CHAPTER 5

The dawn sky fought through thick clouds of smoke which did their best to block out the rising sun. It left the world awash with the brush of dark russet. Beyond the impenetrable clouds of ash, the dawn fought hard for its rightful place. Although the hue of deep orange and red replaced the usual blues, it still allowed some light in to know that we had spent far longer than expected in the deep caverns of Lockinge’s prison.

It was the perfect backdrop for my crumbling plan. All my hard work literally running away from me, and there was nothing I could do to stop it.

The muscles in my legs screamed as I ran out of the Below, lungs aching, back bowing as though I carried the weight of the world on it. And in a sense, I did. Because my world, everything about my life over the past three weeks had led to this moment.

I should’ve known they wouldn’t listen to me, but gods know I wasn’t going to give up now.

It was clear the moment Duncan and I escaped the staircase and flooded out into the chaos beyond that ruled the human city.

The courtyard before the rise of Lockinge Castle bustled with fey gripped in the throes of panic. I pushed through the swell of the crowd, suddenly aware of the stench that poured from the bodies of the captured fey as the winds whipped among the crowd. The smell of stone and musk did well to combat the heavy presence of burning wood and charred stone that wafted up the incline from the slums. The Cage still burned, hot and violent.

It was impossible to understand where I was when the majority of the bodies around me towered far taller than I. But Althea’s booming voice acted as my guide. The harder I worked through the squashed bodies, the louder her shouts became.

“Stop!” Althea roared. “It is not safe for you out there.”

I saw her the moment I broke free from the wall of fey. Her skin was pale, her eyes wide as concern practically poured from her. She did not shout at the crowd that I had fought my way through but toward the outlines of figures that broke away from it, and ran toward the city instead of away from it.

“We need to stop them,” I said, stumbling toward her, my heart lodging in my throat. I dared not blink and miss the fey running away from me, toward danger I couldn’t save them from.

Althea raised her hands and placed them at the back of her head. “There was nothing I could do.”

“How many?” I asked, breathless.

“I don’t know, Robin, they just ran. There was no stopping them.”

There was a part of me that longed to remind her she was wrong. She could have, in fact, stopped them. My mind raced with ideas of how her power could have conjured a wall of flame and kept the fey penned within the courtyard.

But what difference would that be to the prison they’d just been in.

I gave them freedom, but expected that to come with them handing their free will to me.

From one captor to another. Aldrick’s voice taunted across my mind. Since his power had invaded me, he’d occupied my thoughts countless times, even if it was only the memory of him rather than his amplified, controlling presence. I knew it was not actually him this time, but more a figment of his presence that lingered on my consciousness like a demon upon my shoulder, whispering into my ear.

In fact, it was Kayne’s voice that tore me from my destructive thoughts. Looking sidelong at the wall of the fey, Kayne had gripped one by the forearm as though to stop her. “You’ve been told to follow orders. Heed them or–”

“Enough,” I snapped, grappling with the understanding that I was failing.

The young woman in Kayne’s grasp fought hard to get free so she, like the others who tried to break away from the remaining crowd, could flee into the city in hopes of freedom.

Kayne saw the powered fist fly toward his face a moment too late. As he gripped for his nose, catching the burst of red gore in his hands, the fey woman escaped and ran for the raised gate, following the small group that fled.

Time seemed to slow as I made my decision deep within my subconscious. I followed the woman as she ran for her freedom. A shiver of cold passed across my arms. My breath thickened into a silver cloud beyond my parted lips as I moved my eyes ahead of the woman and toward the open gate.

Althea made it two steps forward, hoping to catch the fearful woman before I opened the floodgates to my magic and let it free.

Duncan called my name from somewhere close, but it was faint enough that I could ignore it. All I could focus on was the fey now steps from leaving the courtyard to join the others who had fled, not from danger, but into it.

I dropped to my knees and slapped my palms across the street. The moment my fingers touched the stone, my power left me with a raging hunger.

I closed my eyes as euphoria filled me. In the dark, I saw an image. The bloodied bed of grass around the axe-scored stump of a tree. Another image came next of the spreading ice as it crawled up the legs of the executioner, turning skin to glass and blood to rivers of frozen diamonds.

When my gaze flew open, I could hear the body of the executioner as it snapped in half and crumpled before me. This moment was very similar to the time my magic first revealed itself in the field full of fey captives and Hunters who longed for fey deaths. I wasn’t in control of my emotions or power then. Now, I commanded both as the rightful king I’d been forced to become.

Ice spread across the courtyard. It cracked across the stone, turning the ground white as it swept toward the gateway. The fey cried out as my power burst before her. It took effort to encourage it to flow around her whilst focusing on my end goal. The gate.

As my icy presence reached it, I threw my hands upward. I conjured a wall of pure, diamond-cut ice to fill the gateway until the city beyond could no longer be seen. Curls of mist danced across the view before me. Tendrils of frozen air stung pleasantly across my skin as I admired my creation.

You and I are no different.

“Yes, we are,” I hissed aloud in response to my inner thoughts. “I do this to save them, not enslave them.”

“That’s enough, Robin. Keeping them trapped hardly sets the example of freedom that our effort has been focused on,” Althea said beside me, her innate flame working to melt the ice closest to her feet. “There have to be other ways, Robin.”

“No,” I said, glancing only for a moment toward her. “For the safety of everyone, I cannot let them run into a city full of people that hate them. I’ve done what I had to do.”

I could see from the pinching of Althea’s mouth that she had more to say but kept it to herself. But the sharp glint in her eye also revealed that she would tell me, eventually.

Facing back toward the crowd, I looked over the wall of dirt-smeared fey as they, too, regarded me with an expression I had yet to see on them.

Trepidation.

“The city is full of people who would see you nailed on pikes for the birds to feed off your flesh. I cannot allow you to wander blindly into your enemy’s arms. They’d treat you in far more hateful ways than the imprisonment you have experienced thus far. The freedom you seek is close, but we must act as one to see this through.” I gave myself a moment to catch my breath, taking in the band of fey that had stuck with me. “Please, to those who still think running now is the best option, I beg you to listen. Know I don’t wish to stop you from finding your freedom, but I simply wish to ensure you do so in a way that sees you survive long enough that Lockinge becomes nothing more than a terrible memory.”

I waited for some reaction. All I could hear was the thundering beat of my heart in my ears. Urgency propelled me forward, looking toward Seraphine and the figures of her fellow Asps as they had wormed their way around the crowds to prepare for the last hurdle.

“Freedom is close,” I repeated, hoping those at the back of the crowd would hear me once my words spread through it. “I promise.”

“I’m sorry, Robin. They fought through me,” Seraphine said as she came to stand beside me.

“You did everything you could,” I replied, thankful for her help.

“I have instructed a small group of Asps to go searching for any strays. Forgive the fey for taking a chance to run, something we cannot blame them for. They’ve spent so many years down there, contemplating this day.”

“I just don’t want to fail them,” I admitted.

“You haven’t. It’s not over yet.” Seraphine shifted her gaze and whistled. The high-pitched sound cut through the murmuring crowd and stilled them into a state of momentary silence. More Asps began calling out with simple instructions and guidance about what was to happen next.

I stepped back and allowed the assassins to sink their claws of control into the fey and gather them in an orderly fashion that would see us toward the shoreline at the back of Lockinge Castle. To the boats that should stand by, ready to collect us and take us all home.

“You can’t worry about everyone,” Duncan said. I’d not heard him join us until his hand was upon my shoulder and his voice warming my soul from the outside in. “There comes a time you must accept that responsibility is something fragile.”

“Whilst I accept the Icethorn crown, I can’t accept that.”

“I just don’t want to watch it wear you down.” The determination that crackled across his face had that effect on me. What had I done to deserve his loyalty after everything my presence had done to him?

I winked at him, feigning a confidence that was becoming second nature to me. “I like when you worry about me.”

“Shall we turn the tables? I could go and help Seraphine’s Asps in the city and see how you like it.”

“I trust you don’t need me to tell you how foolish you would be to approve that,” Althea added, cheeks flushed as she interjected her opinion.

I nodded softly in agreement with her. “Duncan, you stay with me. I cannot save people if they don’t wish to be saved.”

“Then I wish them luck.” He offered me a sympathetic smile, then lifted a gaze toward the expanse of fey the assassins had begun shepherding toward the direction of the castle’s docks.

“They’ll need more than luck,” Kayne offered, still clutching at his nose. I could tell from the shadow behind his gaze that he meant every word with little sincerity. Already the freckles beneath his eyes seemed to disappear beneath the darkening bruise the fey woman had gifted him. Blood spread between his fingers, some even smudged across his chin.

“You know, mate, you should really get that looked at,” Duncan said, knocking his friend with a bump on his shoulder.

“Fuck you ,” Kayne replied, searching the skies for Lucari, who would have squawked with shared anguish at his broken nose.

We made it around the castle without another issue to deal with. My mind, although still locked on the group of fey who left us, was thankful that those who stayed were not under threat. There were no Hunters who came out to stop us. The presence of Kingsmen was also non-existent. The further we made it toward the rear of the castle, the more dread settled within me. Amplified by Althea, who seemed to pluck the worry from my mind and speak it into existence.

“This should not be so easy,” she said, keeping her voice low to prevent the fey from hearing her concern. “It doesn’t seem right.”

“Thank Altar it is,” I replied, trying to force confidence into my tone whilst clinging onto the presence of my magic in case the moment required it.

“Admit it, something is not right about it,” she continued. “The castle is too quiet. We have met no resistance when there have been many opportunities for it. I can’t help but feel that Aldrick wants this to happen. He practically opened the door and allowed us in. He may as well have offered us a warm meal and a soft bed to sleep on.”

I didn’t wish to agree out loud for fear that what she spoke was true. Instead, I kept my gaze fixed on the mass of fey that thundered through a corridor deep within the castle. As Seraphine had previously confirmed, we passed heaps of humans who looked as though they slept on the floors, others in a deeper slumber with throats sliced and bodies covered in blood.

But where was everyone else? Where was the human king, who had become a puppet for Aldrick? He’d not been previously confirmed as another number of the dead in the days that followed our initial escape. What about the servants who should have filled a castle? Perhaps they were hiding within many of the rooms, or they had run when the first signs of our ambush had occurred. It could not have been the latter as the Asps hadn’t seen anyone flee the castle when we’d been deep in the prison beneath. And the castle, as Althea had said, was far too quiet to suggest that anyone was within it at all.

Burying the dark thoughts deep in the pit of my being, I focused on keeping one step ahead of the other. We were so close to the promised freedom, the plan almost over. Focus was important to seeing it through to the end. Not looking back, but forwards.

“We cannot afford to contemplate failure,” I said, pinching my nails into the skin of my palms. It was the only thing to keep them from shaking. “It’s not an option. I won’t allow it.”

“Tell me that again when we are safely aboard our ships. I wish to never look back at this place again,” Althea replied. “I’m ready for a proper bed, a nice meal and something to wear other than fighting leathers.”

“I get the impression you still don’t forgive me for refusing to return to Wychwood.”

“It would have been a lot easier than this.” Althea glanced my way, lips pulled into a thin line as she contemplated her next words. “But not nearly as thrilling. This will forever be the bravest thing I’ve known someone to do. I admire your decision, Robin. I only wish it never had to happen. All these years and the courts… we continued on, complacent with the shared belief that they’d all died. We failed them, over and over. No more .”

I raised a hand and placed it above the scar on my chest, the very one Althea had burned upon me after Tarron drove a blade of light through me. It felt like it happened so long ago. Far beneath the leather material, I recognised the scar, wearing it like a badge of honour. In a sense it was the day I died and was reborn into this new version of myself. “So much has changed in such little time. I’m scared to blink for fear of what else will happen.”

Althea focused her gaze forward to the glow of light that signalled the exit that we moved toward. She didn’t recognise this corridor like I did. Althea hadn’t been with us as we escaped Aldrick. After Seraphine had buried him beneath the haunting mirror that’d shown a glimpse of the demonic presence which caused all of this. Duwar. The demon.

Talking with Althea did little to keep the dread that had lodged itself in my heart from piercing it completely. The scorned monster and its threat to both realms always lingered at the back of my mind.

It’s that terrifying vision we witnessed that made looking in mirrors hard for me since then.

I wasn’t a fool. I knew that when we finally left Lockinge upon the ships that waited for us just beyond that door, it wouldn’t be peace we faced. The threat of Aldrick and his promise to bring forth the demon god into this world was genuine. Our next issue to deal with. Tonight was merely one step closer to solving the actual devil at hand.

“We must keep our focus on the horizon,” Althea said softly. “One step at a time, and we will one day reach it.”

I exhaled, feeling the pressure in my lungs fade. Duncan walked ahead of me, aiding an elderly fey woman by taking hold of her arm and offering her support.

He was my horizon.

As if sensing my attention, he glanced over his shoulder and smiled. Duncan kept me going, at least, one step at a time. As long as he was close, I had the energy to keep playing this part of king until it benefited those around me.

I returned his smile with one of my own. But the moment was severed when a hollow bang sounded far beyond the castle’s walls outside the doors. Right toward the rear of the castle where the Cedarfall ships waited for us.

The crowd ahead came to a collective stop suddenly. My breathing hitched as though talons wrapped around my throat and squeezed. The shuffling of feet faded into silence as the thunderous song of my impending doom chorused in my mind.

There was another bang, this time louder, like the splintering of wood. And then I was running. My mind focused on the blue expanse that raced toward me. There was a ground-shaking boom followed by the splinter of wood as it exploded beneath the force.

I knew, deep down, before I burst out into the world beyond and looked at the ocean, that our ships were under siege.

But what I didn’t expect to see was an armada of monstrous vessels cutting across the ocean toward the line of Cedarfall ships. Nor did I think it possible when I saw the white-winged figures filling the skies with hands full of gleaming weapons of gold splendour.