39. Kami

39

Kami

T he dream is strange, in a land with vibrant colors, over grasses of emerald green and under a sky so blue even the clouds can't dull its brilliance. There are red and gold flowers in bloom, the sweet scent of faeberry overtaken by blood and smoke.

Around me, the sight of fae lie dead, ripped in pieces, weapons littering the forest floor.

But in the clearing, I see…I see…

Then I'm drowning in anguish, guilt, and fear. And the darkness overtakes me.

The ambush is unexpected. I can't see out of the eye they've taken.

The pain is crushing, but nothing next to the sound of my sister's roar and the sheering of her wing. She crashes to the ground, her blood feeding the earth, and struggles to get to me.

"Malkar. "

Her voice is too weak, thready, and she's shrinking, becoming so much Less.

But before she completely transforms, he's there. That bastard that lied and cheated and stole to get to us. Who killed her pets and her progeny.

An inconceivable sin, even for a Lesser being such as this elf.

In my hubris, I thought him too weak to be a threat. I didn't believe her when she told me he was dangerous. An elf doesn't have our level of magic.

And yet he does. He's brought an army to fight us, and despite our power, they have overtaken us with dark magic that comes only from our kind.

But how? Why?

And how does he know my sister well enough to call her by Name?

Her writhing grows weaker. The grasses underfoot are dying, saturated in a blood that doesn't belong to this world.

Of all those who came through when The Meld happened, we were the last. The strongest from the fae world that should have stayed back.

We fought as we entered this plane, and ever since, our numbers, never large to begin with, have dwindled.

My sister is a warrior. Older by centuries, strong and sure.

And she's dying before me, brought to heel by an unworthy creature of betrayal and malicious intent.

"A curse upon you," she whispers as the elf cuts off her wings. "Under your beauty lay such treachery. You will never know happiness, Folas."

Her wings!

Then her ears. Her horns. Her scales.

"Now, Iskae. That's not true. I enjoyed fucking you." He smiles, and his beauty is made more repugnant by the evil it hides beneath.

I blink back tears that refuse to stop flowing. " Iskae."

Her tail twitches, but before Folas can cut it off too, it vanishes.

"Shit. Grab what you can," he tells his fellow mercenaries. "Hurry."

They swarm over her like hungry ants, gathering bits of flesh and bone and blood in their magical flasks.

"And this one too," he says with a nod at me. "But we need to keep him alive. We'll be able to use him for decades if we do it just right."

I stare at him with hatred, vowing to end his entire bloodline.

"You'll pay for this."

Of all my siblings, only Iskae protected me. Only she forced my Betters to let me into our world, to accept me despite my father.

None of them will ever believe my father didn't rape my mother, that she came to him of her own free will and allowed herself to get pregnant with me before dying.

Instead, they blame me for her passing. Iskae doesn't.

Didn't.

Now, because she trusted the wrong fae, she's dead. And because I am not her equal, I could not save her. She's gone, and I am to blame.

A True Brother protects those he cares about.

Real Family give all of themselves to bolster the den. To protect the Breeders and the Feeders.

As I think it, I feel an overwhelming pain in my empty eye socket.

I'm burning alive, grieving, raging, and lost to the physical torture of this fucking elf my sister thought herself in love with.

But when it's over, and I'm doing my best to catch my breath, I can see again out of both eyes.

"My last blessing, dear brother. See our enemy and end him," I hear whispered in my mind.

I scream and blast the area with so much deep, burning cold that everyone freezes long enough for me to escape .

I complete my change and dart into the sky, flying on injured wings to the castle where we nest. Our home.

Now a prison that offers nothing but safety…so long as we remain undiscovered.

I'm still bleeding, but I can see and hear as I fly the long, torturous distance home.

Landing in a crumbled heap, I hear the screeching sirens blaring of danger and allow myself to be rounded up by our guards.

They toss me into a holding pen in the middle of the keep, waiting for my older brother to approach.

A cloud of smoke precedes him, his fire hotter than the lava core of this land. Of all our Betters, he is the Best. Our prince once, now king and future ruler of us all.

A pure-blood from a long-lost colony, hatched during The Meld itself.

"What have you done?" he roars as he stares at me, seeing Iskae's eye, the bright blue having burned through my previous yellow color.

She had the magic of the Known. And now I have it, because her strength allowed her to pass it down to me before dying.

"It was a fae," I say, my throat thick as I try to stand. Not a fae, but the fae Iskae trusted. The one she confided to me that she thought she might love.

A truth I can never reveal without impugning her honor. Because Betters do not lie with those not of our kind.

And yet our mother did to make me.

Iskae did and found a love that brightened her for such a short time.

Before it—he—killed her.

My brother knocks me down by barely flexing his massive wing, his eyes flashing from red to green to blue and black, a kaleidoscope of power and emotion .

Ulrast feels more than most of us. As king, he has supporters and many treasures who now surround him, offering power.

A conglomeration of fae and monsters: centaurs, a phoenix, a few harpies and sylphs. Monsters and powerful magic users, they support our kind. Servants to an old and much championed way of life.

As one, they glare at me, empowered by his fury, emboldened by his grief.

I continue to shed tears of blood and sorrow, saddened by my sister's passing, the knowledge she has been torn apart to be used by weak fae an insult of the highest order.

Betrayed by love.

"They took her," I rasp. "All of her but the eye she gave me."

"And you let them," Ulrast snaps in disgust. "I tried, Malkar. But your weakness is your undoing. You are more like your father than you ever were like our mother. It is time you left us to make your own way in a world that cares nothing for kin."

"But Ulrast, Iskae—" No. He can't know Iskae brought this on herself.

"Sire," the phoenix says, her words soft. "The elf that did this is known to us. We have seen him circling the hills below. He ? —"

"Silence," Ulrast bellows.

The entire castle goes quiet.

"My word is law. Malkar, you are excised from the clutch. To see you is to kill you."

"To see you is to kill you," the other Betters bellow from all over the keep.

And I have lost not just my sister, but my family as well. Better to have died alongside Iskae than know the absence of love.

"To see you is to kill you," Ulrast says, and I see a flash of grief and pity before anger overtakes him once more. He roars and lets out a flame that spears the sky and shocks the gathering clouds with lightning.

All is silent, our people in awe at our sire's power.

Then Ulrast adds, "You are unknown to me. Perhaps your kin will welcome you home."

"But you are my kin," I want to say but don't. They are all I have ever known. My father and his kind have been pushed from our lands since my father got my mother with child.

And now I have no one.

Nothing but a need for revenge.

And an elf to take apart, piece by piece, until he has nothing left but a life I will come to claim.