The Horde King of Shadow (Hordes of the Elthika #1)

Chapter 2

KLARA

“Stop fussing, Klara,” Dannik ordered, though amusement curled in his tone. He slid into the empty space beside me, tucking his shoulder against the column of the open window. “You don’t have a hair out of place.”

I huffed out a sharp breath, and my hand dropped away from my head, from where I’d been nervously smoothing down my hair. “That’s not?—”

“The guards said you were down in the western market today,” he said, cutting me off, bumping my shoulder with his arm. “Why’d you go there?”

I shot my brother a sharp look. “You had me followed?”

“It’s the shadow moon” was all he replied, shrugging one shoulder, as if that would answer my question. And well…it did.

“Then you’ll know I was with Sora. I’d been in the archives all morning, I wanted to get some air before this tonight,” I explained, waving a hand before us.

We were tucked against the far window of our father’s grand throne room. I could hardly hear my own thoughts with all the chatter, music, and laughter, a headache starting to bloom behind my right eye.

There was an edge to my brother tonight. More guards were in the throne room for this celebration than for any other throughout the year. Even the laughter of the guests seemed louder, more forced.

Perhaps we were all trying to pretend that dragons wouldn’t land at the East Gate any moment, if they hadn’t already.

Across the room, I spotted the Laseta Kalliri —the high priestess of Dothik. She was watching me across the crush of bodies, and I pressed my lips together, inclining my head in respect. Then I looked away swiftly, telling myself to relax my shoulders and to smile softly at no one at all, like I was enjoying the merriment of the gathering, like I was at ease with her piercing eyes on me. Like I had nothing to hide.

Out of the corner of my eye, I waited until she turned her back, speaking with a male I recognized as a powerful merchant, and I blew out a steady, slow breath through my lips.

“What is it?” Dannik asked.

“Nothing,” I said, turning to him with a small grin.

My brother frowned, his golden eyes cutting to the Laseta Kalliri before fastening back on me. His lips parted, but before he could say anything, a guard approached.

“ Rukkar , your father is requesting your presence on the dais,” he said. Prince , he’d called Dannik. His proper title.

A jolt went through my belly, a spear of disappointment cutting through me.

“Come,” Dannik ordered me, grabbing my hand.

The guard said, with evident hesitation, “Only you. The Dothikkar made it clear.”

He stared down the guard, who was a head shorter than him, until the other male dropped his gaze to the floor.

“It’s all right,” I told him, pressing my fingers to the back of his scarred hand. “Go.”

Dannik’s gaze cut to mine. I hadn’t expected to see the burn of anger there.

“There is always defeat in your eyes, sister,” he told me, cupping my cheeks in his warm palms. “I wish you would fight more for what is yours by blood.”

Then he released me. He turned away while I struggled to swallow the sudden shame in my throat. I was alone again, watching my brother spear through the crowd, which parted for him like curtains in the morning, welcoming the dawn.

That was what he was for Dothik. It was common knowledge he was my father’s favored heir, though my half sister, Alanis, was his firstborn. My father was expected to step down from the throne in the coming years. A new rule would come. Dannik would likely be at the helm.

From my corner in the throne room, I watched my family rise together on the dais. My father, with his graying hair and unyielding green eyes; a pink, thin-lipped mouth; and ruddy, wrinkled cheeks. My stepmother was next to him, though she hated when I made any mention of that title. Instead, I called her Lakkari just like everyone else. Queen of Dothik. And my half siblings.

Alanis, with her waist-length blonde hair and black pyroki scales sewn to her clothes in a way that resembled armor—not unlike the male from the market, I noted. She had never warmed to me, thinking me nothing more than a bug beneath her boot, another competitor for the throne she coveted.

Lakkis, in all her ethereal beauty that left the guards’ tongues tied in her wake. My sister—while she’d always been kind to me—was still practically a stranger, an impenetrable wall I’d never been able to break through.

And Dannik, the unspoken heir to it all.

Together they made a pretty picture. The longing to join them on the dais burned so hot in my stomach it made nausea rise.

Across the room, my siblings’ mother caught my eyes. Her chin lifted, brow raising. The gold crown seated on her brow sparkled under the lights as the throne room quieted, eager to hear the Dothikkar ’s welcoming speech.

This blatant rejection was growing more humiliating every year. I’d thought it would get better. It only ever got worse.

Leave, came the thought that had been surfacing more and more in recent months. Rent the little room we had above the tavern, and live as you please. Or return to the wildlands, where you remember Mother best, where we were happy.

But then I would truly be alone…and that scared me more than anything in this life. At least here, in this cold palace, I had Dannik.

The Lakkari ’s serene smirk followed me out of the throne room when I fled, keeping to the outskirts of the room like a rodent, hoping that I drew no one’s eyes but hers.

Unfortunately, I felt the burn of dozens’ as I slipped through the door, the snickering whispers erupting in my wake.

“I knew I’d find you here,” came my brother’s voice, cutting through the hushed, dark chamber.

I raised my head, confused. Then I jolted and wiped my right cheek with the back of my hand, my spine straightening as I smoothed my dress.

“It’s only me,” Dannik said. “You don’t have to do that, Klara.”

I was sitting on a bench across from an unyielding pedestal, one that held a gleaming sword. Dannik was regarding me carefully, and I couldn’t help but frown.

“Have they come?” I asked immediately. “How many are there this time?”

My brother and I looked nothing alike. I looked like my mother—all dark, wavy hair and small features. And Dannik? Well, he looked like his mother. With golden hair and light eyes, his skin warmed and blessed by the sun, with a wide, bold smile that had broken the heart of at least ten different females.

“You spend more time in here than you do in your precious archives,” he grumbled, his booted feet crossing to me, ignoring my questions. “You’d think Arik’s sword would’ve lost its appeal by now.”

“It was Bekkar’s sword first,” I told him. The first great king of Dothik, passed down to my own ancestor. There was a white glowing stone still embedded in its hilt, its energy palpable. The heartstone. The last one in existence.

“And then Kara gifted it to Arik after the red fog’s defeat, lysi ,” Dannik said, impatience threading in his tone, making me bite back a smile. He wasn’t interested in history, in our ancient line, in all the little roots and paths and stories that had brought us here to our present. It didn’t matter. I cared for more than the both of us. “We all know the story. I could recount Bekkar’s campaign trail and the history of the Five in my sleep.”

I turned my gaze back to the sword. The power of the heartstone was warm. It felt like a heartbeat to me. Comforting. Tangible. I could feel the tendrils of power floating over my skin, and if my mother was still alive, maybe I could ask her why .

Dannik took a seat on the stone bench next to me. There was an edge to him that I couldn’t quite pinpoint. We were in the bowels of the palace. Once a dungeon, this place had been made new. It housed a vast collection of our history, of our family’s history, Bekkar’s sword included.

No one had wielded it since King Arik. It burned any who touched it. And yet it remained gleaming throughout the years, not a speck of dust or sign of mottled age marring the metal. The blade was as sharp as it had been in Bekkar’s own hand.

“What does it feel like to you?” Dannik asked suddenly, taking my palm. I frowned, but then he waved his other hand to the sword. “The heartstone.”

I swallowed, my spine snapping. “What?”

“I heard you and your mother speaking once, shortly before she was sent away,” he started, his voice hushed, as if we weren’t alone in this crypt of a place. “Shortly after you came to live here. Right here.”

I swallowed, dropping his hand quickly. “Dannik, that was a long time ago.”

“You told her you had seen them in your dreams. For years ,” he said quietly. “What did you mean? Because I know a sword injury when I see it. And that scar? It didn’t come from a sword.”

“Dannik,” I whispered, averting my gaze from his to drop to the ground. “I—I don’t… You know I cannot…”

“You think I’ll let them take you to the orala sa’kilan ? You think I’ll let them take you away to the priestesses in the North Lands, to live out the rest of your days in training and servitude, used as a conduit to try to create more heartstones?” Dannik asked me, his tone bitter and aghast. “Your mother lied to them. What makes you think I wouldn’t lie to protect you too? You know me, Klara. I would do anything to protect you. You’re my sister .”

Blood is blood, Klara . You are of me. He is of another. You cannot trust him fully.

My mother’s words. Permanently embedded in my mind. I’d wanted to tell Dannik. My mother had forbidden it. Now she was dead. So why couldn’t I shake her words?

“Even go against your own mother?” I asked. “Because we all know what she did.”

Dannik reared back.

“She’s wanted me gone since I first came to the palace,” I told him. “Any hint of weakness… I’m surprised she hasn’t married me off to a darukkar in one of the hordes. If only so she never has to look at me again.”

“You are of royal blood,” Dannik argued. “Even more so than any of us. She…resents that. Alanis too. They fear you.”

I laughed, but it sounded hollow. My eyes were stinging from the tears that had already dried in my lap. “Because I’m so frightening. With all my books and half-mad theories.”

“You didn’t answer my question.”

“Which one?” I returned.

His eyes cut back to the sword, a muscle in his jaw ticking. He was on edge, his tail skittering across the stone.

“What is it?” I asked, turning on the bench to face him more fully. Something was wrong. Had the celebration feast already ended? “Dannik?”

“The riders landed at the East Gate.”

His words weren’t unexpected, however. Yet there was something I couldn’t place in his tone that made nerves curl in my chest, skittering my heartbeat.

“How many?” I asked, repeating my earlier question.

“Too many this time.”

I straightened. “What does that mean?”

Dannik said quietly, his voice hushed, “If you know anything of them that might be of use, it’s your duty as a descendant of the royal line and to your people to speak it. You must trust me, Klara.”

“They’re just dreams! They aren’t real,” I told him, unable to withstand him feeling betrayed. Like I didn’t trust him. Because I did. I trusted him with my life. And if the priestesses caught wind of this , my life would be given to them. That was what at stake. “They are unclear. No words are spoken. I’ve never seen another person in them. Only…”

Only the dragons.

Two in particular.

A terrifying black creature with eyes as gold as the sun and teeth as sharp as swords.

The other…

I blew out a sharp breath, standing to pace to Bekkar’s sword. I stared down at the white heartstone shimmering in its hilt. The last heartstone in existence on Dakkar…as far as we knew. It had been the heartstones that helped the Five banish the red fog in the Dead Lands. It had nearly cost them their lives.

“ If ,” I started quietly, my words barely a whisper, “I possess fragments of our ancestors’ magic, it is a useless thing.”

Dannik’s hand came to my arm, right over where the male in the market had gripped me, where he’d left that strange black residue on my skin.

“You might believe that,” he whispered, as if we could be overheard. “But I don’t.”

My lips parted?—

“Through our father, you are a descendent of Queen Kara, the Banisher and the Wielder of the Heartstones, and King Arik of Rath Serok. And your mother’s line of Rath Drokka? You descend from the Mad Horde King and of Vienne the White Sorceress. There is power, electric in your blood, and it chose you . Not Alanis. Not Lakkis. Not even your mother. You , Klara.”

My throat went tight.

“Can you feel it?” he asked, voice suddenly guttural. My lips parted when I heard the trepidation in his voice. “The power leeching from the land? Our home? This heartstone is growing dimmer with every passing day. Have you noticed?”

The hairs on the back of my neck stood up. My gaze cut to the heartstone. It hummed in answer. I could feel it. For the first time, I wondered if Dannik could too.

“These dragon riders?” my brother continued, shaking his head, and I heard the gold beads in his hair clicking together. “I think they want what we cannot give them. And I fear what they will demand in its stead. They are much too at ease. They have no fear. The only reason they would have none is if they knew there was no need for it. Because they know they could snap this city in two within the jaws of their beasts. I only wonder why they haven’t yet.”

“Dannik, what?—”

“It was foolish of us to believe that there was nothing beyond Drukkar’s Sea,” he continued, his lip curling in a mocking, sad smile. “I have a feeling that we know nothing at all and that we will pay for it in due time.”

My brother took my hand again. “You need to have strength, Klara,” he said, trepidation in his eyes. “More so now than ever before.”

“Why?” I asked, hearing a thread of warning in his tone. “Dannik, what’s happening? You’re scaring me.”

“They’ve asked for you.”

“What?” I asked, thinking I heard him incorrectly. “ Who? ”

“The dragon riders.”

All my breath left me. Dannik’s grip tightened around my palm.

“Their leader. He asks for you at the East Gate.”