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“How did things go with the woman?” His voice is gruff and hardened by years, and his smile fades away as he waits for my answer.
I don’t want to disappoint him. Not because he’s my father. Not because I particularly care what he thinks. But because he’s my king and pleasing him is essential to staying alive. The need to prove myself worthy burns inside me, but I don’t have news that he wants to hear.
I sigh. “She won’t agree with our plan.” But I don’t look at him. I can’t. I don’t want to see the disappointment I know is bound to be there. It’s a hard thing to disappoint my king.
“She will. In time.” He’s confident. As a king, confidence is his birthright.
“Is this what happened with Shenra?” It isn’t that I care about her, the woman who was my first love. It’s that I want to know the details I’ve never been told. Knowledge, after all, is its own kind of power.
“Shenra was killed because she was unwilling to behave as a king’s wife. She was unwilling tobecomea king’s wife.” He’d forced her to become his wife anyway, so that is a moot point, and I don’t need the explanation, just an answer to what happened to her. I never saw her body once they told me she was dead. I suspected the body in the moot was hers, but suspecting and knowing are two different things.
All I know for certain is that when she failed to bring him the power he desired, the power he thought bonding with her would give him, he erased her. How he did that… I still don’t know.
I don’t point out that he took her from me because he’s my king and whatever he wants of mine is his by right and by rule. For some reason, I can’t even remember why I thought otherwise.
“If your woman can’t be controlled, she will need to be handled.” His tone leaves no room for argument reminding me that it doesn’t matter what happened to Shenra, just what happens from this point forward to lead to our victory.
“Yes.” The agreement is easy. Automatic, even. If she isn’t amenable to helping, to being an asset. She has no purpose and she will be destroyed.
And he won’t have to tell me twice.
NINE
Ann
After throwing myself a bit of a pity party, I went back to work trying to figure out how to escape. The first order of business was to get dressed. I found a variety of medieval-looking women’s dresses in a wardrobe and reluctantly pulled on the simplest dress, a sky-blue gown. Then, I drank a lot of water from a pitcher left beside my bed before finally taking a deep breath, readying myself.
My men are out there, still fighting our enemies, and they need me. They need me to get out of here and help them kick some ass, to keep them going when everything seems dark. To use my magic to defeat more enemies than their blades can handle.
So, every minute matters.
Besides, I know deep down Phantom can still be saved, even if he’d broken a part of my soul with our heartless sex, and in some ways over and over again since his father had plunged the moon shard into his heart. But what he is right now isn’t his fault, and I’ll never be able to save him if I stay trapped in here.
So, escape it is!
Unfortunately, the doors still locked and no matter how much shoulder I put into it; the damned thing isn’t opening. It’s thick wood, probably made of a couple thousand-year-old oak trees, if they even have trees like oak here. Maybe it’s some other weird kind of wood I’ve never heard of. Either way, it isn’t budging.
Giving up on it, I start to circle my room, trying to see if there are any tools I can use to help my escape. The ceiling is tall, at least twenty-feet, and the bed is large enough to sleep five men the size of Phantom, at least. Neither of which is helpful to me right now. On one wall there’s a wardrobe and a dressing table, uniquely styled furniture I’ve never seen the likes of, with carvings of the moon and a woman’s eyes. There’s also a fireplace, and two nightstands beside the bed.
Another doorway leads to an empty closet and nothing but darkness. While another doorway leads to a large bathroom, which appears to have modern plumbing, although I’m sure it’s different from the ones the humans and fae use. Not that I intend to rip up the plumbing.
At least not until I get truly desperate.
Nothing in the room is particularly helpful, so I go back to the window and stare out across the landscape, this time in less of a panic. I’m being logical. Trying to put together a puzzle of how I can escape, and this might be the answer.
Maybe.
All I can really tell about where they’re holding me is that I’m in a castle, with a massive gate surrounding it covered in torches, patrolled by shadow beasts, and that there’s a moat far beneath the balcony. The dark waters call to me, and I wonder how deep they are.Can I survive jumping into it?Suddenly, I remember that it’s the same moat where the Shadow King’s wife’s body was found after she jumped or was thrown.
Probably where they’re going to find my body, too.
A shiver rolls down my spine, even under the thick dress I’m wearing. Jumping into that moathasto be last resort. Because if it kills me, I’m no good to anyone. At least trapped in here I have a chance at getting out.
With a sigh, I look down at the moat again.Maybe I could knot the sheets and use them to climb down?But the distance is too much and I wouldn’t be anywhere close to halfway to the ground before I’d run out of “rope.” A jump like that would kill me. Even if I somehow managed to land in the moat and not on the spikes at its banks.
There has to be something I can do. An escape. This can’t be how my life ends.
Leaning further and further outside the window, to the point where I’m being stupid, I spot a window almost directly below mine. It’s still a far distance from where I am, butthatI might be able to reach with bedsheets.
