Made From Death (The Darkest Queens Series Book 1), page 4
Three doors opened. Three bodies fell.
The prisoners’ feet kicked underneath them as if they'd be able to find some sort of footing to hold them up. Their faces turned from red to purple to blue. Their eyes bulged from their heads. Sienna watched until life had fully drained from their bodies and she could feel the small relief their deaths gave her from the pressure of the magic that demanded it inside of her head.
Her guests had been wise not to make any noise, not to gasp as the doors had dropped open and the criminals had hung. No one shed a tear. No one called out. As soon as the queen smoothed her skirt and leaned forward on her throne, the citizens of Maipeg turned away from the criminals in the back who would remain as party décor. Everyone began their conversations again.
Ophelia finally slipped past the queen. She’d never had the stomach for death and often excused herself during times like these. Weak. That made the girl weak. However, since Sienna and she had been lifelong friends she excused the small imperfection. She watched as her friend glided across the floor seeking out the three men the court had deemed as worthy for their king.
To the queen’s surprise, Ophelia also stopped by the man that she herself had pointed out, Leo Maverick. Ophelia waved them forward and Maverick and his companion followed. Other propositions eyed these five with serious contemplation. It was no secret that any one of these five was more likely to get the crown than anyone else in the room. That just meant the others would have to work that much harder. Sienna tried to keep her face straight as they were lined up in front of her.
Which one? she wondered as she set her staff through the hole in her throne made specifically to hold it. Which one? That was the question.
"My Queen please let me introduce you to Mr. Jack McHaynes, Mr. Thomas Delroy, Mr. Lucian Dean, Mr. Leo Maverick, and his friend Mr. Hollis Weebly." Ophelia presented them with a sweeping gesture.
The group bent at the waist, all of them casting their eyes down except for the last. When Sienna made eye contact with him he cocked a brow and the corner of his lips twitched to the side in a failed attempt at hiding a smirk.
That right there was a good way to die.
"I will let you chat and I will be right over here," Ophelia said before stepping away quietly.
"It's so lovely to finally meet you." Lucian extended his hand, allowing the queen to set her fingers in his as he pressed a small kiss to her knuckles.
"What's lovely is the queen herself," Jack cut in, gently taking the queen’s hand from Lucian and brushing his mouth over her fingers.
Queen Sienna offered her hand to Thomas and the slight red color of his cheeks deepened into a darker blush.
"It's very nice to meet you again," Thomas said with a kiss.
Both Leo and Hollis stood there waiting. Hollis still looked amused while Leo bowed again.
"And it's nice to see both of you." Sienna left her hand hanging in front of Leo.
The man stared down at her for a moment longer than she would've liked before he too kissed her. When she pulled away from Leo, Hollis had already extended his hand and his dark gaze conveyed more of his humor.
Hollis took her hand in both of his and leaning down, he looked up catching her gaze, "Let's not pretend as if we've never met before," he answered with his now baritone voice that was much deeper than she remembered. The velvet of his lips touched her hand not once but twice. Before he righted himself he finally fully grinned.
Music played behind them without the vicious wail of sobbing criminals and Hollis didn't let her hand go before he asked. "Might I steal you for a minute? I would find it most pleasing to start this party off right with a dance with the queen.”
The air was thick with tension as soon as the words left his mouth and the others knew by the way the queen started to smile that she was keen to agree. Hollis eyed the four other men as he responded. "Don't worry, there will be other songs and more opportunities my friends."
Hollis’s hand in hers was warm, soft, and near nostalgic as she recalled all the times he’d touched her with those hands. The brush of his fingertips here, the playful tug of hair there, big sweeping hugs that swept her off her feet, and meaningless moments where he had grabbed her hand to pull her away that always made her blush. At least she’d always thought they were meaningless. But he was here…holding her hand again.
He led her away from the group and toward the dance floor where people crowded its edges waiting. All she could think about was the way she’d forgotten what it felt like to touch him. Settling her arm in his elbow, the scent of him felt almost like a new experience. Even through his suit jacket, she could feel the warmth of his body and a wild tingle chased up her arm into her chest where her heart gave a nervous pitter-patter.
People didn't make her nervous anymore and she almost choked when she realized what this feeling was. Good, bad, and deliciously dangerous, that’s what he made her feel. They broke free of the crowd and stepped with the beat of the music to the middle of the dance floor. She pulled her hand from his and they turned to face each other. Hollis's face remained relaxed except for the slightest uptick of a smile at the edge of his lips.
For a moment, she could see him as the boy he had once been. She could picture the dirt on his face and the fluffiness of his curls when his mom hadn’t had time to cut his hair for too long, and she could still see the mischievous twinkle. The same boy but he played those games much better as a man.
"I hate that you're pretending as if you don't know who I am." Hollis wrapped his arm around her waist, picking up one of her hands and pulling her close. He mocked a scowl.
Sienna swallowed her uncertainty. She was not the girl she once was and she wasn’t going to let him make her feel as though she was.
"Oh? You do look familiar." She smiled broadly at him.
He blinked once before they fell into the rhythm of the music and spun together while dancers joined them on the floor. Hollis carried their momentum, his hold growing tighter until she was flush against him and his breath caressed the side of her face.
"Oh, you wound me."
She chuckled under her breath. Far too often Hollis had been the one with the upper hand. He'd always been handsome and charming and caught the eye of any girl who happened to look up. He was smart, witty, and able to get himself out of any bit of trouble he found himself in. Sienna had been quiet, awkward, and went along with everything he did, always feeling as if she was the fool, always following him around like a lost puppy. Here they were in her castle where she had the power, and he was still somehow getting her in trouble. She glanced over his shoulder at the four other prospects who were favored that lingered by the throne.
In her head, she could already hear the bickering of her court. They were complaining about the disrespect of her action when she had walked away from them so quickly. But she didn't care what her court thought and with the sort of power she had, she knew she could get away with it.
"You've…changed." Hollis straightened, pulling his attention from the bodies that still swung in the room. His voice didn't give away if he thought she was cruel or if he was impressed.
"Yes, I'm a far cry from the girl on that farm. Are you scared?"
It was Hollis's turn to laugh and the rumble of it traveled through his shaking shoulders and into Sienna's very being. "Scared? Of you? Never."
The queen tried not to physically pull away from his blatant honesty. However, the sneer that spread across her face made it obvious that she didn't like his answer. Fear was how she ruled. Fear was how she held her power.
His grip tightened on her waist. "You are different." He cleared his throat before he started again. "The Sienna Havlock that I knew would have hated this. What happened to my little rule follower?"
She died, she whispered to herself. That woman she used to be, the child, had been lost when she lost her parents, when she fought the Fae, when she made her sacrifice to the gods.
"You never wanted me to follow the rules," she amended, enjoying the way the room seemed to fade when she stared up into his familiar eyes.
"I wanted you to be free." The brown hue of his gaze shone as if he could draw forth tears at any moment. An old concern. The reminder of some sort of regret. A weakness.
The beginning of a grin warmed the queen's face at this small reaction. Weaknesses could be used. Queen Sienna loved—
"HEY!" The booming voice of a guard broke through the music. Faces turned toward the interruption like flowers facing the sun. Movement blurred as two people bolted toward the exit of the room, shoving the crowd apart and knocking a glass of wine from the hand of a bystander. Glass shattered against the floor splattering red along the hem of several dresses and drawing forth more than a few unpleasant gasps.
"Unsanctioned magic!" the guard shouted as he stumbled after the criminals who headed for the servants’ entrance.
Fabric swirled around Sienna's ankles as she twisted to watch the disturbance. Hollis stepped up behind her, his muscular chest firmly lining up with her back, hands hovering near her waist.
Music continued in the background, the musicians unbothered by the commotion. As the door was flung open, a man barreled through it and a girl sent one last fleeting look at the guards who charged in her direction.
Queen Sienna Havlock met her gaze and swore she saw a ghost.
Ace
The feeling of the prickly brush jabbing her in the back still hadn't gone away even as Ace started up the rocky path to the queen’s castle. A cold front had come in from the east causing the long line of caterers, musicians, and other citizens coming to work for the queen to tug their cloaks a little tighter.
Excitement made the people jittery and preoccupied with their crafts as they waited to get into the staff’s quarters to begin preparing for the event. This made it easy for her to slip in line behind a cart stacked with trays of small cakes and pastries. She placed her hand on the back of the cart, saving the delicate desserts from falling over.
Sneaking by with the food seemed like an obvious choice for criminals but because it was so predictable, the guard never even considered it a real threat. They never caught on to the lax security and Ace took full advantage of that. This was the only way she could get in to see the queen; however, that wasn’t the reason she came so early. She needed the spell room where the books that held the magic were kept.
She came to steal. With her unnatural features, she knew there was no way for her to make it through this party unnoticed. The castle would be crawling with people, it already was. What she needed was to be someone else, or at least to look like someone else for a little while.
Her cloak matched those that waited to be let into the castle. They all wore similar clothing, black pants with a black shirt covered by the midnight blue cloaks. Blue was a common color for people in a position to be serving others. Like a particular shade of purple was a sign of the queens’ ownership. While the cloak Ace had stolen was fine enough to match theirs, the black clothing she wore underneath, if they looked closely, was faded and tattered. Nothing a spell book wouldn't fix.
Ace had tried to take in the castle from a distance. It was new—built within a month of the queens taking over for the Fae king. Tall towers stretched for the heavens, to the gods they could never reach. Stone was only broken up by small slit-like windows and a handful of large arching windows. Balconies jutted off of several windows to overlook the forest on one side and the view of the city on the other. All of it was a fancy show of magic that disgusted Ace. The stone was all still incredibly white which made it hard to look at when the sun was directly on it. It wasn’t the largest castle she’d seen but it was still a work of art nonetheless.
The cart behind them with all sorts of decorations packed into it was pulled by a man who remained busy trying to keep bits of ribbon and what looked like paper streamers from trailing out and tattering in the wind. A nervous flutter built up inside her stomach as the wagon rolled forward and stopped at the gate. The person in the front, the head baker who’d been invited to share his food for the event, talked quietly with a guard.
A second guardsman placed his hand on the hilt of the sword and strolled around the wagon. He took his time looking each person up and down before moving on to the next. He didn't speak but when he got to Ace she could tell at first he was already not approving of her. The rapid beat of her heart leapt into her throat.
When Ace felt like the guard looked at her for a moment too long, she noticed how his eyes glazed over as if he’d just remembered something incredibly important to him. Ace wasn’t the only person the gods could talk to and she got the distinct feeling they were whispering his thoughts into existence. He gave her a short nod and continued around the wagon.
She slowly let out her breath. The gods remained quiet, not speaking to her as they had promised in return for her appearance tonight, but she could still feel their presence, heavy around her like a fog. They were always watching.
Leather creaked as the driver gave a snap of the reins and the horses whinnied before the wagon lurched forward again. Ace kept her hand on the crates filled with desserts as they rocked back and forth keeping her attention pointed forward. Since returning to the land of the living she’d done many stupid and dangerous things, but this had to have been one of the riskiest to date. At the very least she knew it was god sanctioned.
It was easy to keep pace with the wagon as they moved slowly with the line of vehicles up to the entrance the staff could use. On the way, she could feel every rock she stepped on through the thin shoes she wore. She ground her teeth and when they reached the door she made sure the hood of her cloak was pulled forward enough to shadow her face, her glowing orange eyes, and her lightning white scar. Ace picked up a crate of what looked like cream filled donuts. The sweet smell rose to her nose and made her mouth water while she followed the other blue cloaked figures into the castle.
Stepping through the small, wooden door Ace was quickly greeted by the bustle of servants and staff moving from place to place. She found herself facing a long hall that diverted into several rooms. One of them had to be the kitchen because she could smell the meat that was being cooked. The way it mixed with the sweets in her arms made her crinkle her nose.
Following the person in front of her, she kept her head pointed down, entering a room connected to the kitchen. There was a door propped open where she could see someone busy cutting, dicing, and cooking away. Carefully she set the crate down and as the others left she turned in toward the kitchen. She’d taken her time before coming, preparing for this event as best as she could. Her preparations included sneaking into one of the guards’ keeps to get a good look at the blueprints of the castle. It was a surprise what could be heard when people thought you were a ghost.
Through the kitchen, there was another hallway that connected to where the warlocks worked and from there she had access to other parts of the castle, like the main dining hall where the party was being hosted.
Ace hesitated by the door, listening for a minute. The moment the main cook quit talking to himself and was called out of the room by another for assistance she moved into the kitchen. She took three steps toward the door on the left, ignoring the boiling water over the crackling fire, the towels draped across cabinet doors, the knives left out next to the chopped vegetables, and the food she had never been rich enough to eat.
A loin of cooked pork that had been thinly sliced sat still steaming. She cocked her head toward it, feeling her mouth water. With half a thought she reached for the food, taking a bite and tossing it in her mouth. The moment the meat touched her tongue it tasted like ash. No, not in the sense that she was eating something wrong or that she shouldn't have eaten it at all. No this was a feeling from the gods themselves, a warning to her. And had she not been so consumed with her thoughts maybe she would've noticed the warning sooner.
"May I help you?" a deep voice said behind her. "You do know that the punishment for thieves is to lose a hand, correct?"
Muscles tensed along her spine. Maybe the cook had never been talking to himself. Ace cleared her throat, keeping her back to the person talking. They couldn't see her face and they didn't need to.
"Oh? And are you going to turn me in for my small act of thievery?"
There was a brief pause for contemplation before he started again. "I should. It would be the right thing to do. And they would probably reward me greatly."
“So, you're not going to turn me in?"
He chuckled and the way he laughed reminded her of a warm spring day which wasn’t too hot, not too cold, and the sunshine was so bright you couldn't help but smile. "I didn't say that either."
"Well, is there anything I can do?” She didn’t know exactly what she could do but she knew this question would give her a greater sense of what sort of man she was dealing with and that could only further help her figure her way out of this now sticky situation.
There was a small whisper of fabric as the man moved from wherever he had been. She grimaced to herself.
“By law, I have to turn you in otherwise I am guilty by association."
“You aren’t guilty by association if no one knows that this even happened."
"You don't think the cook’s going to notice that you took the best piece of meat?" His voice lost all sense of humor and she could tell his patience was wearing thin.
A rule follower. That's the sort of man she had encountered. Sometimes that was a good thing but the times where they knew they’d caught a criminal, not so much.
"I—"
A hand gripped her shoulder, spinning her around. She reached a hand up to hold her hood against her hair but it did no use as hazel eyes met hers.
"You." The man bit out.
"You!” Ace sneered. Standing before her was not some random servant or just a friend of the cook. It was the man who had stopped her from getting the spell book she had needed the other day at the market! He hadn’t caught her once, he’d caught her twice now!
