Sapphire Falls (The Lost Realm #2)

32. Chapter 31

Chapter 31

Savine

S avine sighed, bored from his seat on the throne. He’d left his life of action, of always being outdoors and near the forest, for a mundane life atop a chair. The day to day inner workings of government were dull, duller than Savine expected. Thank the Goddess the war was over and he’d come out victorious, but Goddess damn him, what he wouldn’t give for an excuse to charge through the Middens on Jari or use his essence to defend his people.

At least he had Avery, and she’d jumped into life as his soulmate and queen better than he could have dreamed. She’d found her rhythm, knitting together a close group of women for support as she navigated her new world and new roles. She didn’t even seem too upset about her sister not being at her side. He couldn’t wait to show her the shared throne he had commissioned for them. A throne wide enough for two, with supple leather comfortable enough to sit in for hours side by side.

Savine motioned for a drink, and Darby was there beside him, carrying a cup of wine. The next citizen would be escorted in soon, under heavy guard after the mountain lion shifter tried to take his life.

A Latian with the woodsy essence similar to Savine’s entered the room. With guards on both sides, Savine understood why the court gasped when they saw the man. He was bruised and sliced open on his arms and neck. His leathers were tattered, nearly disintegrating on him. Unlike most fae, who naturally smelled like their essence, his scent was something dirty and rotting.

Those in the throne room made way for the man, leaving a clear path to the throne. When the fae saw Savine, he started shrieking with laughter; like a man lost in the madness of his own mind.

The guards on all sides of him drew their weapons, ready to end the wretch before he got too close to their king.

Savine felt Raikin’s quick, fluid steps toward him. He’d been hiding in the shadows, observing, as he often did when Savine held court. “This man was found wandering the forest north of here, rambling something about carriages without moose pulling them.”

Savine frowned at Raikin. “Was he alone? Did he say where he came from?”

Raikin slowly nodded his head. “I was informed there was a body with him. He was decomposing in a way that shouldn’t happen to a young fae with so much essence left in his body. The trauma to his head suggested a weapon made of iron.”

Savine’s eyes widened. “Carriages without moose?” Raikin nodded.

“See that Darby prepares a private meeting space.”

“A wise choice, My King.” Raikin slipped away, speaking to the guards who turned with the filthy prisoner and led him out of the throne room.

Savine dismissed his court, leaving through a side door as he followed Darby into an outdoor hallway that led to another segment of the King's Residence. Try as he might, he always thought of it in that way now, with the playfulness Avery brought to the word.

“The guards are making the man more presentable for you and they’ll meet you in the city view room. Is there anything you need?” Darby asked.

“Bring something hearty for the man. Raikin has reason to believe that he came through the portal. He’ll most likely be hungry. Avery has suggested that most of the area on my father’s map would be wilderness in her world. If so, the man may be starved.”

Darby pursed her lips. “We should assume he went through on the old king’s orders. If so, he is your enemy.” She took Savine’s hands in her small, pale green hands. “Please, Savine, be careful meeting with such a man. We know now that your father was dabbling in powers that aren’t meant for a fae. Who knows what he’s done to these folk to be able to send them through a portal and back like that.”

Savine shook his head, trying not to dismiss her worries, but there was no reason to fear this fae. “Don’t fear. Just bring the food up once the man joins me.”

Darby bowed low, leaving Savine alone in the hall. The cool breeze brushed past him and he inhaled the faint scent of the forest. What he wouldn’t give for some time alone with Avery in the forest instead of dealing with constant disasters like this.

He felt down the bond. There she was. Running, he thought. She felt light, happy, and free. Mentally, he stroked that bond, sending his love down it. It was easier now, always feeling her close, even when she wasn’t near him. Always being able to connect to her, to be reassured that she was safe, she was happy. Thinking back, he wasn’t sure how he survived those two separations without this deep connection to her.

She responded down the bond and it felt as though she were dancing in his soul. Goddess alive, he didn’t know how he’d survived so long without her. Without this better half of himself.

Savine took one last long, deep breath, scenting the moisture on the cedar boughs and went back inside. He made his way to the city view room. It was empty, which was what he hoped. He looked out the paned windows that provided a view of Orofine below. The city was bustling with folk, even though the weather was turning brisk.

So far, the city had seen a steady stream of nomadic groups enter the city, seeking help or looking for reassurance that Jasper was actually gone. Many of the folk he’d met were in poor health, desperately in need of food after being forced into a lifestyle that they weren’t accustomed to. He could see one such group, making their way to the gates of the city, loaded with supplies that Savine prayed would last through the harsh winter. This group, like so many, wanted to return to the nomadic lives that they’d been denied under Jasper’s regime, and Savine hoped that many of them would find solace in the free and open plains of the Middens next summer.

A knock on the door caught his attention, and Savine called for the folk to enter. Raikin led the way into the room, a few guards and the cuffed man behind him. The man was bathed, hair still damp, and his clothing was fresh.

He looked at Savine with hatred in his eyes as he spat at Savine’s boots.

“You don’t deserve the crown atop your head,” the man hissed.

Savine felt nothing but cool distaste as he looked at the emaciated man. The man despised him, had served his father loyally, yet what had it gotten him in the end? His essence was so faded that the whorls on his skin were but a ghost of what they should be.

There was something familiar about the man. No doubt, Savine would have seen him around Orofine if he’d served Jasper in any close capacity.

That was it. He was a former guard for his father. “Kinlon, isn’t it?” Savine said, his tone soft.

The man sneered, tugging at the chains that held him back. “You betrayed your father and your folk! How dare you wear the boughs and antlers.”

Savine quirked his lip into a half-smile. “The Goddess and the folk of Latiah seem to think otherwise. Despite your treasonous words, no harm will come to you in this room.” Savine directed the guards to let the man sit. Raikin called for Darby, and she brought in a tantalizing stew. The scent of it made Savine want some for himself, despite having recently eaten.

He didn’t give in to the temptation as he watched the man dig into the dish. Kinlon moaned and slurped, shaking as if he couldn’t survive another moment without sustenance. The chain between his handcuffs was just enough length that he was able to feed himself, but not enough to cause harm to himself or Savine and Raikin.

The sight of the man eating with no dignity made all thoughts of eating disappear. He looked at Raikin, who wore a revolted look on his own face. Wordlessly, he watched the man finish his meal.

When Kinlon was finished, he turned his attention back to Savine. His face had splatters of stew meat caught in his beard, and his eyes had a spark of disgust. “I suppose I’ll soon die from poison. In any case, I hope you rot in the depths of the Abyss. That you will feel no relief for what you have done to Latiah.”

The guards moved in closer, weapons drawn, but Savine waved them back. If this man did take Savine’s life, he would be joining him in the depths of the Abyss. There was no lesser consequence for killing one’s sovereign. And that was what Savine had become. He had absolute power over this nation, over his folk. Including this nobody who detested him so palpably.

“You best watch your words. You won’t be the first to find the trees will act out my punishment for me,” Savine said through gritted teeth. “Raikin, will you see the guards out? I believe we should have a private conversation with Kinlon.”

Raikin stood and ushered the guards out of the room, latching the door behind them. “My King?” The question in Raikin’s tone was heavy with meaning. He knew what Raikin was capable of doing to draw answers from this man.

“Not yet, Raikin. Feel free to ask questions, though.”

Raikin nodded.

Savine sat across from Kinlon, Raikin standing behind him. “Tell me, Kinlon. I haven’t seen you on the battlefield in at least a decade. Where did my father send you?”

The man scowled at Savine before he kicked the bowl from the low table between them, launching the mess of stew and earthenware bowl toward Savine.

Savine pressed his hand up, releasing some of his essence as a wall of foliage came between them, stopping the bowl before it clattered to the hard wooden floors. Did he need to use his essence to stop a bowl? No, of course not, but he did want Kinlon to remember who he was and what essence flowed through his veins.

Savine sent vines forth, binding the man’s legs. The man pursed his lips, eyes alight with frustration and rage.

“Your participation will make this go much more smoothly,” Raikin said.

The man leered, “I haven’t forgotten your betrayal, Raikin Aspinen.”

Raikin raised an eyebrow to Kinlon. “You were nothing when I chose my allegiance to King Savine. Nothing. You best not forget why I’ve been so valuable to kings.”

Savine pressed his thumb and forefinger to the bridge of his nose. He needed to be here for this, but he was beginning to think that he’d rather be anywhere but here.

“I grow tired of your spewing dissonance. Tell me, how long were you in Montana and how did you return?”

This took Kinlon by surprise. His eyes snapped to Savine’s and he showed a mouth of rotting teeth. Teeth that couldn’t rot like that in a fae with a healthy essence coursing through his body. “You know of the other realm then? The realm made of humans.”

There was no reason that he would tell this scum about Avery. No reason to share all that he knew. “I have found Jasper’s documents on his progress in sending Latian warriors through the portal.”

There was a spark of interest in the man’s dull features. “Then how would you know the name of the realm when King Jasper didn’t? The humans we found couldn’t speak our language. No fae that I knew of returned to Aeritis.”

Savine didn’t allow himself to reveal anything to this man.

Raikin said, “Perhaps you were not privy to such information.”

Kinlon let out a harsh laugh. “You have no idea what information was provided to The Hunters. None. What training and experimentations we underwent to prepare for our journey. I underwent thirteen years of training to prepare for my journey through the portal.”

“How do you know you are the only one to return?” Savine asked.

“All of us had the ability to return. It was successfully tested and we had our orders to not return until our task was complete. Only things did not work out as we planned.”

Savine felt Raikin lean in, close enough for his essence to stir from the nearness of his body. “You are saying Jasper had the capacity to slip between portals?”

“Of course he did. We all had the power to return after our mission was complete. Our king would never abandon us to the fate of being trapped in a human realm .” Kinlon spat at the ground, his faded essence swirled slowly.

“It was a human and a human weapon that ended Jasper,” Savine replied, his tone neutral.

Kinlon’s face twisted with disgust. “A human killed my king? Was it the two born of one womb? Tell me, is it true that they are here?” He began to look frantic, trying to jump up, but the bindings on his legs were too tight and he fell to the ground. Kinlon thrashed on the ground, knocking the table forward.

Savine looked at Raikin and they both picked up the man. Savine bound him tighter with vines and set the man back into his seat.

This man somehow knew about the prophecy. He knew that twin women would return to Aeritis. How was it possible that so many knew for so long without him hearing word of it? How could his soulmate, his Avery, have transformed the political landscape so thoroughly?

“They cannot be allowed to live! They will destroy our nations and expose us to the evils in their realm. The fae will fade if they are allowed to live. They will fade and diminish just as I have.” Kinlon lifted his chained hands up to his face. “This is what their world does to us. It eats away at our essence. They have already taken some of our kind for their experiments. Distant places, untraceable and unreachable. Those that are not caught are forced to roam like animals as we searched for the two from one womb. I found the corpse of one of the Hunters, killed by the sisters!”

“Enough!” Savine growled. Kinlon fell silent to the power in Savine’s voice.

A soft knock rapped against the door. The guards would still be outside the door, so anyone knocking would have gotten past the guards.

Raikin went to the door and opened it, letting Avery in.

Kinlon’s eyes widened in shock as he took in Avery’s distinctly human body and the delicate crown atop her head.

“NO! No! She cannot be queen!” he shouted as he scrambled to move toward Avery.

Avery gasped at Kinlon’s quick movements.

The man released his essence in a violent eruption of binding weeds and thorns. Savine shielded Avery from the blast with his own essence, but it was Raikin who was finished with this conversation.

Kinlon writhed on the ground, a sticky sap covering his face.

Savine moved across the room, wrapping Avery’s arms around him. Protect her. He must keep her safe from harm. The mantra chanted through his brain as he pulled her closer.

Avery tucked her face into Savine’s chest. She let out a gasp as she buried her face from the scene before them. Savine didn’t want this man to die, not yet. He still needed more information out of him. He signaled to Raikin that it was enough. Raikin began pulling back his essence, controlling the sap as it slid off Kinlon and onto the wood floor.

“Can we get out of here?” Avery asked. Savine nodded.

“I’m finished with him today. Bring him to the prison and see what information you can gain from him,” Savine said as he took Avery’s hand and led her toward the door.

“Of course, My King,” Raikin replied.

The fresh breeze off the mountains met them and Savine breathed in deeply. He could feel the bond bucking between them, his need to get Avery to safety becoming too much for him to stand.

“Please explain what that was about,” she muttered as they walked through the hallway. She was leading them up, either to his father’s or mother’s former chambers. He followed blindly while the need to protect her, to consume her, coursed through him. Savine needed to get her back to their rooms and make her his again. The bond demanded it, forced him to claim her.

Always his desire to fill her, bury himself in her wasn’t far away. But this? When that threat happened, he felt himself become obsessed with the need to claim her as his own true mate again and again. He hadn’t expected this from the soulmate bond. Nobody had warned him, but then again, he’d spent so long avoiding any conversation about soulmates that maybe he only had himself to blame.

His voice came out low and rough as he said, “That man, Kinlon, has been through the portal to your world and back.”

Avery stopped walking and looked up at Savine. “He has a way to return?”

Savine closed the space between them, pressing himself into her, needing to feel her, to taste her. “Yes, but I don’t know what it is yet. That’s why I cannot let Raikin kill him at this point. We need more information. But for now, it’s enough.”

He looked down at her, the bond between them growing taut as he sent his desire down the connection. “You know what seeing someone threaten you does to me,” he said, voice full of suppressed desire.

Avery smiled. “You know I like it when you get possessive and obsessive. I was bringing you up to Kyla and Garnel’s rooms, but we could make a quick stop in our rooms first.”

“Quick? I have no intention of being quick,” Savine said with a half grin.

“Quick is a relative term.” Avery pressed her hand to his hardening cock. He let out a gasp as the heel of her hand rubbed against him, applying just the right amount of pressure. Sweet goddess, he needed Avery’s touch. Avery continued to rub her hand against the leather of his pants, making the bulge of his erection push uncomfortably against the ties.

“Avery, not here,” he rasped. She looked up at him with a hint of mischief. Cruel, torturous witch. He wasn’t about to spend his seed in his leathers in the middle of the outdoor hall.