Chapter 2

CHAPTER2

Abraxas shouldn’t be disappointed that their ship docked without incident. No one stood at the edges of the planks, ready to get their wares off the ship. But Allura claimed that was fairly normal, considering no one had known they were coming.

But the siren’s eyes had darkened as she stared around the quiet docks, even in the middle of the day. They were, clearly, much more empty than they had been when they’d left.

That unsettled feeling in Abraxas’s stomach never left. He’d picked it up from Lore. He was quite certain of that. She had fed anxiety into his body as he took it away from her, like he could make it better just by... what? Absorbing it himself?

Foolish. He shouldn’t have tried to feed off her anxiety, as though that would make it better. He knew by now that her feelings spread like a plague. If she didn’t want to feel them, she wouldn’t. But giving them to him would only succeed in just that. He’d suddenly be anxious as well, and he couldn’t afford to be so when he had a job to do.

Protect her. Protect the people that he cared about and make sure that this mission didn’t fail. He needed to be certain that Lore never stepped too far out of his sight.

Perhaps he was being a little overprotective. But these few months on the ship had opened his eyes to something he desperately wanted. No, needed.

Her.

He could never survive the feelings of losing her again, and now they were marching toward a future—again—where that could happen.

Tilting his head back to the sky, he took a deep breath and told himself to calm down. Dracomaquia was the one place where he could feel uncertainty. He didn’t know his homeland as well as this place. He’d lived in Umbra for hundreds of years, and he had followed in the footsteps of kings. This was his home just as much as it was hers.

Together, they would stop whatever was thrown at them. They would change the very fabric of the world, just as her prophecy had claimed they would.

Still, the quiet docks made him uncomfortable.

Lore shouldered her bag beside him, her eyes skating over the empty docks. Only a few people trailed toward a much smaller ship, one of the few that was still in the harbor.

“What do you think?” he asked.

“I think it’s very quiet,” she replied, and her eyes followed the same track his had taken. “I don’t like it. There were hundreds of people the last time we stood on these docks.”

“We?” He arched a brow. “You were here without me last time.”

“Oh.” She shook her head, the fog clearing in her gaze as she turned to him. “I forget that I was looking for you. I think I’ve... tried to forget that.”

With a soft snort, he reeled her into his arms one last time. Tucking her underneath his chin, he took a deep breath and felt her take it with him. In and out. Slowly, quietly tucking away both of their fears. “I was here with the King. He frequently enjoyed pleasure rides on ships when he was younger, like his father before him. And we both know that man was long lived.”

“Indeed.” She pressed a kiss to his bare skin where his shirt parted just underneath his collarbone.

Heat flared through him, but now was not the time for that. He knew there were very few things they could do now that they had arrived. After all, they had a kingdom to save.

Their own pleasure ride through the seas between the continents had been wonderful. They were memories he now needed to keep close to his chest as they meandered through the docks.

“Ready?” Allura’s melodic voice interrupted them. “We have a long way to go.”

Abraxas frowned. “Go? I thought we were parting ways here.”

The two women looked at each other and then back at him. Clearly, they had been talking while he had packed their things in the cabin.

He hated it when they did this.

Again, he rolled his eyes to the skies and counted to ten before he looked back at them. “What plan have you two cooked up, then?”

Lore eyed him as though he were going to argue. “I think we should look around the docks first. I’m not sure what is the best way to tackle this kingdom, nor do either of us know what has changed. Margaret clearly has her claws in everything and I want to know what that means, and just how much she’s affected before we make any more plans.”

Why would he argue with that? Hadn’t he been telling her the same thing?

His woman was the most annoying person he’d ever met, and yet, he was madly in love with her.

Abraxas gave them both a nod and then reached for the bag that Lore held. “Lead the way, ladies. I won’t get in the way while the two of you plot.”

“I can carry that,” Lore said with a little grumble.

But he didn’t give it back. He gave her a very unimpressed stare before he jerked his chin to the plank that would bring them down onto the docks. Let her try to take it from him. He was nothing if he wasn’t a gentleman, and his woman would not carry all her own bags.

He was no fool. Nor was he anyone’s whipping boy. He just wanted to make sure she was happy and comfortable. It wasn’t too much to ask.

Lore shook her head at him, but he saw the glittering pleasure in her eyes. She loved it when he did things like this. It reminded her that she wasn’t alone.

Meanwhile, Allura gagged. “The two of you are disgusting, you know that?”

“Ah, you’re just jealous.”

“A bit,” she grumbled as she started down onto the docks. “You can come to my house to get settled if you want. I can’t host you for long, though. I don’t intend on staying here.”

He tilted his head to the side as he watched Lore balance down the gangplank without any issue. “Itching to get back to the sea already, siren?”

As he joined them, his booted feet heavy on the plank that groaned underneath his weight, he felt the air still around him. Abraxas looked at the siren, only to see her staring off into the shambles of buildings with a troubled expression on her face.

“No, it just feels like something is wrong. I don’t want to be here when it all boils to the surface.” She shook her head, and then gestured for them to follow her. “Come on.”

Abraxas remembered many of the times he’d been here. The docks were a mixture of mortals and magical creatures. They moved as one. The sea brought everyone here, and many of them had learned how to get along with each other. A very different place than the rest of the kingdom.

Zander had hated it. As had his father. Both devious kings thought that the magical creatures shouldn’t be near humans.

The first time he’d come here, Abraxas had been shocked to see them all. Together. Working as one and teasing each other as they went about their day in whatever safe manner they could manage. The docks weren’t safe. They were a place where the rough and the dangerous ended up to survive.

And yet, it was always still full of life. He’d always known that there was a place here, in this kingdom, where magic and non-magic could live with camaraderie.

Until now.

As they walked through the streets, he scented the air and listened for whatever he could find. There were no humans left. Only magical creatures darted from the shadows and moved along to get their labor done for the day. And none of those creatures looked well.

He noticed a small pixie who ran across their path. The woman’s face was gaunt and dark hollows underneath her eyes suggested an exhaustion that only came from being overworked. She looked terrified that she’d even seen them, and then raced away into the shadows.

None of this was normal. None of it was right.

He stepped closer to the women ahead of him and muttered underneath his breath, “What is going on?”

“Not sure.” Allura peered down a dark alley before making a low sound in her throat. “There should be a lot more people here. At least a hundred more, if not two hundred.”

“That’s what I thought.” Abraxas made to look down another one of the streets, but again, it seemed... “Abandoned?”

“No reason for it. This is the only place any of them can go. They don’t hide from the crown anywhere else in the kingdom, that’s for certain. Besides, sailors are sailors for life.” Allura’s troubled expression deepened, furrows carving through her face. “I know nothing that would have made them leave.”

Lore interrupted their conversation, her voice low and full of dark omens. “Unless they were forced.”

The thought had crossed his mind. Margaret truly hated humans. She’d stop at nothing to get them away from what she thought might be a sanctuary for humankind.

They turned down a street, following Allura as he leaned low to whisper in Lore’s ear, “You think she targeted the docks?”

“I do.”

“It would be a good plan to attack where the most people were living in harmony.”

Lore shook her head. “It’s the first place people would go if they wanted to leave. She’d want to make sure they couldn’t escape.”

He had hoped it wasn’t that, but the certainty in Lore’s voice gave him no other way to think. Of course Margaret would want that.

He said nothing else until they reached Allura’s home. The small shack had seen better days. Salt and wind had battered upon the outside edges, tearing the wood and rotting parts of it until it looked almost abandoned. The thatch roof was rotted, but he assumed she needed to replace that yearly.

Grumbling under her breath, Allura slammed the door open that was no longer locked.

“Bastards,” the siren hissed as she stomped through the piles of her clothing on the floor. “They just couldn’t wait a few more days to rob me, could they?”

Abraxas filled his lungs with the scents of the room. Old scents. Very old. “No one has been in here for months, Allura.”

She froze in the middle of the small room. “What... How do you know that?”

He tapped his nose. “I can smell them.”

As the siren swore about thieves who couldn’t wait even a few days to steal from her, he eyed the small room. He’d thought it might have a secret area below the cabin, but this was it. Just a single room with a miniature stove in the corner, now covered in dust and grime. A cot on one side of the wall, jammed up against a small table and a single chair. A wardrobe on one side had been placed haphazardly, although maybe the thieves had yanked it out. The floor was covered in layers of clothing and picture frames. But other than that, there wasn’t much in the siren’s house.

He had no intention of staying the night here. There was no room to move with the three of them crammed inside these small walls. If anyone tried to attack them, and he had to assume that it was already known that they’d arrived in the kingdom, then they could not protect themselves.

Allura gestured. “Sit down friends, I’ll see if they left anything to eat. Probably not, the backstabbing bottom feeders.”

As the siren grumbled and rifled through her things, Abraxas took the chair in front of the bed and turned it around. Lore sat in front of him, and together, they leaned in close.

“What do you think?” he asked.

“I couldn’t feel any of them, Abraxas. They’re all gone.”

“We thought she might do something like this. If she’s trapped Zephyr, then it’s likely she’s gone after all the mortals. Just keeping the next in the bloodline in a dungeon won’t make the humans follow her. Not in the slightest.”

“Then we need to figure out who else she’s trapped.” The heartbeat in Lore’s neck fluttered. “I haven’t checked in on Beauty. Or her father. There are others we need to have with us before we do... anything.”

“We should know more about what’s going on in the kingdom, yes.” He tucked a strand of her hair behind her ear. “But we cannot stay here.”

“There is nothing for us on the docks. And I think we both agree, there is nothing left without gathering up those who are still here.” She watched his features, her eyes flicking back and forth between his. “Do you understand what I’m saying?”

He knew she was worried about who might listen through the walls. Margaret’s shadows were all around them, and though she could cast a spell to keep them all silent enough that even Margaret’s magic would not hear them, he also knew the waves of that magic would also give her away. Lore needed to tread carefully. Just as carefully as he did.

“Home,” he whispered, knowing that if he said it, whoever might be listening would assume they were going to the castle. “We go home.”

Lore nodded, and he had to mentally prepare himself for Tenebrous. It would take days to get there, and days for him to trudge through the swamp and the muck that surrounded her home.

They’d survive it. They would find Beauty and perhaps then they would discover what was really happening in this place. But until then, they had to keep their ears open and their wits about them.

“Fuck,” Allura hissed. “We’re going to the pub, I suppose. Not a single bite of food left in this place that isn’t moldy or turned to dust.”

Lore eyed him, the question in her eyes about how smart it would be for them to go anywhere right now.

He didn’t care. They needed food for their journey, and he needed to get those shadows out of her eyes. He stood and pulled their cloaks out of their bag, carefully wrapping one around her shoulders and drawing it over her blonde hair.

“To the pub, then,” he said with a soft smile. “Let’s fill our bellies while we still have the chance.”

He tried to convey that he wasn’t worried about anyone seeing them. After all, he was made to protect her. And protect her, he would.