Chapter 2

CHAPTER2

The ax cleaves right through my momentary burst of confidence, shattering it into a hundred tiny fragments of bone.

A fucking ax.

Honestly, it’s a first.

You’d think in five thousand years and more battles than I care to list that I might have encountered one lodged in my body before. But you’d be mistaken. Arrows, yes. Swords and daggers, of course. Pikes, yes, multiple times. A few corkscrews, wooden stakes (stupid humans and your myths), a pencil, even a mace in my guts once, which was pretty fucking gross. But an ax? No. I didn’t even notice someone holding one.

Lesson Two of the Shadow Realm: pay closer attention to who is carrying what.

Lesson Three is one I’ve known for a long time. I just need to apply it despite my shock and pain and rage.

Don’t let them see you weak.

The shunk of the ax lodging into bone still reverberates in my mind. My scapula and the ribs beneath are shattered, pins of bone and the sharpened edge of the blade piercing into my lung. I manage to stay upright by leaning on the spear still clutched in my hand. Thick blood cascades into my chest with every torturous breath.

Don’t let them see you weak.

Zida’s rage is incandescent, as blinding as her brilliant white scales. She coils around my legs and keeps me standing as she hisses at the audience. But before she can descend the dais and strike at the onlookers, Ashen is already there.

I look over my uninjured shoulder. The crowd is parted, watching as Ashen clasps the ax-thrower’s throat in a vice grip. The demon is big, burly. Thickly muscled. Definitely the ax-carrying type. He reminds me of Gallus. But where he’s blocky, he’s also slow. A little cumbersome. By comparison, Ashen is tall and swift, strong but with the kind of power that’s graceful and lithe. He’s fluid, adaptable. And cunning.

Ashen squeezes the demon’s throat, his rippling blade aimed at the rival Reaper’s heart.

“You dare to injure my wife.” Ashen’s voice is cold. Clear. Measured. The control he has over his rage makes him ten times more menacing than usual.

“She is no queen,” the man spits through gritted teeth. His eyes flick to mine.

Ashen tightens his grip, pressing the tip of his sword to the man’s chest. “You dare to even look at her. In fact, I will make sure you cannot.”

His movement is faster than I can even track.

One moment Ashen’s hand is around the demon’s throat, the next his sword is clattering against the floor as he presses the man’s cheekbones between his palms. The tattoos on Ashen’s knuckles glow as though sensing the power of war within his skin. And from nowhere, Cole appears, materializing from the crowd like vapor. He pulls the struggling demon’s arms behind his back.

Ashen’s thumbs lay over the ax-thrower’s closed eyes. The man twists desperately between Cole and Ashen, but despite his bulk and size, he hardly moves my Reaper. All Ashen has to do is apply a little more pressure with his thumbs and the demon falls to his knees, as malleable as clay in Ashen’s hands.

“Let me make something abundantly clear for all of you, if you will excuse the irony,” Ashen grits out. He presses his thumbs into the man’s eyes so slowly, drawing out every second of the agony he creates and molds with his touch. I hear the squish as he punctures the gelatinous orbs, like the juicy pulp of fruit collapsing beneath his fingertips. The demon in his grasp screams and thrashes, but still I hear that squelch, and every drop of blood and ruined flesh that falls to splatter on the floor. “Leucosia of Anthemoessa is your Queen. No one harms her. No one touches her. And if you even look at her in a manner that I do not like, I will take your eyes and make you suffer.”

Cole lets go of the demon’s arms. Ashen raises his foot and kicks the man’s chest, releasing the pressure of his grip. The demon falls to the floor, shaking, screaming, his hands raised to cover the sightless holes where his eyes once were.

“Cyrus,” Ashen bellows. A soldier steps forward. His dark hair is tied back with a thread of leather, his black eyes filled with a languid sort of flame. He has a neatly trimmed beard and dark olive skin that seems to glow, even in the dim light.

“Yes, sir.”

“Have someone take him to the cage. Strip him. Remove anything in the cell that he could use to kill himself with. I do not want him in the Resurrection Chamber. Not yet. You go to the Chamber and check on those resurrecting. Take half the Shub Lugal with you and we will meet you there.”

Cyrus gives a stiff nod, careful not to look at me though I almost feel his desire to do so. He beckons another soldier over to drag the bloodied demon away, the crowd parting as they disappear into the shadows between the pillars with twenty of what must be the elite Shub Lugal soldiers with them.

Ashen glares across the audience. “Did I make myself clear, Shadow Realm? Because if not, I will gladly unburden you of your eyes, one by one.”

No one moves. I can barely hear anything beyond the rumble of my punctured lung and the galloping beat of my distressed heart.

Imani rises and takes a single step forward. She looks at me with a subtle smile. There’s determination in her face. She knows her power, and this is a game she can play.

“Hail Queen Leucosia,” she says, her voice echoing to the highest reaches of the tall ceiling.

A chorus responds. Hail Queen Leucosia.

This is the most fucking surreal moment of my life.

A month ago, I was in the dungeon beneath this very hall, tortured and broken. Ready to die.

Days ago, I let my heart win over my mind, choosing to love the demon I thought betrayed me to this place.

Hours ago, I died, resurrecting here in the realm of my enemies.

And now I’m the Queen of the Shadow Realm, standing on the dais with an ax in my back and a giant snake coiling around my legs.

Fucking wild. Dizzying and terrifying and a little exciting and super painful right now, quite honestly. This ax is still just hanging out of my shoulder like a single iron wing.

Ashen gives a final sweeping look across the room before turning to me. When he faces me, the black flame of rage in his eyes roils as though caught in a wind. He climbs the steps of the dais with Cole in his wake, and only now do his wings erupt, as dark as night with heavy smoke and brilliant sparks. His eyes bore into mine and I understand. He wanted no obstructions between us. He wanted me to see it. And now he wants me to see only him.

“Soldiers,” he says as he stops in front of me, raising his hand to my face. He’s careful not to mark my skin with the blood that coats his thumb and streaks across his palm. I stagger on my feet. No one can see but him. “Get everyone out. Out of the Kur. Back to their houses or wherever the fuck they’re supposed to be and keep them there. If they disobey, kill them. Permanently.”

Zida hisses at the crowd to put a final scaly stamp on his order. There are shouts and shuffling, and in a few moments the last footsteps exit the building, the heavy doors at the other end of the hall closing with an echoing thud.

The second they do, I pitch forward with a wheeze into Ashen’s arms, dropping the spear and the head with a clang and a thud. I taste blood in my mouth and spray a cough of it like a cloud of dark mist into the air.

“All right, vampire?” Ashen asks, his voice strained.

“Never better.”

Ashen sets me down on my knees, draping my torso across Zida’s body. He positions my arms so I can brace myself against her, firming his grip on my forearms in a wordless request for me to hold on. Then he lays a foot on Zida’s scales and grips the handle of the ax. “Ready yourself, vampire.”

Before I can even tell him to do it, the ax is sliding out of my lung. I can’t contain my anguished cry as it grinds against the split bone. Ashen tosses it across the dais as soon as it’s free of my flesh. My chest rumbles, blood rushing into my lung.

“I am so sorry, my Lu. Drink.” Ashen holds his wrist to my mouth and I slide my fangs into his skin, closing my eyes as I draw in his blood. It charges down my throat like a lightning strike. I feel my flesh begin to knit together, the pins of shattered bone shifting back into place. In a few pulls of blood, the injury is healed enough that I can move my shoulder. “Much faster than usual,” Ashen observes.

I let go of his wrist and nod, still recovering my breath as Urtur comes to investigate, shoving his nose beneath my arm with a gentle whine. “Hybrid level-up. I saw one struck by a blade on the battlefield. The dagger should have taken it down, but the creature barely slowed.” I turn my attention to Cole. “It’s so good to see you.”

That boyish, surfer-boy smile brightens his skin. “Same here. Queen, huh? Ediye will be so excited to hear this gossip.”

The sting of tears gathers behind my eyes as Cole leans down to give me a hug. His warmth seeps through the silk of my robe that suddenly feels so cold as the adrenaline subsides, leaving jittering, sparking nerves in its absence. “Is she okay? Is everyone okay?”

“Yeah, Lu. They’re good. I mean, Ediye sent me here to check on you even though it might result in my everlasting death, so I know where I stand in the order of things.”

I laugh and grip him tighter. Tears of relief nearly shake free from the edges of my eyes as the vibrations of shock quiver through my flesh. “Hoes before mo-fos, you know the drill. Don’t take it personally.”

“I know,” Cole says through a laugh as he pulls away to press a kiss to my cheek. “That was clear from day one.”

Cole’s hands slip behind my neck. The cool gold chain glides across my collarbones as the familiar weight of the small pendant settles against my skin. “My necklace,” I whisper, touching the delicate links.

“You left that behind in the snow when you turned to cinders on us. I never thought I’d be so relieved to see someone collapse into a heap of dust.”

Ashen claps a hand on Cole’s shoulder as the demon stands. He extends a hand to him. “I’m sorry that I threatened to turn your eyes into cake pops in Cairo.”

Cole smiles and takes Ashen’s forearm. The grip of two soldiers. My heart is ready to burst open and spill glitter across my ribs as I watch their exchange. “Well, looks like you’ve scratched that particular itch for the moment.” Cole winks at me and I grin as Ashen claps him on the shoulder once more, a little harder this time. Cole’s smile broadens but quickly fades as he shifts his gaze between me and Ashen. “I can’t stay. I need to let the others know you’re okay. We’re at the coven over the mountain from Valentina’s estate. The hybrids and werewolves are keeping their distance. We’ll make sure it’s safe for whenever you can make it back.”

“We will come as soon as we can,” Ashen says, and Cole gives a single nod in reply before he turns and starts down the steps of the dais. “Cole…”

“Yeah?”

“Thank you. For everything that you’ve done for us.”

Cole tries to contain a smile, but he can’t keep it from his eyes. He gives one more nod and jogs down the steps, skirting around the bodies on the floor as he heads through the long, quiet hall.

“You’re growing soft, Reaper,” I say as I reach up and take Ashen’s offered hand.

“I blame that entirely on you.” Ashen gives me a subdued smile before he gathers me in his arms, lifting me from Zida. He turns to stride down the dais, the smoke and sparks swirling around us like a billowing gown.

“Spear,” I say, pointing to the floor.

“I’ll come for it later. Zida will guard it.”

“Head,” I say, pointing to Eshkar’s blood-spattered face.

“I’ll come back for that too.”

“Feet.” I point to my toes that poke out from the edge of my robe. “I can walk.”

“I know you can. But I’m not having your soles stained by the blood of your enemies.”

My heart tumbles in my chest. I loop my arms behind Ashen’s neck and tilt my head back to smile at him. “That’s very romantic, Reaper. So was the eyeball thing.”

Ashen regards me for a long moment as we walk. There’s affection and pride surfacing in his eyes with every step he takes, drowning out the worry and rage that still roll through the black flame. “Your idea of romance is perhaps a bit dark.”

“Pfft. You love my dark side.”

Ashen lifts me closer as though I weigh nothing, placing a lingering kiss to my forehead. “You are right. I do.”

I lay my face to Ashen’s matte black armor, wishing I could press my skin to his warmth. Even through the cool, thick metal I can still hear the steady thud of his heart and the whoosh of air swirling in his lungs. It’s soothing. The one steady percussion in the melody of chaos.

The further we walk from the dais, the closer we seem to get to reality. The reality that this is still a super messed-up place, as evidenced by the souls who drift in the shadows and the scuttling of the few crawlers who stayed behind in the Kur when the demons left. There’s also the reality that I’m now supposed to be running this ridiculous circus, despite the fact that I know very little about this realm. I’m aware some shady shit goes on here, no surprise. I’m sure Leander was honest when he spoke about hunts and the gauntlet, whatever the fuck that is. But, like…I don’t even know about regular, everyday stuff. Where do I buy booze? And with what money? Where do I go to get a wax? Shit’s gonna start getting real feral downstairs if I don’t get answers soon.

Plus, there’s the more important issue. Namely, I don’t know how to lead a bunch of demons who literally just stabbed me in the back. I’ve been hiding for three hundred years, for fucksakes. Anonymity has kinda been my jam. This is quite the opposite from my recent lifestyle in Sanford. And even if it wasn’t, even if I was some kind of vampire siren socialite, it still doesn’t mean I know shit about leading a realm.

These thoughts just keep swirling in my head like a whirlpool, sucking me under. I don’t say anything as we arrive at a black carriage, Ashen setting me down on the first step. I get in and sit back against my torn robe, my shoulder still a painful physical reminder of the hacked-up thoughts scattered in my brain. Ashen climbs in after me and closes the door, and the carriage lurches ahead, pulling away from the Kur.

I feel a thousand things all at once, rolling through my head just like the wheels gliding beneath us on the dark road. What the fuck, that seems to be a dominant thought. Dread is equally mixed with an odd kind of excitement, like I’m on a dodgy carnival ride with rusty bolts and it might be fun but I’m not entirely sure I won’t die. A devious whisper reminds me I now have the power to dismantle this realm and even rebuild it the way I want, but that thought is always drowned out by the enormity of the task ahead. I feel moments of relief sitting across from Ashen, who’s watching me with both suspicion and a bit of amusement in his faint smile. But then other moments I just feel like squirming from beneath the weight of his gaze and the scrutiny in the dim flame that ripples through his eyes. I guess my super expressive face must be at full expression capacity and he looks like he doesn’t want to miss a moment.

I feel like I want to crawl out of my skin. I look out the window to the Bay of Souls and that definitely doesn’t fucking help. My whole body writhes involuntarily and I drag my hands down my face.

“Vampire—”

“How do I stop this thing?”

“Stop what thing?”

“This fucking ghost carriage. I need to get out.”

“You can’t just get out. We’re in the middle of the bridge.”

“I need to get out. Is there a secret code? Is it ‘stop the fucking ghost carriage?’ STOP THE FUCKING GHOST CARRIAGE. Right now. Get me out.”

“Lu—”

“You’re telling me I’m the Queen and I can’t even stop this wack ride? What the fuck, Ashen. Get me out. Get me out get me out get me out get me out.”

Ashen pounds three times on the roof of the carriage and it lurches to a halt. I’m out the door before the wheels have even stopped turning.

“Lu…” Ashen says behind me. I can hear both amusement and concern in the way he says my name, but I’m too busy pacing by the stone railing of the bridge to stop and look at him. “Lu, you are freaking out, as Ediye would say.”

“I know that. Of course I’m fucking freaking out. You just made me Queen of the goddamn Shadow Realm. What the fuck, Ashen. Can you even do that?”

“Well…I did. So…yes.”

“Then un-Queen me.”

“I can’t.”

“Why the fuck not?”

“I would have to stage a coup. That would not look very good against my wife. Too reminiscent of Catherine the Great, really. It would not lend a lot of support to the idea that we have a solid marriage.”

“Well good, because we don’t have a fucking marriage, Ashen,” I say, twinkling my ringless fingers in front of his face as his grin grows more wicked. I jab him on his armor where his mark lies above his heart. “We are mated. Not the same thing.”

“Pretty much the same.”

“Not at all the same.”

Ashen smiles as I level him with a flat glare. His gaze drops down the center of my robe, down to my bare toes. “And how are you planning on getting to our accommodations? Walking?”

“Umm, yes. Unless you’ve suddenly developed teleportation skills I don’t know about.”

“But you have no shoes. And you’re in a robe.”

“Yes, thank you. I hadn’t noticed until you told me. It’s not like I was thinking about it the entire time I was on the dais being given the title of Queen of the fucking Shadow Realm. It totally hadn’t occurred to me that I’m naked under here with fucking jizz on my legs.”

Ashen snorts a laugh and looks across the sea before catching my irate glare. His eyes soften as his head tilts. “Pick your battles, vampire,” he says as he reaches up to shift a strand of hair from my temple, securing it behind my ear.

“I am. I’m picking this one.” I stay locked in Ashen’s scrutiny for a short moment before I pivot past him, heading for the souls yoked to our carriage who wait with eternal patience for our next instructions. “Where do the souls sleep?”

“Sleep?”

“Yes, Reaper. For fucksakes. Sleep. You know what sleeping is. It’s what you do on a bed when you’re not banging on those ridiculous sex sheets of yours. Where do they sleep?”

Ashen snickers at my reference to his sheets that I want to hate yet still can’t, but quickly subdues his grin as he takes in the ferocity of my glare. He shrugs and looks around. “Anywhere,” he says with a sweeping gesture of his hand. “They kind of stand in place and…sway.”

“Th… they… sss. Errrgh.” My ability to make words seems to evaporate as irritation boils over into rage. I take a breath and try again. “They sway? They fucking sway?”

“Yes…pretty much.”

I let out a frustrated growl. I even stomp my bare foot on the road. And then I march over to the closest soul and grip the iron clamped around her neck, working at the bolt that keeps her tethered to the carriage.

“Can’t you reap a fucking horse?” I toss over my shoulder as I release the clasp and approach the next soul. It’s a warlock. His thoughts are slow but loud and I try to push them away, careful not to touch his skin in case it makes him harder to ignore.

“Why would I want to reap a horse?”

“To pull your carriages, why do you think, dumbass?”

“Is it like a werehorse?”

“A werehorse?”

“A werehorse. An immortal being who changes from a human into a horse.”

I pause and turn toward Ashen. “What…the fuck…does that exist? Have I been missing out on werehorses all my life?”

“…No.”

I look out across the Black Sea as though I might find help there. Of course, there is none. I drag my hands down my face and take a deep breath, which accomplishes nothing. “Why?”

“Why do werehorses not exist?”

I drop my head into my hands and let out some kind of strangled sound of frustration and anguish. My throat is burning and twisting beneath my skin. I turn toward Ashen, my fingers still pressing into my cheekbones. “Jesus H. Christ in a chicken basket, Ashen. No. Though maybe yes, for convenience. But also NO.” I sigh as my hands fall to my sides. “Why are you messing with me?”

Ashen shrugs, his gaze darting away before finding mine again with a glint of amusement buried deep beneath the sparks. “Well, you have defiled my butter multiple times. There had to be retribution at some point.”

“You…you’re doing this to me because of…butter? Butter, Ashen?”

He laughs. The fucking audacity. He laughs. That stupid, wonderful, spellbinding sound. I cross my arms over my essentially naked chest and glare fury at him, which only makes him laugh again. I want to hate that sound, as much as I want to hate those sex sheets of his, but I can’t. That timbre, the rarity, the precious warmth…it fills my chest with just enough heat to burn away at least some of the panic that creeps beneath my ribs, eating my bones.

“No, vampire,” Ashen says as he takes my elbows, cradling them in his steady, warm palms. “Of course not.”

My brows stitch together. Desperation is like a tight lace that pulls my skin taut. “Why? Ashen…I am not made for this. All of this. I’m not a queen. I’m not. Not in any time, or any place. Especially here.”

Ashen ducks his head to keep hold of my eyes when I try to look away. His grip on my elbows grows firmer when I feel like I’m vibrating. Everything about him is like an anchor. And he just waits, as steady as that iron hook lodged in the silt at the end of a heavy chain. He watches until I go still for a moment in the storm. “You are exactly the queen that the Shadow Realm needs. You are the only one who can heal this place.”

“I’m not.”

Ashen’s hands frame my face as tears well in my eyes. “You are, Lu. You are the balance between shadow and light. You change the people you’re with. You bind them together. And when they can’t get behind you, you do what needs to be done. You are not afraid to make a friend. And you are not afraid to kill an enemy.”

“But I’m not ready for this,” I whisper.

“No one is ready for destiny.”

“What if this isn’t my destiny at all?”

“What if it is?” Ashen watches me as I look out to the sea, searching the black water for answers. He tugs on my sleeves and reels me in like a rare creature captured from its darkest depths. His arms fold across my back and he waits until I lose a little of the tension coiling through my back before he speaks again. “Lu, you are the one person who looks at these souls and sees them. Really sees them. Cares for them. Wants to change this place for them. You believe the Shadow Realm could be different. Just like you believed I could be different, or Urtur or Zida.”

I blow a thin stream of air through my tense lips. “This is madness, Ashen.”

“You are right. It is madness. Look at you, here in the middle of the bridge, wearing nothing but a robe and…jizz…stopping a carriage so that you can let these souls go. It’s the best madness imaginable. And I was wrong just now. You are right to choose this battle. The only one I truly think you should give up is the one against yourself.”

“I don’t know how.”

“Then maybe that is the first thing you need to learn as Queen. How to lay down arms against yourself.”

I sigh against Ashen’s armored chest. “That sounds all wise and logical and shit. I don’t like it. Can’t I just continue to freak out for a while?”

Ashen puffs a breath of a laugh, stirring the blood-encrusted hair on my shoulder. “You are the Queen. Do what you need to do. If you need to freak out until it gets old, then freak out.”

“You mean like killing you got old?”

“You and I both know it did not get old.”

“You’re right,” I say. “It didn’t. Especially not if it results in sex in the Resurrection Chamber. I’ll be killing you all the time if that’s the deal.”

I rise on my toes and steal a kiss as we release one another from our embrace. We head back to the carriage to free the remaining four souls from their iron yokes. “What about sex in the Council Palace?” Ashen asks, releasing another clasp.

“You mean where Eshkar and Imogen lived? Eww.”

“Hmm. Good point.”

“What about your room at House Urbigu?”

Ashen’s eyes darken. He keeps his gaze away from mine. “Not habitable.”

“Right,” I say, letting a soul free of its shackles. “I heard.”

Ashen’s gaze flicks to mine, his jaw ticking. A quiet grunt is all he has to say about the room he destroyed when I was captured by his realm.

We work in silence, releasing the last souls who wander away, listless and alone. We watch them for a moment before Ashen slips his hand into mine. I feel a ripple of anxiety in him, teasing at the flesh beneath my mated mark, and I wonder what it’s for.

“Come on, vampire. I know a place we can go.”