Chapter 2

The sun was gone, leaving us to travel the last half hour in near dark. Never had I looked at the sinking sun and felt such a cold fear of the night. Every snapped branch, every owl's cry, had my dagger in hand. No one spoke; maybe if we breathed too loudly, whatever the fuck was in the forest would follow us, and we didn’t stop until the old castle wall finally appeared.

The guard on duty saw us approaching, waved a torch, and raised the portcullis. It creaked open with a lot of protest and much wailing, the sound oddly reminiscent of whatever had screamed us out of the farmstead, and I suppressed a shudder.

Adrian was waiting in the stone courtyard, doing that nervous thing where he didn’t pace but bounded on the balls of his feet, hand on the hilt of his sword. He was still angry that he wasn’t allowed to come with us. 

The stable boy Jack appeared like magic, his knobbly knees pumping as he skidded to a halt and took hold of my reins as I dismounted.

“And?” Adrian asked, not even bothering with a greeting, and I gave him a long look and then turned to Jack. “Give them all extra food and a good rubdown. They earned it today.”

“Yes, Milady.” He blushed and half-bowed, half-curtsied. It honestly just looked like a stork opening its knees, a movement not helped by his stick-thin legs. He was an orphan I had found in the village below the castle, sleeping in a ditch. I thought he was dead, discarded under a pile of leaves. And maybe it made me soft-hearted, but when I nudged him with my boot and he woke with a scream, then said, “Fuck, I thought you were a ghost!” It had made me smile, and I had delivered him to Old Thomas, the horse master, with no more than a “Here, he is now your apprentice.” It might not have been much, but I now knew Jack slept in the warm stable and got extra bread from Cook, and it didn't hurt that he thought I could do no wrong.

We dismounted, stiff and shaky. Rodric was covered head to toe in dry blood, his eyes a bit vacant. I looked at my loyal Right Hands, silently reminding them of the rules: nothing we did or saw was up for public debate. It was a rule that, if broken, meant the dungeons or something far worse. No one needed a reminder of Lord Hansley, now known as Lord Handless.

I cleared my throat hoarsely. “Get some rest and get a drink. Tomorrow is a new day.” Of fresh torment. 

I turned to Arlo and hesitated, my eyes darting to Jack watching us with an awed expression. “Put it in my office.”

“Yes, Milady,” he replied and held the sack behind his back. His eyes watched me for a long moment as the rest turned and disappeared through a stone arch. 

For someone who knew his mind intimately, I could not decipher what his expression meant, but there was a static charge to the air around him. Why did I feel like he was waiting for something? A sign maybe, or courage?  

I nodded, and he dropped his gaze, turned and followed Johnith, leading Rodric away with an arm over his shoulder. 

For all Johnith's blustering and swearing at the boy, he had a good heart; they all did. It was another reason why I had picked them to be my Right Hands, because I would not abide touching a cruel man, having their skills in my body. And I could always tell their type of soul. 

I ignored Adrian bouncing on his toes like a puppy waiting for the others to leave. I was in no mood; he was too fucking cheerful and bored. 

“How did Rodric do?” He asked, keeping step with me as I ignored him and started across the courtyard and pushed open a rough wooden door that opened to a stone spiral staircase.

“Rodric is probably going back to being on guard duty tomorrow,” I answered simply.

“That bad?”

I sighed heavily, still feeling the tang of fear on the back of my tongue. “After today, he might never leave the castle again. None of them might. Not that I would blame them.”

“Pan.” He pulled my arm, stopping me.

"What happened?” His light blue eyes went wide with concern, almost silver, just like his father's. But unlike his, Adrian’s held kindness and compassion. If they hadn’t, I might have pushed him down a flight of stairs years ago, just to save all of us from the misery of another cruel ruler.

I closed my eyes and rubbed my hand down my face. I swear I could still feel that…thing… in the well pushing back at my senses, like it left an imprint on me. And I couldn’t shake this terrible foreboding feeling, like time was running out, and when it did, I’m not sure we would survive whatever was waiting at the bottom of that well. 

I opened my eyes and stepped into his space, which smelt like sage and sandalwood. “There was nothing but blood ... and we couldn't find any bodies.” 

Loud boots thundered down the stairs, and we jumped apart.

“Lady Panithea,” a guard bowed, hand over heart. “The King is waiting for you in his chambers.”

And I wondered if I should have maybe taken my chances in the forest.

I marched down the dark corridor, fists clenched tight as I fought the urge to hit something. Of course Malric would summon me the moment my boots kissed the cold stone. As if I hadn’t witnessed enough evil today, I was now required to breathe the same air as that man. He would be several tumblers deep by now, riding a wave of paranoia only fuelled by the news of the farmstead, and it would only amplify his particular brand of madness.

He had always been the worst combination of obsessively cruel coupled with a fragile inferiority complex that could only be mitigated by overt displays of cruelty and dominance. But a new delusion took root six months ago with the news from Valmere. Vethros, the king who starved us by cutting off all trade, had been usurped by his bastard brother Thandrel. And it had snapped something in Malric’s alcohol-addled brain; now he saw traitors in every shadow. So much so that he had dragged us here, a half-ruined hill fortress clinging to stone and wind, and shut himself away like a recluse from his own court. Leaving Adrian and me to govern a kingdom not likely to see through another winter if something didn't change.

And winter brings with it its own particular flavour of fucking misery in the form of the Rues. As the glacier between our two mountain ranges freezes and forms the Spine, the Rues descend to raid and pillage. Although this year even they had pulled back early when they realised Drukha had nothing left to steal. No grain. No livestock. Nothing worth the risk to life and limb navigating over the crevasse-filled ice plain, with winds that could strip flesh from bone. 

And yet despite all the other problems clinging to our backs, the one I feared the most was the one we couldn't see. For weeks now, reports had been crossing my desk about people vanishing, leaving behind nothing but bloody evidence that screamed, ‘look what they did to me!’

Babies had been stolen from their cribs. Strange tales of mutilations. Severed appendages found in rivers or crossroads. Bodies were being dug up and desecrated. And just this very day an entire farmstead were slaughtered, their bodies missing, and something… indescribable… was in their well.

As the leader of the Right Hands, it was my job to investigate, but I was struggling to sort credible incidents from rampant gossip. Drukharen’s were naturally superstitious people; as fear spread, every wayward husband sleeping off a hangover in a barn was suddenly a potential murder victim. I kept getting reports of a black goat that could kill a man’s erection with a single look. If every account that passed my desk were to be believed, monsters were as common as chickens and causing more ruckus than a half-pissed man outside a whorehouse.

“Fuck!” I shouted and kicked a door open that led to the waiting chamber of the King's suites. A servant who was trying to build a fire in the empty grate screamed in fright and bolted out a side door.

I sighed heavily. “Well, there is another story for the kitchen.” 

I was used to people's suspicion and fear; there was no use in pretending that I wasn’t anything but an oddity, a frightening peculiarity that wielded the King's spite. I was the sword in the hand of a madman. 

I saw my blurred reflection in the chilled glass and touched a hand to my hair, finding my braid half-unravelled. It was ironic; I looked exactly like I had spent the last three hours fleeing a massacre through a forest. I guess my disconcerting appearance certainly didn’t help much with people's weariness of me.

I looked out the window at the thousand stars that smiled down at me in serenity, and I shut the heavy drapes with a rough yank; I fucking hated stars.

I turned from the window towards Malric’s door and froze. I hated the reaction my body had at this very spot, every time, no matter the years or my resolve. Where had the irritation and anger gone? It had fizzled out like a wet fart in a windstorm. 

The court had never stayed here, but Castle Craggen and I had baggage of the personal and deeply disturbing kind. I was confined here when I had first been sold to Malric; you could say this is where I was broken in, both Ester and I.

I dragged my feet past the bleary-eyed guards standing vigil over the quiet hall. They did not question my appearance at this hour or the things they heard inside. They merely avoided eye contact and let me into the dark study.

The fire in the hearth had burnt almost to embers, hiding his face in the shadows of his oversized chair. Our years together had added lines around his eyes and grey streaks to his dirty blonde hair. Time had changed us both, and ironically, it seemed we were both going grey. 

A burning acidic rage hit me suddenly, like a cresting wave, like it always does when I stood before him. It tingled from my ankles up to my hands. The insatiable urge to hear his last shuddering breath. A craving to see that light snuffed out when he looked at me and saw the monster he made. I shuddered against the darkest of my desires. In front of him, I wasn't a person who could save orphans; I was only bitterness and rage.

“You summoned me, Your Majesty.” I bit out through gritted teeth.

“Report,” he barked, and I tried not to flinch because, in that moment, he reminded me of myself.

“The farmstead was deserted, and the amount of blood we found would suggest that several, if not all, were murdered. But we can not confirm this because we were unable to find any…” I hesitated when he suddenly shifted in his chair to glare sideways at me. “Bodies,” I finished.

He regarded me in silence for a moment. “Were they moved or dragged away?”

“No, it does not appear so.”

He turned more of his body towards me without moving his head, in an unsettling serpentine way. That is when I noticed the fire poker already nestled in the coals, the tip a cherry red, and I knew where this night was going.

“Are you telling me that everyone on that farm just disappeared?” he asked in a deathly quiet voice.

I swallowed and clasped my hands in front of me, the indigo ink across my knuckles stark against the bloodless white of my grip. “It would appear so.”

In an instant, he was out of his chair and had my jaw gripped in his hand. “Did the fucking Rues do it? Did they hear about the coup in Valmere and think that they can take what is mine?!” He screamed so loudly that spit landed on my face. 

I hated the way he smelt, like alcohol and violence. I hated what he wore, furs and jewels so extravagant it would make a whore green with envy, while his people starved around him. My neck strained as he held my face, his eyes darting between mine. Like after a lifetime of looking, he still couldn't decide which he liked more: the blue one or the green. The only saving grace of this fucked-up interaction was the supple black leather gloves he wore; he had never allowed me to touch his skin, and I had often wondered what he feared I would find. 

“I don't think so, Your Majesty,” I mumbled through my squashed and stinging cheeks. "The Spine melted two months ago, and nothing was stolen." 

He relinquished his grip a fraction, but something in his eyes turned colder. 

"Was it the Caledons?" he hissed. 

“The Caledons have never come down from the Arithia mountains and have never even met with our emissaries.” I mumbled. They were our neighbours to the north that we had no interactions with. They stayed above the Arithia mountain and killed anyone who tried to venture through the single pass that connected us. They were a mystery to us, or maybe they were unbothered because they knew we had nothing to offer them but a mad king.

“I don't think they would venture to some random farm in the middle of Drukhar to kill twenty-two farmers for no reason.”

His grip tightened, and I could now feel his nails through the gloves. “Maybe you are too useless and stupid to know the reason. Maybe you wasted the power and trust I gave you.” He swirled his drink in his free hand and downed a hearty gulp, some spilling down his chin onto my face and chest. 

“Maybe I should just kill you and be done with it.” He hissed and let go of my face with a shove, and I stumbled backwards away from him as he smashed the half-full glass into the coals, and a blast of fire erupted out, almost setting his disgusting fur coat and the carpet on fire. 

“I'm surrounded by traitors and fools!” He howled, “Nothing will save me now! Not even my weak-hearted son!”

The hatred in my heart swelled to a point of pain as I wiped his spit from my face. I had drawn lines around people I would not let him cross, and Adrian was one of them. If Malric ever thought Adrian would usurp him, I had no doubt he would eliminate his own son, and my bones told me that is where this madness was heading.

Maybe it was time we did it first? 

He stumbled across the room, his eyes unfocused and darting around to the lavish paintings silently watching another tonight's performance from the safety of their golden frames. 

"Traitors everywhere... power... it's not enough... betrayal and deceit... kill them all." He reached for the crystal decanters on the edge of his desk and poured himself a glug of something amber into another tumbler, most of it splashing to the floor. Then he leaned over the desk and, with a long arm, swept half the contents to the floor in a crash of crystal and papers. 

"Everywhere!" he screamed.

He was always unhinged, but never more so than when he drank, shifting wildly between these moments of serpentine stillness and clarity to strike with such a detached ambivalence, then devolving into a jittery, agitated, altogether different kind of unpredictable manic violence. Two demons pulled his carriage, both opposites to each other but equally deadly.

He leaned against the desk and wiped his hand down his face, the rings on every finger catching the firelight in flashes and twinkling like the stars I hated. 

Fear twisted through me as I watched him. I couldn’t name the change, but something about him tonight felt different, moving through my gut like oily fingers grasping at eels. Despite the looming violence of the poker, a new and distinct dread took hold. When his pale eyes flicked to mine and lingered, his sudden stillness was terrifying.

I held my breath as we watched each other, and it almost felt like the pressure in the room changed, contracting like an inhale before the plunge.

Instinctively, my secret sense flashed at my hand, and if I looked down, I knew I would see a golden light, my only precious hidden thing. I had never reached for him with it before; I had never dared. But maybe it was my recent brush with the darkness in the well that stirred the idea. 

I sucked in a breath and pushed out my golden light when a huge gust of wind blew through the room. It pulled at my ankles like a tide, and as it exhaled past me, I swear in the back of my mind I heard the faintest whisper, ‘Asssssk.’

“Where did you come from?” He abruptly said.

I flinched backwards in shock like I had been slapped, my light dying in my hand. I always assumed he knew, and he had been holding that knowledge over my head like bread before a starving man, knowing I needed it for my survival. 

It had always been my greatest desire and ultimate fear to hear its name spoken out loud. Amaral, my twin, and I were only six when we were stolen in the night. I don't even remember how we had gotten into the bowels of the ship, chained to a giant metal ring bolted to the hull. And in a single moment, everything and everyone we had ever known and loved had been snatched away. 

“I…” I stammered and found my hand looking for my dagger, Stabby. But I had purposefully given it to Adrian for this exact reason.

“You what?” He hissed, and his eyes narrowed to slits. My hand gave up its empty search and found my chest instead, my heart galloping behind my fingers.

“I…” I stammered again as a strange idea took root inside my mind: did he not know where it was? The thought struck me like he had knocked out my tooth, leaving a hollow space where something solid used to be, and every one of my fantasies dissolved like mist under his question. 

I had always dreamed of the day I would twist my dagger in his heart and he would whisper the name to me. I would find Amaral, and together we would burn down kingdoms to get back to the home we had been stolen from. But if he had never known, then how was I ever to find it? 

And did it even matter now that she is dead?

“I don't remember,” I whispered. “I always assumed you knew.”

He regarded me for a long moment, then stood and walked over to the fire and jostled the poker in the coals a few times, causing sparks to fly.

“Are there any others like you there?”

The question was a physical blow, and I felt the blood drain from my face as my lips started to tingle. I had always assumed he did not know about Amaral. We had been separated long before I was sold to him, and I was certain that if he had knowledge of her, he would have used it as some form of torture. She remained a secret I had kept only for myself; I hadn't even shared her memory with Adrian or Ester.

“No,” I answered quickly. 

Too quickly.

He pulled the poker free from the coals and turned towards me slowly, the poker tip held at eye level, casting a red glow in their pale depths. Maybe that colour was a true reflection of his soul, of the evil that lurked there.

He swaggered closer. “The way you answered so quickly makes me believe that you are not being truthful. Is my monster lying to me?” and I tried not to cringe away from the poker as he brought it closer to my face.

Every instinct in my body screamed to fight! But we had been playing this game a long time. As a child, I would scream, scratch, kick, and bite until I was nothing but a feral rage of caged fury, and it always ended worse for me and, more importantly, for others. He grabbed the back of my neck and held my head steady as he brought the cherry-red poker to my thin collar around my neck and placed the tip against the iron, being careful enough not to touch my skin because he couldn't leave scars in visible places. 

I squirmed against the heat as the metal choker started to warm uncomfortably, then it started to burn, then it started to scald, and suddenly I was sure my skin was on fire as pain lashed around my neck, touching my very soul. 

I tried to stop the scream building up in my throat, but the second it passed my lips, he removed the poker and blew a gentle, alcohol-reeking breath over my neck several times, soothing the burn in an almost perverted, concerned way. 

Then he sighed deeply and rested his forehead on mine, our ragged breaths mingling. 

“It hurts me when you lie to me, Panithea,” he whispered, and his hand fisted painfully in my braid. “I will ask again. Are there others like you?” And he slowly moved my face away from his.

A deeper preservation kicked at the bottom of my belly, one that wasn't attached to my flesh but to the safety of people I must have once loved.

“I... I… don't know.” I whispered the truth, and he smiled like it tasted like a lie. 

He leant in closer until his lips hovered next to my ear. "It doesn't matter that you don't remember because I already have someone looking for it.”

And I knew in that instance I would kill him and anyone who ever breathed its forgotten name. I would burn down kingdoms to save the people I could not remember from a fate like mine.

I wondered if he could see that in my eyes as he let go of me and stepped away, crossed back to the fire and returned the poker to the coals.

I bent over slightly, pulling several breaths into my lungs, trying to steady myself for what was to come, and ran a hand over my cooling collar.

He stabbed the fire several times and said without turning, “An emissary from Valmere is arriving tomorrow to discuss terms for a new trade agreement. I don't trust the usurper Thandrel not to have sent him as a spy to best learn how to infiltrate my defences. Touch him and steal his secrets.” More sparks flew with every stab. 

“I still have time.” He whispered absentmindedly.

When I did not reply, he turned back towards me. “Take off your coat.” He snapped, irritated that I hadn't just automatically done so.

With shaken fingers, I started to unbutton my dark teal coat. Luckily, I had already removed my armour and blades, instinctively knowing what this night would bring. Malric had no patience for all the laces and buckles and had, on several occasions, cut through, leaving me with no armour for several days as I got it repaired or remade. 

I dropped the coat to the floor and then removed the thick, cream-coloured jersey. Only when I stood in nothing but a white sleeveless vest, black riding pants, and boots did he pull the poker free. It glowed a furious cherry red for a moment before fading to a dark, menacing black as he approached. 

He began moving in a slow circle around me, admiring his craftsmanship. From the tips of my shoulders to the crook of my elbows were covered in hundreds of small, round, white brands from the tip of that poker. They were so close and evenly spaced that from a distance, my arms looked as if they were covered in scales. It was a perfect reflection of the dark, vicious thing living in my soul, a sign that I was in mid-transformation, and one day I would grow fangs and claws and shed the last of my humanity behind me.

His eyes trailed down the ruined flesh almost seductively, and I knew he was looking for the next piece of me to destroy.

He raised an eyebrow, a silent command for me to bow. This was the start of our ritual.

I looked to the floor and took one small step back and in and bent my knees, dropping into an elegant curtsey.

“You make me do this,” he said for the millionth time, and I knew the pain was coming. He always hesitated at the last second, giving me a chance to fight, hoping I would. 

But I was not a child anymore. This was our fucked-up game, and I too had been playing it for a long time, and I would not run. 

The monster he made in me would not allow it.