Aelin
I watched the entrance Vaults from where I crouched on the opposite rooftop, twirling a throwing knife in my hand. Dark glee coursed through me as the king's new guards finally found the winding trail I'd left from the docks, converging on the derelict hall.
Shouts and cries rang from inside as it exploded into bloodshed, the clang of clashing weapons clear with my enhanced senses.
Idly, I wondered how furious Arobynn would be when he discovered what was left of the pleasure hall that had brought him so much money.
He wouldn't be pleased, but considering the disgusting place had also filled the coffers of the people who had slaughtered Sam, I was enjoying watching it be reduced into bloody splinters far too much to care. My position on the roof also afforded me a front row seat to the current owner of the Vaults, a former underling of Sam's murderer and a dealer of flesh, had caught a knife to the throat.
Such a shame that my hand had slipped, I really was out of practice with throwing knives.
Confident the destruction would be absolute, I brushed my now-empty hands on my dark cloak before standing. Ambling along the rooftops of the city, I traveled south, having caught Chaol's distantly familiar scent after leaving the Vaults earlier in the day.
Why he was playing around in the sewer tunnels, I had no idea. Clearly, much had changed with him, and I intended to figure out why.
With feline ease, I shimmied down the drainpipe anchored to the side of a building. Latching my fingers under the lid of the nearby sewer grate, I hauled it open and slipped inside. I bit back a gag at the reek that rose to meet me.
I crept through the dim, moonlight tunnels, silent and swift.
I loathed the sewers, even if I could admit they were a convenient way to get around Rifthold unseen. I'd hated them since I'd been bound up and left to die, courtesy of a bodyguard who wasn't pleased with my plans to kill his master. The sewers had flooded that night, and after freeing myself I'd had to swim - actually swim - through the festering water, nearly drowning thanks to a sealed exit.
It had taken me days to feel clean again. I hadn't been in the sewers since then, and I'd assumed my first time back would come with echoes of the fear I'd felt as I almost died. But that memory had nothing on my most recent trauma.
An ash bolt shot through a chest -
Wings, shredded and bleeding -
Blinking, I forced the memories down as I headed down one of the main arteries of the system. An intersection of four different tunnels loomed ahead, and I slowed my steps, scenting someone just ahead, approaching from the southeast tunnel.
But from the southeast - the one that headed straight towards the castle - darkness was leaking from it, not the usual sort. A thicker, oily darkness that had the hairs on the back of my neck rising. The moonlight peering through the grates above didn't pierce it, and no sound could be heard - not even the scampering of rats.
I hissed out a quiet curse as I stepped closer, a familiar foreboding rising, reaching out with my senses to try to get any kind of idea about what lay within.
"I wouldn't do that if I were you."
I turned, smiling at the cool female voice. The hooded guard from the Vaults stood in the tunnel not twenty paces behind her. Which meant Chaol wouldn't be far behind.
I held up a knife as I stalked slowly towards the guard. "Didn't anyone ever tell you it's rude to sneak up on strangers?'
The woman lifted her hands when I got between a few feet, her hands delicate but scarred. So she had some skill. I cocked my head at her, "Although, considering you appear to frequent pleasure halls and sewers, manners may not be in your wheelhouse."
"I wasn't aware former assassins were so concerned with proprietary," she responded dryly.
Oh, I liked this one. And she recognized me, then.
"Where's your master? I can't imagine he let you slip the leash," I goaded.
The guard pointed toward the tunnel closest behind her, full of bright, open air. "Come with me."
I chuckled, "Now, now, it's a little early in our courtship to be wandering down abandoned tunnels. You'll have to do better than that."
The woman stepped closer, the moonlight illuminating her hooded face. She was pretty, if a tad serious, and perhaps two or three years older than myself.
She huffed out an exasperated breath, "I'm on scouting duty. Luckily for you, I recognized you. Usually, we have a strike-first, ask-questions-later policy."
I wanted to laugh at the insinuation she could have gotten the drop on me. But we ... that was intriguing. I had scented a surprising amount of people down here - to learn Chaol may be associated with them?
Turning on her heel, the woman began walking down the tunnel, completely unconcerned with the threat I posed at her back. Arrogant and stupid - I knew I liked her.
She called over her shoulder, "You can come with me, Champion, and learn some things you probably want to know, or stay here and see what answers the tunnel provides."
Shrugging, I sheath the knives at my thighs and fall into step with the guard. As we strode down the tunnels, I turned my head slightly towards her, "How'd you recognize me?"
"I've seen you around - months ago. The red hair was why I didn't immediately identify you at the Vaults."
A guard, I surmised, watching her from the corner of my eye. They were the only ones who could have known I was both Champion and assassin. The question was, what was she doing down here, and at the Vaults? It seemed unlikely that either were a part of her official duties.
We traversed the sewers, turn after turn, until we approached the entrance to another long tunnel with that same unnatural darkness drifting from the far end. I cataloged the area automatically, predatory unease slithering up my spine as the scents hit me.
"Here," the stranger said, approaching an elevated stone walkway, exposing her back. She really was a fool. Oh well, time for answers.
I slipped up behind her, our bodies flush, and pressed a blade against her throat.
"You get one sentence," I breathed in her ear. "One sentence to convince me not to spill your throat on the ground."
Thankfully, the woman wasn't quite stupid enough to go for one of the weapons at her side. She swallowed, throat bobbing against the dagger. "I'm taking you to the captain."
I dug the knife in a bit more. "Not that compelling when I can tell there's more than one person past that door. I'm gonna need more than that."
"Three weeks ago, he abandoned his position at the castle and fled. To join our cause. The rebel cause."
Well, shit.
I certainly hadn't seen that coming.
To be completely honest, I'd mostly forgotten about the so-called rebel cause. Which made this a bit awkward, especially considering they might be holding a grudge from when I'd gutted one of their own and attacked several more.
But if Chaol had abandoned the castle ...
"And the prince?" I demanded.
"Alive, but still at the castle," the rebel hissed. "Can you put the knife down now?"
So touchy. But if Chaol was now working with her ... there had to be a reason. And there had to be a reason he would have left Dorian on his own. Chaol was more loyal to Dorian than most lovers were. I lowered my knife and stepped back.
The rebel whirled and reached for one of her knives. I clicked my tongue, "I wouldn't do that if I were you."
The rebel slowly straightened, letting go of her knife while her dark eyes stayed fixed on me.
"Tell me why you're here," she said quietly. "The captain says you're on our side, but I heard what happened this winter - when you slaughtered those rebels at the warehouse - and then you hid from him at the Vaults tonight."
I tilted my head at her, "I'm sorry, how was I supposed to react when people kidnap, beat and threaten to kill my friends? Did the person who had my beloved friend assassinated not deserve to be gutted? Would you like me to grovel, to beg for forgiveness for protecting my own?"
The rebel flinched at my words, and I smiled softly, "I didn't think so."
The woman jerked her chin towards the darkness, "Through here."
Following her, I finally saw what I had sensed from the darkness. Nine humans in total, seven men and two women. Two were injured, hanging limply between their companions. All of them splattered with blood - red and black. And I knew that emaciated, dried-out look. The hollowness on their faces, too similar to the corpses I'd seen in Wendlyn - before my time in Prythian.
The humans looked up at our entrance, and I immediately locked eyes with Chaol. I didn't smile.
The others quickly took in our appearance, dismissing my companion with a glance. I held each of their gazes as they hurried towards me, weapons out. Whatever they saw in my eyes had them halting.
And then Chaol was in front of me, eyes running over my frame. He looked the same. His features, which I had once considered ruggedly handsome, hadn't changed. Still, something about him seemed ... diminished.
"Are you hurt?" he asked hoarsely.
I shook my head silently, gazing at the man I had once thought I loved. And I felt ... nothing.
He nodded, barking orders at the others to continue down the tunnels. The woman - Nesryn, Chaol had barked - hesitated, looking me up and down for a long moment before she too followed.
Chaol turned back to me, lips tight. "You came back."
"I did, it seems I have much to catch up on," I murmured.
"It - Aedion - It's a trap -"
I cut him off, "I know about Aedion."
He took a step towards me, before seeming to think better of it. "Walk with me."
I did, thankful he didn't seem inclined to act based on our previous relationship, following him into a tunnel I knew led back up to street level. Out of the corner of my eye, I caught how he watched me. The caution, the added guardedness to his eyes.
"You figured out who I am," I hummed.
"The day you left."
I'd figured he would, when I'd given him a hint as I boarded the ship. And I'd expected it to strain our relationship - as it clearly had. The silence between us was heavy.
"I have a lot to tell you," I finally said. "But so do you, it seems. I think I'd rather hear your story first."
The captain sighed as we emerged from the sewers, into the heart of the slums. "It's not a pleasant story."
Chaol talked as we continued walking through the slums, and what was left of my heart broke. I remained silent as he told me how he'd met Aedion and started working with him for the rebel cause, how the king had captured Aedion and interrogated Dorian. I wanted to snarl at him and demand why it had taken him so long to act - but that wouldn't fix how reckless and stupid he'd been.
When he told me of Dorian's lover being beheaded, his words were nearly too soft for human ears to catch. Each sentence short and clipped in sorrow. It seemed I was no longer the only one of the three of us familiar with heartbreak.
A tear nearly escaped when he explained how Dorian had sacrificed himself to get Chaol out of the castle, revealing that he had magic to the king. The grief in his eyes was the only thing that kept me from snapping at him. He'd learned nothing from Nehemia's death, it seemed. He should have gotten them out the instant he had a crumb of evidence that they were in danger.
"So now you're working with the rebels."
He nodded. "We meet as often as we dare. Nesryn and some of the city guards have been able to get us in contact with a few of my men. We've been looking for ways to get Dorian out. And Aedion," he tacked on as an afterthought. "But that dungeon is impenetrable, and they're watching the secret tunnels."
Everything he told me about the king's new guard confirmed my suspicions. Erawan was slowly seeding his army full of more and more of his brethren - but to what end?
With them there, and the strange beings I'd sensed within the sewers, the castle would be nearly impossible to get into - another problem for tomorrow, adding to my growing list.
"What have you heard of Dorian since you fled?"
Shame flickered to life in his eyes, but I refused to soften my words. He had fled. He'd left Dorian in the hands of his monstrous father, who had finally shown his true colors. And he hadn't exactly been hiding them well to begin with. How Chaol had ever served the man -
I shook free of my thoughts. It wasn't worth the effort, I had more important things to worry about.
"The king hasn't publicly punished him, or even locked him up. As far as we can tell, he'll be attending this execution-birthday party of his," Chaol said. He hesitated, "But our spies have claimed that his demeanor is off, colder, and that he has a torque of black stone around his neck."
A collar.
The cobblestones I walked on seemed to tremble, the air thicker, threatening to suffocate me. All I could do was stare.
"You're pale," Chaol said worriedly. Thankfully, he made no move to touch me.
Fuck, if Dorian was collared - I couldn't tell Chaol, not yet. Couldn't tell him that the only way out for our friend might be death. If there was even a sliver of a chance I could do something, anything, I had to try.
"That was ... a lot," I admitted.
"Tell me what happened to you," he offered in understanding.
I hesitated for a moment as I decided what exactly to tell him. I wouldn't have told him anything months ago, but if this realm was going to heal when I was gone - it needed people who understood what happened. And he was already working with the rebels ...
I took a breath, and then I told him. What had happened in Terrasen ten years ago, and what had happened in Wendlyn.
And then, "Do you remember the portal you found me within in the tunnels beneath the stone castle?"
His face paled, but he nodded, and I launched into an abridged version of my journey to Prythian. I told him how I'd arrived, that Rowan had followed me. I gave him a short explanation of the realms, the Valg and their role, that I'd returned to set things right and gave an overview of my show-down with Maeve. I did not tell him about my mates, the power of the amulet around my neck or that I knew where the third Wyrdkey was. Nor did I mention the three fae currently stalking me around the city.
I huffed out a breath, "So now you know. Why I'm here, and what I plan to do."
He didn't reply for an entire block, as stiff and silent as he'd been the entire time. Finally, he met my gaze. And there was nothing of the man I'd once cared for in his eyes.
"So you're here alone," he stated flatly.
I startled, "Excuse me?"
He barked out a sharp laugh, "I sent you away, to the safety of your cousins in Wendlyn, and even after traveling to another gods-damned realm, you've returned alone. No army. No allies. Completely empty-handed."
My heart thudded painfully at his reminder that I was completely, utterly, alone. But I didn't need anyone else. Not for this.
So I scoffed at him, "I wasn't aware I needed anyone else."
"To do what?" he cried. "Reforge the realms? What good is that for anyone else?"
Plenty, if they preferred not to be enslaved by demon overlords.
Chaol's agitation only grew. "Do you have any idea what it was like for us here? While you were off playing with magic, gallivanting with faerie princes in other realms, do you understand what I, what Dorian, what the people of Rifthold had to endure?"
"That's not my fault," I said quietly, "and I'm not the one who served the king responsible for the better part of my life."
Chaol flinched, but refused to be dissuaded. "Of course, nothings ever your fault is it? Except, apparently," he spat sarcastically, "that you could have freed Rifthold from the demons ages ago but decided to spend ten years in hiding, playing assassin."
His words were so venomous, so heartless, that any shred of the regard I once held for him vanished. I had to remind myself that he didn't know, that no one knew, what the cost of purging both realms of the Valg would be.
"Are you looking for me to be at fault here?" I asked incredulously. "You blame me for the actions of the Valg as if I were the one who brought them here. Is everything on my shoulders, then? The fall of the kingdoms, the loss of magic?"
"The second one," he said through his teeth, "at least I know without a doubt is not your doing."
I paused. He couldn't - there was no way he'd discovered the truth about the towers, was there?
"What did you say?"
His shoulders tightened, and that's all I needed to realize he didn't plan on telling me.
"What did you learn about magic, Chaol?" I said too quietly. "Tell me."
He shook his head, staring at the street ahead. "No. Not a chance. You're too unpredictable."
Unpredictable.
"That might be the first correct thing you've said all night," I laughed brokenly. "But I regret to inform you that you don't have to tell me a damn thing, because I already know what's suppressing magic, and how to get it back."
He froze at that, turning to me. "You can't. Having magic free would only result in chaos - it would make things worse, make it easier for those demons."
"You're an idiot," I said softly, vehemently. "Can you not see that magic was suppressed to make it easier on the Valg? With magic, the king wouldn't have been able to conquer Terrasen and we wouldn't be in this gods-damned position in the first place."
I tilted my head, quiet venom dripping from my tongue. "That collar Dorian is wearing - let me tell you what it does and see if you still dismiss what I'm saying, what I'm planning to do."
His face paled, and the wicked part of me that had been growing stronger the longer I spent without my mates reveled in it.
"Those collars and rings allow them to target magic-wielders, possessing them, feeding off the power in their blood - the power they don't have access to, that they can't use to defend themselves. Those that don't have magic, they just drain the life from them completely. They are a race of beings stronger than all but the most powerful of the fae, that feeds off fear, misery and despair," I pause, allowing my words to sink in, to pierce his thick skull. "And do you know what one of their two weaknesses is? Fire magic. Fire magic with a strength that only I possess."
I was right in front of him now, nose to nose. "So, considering all that, you might find that you want me to free magic. I might be the only person capable of freeing Dorian, or give him the mercy of death. If there's anything left of him that the Valg hasn't devoured."
The worlds were horrible, but true. I needed to discover more about the rings and collars, if it was even possible for a host to remain after they were overtaken by a demon parasite.
Chaol shook his head. Once. Twice. I almost felt bad for the panic, the grief and despair on his face. Until he spat out, "And what then? Will you encircle Rifthold in flames the way you did Doranelle - burn anyone who doesn't agree with you? Or will you just incinerate the entire kingdom out of spite? You're petty enough to do it." He huffed a bitter laugh. "Perhaps we're better off without magic. It doesn't exactly make this fair amongst us mere mortals."
"Fair. You're worried about fair while there is a demon possessing our friend?" I enunciated.
He glowered at me. "Magic is dangerous."
I threw up my hands in exasperation. "Any weapon in the hands of an enemy is dangerous."
"Yes," he seethed, "but at least steel and soldiers can be fought against. Even empires can fall with enough resistance. Where are the checks against your kind, your level of power? Iron? Not much of a deterrent is it? If magic is free, who is to stop the monsters from coming out? Who is to stop you?"
A spear of ice shot through my heart.
Monster.
A part of me had always suspected, always known, that's how he thought of me. Ever since his first glimpse of my fae form through the portal in the bowels of the stone castle - when horror and revulsion were first and foremost, before concern regarding even his own safety.
His absolute disgust over my activities as champion, even under the direction of his own king. And when I'd gutted Archer Finn for Nehemia's death - yes, I'd always been a monster to him. Since the very beginning, when he'd found me dirty and beaten in Endovier.
Nothing but a monster - simply one he'd thought could be leashed for a time.
And perhaps he was right, perhaps I was a monster. Enough people had told me that throughout my life. After all, only a monster could do the things I'd done, abandon her mates the way that I had. Only a monster would rip their choice from them, conspire against them. Even if it was to save them, I'd still betrayed them.
So I reinforced my too-familiar walls of ice and steel, ignoring everything behind them that was shaking and crumbling, straightening my shoulders. And I pledged, "If it takes a monster to stop a demon, then I will gladly be remembered as one."
I tossed the cheap amethyst ring at him, watching dispassionately as he scrambled to catch it. I'd brought it to politely tell him that there was no future for us, that whatever we had been was no more. But I think him calling me a monster made it more than clear that there were no lingering feelings.
"I'm staying at my apartment if you ever get your head out of your ass and realize you just might need the help of a monster," I spat.
Turning on my heel, I didn't give him a chance to reply before I stalked down the street.