Текст книги "The Ashes & the Star-Cursed King"

Автор книги: Carissa Broadbent

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Текущая страница: 20 (всего у книги 37 страниц)

40

ORAYA

The music had gotten louder, more chaotic. I couldn’t hear myself think over it. The alcohol had flowed freely. The blood, too. The blood vendors had arrived, a dozen humans who had clearly been chosen for their appearance just as much as their blood. All were dressed in finery no human in Obitraes could possibly afford—dressed by Cairis, I was sure. Some were obviously professionals—I even recognized a few from Vincent’s parties. Others seemed new. One sat on the lap of the Shadowborn prince, her cheeks and chest flushed, eyelashes fluttering as he nipped at her throat, his hand wandering up between her legs. Her bodyguard—one of Ketura’s—stood beside them, clearly struggling to fulfill her job of watching over the human without making awkward eye contact.

That was the difference between this party and Vincent’s: every one of the blood vendors had a bodyguard. I recognized these ones. They were among Raihn’s best. And this was what they had been chosen for tonight. Not guarding Raihn. Not serving the Shadowborn guests. They were watching over these humans—humans that, under my father’s rule, would have been considered disposable.

It was Raihn’s order. He’d probably gotten pushback over it. Vampire nobles didn’t like to feel like they were being chaperoned while they nibbled on beautiful humans.

I took a sip of wine that I immediately regretted. I subtly spat it back into the cup. Vampire wine was strong. I had the nagging sensation that I had to keep my awareness intact.

My mind, involuntarily, wandered back to Raihn, and that little stumble, and that flicker of confusion.

I glanced around the room and didn’t see him anywhere. I didn’t see Mische, either, even though her dress would’ve made her stand out. Vale and Lilith were still at their table, not partaking in the dancing, Lilith looking curious and Vale looking like he was very ready to go to bed.

Everyone else was engaged in… debauchery.

I found myself fidgeting. I let my hand fall to my side, brushing the hilt of my blade strapped around my thigh, just to check that it was still there.

“Quite a party, isn’t it?”

I glanced up. Ugh.

“I don’t think I’ve ever seen you not smoking,” I said.

Septimus smiled. It was the same smile he had given me the first night I met him—the kind designed to loosen lips and undergarments.

“Afraid I’ve run out,” he said. “I’d offer you one.”

“I don’t like to have too many anyway. Addiction is for the weak.”

He took a sip of his wine. “Oh, how she wounds.”

He had a smear of red at the corner of his mouth. Apparently, he’d been having plenty of fun with the blood vendors tonight.

My gaze fell across the ballroom, where a set of open arched doors led into the castle. Simon’s wife was heavily occupied with one of the young male blood vendors, while Simon approached her and whispered something in her ear. She turned back to him and laughed, offering him the human’s wrist.

Mother, I fucking hated them. Meeting them once was more than enough. They seemed far too happy.

Perplexingly happy, actually, for two nobles who’d just had to bow to a former slave.

“I have to admit,” Septimus said, “though I knew you had many talents, I never thought you were much of an actress.”

I said nothing, still watching Simon across the room, brow furrowed. An uneasy sensation tingled at the back of my neck.

Something just seemed…

“Actress?” I said to Septimus, half-listening.

“The dance,” he replied. “To be honest, I’m not sure what you would have to gain at this point by making Raihn believe that you want him.”

That got my attention. My gaze flicked back to him, and he chuckled.

“My, you are an actress,” he purred. “Look at that little startle on you.”

“I don’t know what you’re talking about,” I said.

“Don’t play stupid with me.” The smile didn’t move. But his eyes narrowed, glinting like sharpened steel. “I know you’re a very smart young woman. Though…” He set down his glass and leaned closer, his breath warming my cheek. “No, I don’t think you are much of an actress, after all.”

His hand grabbed my forearm, hard enough that his sharp thumbnail pierced my skin, and I jerked away.

GONG.

The clock struck.

In a lifetime here, I’d never heard it this loud—as if the entire room inflated to take it into its lungs, the marble and stone and glass vibrating with it. The music only grew louder, as if emboldened by it.

Across the room, Simon and his wife rose, abandoning the half-limp blood vendor. They went to the door leading from the ballroom.

Why the hell were they doing that alone? Why would they be allowed to go anywhere in this castle?

Suddenly I didn’t even care about the blood running down my arm. “Excuse me,” I muttered, and set off across the room before Septimus had time to say anything.

Everyone was drunk. The dance floor was little more than a mostly dressed orgy. Some of the Rishan attendees were slumped on the ground, laughing hysterically to themselves with blood running down their chins.

Simon and his wife had disappeared down the hall.

GONG.

I followed. The ballroom was so hot that the moment I stepped from the room, I met a rush of cold air. The hall was quiet. Distant footsteps faded ahead. I glimpsed Leona’s purple silk skirt disappearing around the corner.

“How noble of you,” a silken voice said. “Charging after your lover’s captor, blades drawn. How sweet.”

I didn’t even notice I had drawn my blades.

I turned. Septimus stood in the doorway, his hands in his pockets, that eternal smirk on his lips. Behind him, the arched door framed a tableau of decadence in the party beyond.

I wasn’t about to wait for whatever snarky bullshit he was going to say next. I started to move—

But just as quickly, his hand was out of his pocket, fingers lifted.

Pain shot through me. My body seized. I glanced down—down at the cut he’d made on my arm, just minutes before.

I couldn’t move. Red mist slowly thickened around me—my own blood, turning against me. I wasn’t anticipating it. Mother, Septimus was a strong magic wielder. Stronger than most others I’d encountered in the Kejari. Then, I could at least fight through some of it.

Now, I was frozen, choking on air, as he stepped closer.

“You could have had everything, dove,” he murmured—and for a moment he looked so deeply disappointed, so confused. It was perhaps the only genuine emotion I’d ever seen on his face.

I tried to choke out, What are you doing?

But only managed a garbled, “Wh—”

GONG.

The world dimmed at the edges of my vision, just in time for me to see blood-soaked chaos break out in the party beyond—as Bloodborn soldiers turned on Ketura’s men. A wave of animalistic shouts rose to overtake the music, swords through flesh, teeth through throats.

But none of it was louder than Septimus’s voice as he cradled my face.

“I told you I only make winning bets, Oraya,” he whispered. “I’m sorry this time it wasn’t on you.”

He flicked his fingers.

CRACK, as my body contorted.

GONG.

Everything went black.

41

ORAYA

Consciousness didn’t want me back. I had to claw for it with my teeth and fingernails, and even then, I only managed to reclaim tatters of it.

The floor, moving beneath me.

Hands on me. Hands all over me.

Don’t fucking touch me.

I tried to say it aloud, but my throat, my tongue, wouldn’t cooperate.

Someone was pulling at my skirt, sliding their hand up my thigh. My instinct was to kick them. Instead, I tamped the impulse down and remained limp, buying myself a few seconds to gather my senses.

I was… where? I was still in the castle. I recognized that rose-stale smell.

“—Should’ve killed her by now.”

“Can’t. You know we can’t.”

A man. A woman. Both Bloodborn—I recognized that accent. Desdemona.

“Get that off,” she snapped.

“Trying,” he hissed.

The hands sliding up my skirt weren’t lecherous.

He was trying to take my blades.

Quickly, I reassembled the fuzzy memory of what had happened. Septimus. Simon. The coup. The blood all over the floor.

Raihn stumbling a little as he walked away from me.

Suddenly I was wide awake, my blood cold.

Raihn. Leaving with Cairis.

He could already be dead.

The Bloodborn man managed to unbuckle my dagger.

“Fucking fi—”

As he loosened his grip on me to lift the sheath, I grabbed the hilt and slammed the blade into his chest.

Black blood sprayed me across the face. He went flying back. It wasn’t fatal—I didn’t have enough strength behind the movement.

But it was enough to earn me time.

Desdemona was on me immediately. I had to be quick—I’d never seen her use blood magic, but that didn’t mean she didn’t have the ability. I couldn’t be stronger than her, so I had to be faster. But even that was difficult, my movements a little too sluggish as they fought the aftereffects of Septimus’s sedation.

My back slammed against the wall as Desdemona countered me. My blade buried in her side, deep.

She barely flinched, her eyes not leaving mine.

Shit.

We both knew I was fucked. She smiled as she drew her weapon back.

But then, she hesitated. Her next strike wasn’t for my throat, my heart—it was for my leg.

Her momentary pause gave me the window I needed to slip her grip, just enough that she only nicked me.

The realization hit me—my greatest advantage. Septimus could have killed me himself, easily. Desdemona could have killed me right now. Neither of them did. That was an intentional choice.

Septimus still wanted me—or at least, wanted my blood. He wouldn’t kill me. Not yet.

He’d just keep me locked up like a slave. He’d make me another tool to be leveraged.

And why the hell wouldn’t he? That’s all I’d ever been. A thing to be used at the convenience of others, or a risk to be mitigated.

Not a force in her own right.

Fuck that.

Nightfire bloomed to life in my hands, clinging to the edge of my blade. Desdemona wasn’t prepared. She stumbled, her hands flying up to protect her face.

I went straight for her heart.

Maybe Raihn was right. Maybe my half-vampire blood meant I was capable of more than I’d ever let myself dream. Because it felt like I didn’t even have to push all that hard—the dagger slid right into her flesh like it was meant to be there.

I did not take time to relish this.

I kicked her off my blade and spun around. The familiar burning had already started in my veins. Her companion had recovered, his hand lifted, pearling droplets of my blood floating around us.

The two of us lunged at each other and tangled in a mass of limbs and teeth and steel. The burn of his magic grew stronger, stronger. I had never managed to stave it off for this long. I let it fade to a faint buzz in the back of my mind—simply made every strike stronger to compensate for the force of it, fought harder to cut through the resistance.

I wasn’t thinking about anything anymore.

I was angry.

I was fucking furious.

I didn’t call upon the Nightfire to consume me—it came to me all on its own.

And when it did, the licks of white-blue obscuring my vision, the only thing that remained was my opponent’s shocked face against the tile of the floor, my knees around his torso, my blade raised.

I brought it down.

He went silent. Countless minuscule drops of my blood spattered to the ground like misty rain.

My heaving breath ached in my lungs. Adrenaline had my heart pumping fast, coursing through every vein. The Nightfire still burned and burned.

I stood. I was shaking slightly. I noticed this only with faint recognition. I was still so angry I couldn’t speak. Couldn’t think.

Couldn’t think except for one word, one name:

Raihn.

I glanced at the table, which had the male Bloodborn’s arm slumped against it, like he had been reaching for something in his final moments. Just beyond his grasp was a long object, wrapped in white silk. Immediately, I recognized it. They’d taken it from my room.

Vincent’s sword. The Taker of Hearts.

This time, I didn’t hesitate. I sheathed my blades and unwrapped the sword. When my hand closed around the hilt, it didn’t hurt at all. Mother, how could I ever have thought it hurt? This wasn’t pain. This was power.

This is what you were always meant to be, my little serpent, Vincent whispered in my ear.

I flinched at the sound of his voice—so much more real whenever I touched this sword.

But he was right.

This is what I was always meant to be. And he’d hidden that from me. He’d stifled me. He’d lied to me. He gave me his power and then spent twenty years making me small and afraid and telling me how weak I was.

And yet, as I drew the blade, a lump of painful grief rose in my throat.

I was everything I was meant to be.

My father’s daughter. Victim and protégée. Greatest love and ruination.

I did not know how to reconcile all those things. Suddenly I no longer cared to. It didn’t matter what he had wanted of me.

I had his power.

Nightfire rolled up the delicate blade like the sun setting blaze to the horizon.

I didn’t even have to consciously call to my wings. Suddenly they were out, and spread, and the air was rushing around me as I roared out the door and into the hall, the wind burning away the tears in my eyes.

Where are you?

I had been taken to the basement of the castle. I slipped into the tunnels that so few people knew how to navigate like I did—the tunnels that Vincent had hoped might one day save him from a coup just like this one. Sounds of bloodshed echoed in the walls, as if the castle itself was moaning and screaming in its final death throes. Some of the doors I passed had blood seeping beneath them, dark and slippery on the stone landings.

I ran, and ran, and didn’t stop—didn’t stop to think, didn’t stop to question why I was sticking my throat out to save him. I didn’t know. I wouldn’t know. All I knew was that the truth of it stood before me, an inevitable action.

Where are you?

The castle had dungeons. But Raihn was a king. Not only a king, but a king who was reviled by the man who intended to take his crown.

I knew exactly what Simon thought of Raihn. Turned. Slave. Tainted. He thought Raihn was only fit to be used by people like him—not the other way around.

Simon needed a show of strength. He wanted to put Raihn in his place in front of everyone. Just like Vincent had once lined the city with Rishan bodies on stakes.

Vampires didn’t kill for practicality. They killed for joy. Retribution. Spectacle. Fear.

You don’t do that in a dungeon. You don’t do that quietly in a back hallway.

Where are you?

I ran up the stairs. My thighs burned.

I kept thinking of Vincent, and all those Rishan wings pinned to the walls of Sivrinaj.

All the times he’d hung some poor bastard who defied him out in front of the castle.

Where are you?

I kept going up, up, up.

Because I knew where Raihn was—or at least, I prayed I did, the guess clinging to my gut with the desperation of hope.

I reached the top of the final staircase and flung the door open. A wall of hot, dry air blew my hair back.

The top floor of the castle—a ballroom, a wall of windows, and a balcony. Beyond the windows, the night sky, pink with oncoming dawn, opened before me, the reflection of the moon and stars spilling over the black marble floor, polished as a mirror.

For a moment, it was all so fucking beautiful—the untouchable beauty of the moment before glass shatters.

A number of people were in the room, their backs to me.

And there, beyond the glass, silhouetted against the sky, wings forcibly spread, was a figure I recognized immediately—even from this distance, silhouetted.

The following seconds happened slowly.

The Nightfire around me swelled and billowed.

The Rishan soldiers turned to look at me.

I tightened my grip on the Taker of Hearts. My palms burned, but I wanted to lean into it. It fueled me.

Now you understand.

Vincent’s voice sounded a little proud. A little sad.

Power hurts. It requires sacrifice. Do you want to change this world, little serpent? Climb the bars until you’re so high no one can catch you.

I told you that once.

I know because I did it, my daughter. I know.

My eyes settled on Raihn’s form, strung up by chains.

When the Rishan soldiers lunged for me, I was ready for them.

42

ORAYA

I had always been a good fighter. But this—this was like breathing, effortless, innate. I didn’t have to think. I didn’t have to plan. I didn’t have to compensate for my weakness.

I was the Heir of the House of Night, and I was the daughter of Vincent the Nightborn King, and I was every bit as powerful as both those things suggested.

The Taker of Hearts was an incredible weapon. It shredded bodies and pierced ribcages like they were made of sand. Now I understood why Vincent might have been willing to sacrifice his soul for this kind of power. Why Septimus was willing to tear Obitraes apart for something even greater.

I was drunk on it.

I didn’t remember killing them. I was only vaguely aware of the bodies collecting beneath my feet. My wings erased the barrier between the ground and the sky, helping me move faster and dodge quicker and fling myself exactly where I needed to be. Blood covered my face, dripped into my eyes, tinting the world black-red.

Another gust of wind as I fought my way to the open doors of the balcony. Sivrinaj spread out beneath me, a sea of ivory curves, the Lituro River slithering through it all like a glass serpent.

The Taker of Hearts cut through the next Rishan who came at me in seconds.

Did he strike me? I wasn’t sure. I didn’t feel it.

I didn’t care, either way.

A strange sensation in my back—not pain, not quite. I turned. The man’s sword was bloody, dripping with crimson. “Half-breed bitch,” he snarled, but my sword stole the rest of his words.

Good, Vincent said. They deserve it.

The last man, the one who had been handling the chains, lunged for me. I lowered the Taker of Hearts and let it slice through his leg, sending him stumbling, howling, to the ground.

I didn’t let him fall fully. Hoisted him up, even though distantly, I recognized my muscles burned. Pressed him to the wall.

The last one here. The last one between me and Raihn. But I wasn’t fucking done. I was hungry. I was angry.

“Simon,” I snarled. “Septimus. Where are they?”

The man spat at me and tried to swing at me. He hit something, I wasn’t sure what.

Fine. If he didn’t want to talk, he didn’t want to talk. Like he’d be important enough to know that information, anyway.

I skewered him and tossed him from the balcony.

I whirled around, ready for the next attacker. But instead of battle cries or gasps of pain or clattering steel, I heard only my own pounding heartbeat.

And—

“Hell of an entrance, princess.”

The voice was hollow and hoarse.

I blinked the red from my eyes. The haze of my blood rage fell away, a sudden cold enveloping me at the sight.

Raihn.

Raihn strung up with silver chains against the wall of the castle. His wings were out and nailed through, blood clumping in the elegant feathers. Blood spattered his face and smeared his once-fine clothing. His hair was free around his face, clinging to his skin.

He’d fought like hell. One look at him told me that. Drugged or no.

I crashed back to the earth with staggering force. Suddenly, looking at Raihn like this, I did not feel powerful, despite the trail of bodies I’d left in my wake or the sword in my hand or the Nightfire at my fingertips. I did not feel powerful at all.

He gave me a weak, lopsided smile.

“I can’t possibly look that bad.”

I sheathed the blade at my side and strode across the balcony. Up close he looked even worse—some of the chains were screwed right through his skin.

I swore under my breath.

They were going to let him burn. Let the dawn kill him, slowly, right in front of all of Sivrinaj. The most humiliating way for a vampire to die. In Simon’s mind, he wasn’t even worthy of a real execution. Executions were for threats.

“Cairis,” Raihn rasped. “It was Cairis. The traitor. Can you fucking believe that?”

Then he laughed, like something about this was hysterically funny.

“Don’t do that,” I snapped.

I heard voices in the distance. Many of them.

Shit.

My attack wasn’t exactly subtle. They’d be coming for me. Coming for Raihn.

He heard it too, his head tilted towards the noise. Then back to me.

“This is going to hurt,” I muttered. I didn’t have time to be gentle. I yanked the first chain free from his wrist, a fresh spurt of blood dribbling down his arm.

“You can leave me,” he said. “I’ll be alright.”

I laughed. It was an ugly sound. “Like hell you will.”

“You’re hurt, Oraya. There will be a lot of them.”

No joking anymore. No cocky remarks.

Raihn was right. I was injured. Probably badly. Now that the adrenaline faded, everything hurt. I tried not to think about it, but I was getting dizzy.

A lump rose in my throat.

“I already came this far,” I muttered, moving faster as I grabbed another chain and pulled it. One wing slumped down, pain spasming across his face at the extra weight yanking on his other side.

The voices were getting louder. Fuck.

I pulled away the second chain on his left arm, freeing it.

“Here. You’ve got an arm now. Help me,” I spat, moving to the other wing.

He did, wincing as he tugged against his right side.

The voices were on this floor now, or closer.

“Hurry,” I said.

“Oraya—”

“Don’t you dare tell me to leave,” I spat. “We don’t have time for that.”

Only his ankles left now. Both wings were free, and both arms. I dropped to my knees to get one ankle while he reached for the other.

Goddess, we had seconds. Less.

“Oraya.”

I didn’t look up. “What?”

CLANG, as metal fell to the ground.

“Why did you come for me?”

I paused for a split second we didn’t have.

I didn’t even ask myself that question. I didn’t want to look too hard at the answer, a confusing knot in my chest.

“We don’t have time for this.” I yanked his final restraint free with one last clatter.

I stood, and Raihn tried to take a step forward only to slump against me. I nearly caved beneath his weight.

Over his shoulder, I watched a flood of Rishan and Bloodborn soldiers pour around the corner. More than I could fight in this state, even with the Taker of Hearts at my side.

Raihn noticed them too, then stumbled to the railing.

I looked at his wings, broken and useless. At his injuries. Down at the drop below. At the soldiers.

Then, finally, at his face.

He was bathed in pink gold as the sun crested the horizon, making his eyes gleam like dark rubies. The right side of his face was already starting to blister under the force of the sun. His hair was so red beneath the dawn—redder than I’d ever realized it was, closer to human blood than vampire.

An arrow whizzed by his head.

As the first soldiers breached the doorway, I grabbed Raihn and held him close.

“You are so impossibly beautiful,” he murmured in my ear.

And then I spread my wings, and we hurled ourselves over the edge of the balcony.