“But, I’m the one who made the flowers grow here. Bring in the piano,My King. Let me show you how powerful your queen can be.”
Bain leaned in questioning, “Your Majesty, could this be?”
Hemlock’s eyes measured mine until he lifted his hands and brushed the ashy tears from off my cheeks. “You think you could give us this pleasure, Raine? Without touching anyone?”
“Just bring me the piano.”
“My pet, there are no musical instruments here.”
From the corner of my eye at the far end of the hall, I saw the darkness seep down from the ceiling and trickle like black ink along the walls. It hummed a chorus of soft voices and darkened everything in its path.
“Ravenswood will bring me one.”
Hemlock burst out laughing, but the horrible sounds died instantly on his lips as he watched me walk past him toward the piano that literally just appeared out of the shadows he thought he ruled over.
Chapter 17
Silence stilled the room as my fingers hovered over the keys. Hemlock stood across the piano from me, his face a mask of confusion and disbelief. I felt his eyes burning across my skin like the fires of Hell were unleashed upon me as I sat forward on the worn bench Ravenswood had supplied me.
“Where did this come from?” he growled under his breath, touching his hand against the smooth surface of the piano.
“I told you, Ravenswood would bring me one,” I replied quietly as I stared down at the ivory.
“This is impossible,” he murmured to himself, “Raine—”
I darted my eyes up to meet his. “This is what you wanted, is it not,my lord? You wanted me as Ravenswood’s queen.” You wanted Raine, and we will give you a storm.I waited so long to be able to say that sentence I found myself smiling at him. Now all I had to do was pray all the dead assholes around me could hear the music.
My fingers pressed softly over the first chord as my eyes held steady on his. I’d been a pianist as long as I could remember and looking down at the keys beneath my fingers was not something I had needed to do since I was a novice. And what I desperately needed was to watch his reaction to what I was doing.
I didn’t even have to watch, though, since the crowd of the dead behind me gasped out in unison the moment the first chord rang out through the banquet hall. Hemlock straightened and scanned his eyes over the crowd then back to me.
I started the piece slow and simple, my heart pounding hard and fast in my chest. Vibrations tingled through my fingers and hands, up my arms and through my body as if Ravenswood was pouring itself into me, filling in all the spaces my soul had once resided.
The music flooded up from the pit of my stomach, harmonizing with the roar of my defiance for him, splitting myself open for all to see. My brain pulsed and my heart exposed itself raw and empty with each note I gave them. I offered them songs of melancholy and led them to the soaring chords of triumph and hope.
Beyond the edge of the piano, the assembly of Ravenswood dead shifted and began to sway and dance to the music.How long had it been since they heard music?How long had it been since they felt hope or life?
The chandeliers along the ceiling blazed with fire—not the icy-white flames Ravenswood always lit, but the hot flames of my world that sent a wave of heat over the heads of the dead. Dark green veins of ivy sprouted out of the cracks and crevices between the rocks and stone of the castle, crawling and spiraling along the floor. The mist and fog and ash retreated into the walls as if some giant vacuum sucked it all back, and blooms of brightly colored flowers burst open in their absence.
“Enough!” Hemlock shouted, “Enough!” He was on me instantly. The sounds of the music stopped abruptly and everyone in the hall was left staring at me with O-shaped mouths. His hands were on my skin, his freezing needy palms gripping around my arms hard enough to bruise. “Everyone leave!”
Hemlock’s guards surrounded us, opening their great flowing robes to block us from being seen. He shoved me through a pair of ornamental doors and into a hallway alight with fiery torches. The flames reached up in bright hues of reds and oranges, blanketing us with warmth.
Hemlock tore one off the wall and grasped his fist around the fire, extinguishing it in the palm of his hand. “What is the meaning of this?” he growled, spinning around to face me. The torch dropped out of his hands and then were instantly pinning me to the wall. His face lowered to mine, his eyes steady, his breath arctic cold. “What trick do you think you’re playing with me?”
My heart sped, tapping out double and triple-time in my chest. I was trapped like a little bug between his body and the wall. Instantly, three of his skeletal guards appeared behind him, watching me from under the cover of their hooded robes.
I could barely catch my breath, my lungs ached with sharp pains and tears of fear prickled at the corners of my eyes. I felt raw and empty, ripped away from the piano keys and whatever strange enchanting power Ravenswood had seeped into me. My whole body trembled with the loss of it.
“Can you even comprehend how powerful you are as a mere human?” He placed a hand gently against my throat as his lips whispered into my ear. “You and I, together, could rule all of Ravenswood and its mortal side.”
“Is that what you want?” I asked, hardly able to form words. “You want my world?”
His lips raked hard along my cheek, his fingers digging into my skin. “I want to rule it all. And with you here, I can feel every part of it. But first—”
But first? But first what?
He pulled his head back, staring at me. “Do I need to end his existence?”
