Page 37 of Daughter of the Dark

Solana bit her tongue so hard she tasted blood. “This has nothing to do with me. Those children deserve peace. I can feel how badly they want it.” She placed a hand against his chest, hoping she could appeal to that small thread of concern and consideration she had seen before. “Let me give it to them. Nobody has to know.”

There was a moment where the lines of his jaw softened and the furrow between his brow smoothed. Where she thought he might agree. She looked into his eyes, imploring, begging him to say yes.

“This is the right thing,” he repeated, the conviction in his voice slightly less than before.

“Then why does it sound like you’re trying very hard to convince yourself of it?”

He brought up a hand to wrap around hers and then, ever so gently, pried it from his chest. Nothing else was said before he turned and strode back into the house.

But Solana had seen it. The hesitation. The doubt. She wasn’t the only one struggling with the confines of belief. She let out a breath and tilted her head to the sky, waiting as her eyes adjusted and the stars popped into existence. The events of the night played on a loop at the edges of her awareness.

There was power inside of her—a door had been opened, and walking through it felt like finally coming home. She only wondered where, exactly, home was.

CHAPTER FOURTEEN

That night, Solana dreamed she was bound in chains, kept deep beneath the castle with only her dagger as a companion. The hilt of it was burned into her flesh, had become one with her palm, so that everything she touched was torn to shreds until she plunged it into her own belly to finally be free.

Even after she woke, she kept a hand pressed against her stomach. She ate slowly, tasting nothing, and jumped when there was a knock at her door. Something had been knocked loose the night before, and now everything felt out of alignment.

A guard greeted her with a slight bow. “Master Solana,” he said, and Solana crossed her arms over her chest. “King Killian has demanded your presence in the training rooms.”

Solana poked her head past the door and glanced down the hall. There was no one else there. No glowering Reyes or optimistic Cora. The guard leaned back to allow her to look but cleared his throat after a moment. “He’s waiting,” he said tersely.

“Do I have time to change, or am I expected to show up in a nightdress?” She smiled when the guard’s pale cheeks flooded with color. “I’ll change, then.”

“I’ll wait here,” the guard reassured her. Solana rolled her eyes and slammed the door. Not knowing why she was needed or what to do besides obey, Solana threw on a set of training clothes she found folded at the bottom of the armoire and tied her wild hair back into a braid. She decided against shoes and padded to the door on bare feet.

The guard was exactly where she had left him, unblinking eyes on her the moment she opened the door. He turned without a word, and Solana, assuming she was meant to follow, swiped her dagger from the bedside table and shoved it into its sheath before jogging to catch up.

On her first day back in the castle, Cora had given her the grand tour, pointing out rooms and pieces of significance, and Solana had followed and nodded appropriately. Even if the library had been a second home, the training room the perfect hiding place, the kitchens her favorite spot. Seeing them as an adult had been like seeing them again for the first time. The magic had been lost, but it was replaced with a deep and mournful nostalgia that she would rather ignore.

The training room, however, could not be ignored. It was a large, circular space on the ground floor of the castle, with floor-to-ceiling windows that looked over the cliffs and the wild sea. The views were spectacular and incredibly familiar, as she had spent many days watching her father spar, but it was the mural painted across the ceiling that had always captivated her. It was an entire bird’s-eye view of Supay rendered in shades of blue and black and gray, from the smallest detail to the largest building. All of it like a faded memory, or a forgotten history, where colors bled and meaning was lost.

It was the first thing that caught her eye when she stepped into the room. The second thing was King Killian sitting in an ornate chair, his head resting on his ringed hand.

“She graces us with her presence at last,” he said playfully, but underneath the words was a sliver of irritation.

Beside the king stood an older man in black, one she had seen before but couldn’t name. His Masters badge matched the silver buttons along his coat, gray hair pulled away from his face and tied at his neck. He was a pillar of severity in comparison to the king, who looked past Solana to the guard at the entrance of the room and ordered, “Bring them in.”

Solana didn’t dare glance back and take her eyes off the men before her. When King Killian stood and strode forward, Solana had to tense her muscles to keep herself still. She knew that if she placed her hand on her dagger like she wanted to, the king would simply remove her hand. Or her arm. Or her head. She wasn’t keen to find out which.

“I hear you’ve been having some trouble adjusting.” Up close, his eyes were more blue than white but still light enough that they were uncanny, like the imitation of color was only for everyone else’s benefit. “That you have been questioning my methods of containment and your role in all of this.”

Fucking Reyes.

“Your Majesty, I—”

But the king cut her off with a raised hand. “It’s no matter. You have taken an oath, and all there is left to do is make certain you abide by it. I think you just need a small push.”

Behind her, the doors banged open, and this time, Solana whirled around, heart in her throat. Two guards entered the room with a muki stumbling between them, its head lolling from side to side with every step. They came to a stop on the far side of the room before the large training mat, where they tossed the muki and backed away.

“The purpose of this training is to ensure that you leave this room without any doubt or questions about your gift and what is expected of you.” He clasped his hands behind his back and strode to his chair. “Hakun will relieve you of your dagger, and then you will engage in hand-to-hand combat with the demon until you can subdue it easily and without hesitation, or are gravely injured.”

Solana pressed her lips together and glared at the king.

“Have you nothing to say?” he asked.

“Hardly seems like a fair fight if I’m unarmed…” She paused. “Your Majesty.”