Queen of Blood and Vengeance (Secrets of the Faerie Crown #4)

26. Veyka

26

VEYKA

The fortress of Cayltay was damn depressing.

Unlike Baylaur, with the goldstone palace perched on the mountainside and the city sprawling across the valley beneath it, there were no buildings or residences radiating out from the high stone walls. There was inhospitable marshland and trees whose branches did not start until a hundred feet in the air, making them impossible to scale.

The fortress itself was a mess of gray stone, with a dizzying array of turrets and crenellations that seemed to make no sense to an outside observer. Maybe that was the point—to disorient any foe trying to decide where to concentrate their attack. I counted at least seven towers rising above the tangle of stone, every one a different height. The tallest of them rose until its spire disappeared entirely into the fog that seemed to cling to the place.

It was not the sort of place that welcomed visitors.

“What is the best way in?” I asked, tilting my head to consider. Of course, there was my way. But Arran had already vetoed that.

“There is only one,” Arran said grimly. He took the first steps into the marshland and the rest of us followed.

“What about the lake? Surely there is a port of some kind,” Lyrena asked, falling into step off my shoulder, on the opposite side as Arran. I rolled my eyes, even though no one was paying me any kind of attention.

Arran had his battle axe already in hand. “It would be a point of weakness. There is only one way into Cayltay. And two ways out.”

I opened my mouth to say something sarcastic, but when Barkke beat me to it, there was no mirth in his voice.

“The way you came in, or death,” he said.

Barkke had never been south of the Spine, by both his and Arran’s accounts. But he knew the legends of Cayltay. They must be pervasive in the terrestrial kingdom—and carefully concealed from elementals.

“And you terrestrials think we’ve got a flair for the dramatic,” Lyrena laughed. Like Arran, she had her weapon in hand. In her other, flames danced. “What about magic?”

“Stone doesn’t burn, Lyrena,” I said, flashing a grin over my shoulder.

“But flesh does,” she winked back.

Arran’s beast growled at our insolence. “The wards here are different than the ones on the goldstone palace. Because the royal line does not pass through families, it repels certain types of magic instead. No vines can climb the walls.”

“And let me guess—no airy terraces that could be infiltrated by shifters?” I said, turning my saccharine smile in his direction and ignoring the fact that my boots were now wet with stagnant marsh water.

He’d once complained about the balconies of the goldstone palace. Coming from a place like this, I could begin to understand how he’d found the elemental palace deficient by comparison. At least in terms of defensibility. This place would win no accolades for beauty.

“You want to linger outside in this?” As he said it, he caught my hands between his. I’d shucked my gloves so they wouldn’t be in the way if I wanted to grab my weapons. As we walked, he lifted one hand to his mouth, cupped between his larger ones, and blew several long puffs of hot air. When he was satisfied that one hand was warm, he changed it for the other.

A wasted effort in cold like this. But I did not stop him.

Nor did I pull my hand away when we reached the gate.

For a fortress so imposing, the gate was anything but—wooden, with metal posts joining the crossbeams. I could see right through to the other side, where a crowded inner bailey was already filled with curious onlookers. But to do so, I had to look over the shoulder of the guard standing in the dead-center of the gate.

“One guard? Arrogant,” I said, flipping a dagger in my hand to stem the nervous energy.

I wasn’t afraid of the terrestrials. I was afraid for them. If they were as obstinate as those north of the Spine had been, then many more would die. Unnecessarily.

Arran kept his eyes pinned to the singular figure before us.

“The Dolorous Guard,” he said. “You must kill the guard on duty in order to be admitted to the fortress.”

I caught the dagger in my palm. “Barbaric. I like it.”

“I’ve always wanted to try my hand against the Dolorous Guard,” Barkke said, cracking his jaw and swinging his mace.

“Any rules? Weapons, magic?” Lyrena asked. Her eyes already had that feral glint that meant blood, and she’d flicked her braid back over her shoulder.

Arran was not the type to roll his eyes. But he did sigh. “Terrestrials train their entire lives for the honor of joining the Dolorous Guard. Hundreds of years. Some serve longer than a thousand.”

My smile matched Lyrena’s. “Even better.”

I felt the flash of desire shoot through Arran— oh, that wicked smile of mine really did do things to him —but he did not act on it. Instead, he stepped ahead of all three of us, battle axe ready.

“I’ve done this dozens of times over the last three centuries.”

“Bragging or reminding us you’re an old male?” I said, stepping to my place at his side. “I’ll do it.”

His beast rewarded me with a growl that had me pressing my thighs together. He coveted my wicked smiles. I reveled in the possessiveness of his beast. The male stared down at me, an argument forming in his onyx eyes.

I cut it off.

“This tattoo might symbolize something north of the Spine. But here? They won’t believe I’ve earned it.”

I’d been thinking about it constantly as we made our way south. The Terrestrial Kingdom of the Fae had accepted an elemental ruler for seven thousand years, but as a figurehead. The High King and Queen ruled from Baylaur; the terrestrial heir, be it queen or king depending on the generation, might occasionally travel back here to Cayltay every few hundred years. But I was asking for something different—demanding it. I would walk through that deceptively simple gate as Arran’s equal, bearing the mark of a terrestrial. A Talisman was sacred. The terrestrials of Eilean Gayl had not bestowed it upon me lightly. But I also knew that some here in Cayltay would see it as a rallying cry—and not to join our cause against the succubus.

Not that there should be any debate about joining. These were our troops to command.

Fucking politics.

I squeezed Arran’s hand harder where it was still hooked around mine. I wanted to reach for his face, to kiss him—fuck it. I deserved all the kisses I could get.

I molded my body against his, claiming his mouth for every onlooker to see. I was not just the Queen of the Elemental Fae. I was Arran Earthborn’s mate. This place had made him hard, these people had hurt him and his mother, Elayne. But now he belonged to me, and soon they would learn the full meaning of that.

By the time I lowered my feet to the ground, Arran was hard against me and I knew I’d won even before I said— “Let me show them.”

The ring of black fire around his pupils gave me his answer.

“Remember, you only need to kill the one.”

I flicked my other dagger into my palm. “What fun is that?”