Crown of Ellova, Vol. 1 (Crown of Ellova Duology)

Chapter 10

CHAPTER 10

T he king of Adreania lies on the cart, his breathing irregular, chest slowly rising and falling. He is securely tied to the cart with ropes over his fine clothing. His eyes are bloodshot, his aged face a worrisome shade of white. When he tries to speak, no sound comes out, his mouth opening before gasping for air.

“Jedrick, it’s Lady Arra, your jeweler. Please stay calm. You have been kidnapped, but I’m going to get you to safety.” I retrieve the sword that lies in the grass next to the unconscious rider and slice off some of the ropes, careful of his body beneath them.

He stares, but his clouded gray eyes don’t truly see me.

Once most of the cut ropes have fallen to the ground, he tries to sit up. Careful of how fragile he looks, I help him ease his body into a sitting position, his legs still secured to the cart. It’s against the law to touch Adreanian royalty without express permission but I’m not sure if he is even king anymore. Besides, the forest recognizes no rulers besides Nueena’s mother.

He reaches back the way he came before trying to undo the last of the ropes. He is trying to say something but nothing comes out.

“Please lie back down. The ropes are here to help, to secure you for our journey. ”

Refusing my plea and brushing away my hand, he stares deep into the forest, down the path he just came from, with desperate eyes. Jedrick tries to shove me away in a pitiful display of strength so I take a small step back. It’s useless but he pulls on the ropes anyway before he reaches out again.

The forest is too quiet. No calls of the owls or tentative steps of deer. It is waiting, watching. A shiver runs down my back, the air colder than it was.

Farren comes up next to me to sniff around, boldly investigating the new arrival.

Jedrick lies back down with a soft thump, his breathing labored, and looks up at me, fear in his eyes. This time he reaches out a hand towards me but I ignore it. He may be an old man arriving at the bitter end of his life, but he let so many innocent people suffer and die, his hateful son raining down terror. I refuse to ease his anguish with a touch of comfort.

The crown can’t be removed until death; he just needs to hold on a little longer. The tree portal to Ellova is not far from here.

His arm falls from my rejection and I look at the crown. He has to make it; the crown needs to get to Nueena. I move towards the horse’s head, pulling its reins in the direction of the fae palace.

Jedrick again points back to the way he had come.

“It needs to go—must be on—a living soul. My, my, my?—”

The words look painful to get out as his breaths go shallow, the light beginning to fade in his eyes.

“Grayden is not here, nor is he worthy of it. Your hateful reign is over and you will die knowing you failed your people.”

Jedrick finally looks up at me, terrified. He lays his head down, taking one last choking breath before he goes still, his limp body staring with vacant milky eyes.

Dead.

I hold my breath as the stolen crown falls off his head. For a moment nothing happens.

The dull circlet has fallen onto the cart, which is eroding, the wood turning black. The lush green of the forest floor is gone as the darkness descends at my feet. Black swirls grow from the circlet, racing in all directions as if the grass has been burned. I scramble back as the ground heats, scorched by the violent magic of the crown’s wrath. A burning smell reaches my nose, and hot pain erupts in my lungs from the smoke.

Then the whirling darkness spreading from the crown erupts in flames.

The horse leading the cart rears back. I raise the sword I still hold high in the air and slice through the straps holding the terrified creature to the cart. As soon as it is free, it races off into the forest.

“Farren, RUN!”

He takes off like an arrow from a bow, running in the direction of the cottage.

The magic released from the crown destroys the ground around Jedrick’s blackened corpse. His body now lies on the scorched forest floor; the cart is nothing more than a pile of cinders. Blackness spreads in hateful spirals.

Must be on a living soul. Jedrick’s last words.

Is this what he meant? Was this cursed crown designed to need a living host to channel the magic? I realize with stomach-gutting horror this must be why it cannot be removed until death. The darkness continues to stretch out. It is going to keep spreading; it will burn all of Merawood Forest to the ground before I can get it to Nueena, who might be able to control it.

My ancestor created that crown. I pray that the magic that formed it recognizes that same magic within me. As Alvina’s descendent, I can only hope I can control it, even if half of me is mortal.

Ellova must be protected.

I run into the fire, the ash whirling around my burning boots as I drop to my knees in the burned sphere and reach into the cart’s ashes for the crown.

“ARRA, NO!’’ Someone is screaming my name. No, not my name but the name I abandoned tonight.

Tearing my eyes from the crown for a moment, I gasp as Leon appears, racing up the path before me. A trickle of blood runs down the side of his handsome face, one eye black and blue. Shock and horror roll over me, and I’m torn between Leon and the burning ground.

The longest burn mark yet shoots out around me. I know what I must do.

Grabbing the cold metal, so at odds with the burning ground beneath me, I call all of the magic within me, flowing it into the crown before I slam the wretched circlet on my head.

Oh, Ellova’s grave, I don’t want this.

Leon is shouting, but I can’t focus on his agonized words. The world seems to explode as a splitting headache brings my whole body crashing to the burnt forest floor. The urge to scream overwhelms me, but the pain in my head has stolen any air in my lungs. My own magic is being ripped from me. Not in the way it drains when I cross the Divide, but like claws in my soul. Tearing it out of me and leaving what’s left ruined.

My body is going back and forth between numbness and a stabbing sensation I know is magic warring within me for control. My own magic is extinguished, the crown’s magic taking over.

My eyesight blurs from the pain in my head and the billowing smoke around me, but I can make out that Leon is running straight at me. When he is a few feet away, he launches himself towards the ground, sliding on his knees to my side, soot flying around us, his arms going around me. Darkness spreads over my eyes and I feel myself losing consciousness. The world is spinning but the scorched earth has finally stopped spreading, the flames gone.

“ARRA!’’ Leon’s scream is a broken plea in the darkness.

His bruised face is the last thing I see before everything fades away.