A Court of Shadows and Lightening

Chaper One

One Year Later

Helion stood on the balcony of his palace, overseeing the view of the Day Court.

His large hands rested on the balcony rails, his gold rings glinting in the sun.

It was a beautiful day in the Day Court. The hum of peace viable in the air.

The war was won. He'd return home with only of half of his original numbers but he'd returned home.

It wasn't until he'd entered the palace did he realize another war was afoot.

Garca was dead.

No details were given, not to him or the servants but he'd come to the palace to find her body in the burial chambers.

Auren leaning kneeling besides her alter, shaking hands clasped in front of her bowed head.

Helion had just stopped and wondered if Auren had begun to pray again.

The thought was fleeting, Auren hadn't prayed for millennia. She had given up on the old gods and the new just like she had given up on herself.

It was this image he pictured in his mind, of the small mixed blood leaning over her bloody and dead friend.

Auren had not strayed from her side since her death, staying with her until Helion returned and offered special burial rights.

Adalin Helion swore to himself, Adalin not Auren.

He still found it difficult to call her by that name. The name of her dead sister.

His ward, and only remaining family was broken with grief when he found her within the crypt.

Her face as hollow and empty as if she was a breathing corpse, the only trace of emotion on her face the near constant tears that fell from her golden eyes.

He'd only seen that expression on her face once before.

When he found her so long ago, burnt, hallow and covered in the truth of what she had suffered.

Weighed down by the death of her sister.

The true Adalin.

He'd known both of them in their childhood. He'd spent his free time in their manor teaching Auren to read or Adalin to fight on horse back.

He loved them like his own children, he promised Turburus that he would protect them.
He gave his word.

And already one had fallen, and the other was on the brink.

Helion was the one who made Auren take her sisters identity, he had planned it out.

Tavian, had Auren blinded so thoroughly that she didn't see the signs before it was too late.

She blamed herself, She tried to hide it, but Helion knew not a day went by without thé youngest twin thinking of her older sister.

Helion had failed her. He hadn't been able to see how dangerous Tavian was.

His lack of attention and availability during those years had left both of those girls unguarded and unprotected.

So when he had learned Adalin had died he made sure Auren was protected. Alive.

Aletheia had hidden her daughters so well that no one questioned it.

No one but the servants who perished in that fire knew the one key difference between those girls.

The faces of the sisters were near identical. The same high cheekbones, tan skin and full lips adorned both of the girls.

It was their eyes.