Chapter Thirty-Seven

THE JOURNEY BACK TO MORARDIA was uneasy. I couldn't count the number of times I'd had to go over what Muna said, because everyone seemed just as shocked as I was. It was like none of us could wrap our heads around reality—war was really on our doorstep. It created an air of disappointment and hopelessness but also a rush of determination. It was like Muna said: battle may be approaching, but that didn't mean our goal was lost. We could still rise victorious, and when the dust settled, we could bring everyone together.

Morardia bustled with activity when we finally arrived back from the four-day journey to and from Muna's Kingdom, but as we made our way through the streets toward the palace, I noticed the commotion of daily life felt … different. People walked faster than normal, and instead of excited chatter among the shops, hushed whispers filled the market. Apprehension coated my skin, and the feeling didn't go away even when we arrived at the palace.

As soon as we stepped inside, Imani and Akira greeted us as though they'd been waiting there for hours.

"Bria," Akira gasped when he saw me. His dark eyes clouded with grief. "Bria, it's awful."

"What?" I asked in alarm, reaching to grab his quivering hands. "What happened?"

"You need to come to the dungeons immediately," Imani reported softly, which was in stark contrast to her locked jaw and fuming eyes. "All hell broke loose while the five of you were gone."

I moved on autopilot, my stomach in my throat, and my heart nearly bursting from my chest. The first red flag was a sobbing Mingxia sitting in the main hallway of the dungeon. She had her knees hugged to her chest, her body shaking with each cry she let out.

I immediately went to go see what was wrong, but Imani placed her arm on my back to keep me walking.

"She's been that way since it happened," Imani whispered. "There's no consoling her right now. You need to see first, anyways."

"See what?" I asked, not even caring that my question came out strangled. "What happened?"

Instead of answering me, she led me around the corner toward the hall where Dax's cell was. When the hallway came into view, I stopped dead in my tracks.

"Oh my God," Dallas gasped as she came out behind me.

"Fuck. Marcus," Rance hissed.

Jesiah rushed past us to kneel in front of Marcus, whose body was slumped across from Dax's wide open cell door. A dagger was shoved into his chest all the way to the hilt, and his head was tilted up to the ceiling, mouth agape and eyes closed. Dried blood smeared his lips and chin, and it caked the front of his white shirt from the stab wound.

"When did this happen?" Rune demanded.

"Two days ago," Imani answered.

"Two days? No one moved him?" I shrieked.

"We wanted the five of you to see the scene yourself since this doesn't make sense. Plus, this is just the tip of the fucking iceberg of new problems," Imani said with tightly shut eyes.

The news was gut-wrenching. Two days. Marcus had died two freaking days ago. I met Rune's gaze. I knew he was thinking the same thing as me—that was the day we'd arrived and left Muna's Kingdom. Could the soul she had to attend to be … I inhaled sharply and approached Marcus.

"H-How is he—" I asked, falling to my knees next to him. I reached my shaking hands toward his gray, lifeless body. "How is he dead? That wound isn't fatal to Fae."

"No, it's not," Jesiah agreed. His brown eyes examined the body. "At least, it shouldn't be."

"That's the part that didn't make sense," Imani explained. "It's why we left him like this. He shouldn't be dead, Jesiah."

Jesiah grabbed the hilt of the dagger and yanked it from Marcus's chest, sending what looked like black tar spewing from the wound. Jesiah gasped and immediately leapt away from the body.

Rune suddenly grabbed me around the waist and yanked me firmly against his chest until my feet no longer touched the floor. He, like everyone else, backed away from Marcus.

"There's no way," Dallas screeched as she stared wide-eyed at the lifeless form.

"What?" I asked in alarm. "What is it?"

"How the fuck—" Rune growled, squeezing me tighter. "Is that what I think it is?"

Jesiah slowly shook his head like he was in a trance as he watched the black gunk ooze from the wound in Marcus's chest. "I—I'm not sure."

I gripped Rune's arm tightly, my feet futilely kicking at air in frustration. "Someone please tell me what's going on!"

"There's a myth among Fae," Jesiah started slowly. "About an oil that a certain flower creates. It's not a plant that just grows out in the wild. It—It's created by Land Fae, but only the strongest of them can do it. You have to have a certain trace of magic. Being injected with or consuming even a drop of the oil stops the Fae's ability to heal, rendering us basically human in that sense. We can't recover from injuries, and what would be a fatal wound for a human is also a fatal wound for us."

"How the hell has no one said anything about this to me?" I snapped.

I thought back to when Rune and I trained all those months ago, and he taught me how to fight and kill a Fae. He never said anything about this oil-producing flower, and it was never brought up in my studies since then, either.

I suddenly remembered the day of my coronation and wedding. Elias's letter had held a single black petal, and none of us knew what it came from. A shiver ran down my spine as I realized Elias had been sending a warning, even back then. Death was right before my eyes then, and here, it lay at my feet.

"Because it wasn't supposed to be real," Rune finally answered. "The Nightbloom was just a myth, a story made up and told to Fae around fires. Like a horror story."

"It looks pretty damn real to me," Dallas fretted, raking her hands through her hair. She tugged on the ends. "If a Land Fae has figured out how to create and harness the Nightbloom …"

She didn't have to finish what she was saying. We all knew what it meant.

A single drop could prove fatal when paired with the right attack.

And Land Fae now had this at their disposal.

"How are we supposed to combat that?" Rance asked.

Swallowing down my rising nausea, I said, "We'll discuss that later. I'm not going to talk war and battle while Marcus continues to rot right in front of us. We need to move his body and prepare a funeral."

"He's infected," Jesiah stated bleakly. "To be safe, I think we'll need to burn his body to avoid spreading the Nightbloom. If it gets on anyone else, I'm afraid of the damage it might cause."

The mental image of Marcus's body being charred made my stomach ripple with revulsion, but I also knew Jesiah was right. We couldn't risk it infecting anyone else.

Glancing over Rune's shoulder, I nodded toward the discarded blankets in Dax's empty cell. "We'll wrap him up with those for now."

Rance and Dallas immediately went to work gathering the bedding and trying to get Marcus in it without touching any of the black poison. While they did that, I focused on the empty cell.

"What happened with Dax?" I asked.

Imani leaned against the bars of the hold and crossed her toned arms over her chest. "Someone broke him out, and I'm assuming it's the same person who killed Marcus. The faction of Water Fae that had been against you and your pursuit of peace have all disappeared, as well. We believe Dax was freed and taken in by that group." She swallowed hard, her eyes squeezing shut. "Angus is gone, too. I … I think he joined them."

"You've got to be fucking kidding me," Rune growled, his voice dangerously low.

Angus.

I didn't know if I wanted to laugh, cry, or scream. Maybe I wanted to do all three. Angus had admittedly been about as lovely as a hangnail, and his obvious dislike of my plan for our Kingdom had been a constant frustration of mine. But he was also wise with valid opinions that I tried to consider, and he'd been loyal to Water Fae all this time. Had I driven him to the point of treason?

"Do you think he was the one who broke Dax out?" Rune asked Imani.

She nodded. "That's my guess. Marcus was guarding his cell, and if Angus approached, Marcus wouldn't have had his guard up."

"But he was killed with something we've already established is a Land Fae power," I argued. I passed a dumbfounded gaze around as I finished, "Why would Anugs have that? That would have to mean he's working with Land Fae, and he hates Land Fae."

Everyone suddenly avoided my eye contact, some choosing to look at the floor, others pretending to fiddle with the door to Dax's room. Rune squeezed me tighter, and that's when I knew what they were all thinking.

He hates me more.

Angus—and probably all the Water Fae who'd been against peace with Land Fae—had been so against me and my ideas that they'd joined the very people who they were supposed to loathe. They'd turned on their entire Kingdom, most likely because they felt any supporter of me was an enemy to them and their beliefs. And who else felt the same way? Elias and his followers. Nothing could join two groups of people that loathed each other like a common enemy.

Me.

Swallowing hard, I patted Rune's arm to signal that he could let me down. He complied, and I said, "Prepare Marcus's body for a funeral, then everyone get washed up. We need to call the Council of Doctrina and all high-ranking military officials to discuss the new turn-of-events."

"Yes, Your Majesty," Jesiah, Dallas, Rance, and Imani answered in unison.

I spun on my heel with Rune right behind me and left the dungeon as quickly as I'd entered.