Lady of Shadows (Lady of Darkness #2)

Chapter 47 Scarlett

CHAPTER 47

SCARLETT

“I am not sure how excited the others are going to be to learn they are going to the human lands,” Sorin said to Scarlett as she removed her witch-leathers in their rooms.

“They need a little more adventure in their lives. They’re too pampered up here in this giant palace,” Scarlett said dismissively, walking towards their enormous closet. She heard Sorin chuckle, and she poked her head back into the room. “I never did ask Hazel about these witch-suits.”

After they had agreed that Cassius would come here instead of to the Witch Kingdoms, Hazel had set about showing Scarlett how to make the tonic. It was all common ingredients that could be found nearly anywhere.

“Tonics and elixirs are not so much about magic as they are about combining the right ingredients at the right time and under the proper conditions. But even more than that, it is knowing which ingredients do what to the body and how. Nature has provided everything one would need for healing and nourishment,” Hazel had told her. “When you return, I will teach you properly. And Cassius.”

She had sent them on their way laden down with several of the ingredients to get them by until they could purchase some in Baylorin. Shortly before they’d left, they’d received a message from Rayner that the summit time and location had been set. Hazel had agreed to attend, albeit reluctantly, only with the absolute assurance that Scarlett would be there and that she would not have to deal directly with Talwyn.

“What do they fly on? Broomsticks?” Scarlett now asked Sorin, leaning against the doorframe to the closet, unwinding her hair from its thick braid. She was exhausted after not sleeping the night before. The sun was nearly set, and she was looking forward to a hot bath and sleeping past sunrise tomorrow.

Sorin burst out laughing. “Broomsticks? Why would they ride around on broomsticks?”

She scowled at him. “That’s what is said about Witches in the human stories.”

Sorin only laughed harder. “You cannot be serious?”

Scarlett glared at him, but a small smile formed on her lips. She’d never seen Sorin laugh so hard. She’d never seen him so…happy, despite having to return to the human lands tomorrow.

After he had gotten his laughter under control, he crossed the room to her, unbuckling his own swords and daggers. They hadn’t told anyone they’d returned, although she guessed his Inner Court likely felt them through the wards. They were not wanting company at the moment, though. No, all she wanted was a bed to sleep in.

“No, my Love,” he said, walking by her into the closet, “the Witches do not ride around on broomsticks. They fly on griffins.”

“On what?” Scarlett asked, turning to face him.

“Griffins,” he answered, like she should know what he was talking about. He peeled his tunic from his chest and tossed it to the laundry bag in the corner. Noting the confusion still on her face, he said, “You know, half lion, half eagle beasts. Griffins.”

This time, Scarlett burst out laughing. “Oh, come off it,” she said between giggles. “What do they really fly on?”

An amused smile was on Sorin’s face now. “The Witches fly on griffins, Scarlett. I swear it.”

Scarlett stopped laughing, her eyes widening. “I want to see one.”

“We do not have them here. Only the Witches have managed to tame them, if you can even call it that,” Sorin replied. “When the territories were isolated, all the griffins were sent to the Witch Kingdoms because they were the only ones who seemed to be able to do anything with them.”

“I won’t believe you until I see one,” Scarlett replied matter-of-factly, striding past him and bending down to unlace her boots.

“You will believe they fly around on broomsticks before you will believe they fly on griffins?” he asked. She felt him come up behind her.

“I suppose that’s a valid point,” she conceded as she stood once more. She turned to face him, reaching up a hand to his cheek. There was slight stubble there, and it rubbed at her fingers. “I am sorry my mother kept so much from you.”

Sorin’s eyes darkened a touch, and his own hand came to cup her face. “The thing that haunts me most about the things your mother kept from me is not the threat of what lies in the mortal lands, or the fact that she was with Hazel for nearly three years. It is that I could have found you so much sooner. I could have found you before…”

Scarlett’s heart clenched as she felt his pain and regret. “Sorin, do I wish I had not experienced some of the atrocities I have? Yes, but somehow it all led me here. Somehow, it all led me to you. Even when I lay on a stone floor in a cold manor house believing all hope had been lost, it still led to you. It still led to us. I do not know that I believe in the Fates as you do, but I have to believe that something beautiful always comes from the heartaches we experience. I have to carry that hope that it’s not all for naught.”

A soft smile spread across Sorin’s face as she stared into his golden eyes. “Hope is for the dreamers, Princess.” He leaned in and kissed her softly.

“Darkness is for finding the stars, Prince,” she murmured onto his lips.

Then he pulled back and said, “But can I make a request?”

“Hmm?” Scarlett murmured, still tasting him on her lips. Maybe the bath and bed could wait a little longer…

“I need to know that we will not keep things from each other. We cannot keep the secrets your mother did,” Sorin said tentatively.

Scarlett snapped from her thoughts at his words. “I do believe, Prince, you kept dozens of secrets from me about my very existence.” She stepped back from him slightly, her hands going to her hips.

“Valid point,” Sorin said, crossing his arms across his muscled chest. She tried not to stare as those muscles rippled with his movements. “But to be fair, had you been more forthcoming about things when I met you, I would have figured out who you were a lot sooner, and it would have saved you a lot of trouble.”

An unimpressed smirk formed on Scarlett’s lips. “Are you suggesting I should have just shared intimate details about myself with a complete stranger who clearly disliked me when I first met him?”

Sorin sighed with acquiescence. “My darling, tenacious wife, from this point forward, there are no secrets between us. No hidden plans to surprise one another in other lands.”

“Sorin Aditya,” Scarlett said, stepping back to him and looping her arms around his neck. “I trust you with everything I am. After today, there is nothing I will keep from you. I swear it on the Fates.”

“You do not believe in the Fates,” Sorin said pointedly.

“Fine, I swear on my life,” she answered with a roll of her eyes. “Is there anything else you need to share with me?”

“Not so much a secret, but something you need to know about me and Talwyn,” Sorin ventured cautiously. Scarlett threw him a suspicious glare and stepped back once more. She leaned against the wall, crossing her arms across her chest, waiting for him to continue. He took a deep breath and leaned back against the dresser behind him. Bracing his hands on it, he said, “After your mother left, I went to see the Oracle. To see if she could tell me where your mother had gone.” Scarlett’s brows rose in surprise, but she said nothing. “I went to the Witch lands uninvited and begged the High Witch to take me to the Seer. I did not care if she killed me. I almost wanted her to at that point, but after I spent three nights in their dungeons, she took me there herself. Now I realize it was likely because your mother was there that I was spared.”

“Cyrus didn’t know you went? Or Briar?” Scarlett asked quietly.

“No one,” Sorin said, shaking his head. “The Oracle, of course, did not tell me where Eliné had gone or why. She cut my palm and dripped my blood into a scrying bowl. After peering into it for a long while, she told me something that… I cannot even begin to describe how I felt. Terrified? Enraged? She told me that the daughter of a queen was my twin flame.”

Scarlett’s eyes widened. “You thought your twin flame was Talwyn.”

Sorin shook his head. “I could not even fathom such a thing. I could not imagine ever loving her like that. I had watched her grow up. I loved her as my dear friend’s daughter. Nothing more. The idea of her being my twin flame was horrifying. Even worse, Talwyn believed she had found her own twin flame. His name was Tarek. They had taken the Mark and were in the Trials. The rift between me and Talwyn? It is a great deal my fault. After visiting the Oracle, I did not know what to think. I believed her Trials would fail, and I hated that she was the person I thought I was supposed to love on such a level. I knew she would hate me if I ever told her. She loved Tarek with her entire being.”

Scarlett’s thoughts were racing as she replayed all the various interactions she’d seen between Sorin and Talwyn. “In the courtyard, she asked if your love for her died with my mother?”

“Of course, I knew by that point that you were whom the Oracle had meant, but yes. I completely understood why she said such things. I have never entirely hated her, but I have hated what I thought she was to me. Then we went on that mission to rescue your mother.” Sorin ran a hand through his hair. “Gods, Scarlett, you may not blame me for the death of Eliné, but Talwyn does. And she blames me for the death of her twin flame because Tarek was on that mission as well. Talwyn had sent two with me, trusting that I had found her, and he was one that was… There is so much hurt and anger and conflict that could have been avoided. Things could be so different…”

Silence fell between them in that closet as he trailed off. Scarlett studied him, the sorrow and shame that lined his features. She swallowed thickly as she stepped to him. “An ancient immortal once told me that we make bad calls, but we can’t change them. You deal with it. You learn from it. You become humbled by it. But you do not let it define you. You let it shape you.” She ran her fingertips lightly along his cheek and down his jaw. “Just as I do not wish away the experiences that forged me, you must not wish these things away. They led us here. To this place. To each other.”

“Careful, Princess,” he said with a small smile. “It is starting to sound like you believe in the Fates.”

Scarlett wrinkled her nose at the idea, and he laughed.

“We will go and get Cassius and find these keys and deal with Mikale. Then we will deal with my cousin,” Scarlett replied softly, stroking her thumb along his cheekbone once more. Sorin’s own hand came up and cupped her neck as he leaned down and kissed her. After a moment, she pulled back and, looking into those golden eyes, she said, “Rayner said that no one knows what the Oracle actually looks like. That she appears differently to everyone.”

“That is true,” Sorin replied.

“What did you see?”

“I saw you,” he replied softly.

“What?”

“I thought it was Ashtine, actually. The silver hair, I suppose.” He twined a lock of it around his finger. “Looking back, though, it was you. It has always been you,” he said. She brought her lips back to his, and he deepened the kiss. She slid her hands along his bare chest, and his fingers fisted into her hair as he pulled her against him. “Again with this damn witch-suit,” he murmured onto her lips.

She laughed, stepping back and disentangling herself from him. “I need a bath anyway,” she said sweetly, tugging the witch-suit down her shoulders as she walked away from him.

“Still so wicked,” he said, clicking his tongue.

She only laughed as she began heading to the bathing room, where she knew a steaming bath was waiting for her.

“In the interest of not keeping secrets though…” she trailed off, pausing by the closet door.

“What?” Sorin asked, his eyes narrowed at her.

“The Oracle is Cassius's cousin.”

“What?”

The shock on Sorin’s face made her grin like a mad woman. Maybe Briar was right. Maybe she did enjoy the grand reveal a little too much.

“That is not possible. The Oracle is centuries old. Cassius is…not.”

“The Oracle, it seems, is replaced every millennium or so. When a new all-powerful Seer is born.”

“And you think the Oracle is Cassius's cousin because…?” Sorin asked, doubt creeping into his eyes.

“Hazel told me tonight.”

“When? When did those words cross her lips?”

Scarlett rolled her eyes. “She didn’t come right out and say it. Two went with my mother to the human lands. Sybil and Juliette. When I saw the Oracle, it was Juliette. When I—” Scarlett swallowed. “When she died, it apparently released her essence or something, and she was able to return here and replace the previous Oracle. She had visions. In Baylorin, before everything. It’s how she knew about me. Who I was. She shared the visions with Nuri. It’s how Nuri knew.”

“If Cassius and Juliette are cousins, that would make Sybil…”

“The High Witch’s sister,” Scarlett finished.

Sorin just shook his head and muttered, “I am going to bed.”

Scarlett laughed as she made her way to the bathing room.

She emerged a half hour later, clean and exhausted, and more than ready to sleep and sleep and sleep.

When she approached the bed, though, Sorin lifted his head from his pillow. “Your shadows,” he said softly.

She paused, smiling faintly as she pulled back the covers on her side. “What of them?”

“They are gone.” He was staring at her in fascination.

She smirked, and a whorl of shadows snaked across the bed, caressing his cheek, before fading away into nothing once more.

“How?”

She had realized her shadows had disappeared while she had bathed in the mountain chalet early that morning. She could feel them hovering just beneath the surface, but they were no longer visibly swirling around her unless she commanded them to do so.

“I love my darkness, Sorin. It is beautiful, and I do not wish it away, but I only need it when I lose sight of the stars.”

“You found the light?” She could see a soft smile on his lips as she blew out the candle beside the bed.

“I learned where to look.”

“Oh?” he asked, propping himself onto an elbow to look down at her as she nestled in beside him.

“The brightest star always leads home.”