Knight's End: A Reverse Harem Fantasy (Tangled Crowns Book 3), page 27
As soon as I did, Lizza clapped her hands. A bright purple light sizzled around Avia and she sat up, gasping. My sister blinked and then reached for my hand. I let the knife clatter to the floor as I hugged Avia to me as hard as I could. I wanted to fuse our bones together, make it so no one could ever take her again. I crushed her into my shoulder as she sobbed.
“Am I healed?” she whispered.
I realized I didn’t know. I might not have been supposed to hug her at all. I might have been interrupting a second part of the spell. I turned to look at Lizza. “Is that it?”
Lizza was stuffing the decapitated lizard into her own mouth. She gave me a smile as she crunched one of the bones and slurped the tail into her mouth. “For this bit, yes.” She chewed a little more and then swallowed. Then she walked closer. Her weathered face was serious as she said, “But Avia has done serious injury to her body. You shouldn’t go around stabbing yourself, child.”
Avia blushed and I hugged her to me once more. My elder sister instincts kicked in. “She thought Ryan could heal her.”
Lizza rolled her black, undead eyes. One of them got stuck as she rolled, and she had to use her finger to shove it back into place. A horrid squelching sound accompanied that task. “Never expect a man to save you.”
Avia squeezed my hand as we watched Lizza right her eye. I knew exactly what she meant. She was gagging inside—just like me.
It only got worse when Lizza dug into her pouch for another lizard. This time she handed it to me. “It’ll strengthen you. You’ve lost a lot of blood.”
My body instantly recoiled. I pressed my lips together. “I think I’ll—”
Lizza waggled her fingers and made me freeze. Then she stuffed the lizard into my mouth. “Chew,” she commanded.
My teeth moved on her command. I tried to make my mind fly to another place as I chewed and swallowed the disgusting, crunchy, textured thing.
Avia merely giggled at my discomfort. But when the tables turned and she had to eat her own headless reptile, I stuck my tongue out at her.
When we’d all been thoroughly traumatized, I searched the room only to find there wasn’t a water jug so we could wash away the taste of lizard guts. Perhaps the mer creatures didn’t drink water since they breathed it all day. I sat back down on the bed and said to Lizza, “You sent my knights away because you said we needed to discuss feminine issues.”
“Well, now here’s the issue,” the undead hedgewitch plopped herself down on the mattress and looked at Avia. “You’ve damaged all the bits around your heart, Princess. They aren’t going to hold up very long.”
My hand reached for Avia’s and tightened around her fingers.
No. No. We hadn’t come this far and done this much for me to lose her. My breath grew shallow. “Isn’t there anything we can do?”
“Of course, there is. It’s why I sent those fools of yours away. The good news, Princess, is you can live without a heart in your body. The bad news is, you need to find a host trustworthy enough to keep it.”
I stood immediately. “I’ll do it.”
But silence met my declaration. Both Avia and Lizza just stared at me. I glanced back and forth between them. “What? I’m perfect.”
Lizza said, “You have a kingdom to run—”
Avia pulled her hand from mine and said,
“I don’t want to become a heartless monster—”
I sank back onto the bed. I felt like smacking something, or someone. I wrang my hands instead. “There has to be a solution.”
Lizza cleared her throat. “I can help with the monster bit. I’ve got some experimental spells I always wanted to try on Posey, but the stubborn old bloom has never given in—”
Avia looked up at her, bright lavender eyes unblinking as she studied the undead healer. “If I leave my heart in my chest …”
“You’ll end up in the ground or like me,” Lizza shot back instantly.
I tried to keep a neutral face, not to let my horror at that possible outcome flood my features. But everything inside me cringed. The thought of Avia becoming undead pinched some nerve inside me. It felt wrong.
I glanced over at my sister, who was handling the news with more grace than I would have.
“Then I don’t have much choice,” Avia responded. “I’ll have to find someone to …” her hand went to her chest.
I nodded. “Well, let’s get back to Evaness and we’ll figure it out.”
Lizza laughed, the scratchy sound echoing in the green glass room. “She can’t leave the sea!”
I looked around. The castle … it was a castle. But it was a stranger’s castle. That witch’s castle. The woman who’d kidnapped her. It wasn’t home.
“She can’t leave the sea, ever?”
Lizza shook her head. “Unless she has a powerful enchantment.”
“Disguise spell won’t work?”
“Disguise spells don’t change what you breathe,” Lizza retorted.
Avia looked stunned. “I have to stay like this?”
Lizza rolled her eyes. “I have to stay the most beautiful and powerful being under the sea? Try again. You won’t get any pity from me, Princess. You’re a queen down here now, you realize. With Mayi gone …”
Avia and I exchanged shocked glances. I’d known that the mer creatures considered themselves their own kingdom. I hadn’t realized they considered Mayi their queen.
“Now, why don’t you two sleep on things? We can talk about destiny in the morning.” She walked toward the door as she spoke.
I gathered Avia into a hug. Her eyes welled up. This was too much. I wished I had a shield and a freezing spell and a magical genius who could take all of this away from Avia and put it onto me instead.
My sister was only eighteen. She didn’t deserve this. Didn’t need this. Couldn’t handle this.
Sarding hell. I hugged her closer. I’d never felt more powerless. I opened my mouth and turned toward the undead hedgewitch, about to demand that she spend the night brainstorming solutions with me so that we could spare Avia.
But Lizza grabbed a bit of dirt from one of her pouches and tossed it toward us. Avia fell backward, eyes closed, sleep upon us both before I could say another word.
The next morning, everyone was feeling better and we gathered in the royal sitting room for breakfast, just outside Avia’s bedroom. Apparently, Lizza had found my knights and given them the same enchanted dirt sleep. Only, she’d let them fall over on Avia’s floor instead of having them climb into a bed somewhere first.
General Enderson joined us for breakfast, reporting that the castle was secure, the mer creatures seemed to accept Avia’s rule, that the gargoyles were running amok out front, stomping all over the place as siren men tossed sea stars for them to catch.
“I’ve also gathered up those who wish to get that peace you offered,” the general said after he slurped up some cooked seaweed. “The others will head home today. Except for Posey, of course.” Enderson nodded toward Avia. “Got a half-flower sprite in the ranks. She’d like to stay and help for a bit, she says. Says there’s a bit of half-sprite stuff that you need to know.”
Avia’s eyebrows lifted, but unlike me, she didn’t blurt out the first thing that came into her head. She smiled. “That sounds wonderful.”
Wonderful? What the sarding hell? I leaned forward to talk to her but then an entire group of people walked in. Blue arrived. Posey entered. Two giggling mermaids with pink tails served us a breakfast of clams on a table made out of the side of a shipwreck.
Blue came over and gave me a kiss on the forehead. Then pulled out a chair carved out of orange sea sponge and sat, saying, “Couldn’t find your spy.” He shoved aside a candelabra that somehow magically danced with flames as he grabbed a platter of clams and dragged it closer to himself. He ate ravenously.
My other knights immediately pelted me with questions. We hadn’t discussed the stranger in the aftermath of everything.
I set down my clam gently and thought, ignoring their words as Blue projected my request yesterday to the rest of them.
My mind felt heavy as I tried to think about it. Everything had happened so fast. Had I really seen someone? Or had I just imagined it? I tried to remember the man from yesterday, to pull up his image in my head. But I couldn’t. I sighed and set my hand on Blue’s. “I’m sorry. I think … maybe I …”
He put his hand over mine and leaned in. He kissed my cheek. “Don’t worry, Bloss. We were all at our wit’s end yesterday.”
When I turned back to the conversation at the table, Avia and Declan were having a heated debate.
“I will not use you or any of the knights. You all belong with Bloss. Besides, I’m eighteen. I’m not a child.” Avia glared at him.
“I’m not saying—”
Avia interrupted Declan and turned to me. “Weren’t you always saying I’d make a great queen?”
I hesitated, but seeing the fury color her cheeks, I quickly tried to appease her. “Well, yes.”
“Well, welcome to my realm.” She lifted her hands. “I’m stuck here—due to a shite need to breathe water—so I’ve decided, may as well rule the place.”
We all erupted into laughter.
But Avia stood. “I’m serious. I thought over what Lizza said. This is my birthright. I might not have known it before, but now I do.” Her wings fanned out behind her, gorgeous and translucent, with just streaks of orange and purple. Her scales glinted in the glowing lights. In that moment, she looked more than royal. She looked magical.
But she was my little sister. She hadn’t known until last night that she had any power at all. She hadn’t trained all her life. She had no idea what she was getting into.
“Avia,” I told her, “Trust me, you don’t want to be queen.”
My little sister narrowed her eyes. “Don’t tell me what to do, Bloss. If I want to be queen, I’ll be queen.”
And with that, my sister turned and fluttered her wings through the door, which she slammed shut behind her.
Declan cocked his head and looked at me over his bowl of crab legs. “Was that a teenage temper tantrum or was she serious?”
I stared at the slammed door. “I don’t know.”
Avia somehow convinced the guards to kick us out the following day. I don’t know how she got them wrapped around her winged fins so quickly. But she watched as they escorted us to the door. Posey and Lizza stood beside her, supporting her as she gave us the boot.
“Thank you kindly for visiting. But I have a kingdom to get in order. As do you.”
“We rescued you!” I protested, as the short dress the sea creatures had lent me floated up around my thighs. I shoved the lacy mess back down, irritated that I looked like I was in my underthings, irritated that my younger sister was trying to get rid of me.
“Yes, thank you. That rescue will be considered in the terms of our alliance.”
“Alliance?” She had to be kidding. I turned to exchange a ‘what-the-sard’ look with Connor.
“That look will also be noted,” my sister said dryly.
Behind her, Lizza and Posey cracked up.
“What is going on? Did you put some kind of spell on her?” I asked Lizza. Undead or not, I’d rend her limb from limb if she had meddled with Avia’s mind.
Lizza shot me a bland glance. “We simply told her we’d lend her our support for a bit.”
“And, suddenly, she thinks this makes her a queen?”
“Her heritage makes her a queen,” Posey countered. “Her mother ruled before her.”
I couldn’t help it. My hand smacked over my eyes. “Donaloo would sarding love this,” I muttered, as frustration boiled in my belly.
“Fine. Be a queen.” I snapped. She wanted to make a foolish decision? So be it. Ugh. I wanted to smack her.
“I don’t need your permission.”
I bit down on my temper long enough to ask an important question. Something my sister had clearly forgotten. Her heart. “What about that other—thing? The feminine matter?” I asked, my eyes flashing meaningfully toward Lizza.
“That other thing is now a confidential matter of national security,” Avia trotted out big words. Posey patted my sister on the back, and I had no question about who’d fed her those lines.
“Don’t do this,” I whispered. “Avia, I’m just here to help.”
Avia descended the stairs. She looked up at me, shorter in her new form. “I know. But you have a kingdom to run. You have your own life to live. And I’ve spent weeks in a stupid cave, making countless wishes and plans and promises for what I’d do with my life if I only got the chance. I have the chance. You gave it to me. I’ll be forever grateful for it. But I can’t waste it. And I need to start now. The thing doesn’t give me a lot of time.”
Then she’d hugged me. And my sister had whispered, “I’ll see you again,” before she leaned back. Something zoomed in front of my face, and suddenly my vision went black.
I screamed. The air in front of me tasted foul. Awful. Horrid. Had my own sister poisoned me?
But Avia laughed.
And then my knights started to laugh.
The black cloud cleared, and I saw a squid hovering next to Avia. Its nasty tentacles fluttered in the current. “That,” she smiled smugly at me, “is for the ink you put on my tiara.”
And my sister then sent me off with a face covered in squid ink.
Ungrateful chit.
Chapter Twenty-Six
I scrubbed my face clean with seawater as we marched away from the ocean palace. I should've been ecstatic. I should have been over the moon. Against all the odds, we'd beaten the sea witch. We ended a war that had threatened to sweep up every kingdom in Kenmare. Against all the odds, we rescued Avia. My sister was alive and well, though Declan and I agreed that she needed supervision.
I left Pony behind with instructions to guard her. Even crazy, Avia was my sister.
Right as we emerged from the water, on the shores I’d negotiated away from Rasle, a merman popped his handsome head out of the water. He pushed back his blond curls and said, “I have a message from Queen Avia. Once the queen has fully recovered, she will send Lizza to you. The witch has told her about your ‘castle mage problem.’”
“I don’t have a castle mage problem!” I’d groused, but he’d already dived back under the waves. I rolled my eyes. “None of them were my fault,” I muttered, turning to Connor.
My best friend stroked my arm and said, “I know, Bloss Boss.”
After that, I mounted up behind Connor on his gargoyle and my knights and I rode in silence. We rode on the ground, so that we could keep pace with the undead army. Slow, slow pace. But we were no longer headed to battle, so I should have been able to calm down.
I couldn’t. Something agitated me, and I couldn’t tell what.
Ryan flew off at one point, to check on the status of things with his soldiers. He came back three hours later, happy to report that Raj’s generals appeared to have dissolved into in-fighting, struggling to take his place.
“That’s made it easy for our troops to clear them out of Agatha's province. I’ve also heard most of Sedara’s ships are gone. It’ll take them years to rebuild, even with the elvish magic. So, they’re no longer masters of the sea. Looks like Isla and Raj and that sea witch got what they wanted in the end. Only we get to enjoy it.”
I’d nodded and smiled. Our enemies were gone. Threatening allies were weaker than they’d been before. Everything in the world was going my way. Yet, even after hours of riding, I felt like something was missing. I felt like something was off. I couldn’t put my finger on it.
I wrapped my arms around Connor’s waist as I wondered what it could be. My best friend slid his hand over mine but couldn’t lace our fingers together like he normally did. The damage to his shoulder had been so intense that even though he'd worked with Ryan multiple times on healing it—even though Lizza had tried to heal it—his arm was still not fully functional. He could only lift his left arm halfway, and he could no longer curl his hand into a full fist. My best friend never said anything, but when I asked Declan how he was feeling, my scholar had responded, "He tastes like exhaustion. Like porridge."
"Why does exhaustion taste like porridge?" I asked.
My scholar ran his hands through his blond hair and sighed. "Why does sarcasm taste like salt? I'm not sure, Peace."
Declan had exhaustion written over his face as well. All my knights did. So, I ended our conversation as my eyes scanned the horizon, searching for the hedgewitch lodge that was our destination.
We landed and dismounted
My eyes squinted. I rubbed them. I squinted again into the distance. I thought I saw something streak through the tall dead grass.
I turned to Blue, who rode a gargoyle on my right. "Did you see that?" Blue stared as I pointed and said, "It looks like the grass moved."
Blue’s eyes narrowed. I hear thoughts. I'll be right back. He was off like a shot, using his super speed.
Ryan steered his gargoyles to walk next to mine. "What's he doing?"
I shrugged. "I thought I saw something in the grass over there."
Ryan squinted. "Probably a deer or something."
"You're right. I'm probably just paranoid after all the fighting we've done."
But when the air rustled around our feet and Blue appeared in front of me, his hand gripping the collar of a ragged looking man, I couldn't help my intake of breath. My instincts had been right.
I stared down at the man, and his grey eyes pleaded with me as he met my gaze head on. Something flashed in my mind. Some sense of déjà vu. Familiarity. But it was gone as quickly as it had come.
"Who are you and what are you doing out here?" I questioned. My tone came out more harshly than I intended. I was on edge. This bit of land was mostly abandoned. Corinna had agreed to clear it of Rasle’s residents. And I didn't want anyone knowing about or going near those amulets.
I eyed the young man suspiciously. His ripped leather pants and the decorative cuffs on his torn white shirt hinted that he came from money. His leather boots screamed it, though they were also discolored and ragged. What had happened? Had the war displaced him? Whose side was he on? Even with the treaty, I didn't fully trust Rasle.
