AllFreeNovel
Share Us
“Why are the mists coming into the Kingdom of Light?”
I shook my head.
“You’ve done something,” Oberon growled into my face. Droplets of his spit landed on my chin, and I twisted away from him. “Stop it right now. Undo it. Take it back. Or I will kill every single person you love in this godforsaken world. I will rip their flesh from their bones and make you watch them scream.”
My heart pattering my ribs, I tried to pull myself away from him, but he gripped me by the arm and yanked me back. “I am your king. Answer me!” His voice boomed in the silent hall, filling my head with his rage-filled words.
“I don’t know,” I said. “I saw the mists coming across the bridge, but I don’t know how or why or who is doing it.”
“You know who is doing it. It’s that fucking Mist King, the one who stole you from me.”
Except it wasn’t. I’d seen the confusion on Kalen’s face when I’d brought it up. It wasn’t him. But I couldn’t explain that to Oberon without letting him in on my secret. I didn’t want him to know that I could communicate with Kalen. He’d find a way to use it against me. Or worse, stop me from ever dreaming of him again.
“If he’s the one doing it, I don’t know how, all right?” I said, hating the pleading sound of my voice. “Whatever he’s trying to do, I have nothing to do with it. I tried to kill him, remember?”
Oberon scowled, though he stopped shouting in my face. One good thing about the fae’s ability to smell mortal lies was that Oberon now knew I was telling the truth. He might not like it, but he couldn’t ignore what his senses told him.
With a hiss, he released his hold on my arm. “I find it difficult to believe that you have nothing to do with this. My barrier has never faltered. Not for a moment, for all these centuries. And yet it shows a weakness right whenyoureturn from your little adventure?”
I met his gaze. “I’ve done nothing to your barrier, King Oberon. I’m a mere mortal.”
He stiffened, and his eyes narrowed to slits. “I don’t know what you’re up to, but it stops here. Take off your shirt.”
I blinked. “What?”
“Take off your fucking shirt.” Oberon stalked toward me, grabbed the material, and ripped the tunic in half. He yanked off the rest of it and tossed it into the flames of the roaring hearth.
Swallowing, I covered myself. “What are you doing?”
“Punishing you. Turn around.” When I did nothing but shake my head, he grabbed my shoulders and shoved me around so that my back faced him. I realized what he planned to do a second too late. He roughly clutched me around the waist and shoved his thumbs against my old scars, the ones he’d given me six years before.
The ones that ached even now.
Pain ripped through me. I sucked in a gasp and bit down on my tongue so hard I tasted blood. Oberon laughed and released his grip. I sagged forward, my breath coming out in frantic gasps. Whatever he’d done to me all those years ago still followed me even now and—
“Lie down on the floor,” he ordered.
I stayed frozen with my feet rooted in place. Stars danced in my eyes.
“Do what I say, or one of them dies.”
Tears streamed down my cheeks. Memories of Nellie’s face flashed in my mind. Not as she was now, but as she’d been then, only seventeen and scared out of her mind. She’d waved that broom around, brown bristles against a clear blue sky. Oberon would have killed her that day if I hadn’t taken his punishment. And he’d kill her now too.
I shook as I lowered myself to my knees and flattened my body against the cool floor. The rough stone scraped against my cheek. I curved my fingers against it, clinging on as best as I could, but I’d find no soothing comfort here. Nothing but hard, rough stone.
The rustle of cloth soon filled my ears. Oberon was opening his little pouch again, the same one he’d had with him that day he’d made the cuts on my back. I didn’t know what he stored inside that thing, but whatever it was, it came from fire. Just like him.
“You think you can defy me,” he said, as he lowered himself to the floor and pinned me in place with his muscular legs. “But you still haven’t learned. You cannot kill me, Tessa Baran. You cannot stop me. And you certainly cannot overpower my magic. Whatever you think you’re doing, it ends now.”
He poured the salt on my scars, a drizzle of sand against my skin. Sudden agony seared through me and transformed my body into one gigantic bleeding wound. The pain was an endless, all-consuming torment that burned up my mind until all I could see was blinding crimson. The red bled into black as I lost consciousness.
Ten
Tessa
EIGHT YEARS AGO
Istared numbly at the swaying branches as I hunkered inside the small patch of woods just behind the village of Teine. There was a yawning chasm inside of me, and I didn’t know how long I’d spent sitting here cross-legged on the leaf-strewn ground. The past few days were nothing but a blurry shadow in the back of my mind.
