31. Chapter 29

Chapter 29

I'll burn for this, but that's a sacrifice I'll make to keep my people safe. The void already calls to me. It won't be long before I join my father, but first, I must protect my House, my people… and my son.

~King Casimir, personal journals

I've seen Hazel and Aunt Prudence wear beautiful dresses. Even some made of silk and exotic wools. What I step into Lorcan and Fiona's showing room wearing is nothing like that. This one is something so stunning I couldn't have dreamed it.

It's a modest dress that is pulled in tight against my chest with a corset top, but it turns into a flowing, airy gown made of sheer fabrics stacked on top of each other that… burn. No, burn isn't the right word. As the light shifts over them, it looks like there's a fire right below the top layer, but if you move the top layer, the fires look like they're hidden under the next layer.

No matter what, the fabric always seems to barely hide a fire that threatens to swallow me alive. Those fabrics flow from that beautiful bright red and orange mix into a shimmering silver along the hem of the dress, and instead of a fire, it looks almost metallic. It's like a chain wrapping around the bottom hem and holding the dress down over the flames.

The red picks up black in the sleeves until it looks like my shadows have been turned into cloth.

I feel like the most beautiful woman in the world for the first time in my life. No, I couldn't have imagined this dress, and the way it fits me is like it was made for me. Which, I guess it was. It's more perfect than I could imagine.

When I see Cole's face, he frowns just a little as he looks at the dress on me. "The earth?"

"It didn't work well. And, Lord Cole, we wondered if that would be the right decision. The House of Earth was always the one that your father disagreed with the most. It might be best to respect that and not bring brown or green into his house. Beyond that, while this looks like a House of Flames dress, it also doesn't."

Cole nods his head, walking around me, and it takes everything in me not to blush at the feelings that run through me at how close he's inspecting me. "As always," he says to Lorcan, "you and your wife's work is impeccable. You earn every spellstone I pay you."

"Thank you," Lorcan says. "We're always happy to work with you." Fiona's ever serious look breaks into the slightest of smiles at the compliment.

Cole gives me a nod and a nearly imperceptible grin. "Well, there's only one thing left to do."

"Meet your father," I whisper. I'd felt so out of place before, but like a warrior putting his armor on, I feel better about it now. I feel like I'm protected by this incredible dress, like it will hide the fact that I'm the last person who should sit at a king's table.

Maybe it will. Maybe this dress will be the reason that Cole doesn't have to receive any kind of punishment from his father. Maybe Cole's father will even like me a little.

That thought almost makes me laugh, and when I slip my arm into Cole's, it's not fear or concern or even excitement that I feel. It's acceptance. This is what we have to do, and we're going to do it as best we can.

When we step into the public area of the Keep of Flames, I'm surprised at the people we see. I'd expected everyone to be High Fae. I don't know why I'd expected that, but it felt like the obvious thing. I was wrong. There's not a single High Fae amongst the servants. Not even the butler, a serpentine being with red and orange scales running the full length of his body, a long tail, and eyes that seem to look through me. Everything about the being is just a little less human and a little more reptilian. When he blinks, I see a second set of eyelids, just like a snake.

Wearing simple red robes, his appearance is confusing. The scales shine in the candlelight and draw attention to him, yet the robes make him seem unassuming. His silence is even louder because I can't keep from looking at him.

"Nevan," Cole says with a smile to the butler. "It's been a long time."

"It has," the butler says softly, the "s" sound even more serpentine than I'd expected. "Your father has heard," he says, pointedly looking at me. "He is… furious." Again, the "s" sounds come out as a hiss.

Cole's smile turns into a grim stubbornness. "Then I will have to convince him of what a wonderful idea my betrothal is. It's time that the Cyrus household has a female in its midst."

For only a moment, there's a twinkle in Nevan's eyes, but then it's gone, back to the stoic butler. "Dinner will be served soon."

Cole nods to Nevan and walks me toward the dining room, which is far too large for the three of us. I doubt it was built with only three people in mind. How rarely did Cole and his father eat here unless there were other people as well?

Cole sits down in the chair next to the head of the table, and he motions to the seat next to him, putting himself between me and where his father would sit. I do my best to sit down in the ornate wooden chair while wearing the formal dress. The dark wood looks so similar to cherry, yet it seems smoother. Each chair been carved with pieces of dragons. The armrests end in claws. The backs have been shaped into a pair of folded up wings. Flames adorn all of it.

The table matches the thirty chairs around it. Above us is a chandelier that holds balls of fire. Not candles or oil lamps. Just… balls of fire in glass dishes.

The same gold-streaked red marble makes up the floors, walls, and ceiling, but paintings have been hung from the walls, most of which have some sort of flame symbolism. Like the image of the hawk, they almost all are made to look like the flames are hunting down and burning everything. Especially the other Great Houses.

If Cole had been human, and I'd been meeting his father, I'd have wanted him to hold my hand, to show some bit of comfort, but not here. Here, if he were to show me any softness, it'd be looked at as a weakness, and his father would have even more reason to be furious.

I try to situate myself to look stronger and more presentable. More regal… if that's even possible. A tingle runs up my spine, and I stiffen. I glance at Cole and try to be strong and cold. I need to be as Fae as possible.

His father walks into the room then, and both of us look toward him. The sound of his feet, covered in thick black boots, is booming with every step. He's wearing a bright red and gold long jacket. A military coat. Crimson fabric that's been embroidered with golden flames and golden buttons. His long, black hair is swept back and pulled into a tight braid.

His shaven face looks as youthful as Cole's, and other than a few traces of gray in that long black hair, there's not a single sign of age on him. Except the way he looks at us. That's not the expression of a young man. There's too much hate and fury for a young man to be capable of.

Across his exposed forehead, a crown has been painted or tattooed onto his skin. Wrapping around, the colors of the crown seem to shimmer. Where my dress looks like flames, but isn't, the crown looks like… fire. Pure, unfiltered fire that constantly burns across his forehead. The Painted Crown .

"You've decided to waste your betrothal on a Wyrdling?" he says through gritted teeth. His dark eyes seem to flare with every word, and he doesn't even glance at me. "Not just a Wyrdling. A powerless one you'll have to take care of for the rest of your life. This is something so incredibly stupid I didn't believe that even you would do."

Cole gives him the same smile he gave me when he told me knew about my deals with the Shade. That almost sadistic looking smile that holds no happiness whatsoever. "This is Maeve Arden, father. Maeve, this is my father, Casimir Cyrus, the current King of Draenyth and the world beyond, as well as the King of Flames."

For the first time, Casimir turns to me, absolute rage in his eyes. His face is as cold and emotionless as the marble his castle's built of. "Welcome to my home," he hesitates, and then, without showing a single bit of the emotion I can hear in his voice, he finishes, " Maeve. "

It's as cold a greeting as I've ever heard. I think this might be worse than him being outwardly furious. If he were spouting flames and throwing chairs, he would get some of that fury out of him. Instead, it just builds. There, behind his eyes, I can see the fury growing.

Servants, many of them looking like Nevan, bring food to us as we sit quietly and stare at each other. I've never seen or smelled food that made my mouth water this much, but I don't dare look at it, much less try to fill my plate.

Cole sits with that smile on his face while his father returns his gaze with a steady calmness. Finally, Cole breaks the staring match and says, "I saw Rhion today. He looks well."

Casimir blinks and says nothing for a few moments. "He is as he's always been. His father's son and nothing more. You, on the other hand, should be more. Rhion has ridden his father's coattails since he was born, never amounting to anything more than a pretty bird, always preening and convincing people to look at him. You were born with so much power, and you've…"

He shakes his head, and Cole arches an eyebrow. "Squandered it?" he asks, guessing at what the King was thinking. "Father, I've done exactly what you wanted. I've been ready to fight the House of Steel for more than a century. Every one of them is afraid to duel me, and if it came to outright war, I would be ready and on the front lines. That's why you had me, isn't it? To have someone you could trust to protect you from King Gethin? We don't agree on things, so I've stayed away, but I've never been more than a two day's flight from home just in case it came down to a fight, and I needed to do my duty for our House."

"Do your duty? Like you did during the Shattering? When we struck down our enemies? I hardly think you did your duty that day."

I have to try very hard to stay silent to keep from drawing attention to myself after Casimir says that. The room becomes deathly silent as they stare at each other again. Then Cole moves, reaching for a roll, and it's like I can breathe again.

"Father, I've never been quiet about the Shattering. It is not my duty to ruin the world, and breaking two of the Great Houses is the worst thing that's happened in the history of this world. I was on the front line, just as you wanted. The House of Shadows was broken by my hands while you sat in the Keep of Flames, your hands clean of it." He takes a bite of the roll as if he wasn't staring down a man that looks like he wants to murder him.

Cole's body looks more relaxed than I've ever seen him. In the finery he's wearing, he looks like an insolent prince, just like Rhion, but I can feel the tension rolling off him in waves. His muscles are ready to spring. The way he lounges in his chair is the perfect position to leap into action, and the tips of his right hand flicker with flames while they're hidden below the table.

I don't know what to do. I'm sitting next to two of the most powerful people in the world, and they both seem like they're on the verge of a fight. The crunch of Cole's teeth against the crispy outside of the roll sounds like it should echo in the room.

I do the thing that Wyrdlings are always so good at. I'm awkward. "Maybe this is the wrong time, but since you two seem like you'd know, how do you learn to use fire magic without singing all of your hair? I'm guessing it doesn't affect your skin, but hair is like clothes, isn't it? Or do some of the Immortals in the House of Flame just walk around with constantly singed beards and hair?"

Cole turns to me, a very confused look on his face, and blinks. Casimir does a better job of hiding his confusion and annoyance, but the fire behind his eyes dies a little. "Right, maybe I'm not explaining it very well," I say. "I mean, when you're younger and learning. You can't feel your hair, so when you're learning to use fire magic, I would think it would be very easy to accidentally set yourself on fire. Or do you just make all the untrained Immortals cut their hair short?"

"They learn quickly not to burn themselves," Casimir says. "It's necessary for anyone who wields fire magic to accept that pain is a part of the process, so frequent burns as children are normal and expected."

When he turns back to Cole, the bonfire that was raging only moments before is barely more than smoldering now. He turns to the food on the table and begins to fill his plate. Cole does the same, and I take it as a sign that I will actually get to eat tonight.

As I put a little bit of everything on my plate, from jellied fruits to a bit of roasted turkey breast to fried bread to blood sausage, I say, "I don't think I've ever seen anything as grand as the Keep of Flames. I still can't figure out how everything seems to be built out of a single piece of marble like this. There aren't any seams anywhere. It's just… all one piece."

This time, Cole explains, "The House of Earth built each of the Keeps. Their powers allowed them to create incredible architectural wonders, and most of the major landmarks in Draenyth were built by them."

"Or the dragons before they left," finishes Casimir. "No one can deny that the House of Earth was good at building, but they were infuriating to work with. When they held the Painted Crown, it constantly felt like the rest of the High Fae's concerns were ignored." I'm not entirely sure why he's going off on this tangent.

"Maybe it's because they were so stubborn about letting anyone breed with their house. They held themselves on a pedestal, as though the other Great Houses were less than them. I've held it for nearly two hundred years, and I've spent that time doing my best for all the High Fae. Not just my house."

Cole's eyes open wide in disbelief. "Are you serious, father? You really think that you've spent your reign working for all of the High Fae? How? The House of Earth and Shadows are gone . It was during your reign that half of the Great Houses were destroyed. By you. "

Damn it, Cole. I'd almost had him calmed down, and now you have to pick a fight with him? Casimir glowers at his son. "I'm looking long term. I'm not so short-sighted to be worried about a few thousand Immortals. The House of Shadows held the secrets of the world, and they refused to allow us to know what they had found. The House of Earth held itself away from the rest of us. Their bloodlines were the only ones unaltered from the time of the dragons. You know how hard they pushed to remain pure without a drop of any other house or race. They both had to be stopped."

Cole smiles at his father and says, "Of course. You destroyed them because of what they'd done. Not at all because you hated sharing the Painted Crown with three people instead of one." He ends the comment with a smirk and then picks up one of the jellied fruits and tosses it into his mouth.

This isn't going to end well. It just can't. Those two are too powerful. Too full of confidence that they're right. Too… emotional.

For people that are supposed to be as cold as possible, they're doing a terrible job at showing that. Then again, I don't think there's anything in the world that makes either of them as furious as the other one.

Then I see the look in King Casimir's eyes. While there's been rage simmering since he walked into this room, it's no longer simmering. What I'd thought of as a bonfire before has turned into an inferno.

Cole sees it just as clearly as I do, and when Casimir raises his hand, Cole stands up. An explosion of fire rips through through the air, directly toward my head, but Cole reaches out… and catches it .

"If you do that again," Cole says, very slowly and evenly as he snuffs out the fire he's holding, "I will walk away from this court forever, and you will have to protect yourself against the House of Steel. If a single hair on my betrothed is harmed, I will abandon my family name and duties, and you will be left alone to deal with King Gethin. If history repeats itself, which I would be surprised if it doesn't, then this entire House will be gone long before Gethin ever considers giving up the Painted Crown."

When Casimir leaps to his feet, his hands are wreathed in flames. I should be afraid of those hands, but it's his eyes that terrify me. Pure, unadulterated anger lies there. Every bit is turned toward me.

"Go to my chambers," Cole says softly. "Now."

I scoot back from my chair and walk backward until I get to the door, not wanting to give the most dangerous predator in the world my back. As soon as I leave the dining hall, an explosion fills the air, and I can feel Cole's pain rocket through me. My chest is burning. Pure anguish fills me as it radiates down my arms.

I scream, and a pair of scaled hands wrap around my waist when I fall to the ground right outside the dining hall. "Let me take you to Master Cole's chambers. You'll be safe there," the serpentine voice whispers in my ear.

I turn and see the kind face of Nevan as more agony shoots through me, this time starting from my chest and moving across my shoulders. "The betrothal bond is powerful," Nevan whispers, "but distance will help. Do not worry about Master Cole. He is… strong."

How could anyone be strong enough for this? I look down at my chest, and there's nothing wrong. My chest feels like it's been burned beyond repair. It's like I've been shoved into a fire and held there, my chest pressed against the embers.

My shoulders hurt nearly as badly, but Nevan's right. As we increase the distance between me and Cole, the pain fades until I can feel where his father is hurting him, but it's not exactly pain. Nevan looks down at me as he sets me into a chair and says, "Master Cole will need… help. Would you like to be the one to do this? Or would you prefer me to?"

I look up at Nevan and see the concern in those slitted eyes. "Can I do it? Or will I hurt more than help him?"

Nevan slowly shrugs. "I don't know you, Lady. If Master Cole trusts you enough to make you his betrothed, I assume you are important to him. I can explain how to care for him when his father is done."

I nod to Nevan, not entirely sure that I'm capable of helping Cole. Especially with how bad I know the wounds are going to be. I'd thought I was strong, and I was for a human. I hadn't known what real strength was, though. The memory of that pain is fading, but when I look down and don't see charred flesh, I'm still surprised.

"I'll take care of him," I whisper. "Just tell me what to do."

Cole knew that this was going to happen. That's why he wouldn't let me calm the situation down. He had pushed the conflict with his father so that he would know exactly when and where it would happen. If he'd left it alone, if he'd let me brush things over with Casimir, we could have made it through the dinner without this.

Cole's not here because he wants to be. He's here because we have plans, and he knows that he and his father will eventually come to blows. He'd rather it happen now than at some worse time and place.

Another shock rips through me as Cole's lower back is burned in a wide arc. Another and another. Like lashes made of flame. Tears fall as I understand exactly what Cole is going through.

Nevan steps out of the room and comes back in almost immediately. A crystal pitcher filled with a shining silver liquid rests on a tray alongside several cloth rags and an entire bag of clean linen bandages. "Wipe the burns with this medicine. Make sure that no clothes or anything is stuck in the burns, and afterward, wrap them in bandages. This is not the first time that Master Cole has been burned like this, Lady. He will know what to do as well, but do not let him try. He will miss spots, and that will keep him from healing correctly. The liquid must be on all of him. Miss nothing."

I nod to Nevan, and he bows, but I stop him before he leaves the room. "Nevan, was it awkward or strange the first time you helped Cole with his… punishments? I'm a little nervous."

"Why would it be awkward? I've been tending to Master Cole's punishments since he was in diapers." Each time he says an ‘s', it comes out as a hiss, but I barely even notice it. "I think he will be happy to have you tend to them, so there's no reason to be nervous, Lady." He gives me another bow and walks out of the room, the door closing behind him. Since he was in diapers. This has been part of Cole's life forever. I take a deep breath as the tears flow freely. More, smaller burns strike my upper arms. Another across my chest. I close my eyes and imagine Cole being wounded like this in that beautiful dining hall. His father's hands are ablaze as he screams at his son. Or maybe he's not screaming. Maybe he's done arguing with Cole and just wants him to suffer. Maybe he's smiling.

How is Cole not dead? I want to run to him, to pull him away from the madman that is his father. I could reach out with my shadows and kill Casimir. I learned how to do it, and he'd never suspect me.

When I lift my hands, I know that there's no possibility that I could create shadows right now. No, right now, I don't think I could do anything magical at all because I'm terrified that Cole won't survive this. No matter what Nevan says, I know how many burns are on Cole's body. I know how broken I'd be if I had experienced the same thing as him.

Then again, Nevan seems to have known Cole and his father for far longer than I have. I try to relax. Cole won't need a crying fiancée sitting in his room when his father's done torturing him. He'll need a strong woman who can care for his wounds. One who isn't afraid of her betrothed's pain.

I take a deep breath and stand up. Up against a corner of the room, next to a chest of drawers, is my spear and traveling pack. I pick up the spear and run my thumb along the glyph, feeling the familiar texture of the yew wood. I've done things that were impossible compared to anything that humans had ever seen. I'm not human, though. My mother was the Queen of Shadows. I'm stronger than this place.

A sense of calm washes over me, and I finally survey the room that I was brought to. Cole's chambers. The floors, walls, and ceiling are all made of that same red marble, but the furnishings of his chambers are drastically different. The bed is a large four-poster one that's far larger than I've ever seen before. Made of a dark wood, it contrasts with the walls and floor. The multiple chests of drawers are a matching dark wood. All of it seems so simple compared to the dining room table.

For someone like Cole Cyrus, the Prince of Flames, this seems so minimalistic. He could have opulence everywhere, like the rest of the Keep. Instead, it's just a handful of well-made pieces of furniture. Against one wall is a bookshelf filled with leather-bound books, something I'm not used to seeing.

I take another deep breath and realize that this room smells like Cole. Even though he's been gone for many years, the scent of him was so strong that even now it's on everything in the room.

That scent calls to me, even as my body is rocked by what should be pain but isn't. Even as I know that Cole's being tortured by his father, I feel calmed while I'm here. That spiced amber scent is everywhere, and something inside me says that I'm safer here than anywhere else in the world.

I put the spear back against the chest of drawers and settle into the high-backed chair to wait. The shocks through my body come slower and weaker now. Casimir is getting tired, and I prepare myself. There's clarity in me now. I'd hoped that touching my spear would bring that sense of peace that I always find in the woods, but it just let me push past the shock enough to recognize Cole's scent.

That gave me everything else.

Now I just need to steel myself against any kind of fear. Because the man that walks through that door is going to be a broken thing compared to the one that walked into the dining hall with me.

But he's my broken thing. This time, it'll be me that's helping him.