A Crown of Cursed Hearts (Kingdom of Blighted Thorns #3)

43. Vexxion

43

VEXXION

I flitted to the other side of the room only to have the beast roar from directly behind me. Again, I flitted, jerking myself around the cavern in a macabre dance. The creature must sense where I’d go next because it always waited.

My lungs burned, and my heartbeat stormed in my ears. The beast's eyes locked onto mine, its pupils narrow slits of hot malice. Its low growl reverberated through me, freezing my instinct to run. My legs felt anchored by an unseen force, and the smell of damp fur mixed with rotting soil churned through my sinuses. Each ragged breath I took in tasted like sweat-soaked fear. It clawed up my throat. There was nowhere to go and no way out. I had to reach my court’s core, but I knew the instant I turned my back on the beast, it would attack.

Its muscles coiled, and its spiked tail whipped behind it, smacking against the wall. Time splintered into fragments around me—each beat of my heart stretching thin enough to hold a lifetime of terror.

The beast lunged, and time froze. My breath snagged in my chest, and my muscles locked in dread unlike anything I’d felt since I hung against the dungeon wall, watching Ivenrail gleefully carve my mother to death. My thoughts raced as I thrashed through every possible escape.

Paralysis turned my bones to stone. I couldn't break through the waves of fear bombarding my body. Whatever future I might’ve wished for, one filled with laughter and a love I could almost taste but not quite grasp, vanished. Only the present existed, crashing over me like a wave I couldn’t fight or flee from—pinning me to this moment with vicious glee.

I tightened my body and lifted my head as the beast slithered closer, its putrid breath coating my face and the wickedness in its eyes reaching inside me to latch onto my soul and wring it of all that was good and true. As it sunk deeper, it battered me in relentless waves fueled by the fear surging within me.

This would not, could not be my end.

I would not permit it.

Yet there was no escape. If I was going to claim my court’s core, I had to do it this moment.

No running. No hiding.

Like everything life had slammed my way, I would face this with my spine stiff and my resolve unwavering.

Power roared up my throat, slamming through my veins at a pace faster than the blink of an eye. It surged to my fingers and toes, cauterizing as it flowed .

I latched onto it like the reins connecting me to a herd of wild creatures who surged and bucked in front of me. Sweat drenched my grip, the reins almost slipping. My heart pounded, a furious drum, and instinct screamed at me to let go, to let this herd, this beast , this cavern of my court’s core win.

Bellowing, I tightened my hold, my muscles tensing against the chaotic power. In that moment of raw struggle, my focus narrowed on taming the frenzy before me and inside me and whatever might echo throughout the very world around me.

Tugging on my mind’s reins, I made the mythical creatures slow. Only as I took control did the looming beast falter. It paused, cocking its head, watching me.

Judging me.

The fates knew I had so much left I must pay for.

In that instant, I saw my reflection in the beast, the part of myself I’d despised and struggled to overcome. I’d done horrible things, even if at my core I did them to protect others.

I confronted the darkest parts of myself. While churning through my regret and guilt, I found something unexpected—a glimmer of compassion and kindness I'd overlooked. It was like discovering a hidden strength within myself, a part of me that only now unfolded to shine like a jewel in the light.

A green, pabrilleen stone much like those mined within this very mountain. Like the spire and the pendant I still clutched in my hand.

I sifted through each painful memory, exposing them all, and one truth emerged. Beneath the shame hid a core of kindness I’d forgotten existed.

A revelation hit me. The forgiveness I hadn’t realized I sought needed to be found within me, not from those around me.

It was time to extend grace to myself.

The king had not extinguished the goodness inside me. It blazed as strongly as ever, a fierce blade I could wield with the strength of my inner compassion.

As the beast paused and waited, watching me, I knew why.

My heart swelled, pressing exquisitely against my ribs, and if I didn’t let it free, it would whip back and turn to ashes. Tipping back my head, I stared at nothing and everything, knowing that only one path awaited me, one filled with love.

I. Am. Worthy.

The beast disappeared, and the reins still biting into my palms disintegrated, evaporating from my grip.

A low hum echoed in the room, and light blazed behind me. I turned to face the spire, where thousands of tiny lights swirled within the small dome at the top.

I strode over to it and placed my hands on the cold surface. It sunk into me, both soothing and stabbing.

It soared through me.

The lights splintered the glass and pierced my flesh.

I was dragged into the spire.

A jolt, and I found myself inside the cavern where Iasar had confronted me for stealing a handful of bone coins from Ivenrail’s bedroom. Like before, the dragon’s immense blue form rose above me, his scales shimmering in the cavern's muted light. My pulse hammered in my throat as I stood frozen, my eyes wide with terror mixed with determination. I knew he’d be angry, but I’d come here anyway. I had to show him that I would not betray him even if I had already betrayed Amronth.

I held out the handful of bone coins. “Take them. You know what to do with them.”

“You sssshould’ve left them there, boy,” he hissed, his voice dragging across my skin like a row of needles. “Now you’ve sssset ussss on a coursssse we may never esssscape from.” Tipping back his head and opening his mouth, Iasar unleashed a torrent of blue flames toward the ceiling. It didn't burn but throbbed with an eerie glow filled with magic unlike any I’d experienced before. Old magic. Power lost to time and to all of faerie. This wasn't any ordinary fire. It felt alive and overwhelming, capable of stilling all life in this world or unleashing something that would never be contained in all the others.

My very soul screamed at me to run, yet my legs refused to move as fear fused me to the cold stone beneath my feet.

“I’m sorry,” I said, defeat making my boyish shoulders sag. “I thought this would help.”

“I cannot wield them! Helping issss freeing my mate. Helping issss killing the one who sssstole them.”

“I can’t kill him. You know that.” If he died, so would I, and if I’d taken anything from my time in the dungeon where he’d tortured and killed my mother, it was the knowledge that I needed to survive. Her sacrifice should not be wasted.

I strengthened my resolve to live when she couldn’t.

It was only when I realized I might have to sacrifice myself to save everyone else, that I welcomed the death his would bring me. If I died, others might live.

“I’ll find a way to free Amronth,” I said .

“You can’t.” He shot fire at me, and I stood strong and let it wash over and through me. Chilling me but not touching my inner strength—the only thing keeping me going.

“Give them to the one who can usssse them.” Iasar said.

“Who?”

“When the time issss right, you will know.”

“I’ll do it then. I promise!”

I. Am. Worthy.

Iasar stared past me, through me, before his gaze locked on my form.

“One day, your truth will sssshine,” he hissed before he winked from the room.

I turned while stuffing the bone coins back into my pocket.

Dregs poured into the cavern from every opening. Their hands lifted, and the squish and slither of their oozing bodies jarred across my skull like the dull edge of a blade. Their glowing eyes locked on me.

They’d come for the bone coins, and I had to do all I could to stop them from gouging their meaty hands into my pockets to take them.

My heart stilled as their limbs squelched like enormous slugs, their footsteps plunging against the hard floor as they lurched toward me. The sound gnawed through my nerves, making them snap and recoil.

“Give them back,” one growled. “Ours, not yours.”

The heavy clammer of their bulbous joints ripped up my spine as their eyes pierced through me. Icy dread pooled in my gut. I couldn't tear my eyes away from their relentless advance. I could not make myself leave .

But in the past, I had.

I’d caught one look at them and flitted to Weldsbane, where I’d huddled in my cold bed, my teeth clattering together, the sound of their oozing bodies echoing in my mind.

Why couldn’t I flee them now?

They reached me, and with a guttural cry, I wrenched backward, stumbling over something soft and squishy lying on the floor. I fell to the ground.

“Ours,” they snarled in unison. “Never yours.”

Their thick, oozing hands latched onto me and they—

Again, someone whispered in my mind, and I was sucked away once more.

I found myself in Ivenrail’s dungeon. He stood between me and my mother hanging from the wall by chains, her limp body barely jerking from the endless slash of his blade.

“Where is she?” he snarled. “Tell me. I need her.”

Who was he talking about? I didn’t remember this, but I’d done everything within the power of my frail, child’s body to block that time from my mind, to seal it away where even I couldn’t find it.

My mother hissed, and while I couldn’t see her around his form, I remembered her lifting her head. She spit into his face.

“I’ll . . . never . . . tell you.” Her air gushed out, a wheeze of pain that scraped across the raw, scorched skin on my chest and neck.

“Tell me!” He gouged the blade forward.

She grunted.

I still couldn’t see her, and I sensed I should. But I could feel the stroke of her hand on my brow, the kiss she’d given me each night before bed, her whispered words that I must remember. That I must seek her . . .

In my mind’s eye, her feral smile rose, blistering across the king.

He howled, but he didn’t feel true pain. He was just giving voice to his frustration.

In that instant, she became the beautiful woman who must’ve captured my father’s attention and the adoration of all of Weldsbane. I could picture her dancing with him inside the same ballroom where I’d spun Tempest around, and the sound of her laughter was a precious balm to my tortured soul.

Even then, he’d used her, never loved her. He wasn’t capable of the feeling and that was why his soul remained cracked. It would never heal, and he’d die alone.

“If you don’t tell me, I’ll make him do it for you.” The words clawed their way up Ivenrail’s throat.

“Never,” she snarled, the word bleeding with pain. So much pain that it consumed her.

“Look at him one last time, then.” Defeat did not ring in the king’s voice. No, it was charged with a determined force she could not withstand.

I didn’t blame her for letting her soul seep from her body or for leaving me in this monster’s clutches. She’d done everything she could to protect me, to ensure I knew what I’d have to do in the end.

Ivenrail slashed out with power, and I felt her lift away from the agony and drift across the room. Her fingertips were a mere whisper across my face.

Remember .

The power-charged knife dropped from Ivenrail’s hand, clattering on the stone floor, and he spun, striding toward me with limitless rage burning in his eyes.

I lifted my head, wanting one last look at my mother before I’d drag my gaze away from her and never peer in that direction again.

My mother did not hang from the wall.

Tempest’s bloody carcass did.