Eleven

Eleven

We would arrive at the Red Palace today.

My thoughts were chaotic, and I was confused. I’d spent the last three nights on a journey to my new husband’s home, and I knew little more about him than when I’d left Lara. No one seemed to be willing to give up information—not about themselves or him. Even asking about their powers seemed to be a topic that was off-limits. These people did not want to have weaknesses.

Despite dreading my arrival at my new home, I was eager to put distance between myself and Adrian. I should be encouraging his betrayal so that I would feel justified in running. Instead, I’d demanded he find another vassal for my sake. I was too invested, which I attributed to the fact that we had been together nonstop since our encounter in the woods. At the palace, Adrian would need to attend to his own agenda while I could consider my future, process the betrayal of my people, and decide how I was supposed to rule a kingdom of monsters—or destroy it.

“You are quiet today,” Sorin said, coming up alongside me.

I stood just outside my tent, close enough to what remained of the fire to stay warm. The evening was colder than all the rest, and I was not looking forward to riding in this chill.

“Well, I am about to enter a den of wolves,” I said.

“We’re not that bad.”

I glared.

“Okay, maybe we are, but it isn’t anything you cannot handle.”

“What do you know about what I can handle?” I asked.

Sorin gave a breathy laugh, his dimples deepened. “I have only needed to spend a few days with you to know you will survive our court.”

I hoped he was right.

I went in search of Adrian and found him beside Shadow. He held the reins of a new horse; this one was white. I hesitated as I approached, wondering why there was suddenly another horse available for me to ride.

“This is Snow,” Adrian said. “I thought you might like to ride into Cel Ceredi upon her.”

Cel Ceredi was like High City in Lara—it was the town that had formed around the palace.

I took Snow’s reins. “Who did she belong to?” I asked.

Adrian stared, and I could tell he did not want to answer my question.

“Her rider was a mortal,” he finally said. “Who died last night.”

I paled, and a number of possibilities ran through my head—like they had been drained of too much blood—but Adrian was quick to shut those thoughts down.

“She wandered away from camp and was attacked by a wight,” Adrian said.

“A wight?”

It was a creature I had not heard of before, but I was certain there were several monsters I had yet to encounter, especially in Revekka.

“It is a creature born of death. They are attracted to life—to the beat of your heart.”

I stared at him for a moment, my eyes shifting to his chest as I fought the inclination to press my hand to where his heart had once beat. As much as I wanted distance from my new husband, I did not like what was forming between us now. It was not hostility so much as uncertainty. I had always been sure about my hatred for Adrian, but these new feelings…his concern for me…scared me.

“Mount up!” he called then, and the camp jumped into action.

We made our way through what remained of the Starless Forest, and as we neared the edge, I felt its grip leaving me, one finger at a time. I thought of what Adrian had said about the witches who had died there and did not realize how heavy of a burden it was to exist beneath that canopy until I was outside it and could breathe again.

My gaze shifted to Adrian. He rode a few paces ahead beside Daroc. He looked just as ominous as the red sky overhead—a powerful man with a long history, and I wanted to know what had made him. How had the history he felt so passionately about—Dragos, the witches, the Burning—shaped him into the Blood King?

Once I was at the Red Palace, I would find out.

The landscape of Revekka was much like Lara—rolling plains, mostly treeless with the exception of a few clustered pines. Beneath the sky, everything was tinged in a red hue varying from pink to crimson. It was beautiful but strange, and I wondered how long until I grew tired of it.

“We are coming upon the first village now,” said Sorin, drawing his horse beside mine. “It is called Sadovea.”

“Who lives there?” I asked. I wasn’t sure about the population of Revekka. What was the ratio of humans to vampires?

“Revekkians,” he said.

“Are they human or vampire?”

“You really don’t know much about us, do you?”

I did not honor his question with a response since it seemed to be obvious to him.

“Adrian only allows a select few the privilege of becoming a vampire,” said Sorin. I tried not to cringe at his use of the word privilege. “Those who go rogue and attack or change others without his permission are destroyed.”

Destroyed was not an exaggeration when it came to vampires. They were hard to kill, but hearing it from Sorin sounded far more ominous.

“What are his criteria?” I asked.

“You must be useful to Adrian if he is to grant your change,” Sorin said. “People petition him often when he holds court. You’d be surprised by their offers.”

I was intrigued, but more curious about Sorin.

“Why were you chosen?”

He smiled softly, and though he did not look at me, I knew it was sad, which made me want his answer even more.

But when he looked at me, he surprised me by saying, “Because I am useful.”

“You never give straight answers,” I said. “Why? Are you afraid to be honest with me?”

“I am not afraid, but you are not ready to hear what I have to say.”

“I would not have asked if I weren’t ready.”

He shook his head. “That is a lie,” he said. “You still believe we are monsters.”

“And?”

Nothing Sorin had to tell me about his past would convince me otherwise.

“Your humans are far more cruel, Isolde. You have no one to blame for our existence but yourselves. I fear the day you come to know it.”

I blinked at him, confused by his words, but before I could say anything, a horrified scream erupted. My whole body felt the shock of it. A familiar routine played out in front of me as Adrian turned to look for me before disappearing around a bend in the road with Daroc.

I expected to be told to halt, but instead, my trio created a perimeter around me—Sorin and Isac to my left and right, and Miha behind me.

“Come,” Sorin said, and we matched Adrian and Daroc’s pace as we headed toward the sound of the screaming. The path ahead widened and turned from a dirt lane into a stone bridge. Beyond the creek was a village. Pointed roofs and chimney smoke billowed from over a wall that encircled the town, but that was where the quaintness ended as a man raced from a heavy mist, through the open doors of the gate, terrified. When his feet could no longer carry him, he went to his knees, and when those would not work, he fell, facedown, and did not move again. I did not need to approach to know that he was dead or that he had died from whatever magic had killed my people, because his skin looked as if it had been eaten away as if he were freshly skinned.

Silence fell, and then Sorin said, “Welcome to Sadovea.”

A few of Adrian’s soldiers entered the village first, returning to report that whatever had attacked seemed to be gone. After, Adrian gave the order to search for the dead. He waited at the gate, and as I approached, he placed his hand upon my forearm, halting me.

“Can you handle this?” he asked, his eyes searching mine.

“I’ll be fine.”

I knew he meant well, but his question made me feel weak. No, I hadn’t been able to look upon my own people, but I had also been in shock. I knew what to expect now, so this would be easier…I hoped.

Besides, I wanted to help in whatever way I could.

Inside the walls of the village, I dismounted as the vampires began to kick in doors and drag out bodies that looked just like the ones found in Vaida. I wandered down a side street, past a storefront, a tavern and inn, and what I suspected were houses, though they looked different from the ones in Lara. These were made from slats of pine, not wattle, which was a weave made of twigs, and the roofs were covered in clay tiles, not thatch.

The bodies in the street were dressed warmly and contorted in a way that made me think they’d been fleeing from whatever had attacked. I paused, staring down at the form of a young woman. Her hair was dark like mine, and her hand was curled beneath her head as if she had merely fallen asleep. I wondered what her name was, if her mother and father lived, or were they here among the dead?

My gaze shifted to my left, and I saw someone staring back from inside a home. A woman with long, ginger-colored hair and sharp eyes.

A survivor, I thought, but I blinked, and she was gone. Confused, I approached and looked through a dirty window into a kitchen, but I did not see the woman, only the bodies of a mother and two children. I backed away from the house, an eerie feeling crept along my spine.

As I did, I noticed movement in the corner of my eye and caught sight of a bare, dirty foot as someone fled down an adjoining alleyway.

“Wait!” I called and began to follow.

I turned the corner and saw a small girl ahead. She turned to stare with wide, blue eyes. Her face was dirty, her hair a pale yellow. She was dressed in a pair of leggings, a tunic, and a thick woolen scarf.

“I can help you,” I said, but she took off once more.

This time, when I came around the next curve, I saw no sign of where she’d gone, but I continued, thinking that perhaps I could draw her out of hiding.

“Hello?” I called. “I know you are here. Please, let me help you.”

I passed several quiet homes and shops, all of which had been built side by side. There were a few people in the road, all skinless, all dead. I drew my cloak tighter around me as I passed them. If I had not seen this in Lara, I would have assumed some kind of plague had taken them, but for so many to die at once? It was like their entire town had been blanketed by death.

A creak drew my attention, and I twisted to find the door of an apothecary shop ajar. Pushing it open, I discovered the girl cowering in the corner, shaking.

“Hi,” I said quietly as I stepped into the shop. “My name is Isolde.”

The girl continued to shiver.

“I’m not going to hurt you,” I said, standing in the doorway. “Are you hurt?”

The girl shook her head.

“Can you talk?”

The girl said nothing, just remained silent.

“Did you see what attacked your village?”

The girl nodded, and I inched toward her.

“Can you tell me what it was?”

She shook her head. I did not know if that was because she did not want to talk or because she truly did not know. It would make sense, considering she seemed to be the only one who was alive.

“And…are you parents…do you know where they are?”

I did not want to ask if they were dead. She shook her head.

“It’s not safe here,” I told the girl. Now I stood in front of her. “Will you not come with me?”

I bent and held out my hand, hoping she would take it. She stared at me for a long moment before reaching out, her small hand touching mine—and then gripping. I was shocked by her strength, and when my gaze returned to hers, her eyes had become red, her lips had peeled back to show jagged teeth, and she gave a horrible cry.

I wrenched my hand away and stumbled back into shelves of glass jars. The smell of pine and mint filled the air as they cracked and shattered beneath my weight. The girl bellowed and charged at me on all fours. I barely had time to draw my knife, but before she could reach me, something caught her in midjump and flung her across the room. She landed as I had—against a wall of jars. The crash of shattering glass couldn’t overpower her angry screams as she rose from the rubble and glared, body heaving with anger as she faced Daroc, who now stood in front of me.

She hissed, baring teeth that did not resemble a human’s, and charged once again. Daroc moved quickly, and it was as if he were teleporting—one moment, he was in front of the creature, the next behind, his hands on either side of her head. A quick snap and she was dead, her wide eyes meeting mine as she fell to her knees, no longer the monster she was moments ago but a girl again.

Daroc lowered her to the ground and then looked at me.

“Are you all right, my queen?” he asked.

I could not answer because I could not say. My body hurt, my arm burned where the girl had reached for me, and I had just watched Daroc kill a creature that looked like a girl. He rose to his feet and yanked a curtain panel from the window, using it to cover her.

“What happened to her?” I asked. I couldn’t take my eyes off her limp body.

“Hard to say,” he said. “We will have to take her to the Red Palace for an autopsy.”

Daroc approached, helping me to my feet, though my legs were shaking.

“You’re injured,” he said, eyes falling to my hand. I looked too, finding that there was a burn on my skin in the shape of a hand.

“Oh,” I said and swallowed. “It doesn’t hurt…not really.”

He frowned. “Come.”

I followed Daroc out of the apothecary and through the maze of buildings. As we emerged, Adrian turned toward me and frowned, his strange eyes brilliant against the gloom of the day. He started toward us, and when he came upon me, his hands cupped my face.

“You’re pale. What happened?”

“She found…something,” Daroc said. “A human…possessed by some kind of magic.”

Adrian’s severe gaze shifted from Daroc to me. “She looked like a girl,” I said, and my mouth began to quiver. “A little girl.”

I had watched her die.

“She is injured,” Daroc said. “Her hand.”

Adrian’s eyes fell to my arm, which I was now cradling with my other hand. He frowned as he studied the wound.

“The creature did this to you?”

“With only a touch,” I confirmed, staring at the wound almost blindly. My skin looked much like that of the dead—red and raw.

Adrian reached for me, and I let him take my hand as he examined it. I expected him to try and heal it. Instead, he said, “I cannot heal this. It is magic.”

He looked at Daroc, worry etched across his severe face.

“We will be at the Red Palace soon,” Daroc said. “Ana Maria can look at it.”

I did not know who Ana Maria was, but I wondered what she could do that Adrian couldn’t. Still, his jaw tightened, but I was not so much worried about my injury as I was about what had happened here.

“I don’t understand. Was that girl responsible for…all this?”

“Not her, but whatever possessed her,” Adrian said. He looked at Daroc again, offering a wordless command before the vampire bowed and departed, returning in the direction we’d come to retrieve the corpse of the girl, if I had to guess.

Alone with Adrian, he tilted my face toward his, and I got the impression he was trying to ensure that whatever had consumed the girl had not consumed me, but as I stared into his eyes, I could not help seeing hers, wide with the shock of death. I closed my own against the image and asked, “Who would do this?”

When Adrian did not answer, I opened my eyes again to find him staring off into the distance, his jaw set tight.

“Adrian?”

At the sound of his name, he looked at me.

“It’s hard to say,” he replied.

“But you have an idea, don’t you?”

Suddenly, all Adrian’s talk of good witches and gentle magic seemed like a trick. If a witch’s magic could create something like this, how could it ever have been good?

“Anything can be evil in the wrong hands, Sparrow.”

As the vampires gathered bodies to burn, another vampire tended to my arm. I had seen him around camp but never asked his name. I stared at him now, a handsome man with sharp cheekbones and dark skin and eyes. His hair was thick and braided, his hands gentle as he bound my burned arm.

“What’s your name?” I asked.

“Euric,” he said.

“Are you a healer?”

“No,” he said. “At least not in the same capacity as they once were.”

“What do you mean?”

“A true healer can mend by touch,” he said. “Your people called them witches and had them burned.”

“They healed by touch. That is magic.”

“It is a miracle, not magic,” he said. “Think of all the ways you cannot fight us. Now think if you had healers, at least you could fight our plagues.”

I stared at him, considering his words, and thought of what Adrian had said yesterday—that history was all a matter of perspective.

Euric rose to his feet and bowed.

“My queen,” he said before departing.

I watched him go and did not move until I saw Sorin, Daroc, and Isac light torches to burn the corpses. I rose to my feet and headed for Snow. As I reached for her reins, Adrian stopped me.

“I won’t allow you to ride alone,” he said. “Your pain will worsen, and it will make for a difficult ride. I will not have you injuring yourself further.”

“Okay.”

I did not argue, because I was already in pain, and I did not really wish to make it worse. The tension in his brows eased at my agreement, and we mounted Shadow while the others followed suit.

I did not think I was imagining the way Adrian enveloped me. His thighs pressed into mine, and one of his arms wrapped around my waist. During the ride, his lips trailed my neck, dusting kisses across my skin. I found myself holding my breath as each one lingered longer than the last.

“What are you doing?” I asked, my voice breathless, betraying what his actions were doing to my body.

“Distracting you,” he said.

It was working. I was warm, my stomach was knotted, but the longer we rode, the less Adrian’s distraction worked, and the pain in my arm was beginning to give me a headache. Coupled with the ride, I felt sick.

“We’ll be home soon,” he said against my ear.

Those words helped me relax, and I leaned against his shoulder, my head too heavy to hold up.

It wasn’t until I saw a town that I sat up straighter. We passed through an open wooden gate, and before us, a winding road made a slow incline up the side of a hill, through a large market town, to a castle that loomed, both terrifying and beautiful. The wall of the castle seemed to span for miles, a series of grand arches. Behind it rose the stronghold itself, a cluster of tall and pointed towers, each carved with fine, floral details. At times, the castle itself appeared to be black, but when the light shone just right upon its glassy surface, I could see a deep red gleamed from within.

“Welcome to the Red Palace,” Adrian said.

He continued through the town, and as he made his way along the path, villagers emerged to watch our procession. Some waved from windows while others threw flowers, wheat, or coins into the road at our horse’s feet. It was a far better welcome than the send-off I’d had at home, and the thought hurt my heart.

“Were they ordered to do this?” I asked, having not expected this.

“Do you really think so poorly of me?”

It wasn’t that. It was that I had expected to find that Revekkians were no happier to be under the rule of the Blood King than Lara.

“I take care of my people,” he said. “Just as I will take care of your people.”

“Were you Revekkian?” I asked. “Before you were cursed?”

“I am Revekkian,” he said and added, “And I am not cursed.”

His comment made my heart beat harder in my chest, and I had the thought that if he was not a curse to be broken, what was he? How had he become this?

Adrian did not speak and continued on through the valley, up a steep incline to the Red Palace. As we came to the gate—a large one with black iron bars—I realized I could not see the wall that surrounded the palace for all the trees. Once inside the gate, Adrian rode right up to a set of wide stairs. These were black, unlike the walls of the castle, and a crowd had already gathered upon them.

He dismounted and held his hand out for me. I accepted, tired of the pain that had at first only been in my arm but was now reverberating throughout my body. Despite this, I pulled myself together and watched as a man approached. He was older, his hairline receding almost to the middle of his head, and yet he kept this hair long. He wore dark-blue robes, embroidered with silver, and unlike many of the vampires I’d encountered, his skin was paper-thin and creased.

“Your Majesty,” he said.

“Tanaka,” Adrian acknowledged.

The man looked as if he were about to speak when Adrian stepped past him, pulling me alongside him. The crowd parted. Unlike Tanaka, they seemed to know he was not in the mood to chat.

“Who was that man?” I asked.

“He is my viceroy,” Adrian said and left it at that.

We entered the palace through a set of large, wooden doors and were immediately greeted by a grand staircase, heavily embellished with ornate carvings of the old goddesses I knew from our myths—Rae, the goddess of sun and stars, and Yara, the goddess of forest and truth, and Kismet, the goddess of fate and fortune—who were no longer worshipped by the world at large. I wondered if Adrian had worshipped them two hundred years ago, back when the whole of Cordova had multiple goddesses instead of just two.

The walls and ceilings of the castle were the same deep red, intricately cut with sweeping designs—vaulted ceilings, interlaced arches, high and pointed windows. If the windows were in Lara, they would have allowed for the halls to be filled with light, but because they were in Revekka, a strange hazy red loomed outside.

“Come. I will take you to your rooms and send for Ana,” Adrian said.

I did not argue. My head was pounding, and my arm still burned from the girl’s touch. We took the steps slowly, and just as I was about to comment on Adrian’s patience, he paused on the step and shifted toward me.

“Let me carry you,” he said.

“That is hardly the introduction I need to your people.”

It would be hard enough to be human in a castle full of vampires without Adrian encouraging them to see me as weak.

“They will not think you are weak,” he said.

But he did not ask again, and we continued, cresting the stairs, heading to our left where another set of stairs led into a darker hallway. My suite was at the very end. It was large, with a four-poster bed, velvet coverlets and curtains, and plush rugs covering every inch of cold stone. I was glad that the fireplace felt so far away from the bed, as it contained a healthy fire.

I expected Adrian to leave me at the door, but instead, he followed me inside.

“Ana will need the fire when she looks at your wound. After, it will not get above an ember, I promise.”

“Thank you.”

“You will rest after she leaves.”

I arched a brow at his command, though my body softened at the thought of sleep in a real bed.

“You must be well enough to attend tonight’s festivities,” he added in response to my questioning stare.

“What is happening tonight?”

“We are celebrating my return and our marriage,” he said. “It will be your first introduction to my people, and while I know you are not eager to meet them, I’m sure we can both agree that first impressions are everything.”

“You do not count our rushed entrance to the castle as a first impression?” I asked.

He smiled then. “I think my people will assume I was more eager to be alone with you.”

“Except that you are depositing me in a room and leaving others to care for me.”

I wasn’t sure why I said that, and Adrian’s brows drew together over simmering eyes.

“Missing me already?” he said, amusement in his tone as he tilted my head upward, his hand splayed across my neck as if he wished to feel my pulse as I spoke.

“Hardly,” I said, clenching my jaw and averting my eyes.

He laughed, unfazed by my curt reply. “This would be easier if you would admit that, against your better judgment, you like me.”

“This would be easier if you would admit that the only reason we remotely get along is because of what our bodies do together, nothing more.”

He stared at me for a long moment, unmoving. His face was near to mine, lips hovering close, his hand around my neck, his fingers tightening, a gentle squeeze that had my pulse racing against his skin.

“All this hate for what I am,” he said. “Would you feel the same if I were human like your commander?”

I glared. “You would still be the enemy.”

“You do not even know why I am your enemy,” he said.

“You are a threat to humankind,” I countered. “You have killed kings and conquered countries! No one, not the strongest among us, stands a chance against you.”

“Such a speech and yet all I hear is your fear of something not like you.”

“Do not reduce my hatred of you to difference! You are more than different. You burned whole villages, spread plague, and killed hundreds. You are a spineless, murderous—”

Adrian stepped closer and gripped my head, his hand tightening in my hair, his body flush with mine. I was not certain of his intentions, even as he bent his head to mine, even as his breath caressed my lips, because his eyes glinted with a sharp, frustrated anger.

“I know what I am,” he said, voice quiet. “Can you say the same?”

Once.

I could have said that once, a week ago, when I had been Isolde, princess of Lara. That was until I met Adrian, and from that first encounter in the woods, it had become clear I had never really known myself at all.

“You call this treason,” Adrian whispered, his fingers trailing down my face, a soft, careful caress. “But this—us—is beyond choice.”

“You’re right,” I replied, and though I knew he was talking about something that went far deeper between us, I ignored it and spoke through my teeth. “I didn’t have a choice.”

He released me, and I had to admit, the distance he placed between us pulled heavily at my heart. Maybe it was because of his expression, which seemed both pained and defeated.

“I have much to attend to,” he said and turned to leave. At the doors, he paused. “I expect you will be eager to explore the castle, but do not do so on your own. You will find those who reside here are not as easily restrained, and I’d hate to have to murder my council for turning you before I have the chance.”

With that, Adrian was gone.