“After you two broke up, I wanted to seek Ansgar and continue the fight. If there is a moment in a male’s life when he is at his weakest, it’s when he’s been rejected by a mate. The cases are so rare, and your connection grew so strong that when he left your side, his energy dropped so low it took part of the forest with it. So I went to that cave he called a home and saw him. He was beaten, dry, small. So easy to kill. But instead of doing it, instead of cutting his head and being done with it,” he squeezed me tighter, predicting my reaction to the threat towards Ansgar’s life, ”I thought of you. How you must be feeling. So I came to find you. I had to know you were alright.”
“Just let me go,” I whispered but my tone sounded harsh enough to imply a demand.
“Not until you promise to calm down,” he breathed into me again, causing my neck to form unsolicited goosebumps.
“We are on a plane and there is nowhere for me to get rid of your presence, but one more second of you touching me will send me into shock. Take your disgusting hands off me!” I raised my voice, loud enough for the two women behind the curtain to hear and come rushing in to find me splayed on the floor in Rhylan’s arms. Only then he reluctantly released me, letting go of one wrist first and loosening the other just enough to be able to stop another attack.
Without looking at him, I rose and retook my seat.
“Is everything alright, Miss Anwen?” one of the women voiced.
“Yes, thank you, just a small misunderstanding,” I nodded and assured her that we still needed to be left alone.
During the short conversation, Rhylan had kept his distance and remained in the same spot as before, taking the time to brush away dust from his designer black pants and arrange his hair. He copied my movement and retook his seat in front of me, keeping his hands on his knees and away from my personal space. He looked shaken, as though I had hit him with a dagger instead of a demand. I kept silent and the fireling took it as a cue to continue speaking.
“The Cloutie root arrangement was a spur of the moment. I hadn’t expected him to make his mark visible in the district until the official ceremony, so I understood he had done it exclusively for you. And your eyes sparkled so brightly at the thought of seeing him. Knowing what happened between you two that night, I consider I even did you a favor. When you returned, the forest brimmed with light, the energy of the place vibrated so much that sooner or later, one of the other kingdoms would have come to investigate. So I took advantage. It was only right for me to be the one to harvest it, seeing how I played a part in its making. I’m not sure you are aware but Cloutie trees are sacred for the earthlings.”
“I know everything about them,” I spat. “I know how the goddess gave them to her people after her death and how they are used to heal wounds. I also know that damaging one is punishable by death.One home, one root, one death. Isn’t that the saying?” My rage threatened to burst out again, succumbing to the memories of what I had done, of how stupidly I behaved. “It can also be used as a curse if one damages the tree and passes it to another to use. An exchange method to claim life. I know it all, Rhylan, I’ve had a lot of time to trace back all my mistakes.”
“I didn’t expect him to accept the trade so easily,” he admitted.
“What happened by the river?” The question he tried to delay for the past two hours, forcing me to hear the story as he wanted me to. He had no escape from it now.
“I expected him to fight, to try to kill me and be free of the debt. But he was too concerned about you, about the repercussions it would have on your life if he were to fail. I asked him to surrender something else and have his life spared, an heirloom of their goddess. The fool chose death.” Rhylan raised a hand to stop my protest before I even had time to interject. “I repeat; he is not dead. But he chose to die rather than betray his kin. Out of compassion, for him, for you, I gave him another night. You were just two youths in love, behaving like the world is yours. I needed to give you another few hours of bliss before I took everything away from you.”
“That’s why he insisted for my dad to pick me up Sunday morning? He knew when he was going to die,” I released a breath and the realization with it.
“He thought he was going to die, yes. That is what I told him. That is what I claimed as an exchange,” Rhylan explained but I was done with this.
“HE DIED IN MY ARMS!” I shouted, barely keeping the urge to hit him again, to expel all that hate and anguish on him. I felt my heart palpitating so eagerly it almost reached my neck, sheer rage boiling the blood in my veins. The man responsible for Ansgar’s death stood right in front of me.
“He is not dead!” Rhylan repeated for what seemed like the millionth time that day, but I would not listen anymore. It was all a plan to torture me, going through the memories and giving me hope, only to make me relive it all again and take sick pleasure from my pain.
“He turned into a pile of leaves in my bed. I saw him release his last breath. How can you tell me he is not dead?” I demanded, wiping tears that blocked my vision of him away.
“Exactly,” he responded with unquenching calmness. “He turned into leaves. There is no body to leave behind because he transported that body along with him. The only thing he left was the connection to Evigt. I had to unbind the energy that kept him grounded to the district through his Keeper Oath,” he explained with patience, speaking slowly and clearly, guessing that I would need time to process the new information. As he spoke, a ray of hope bloomed into my soul at the thought that maybe, just maybe, I could see Ansgar again.
“Where is he now?” I immediately asked.
“He is in the Fire Kingdom, with King Drahden and Queen Shayeet. You will be able to visit soon,” Rhylan reassured.
“How soon?” I jumped from my seat, struggling to bottle up all the reborn feeling inside my chest.
“As soon as you give me what I want,” Rhylan purred, his hand leisurely reaching for another glass of champagne.
Chapter Four
There were many things I had to learn as a youth about the Fire Kingdom. I knew their origin, how the spirits first appeared, created by Belgarath, the first god. How they lived banished along with the deity under the surface of the earth when the goddesses united against him, fighting together for a free world of creation. I had to memorise the many wars the firelings had been involved in and knew about their mighty warriors, beasts that resurfaced and were reborn out of pain and torture.
I remembered what kind of attacks they presented the highest vulnerability towards and which kind of blades I had to use for their different species. My oratory tutor even insisted that I memorised the meaning of the few words of their native tongue that had escaped through history, should I ever be trapped in a situation where I needed to understand conversations.
But I never knew their rulers. None of us did. The only firelings we had ever encountered were the warriors they dispatched onto the surface, ready to attack and kill everyone standing in their way, fighting for their land’s liberation. For some reason, none of us expected them to have a life underneath there, to organise themselves and build great halls for their leaders to feast and command. Which is why I knew this information would not be permitted to escape their kingdom. Nor I along with it.
As soon as the great doors opened to receive my crouched self, all surrounding noise stopped abruptly, allowing the chains that clinked on my every forced step to make the necessary introductions. I tried to lift my shoulders as much as I could and push my neck back, forcing my eyes to accumulate more information. Through rippling locks of hair, I saw the tall walls, adorned with historical scenes, columns that sustained the high ceiling, filled with black wax candelabras and spotted the gathering crowd.
They did not look like the firelings I had encountered. They had women, young children even, wearing their finery, embellished with crystal jewellery and decorated with pure gold accessories. I never understood why they had to be so connected to gold, but the firelings worshipped the metal above all else. All credit to them, their pure gold daggers proved lethal, though highly difficult to handle.
Some of the children walked close to me, so unafraid, that my two keepers, Serpium and Crypto, had to shove them away from our path with their sword sheath, but the closer I got to the vantablack sculpted podium, the louder the commotion caused by my forced approach. I might have been the only outside-being most of them had seen throughout their lives and they seemed determined to come as close to me as they could to either poke me, spit at me or leave their mark in any other way.
