Chapter 59
Azriel
The throne room rooks of fae bloed and broken glamour. Tean’t even put into words how proud Lam of Eden for seeing her shatter it like glass. She hasn’t had much training and just discovered she is a fox, but she is already proving herself to be powerful. The downside is that my sister is even more
determined to eat her new.
1k my chin to look at Mars while kneeling, my body shaking from exhaustion. Opening a portal and fighting Marn when she knows my true name.. didn’t think I had it in me. I guess the mate bond is stronger than Mara’s hold of me. The knife falls from my hand with a dull clatter, and I barely notice the pain erupting in my spine.
Because my mate got away.
For a single, infinite second, Lallow myself a thought that doesn’t belong to this nightmare–Eden is safe,
I don’t know where she’s gone. I don’t know if she’ll survive the winter beyond the portal I opened to Swedish Lapland. But she is not here. Not sitting
under Mara’s thumb. And that’s all that matters.
If 1 had to die to ensure her freedom, I would’ve done it ten times over. Eden is everything to me, and a little smirk curts my lips when Mara’s eyes touch
my hot.
“You think you’ve won, brother?” she asks.
I don’t answer her. I just keep the smirk on my lips to infuriate her oven more, Mara being angry with me will buy Eden more time to hide before Mara herself decides to visit the mortal realm.
“I’ve heard about the mate bond,”
1,” Mara continues, walking around me with a thoughtful expression. “Didn’t think it would prove to be strong enough to make you able to fight the pull of me knowing your true name. That’s troubling news for me, brother, I can’t have you so…clear in the head.”
She comes to a stop behind me. “Bring him to the basement. It’s time to break whatever little sanity he has left.”
I might be of royal blood and the strongest high–fae in the entire magical realm, yet no one hesitates. They know I can’t fight Mara when she knows my true name. So four guards approach me, their steps cautious despite my collapse. I raise my head in their direction, Snarl. My magic flickers, but it’s cracked and unstable, twisting inward like it’s trying to rip me apart. The price of resisting my true name.
I try to fight it, but the chains of command wrap around my ribs, my spine, my will when Mara whispers my name into the winds again.
It drags me downward, making it easy for the guards to chain me and drag me through corridors lit with blue flame–the color of Mara’s magic. The deeper we go, the more twisted the air becomes and the bluer the light becomes. Mara is the strongest here, and once we’re in the basement, my heart almost wrenches its way out of my body.
This is where Mara brought Rhinoa when he refused to bow down and be her pet. He wanted us siblings to remain equal, at least when we hung out, but Mara was already corrupted and hungry for power.
So she ate him. Tore off his wings and munched on his flesh while making me watch so that I would know my place.
My feet skid against stone as we walk down into the dungeon underneath the Nightmare Court. A cathedral carved into the bones of the world. A place made for suffering
They toss me to the floor.
I land hard, blood dripping from my mouth. I look up just as Mara enters.
Barefoot. Smiling.
She holds a nail in one hand, and a long in spike in the other
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Chapter 59
My voice is hoarse, yet I force out words. “Are you going to kill me, Maiat Like you khied thinos? Will you eat my flesh and steal my powers”
She stops, that twisted smile never faltering. “No. I needed Rhinoa’s powers to grow strong and while you’re certaintly stronger than him, your magic is.. harder to use. So you… I’d rather keep”
She crouches in front of me Violet eyes burning when she grasps my chin with her long fingers. “You were supposed to be my pet, Ariel. My strongest warrior and spy, but you betrayed me. You chose that fea over your own blood. Over your Court, Over me.”
“She’s more than you’ll ever be,” Trasp.
Her smile deepens. “And now you’ll pay”
She lifts my hand to the wall and drives the nail straight through my palin. The pain is instant. Radiant. Like fire licking bone. I jolt, but her magic pins me to the wall. I can’t even flinch properly. I only scream.
Then she does the other hand.
My foot.
My neck.
I’m crucified to the wall, blood running in rivulets down to the cold stone floor.
Still, I breathe.
Still
Li think of Eden.
Still, I smile.
Mara notices
“What could you possibly be smiling at?”
“She’s free.”
A shadow crosses her face. She steps in close enough that her head is right underneath mine.
“It doesn’t matter that she’s free. You know why?” she whispers, he voice turning almost gentle. “Your little fox can feel it. Every spike. Every tear. Every scream. The mate bond doesn’t lie.”
My smile fades.
No. Not that. Please, not-
That’s right,” she coos. “She’s out there. Somewhere. Feeling everything I do to you. You’re hurting her…without even touching her.”
My chest heaves. I try to block the mate bond, but my magic doesn’t come out. Doesn’t help me. Instead, my pain is bleeding into the mate bond, and Eden must-
Iscream again when Mara digs another nail into my skin, this time into my neck. But the scream isn’t from the pain. It’s born from guilt.
Mara circles behind me. “Time for the wings,” she says
jerk. “Not the wings.”
“Oh, but Azriel,” she breathes. “They’re the most sensitive
She presses her palm against one. I can’t pull it into my skin. Mara is in control here, and she drives a spike through the joint with a sickly sweet smile
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Chapter 59
roar. The sound is not human. Not lan. Just agony given vasten.
Mara does the other wind, and pain Boods my skull. My sisines darkers
The last thing Tren
withouette, graceful and unbothered.
“You’ll break soon,” the says. “And when you do, you’ll come crawling back to me “
The darkness wants to swallow me whole when Mats sings my true name. I know that her goal is to break me. To brainwash me into becoming her slave
But somewhere, deep inside, a flicker of Eden remains.
And beling to it like a dying stai
