Page 6 of Throne of the Wolf Queen

‘I am so completely fucked,’ I said, finally crossing the frozen floorboards to slump onto the mattress.

CHAPTER 4

MATTHIAS

Do they know what she’s stolen? Are they aware of how that empress has pilfered relics older than time from our shrines and altars? Or don’t they care because it’s neither their beloved Evella nor feared Vyrus? Our world is on the brink of devastation, mark my words. It won’t only be those in the north who’ll perish if her actions go unchallenged.

​— ​A STATEMENT FROM LORD ROSHAN OF TEMLHEN TO THE NATIONS OF THE SOUTHERN LANDS

Ifan refused to meet my glare as he dragged me through the damp dungeons, his chin high as I struggled to free myself. The freshly inked tattoo burned as I wriggled. He inclined his head as the doors were opened, the empress’s guards sneering as he hauled the fallen king of Asmar behind him.

‘Tell me, brother,’ I said, knowing the fake grin plastered on my bruised face would piss him off. ‘Do you think of Skye while you stand by the woman who forced her to flee?’ He threw me headfirst into a stinking cell. ‘Did you help her destroy our home? Deface Elmswood artefacts? What would Mother say, Ifan?’

‘Shut your fucking mouth,’ Ifan bellowed. His hand gripped the base of my throat as I stood. I flung myself against the bars clanging in my face, revelling in the first signs of emotion I’d managed to rend from him in over a week.

Ifan slammed his huge fists against the bars, anger flashing through his green eyes when I refused to flinch. I could have sworn I spotted the first glimmer of a tear catching in the flickering light of the sconces. I crossed my arms, chains rattling faintly as Ifan turned, storming away.

He took two steps before stumbling. Ifan fell, white knuckles clutching a rickety table as he crumpled. The rusting bars of my cell sliced into my face as I peered at my little brother, a knot curling inside as he retched on the floor. I should be pleased. Had my words finally forced some emotion from him? Some faint sense of guilt for the devastation he’d caused? The final words of my father – to protect my siblings – swirled around my mind as I watched Ifan expel a black, tar-like substance. His huge shoulders heaved as thick vomit splattered on the straw strewn across the dungeon.

‘Ifan?’

He spat out a last glob, clutched the table and stood on trembling legs before pitching out of the cells, the heavy door shuddering as it slammed behind him.

I exhaled a shaky breath, prised my fingers away from the bars.

‘It’s times like this, I thank Evella I was an only child.’

My heart lurched as I spun about. I’d thought I was the only one held down here. But as I peered through the bars into the joining cell, a form emerged in the weak light. I peered at the man shuffling towards the bars separating us. He slipped a thin, fragile arm through the gap and I squinted into his dark brown eyes as the man smiled. There was something familiar about him, but as I took in his filthy shirt over his dark copper skin, his wild, almost black hair and unruly beard, I couldn’t place him.

‘It’s Musa,’ he said, stretching his arm out further through the bars as far as his cuffs would allow. I couldn’t help gasp as I stared wide-eyed at the former King of Yepana – the oldest king, whose crown was the first to fall when the empress decided she’d had her fill of Carush. Musa’s smile wavered at my reaction and I cleared my throat, shaking his frigid hand.

‘It’s good to see you,’ I said, noting the changes in the once-proud king. The wise monarch who’d shown a trembling sixteen-year-old version of myself how Alliance meetings were run. The man whose bright clothes had stolen my breath, his kind words soothing the thunder of my pulse. ‘I thought she’d killed you.’

I grimaced against my words. Once more, I’d let slip something that should have remained safely in my mind. His smile fell as his hands shook against the bars, his Adam’s apple bobbing as he stared into the shadows.

‘Oh, that she had, Matthias,’ he said, his wide dark eyes finally meeting mine. ‘I may as well be dead. She took everything from me. Everything. My throne, my land.’ His voice caught. ‘My family. The secrets in here.’ Musa tapped his forehead. ‘There are many moments when I wish… I wish…’

‘You can’t think like that,’ I said softly.

Musa swallowed before lifting his tattered cotton shirt, exposing the stark hollow of his hip bone, my gut clenching at the sight of a tattoo etched into his stomach. The wrinkled skin about the marks was laced with Vyrium, tinged with dark green.

‘It’s killing me,’ he said, lowering his shirt and gesturing to the covered tattoo, unable to meet my gaze. ‘Us.’

I squinted at the thick mess Ifan left on the floor. I raised my questioning gaze to Musa. A sad smile flickered across his face, a faint nod. I inhaled sharply, staring at the steaming globs. My forehead crashed into the chill of the bars.

‘He promised me.’ I wasn’t even certain I’d spoken the words out loud. ‘Fucker promised it’d help my people. Promised it was safe.’

Musa snorted. ‘The empress told me the same. We’re too trusting.’ I shook my head against the bars, the rust digging into my forehead. ‘No?’

‘I never agreed to this. I know I didn’t.’ I leaned back, my eyes snagging on the glint from the Evellum cuffs. ‘This isn’t to give me a reprieve from her orders, is it?’

Musa slid down the bars, his back to me. I mirrored the move, pretending my heart wasn’t lodged in my throat.

‘No.’ The King of Yepana sighed, his chest rattling with each strained inhale. ‘I’m afraid not, Matthias. It’ll keep us alive a bit longer. Till she’s wrung everything she wants from us. You recall Queen Eira from the North?’

‘The Anomaly?’

‘Plant Anomaly. You’d have loved her gardens. Roses of every hue, so stark against the snow of her home.’