She had seen the Blade months ago, at that ridiculous party. The very party where she had enchanted herself to evade her feelings for Killian. Fate had a dark irony.
Royce had taken Elyse to his artifacts room as a means of impressing her. He had boasted about the Blade of Hanael and its ability to kill a demon—a tidbit she had scoffed at. Now sheneeded it to be true, and she needed to know where the Blade had gone.
It was a moment longer before Royce regained the ability to speak. His breaths were shallow pants as he spat out, “Not here.”
Elyse rolled her eyes and pressed the dagger further into the fleshy space beneath his chin. “I know where itisn’t,” she scoffed. “Where the fuckisit?”
A bead of sweat trickled down Royce’s temple and soaked into his fair, greasy hair. “I don’t know,” he spat out. “It’s being held somewhere. I put it up as collateral for a game.”
“A game? What kind of game requires the Blade of Hanael?”
“Dead Man’s Bluff—it’s a card game!” he added hastily, anticipating her need for more explanation. “Everyone puts up a magical artifact as collateral for entry. The winner gets to choose one of the artifacts as their prize.”
“Who did you give it to?” she snarled. Her patience was wearing thin.
“I-I don’t know,” he stammered. “He was wearing a cloak with a hood. I didn’t see his face.”
“When is the game?”
“In a few weeks. There’s a card over there,” he said, his eyes flickering toward the dresser. “It has all the details.”
Elyse raised her free hand and summoned the card. It was small, no longer than a few inches. Gold lettering had been etched into thick black parchment, spelling out a date, time, and location. Elyse pocketed the card and turned her focus back on Royce.
“That’s not the actual location,” he explained. There was a heady desperation in his voice as he rambled, as if doingso might save his life. “It’s just the entryway—like a portal. Everyone enters from different doors, and the real location is neutral—hidden.”
“Anything else you’d like to add?” Elyse drawled as she caressed the dagger against his cheek. His skin was slick with perspiration. “Like who runs this little game?”
“I don’t know who he is. But there’s no magic during the game. There’s no way to cheat.”
Shit. That ruined Elyse’s plan.
She sighed, officially bored, and patted him on the cheek. “You’ve been a very good boy, answering my questions,” she purred. “For that, I’ll make this quick.”
In the end, Royce begged for his life. They always did.
Interlude
It began in the West.
Fires ravaged the forests of the Asterial Mountains, fanned by the summer heat and dry air. The citizens of Cliffguard and other neighboring towns flocked to curb the destruction, but their attempts were futile. Homes burned, lives were lost. It finally rained after five days, and the fires ceased their havoc.
No one thought much of it. Wildfires weren’t uncommon this time of year. A campfire gone awry, nothing more.
But then a sinkhole erupted not far from DeVesalis, swallowing an entire village whole. Coincidence, many called it. The natural disasters were horrendous, but unrelated. A bad omen, others deemed it.
Then the rumors spread. There was a lake in the North where swimmers mysteriously vanished. Poltergeists began haunting inns across the kingdom. Women were compelled to throw themselves from bridges, ending otherwise happy lives. Dogs turned on their masters. The dead turned on the living.
No one knew how much was true and how much was exaggerated. King Maelor urged his citizens to remain calm, torepress the fear seeping its way through the kingdom. It was rumored, too, that he knew more than he was letting on.
Amidst the stirring chaos, hardly anyone took note of the merchant murdered in his bedchamber on the night of the summer solstice. The papers left out how his screams had filled his mansion, how his servants had tried to help him but found the door barricaded. There was no mention of how, once they finally broke into the bedchamber, they’d found Niall Royce’s body in pieces. How there was no trace of his murderer.
And so Royce’s legacy was overshadowed by a destruction that was only just beginning.
5
Killian
Killian stared out at the empty field. There was nothing but tilled dirt for as far as he could see. The same shade of dreary brown stretching into the horizon.
