Читать книгу Dark Prince's Desire - Jessa Slade - Страница 7

Chapter One

Arazael—known as Raze the Ruiner to the rightfully wary inhabitants of the phaedrealii, the court of the magical phae—braced his back against the cold marble wall, staring at the iron door in front of him.

“It is over at last,” he murmured. “After all the battles we survived together, I am done.” As he sank wearily to his haunches, the athame belted at his side clacked against the floor. The pristine white stone made the black iron even darker.

Raze was close enough that the cold-wrought metal bit at him, though he was not technically on the barricaded side and could have dragged his sorry ass down the corridor to escape the painful burn. In the sunlit realm, iron had given way to steel as the humans forgot the vicious wars that had decimated the phae. But here in the Queen’s dungeon, the torture of black iron was never forgotten.

He was the thrice-damned bastard who made sure of that.

A vein of darkness stained the white marble floor in a rough circle around the iron: the remnant of a ruined gateway that had once connected the phaedrealii to the human world. Two phae had escaped the court through that portal and now lived in the sunlight, their rebellion feeding a troubling restlessness in the court.

A rebellion that had to be crushed.

As if in answer to his thoughts, a crack appeared in the marble and traced the circular vestige of the portal, spreading in both directions, seeking an out. But the fissure found only itself as it reached the opposite side of the ring. Frost flowers bloomed in the wake. The delicate silvery tendrils of ice sparkled with poison salt.

“There is no out,” Raze said to the black iron. As if either of them needed the reminder.

The frost curdled, streaking the marble with improbable drops of crimson as it melted.

Averting his gaze from the iron and its caged fury, Raze drew his athame. The geas symbols carved into the steel refracted the flitting lights of the few will-o’-the-wisps who had followed him this far. He stripped off his gray gloves and pushed back his gray sleeve to bare his muscled forearm, revealing more geasa carved into his skin.

A few of the wounds were still raw. It had taken even longer than he’d feared and it was almost too late, but he’d finally marked every portal in the phaedrealii where the dangers of the sunlit realm might seep in—and where the even more dangerous phae might sneak out. His long-wrought spell needed only one last element: him.

“I’m sorry, my King. There was—there is no other way to save the phae.”

As the pool of blood and saltwater tears seeped toward him, he set the blade against the tangle of geasa scarred into his wrist.

* * *

Yelena Morozova counted the empty shot glasses in front of her. There were a lot. Or she was seeing double. Either was a bad sign since for all the best, fiery efforts of the high-powered home-distilled whiskey, she still felt the cold knot deep inside her. Maybe another shot. Or seven...

“Party’s over.” A hand reached over her shoulder to pluck up the bottle.

She whirled to set her back against the bar, her pulse pounding.

Beck straightened slowly, his palm held out in an appeasing gesture. “Sorry. Too fast.”

Behind him, Merrilee bustled past the pool table with a tub of rattling tall boys. “Silly Alpha, you should know better.”

Yelena let out a hitching breath. When she’d emailed Beck Villanova to see how he was recovering from his injuries, he’d talked about the peace he’d found back in his small Eastern Oregon hometown with his new girlfriend. He’d lured Yelena with the promise of long winter nights, much like her motherland, where she might find her idealistic dreams again. She’d gone, hoping he’d be right, knowing he wasn’t.

Instead, for the past week, she’d imbibed too much at Beck’s Sun-Down Tavern—as an NGO volunteer, she’d learned to drink army boys like him under the table—then spent the rest of her sleepless hours wandering around the chilled forest, the November wind nipping at her skin.

But no matter how much skin she exposed, no matter how the cold chomped down, still the verita luna—the Second Truth that was her wereling heritage—evaded her.

She’d been at the same hospital where they’d brought Beck with the wounds that had ended his military days, but she’d known even then his injuries weren’t as bad as hers. Shredded muscle and broken bones would heal, especially for a strong Alpha wolf like Beck, but her damage, though unseen, went deeper.

That cold at her heart sapped even a hint of hope. “If I fall to the il-luna, you’ll stop me.” She didn’t make it a question.

The wolf werelings glanced at each other, the bond between them like a silent song. Their merged strength soothed the jagged edges of her anxiety for a moment; together, they would be enough to end her.

But Beck shook his shaggy head. Though his hair had grown out of its regulation oorah high-and-tight, his jaw was set with the same obstinacy she remembered from grueling days of PT. “Don’t borrow trouble. You’ll find your way to the verita luna.”

When she growled low in her throat and he rumbled back, Merrilee touched his hand to quiet him, her blue eyes half-lidded. “Whatever happens, Yelena, we’ll be here. This is our home and we won’t let anything threaten that.”

Yelena nodded, grateful for the rock steadiness in the other Alpha’s stare. A woman who had brought a wolf to heel—sort of, since he was willing, anyway—was a woman to respect.

A pang of longing for the wolves’ closeness, even in their disagreement, shook Yelena more than she cared to admit. She’d never gotten around to seeking a mate, being too focused on “more important” things.

Some had thought teaching at a girls’ school on the edge of Helmand Province was asking for trouble, but she’d armed herself with grand dreams. She’d hoped to prove a fractured country might be put back together so maybe she could give her family hope to overcome their own difficulties.

She’d gone to Afghanistan to change the world.

Now she couldn’t even change herself.

She pushed away from the bar, relieved her feet stayed under her. “I need some fresh air.”

“Don’t go too far.” Sliding the tub of empty beer cans across the oak, Merrilee reached out as if to pat Yelena’s shoulder.

Yelena sidled away. The coldness inside felt too brittle to bear even the lightest touch.

Under a full moon, with fresh snow on the dark trees, the whole world seemed to have turned to black and white: beautiful but dead. At least the cold darkness kept everyone else away from her. Going so long without the verita luna left her vulnerable to lapses of judgment and loss of self-control. Those whiskeys weren’t helping matters either, but the effects of alcohol wore off eventually while the consequence of failing to change would only worsen.

She didn’t mean to wander, but numb as she was, she didn’t even notice the passage of time until her boots crunched through the snow to the edge of a high mountain lake. Ice rimmed the still, inky water, slowly freezing inward.

She knew too well how that felt.

If only she could sleep. To sleep, perchance to dream. She hadn’t taught Hamlet to her students. Her half-sisters had been underwhelmed by Ophelia’s convenient madness, and she doubted the Afghan girls needed schooling in patriarchal oppression. So she’d focused on Shakespeare’s comedies instead, letting the language and the laughs form a bond with the girls. But in the end, tragedy had found them anyway, and now...

Like the mad Dane, she could see no way out. She was trapped, broken and plagued by nightmares when her only goal had been to set others—those Afghan girls and her troubled sisters—free in a world where their hopeful dreams might come true.

Her eyes burned with the cold and whiskey and sleepless nights as she edged down to the waterside. Past the frozen rim, the full moon blazed a white hole in the open center of the lake like a pathway to some other realm. If she thought for a second she might find her lost other half there, she’d willingly brave the water’s icy kiss.

“What dreams may come,” she muttered as she started to turn away.

Despite the stillness of the night, a ripple made the reflected moon dance. Before the wave subsided, a wash of crimson turned the white orb to blood.

Startled, Yelena glanced up at the moon—pristine-white, as always—and the sudden unbalancing made her boots skid.

She windmilled her arms but found nothing to hold onto. Her ass hit the snow hard enough to jolt a curse from her, then she was sliding. The icy rim at the shore shattered, and the shock of the lake water was as sharp as a knife. She drew a breath to shout—but darkness closed over her head.