The Midnight Kingdom, page 3
Fin swallowed. “What are you planning to do with me?”
“Finally, a good question.” The god walked around Fin’s chair, pulling on a chain. It yanked on the circles of dark stone at his wrists. “Are you wondering why I haven’t killed you like I killed your father?”
Fin paled. The chains rattled, but this time because he was trembling.
“It’s very simple. You have magic. He does not. You have Deia’s magic, and the Mardova was removed from the circle before the spell took effect. I need a replacement.”
“You wanted Angelica Mardova? Why?”
“Offerings. The more magic used, the more diverse the magic, the better the outcome.” The god tilted his head. “From what I saw earlier, your element is earth, is it not? Any secondary element? Tertiary?”
Fin did not answer. He was still ashen. He was still trembling.
The god waited. The god sighed.
“Being quiet now won’t help. I can be merciful. I have been merciful. I could have thrown you into the dungeon with the others, to rot in the dark.” A stretch of his mouth, the shine of teeth. “Did you know that without light, Vitaeans will die?”
Fin closed his eyes. He trembled harder.
A moment of silence. Another sigh.
Soft footfalls. Nikolas stared into a face that seemed to crush him without force. It was a contrasting mask of gentleness and cruelty, of familiarity and foreignness, wrong, wrong, wrong wrong wrong wrong—
“Nikolas,” the god crooned, and the spinning in his mind abruptly stopped. “Would you please hold out your arm?” Nikolas held out his left arm.
“What are you doing?” Fin demanded.
“I said I could be merciful,” the god explained as he lovingly rolled Nikolas’s sleeve up to his elbow. “You didn’t want that. So this is me, not being merciful.”
A steel blade in his hand. Nikolas watched impassively as its tip sliced his flesh, splitting skin, parting like a fruit rind broken with his thumb on summer days, juice rolling down his hand, a brilliant laugh at his side, the sun—
“Stop!” Fin fought against his chains, chair legs scraping against the rug. “Stop!”
The god paused. “Secondary element?”
Fin panted harshly. The liquid in his eyes had fallen to his cheeks. He stared at Nikolas’s arm and whispered, “Water. Not… not as strong as earth.”
“Good to know.” The god wiped the blade off on Fin’s shirt, crimson staining the light fabric. “This will help when adjusting the circle.”
Nikolas stared down at his arm, which he still held up, because he had not yet been told to put it down. Red seeped out and over, dribbling onto the rug. Some part of his body told him it was painful, stinging, aching. His blood was very bright. It dampened a piece of tangled string on his wrist, dripped off a small charm in the shape of a tree.
“Come, Nikolas,” the god ordered. “And lock the door behind you.”
For some reason his eyes met Fin’s. They were wide and wet, in the shape of a plea.
Nikolas closed and locked the door behind him.
IV
Angelica Mardova stood at the edge of a massive hole in the center of Nexus and thought about doors.
The hole was really more of a crater, a hollow cavity, as if a giant had dug a spoon deep into the city’s foundation and scooped out a chunk of earth along with the Bone Palace.
But this wasn’t the work of a giant. It was the result of a Conjuration circle that had engulfed the city, drenching the square and nearby buildings in otherworldly light until everything within its center—everyone within its center—had disappeared.
It had taken Angelica two days to wake up after Godsnight. Once her mother and Miko had made certain she was fine, they’d answered her questions.
The Bone Palace? Gone.
The king? Also gone, along with all his staff.
The other heirs?
Her mother and Miko had exchanged a look.
“Taesia Lastrider, Nikolas Cyr, and Risha Vakara are also missing. They’ve likely gone wherever the palace went.” Adela had swallowed, reaching up to touch her injured shoulder. “Dante Lastrider escaped the Gravespire.”
“How?”
“No one knows. The Lastriders are in hiding, but I’ve been in communication with Elena. She insists she doesn’t know where her son is.” The slight twist of Adela’s mouth showed what she thought of that.
“What kind of communication?”
“His Majesty is gone. Waren Cyr is dead. Someone needs to keep the city and this country stable.”
Which was how she’d come to learn that her mother and Rath Vakara were openly working together to sort out the aftermath of Godsnight. The Lastriders had all but dissolved, their public image ruined, so Elena could only assist them from the shadows. Often quite literally.
Angelica had asked her mother why she bothered working with the other Houses at all. The time was ripe for the Mardovas to step forward and claim Vaega as theirs.
“It’s not so simple.” Her mother had sighed. “The Cyrs and Lastriders may be done, but Elena knows the most about Vaega’s commerce and resources. We need her, whether we like it or not. And the Vakaras are still a strong and necessary presence in our kingdom. Not to mention they have the backing of Parithvi.”
“We’re descended from the god of this realm.”
“A god who’s been ignoring us.”
Angelica now curled her hands into fists and stared into the empty crater. Everything the Mardovas had worked for was nothing but an empty pit. She remembered standing on a stage and being filled with Deia’s might, the doors to her powers banging open with the god’s presence. Doors that Deia herself had constructed and then barred.
She had made Angelica her puppet, and she would do so again at the first opportunity.
Unless Angelica learned how to open the doors herself. Unless she learned how to better wield her powers, to maintain control in the face of its intensity.
But her violin was shattered—the instrument a gift from her father, who’d known how much the music meant to her. The one she’d attuned to fire in order to calm the elemental addiction that plagued her. She kept telling herself the sacrifice had been necessary, that Deia would have engulfed Risha in an inferno. Instead, Angelica had sung, the notes reaching for that intangible element just beyond her grasp. She had created something, a hazy portal, had been able to push Risha through it to…
She didn’t know. Maybe she’d ended up killing her after all.
Angelica pulled the hood of her fur-lined cloak down farther. Autumn was creeping toward winter, and the chapped skin of her hands stung in the cold. Somewhere nearby came the sound of muffled sobbing. The crater tended to draw citizens who were curious or mourning, and all along its rim were dozens of small offerings for the souls of those who had been taken: candles that quickly guttered out in the breeze, incense, fruits and small delicate cakes, prayers written on paper that ranged from creamy ivory to coarse ochre. As Angelica watched, a couple of urchins quickly ran toward a pile of fruit and grabbed as many as they could before someone noticed and chased them off.
Who are you even doing this for? she wanted to demand of the mourners. A king who didn’t care about you or your safety? The high commissioner’s killer?
But then she thought of Nikolas Cyr, who in his persistent kindness had always been a bright spot among the gentry, despite being the weakest heir. And when Angelica looked closer, it wasn’t just sorrow she saw in the citizens’ eyes, but terror.
Their ruler was gone. Half the Houses were gone. Something unspeakable had happened to their city.
What were they supposed to do now?
To her right, someone approached the lip. They were also shrouded in a cloak, head bent over the small offering they laid upon the broken, pitted cobblestone: a single bun dusted with cinnamon and sugar. The wind stirred the trim of their deep hood as they stared down at the crater.
“Angelica.”
For a wild moment she thought she heard Taesia’s voice.
Don’t you dare fucking haunt me.
The person raised their head, and Angelica’s panic washed away. Brailee Lastrider looked solemnly up at her with those unnerving Lastrider eyes, a shade of brown so dark they seemed black.
Angelica glanced around to make sure no one was watching them. “What do you want?”
“We want to talk.” Brailee stood. Though her brother and sister were too tall for their own good, Brailee was petite, much nearer to Angelica’s height.
“We?”
“Don’t pretend the Mardovas have completely shunned House Lastrider. Our mothers are working together.”
“If this is about reallocating resources—”
“It’s about Deia’s fulcrum.” Seeing the shock flit across Angelica’s face, Brailee dipped her chin. “Will you come or not?”
“I don’t like being manipulated, Lastrider,” Angelica groused, wrapping her cloak tight around her body as she followed Brailee down a narrow alleyway.
“This concerns you, too.” Brailee’s voice was similar to Taesia’s in pitch, but the tone was far softer, giving Angelica a feeling of wrongness. “I wouldn’t call that manipulating.”
Angelica took stock of their surroundings. They were in one of the outer districts, not the river quarter but close enough she could hear its faint murmuring. The Lastrider villa was currently being held by the city guard—now under a new high commissioner chosen by her mother and Rath—and Angelica had to admit she was curious about where the family had gone into hiding.
Brailee ended up leading her to a small two-story house sitting on a quiet, damp street. It was stained white with lime mortar, its wooden shutters closed against the chill. Or perhaps to prevent anyone outside from looking in.
“Did you kick out a family to squat here?” Angelica asked.
“A friend of my father’s is in the housing trade. This one was empty, and he’s allowing us to use it.”
“Isn’t that risky? He might give you up for a reward.”
Brailee shrugged and unlocked the door. “Nothing we do now is without risk.”
The inside of the house smelled like dust and something bitter, like tea that had been steeped too long. Everything was wooden in design, from the old floors to the timbers above their heads. The central floor revealed a small kitchen space and a scarred table. An open doorway led to a room in the back.
Brailee hung up her cloak and made for the back room. Angelica followed slowly, hand drifting to the thin knife tucked up her sleeve. The always-present urge within her made her fingertips flare hot, just on the brink of bursting into flame.
As soon as she crossed the threshold behind Brailee, they did just that.
Standing next to a threadbare armchair was someone the kingdom had labeled traitor, a man who should have been hanged, who had somehow managed to escape an unescapable prison.
The erstwhile Lastrider heir turned and locked eyes with Angelica. There was an ashen hue to his brown skin, his handsome face gaunter, leaner, making the sharp angles of his jaw all the more prominent. His black hair, which had always been well styled, had grown shaggy and unkempt during his imprisonment.
But the smile he directed at her was exactly as she remembered it. That charming, deceptive grin, setting off the dimples in his cheeks and the spark of cunning in his gaze.
“Angelica,” Dante greeted. “It’s been too long.”
The flames alighting her fingers spread down her hand. “Not long enough.” Angelica started forward only to have Brailee step between them.
“Stop. Please, Angelica, just listen. Dante didn’t kill Prelate Lezzaro. He was falsely accused.”
Taesia had told her as much, but it had been without evidence. And now that she knew Taesia had murdered Don Soler and Don Damari, she was even more convinced the older Lastrider siblings had been working toward something sinister.
“Fuck this,” she snarled, ready to turn back to the door. “I’m not going to talk to a—”
“Do not leave.”
Angelica froze. The words were in Dante’s low voice, but they had a strange, chiming quality that drove out all thought or incentive. Her mouth hung slack as Dante’s fathomless black irises flashed green.
She wasn’t sure where she was. What she had been doing.
“You will not tell anyone that you’ve seen me,” Dante said in that ringing, chiming voice.
Angelica’s body floated without motivation. For the first time in a long time, she was… calm. She nodded slowly, uncertain what she was agreeing to but peaceable enough that she didn’t care.
Brailee moved toward her brother, brow furrowed. “Dante. You said you wouldn’t.”
He sighed and raked a hand through his hair. “I’m sorry. I panicked.”
His voice and eyes were back to normal. Angelica blinked rapidly. “What was I…?”
“You were about to hear us out,” Dante said. “To learn the truth about Prelate Lezzaro and my aunt.”
“Your… aunt?” Angelica frowned. “Camilla Lorenzo? What about her?”
“You might as well sit down,” Brailee said. “I’ll make tea.”
“Let me get this straight,” Angelica said once Dante and Brailee were finished. They sat on the pitiful couch across from hers, Brailee’s hands held tightly in her lap. “Phos has taken control over Rian Cyr—who’s supposed to be dead—and he was the one who took the Bone Palace.”
Brailee nodded. “He summoned it to Noctus. We think that’s where Taesia and Nik have gone.”
Angelica turned to Dante. “And you’re saying that Camilla read Lezzaro’s grimoire, found out about Ostium and the fulcrums, and decided to summon a demon that would help her bring the Ostium fulcrum here.”
“That’s the heart of it.”
Angelica had read that very same grimoire, had learned about the missing fifth realm and how each god needed to be tethered to their world, and so had hidden the cores of themselves.
I would have taken of their flesh, but all I have left are remains, Deia had told her in the basilica, confirmation that the Bone Palace was constructed with the fifth god’s bones. And Phos, if he really had possessed Rian, knew it, too.
She touched the spot on her arm where Deia’s burning handprint had scarred her. Her mother had been trying to get her to return to the basilica, but Angelica refused.
Her god was no longer fit for her worship.
“I still don’t understand why Aunt Camilla wanted it so badly,” Dante murmured as he gazed into his mug of swampy-looking tea. “She’d never struck me as power hungry, but…”
“But with a god’s fulcrum, she would likely receive that god’s powers,” Brailee finished softly.
Angelica finally took a sip of tea to help the dryness of her mouth. She made a face, and Dante huffed.
“It’s not exactly what we’re used to either,” he said. “I miss my peach rooibos. And coffee.” He sighed, long-suffering, as if it weren’t his own fault he didn’t have access to such luxury anymore. Then again, after hearing what he’d been through—witnessing his aunt’s demon breaking Lezzaro’s neck, then the betrayal of Camilla incriminating him—perhaps it wasn’t. Fully.
Angelica glanced around the room, a far cry from the stately blacks and silvers of the Lastrider villa. “Where are your parents?”
“Helping yours.” Dante arched an eyebrow. “At least it’s easier getting around the city when you have control over the shadows.”
“Why even stay in the city if there’s a price on your head?”
“I don’t plan on staying.” Dante placed his mug on the low table between them. “That’s why we wanted to talk to you. We have no idea where our aunt is, but I’m sure she’s left Nexus.”
“You want to go after her?” According to him, Camilla Lorenzo still had possession of the grimoire. There was no telling what the woman could do with the perilous secrets it held.
“Partly. But also…” Dante exchanged another look with Brailee. “I have a feeling she’s going to go after the Vitae fulcrum next.”
Angelica set her mug down hard, splashing bitter tea over her knuckles. “What?”
“Her chance to get the Ostium fulcrum was only possible during Godsnight. What else can she do now but turn to what’s available?”
“Deia won’t allow it,” Angelica said flatly. “She still has plenty of control in this realm. She wouldn’t let a mortal get near enough to claim it.”
“But my aunt knows how to summon demons,” Dante countered. “And there could be other rituals in the grimoire we don’t know anything about.”
“We figured you would want to put a stop to it,” Brailee added. “Or at least help locate the fulcrum before she does.”
Angelica studied Dante. Everyone had always fawned over him, wanted to impress him, wanted to be him. Sometimes she thought she was the only one who could see that behind all his charm was someone overflowing with ambition and desperate to use it.
“You want the fulcrum for yourself,” she deduced.
Brailee opened her mouth to deny it, but Dante put a hand on her shoulder. “Not for the reason you think,” he said.
Brailee’s eyes widened. “Dante—”
“No, listen. Phos made the most of Godsnight by taking the Bone Palace. We can’t create those conditions again… unless we had access to a god’s full power.”
Angelica leaned back. “You—you want to use Deia’s fulcrum to open a rift in the barriers?”
“If possible.” His somber expression was just as unsettling as his smile. “We have to save Taesia.”
“I should have guessed.” Angelica stood and brushed out her skirts. “The other heirs are finally out of my way. Why should I save them?”
“It isn’t just about them,” Dante countered. “Vitae is withering. We’re heading toward extinction. We need to get the barriers open.”
