Chapter 12

T he male’s gaze kept falling on me as we followed the Prince away from the grand staircase and toward a set of arched doors at the end of the hall. They were carved with images not dissimilar to those on the Gates inside Yggdrasil , and I suppressed a shudder. They flew open as the Prince approached, walking fast and no longer lightly.

* * *

The throne room was a mass of darkness, a putrid stench invading my nose immediately. As the Prince’s feet met the floor, sconces on the walls flickered to life with flames. They cast shadows on the walls that danced like ghouls across the deep maroon red — the color of dried blood. A shove in my back made me step into the room after the Prince, and my skin felt tight as my breath caught.

A black carpet ran the length of the long hall, ending in a dais and I assumed the thrones, but it was too dark at the end of the room to see.

I could see was what was either side of the carpet though. Urns ran along the edges, filled with human skulls. Some of the skulls were stacked on top of one another, and others were lined up with their mouths facing outward, like silent sentries.

My eyes travelled up at the clinking sound of metal, and my already hesitant footsteps faltered. The ceiling of the throne room was vaulted, but long iron racks hung on chains at regular intervals. And hanging from the racks were people.

They were still, and it was too dark to see if their chests moved with breath. In fact, it was too dark to see if they were male, female, human or fae.

I dragged my eyes away, unable to look. Fingers closed around my arm, and I pulled Kara to my side, making myself look at her instead.

“It’ll be okay,” I whispered. Silent tears were streaming down her cheeks as she stared up at the racks. “Look at me.”

She did, slowly.

“It will be okay. I won’t let anything happen to you.”

She nodded, and I felt another, gentler press in my back. I threw a glare over my shoulder at Frima, then resumed walking down the soft carpet.

As we moved further in, catching up the Prince, I became aware of the sounds of nails scratching against stone, the clicking of talons, and the hiss and slither of scales.

When we had almost reached the end of the room, two final torches burst to life, each inside the gaping jaw of massive skulls on tall pedestals. Two thrones were revealed, an occupant in the one on the right.

The Queen of the Shadow Court.

She looked like some kind of demonic goddess.

She was wearing black lace and silk, her skirts draped across her knees and her torso elegantly contained in a tight bodice. But scarlet red adorned her clothes, dripping down the fabric. I kept my eyes on her face, refusing to look up and see what could be dripping blood over her where she sat.

She had raven black hair in a hundred intricate braids piled up and knotted elegantly around a crown of ivory bone.

As she looked at me, her crimson eyes widened and her lips curled with pleasure, revealing teeth that were sharp as spear points and as black as night.

“My son,” she said as we came to a stop. Her voice was lyrical and soft, but I could feel the magic it carried within it. Dizziness ticked at my mind, and my insides felt cold. Kara made the tiniest whimpering sound beside me.

“I am not your son.” The Prince set his staff down on the carpet with a gentle thud.

The Queen moved her intense gaze from me to him. A single drop of red hit her cheek, rolling slowly down her skin. When it reached the corner of her mouth, her tongue darted out, catching it. I felt sick as I watched the pleasure on her face. Kara’s whimpering got louder, and the Queen looked at her.

“You have brought me gold-givers.” Power rolled from her as she spoke, her eyes not leaving Kara. She looked like a predator imagining all the different ways it could devour its prey. Fear flowed through my veins.

“I have brought myself gold-givers.”

“You have creative plans for their demise?” Her voice was hopeful. “I can’t see why else you would bring them here, if they are not a gift for your mother.”

“You are not my mother.”

Something moved in her hand, catching the light. A staff, I realized, but not anything like the staff the Prince carried. It was engulfed in darkness again. “Really, Mazrith, you must get over this. We have discussed it at length, and will again if needed.”

I thought I heard a growling sound come from the Prince but when he spoke his voice was clear and calm.

“I have plans for them, yes. I shall see you at dinner.” He lifted his staff and began to turn away from her.

“Mazrith.” The Queen’s voice lost its softness in a beat. I caught a flash of fury in his eyes, before he turned back to her.

“My Queen.” The two words were ground out, as though they caused him physical pain.

“Let’s kill them now. Together. A bonding activity, if you like.” The softness was back, a smile playing on her blood-red lips.

“I have plans for them.”

Her smile vanished. “I’m killing them now. Stay, or leave, it’s up to you.”

“You can’t.” The Prince stepped forward, and a frown crossed the Queen’s face.

“I think you’ll find, son, that I can.”

There was a silence as they stared at each other, filled only with the rush of blood pounding in my ears and Kara’s quiet crying.

This was it.

Whatever was in store for us, it was coming.

Were the Prince’s plans for us any better than hanging from a ceiling on hooks, our blood tasted by our twisted tormentor?

Did it matter which of them won the battle of wills over how to end our lives?

Something flashed in the Queen’s eyes, and they fell on me. My stomach lurched. A strange restrictive feeling tightened around my throat, and through my icy fear, I felt something even colder on the skin of my neck.

Shadows.

Panic flooded my system, every muscle in my body tensing.

“My son, what you wish to do with your human thralls is your business, of course, but we can’t afford to let gold-givers live. Even the pretty females.”

“I am keeping her,” he growled.

“You want to fuck her?” The Queen gave me an appraising look, her lips curling and showing her black teeth again. “I suppose I can understand that. But still… I forbid it. She dies. She is an asset to our enemy and needs putting down.”

The Prince let out a hissing sound that could easily have come from a real serpent. “You leave me no choice.” His words were so low I didn’t think they were meant for the Queen.

With a rush, his shadows burst up around me, lifting me bodily from the carpet.

An involuntary cry attempted to leave my throat, but it was still tight, and no sound came out. I gasped in a breath, kicking my legs as both Lhoris and Kara cried out. The Prince turned, his black skull mask catching the blood-red light, his bright eyes filled with power. He lifted his staff high and the skull on the top glowed.

“Mazrith, what—” the Queen started, standing from her throne.

“I announce her as bound to me,” he boomed. Pain flared in my chest, then a searing feeling matched it on my wrist and shoulder blades.

A cry finally managed to escape my lips, as the pain built and built. I lifted my arm, trying to breathe, my feet desperately groping for the floor a foot below me.

My rune. I blinked in pain and confusion at the mark on my wrist. Black shadows were dancing across the golden rune, almost covering it before the gold burned bright, clearing them away.

The Prince’s voice slithered into my skull. “The pain will stop if you consent to the binding.”

“I will not be bound to you.” I hissed the words through my pain and his eyes turned even paler.

“Consent now, and the pain will stop.”

“Never.”

I had been prepared to run from one cruel fae who wanted to bind me. I would not submit to this one. No matter how much it hurt.

“If you do not consent, I will kill Lhoris and Kara. Or leave them with my stepmother.”

My panicked gaze flicked to my sobbing protege and my fierce mentor, both staring up at me with fear-filled faces.

I had already made my decision, back on the boat. I would do whatever needed to be done to protect my family.

With a snarl of pure rage, I submitted to the pain. It vanished in an instant. The shadows flurried around me in one final turn, then they rushed back to the Prince. I fell to the floor, landing on feet too shaky to take my weight and dropping to my knees.

“It is done,” the Prince’s granite voice sounded above me.

I choked out a strangled sound and lifted my head. Fury danced across the Queen’s face as she stared between me and the Prince. Kara crouched beside me, gripping my arm and pressing her face to my skin. A flash of pain seared across the back of my hand, leaving an onyx-black rune etched into my skin.

It was done. I was bound to the Shadow Court Prince.