“Why does the Lich King care about a lowly human?”
“That is none of your concern.” The vampyre pushed off the wall and I took a step forward. “You have one week with your bride before she must be returned to her rightful place.”
Rightful place? What was he talking about? The Lich King has no love for anything human or fae.
He snapped his fingers, and a dark, shadowy sliver cracked through the air next to him. “The Lich King has waited long enough. Do not make him come for her.”
The vampyre stepped in and grinned before slipping into the strange vertical hole where shadows poured out and disappeared.
Then the image was gone, winking out with him.
“A shadow walker,” Alina gasped.
I had heard of shadow walkers, but few existed, even fewer after the magi closed the Rift to the Never. I’d often wondered if I could rip the shadows apart and enter the Never, but I dared not try. Not whenever I was reborn, my soul seemed to drift in that dark place.
“What does the Lich King want with Deirdre?” I scratched the back of my head.
“It doesn't matter. You cannot hand her over,” the king said.
“You think I would?”
King Henry eyed me. “Since her birth, you have never shown interest, and when you do, suddenly the Lich King appears, wanting the child of prophecy for himself? Since when does the dead care about the living?”
He kept his blade out. “Why did you marry her? Do you believe in the prophecy? Do you truly believe that your love will bring balance?”
I cringed at the wordlove. Deirdre and I could barely tolerate one another.
“I know what happened when you took her,” King Henry said.
“What happened?” Alina whispered.
King Henry ignored her question. “Now's not the time for old grievances, any of them. You must bury your past or this…” He pointed to the surrounding destruction “. . . will not just happen to humans, but to your people, too. We must have an alliance, Kane.”
I stood there, thinking about everything that had happened, everything that had taken place. What did the Lich King want with Deirdre? What was he trying to accomplish?
He had been around for hundreds, maybe even a thousand years, but never had been this bold.
“Kane, you married the child of prophecy. The prophecy is already in motion. You need to embrace what it means.”
“This is ridiculous,” I said. “A prophecy will not protect these people or mine. We need to take the attack to him and end the Lich King for good.”
Alina scoffed. “Do you even know what you're saying? Do you even know how many twisted exist in the wastelands? There are thousands, and that's not even including his creepy lichen moss creatures or the undead he can summon. His necromancers can raise the dead. Every one we kill, if they're not killed correctly, they can bring back. We don't have the numbers anymore. The final battle with the Rift decimated too much.
“I need to return home and report what's happened here. I’ll be in touch,” she stated to the king before whistling to her bird. And then she started running, jumping over the dead knights and out of the village.
“Why does the Lich King want her?” I said, questioning it again.
“I don't know. He knows something we don't.”
“I'll just keep her in the castle. He will never be able to infiltrate there.”
“That may work for now, but you cannot keep her locked up forever.” King Henry folded his arms. “She needs to trust you.”
“That opportunity died the moment I killed her husband. I will keep her locked away. Use that spy network of yours and find out what is going on.”
“And the alliance?” he asked.
“We will discuss it.”
