A Kingdom of Lies (Realm of Fey #2)

CHAPTER 40

We ran, feet pounding through corridors and endless connected rooms each as barren and lifeless as the next. Mixed with the sound of our heavy footfalls were clattering steel and the occasional screech of gryvern that still tore through the castle in search of us.

There was no room for trust as we moved with haste, surrounded by the party of armed assassins. This fate would’ve been far better than being left to the Hand’s plans or the desperation of Doran and his twisted creatures that filled the skies beyond the castle.

A small part of me felt guilty that we had left the human king behind, crying on the floor. Elinor had tried to take him with us, but he refused, pushing her and demanding to be left behind. It seemed my boon did not cover the human king’s survival as Seraphine and her fellow companions did not waste any time retreating, not with the threat of Aldrick awakening and regaining control of our freewill. He had the power, infused with his undeniable connection with the demon God, to overwhelm all our minds and take over.

Run . I screamed at myself, filling my head with that single word as we navigated through the castle.

Duncan held my hand from the moment we left. His grip was certain, full of unwavering strength. He didn’t let me go – wouldn’t let me go. Duncan’s legs were longer than mine, far more powerful and faster; he had to slow himself down a few times to stop from pulling me over.

Seraphine knew where she was going. All we could do was follow instinctively as we raced towards her promise of a friend . I wondered about her twin sister. Had she been part of the Children of the Asp too? Perhaps her life was the price Seraphine had to pay to see me delivered to the highest bidder.

Our party came to a sudden stop when the breeze of nightly air cut through the stuffy, stone walls of the castle. We’d flown down a narrow corridor that ended in an open doorway. Two, maybe three figures stood waiting for us, shapes outlined against the night behind them. If it was not for Seraphine’s continuous running, I would’ve believed them to be enemies, yet another barrier stopping our escape. We rushed towards the open door, only slowing our run as we reached the figures.

“They wait for you at the shore, Seraphine,” one said the moment we reached them. They spoke to her only, caring little for our party. Duncan stood before me, hiding me from view behind his back. “You told us you would have one. Not four.”

“Plans change,” Seraphine replied, voice light and full of twisted pleasure. “We accommodate.”

“But the bounty doesn’t cover–”

“Send a report only when you hear that the Hand has crawled his way out of the predicament I’ve left him in,” Seraphine interrupted. “Monitor his movements and keep me informed. Be wary. He will be furious as a result of our betrayal and will likely see all those around him as traitors. Keep your distance. Continue ingesting your stores of Mariflora. Strike for information only when the time is right.”

They nodded in agreement, their silence telling me all I needed to know about the hierarchy of the group.

I noticed as other beings peeled from the balcony of sorts that we had come to. Duncan did too as his hand tightened in mine.

Wind ripped around the towering walls and the heavy scent of salt itched my nose; as I breathed in, I could taste it, thick and undeniable. The swollen moon’s reflection rippled across the expanse of darkness below us; even the winds could not hide the lullaby of water rushing over rock and stone.

“The path down to the coastline is old and worn, tread carefully but move quickly.” Seraphine’s command was meant for all of us. “If we don’t get you far from Lockinge now, there will not be another chance again. Go. With haste.”

We continued running, feet clattering down the steep set of steps that seemed to have been carved into the castle’s outer wall. Light was sparse which made it feel as though each footstep down was another closer to our final fall. Seraphine led the way, each of us following behind, wind ripping at our faces.

I felt pure relief when the world seemed to settle, and our feet touched down on solid, flat ground. Cold sprays of water splashed across our skin. Our feet crunched over stones, slick and wet from the swell of the dark ocean before us.

When I spoke, my voice felt shattered, as though I spoke through shards of glass embedded in my throat. “I’m frightened.”

Duncan wrapped his arm around me, body damp from the ocean’s spray. “Rightly so, but I’m not leaving your side this time. I won’t let you out of my sight ever again.”

I pressed my forehead into the mounds of his chest, feeling his hard muscle push back against my face. “If I could have done this all again, I would never have come. I put you in danger and I’ll never forgive myself.”

“My actions are my own,” Duncan replied, large hand taking the back of my head and rubbing it in calming circles. “I wished to meet the Hand as much as you, yet it would seem that hope was all in vain.”

Seraphine busied herself, shouting towards our crew as she waded into the body of rocking dark water. A boat, small and weak, clattered into the pebble shore. I was certain the rough sea could have broken it into pieces of useless wood if the weather was any wilder. It was incredible to believe that this small vessel was our only hope of leaving this city.

“He told you their names,” I whispered, lips pressed to his skin. Duncan tasted of salt and copper. “Tell me that it was worth it at least. Give me a reason to cling onto some feeling that this was worth something.”

Duncan stilled, his hand ceasing its circles as it paused upon my head. My face moved, rippling as he took a hulking breath inward. “I don’t believe I’m ready to face the truth the Hand has revealed to me. Not yet.”

I pulled back, glaring up through the darkness at Duncan’s stern, glassy-eyed expression. “When you are ready, I will be here to help piece it together with you.”

He looked down, forcing a smile as the world around us drained away. “Repeat that promise to me when we make it far from Lockinge, okay?”

I had no plans of leaving Lockinge, not yet. I had a promise to those fey beneath the castle to see through. However, I couldn’t admit it yet.

Reaching up onto my toes, body aching from tiredness and deliria, I pressed a feather-light kiss upon Duncan’s lips. I felt his own quiver in response, pressing out to greet mine for a small, brief moment. There was a tension between us, taut and harsh; I only hoped we had the space and time to deal with it soon.

“There will be plenty of time for that.” Seraphine pulled us apart, hands harsh and nails unforgiving. “Get in the boat, both of you.”

Her urgency and unruly panic had us both moving towards the shoreline. Kayne already waited within the small vessel, standing with legs wide as he steadied himself against the rocking. Seraphine’s fellow assassins held the boat as steady as possible like an anchor, some chest-deep.

“Come quickly,” Elinor spluttered, hand outstretched as her chestnut curls flew wildly around her face. For a moment, it was like seeing the vision of my mother that had haunted me all these years. Face obscured by floating hair, lullaby voice soft and gentle, even beneath the bellowing of winds that tore around us.

Seraphine waited for us to move. She took up the rear, looking back up towards the castle as though Aldrick would fly out from the windows in search of us at any given moment.

I reached for Elinor, taking her hand, and she led me ankle-deep into the water. We were only a few steps in when the dark night exploded with unwanted light. I clamped my eyes shut, almost losing my footing as the sudden light shocked me with its blinding brilliance.

“This ends tonight as it should have many years ago,” a voice called out over the crashing waves.

I stopped dead in my tracks, water lashing up my legs. Elinor’s grip on my hand weakened and fell, and I felt entirely alone and helpless as I turned to face the speaker.

King Doran Oakstorm stood upon the shore, outline glowing as though a star burned beneath his skin. His power stained the rocky shore and the castle far beyond him as he lit the scene like a beacon. The rippling of the portal he had stepped through faded behind him. At first it was hard to see his features until his glowing skin died down to a smattering of embers. Bloated belly, sunken, grotesque skin, short, awkward frame. For a man with such tremendous power, he looked as though it did not belong to him.

“Get in the boat!” Seraphine said, voice deep as the ocean that waited behind us.

“Quiet, Asp ,” Doran spat, displeased. “I have come for the boy. This time I will not leave without seeing him dead.”

Fury erupted within me. All the pent-up emotions, all the regret and hesitation evaporating on the wind the moment I laid eyes upon him.

“You have come all this way for me?” I asked, wading back through the water towards Doran.

This was what I wanted. Army or not, I didn’t need them to take him down.

Even with my power cut off by the iron cuff, and the lack of weapons in my hands, I felt the urge to run at him, to destroy him with my bare hands. Seeing him conjured the faces of all those who had died. Mother. Father. The memory of Erix. All the innocent lives, human and fey, lost in the crossfire of his hate. And the gryvern, his children, warped and twisted into creatures. They didn’t choose to be born. Doran condemned them from the moment he spread his careless seed. For them all, I would kill him.

I had a hunger in that moment, one that was only quenched by death. Seeing Doran reminded me of my father and the way the light dulled from his eyes. How I carried his broken and lifeless body to his eternal resting place within the Icethorn Court. Seeing Doran reminded me of it all, the storm of feelings smashing into me all at once. Even with my power severed, the hate that fuelled me made me feel like the most powerful being in the world.

“And who is this?” Doran mused as Duncan stood between us. His frame was wide and strong, hands balled into fists of stone at his sides. “Ah yes, Erix told me of you. The human Hunter whose heart has been touch by his enemy. Poetic how your parents’ story has followed you like a cursed shadow. It would be a pleasure killing you, Hunter, to see Robin suffer and to know your kind could never do as you have to my family again–”

“Dearest husband, is that you?” Elinor called out, passing me with grace and ease. Her voice was a song, soft and welcoming. It was as though the water parted as she walked through the shallows with an ease that belonged only to those who demanded respect. Even nature bowed to Elinor.

Duncan took the moment of distraction to his advantage. Wrapping his arm around my chest, he turned his back on Doran and spoke. “This is no longer your fight, darling.”

Perhaps my hearing was damaged, or the reality of what was happening finally came through the pure undeniable wish to cause Doran pain. But it took me a long moment to grasp what Duncan said and what he meant by it.

Doran’s light faltered as his long-lost wife stepped free of the dark water. Her torn dress clung to her emaciated frame. The longest strands of her hair hung in clumps from where they had dragged through the water.

“It cannot be,” Doran said, voice breaking with each word. “A trick. A ghost.”

We all watched as the fey king trembled where he stood. Doran’s heavy body thudded to the ground, knees slamming into stone without him showing an inch of care. In a heartbeat the burning power of his light dwindled to nothing, and he was simply a broken man, watching the phantom of his beloved wife walk towards him.

The far-off screams of gryvern built in the distance. They grew ever closer. But the night-washed sky made it harder to make out their shapes, or how close they were.

“Time to go,” Seraphine spoke, appearing suddenly from the shadows. “I’ve got coin to collect, and for that all I care about is seeing you out of this place. Enough time has been wasted to distraction.” She snatched my arm and began pulling me towards the boat. Duncan did not hesitate to follow nor refuse to leave without Elinor.

“I can’t leave her,” I said, watching as Elinor reached up for the full cheek of her husband. Greedy, stout hands reached for hers with frantic urgency and I heard his small, broken voice speak with a furious desperation.

“My love,” Doran cried, his heartache amplified across the night sky. “I have found you.”

“Indeed,” Elinor replied, standing above Doran, back straight and unwavering. “All these years and I thought I would never see you again.”

“I – I searched for you,” Doran said, spluttering like a pathetic fool. “Given time I would have ripped this entire realm apart in your memory. Everything I have done since you were taken has been for you. Everything, my love.”

“That I do not doubt.” Her reply was cold and void of any love.

Something hard smacked into my back and I realised I was now waist-deep in water. Seraphine shouted something at Duncan who promptly followed by hoisting me up. Kayne reluctantly aided me into the boat. All this happened without taking my focus off Elinor and Doran.

“The Court has been poisoned since you were taken,” Doran said, ignorant to Elinor’s change in demeanour. “But your return will make it a home again.”

Behind them the air split, untethering in two lines of pure golden light that created a portal.

Elinor stepped back. “I can’t come with you.”

“Pardon?” Doran replied, breathless as he forced his body from the ground as he stood. Elinor towered above him, in height and grace.

“I was never taken from you, Doran. All these years and the deaths that have followed have been nothing but wasted life. They would have never brought me back to you, then or now. And I would rather face a lifetime imprisoned within this realm than ever stand proudly beside you. How could I rule willingly beside a monster?”

Doran stumbled, swallowing his words thickly. We were in the boat now, feeling it rise and fall over the waves as the other assassins guided us out towards the endless, dark expanse.

“Wait,” I said, gripping the boat’s edge as I continued looking out towards Elinor and Doran. “Wait.”

From a distance it would have seemed that two lovers embraced after a prolonged time apart, but I knew different. Having shared our truths, I knew how Elinor loathed Doran – even more than I did.

Elinor’s hand drifted into her dress and quickly pulled free, as though she never had moved. Even from far away, with the splashing dark water between us, I could catch the glint of metal in her hand.

“But I love you,” Doran cried out, fingers glowing as he raised them before him. “Everything I have done has been out of my love…”

His voice faltered when Elinor drew her arm backwards until it bent at her elbow, then thrust it forward with strength only one scorned could hold. She stabbed the Oakstorm king, over and over, the beating of the dagger’s hilt against his chest melding with the beat of my frantic heart. Elinor held the king within her arms, thrusting and jabbing, until a ragged cry tore from her throat and filled the night sky. Even the winds died down as her anguish spilled into it.

Duncan held me, arms wrapped around my chest as he stopped me from falling out of the boat; only then did I register that I cried her name out across the water, throat ripping to shreds as I equalled Elinor’s cry.

King Doran Oakstorm fell onto the shore, not a speck of light left within his body, the portal gone. Elinor dropped her arms to her side, dagger falling into the waters that rushed up and claimed it. Then she turned her back on the body and waded out towards us.

“Hold,” Seraphine shouted. I could hardly care that Kayne and Seraphine had begun rowing, each slicing an oar through the water. The boat calmed, rocking only because of the waves beneath it now.

And we waited – waited patiently for Elinor Oakstorm. She swam towards us, face held above the water. I imagined Doran’s blood being cleaned from her hands, her clothes, as the ocean drank it away. By the time she reached us, Duncan practically threw himself into the water to help her up. She fell upon her back in the boat, hands clasped over her chest as she looked up into the night.

“It is truly over,” I said, looking down at her. There was an empty, light feeling of relief that filled my chest. It shared the space with another feeling, a darker one of jealously that it was not I who had the chance to pierce the blade into his chest. “For good.”

Elinor blinked, tired eyes flicking over the stars as though she wished to remember every single one she saw. “I did it for Lovis. For your mother, Julianna. And for you. Doran will never hurt you again – never hurt anyone. His tirade of pain and suffering is over.”

I leaned down, pressing my forehead to hers, tears spilling freely. Duncan placed a hand upon my shoulder, his touch a welcome anchor as I lost myself to my emotions.

“You,” I added, voice no more than the flutter of a bird’s broken wing, weak and tired. “He will never hurt you again either.”