loud, and rough. Always was with Larisa.

I was even considering one more round with her when, without a single objection, she left my bed and tiptoed around the shards of glass on the rug.

Her spectacular tits bounced with every movement and that long, lean, tan body was…

delectable. And her tight, round ass was still red from my hand.

She caught me watching and gave me a bashful smile while slipping into the joke of a silk red gown she’d flaunted last night.

Her sensual movements were intentional. There was nothing shy about Larisa Cates.

“Tonight?” she asked, lingering by the door with a coy grin plastered on her beautifully angled face.

“I don’t know,” I sighed, irritated as I folded the rug into four squares to keep the shards from escaping. “I’ll send for you.”

“As you wish,” she crooned, taking her time with the doorknob, “ Commander .”

The door closed behind her, and I paused to massage my temples for a moment of quiet solitude. But mere seconds later, four angry knocks made me jump. I cursed under my breath and contemplated my next words to Larisa. Cruel enough to keep her away just for a week or for good?

I opened the door and found relief instead. It was a woman—far more important to me than Larisa—a woman who required less attention and demanded no post-coital cuddling, which I thoroughly despised.

Valda’s slim, ebony neck tilted as she looked down at me in disapproval, despite being just shorter than me. She was extremely tall for a female. Her thick black locks shifted on her shoulders. She glanced in the direction Larisa had gone and lifted an unamused eyebrow at me.

“Morning, Val.” I smirked, stepped behind the door, and opened it for her to enter.

She strode in, confident and strong. When the door closed, she groaned at my still-naked form. She’d seen it before and would see it again. I owned a mirror, and I had no reason to be ashamed.

“Would you put some damn pants on, you rake ?”

I laughed but slid on a pair of trousers to appease her. “You know better than to assume I’m decent before sunrise. “

“Yes,” she hissed, crossing her long, toned arms over her chest. Her brown lips pursed as she scanned the full length of my body. Unimpressed. “Since all you do is drink and fuck your sorrows away.”

My eyebrows shot up in pleased surprise. That Valda’s tongue could whip as hard as her fist could punch was exactly why she was my best friend.

“What’s your issue today?” I chuckled. But where the normal glint of fiery affection burned in her dark-brown eyes, there was apprehension. The air left my lungs. “Is there word of her?” I scrambled for my boots.

Val reached in the pocket of her black leathers and handed me a letter. “From one of our spies east of Tovick.”

I tore open the letter and began to read.

“He was near Molochai’s camp a few weeks ago, south of Brinnea.”

I froze with my eyes locked on the paper, but I stopped seeing.

Valda delivered the news gracefully, but I could tell by the way she nervously shifted—Val was never nervous—there was more. “He saw our queen there,” she added gravely.

My eyes drifted back up to Val. “ What ?” I gritted out.

“She was in Brinnea, Eli. She—”

“What the fuck was she doing in Brinnea?” I shouted, running my hands through my hair.

First Tovick, then Brinnea. As if someone had devised some twisted plan to keep her far, far away from me.

I grabbed yesterday’s shirt off the chair—where I’d thrown it last night in a fit of carnal need—and slid my arms through the sleeves.

“Every detail, Val—every gods-damned detail—was supposed to go through me! Shit!” I smashed a wooden chair to bits with my boot.

“Simeon!” I hissed, turning on Valda. He had some explaining to do.

“Deploy the forces—all of them—and find Simeon! Find her !”

She flinched. “We have been looking for Simeon and we… we can’t find her.

” Her normally hard demeanor and sharp voice softened.

She took an apprehensive step toward me.

“Somehow, Insidions got a hold of her. And what they saw…” Val shuddered, horror painting her sharp face.

“Our spy saw Molochai kill her. He… he ripped out her heart.”

A cacophony of sounds rang in my ears. I closed my eyes and slowly shook my head, rejecting the image. “That’s not… no, it wasn’t her.” My pulse pounded, brutal and painful in my veins. “She has power. She’s more powerful than Molochai.”

“I thought the same thing, but the Butch—” Val choked on the name, took a deep breath, and reset.

He had taken plenty from her too. “The Butcher was there. The man named Smyth… based on Ezra’s description and the things he said he could do—the way he killed —we think they’re one and the same.

That he tricked them into thinking he was working for Simeon and took her to Molochai instead.

And after Molochai killed her… the Butcher stole her body. ”

I met Valda’s rigid gaze to search for a sign of insanity or dishonesty. As usual, no trace of either. “They wouldn’t have been that stupid,” I uttered. “Not the Sinclairs, not Ezra, and definitely not Tremaine.”

“If the Butcher has managed to keep his identity hidden from us for four hundred years, you would be stupid to think he couldn’t trick even our best soldiers.”

“ No .” Not him . Not that devil-spawned monster. “Simeon wouldn’t let that happen.” I paced back and forth in front of my fireplace, white shirt hanging loosely off my body. My hair was wild as I stirred it with my frantic hands. “It’s not possible.”

“We haven’t heard from Simeon in months, Eli!” Valda pressed. “We’ve been waiting, vulnerable , and until we hear from him, we have to assume, based on what we’ve seen and heard, for the protection of our people, that she’s—”

“Val!” Vomit stirred in my stomach, rose up my throat. I halted mid-step. The vile things that beast would do to her. Even after she was… dead . “ No , Val.” I pointed an angry, trembling finger at her. “Don’t you fucking say it!”

But Valda was the only one of my soldiers who didn’t fear me. She was my official second-in-command. The only one I knew, without a doubt, who would tell me the truth regardless of what I wanted to hear.

“I’m sorry.” She clenched her teeth, biting back sorrow and rage of her own. Her normally solid voice trembled as she uttered, “But if it’s true, our queen is gone, and we have to act.”

My knees almost gave out. I pressed my palms into the edge of the wooden table while my shoulders trembled beneath the weight of it all.

My purpose in life had been my army and the prophesied queen sent by the gods to save us.

Nothing else mattered. Nothing else ever would.

Without her, I… there was no solution without her.

Tears bit at my throat for a beautiful young woman I had yet to know.

This was not possible. This was not real.

I centered myself in the meticulous rhythm of air I breathed. As I’d been trained to. As I’d trained countless others. Behind my closed eyes, I saw my sweet little sister, Willa. And my parents. They had been good. They had all been good , and the Butcher had taken them from me.

Now he had taken her from me too. My betrothed. My queen. Dutifully, rightfully mine .

When my friend rested her hand on my arm to comfort me, I jerked away and held up my own in warning. I sneered at Val, while she waited, stone-faced, for my command. I recalled that eerie quiet from Tremaine, who was never silent. Her quiet had nagged at my instinct the moment she’d returned.

“ Bring me Gemma Tremaine.”