“I can’t live if something happens toyou.Youare my life, Auraelia.”
“And you are mine. So don’t you dare do something heroic and get yourself killed. Do you hear me?” Her words came out around a sob, tears flowing freely down her cheeks.
Daemon crushed his lips to hers, pulling her against his body as her hands wrapped around his neck, holding him just as tightly. It wasn’t meant to be a goodbye kiss, but everything about it felt like it was. His heart and magic raged against the decision he had to make.
Leave the one person who meant the entire world to him and help his people…or stay and live with the consequences of that choice. Either way, there was a chance he would lose.
Auraelia broke their kiss, her breathing as heavy as his own as they pressed their foreheads together. “Promise you will come back to me.”
“I will always come back to you, my star. Always.”
It had taken him longer than he’d hoped to shadow-walk from Lyndaria to the border between the Court of Opal and the Court of Pearl, but as he stood in the center of the battlefield, the scene that was sprawled out around him momentarily froze him to the spot.
Opal’s warriors were easy to spot among the fray, their flowing white garb masking the armor and weapons hidden beneath. Magnolia flowers were emblazoned in gold across the chests of Pearl’s soldiers, and a sea of silver and blue marked the men who fought under his father’s banner.
Agonized screams pierced the air, mixing with a chorus of battle cries as droves of people clashed together in a cacophony of clanging metal.
Formations had long been forgotten as soldiers fanned out around him, meeting enemies from all directions. Bodies of members from each of the courts littered the ground, reducing the once grassy plain to nothing but crimson-soaked mud.
During his meeting with Lady Aesira, they’d decided to set up camp beyond the tree line that bordered her court, but with the chaos surrounding him, there was no time for a briefing. No time to get the lay of the land or the battle plans that had been established.
He’d barely had time to get his bearings, tobreathe,before a soldier from Pearl charged him from his right.
Daemon’s body moved on instinct, his shadows spilling out of him into a solidified mass to block the man’s blow as he drew the swords sheathed across his back. Letting the wall drop between them, he blocked the next blow with one blade while parrying with the other. He met each strike from his opponent with a maneuver of his own until his sword met flesh just below the man’s breastplate, slicing clean across his abdomen.
The soldier staggered, his sword falling to the ground as he tried to hold his stomach together and sank to his knees. Daemon sneered as he stared down at him, disgust churning in his stomach as he met the man’s gaze and plunged his sword clean through the magnolia on his thin armor. He was the first in what would undoubtedly be a long line of enemies that met their end by his hand.
Rolling his shoulders, Daemon turned his head, his eyes locking on another opponent. The sound of metal scraping against metal sent chills down his spine as he removed his sword, spinning it once over his hand and letting a smirk tilt one corner of his lips.
And so it begins.
One by one, Daemon met his enemies, and one by one, they all fell to either his magic or his blade. A warrior’s calm washed over him, numbing him to the chaos as more and more people succumbed to the perils of war. He ignored the blood and mud that now caked his clothes. He lost count of how many soldiers he’d slain. He tried not to remember their faces or their garbled final words as the Goddess Keres came for their souls.
Though he’d lost sight of them as the battle raged on, he held onto the glimpses of Yvaine and Sariah fighting side by side and the wisps of his father’s magic that mirrored his own. Of the way Lady Aesira and her warriors moved languidly through the throng of soldiers, leaving bodies in their wake.
As Daemon drove his sword into yet another soldier, a deep, guttural scream cut through the tumult, and the world seemed to slow around him.
He knew that voice.
Linked it to the bellowing laugh that used to fill his home. To the stories that were told and the teachings that had been shared throughout his childhood.
Daemon quickly pulled his blade from the man’s neck—thick, hot blood spraying his face and coating his hands. But by the time he turned around, he was too late.
“Father!”Daemon’s scream mixed with those around him.
He watched his father fall to his knees as Lord Kaemon of the Court of Pearl pushed his sword further into his father’s chest until it protruded from his spine.
Shock rooted him to the spot, but everything around him seemed to be moving in a blur as if time couldn’t decide whether to speed up or slow. Blood rushed through his ears, blocking out the sounds around him, and his thoughts spiraled through every conversation and argument he’d had with his father.
As Lord Kaemon pulled his sword from King Evander’s chest, every thought racing through Daemon’s mind ceased and was replaced by a deep-seated rage that burned away every fiber of calm he’d been trying to cling to.
His breathing came in harsh inhales and ragged exhales. His nostrils flared as he watched his father’s blood drip from the end of the sword.
Drip.
Pure, blinding hatred twisted in his stomach.
Drip.
