Thrones Of Shadows And Flames

Prologue

Summer Solstice

Twenty-two years prior…

She came when the sun was at its highest in the sky.

I woke and marveled at the beautiful summer day, at how the sky seemed more blue, the meadows just past the castle more green as pops of purple, red, yellow, and white dotted the landscape. Drinking tea from my balcony, the warm air brushing against my cheek, I had thought to myself that it was a lovely day for this baby to arrive. And maybe it was luck or something more serendipitous, but the moment the thought flitted from my mind, the first pains of labor began.

The midwives warn me that it will be difficult as they prepare the bed for me to lay in, explaining that a baby’s preference is to stay in the womb. They make it sound violent, like each push by my body is the equivalent of yanking my baby away from the only comfort and safety she has known for months and months. In truth, it terrifies me to know that her first moments after crossing the veil from womb to world will be filled with pain. But the birth is gentle. As if she knows it is her time to come. Between one breath and the next, she is born. She. I collapse back onto the bed, eyes shutting as joy suffuses me.

“She’s silent,” Conrad whispers to the head midwife, Lilah, from where he is sitting by my side, a hand gently brushing hair from my face.

I lift my head, looking down to where they are cleaning her, my heart thundering at the fact that he is right—it is quiet, and quiet only ushers in fear and sadness and longing. Lilah doesn’t answer, her face pinched in concentration while Conrad’s turns red, a sign of his frustration building. I lace my fingers with his, tugging on his hand until his gaze falls to my own.

“How are you feeling?” he asks, a slight edge to his voice that tells me he is asking beyond just the physical.

My eyes dart to the midwives, but they are focused on the baby, so I speak only loud enough for us to hear. “Good. The tinctures seem to be working, if only temporarily. I have not felt my magic once.” He tips my chin up to kiss me, the movement of his lips gentle. “Have you decided on a name?” I ask, smiling when his hazel eyes soften. They have always been the most expressive part of him, a fact I know he hates because it always gives his intention away before he means to. In our early days together, I had used the ability to read him as a weapon. Something to poke and prod and taunt. Now, however, I stare at my husband and see the fear and uncertainty in his eyes, and I simply want to take the burden for myself.

“You gave me two lovely options. Perhaps we should go with—”

“Here she is,” Lilah interrupts, carrying a bundle that appears to be only blankets until I see the curl of tiny fingers reaching up past the layers.

“Healthy?” Conrad asks, taking his daughter into his arms.

Lilah grins fondly, having been the one who helped Conrad’s mother deliver him. “She is perfect.”

His smile is wide as he returns his gaze to our baby girl, and I have the midwives help me sit up. He drinks in every detail of her that I cannot yet see, and when his eyes lift to meet mine, tears line them. “She’s perfect,” he repeats, finally leaning down so that I can see her. I thought I might know what to expect. That after nine months of carrying her, half of those spent feeling her move in the womb, I would know with certainty how to be a mother. As if the knowledge would rush in suddenly, leaving no room for doubt.

And, maybe, to a small degree that happens. When I look at her, fear still lingers beneath my skin, an incessant hum that reminds me I am now in charge of this brand-new life. But stronger than that, coursing through my veins with relentless undeniability, is love. A love unlike the one I feel with Conrad. With my parents or my friends or any other being in these realms.

Taking her into my arms, I lean down and brush my lips against her head, the golden fuzz of hair tickling my nose. Conrad’s arm wraps around my shoulders, his other finger tracing over our daughter’s cheek right where a stream of golden sunlight shines. “My little ray of sunshine,” he whispers, and I marvel at the awe in his voice. At how such a small being could soften such a powerful man—a king. “Rhea.”

“You’re sure?”

A tear slips free, painting his skin as nods. “Yes.”

My gut warms as a rightness coils through me. “Rhea,” I repeat, smiling as her eyes flutter open, like she’s answering the call of her name. I bring her closer, every part of me settling with her cradled in my arms. Rhea, I whisper in my mind. “My little sun.”

***

Night comes quickly, as do the return of Conrad’s duties. “My brother says it’s urgent,” he says while kissing my cheek, his fingers tucking an errant strand of honey-blonde hair behind my ear. “I will come back as soon as I can.”

I swallow as I reach for his wrist, halting his steps away from me. “I love you.” The words are foreign on my tongue, and for a moment panic surges that I shouldn’t have said them. But then Conrad’s shoulders relax—an invisible tension releasing—and the look he’s giving me prompts the words to lay on my tongue again.

“You are my everything, Luna.” He leans over to press his forehead against mine. “And this is only the beginning of the rest of our lives.” My eyes shut at the promise of his words, and then I’m left alone with Rhea for the first time.

I ensure she is asleep in her cot next to the window before I bathe, taking my time as if I’m washing away who I was before. Then again, perhaps it’s not a matter of stepping into something new so much as it is finally feeling like I’m where I’m meant to be. The beginning of the rest of our lives Conrad had said. I smile as I trace over my lips with my fingers, his kiss still lingering on them. I liked the sound of that.

Once I’m dressed, I check on Rhea again and then move to the sitting room, grateful for the food and tea left there by the servants. Moving carefully, I carry the tray of food to the couch, setting it down on the table in front of it before slowly taking my seat. I manage a few bites before I rush to check on Rhea, sure I’ve heard her cry. But she sleeps peacefully, so I return to the sitting room and sit again, eager to eat a little more. The door to the space opens just as I pop a grape into my mouth. “How did it go?” I ask as I chew, turning to look over my shoulder just as the door closes.

But it isn’t Conrad who stares back at me.

“I hear she looks like you.”

“Dolian.” I use the armrest of the couch to push myself up again as I stare at Conrad’s younger brother. “What are you doing here?”

His lips quirk as he tilts his head and takes a step towards me, his hands clasped behind his back. “Can I not come to congratulate my queen on the birth of my niece?”

I stiffen at his use of the words my queen, the connotation undeniable.

“Of course you can,” I reply, moving to put myself between Dolian and the door that leads to Rhea. I can’t say why I do it—he has never hurt me beyond the use of words—and yet, as I stare into the same hazel eyes that Conrad has, I can’t read his intentions. All emotion is stricken from his face except for the air of superiority he wears like a mask. So different from the man I used to know. “I just thought you were with Conrad.”

At his brother’s name, Dolian frowns, and I fight back the urge to shout at him for it. It has been years since he and I were anything more than just friends, and even that was fleeting. Conrad may have been the catalyst for the termination of whatever relationship we could have had, but in the end, it was the right decision. Dolian and I were never compatible in the way I yearned for. In the way he deserved. “You don’t have to be with him.”

I rock back a step at the desperation in his voice, the eager way his eyes gleam as he stares at me. Panic tightens like a vice around my throat when he steps nearer, a hand reaching out to grab one of mine. “What do you mean?”

“I’ve figured out a way for us to be together. Free of Conrad’s rule.” Though his grip on me remains soft, it is unrelenting. At the look on my face, he steps close enough for his chest to brush against mine, his breath stirring the hairs along my temples.

“Stop,” I rasp, attempting to put space between us only for him to immediately fill it.

“Do you want me to beg, Luna? Is that what you need for me to prove myself to you?” He drops down onto his knees, his grip on my hand tightening as he looks up at me with pleading eyes. Behind me, I think I hear Rhea stir, but my heart beats so loudly in my ears that I can’t be sure. “We can still have everything we dreamed about. All those conversations about freedom and desire—it can all be ours.”

My heart clenches at the desperation in his tone, even as warning bells ring in my head. “Dolian, that was a different time. We were different. You and I can never be.”

“But we can. I know that what we had was short, but you are the only person who I’ve ever felt completely safe with. And I have had to watch for years as Conrad cocooned you away from everyone else just so he could have you!”

“Is that what you think?” I snap, tugging on his hand to get him to stand. He does, but he sticks close enough for me to see the faint freckles that dot his cheeks. “Conrad and I may have had a rough beginning, but I chose him.”

“No—”

“Yes!” I hiss, just as a fussy cry sounds through the open door. Inhaling a deep breath, I slowly release it through my nose. “I love Conrad. We have a daughter together and—”

“You love him?” he interrupts, the air growing thick. At my nod, a breath shudders from him, and finally the mask drops, revealing a flash of regret followed by one of unrelenting fury. “You could have been my queen,” he says raggedly, a hand diving into his hair as stares at me. “You could have been mine!” His shout reverberates, making Rhea cry louder as every instinct within me begs to go to her.

I retreat a step, bringing my hands out in front of me as I call on my magic for the first time in years. I feel it stir somewhere distantly, as if it has been placed behind a hundred locked doors. The tincture. I had taken it so I wouldn’t accidentally draw on my power while giving birth. Pain flares behind my ribs as my heart pounds, my mouth growing dry. And Dolian… he knows about my magic. About the curse I viewed it as. He sees the way I try to draw on it now, and I watch as he strengthens his defenses behind that building rage. And for the first time since I met him, I’m terrified by what I see.

“Guards!” I scream, and take another step back. “You would have them apprehend me? Simply for loving you?”

“This is not love. This is something else—something twisted.” Though my voice shakes, I keep my hands drawn out in front of me. “Go. Before Conrad returns. He will punish you for being here not as your brother but as your king.”

Dolian blinks, and then he’s impossible to read again, his steps sure as he marches towards me. “I’m afraid Conrad’s been relieved of those duties.”

My back hits the frame of the door, and I don’t give myself time to register what Dolian has said before I turn and sprint into the bedroom.

“Luna!” he shouts, his steps vibrating over the floor as he runs after me. The room feels too big, and each step is like trudging through honey, my body still recovering from birth. Dolian’s hand closes around my arm, and something sharp pierces my lower back, pain flaring and making me scream. I stumble into him as the pressure surrounding the pain releases, something wet and warm coating my back. Dolian’s hand tightens on my arm.

“What are you doing?” I ask, calling on my magic again only to have a hollow silence answer. Dolian flashes a knife in front of me, my blood coating it as my knees wobble beneath my weight. I try to tug out of his hold, my gaze shifting to Rhea, her small hands reaching above the edge of the cot, fingers curling open then closed as she cries.

“It didn’t have to be this way,” he growls, and a scream tears up my throat when he plunges the blade into my shoulder. Once, then twice. I collapse to the ground, blood already dripping down my arm as I begin to crawl.

Gods, do not harm her. Please, help me. I had never imagined what I might look like as a mother before becoming pregnant. My spirit was a wild one—one that called for adventure and freedom. Children had always been the symbol of a slower life, of surrendering to someone else’s schedule. But, as I stared into my daughter’s eyes after her birth, a knowing filled me. Being a mother could be whatever I defined it as. Whatever Rhea needed me to be. I would do anything to protect her. To make her happy. To see her live.

My head slams against the ground as Dolian flips me over, his knees bracketing my hips. Silver moonlight paints his face in a horrifying glow, my blood speckled over his skin like a macabre collection of new freckles.

“Don’t hurt her,” I wheeze between gurgled breaths, the taste of iron blooming over my tongue. “Rhea is—” He drives the blade down into my stomach. Protect her. Protect her. Protect her. My hands catch his wrists, his silhouette blurring as he bares his teeth at me.

“It didn’t have to be this way! You made this the only option!”

The ceiling above him spins, shadows swirling in from the edges of my vision, and still, I grip his wrists. I dig my nails into his flesh. If there are any gods listening, please help me. Dolian shakes free of my hold, my fingers and toes tingling as my arms fall lifelessly to my sides.

The darkness above grows, sweeping in as Dolian raises his hands again, the dagger glinting against the night stars behind him. “I love you, Luna, and because of that love, I will make this next part quick.” His scream echoes out as his arms begin to descend, Rhea’s cries drawing my head in her direction, a whisper of her name passing my lips. Protect her. In my ear, someone whispers, their voice deep and resonant as warmth presses at my chest and white light flares behind my lids.

Protect her. Protect her. Protect her.