Married by Treachery Page 14

How was this possible?

  Raquel flexed her jaw, and she was staring at her unbound hands when a pair of heavy boots appeared before her. She followed those heavy boots with her eyes, up a pair of wide calves, and over a broad and hairy build until her gaze met Prince Edom’s.

  “Where are your ties?” He growled like a bear as he searched the ground, and then he grabbed her hands and jerked her to her feet. “Where are her damned ties?” he shouted at his men, who now scrambled like ants having their anthill destroyed.

  “What did you do with them?” Edom jerked her closer and bent in her face. Raquel was too bewildered to respond. “Did you cut your way out?”

  “No, I—”

  “Are you hiding a blade from me, mortal?” Edom snapped, and now his eyes raked over her frame. “I will strip you down until I uncover every last—”

  “Found it,” said one of his guards, approaching them, rope in hand.

  The rope was clearly uncut, and Edom let out a puff of a breath. He grabbed the rope, jerked Raquel’s hands forward, and tied her wrists again.

  “The gag?” Edom barked.

  “I couldn’t find it, your grace,” the guard replied. “But this will work.”

  A beat, and then Edom was shoving a new piece of fabric into her mouth that tasted like mildew. Two minutes later, his guards threw her back upon the horse, Edom glared at the mist, mumbling something beneath Raquel’s hearing, and they were off riding again.

  For her part, Raquel sat in silence to the rhythmic pulsing of horse hooves as she tried to untangle her thoughts.

  Jake had been there last night. He’d been the one to unbind her hands and mouth, and Edom knew it too.

  But why?

  Her gaze skirted the trees, the mist, searching for what she felt so strongly was there. How Jake could keep pace, Raquel had no idea, but she felt his nearness even stronger now, after the night.

  To what end?

  The princes needed her blood to stop their curse—that much was clear—but why bother unbinding her? Edom had not bothered with her comfort; why had Jake?

  I never lied, my bride. You simply refused to believe me.

  Raquel continued searching the mist until, eventually, they drew upon a great fortress. Similar to the outpost, the mist stopped at its walls, but this was much larger. The moment they passed through the gate, a barren landscape spread before them, with rocky earth and rotting structures and a dried riverbed cutting it in half. The riverbed was like a royal carpet made of stones, spread out before the mouth of the fortress, and Raquel thought it had probably been beautiful once. With glittering blue water and vibrant green trees and a magnificent palace standing sentry over it all. But it was difficult to imagine that now with it so bathed in darkness and shadow, which Raquel found ironic for the Court of Light.

  Edom led them through a small village of sorts as Forest kith emerged from buildings to see the source of commotion. He rode on for the castle without slowing until the road wound higher, over a bridge, and through the castle’s wide-open doors.

  Into a courtyard.

  Prince Edom dismounted and pulled her down from the horse, then grabbed her by the rope as he dragged her after him toward the great doors in back.

  Inside, the castle was like a great tomb. Candles stood everywhere, but their tiny flames could not chase away the shadow. Vines and tree roots had crept into the walls and ceiling like capillaries, cracking the stone in places. Raquel finally understood Jake’s haste. She couldn’t speak to the depravity he’d mentioned, but this castle could not physically stand much longer.

  Nor could its king, apparently.

  More Forest kith rushed to greet their prince, but Edom stormed on, pulling Raquel behind him, and it wasn’t until they reached a quiet corridor that Edom stopped and addressed one of his men. “Lock her in the dungeon. I need to speak with my father first.”

  “Yes, Your Grace,” the man said.

  “And keep your eyes open for my brother,” snarled the Bear Prince.

  Rough hands grabbed her arms and shoved her on, away from the Bear Prince. They led her down a narrow stair that wound deeper and deeper into the earth, where cold seeped in and rot clung to the air.

  Where bars designated the bowels of the castle.

  One of the kith threw open a barred door. They shoved her inside and slammed the bars shut, and Raquel was left alone in the darkness.

  20

  Raquel did not know how long she sat in darkness. Time was a dream, a haze of cold and shadow, sometimes accented by the errant drip of water. She wrapped her arms around herself to keep warm, but the chill set deep in her bones.

  Deep in her heart.

  She’d been so certain that Jake had been following her, but now, locked in the belly of the fortress, that certainty fractured. How could he possibly rescue her now? And even if he managed to reappear, even if he managed to unlock her door and slip her out of this prison, how could they ever hope to escape?

  Unless he didn’t plan to rescue her.

  Unless he didn’t plan for her to leave this place alive.

  He needs your blood. From your heart.

  Raquel sank lower as disappointment weighed upon her shoulders, heavier and heavier, until she felt like collapsing beneath it all.

  Edom was right. She was a fool.

  And that foolishness had made her fail in her one objective: to save the people of Harran.

  Perhaps I did save it, she thought bitterly. Not because I succeeded in killing the forest prince, but because my blood will break the curse and Canna will no longer need brides from my people.

  However, this thought did not bring the joy Raquel had expected it to bring when she had set out on this mission. When she had been so ready to die for her cause.

  She didn’t feel so ready to die now.

  Her dreams proved a torment, a constant banner of what could be, and Raquel found herself futilely clinging to them.

  Mourning them.

  Grieving them.

  Hushed voices eventually sounded down the hall, where a golden glow appeared, dispelling the shadows, and three figures approached. One was undoubtedly the Bear Prince. His hulking silhouette was unmistakable.

  He stopped before her bars, while his two kith stood behind him, and his black eyes glittered in the torchlight.

  “Have you finally come to kill me?” Raquel said, weary.

  A row of teeth shone within that full beard. “Not at this time, my bride. I have need of you yet.” His voice had lost its wildness. It was softer now. More subdued.

  “Get her out,” he barked, and his two kith stepped forward. One unlocked the door, and the other strode inside, grabbed her arms, and hoisted her to her feet.

  She was too weary to resist, too famished to pull away. Too heartbroken to fight.

  The guards held her before their prince, who scrutinized her from head to toe, and then he abruptly turned and started down the hall. The guards dragged her after him, up the stairs and down more winding corridors through the palace while servants and guards alike gawked at her.

  As though they had never before seen a mortal.

  They eventually reached a set of engraved wooden doors, and Prince Edom made a fist and slammed it upon the wood so hard the door rattled upon its hinges.

  “Enter!” said a thin male voice from within.

  Edom pushed the door open, and the guards dragged Raquel after him.

  Into a bedchamber.

  It was a large space—large enough to hold her entire home in Harran—with arched ceilings and tall, narrow windows that probably would have illuminated this entire space with sunlight had the mist not obscured the world. Bookcases filled the walls, and luxurious furniture ornamented the floor. Raquel’s gaze snagged upon a table trimmed in gold filigree that could have fed all of Harran for winter.

  A cough rattled, and her attention slid to the enormous four-poster bed, where an old man lay.

  King Issachar, Jake and Edom’s father and the r
uler of the Court of Light and all of Canna. It had to be. His hair was bushy, like Edom’s, but shaded a midnight black like Jake’s, though his was laced with silver. He had Edom’s dark eyes, but his bore a milky sheen, and they did not focus, as if he could not quite see, but there was no mass to him. No muscle or strength. He was reed-thin, his frame hardly distinguishable from the thick blankets now covering him, and his skin was like paper, thin and wrinkled, and also sallow, and dark shadows pillowed his sunken eyes.

  Jake had not lied about this much, at least.

  Edom took two steps and knelt upon one knee, head bowed. He looked like a boulder with a mop for a head. “My king, I have brought the mortal,” Edom said quietly, in that same subdued tone.

  King Issachar’s dark eyes slid from his son to Raquel, though still, they never focused. Not completely.

  “Is it really you, my son?” King Issachar wheezed.

  “Yes, Father. I would have returned sooner, but as you know, Jakobián took off with my bride. Again,” Edom growled. “However, this time he planned to abscond with my birthright as well.”

  “How is that possible—”

  “Mother glamoured him a coat, which he intended to use in order to receive your blessing.”

  The king lay quietly, and his next inhale rattled.

  Edom lifted his head, and he looked pleadingly at the king. “Father, I beseech you: Please bestow the blessing that is mine by right so that this never happens again.”

  King Issachar stared at his eldest son and heir for so long Raquel wondered if he’d simply passed on. As if the news had been too much for him to endure, and so his soul had finally departed to find peace.

  But then his eyelids slid closed, and a tremor rolled through his body. “Where is my Jakobián?” His voice was a pained whisper.

  “Locked away with Mother, awaiting your punishment for their lies and treachery.”

  Raquel frowned. Edom’s words were disconcerting, yes, but why were they having this conversation now? Hadn’t Edom locked her away specifically so that he could speak with his father? Wouldn’t they have already discussed this?

  Or perhaps that was when Edom had intercepted Jake and locked him away.

  Raquel’s heart beat faster. She hated that she still cared.

  “Then come near to me so that I may know you are my son Edom,” King Issachar said.

  “Of course, my king.” Edom stood and strode forward, then stopped beside the bed and bowed his head.

  The king reached out with a trembling hand and touched Edom’s head. His fingers slid into that shaggy mass of hair, and relief smoothed his brow. Suddenly, an invisible force wrapped around Raquel like a blanket and jerked her forward so fast and so strong that Raquel nearly tripped on her own two feet. In fact, she would have, but the force had lifted her enough to drag her toes and hem across the black tiles to where it set her down next to Edom, beside the bed.

  But that force did not let go.

  Even so near death, King Issachar’s power was astounding.

  King Issachar reached out and pressed two fingers to Raquel’s brow, and a shock of energy jolted through her body. Raquel would have collapsed if it weren’t for the invisible vice still holding her upright.

  “Let us hope she ends our curse once and for all,” King Issachar said. Edom’s head turned, and he glanced sideways at her while King Issachar closed his eyes.

  “May the Fates give to you of heaven’s due and earth’s glory—an abundance of love and all the color absent from this world,” King Issachar began. Where his voice had been quiet before, now it echoed with his power. Weaving promises into the continuum of time and space, across planes of possibility, and Raquel’s entire body suddenly felt bathed in the sun’s brilliant warmth, as if his words were knitting her into the tapestry of his new future.

  “May this kingdom serve you,” King Issachar continued, “and her people bow because of your just mercy, and may you lord over your kith and kin, and the sons of your kith bow before you. May those who curse you be cursed, and those who bless you be blessed.”

  With every word, that warmth bloomed hotter, brighter, until Raquel’s entire being felt aflame.

  This was the blessing Jake had spoken of. The one he’d needed so that the title of heir would pass on to him.

  So that he could fulfill the curse.

  And now he was too late, wherever he was. Edom had secured it from their father.

  Her blood was his now.

  Prince Edom reached out and placed his hand over his father’s. “Thank you, Father. I will fulfill my duty to this kingdom.” He turned his head and looked straight at Raquel, and his black eyes glittered. “And to my beloved bride.”

  Raquel stilled, gazing at him in confusion, but then the door burst open, and an enraged Prince Edom barreled through.

  21

  “What have you done?” this new Prince Edom roared. His eyes were wild, and one of them looked as though it was beginning to bruise.

  The first Prince Edom, the one who had accepted King Issachar’s blessing, stood suddenly, shoulders back and chest puffed out with victory. King Issachar looked utterly bewildered, glancing between the two Edoms, who were both spitting images of each other. But now that Raquel observed them together in the same room, she began to notice subtle differences. The variations that went beyond the physical, like the shining amusement in the eyes of the Edom beside her, and the subtle twist of his lips that looked very much like Jake.

  Raquel didn’t know how it was possible. She’d thought he needed his mother to mend the coat, but here he was, glamoured to look exactly like the real Prince Edom. Suddenly King Issachar’s prior questions made sense. Edom had never made it to his father. Jake had intercepted him—somehow—momentarily disposed of him, and then come to Raquel’s cell, glamoured as his brother.

  Jake had stolen Edom’s blessing and birthright after all.

  “Well, well, well, how nice of you to join us,” drawled the Edom beside her in Jake’s smooth voice.

  That was also why “Edom” had sounded different when he’d come to take her from her cell, Raquel realized. Because it had been Jake trying his best to match Edom’s tone. He hadn’t needed to do that when he’d come to Harran because those with him were already loyal to him.

  And Prince Edom’s face twisted with rage. “Tell me you did not bless him, Father!”

  King Issachar’s expression faltered, broken with understanding, and he sagged back upon his pillow as if the weight of this truth were too heavy to bear. “I did, my son, and he has received it. The binding is done.”

  Prince Edom—the real Prince Edom—stopped before them, looking caught between the desire to murder his brother and beg his father. “But surely you still have blessing left for me?”

  “What else can I say?” King Issachar said with exasperation. “I made him lord over you and all your kith and kin, and I have exalted him with heaven’s due and all the earth’s glory.” The king gazed upon his eldest, those milky eyes set with despair. “What else is left for you but to labor far away from your new master and future king?”

  The real Prince Edom seethed, shoulders heaving, and his hands curled into fists at his sides as he glared at his brother.

  There was a knock on the door.

  All four of them glanced over as a guard burst through.

  “Your Grace, Your Majesty…” He bowed quickly. “I am sorry to intrude, but there is—” His words trailed as he lifted his head and finally ingested the scene and the two Prince Edoms. The sight struck him mute, but a distant explosion brought him back.

  It brought everyone back.

  The only one who did not seem alarmed by the sound or shudder currently rolling through the floor was the Edom Imposter.

  Jake.

  He caught Raquel’s gaze and winked as his father and the real Prince Edom both startled.

  “What is happening?” King Issachar demanded, trying to shove himself to a seated position.

&nbs
p; “That is why I came, sire,” the guard continued. “We are under attack—”

  “By whom?” roared the real Bear Prince.

  “We can’t be certain, Your Grace, but Gorva swears she saw Sienne in their ranks.”

  The real Edom cursed and ran to the window. “How many?”

  “One thousand, Your Grace.”

  Edom’s gaze whipped back in shock, King Issachar clutched his chest and slumped back upon his bed, and another explosion rocked the floor. Raquel wobbled unsteadily, but Jake caught her hand and didn’t let go.

  Their gazes met—held.

  “You,” the real Edom snarled.

  Jake—still glamoured as his brother—released Raquel’s hand and moved to stand between her and his furious brother.

  The real Edom took a step even as the floor rocked with yet another explosion. “I will kill you for this,” he snarled.

  “No… wait…” King Issachar wheezed, his arm outstretched like a dying man reaching for what remained of his life.

  And the real Edom charged his brother like a battering ram. They collided, both of them tumbling past Raquel, but then one Edom vanished. Just like that. If Raquel had blinked, she would have missed it, because he didn’t stay invisible for long. The real Edom was just trying to regain his balance when Fake Edom appeared immediately behind him.

  The real Edom growled in fury. “Cowardly little gnat. Stand before me and fight!”

  Edom reached for him again, but Jake vanished and appeared behind him again, a wide smile upon his face. His sword of light winked into existence, and he smacked Edom across the back with the flat of it.

  “Is that better?” the Fake Edom said in Jake’s voice.

  Edom whirled around like an enraged bear. “You’re pathetic. You always have been. Gripping the backs of my heels to pull yourself ahead.”

  “You dare speak in such a manner to Canna’s heir?” Jake’s tone taunted.

  Edom snarled and charged at Jake, but Jake vanished again. “Always running from the fight, just like when you were a sniveling little runt.”

  The Fake Edom reappeared, and he smiled wickedly. “A sniveling little runt that just stole your blessing.”