“I must go to Eros and prepare our fleets for war. None of the rulers know the extent of unrest in the towers yet.”
“And King Mattock?
“Corric is nearing death.” Her eyes glistened with the words.
“Amara—you cared for him deeply. Didn’t you?”
My dearest friend simply nodded through her tears. Her reaction during our meeting that day when Firose revealed he was ill made more sense. It suddenly felt unfair to keep what I suspected of my own fate from her.
“There is a real chance that my death is a part of righting our path. I’m sorry to leave you if that’s the case. I wish we had the chance to know one another outside of these tower walls.”
“I wish that were not true, my dear. But I trust what you must do. I trust in you. I have always trustedyou.”
Pressure grew behind my eyes. For the second time that day, I was crying.Was showing emotion becoming a new habit for me?She squeezed my hand across the side table. We sat like that, hands held, turning back to stare at the flames for a long while.
“I have so many questions,” I mused finally. “But I fear their answers will have come too late.”
“Me too, love. Me too,” she answered to the flames.
My mind raced through all the information she had just unraveled. After our glasses were drained, Amara pulled me into a tight embrace.
“Goodbye, Asterie. I will come to Luz as soon as the Southern isles are secure from attack.”
I nodded, sniffling back my tears. Neither of us was ready for a goodbye so final, so we attempted to treat it as any other farewell.
“See you soon,” I said with a weak smile.
Once Amara left through the Egress, I began to blow out candles before retreating to my bedchamber. Before my feet hit the steps, a particular set of history volumes caught my eye on the bookshelves. Tip-toeing, I pulled the volumes from the shelf, dusting them off before I lugged them up the winding iron stairs with me.
* * *
I awokewith a history volume tented over my chest. It was a miracle that I’d slept through the night, and without nightmares.Why dream of horrors when there was one sleeping right under my roof?
The stack of volumes was littered around my bedchamber. The otherwise gray wood floors were colored in a rainbow of dusty-hued spines—a haphazard mess of texts.
Upon waking, I opened the volume once more.Would the light of day help me read something different?
The dark crimson curtains were pulled tight and blocked all but a sliver of light, which taunted me by illuminating the passage.
The volumes were chronological. Fenris’ name was four centuries back. Four centuries ago—when he’d been condemned to the northern woodlands. It wasn’t a long passage.
“The Three” were magic-wielders whose powers were feared and respected amongst both courts of the Old World. The vigilante group was composed of Amara Odili, Firose Van Gran and Fenris Lamoreaux. The Three were once a neutral party, siding with neither Brennax nor Phynx and instead prioritizing the protection of the vulnerable during the beginning of wartime.
I flipped to the next page.
“Fenris the Destroyer.” Fenris was the strongest among The Three and commanded a great beast named Vangard. The origin of this bond is unknown. During the fall of Phynx, Fenris betrayed The Three by aiding Brennac forces in their attack. He and Vangard destroyed the city of Phynx in a single night and allowed the Brennac to siege the court.The fall of Phynx is said to be one of the most significant losses of civilian life in all of the Great Wars. The attack began on the armed forces surrounding the city, but once white flags were flown and Phynx surrendered, the Brennac onslaught did not end. Instead, the beast continued to destroy the city. Krait Darvanda, then King of Brennax, never called his troops back.
Historians have long speculated over the motivations for the attack that night. Many hypothesize that Fenris’ actions were spurred by jealousy of a budding romance between his then lover, Firose Van Gran, and Gauvin Wymark, the then King of Phynx. Others speculate that his ties to Brennac’s beliefs and prior employment with Krait Darvanda had radicalized him enough to aid in the attack.
In an act of heroism,Van Gran stopped Fenris’ destruction by casting an enchantment to strip him of half his power, thus gaining control of the beast. Odili and Van Gran then destroyed half of Fenris’ power, condemning him to death in the process. It is said that the fall of Phynx’s capital city sparked the rapid fall of the two kingdoms and the rise of the Order of Henosis.
Thinking that I offered Fenrisanykindness in the preceding weeks sickened me. Worse yet, I’d let heat into my veins at the thought of his touch, which now made my skin crawl.
If history thinks Fenris is dead, how was he sleeping in my guest chambers? How did Queen Wymark know precisely where to find him? Why did she want him?
There were so many omissions theyallhad kept from me. Fenris didn’t just have blood on his hands—he was responsible for one of the most horrific acts in the history of the realms.And for what?A lover’s quarrel with Firose?
If I hadn’t been sick at the image of them as lovers before, I was now. My stomach churned thinking of what he’d done—killing women, children, innocent civilians. He was no better than whatever evil approached Henosis now.
