1. the smell of smoke

1

the smell of smoke

Rivian

October 24th

There's blood everywhere. The smell is so pungent that it creates a hunger so undeniably strong within me. The thirst and anger that courses through my veins mix in an agonizingly slow parade, crashing against my reserve and screaming into the void of my mind. I can't believe what just happened, and I can only blame myself.

The stake is buried deep into my chest, splinters breaking off as I try to yank it from my hollowed organ, desperately beating as to keep life vibrant inside of me. But seeing as the subject of my selfishly sought out retribution is mere seconds away from igniting in flames, my mission is nearly accomplished, and I teeter the edge of saving myself or letting it all burn to the fucking ground.

I was always going to seek my own demise, ridding myself of the pain I've had to suffer through, allowing myself the release of the shadows that buried me six feet under. It was always the plan to fall with my vitriol. I never wanted this life. I hated this life.

Being born in blood, seeing the hate in my father's eyes for the choices he made—me included—and knowing that I am truly a monster is not something I wanted. I didn’t want to lead a society of equally menacing monsters and I didn’t want to hide myself from the possibility of finding love. Those were all choices taken from me and I was forced to live this life of burden.

I was unsure of it all at first, turning at eighteen seemed scary and I resented it even more because of the abuse that I was forced to endure— strength and conditioning as my father would call it—and knowing that the only person I loved was taken from me when I needed her the most is what made me hate what I've had to become.

But this is who I am. This is my life, and I have learned to relish in the villain that soon begged to be unleashed. In fact, the older I got the more I craved it. I devoured the feeling that came with wielding the power I held because it meant I was in control.

Until her.

Now, as my life tempts the line of obliteration—my exact plan near moments away from crossing the finish line the way I had only hoped—I can't help but feel the need to fight through the fire that burns at my sister's feet; her heart littered on the cemented ground. Something eats at me. Telling me to follow Lucynda if only to explain and understand. Or at least to eliminate the threat she now causes. It wasn't supposed to end this way, and it's all because I lost control.

I know I can save Troian; I suppose Lucynda didn't know that killing a Royal wasn't as simple as ripping one's heart out. If my sister's body gets caught in the fire though, then she really will be gone forever. She didn't deserve my betrayal.

Though, in all honesty, despite my love for my little sister, it's not her I feel the need to save.

It's my wife.

The lavender reaper has taken over and her humanity is being torn to shreds because of something I created. Something I promised her and something she soon sought after. I knew this marriage would end in ruin. I knew my love for this one girl would turn my world upside down, literally to burn in the flames of her storm. It's why I tried to force myself the distance and to urge myself not to give in to the way my heart beats for hers. I tried to deny it, I didn't want to feel the effects of our bind. But anima vinculum or not, my soul was made to warp in the darkness of hers and I don't think I would have ever survived walking away from her. Not truly.

Despite the lies I tried to tell myself when it came to my sweetest sin, I wanted more than anything to protect her. But I failed the moment I became selfish in my decision to bring her into my life if only to use her for my scheme to avenge my mother and rid myself of the awful ache that comes with being a monster. But also just as selfishly, I wanted her close. I needed her near me, she consumed my mind. Though I knew that once she found out that Ameliana was really Amy, her mother, she would react the way she did. Hating me for the very betrayal she tried to escape from those she needed loyalty from most.

I fucked up. And it was only then when I realized that I didn't actually lose control . . . I gave it to her .

"Rivian!" Ameliana's cries finally echo over the gurgling roar of the bright orange flames that ravage around us, tearing apart the wooden beams and clinging to the concrete walls while tracing the room for purchase. "Please! We have to do something!"

The fire is close enough to engulf all three of us, cackling in mockery of the way I intended to put an end to this all. But this was not what I wanted to happen. She can not survive in life if I am suffocating in death.

Ameliana is attempting to show selflessness by begging me to save her daughter. And maybe even her. Though despite the realization of just how trivial my acts might have been—anger and revenge being my driving force in focus of emotions in my vampirism—I still want to see Amy suffer. She still denied me of the life I could have lived by allowing the erasure of my mother. She denied Lucynda of being free from the monster she left her with. She abandoned her twins to free herself of the same monster she turned a blind eye to when it came to me, because I wasn't her son. She was selfish and chose herself over the love of others. I am doing this because of my love for others.

The broken off piece of wood that penetrates my heart is seconds away from desiccating me, which would leave me helpless and lifeless until the flames take over. I could end it. Still.

But that’s not what I really want now.

I lift myself off the wall and grip the stake in front of me with both hands, pulling it out slowly as the splinters of wood break off into my chest; my strength is weakened just enough to make it difficult. Squelching noises reach my ears as blood leaves my chest, dripping out around where the stake has entered and even more so as inch by inch, I remove the wooden weapon.

I groan as the last inch is nearly free, but I wince as it grazes another part of my heart, the pain shooting through to my gut and forcing me to stop. But the flames touch Troy's feet and threaten the chains her mother is tied to. I don't have time to waste, so I let the pain my wife could be enduring right now be my motivator as I yank the last of the wood out of my chest, a gaping hole takes up my skin as blood drips generously from the wound. It will heal shortly, but not fast enough for me to save my sister. So in order to help my cause, I look over to the only person worth the pain of my hunger and I rush to her without another thought.

She yelps, knowing what I need, and I rip into her neck. Chains shatter against the floor and hit at my back as Ameliana tries to fight against me. She's still weak from the wounds Lucynda caused her. Typically, vampires feeding from other vampires, especially Royals, is not ideal but in this case, it's necessary.

I feel the surge of power run through my veins as I drink from her neck, and for a second, I think to drain her dry and let the flames take over her lifeless body. But as I take more than I need, she groans in agony and forces my attention to Troy whose body is seconds away from fully igniting.

The smell of smoke causes vexation in me. Memories stirring deep in my head that I have to try and avoid if only to be able to help my sister.

The cigarette burns. The sizzle of my skin against the ashes.

Travois. The flames that touched his skin.

"Rivian!" Amy's weakened tone reaches me once more, knocking me out of my own head.

I appear at Troian's side in no less than a blink of an eye and pull her limp body into mine, reaching for her heart and tempting to manifest out of the castle where the flames are likely not burning. But I look over at Amy. Would it be better or worse for Lucynda if I save her? I know Troy would appreciate it. But she's not the one who is waging war because of the fact.

I rush back over to the chains and use most of my energy to yank them free, opting to let my enemy fight her way out of the flames herself. At least I can say I gave her a chance which is less than what she gave me.

With Troy still in my arms, I manifest ourselves outside into the forest where smoke billows out of the castle. Nocturnes in a panic around us running through the night while my kingdom burns down before my eyes.

I lay my sister down on the gravel and dirt below me, the creek running nearby. I curse myself for allowing this to go as far as it did, seeing my sister lifeless before me puts it into perspective. I take her heart, nearly dried out completely, and shove it back into her chest as the crackle of the fire snaps in the echoes of the horizon.

"Hey!" I holler at one of the nearby Nocturnes running from the flames engulfing my compound. He rushes to me.

I grab him roughly by his shoulders and force his eyes to mine in an act of compulsion. "You are to stay here until she wakes. Keep her from the fire. Feed her your blood when she wakes up." My Nocturne nods his head in obedience at me.

I give one last look to my sister knowing that when she wakes up she is going to hate me for what I've done. But all I can do is try to figure out how to make it right again.

I run up to the edge of the building where the fire threatens the foyer, smoke exuding from every window in sight. It's spreading fast and soon the castle will burn down. The ashes of my failures will be all that's left.

"Sir, what can we do?" A group of Nocturnes approach me as I assess the damage being done.

I don't have time to mend this, I have to find Lucynda before she creates even more chaos than any one of us can handle. I know the fire in her heart, she has it in her to save the world or burn it down and the latter is what she's promised to do.

There is only one person that I know can fix this in a matter of minutes. Likely the one person I shouldn't bring back to the compound for any reason given the history between her people and our own. But I have to find a way to lessen the blow and leaving hundreds of Nocturnes out of a home, loose in the town and victims to the daylight that will rise in mere hours is not how villainous I plan to be portrayed.

"We need Nathairia," I state matter-of-factly, knowing that my decision isn't one that will be taken lightly.

I might be just as crazy for the demand as I am to think that she'd actually help us. It's ironic to think that her actions were petty, seeing as mine have led to me needing her to reverse my own. But I'm hopeful she still has some semblance of sympathy for Hollows Trace.

"But, sir-"

"Do it!" They scurry off to summon the one person I should avoid letting in, but I can't be too stubborn to admit that I need her more than I don't.

The sky is magnificently charged with a blanket of fog that creeps from the flames, lighting up the sky against the trees and made luminescent by the moonlight and stars. Fire spits into the forest as I watch the product of my creation's actions swallow the grounds. Oranges and reds mix against the grays and blacks of the smoke that wraps around the structure of my home. Folds of heated tendrils suffocating the bricks as terror courses through my Nocturnes.

The idea that something can start off so infinitesimal and ungraspable is able to then take away so much of what one loves in a matter of seconds as oxygen feeds its anger, is a fear for most. Being captured in the wisps of an inferno and swallowed whole is the determination of life for vampires.

It was how I imagined I would end it all. But now as I watch the fear rattle the bones of my Nocturnes, the memories of my mother and I out by the gazebo fading away in the flames—the same gazebo I met Lucynda under when I allowed her to enter my mind while I told her more about my world—and the fear of losing my wife in the midst of this mess I've created is what changes my mind on ever wanting this in the first place.

I have to fight for her. For us. For the kingdom.

"Rivian!" A familiar voice echoes from beside me and I turn to see Zharus rushing over to me, seemingly unscathed from any evidence of being caught in the castle when the fire started. "What happened?"

I think to tell him the truth, there's very few things I haven't trusted Zharus with. But on top of the chaos that's ensuing, there is more to unfold within this kingdom and at this point I can't afford to trust anybody, including my Factotum. I don't want anyone knowing that my wife caused this destruction or that I enabled her to. I don't need anyone knowing why. I had asked Zharus to chain up Ameliana in the dungeon, he did it with no questions asked and I didn't plan on telling him what the reason was. But I had to come up with some kind of excuse as to why I needed her down there to begin with because soon, he'll ask.

I think about how much I want to say, not wanting to give every detail away but I need to clear my wife's name of this or else the Faction could call for retexere— an unraveling of our tether and possibly the erasure of her—and I can't have that.

"I don't know what happened, but I think someone took Lucynda." It's not a lie, someone did take her . . . it was me. I took who she was and turned her into something that she might not be able to come back from.

"What? Does this have anything to do with the former queen? What do you need from me?" He sounds confused and panicked. Rightfully so.

"Find Kacian. I need you to keep him busy by gathering the Nocturnes somewhere where the fire isn't burning and get them to calm the fuck down." I take a deep breath and prepare myself for the reaction of my next words. "Nathairia is coming."

"Nathairia? Rivian." His tone changes to a sterner tone, concern now leaking darkly from his voice. "You're joking."

"Does it look like I'm joking?" I stare blankly ahead, trying not to let my thoughts slip.

"Do you really think she's going to help?"

"If she knows what’s best for her, she will." My threat sounds like I have something to offer Nathairia for her cooperation, but the truth is. I have nothing. I just hope she feels inclined, which is laughable to be honest, but I have no choice.

"And where are you going?" Zharus lets his eyes fall over the burning castle with me, his panic settling just enough to get his own mind right.

I chew over the thought of whether or not I should tell him. I've let him keep his secrets, and for far too fucking long because I always knew that I was never going to take being the king too seriously to demand the things my father did from people he should trust. But this is not a matter of secrecy. This is a matter of fixing what I fucking started and further protecting the one person who didn't deserve what I did to her.

Pushing all of my thoughts of my own needs aside, I decide it's time to put someone else first.

"I'm going to find my wife."