A Kingdom of Lies (Realm of Fey #2)

CHAPTER 37

Windows exploded as slick grey bodies shattered through them. The shards of glass fell upon the crowd like rain as they froze, gripped with terror. It was impossible to know who screamed louder, the petrified humans or the monstrous gryvern.

There was no time to think, only act.

In the panic, Aldrick had withdrawn completely from my mind. Duncan’s distraction had been the beginning, but the gryvern flooding the great hall had been the knife that separated his cord. My body was mine again, and so was my voice.

“Duncan!” I shouted over the chaos. “Leave him.”

Aldrick was being surrounded by the silver-plated guards. His aged, drawn voice was muffled by the thundering of feet, screams and horror that clasped the room.

For a brief moment, I’d never been so thankful to see the sickening creations of King Doran’s curse.

I pleaded for Duncan to join me. This moment of distraction was what we needed to get away from Aldrick.

“Stay with me, okay?” I said to Elinor, who faced the horror with an expression of stern power. I gripped her wrist and held it as though she was the most precious thing in the world. “We are getting out of here. Now. Duncan, come!”

I could do little but watch as the gryvern picked humans up without care, ripping limbs apart with a sickening wet noise that turned my stomach inside out. The death transfixed me, as well as Elinor, who muttered her husband’s name quietly as though she knew what these creatures were to him.

By the time I looked back towards Duncan, Aldrick was no longer in sight, removed from the room with haste. Meanwhile, the human king and queen were left for the feasting creatures, holding onto each other upon the floor. No one went to help them. They were not even an afterthought.

“I will help them,” Elinor shouted as though reading my mind. She tore her arm from my grip and positioned her body towards the human royals. “Go and calm your Hunter before my husband’s monsters reach us. If this is our chance to get out of Lockinge we will not have long before the window closes.”

I nodded, feeling the warmth from my body drain. My throat tightened at the prospect of escaping. Perhaps I should’ve demanded we left the human royals and thought of ourselves. But the steely look in Elinor’s diamond-bright eyes told me she would’ve refused.

The humans who circled Duncan had either fled with Aldrick or raced towards the beasts with forced confidence. Hunters swung short swords and fists, both as pathetic as the other against the clawed and sharp-toothed monsters. Many flooded out beyond the open doors, beneath the dripping of flesh and blood, only to be greeted by a sky filled with the flying demons.

I reached Duncan with ease. He stood before me, shoulders rising and falling dramatically. I reached instinctively for him and was met with a sharp, sudden pain that had my fingers rearing back.

“What’s happening to me?” His voice popped and crackled, charged from within as the bolts of stark light still raced across his skin. Duncan held his hands before him, looking down at the snakes of power that circled his fingers and set the hairs across his strong arms aloft.

“We can figure it out,” I replied, breathless from urgency. “But only when we are far away from this place. You’re alive, that’s what matters.”

Duncan’s glowing gaze widened. It was the only warning that something was wrong before his hands pushed hard into my chest. The world faded into darkness as the air was driven out of my lungs. Nothing made sense for a long, painful moment until I caught my breath, noticing smoke curling from the burned handprints on my tunic. I was at a distance, my body aching as though every bone had shattered, mended and broke again.

Duncan was no longer standing where he had been. Instead, he dangled in the air, kept from the ground by the gryvern whose taloned claws pierced his arms. I couldn’t conjure enough breath to shout as the prickling of Duncan’s new power still coursed through my body. I watched, splayed across the floor, as Duncan reached up, wrapped a hand around the gryvern’s long, bent leg and forced the blue twisting light into it. The gryvern burned from the inside; the wet pop that followed was beautiful.

Duncan fell hard to the ground as the creature exploded, chunks of gore, bone and skin splattering everywhere. I was stunned, awed by the power that crackled beyond Duncan’s skin. He looked to me, horror and concern creasing his brows.

That was when I saw the Twins. “Be–behind you!”

Duncan had not a moment to spare before they attacked. Each wielded a blade, equally deadly and beautiful with its sharp steel and bejewelled handle. Their lack of trepidation to the power emanating from Duncan only confirmed that their actions were not their own. Duncan threw out his hands before him, a bolt of crackling light following, missing the Twins but colliding against a wall; stone split and exploded, leaving a charred crater in its wake.

My arms shook as I pushed myself from the ground. I could recognise Elinor fussing over the hysterical king and queen, whilst shouting my name to see if I was alright. Her pleas didn’t matter.

I had to help Duncan.

Despite the unknown power crackling around him, Duncan was fluid and precise as he danced around the two fey women, years of training put on display. The Twins did everything to stay away from his fists and reaching hands, but they too had enough training to keep out of harm’s way.

Beside me there was a human body, lifeless and still, clothing drenched in his own blood. His dead fingers gripped a sword that had done little to keep him alive. My body screamed as though it was lit by fire from within. Gritting teeth together against the agony from Duncan’s touch, I clawed myself across the floor, tore the sword free and claimed it as my own.

I raced towards Duncan and the Twins; sword held high. I did so without uttering a sound, knowing the element of surprise would be the only thing to give Duncan a fighting chance. There was no hesitation. Neither paid me mind as they spun and twisted, swords flashing towards Duncan’s exposed skin. As I cut my blade downwards, it was met with steel instead of flesh.

Kayne. He looked over the edge of his blade, eyes narrowed. With a great push he forced me to take steps back, his strength unparalleled.

“They will kill him!” I said, knuckles white as I stared the tracker down. Kayne’s disdain for me was palpable, and his tall body acted as a barrier, preventing me from saving Duncan.

Kayne hesitated, the lines creased across his forehead softening for a moment. My breathing became shallow as I watched his mind turn behind his narrowed eyes. He was captured in his own internal war; then he replied, jaw tightening as he spoke through gritted teeth, “I’m going to fucking regret this.”

Kayne spun, grunting as he brought the hilt of his sword down on the back of one of the Twins’ heads. The crack could have been heard over any level of noise. She dropped, and her narrow body crumpled in on itself. Her counterpart screamed, her entire focus on her sister, who lay in a heap upon the floor, ignoring everything else around her.

Duncan took his chance and joined my side. “Brother,” Duncan panted, facing Kayne who still held the sword determinedly in his fist. “Glad to see you’ve found some sense.”

“What has he done to you?” Kayne whispered, sweeping his sweaty, ginger curls out of his eyes. “Give me a good enough reason not to put you down right now.”

“You won’t do that because it is me ,” Duncan replied. “I can’t tell you what has happened because I don’t know.”

“It’s not right, Duncan. None of this is right.”

“Then help us,” I interrupted, aware that the crowd was thinning and the gryvern would soon be focused on us. “If we don’t get out of here, all of us will die.”

I could see the hesitation in Kayne’s gaze as he looked between Duncan and me, then to the blood-soaked room.

“By helping you I go against the Hand and Duwar. We have been warned about your kind’s trickery. Duncan has been too weak to see it but–”

Sparks of light reached for Kayne as Duncan’s sudden anger exploded around him. “It has all been lies. Kayne, see it for what it is.”

“We really don’t have time for this.” I wanted to tug on Duncan’s hand and draw him away from here, but his power frightened me, and it was still crackling in the air around his body. Even now I felt the lingering pain from his touch; the burns in my shirt were enough warning as to what would happen if his charged touch met mine again.

Elinor cried out, capturing our attention. She pulled back on the arm of the queen who was being dragged by the claws of a gryvern. Her cry was one that would inspire war. Powerful and determined, Elinor did everything in her strength to hold on without the help of the cowering king at her feet.

Kayne sprung to action before we had the chance to help. He raced forward, sword held with two hands above his head. With a great leap he swung it downwards, aiming for the gryvern’s claws. But he was too late. Elinor let go, tumbling from the momentum until the back of her head hit the slabbed floor. The human queen was ripped into the air, thrown into the claws of another gryvern who treated her more like a toy. Kayne’s sword slapped into the ground, sparks emanating from the collision. With the strength of his strike, I was surprised the floor didn’t split in two.

I raced to Elinor’s side, helping her up. “We need to leave.”

She grunted her response, reaching for the back of her matted curls with a wince. “I tried to help her.”

“I know, you did all you could,” I replied, witnessing as Kayne consoled the human king. “But now is our chance to run. Do you think you can manage it?”

Elinor nodded, stern and resolute. “I would rather die by the hands of my husband’s children than visit the prisons again. We leave, or I die happily.”

Husband’s children . In that one comment she confirmed what I’d learned after seeing Erix’s transformation.

“There is far too much that is required from you in Wychwood,” I told her, gritting my jaw as I pulled her to her feet. “Dying is not on the cards today. Not for any of us.”

“Fine,” Kayne shouted. “We leave together. Now. Before I change my mind. Those doors will take us out into the belly of Lockinge. I need to find Lucari and she will scout the skies for the safest time to leave.”

Lucari, as Duncan had explained, was the hawk I’d seen nestled upon Kayne’s shoulder.

There was no time for further discussion. Kayne took the human king, arm draped over his shoulder, and I helped Elinor as we left the room together. The gryvern were growing restless. They’d successfully picked through the crowds, toying with the dead flesh of the humans with growing distaste. Without living humans to feast upon, it was likely they remembered why they had come all this way. For me.

Duncan led the way, an illuminated torch of power. He kicked open the door, boot leaving a scorched mark across the wood. Into the dark corridor beyond we ran, Kayne forced to close it behind him.

Something heavy thumped into the other side as Kayne lowered the slat across the door, locking it in place. Then another. And another. Gryvern flew into the door, straining the wood until it groaned and snapped beneath their weight. Even the aged wall around it shuddered, fluttering dust upon us like snow.

All we could do was run.

“Don’t let go of me,” I said to Elinor.

“Never,” she replied, breathless. “I did with your mother and vowed I never would again.”

Her words kept me going, each step less of a struggle as the memory of my mother raced through my mind. Even with the heavy, draining echo that the iron collar left upon me, I felt close to her, with the hand of her friend enclosed within mine.

Duncan led us blindly through the castle. Every now and then Kayne would shout a direction. It was clear the Tracker had been within these walls before. It was a maze of darkness and stone for the rest of us. Putting my trust in him to guide us to safety wasn’t my first choice, but I was out of others.

The sky beyond was dark, Lockinge alight with terror as gryvern wreaked havoc. I had caused every pain and death beyond the castle’s walls. It should’ve made me feel guilt. If the humans within the city didn’t already hate the fey enough they would despise us even more now. Just like the humans in Ayvbury had when they had been senselessly attacked by the fey king’s creatures. The horror from this evening would snap the little hope of tolerance between both realms, a wound that might never heal.

Pushing all of those thoughts aside, I focused on the burning need thrumming through my blood. The need to survive. It made thinking about anything else impossible. One foot in front of the other, breathing harsh yet focused, I kept my attention on putting as much distance between myself and this place as I could.

“Robin Icethorn, where do you think you are going?”

Aldrick’s presence crept back into my mind like a vicious snake, constricting and hungry. I opened my mouth to cry out in warning until his command kept me quiet.

“Silent. Until I tell you to speak, you will listen.”

My body kept moving despite my wish for it to stop. I looked to Duncan’s back, wishing nothing more than to call out and tell him what was happening. Aldrick kept me compliant, his controlling, unseen strings tied tight around my body and mind once again.

“Did you truly believe I would simply let my two most valuable assets leave my castle so easily?”

I screamed back, voice filling my head. “ It is too late.”

“It is not. Now, you are going to do what it is I tell you to do. Understand?”

“No.”

Aldrick’s laugh bounced across my skull. “ Like a fly within a spider’s web, you have flown too close. I will not let my treasure slip so easily through my fingers. Come to me. All of you.”

I blinked as directions filled my head. Without being able to stop myself I called out, voice mimicking what Aldrick spoke within me, “If we leave now, we will only be picked off by the gryvern. Follow me.”

“Robin,” Duncan shouted as I turned, pulling Elinor with me. “What are you playing at? If we go back, we will only lose ourselves within Lockinge. We need to get outside to make sense of our direction.”

“Trust me,” Aldrick made me reply. Elinor was more trusting than Duncan, but even she noticed a shift in my behaviour.

I pleaded for her to comment about it. To say something, anything for me to reply and tell her what was happening within my mind.

“Why me?” I asked as my hurried footsteps lead us back into the heart of Lockinge, right towards Aldrick.

“Because your mind is wide open, and your will is weak. If you did not wish to be such an easy catch, then you should put up more of a fight like Duncan did. My, how he impressed me.”

There was nothing I could do or say to stop the inevitable from happening. That spark of hope that I’d clung to dissipated as I led Elinor, Duncan and Kayne, who still carried the king, towards Aldrick.

We were all flies, and this castle was an elaborate web that not even the king could have crawled out of. This was Aldrick’s domain now, we simply dwelled within it.