AllFreeNovel
Share Us
The crowd doesn’t cheer. They don’t even respond… Not like ours when Kai and the Devil rode through our ranks. They were moved, and ready to fight for their home, even facing impossible odds. These people, these creatures, they don’t want to follow him anywhere. Asmo was right. They’re waiting for someone strong enough to put them out of their misery, and I am that someone.
“The Princess of Hell herself is here, ready to fight alongside us.”
Awww… You shouldn’t have.
He motions me closer, and I’d be a fool to not oblige. Only, I don’t move to his side. Enchanting my hand, I plunge it through his back. His words cut off as my fingers wrap around his beating heart, feeling the pulse of blood coursing through his body. I squeeze hard and rip it free.
The king spins around. Claws have shot forth from his fingertips as he attempts to slash me with them, but I’m quick with stepping back. Once his hand has cleared his swing, as I create a dagger and slice a large wound open across his throat… but I’ve misjudged my strength. His body sinks to the floor, sending his head wobbling across the floor until it stops at my feet.
For a moment I’m frozen in place with disbelief. How could it have been so easy? The heart in my hand beats still, glowing from the inside out, but everything else about his person is lifeless, cold and empty. His blood drips off the balcony edge, weaving through the bars and gasps and chatter sound from below. I grip his head by his mused hair, and step forward, careful to not trip on his body. Holding it up high, the crowd hushes at the face of their king.
Dropping his head off the balcony, it tumbles through the air right into the hellhound’s open mouth at the bottom, and he swallows it whole. The irony… The king adored his hellhound pets, plastering them on every royal crest, letting them make up his court. Though he somehow altered them to be able to shift into men, compared to those our reapers keep as pets, he treasured them. It would be fitting that he be swallowed up by one.
A true death for an immortal.
One I might be willing to give him had he not committed genocide to an entire race of shifters. Had he not sold his children off or planned to imprison my womb. He deserves to suffer and I’ll make sure he does.
Staring at the swirling crystals the king used to project his voice, I reach a shaky hand toward them, and a pulse of power crashes through me the moment my skin connects with it. “Your king is dead…” The sounds of the crowd blast through the air, filled with roars and cheers as his own people celebrate.
“I am Alice Whittaker and I’m here to bring peace to the seven realms, to unite our people with Hell Hold’s, so we might all coexist as allies instead of enemies. I know what it feels like to be cast out, to be feared for what you are and not what you’ve done. Someone reminded me of how similar we are…. We’re not monsters, merely creatures trying to survive in a world that would have us buried for breathing. I can’t promise you it tomorrow, but I can promise peace will come without the false reality of it made with enchanted shackles.”
Someone’s hand sets down gently on my shoulder, making me jump, but even as my heart speeds off, I know exactly who it is. Asmo. He steps forward, placing his hands on the crystal. “All hail The Crimson Queen.” He lifts my hand with the king’s beating heart into the air and the crowd roars so loud, my eardrums threaten to rupture.
Stepping away from the helm of the balcony, the crowd falls into a lull.
“This is a joke, right? The crimson queen?” He shakes his head, a soft smile pulling at his lips.
“I’d never joke about that. You killed the king, Alice. That’s your title.”
My eyes dart to the heart in my hand and back to him. “Really?!” Kai would have a fucking party with this.
“I’m not understanding the problem. Is this not what you wanted? You told me that you were going to kill the king, and in our culture, that would grant you the crown…” Asmo steps over the body, bending to look at it. “And kill him you did.”
“It’s not that. It’s the title. You might as well have labeled me the Queen of Hearts from Alice in Wonderland.”
He stands to his full height, bouncing his shoulders once. “If the shoe fits.”
“Not you too,” I scoff, rolling my eyes.
“Oh.. me too. It was my mother’s favorite story to read to me, and I’m sure Kai was read a mouthful of it as well.”
22
Alice
Asmo has locked off the stairwell, sealing it shut so no one can get in or out. As it turns out, not everyone is as enthused about the king perishing as the crowd outside. Most of his castle guards and the noblemen he’s let marry into the family are anything but.
“There. That should hold them off for a bit. At least until we figure out what we plan to do next.”
“Why is his heart still beating? Nothing else about him seems to be healing or showing any signs of life.”
Asmo comes to sit next to me on the couch, being sure to sit on the very opposite corner. “Your guess is as good as mine. Not many know how immortality works. Nor have many cared to find out. The only person who’s garnished answers at all is lying dead on the floor.” He points to the heart sitting on the small table next to me. Two small lumps have sprouted from its glowing surface. “I’d say he’s regenerating, though. Wouldn’t you?”
The lumps begin to grow slightly bigger and I push from my seat with a huff. “We need to find a box or an object I can spell.”
“What are you going to do? Slow time? You can’t hold that forever. He’ll regrow. We just need to build something to contain him before he does,” Asmo says, not bothering to move from the couch. In fact, he’s all but petting the fur surface.
“Lucifer has been keeping your mother in a glass coffin, spelling to be frozen in time for years. All I have to do is figure out how,” I say, shuffling through the large wooden desk and combing through shelves of objects.
