Chapter 18

I stared after Starke’s rigid back as he rode ahead of me through the cold, wet rain like a man possessed. We were almost there. The closer we got to the village, the more rigid he sat. Like he was preparing himself for what he was about to find.

My own back screamed in agony from the three days of straight riding with barely time to stop to rest or eat. My hair was now plastered to my head, and my clothes so wet I could barely stay in my saddle since I was shivering so much. Yet I didn’t dare complain. None of us did. Accompanying Starke on this journey was our own choice. He hadn’t asked any of us. But there was no way in hell he was doing this without me.

He’d barely spoken more than two words since his guard had died in his arms. He stayed long enough to get the full story from the remaining survivors before packing a bag and grabbing his sword. I knew his decision was made; I didn’t need to ask. Just like he knew my decision was made when I saddled up a steed alongside him.

Athena had not been happy. She spoke the right words of sympathy. I heard the condolences sprouting from her mouth, but her eyes said it all. We didn’t have time for this. We had another elemental to find. I understood her side, even if I didn’t agree with it. We were running out of time. We needed to get to Larry before Asha did. But Starke needed me now and there was no way I was turning my back on him. It didn’t matter who needed me more. I needed to be with him when he found out the fate of his people.

Bishop and Kara had also aligned themselves to going with us, along with half a dozen of Baylor’s men. I appreciated their loyalty and Athena had agreed to their decision. She had, however, refused to allow Jill and Zoe to accompany us, no matter how much they insisted. I agreed with her on that one. It was bad enough we were putting ourselves in danger heading out into Asha territory. We didn’t need to stupidly hand over three elementals to her all at once. So we had left them behind with the promise that we would return soon. I really hoped we could live up to that promise.

The village appeared on the horizon as soon as we crested the ridge. Without magic warding it, it was in full glory for all to see. Or what was left of it. The smoke hovering like a cloud of doom over the high abbey told its own story.

The noxious wind assaulted us with its rancid breath, blowing the black clouds across the sky and following the river as they crept toward us. Clouds that reeked of smoke and death, coiling up from the still smoldering village. Not even the relentless rain had been enough to quell dragon fire.

I didn’t want to go any farther. I wanted to stop right there. Turn around. Go back and prevent Starke the heartache of what he was about to find. But I knew we couldn’t. He had to know. He wouldn’t rest until he saw with his own eyes what happened to his people. What happened to Shay, the only mother he loved.

He pulled his horse to a stop and just sat there, staring wordlessly at the village that lay below us. I drew alongside him. His face was tormented. He didn’t want to face this either. I reached out and gripped his hand.

“Hey, I’m right beside you. We can do this.”

He nodded before steeling himself once again. Shaking the reins, he started his descent down the ridge, the rest of us following behind.

My stomach tied in knots as we passed the sheep farm and took the road into the village. Our horse’s hooves thumping on the blackened, packed ground the only sound. No children laughing. No dogs barking or roosters crowing, not like my last visit here. This place was filled with the silence of death.

The houses that weren’t burnt to smoldering ruins, were warped and twisted, falling in on themselves. Carts and wagons burnt and withered, overturned in people’s mad dash to escape the chaos. Blackened fields that were once green and alive, spread as far as the eye could see.

But it wasn’t the devastation that made my blood run cold and grief claw at my throat. It was the bodies. The burnt, shriveled corpses fallen in the streets where they had been attacked. There were dozens upon dozens.

I tried to swallow the sob threatening to erupt as my mind registered the horror.

“May the gods have mercy on their souls,” Bishop whispered from behind me as Kara began mumbling her own quiet little prayer.

Starke slipped off his horse and stood for a moment, just surveying the destruction. The rest of us followed suit. I watched, holding back tears as he stopped at the bodies of a mother holding her baby girl. The woman’s entire back was charred, but the front holding the child was still recognizable. Her arms were wrapped around the little blonde head of curls, trying to protect the child right up until the last moment.

He dropped to his knees and just stared at the cold dead eyes peeking out from the mother’s spread fingers. My heart broke at the anguish etched in his face and the defeated slump of his shoulders. I always considered him strong. Indestructible. Now he just looked broken and I wasn’t sure if I could handle it. This defeated Starke was killing me. I approached him, trying not to retch from the smell, and reached out, laying my hand on his shoulder.

“Starke,” I said gently.

“I should have been here,” he whispered. “I should have been here to protect them.”

“This is not your fault, Starke,” I whispered. “The blame lies with Asha. Not you.”

“They are dead because of me, Jette.” He stared up at me with tortured eyes. “None of them would have been here if it wasn’t for me. I brought them here with the promise of safety. With the promise of a normal life and they followed me willingly. Yet I left them here unprotected. I failed them.”

“No,” I whispered at his back, but he was beyond hearing me. He stood and walked among the bodies, closing the eyes of those that still stared, even in death. Mumbling prayers. Saying goodbyes, I wasn’t quite sure what he was doing. I let him be. Whatever he was doing, he needed to do, and who was I to stop him.

Instead I forced myself to survey the horrific scene. Not all the dead were burnt. Some had died from other causes. Magic maybe? Some had sword wounds. People that had escaped death by morqual had died by other means. Asha’s army had left no one alive. Men, women, children, all had suffered the same fate. The anger and hatred toward the queen and her followers slowly began to replace the pain in my heart. How could she have done this? How could she have performed such atrocities against her own people? They were innocents. They posed no threat to her. How could someone be so inherently evil? I stopped looking. I couldn’t anymore. It hurt too much. I swallowed the lump in my throat and turned to Bish and Kara standing behind me. I swiped at the tears in my eyes with my sleeve.

“We can’t leave them like this,” I whispered brokenly. “It isn’t right. Some of them have already…”

I trailed off, pointing instead to the defilement brought on by scavengers.

Bishop nodded. “We will handle this, Jette girl. The guards and I will build pyres and send them to their final resting place. He needs you right now.”

He nodded toward Starke who was heading up the hill towards the abbey where he had lived with Shay. He was going to look for her. I didn’t want him to be alone when he found her. I hurried to catch up.

The shattered abbey doors that met us at the top of the rise told their own story. Someone had bolted them from the inside, trying to keep the invaders out. It hadn’t worked. Enough force had been applied to blow them off their hinges. Starke stepped slowly inside, his gaze swinging back and forth through the dark hallway. Streaks marred the floor, looking almost black in the low light but I didn’t need the room lit up to tell me what the streaks were. Blood carried a very distinct and unmistakable scent.

Without a word to each other we headed toward the kitchen. This room fared no better than the hallway entrance. More blood splatters stained the floor. Shattered furniture and dishes strewn about the room told the story of a battle being waged here. Shay had put up a fight, no doubt. It didn’t surprise me in the least.

Starke stared about the carnage of the room; his face lined with grief.

“We don’t know yet,” I tried to reassure him. “Shay is strong. You said so yourself. She is one of the most powerful Fae you know. She wouldn’t be taken down that easy.”

He gave a curt nod, but I knew I really hadn’t convinced him. The blood belonged to someone.

He closed his eyes and breathed deeply. I thought he was trying to control his grief, but the moment his eyes popped open I could tell something was different.

“Can you feel that?” he asked.

“What?”

“Focus, Jette,” he snapped, and I did just that. At first I felt nothing other than the sadness and grief radiating off of both of us. But just as I was about to give up, a slight shiver of electricity shimmered over my skin.

“Someone’s using magic,” I breathed. “Could it be Kara?”

“No. This is not coming from outside. It’s coming from below us. It is weak, but it is there. Someone is alive in the abbey and using magic.”

He whirled on his heel, about to bolt from the room.

“Starke, wait. What if it’s one of Asha’s people? What if they’re still here?”

He paused. “Noted.”

Pulling his sword, he exited back into the stone hallway, following the pulsing magic like a hound dog tracking a rabbit. I followed behind, yanking out my sai and walking on my tiptoes, trying to mute the squelching of my wet boots on the stone floor.

The lower we went in the abbey, the stronger the pulsing became. Almost as if whoever was emitting the magic was leading us straight to them. I fervently hoped, for Starke’s sake, it wasn’t a trap like my gut was telling me.

I half ran, half stumbled down the stairwell, one hand trailing along the mossy, stone wall to keep from slipping, the glow emanating from Starke’s sword our only source of light. Only when we hit the bottom and entered the gas lit maze of archways did I recognize where we were going. Shay had led me through here before when Starke had wanted to practice weapons defense. We were down in the underground springs.

It was eerily quiet down here. Too quiet. Like I swear I could hear every single droplet of water drip down the walls and every bug as it skittered across the floor. Maybe it was just my over heightened senses, but I kept glancing over my shoulder, expecting at any moment for the bad guys to pop out of hiding and yell, gotcha!

Within minutes I was lost. But Starke knew exactly where he was going. Surefooted, he led me down a series of halls to a cornered room, hidden from the hallway we were in. The doorway positioned around the corner and behind a column so if you didn’t know it was there, you would never see it. The room was dark. Much darker than the hall, but the moment we entered a wave of warm air hit my face, followed by the unmistakable copper odor. Whoever was in here was bleeding. A lot.

We stopped at the top of the stone stairs, the room below us hidden in darkness. A thick and syrupy darkness that was by no means natural. Someone was cloaking the room.

“Starke,” I whispered a warning in his ear.

“I know,” he muttered back.

A few mumbled words fell from his lips and the room below us exploded in a flash of pure light. Pretty much his dandelion light magic only enhanced a thousand times over. The array of light blossomed over the room, exposing the bodies littering the cavern and Shay standing in the middle of them, sword raised in protectiveness above her head.

Her eyes opened wide as recognition set in. The sword trembled in her hand and fell to her side. The side where a huge crimson stain covered her shirt from her breast to her hip.

“Prince Starke,” she cried in relief as she wobbled and fell to her knees.

“Shay!”

Starke flew down the stairs before I even had a chance to think about what was happening. Pulling myself together, I hurried after him. The people sitting and laying on the floor started coming to life. Murmuring and crying erupted at seeing their prince. The survivors were mostly women and children, with the odd farmer or guard sprinkled in. Maybe thirty or forty in all. Some were bandaged and covered in blood, but all wore the same look of shocked relief. I knew immediately that Shay had led them here, keeping them safe from the attackers outside, and using the last of her magic to keep them hidden and alive until help arrived.

Starke caught Shay as she stumbled and fell. He laid her down gently, pulling off his jacket and bunching it under her head. She didn’t look good. Her normally ruddy face was ashen. Sweat beaded her brow and there was so much blood. She was not in good shape.

“About time, boy,” she muttered at him, her smile tapering off to a grimace of pain.

“Shay hold on. I’m going to heal you.”

“No.” She grabbed his hand. “Don’t waste your precious magic on me. There are young’uns who need help.”

“I will help you all. Save your breath, woman,” he snarled at her, trying to get a look at her injury under her tattered shirt. She had lost a lot of blood. There shouldn’t have been the strength to do what she did, but she pushed his hand away with surprising force.

“You can’t help me, my boy. Asha wounded me with blood magic. You cannot save me, no matter how much you wish.”

“Then I will heal you with blood magic,” he growled and drew his blade, but she grabbed his hand once more, stilling the sword from making the cut.

“No. You cannot. To fight her blood magic will require too much of you, and we cannot allow what she wants to happen. You know that. Do not let her have her way.” She stared up into his face, her eyes shining bright with her intensity. “Promise me you will not let her win.”

“Shay.” Her name falling from his lips was filled with his grief and anger and sadness. But Shay only smiled at him as she cupped her bloody hand around his cheek.

“I am so glad I got to see you before—”

“Save your strength,” Starke hushed her, but she wasn’t taking any of that.

“Let me speak, boy,” she growled, but coughing interrupted as she struggled to breathe. Starke ran the back of his hand over her cheek. He was soothing her with magic. Easing her pain. I could feel it from where I stood.

“I’m so proud of you, Starke. My boy. My prince. My son. Promise me you won’t let her win.”

Starke could only nod as the tears finally fell, admitting his defeat.

“Promise.”

“I promise, old mother.”

She patted his cheek like that’s all she had been waiting to hear.

“Good. I’ve done what I could. Do not grieve me, for I get to see my Deanna again.” She smiled up at him as she sucked in little gasps of air. “Don’t you…dare give up.”

A long sigh escaped her as her hand began to fall, like she had no strength left. Starke caught her hand and held it lovingly as the light in her eyes faded away. And just like that it was over. One moment she was here, the next she was gone. Passed on to whatever was on the other side of that shadowed veil.

I’d barely known Shay. She hadn’t raised me from childhood. She hadn’t been with me, supporting me every step of the way, like she had Starke. Yet in the short time I’d known her, I knew she was a good person. Loyal. Caring. Loving. It angered me to see her taken for no reason. To witness the grief emanating from Starke. He loved this woman and his pain made my heart shatter into a million pieces. This was so wrong. I blinked back my own tears and glanced around. I didn’t know what to do. How to react. I had no experience at this.

Starke stared at her for a few moments in silence, like he couldn’t quite believe she was gone. Eventually, he kissed her palm and laid her hand lovingly by her side. Closing her eyes gently, he brushed her messy hair away from her forehead.

My throat hurt and I kept trying to swallow, but the tears had other ideas as they forced their way out.

“Starke,” I croaked as I reached for him. His back went rigid at the sound of his name and he stood to his feet. His face hardened as he stared around the room. There were still tear tracks running down both cheeks, but he didn’t even try to brush them away.

“I’m so sorry,” I began but he cut me off.

“Keep your condolences for another time, Jette,” he growled as he looked about the room. “We have a lot of work to do.”