Page 54 of She Who Holds My Wrath

“My apologies,” I say after my third sip. “I’m just… on edge. My first time realm-travelling without my husband.” The word catches in my throat. Husband.

Kaelith nods once, his gaze softening briefly. “Understandable. Tell me, how did you get here?”

“We travelled by my shadows,” Maelkar cuts in smoothly. “She really doesn’t do well with realm travel.” He smirks, taking a sip of his own drink.

Silence fills the room for a moment, Kaelith’s eyes narrowing as they dart between us. I’m not fully sure why Maelkar didn’t tell him the truth, but I decide to play along with it anyway.

“Yeah,” I say quickly, keeping my eyes on the swirling wine to avoid any eye contact. I’m really not a convincing liar. “It sucks. Especially in his shadows. It’s creepy.”

“Anyway, Duskwalker,” Maelkar continues, quickly moving the attention away from me. “Enough of the small talk. You claim your realm was attacked, yet I see no evidence. Especially not in the way you hold yourself. You hardly look distressed.” I shoot him a look, but let him take the lead as he leans back in his chair with an accusatory grin.

Kaelith snaps his fingers and the VeliNypmh steps forwards. He sets his glass on the tray and dabs his mouth with a napkin, tossing it back down carelessly. I watch as she walks away, and I swear she almost glitches as she moves. I blink rapidly, and it’s gone. Her movement’s back to normal.

“Yes, the attacks,” Kaelith says breezily, drawing my attention back to him. “It happened to the southern lower wing of my palace. Come, I’ll show you.”

He rises, gesturing for us to follow. The VeliNymph takes our glasses from us, and I notice her eyes look filled with something akin to sorrow. I stand, stumbling a little bit as I do. Maelkar catches my elbow to steady me.

“You okay?” he murmurs. I nod, giving him a small smile as I blink against the haze gathering in my head. Shadow travel, I tell myself. Still adjusting.

“We’ll take the servant passageways,” Kaelith calls. “Much quicker.”

My head seems almost fuzzy as we follow Kaelith down the narrow passageways, but I brush it aside. I force myself to focus on the back of Kaelith’s head, his long star-dusted onyx hair swishing softly from side to side as he leads us deeper into his palace.

After several minutes of walking, I notice Maelkar’s shadows trailing around my ankles. I glance back at him. “You good?”

“Feel… off,” he mutters, frowning as his shadows writhe erratically. “Small spaces.”

“Just a little further,” Kaelith calls from ahead.

The longer we walk, the worse I feel. My limbs feel syrup-thick. This can’t be right. Surely the shadow travel isn’t causing this much effect on me. Even when I realm travelled with Korithax, the disorientation never lingered. I turn again to glance at Maelkar, and notice a sheen to his deep dark skin, the sweat making him look like wet obsidian. His eyes lock with mine, and I notice even his usual bright violet eyes look like they have a cast over them.

“Something’s wrong,” I whisper.

I suddenly halt, and Maelkar grabs onto my hand. The passageway isn’t wide enough for us to stand side by side, which makes me feel even more uncomfortable. “I feel wrong,” I breathe. Did I just slur? “Maelkar… I think we’ve been drugged.”

I hear Kaelith chuckle behind me, a low, satisfied sound, the sound skating across my spine. My stomach twists as I turn, the movement slower than it should be, as though the air has thickened around me. The passageway tilts. It’s not violent enough to send me falling. Just a subtle, sickening shift, like the ground has decided to breathe beneath my feet. My pulse stutters, then races, each beat echoing too loudly in my ears. The minimal light of the passage smears at the edges, halos forming around the flickering lanterns.

Kaelith comes into view. He’s grinning. Not the smooth, charming smile he usually wears for diplomacy. This one is all teeth—sharp, hungry, predatory. A wolf who knows the trap has already sprung.

“You would be correct, Hell’s Whore.” The words land sluggishly, like they have to push through water to reach me.

Heat floods my face, but the rest of my body feels strangely distant, numb at the edges. My fingers twitch uselessly at my sides, refusing to obey the sharp command my mind sends them. My tongue feels thick. My throat dry. Even breathing takes effort, each inhale shallow and unsatisfying, as though the air has been thinned. A faint metallic taste coats the back of my mouth. The drug.

Panic detonates in my chest. But not because of my current situation. The memory slams into me with brutal clarity. A drink pressed into my hand. A bitter aftertaste. The slow, creeping loss of control. Ethan’s voice, soft and coaxing while my limbs turned to lead. The helplessness. The terror of being trapped inside my own body while someone else decided what happened next. My pulse spikes so hard it hurts.

Not again. Not like this. Please. No. My breathing turns ragged, bordering on hyperventilation, but it doesn’t help. The air still won’t fill my lungs properly. My vision tunnels, black creeping in at the edges as my body betrays me all over again. I try to force my hands to summon even a spark of flame, anything, but even my magic feels muffled too.

The world continues to blur, Kaelith’s outline sharpening and softening in dizzying waves as he watches me panic, delight gleaming in his eyes. He steps towards me, and Maelkar wraps his arm around my torso, trying to pull me behind him, but it’s no use. The passageway isn’t wide enough to manoeuvre me around him.

“Just a pinch of Dream-root in your drink,” Kaelith purrs.

I blink sluggishly, my words slurring. “But… you drank it too.”

He laughs. “The napkin. It held the antidote. I knew you wouldn’t trust me.” His grin widens viciously. “You’re a clever little thing, Daisy. But not clever enough.”

He takes another step towards me, and I can feel my heart thundering beneath my ribs. “Soon, you’ll succumb to its effects, and when you wake, I’ll tell you all about how you’ve been played.”

The world suddenly tilts, colours bleeding together. My body is no longer mine. The last thing I see is Maelkar’s shadow reaching for me before the world folds into black.