The Dawn of the End Read online

  True dipped his chin.

  Brix glowered at him.

  Gal sighed.

  Both gnomes then strode out.

  True watched until they disappeared, then he turned back to the traitors, ready to see to this grim business, when he heard Serena make a noise in the back of her throat.

  His gaze went her way to see she was quickly drawing her broadsword.

  “What is it?” Chu asked her, drawing his.

  True pulled his sword from his belt and turned to the door as a commotion sounded from there, nearly drowning out Serena’s answer of, “Magic.”

  “Do not stand in our way!” Elena could be heard shouting.

  “Oh fuck,” Cassius muttered, sounding harassed.

  It then happened.

  A great gust of wind swept from the hall, into and through the room.

  Oh fuck was correct, for True had a feeling what was about to happen.

  As it got stronger, True scabbarded his sword and braced his legs, and the indication he was correct came as Elena announced, “Do not forget, she is now Princess Royal!”

  And then his very new wife came in.

  And with her came the wind.

  No.

  A storm.

  His hair whipped around his head, his mantle about his body, just as her hair, skirts and cloak whipped around hers.

  She didn’t even look at him.

  Her one arm strapped to her chest from the opposite side, so the shoulder that had been pierced by an arrow did not have pressure, she brought the gale and her eyes shone like twin golden blazes.

  He moved with difficulty against the tempest to try to get to her, starting to call her name, when she swung her free arm up in front of her and then to the side.

  True’s head turned when she did this, and he watched twenty-one men lifted right off the ground and tossed like they were wisps of parchment across the room, slamming against the wall and each other.

  Her emotion was getting the better of her.

  And as such, she had no control of her magic.

  “Farah!” he barked, now moving swiftly to her.

  She swung her arm the other way and only the prisoners, crying out in shock and fear, sailed across the room and slammed into the opposite wall.

  “Farah!” he roared, making it to her and catching her by her upper arms, carefully on one side, but definitely with the aim to get her attention.

  Her eyes shifted up to him and he fancied he felt their burn.

  “Darling, calm,” he whispered.

  “We will have vengeance,” she whispered back, her voice one he’d never heard before, not even when her own mother perished not long ago.

  “My love, we will,” he said. “But now you’re injured, and you need to calm.”

  She pulled from his arms and turned to Mars.

  “You will learn everything they have to tell,” she demanded.

  Mars looked stuck between amused and reciprocating her wrath when he replied, “Yes, I will.”

  Though, even in the circumstances, True did not fail to note Mar’s expression was also partly exasperated, for his attention was partly taken by his wife standing behind Farah.

  As were her friends, not only Elena, but Aramus’s queen, Ha-Lah.

  Mars focused on Farah. “I need you to take my wife back to the castle, little sister.”

  “I think not,” Farah retorted. “She was the one who suggested we come. And she was adamant about it. She might be small, but when she’s got something in her head, she makes it happen.”

  Mars’s chin jerked into his neck as his brows rose and he looked to his queen.

  He studied Silence. True studied Silence. Both men took in her determined expression and the mercurial shift of her silver eyes as the winds in the room died down.

  True then looked to Mars only to watch him smile at his wife very slowly and very scarily.

  “We will watch,” Farah declared, and True’s attention went back to his own wife.

  “You will not.”

  “We will watch,” Silence declared. “And if we have any ideas you can try, we will share.”

  “Oh, for fuck’s sake,” Cassius said to the ceiling.

  “I couldn’t stop them, my prince,” Elena told him.

  “Did you try?” he asked her.

  She looked guilty and gave only a shrug in response.

  “Do you want to watch, my queen?” Aramus asked his Ha-Lah.

  Ha-Lah, however, wasn’t looking at her husband.

  She was looking at Serena.

  And doing so, she answered, “I want to chat.”

  “I think this is a good idea,” Cassius decreed.

  “I don’t,” Serena put in. “I was hoping my job would be putting some balls in vises. Then squeezing.”

  “I think we have personnel covered,” Cassius pointed out, gesturing to all the men standing in the room.

  True did not have time for this shite.

  Thus, he looked to Elena.

  “Take them away,” he ordered.

  Her attention came to him and her face gentled.

  “True,” she said softly.

  “Take them.” He turned to Serena. “And you. Take them safe to the castle. And I’m trusting the both of you.”

  Serena looked to Chu.

  Chu nodded.

  Serena nodded back and moved toward the door.

  True stared for a moment at her easy compliance before he turned to Elena to see her gaping at her sister.

  He then gave his attention to his wife.

  “Go,” he said gently. “Go home. Please.”

  She gazed up at him for a long, heavy moment before lifting her hand and resting it on his cheek, any residual fury dying from her eyes as she studied his features.

  “I will await you in our chambers,” she whispered.

  He wrapped his fingers around her wrist, brought her palm to his lips and kissed her there before he held that hand to his chest and urged, “Try to rest as you do.”

  She continued to study him as if hoping his expression would change and he would share this was all a hoax, all was well, and they could enjoy the rest of their wedding day—and night—as they had planned.

  He could not do that.

  All he could do was hold on to his own fury long enough to be sure his wife and her friends were away.

  And only then would he unleash it.

  Again.

  “Go,” he prompted.

  Her eyes dropped to his hand. He noted when she saw his bleeding knuckles, but her gaze merely danced with gold fire before she gave him what he desired.

  She pressed her hand into his chest, leaned in and touched a kiss to the underside of his jaw.

  She then pulled away, looking deep into his eyes before she nodded and turned.

  The women moved with her.

  True looked to Wallace and Luther.

  “They are safe to the castle, then you both come back,” he commanded.

  He got nods and his men followed the women.

  When they were gone, True looked to Mars.

  “Do you need your men?” he asked.

  “They’d be useful.”

  “Are they here?”

  “Outside.”

  True turned to a guard. “Get the Trusted.”

  That guard moved instantly.

  “Chu,” Mars called.

  But Chu was already striding to the men that the guards were again arranging on their knees on the floor.

  Chu did not look thrilled with his task, he did not look like he dreaded it.

  He looked nothing.

  Expressionless.

  Emotionless.

  As if what he was about to do meant naught to him.

  True had noted this of Mars and his men when they’d been at work in the necropolis in Fire City after the last attack.

  And then, as now, he thought if he was in the opposite position, that impassiveness would be the most terrifying of all.


  Cassius coming to stand on his one side, Aramus on the other, Drakkar and Ulfr flanking either side, they crossed their arms on their chests.

  Settled in.

  And watched.

  84

  The Nil

  Queen Ophelia

  Northwestern Border of the Veil of The Enchantments

  WODELL

  Ophelia stood at the side of the cot, staring down at her friend.

  Melisse was deathly pale, and even unconscious, looked in pain.

  Ophelia’s mouth tightened.

  “A word, Your Grace,” a voice murmured.

  She turned her head and looked up to the Go’Doan priest who may have saved Melisse’s life.

  G’Liam, probably named William by his parents.

  He was the priest who gave her daughter the medication Ophelia now took to help battle the pain and fatigue of the illness that was slowly draining her life away.

  It had taken some days for it to start working, but it did.

  The sickness ate at her still, she felt it.

  But she could now function with much more energy, and much less misery.

  She inclined her head to the man, moved out of the tent and several feet away.

  She saw her lieutenants, Julia and Lucinda close.

  Agnes was supervising the lining up of the Go’Doan bodies that had fallen to the Nadirii in battle the night before so whichever ones could be identified by whoever might wish to claim them would.

  Also, the corralling of the prisoners which they very much took and very much intended to interrogate.

  “Her prognosis,” Ophelia asked when they stopped.

  “Frankly, I’m surprised she’s still alive,” he answered.

  His attention was then taken, and Ophelia watched in some shock as his face softened with affection and his chin dipped to something over her shoulder.

  She looked that way to see a Go’Ella, one of the acolytes of the Go’Doan, though this one not wearing the sheers of that caste, but instead, the same kind of apparel, though not see-through, and a lovely shade of pale pink, not white.

  The woman ducked into the tent.

  She was pretty, as many of the Go’Ella were.

  She also had a certain serenity about her, which few of the Go’Ella had.

  “My chosen one, Saira,” Liam explained. “And if I see the changes in the Go’Doan I wish to make, she will be my wife.”

  At her age, there was little that surprised Ophelia.

  But that did.

  “I teach her what I know. She assists in my work,” he continued astounding her. “You can trust her. She is very good at what she does, has much knowledge and experience. And if she had not been at my side helping me work on your sister, all would have been lost.”

  “She is a Go’Ella,” Ophelia pointed out.

  Aversion shifted through his expression before he replied, “She was and perhaps officially she still is. I have five other women who work for me, and officially they still are too, even if they are not.”

  Ophelia’s brows shot up. “Who work for you?”

  “Administratively, in what I do for the Education Ministry of the Go’Doan. Or as nurses in the work I do at the hospital. I do not consider them Go’Ella. I consider them colleagues.”

  And that astonished her most of all.

  Thus, Ophelia studied him, perhaps his words, or the sense she felt that they were genuine, bringing to the forefront her realization if she was not as she was that day—her age, her condition—she would wish to lay with him.

  More than once.

  He was tall, handsome, self-possessed and unmistakably intelligent.

  Alas, not only was she her age, and her condition, he was committed to another.

  She brought them back to the matter at hand.

  “And as Melisse is a miracle of survival at this juncture, you cannot say her prognosis.”

  “I can say I would prefer to have her in a situation where I could control her environs and the possible poisons that could get into her wound, which, it is my feeling, some actually exist in the air and not just the dressings or instruments used on the wound.”

  How fantastical, Ophelia thought.

  “In other words,” he continued, “I would like to see her in a hospital. But I do not think it’s safe to move her now. Nor will it be tomorrow, if she survives. After that, I will reassess.”

  “But as she is now still alive, you must have some feeling of what the chances are my friend will get to after that?”

  “If you asked me before I worked on her what the chances of her still breathing right now were, I would have said nil. But by some miracle, he missed her trachea by but a centimeter when he punctured her chest. However, she lost a great deal of blood, the wound is large, the weapon was a horn which I can assume was not drenched in spirits to kill possible poisons. So, my answer to whether she will still be with us in two days is, perhaps not nil.”

  Good goddess, she might like this Go’Doan.

  On that thought, it was definitely time to move on.

  “And your brothers who attacked my realm?” she queried.

  “They are not my brothers,” he replied calmly, lifted a hand when she opened her mouth to retort, and spoke on when she did not. “They are Go’Doan, trained priests. Yes. And it’s my understanding some time ago, precisely thirty-seven years, a small faction of our kind approached the high priests, suggesting that the spread of our faith was not occurring fast enough. Peoples of Airen, Firenze and Wodell were doggedly worshiping their own gods, and The Enchantments and Mar-el would not even let our priests in to educate and heal. They felt more should be done.”

  Ophelia nodded.

  Liam carried on.

  “This was decidedly not a popular suggestion and their ideas to facilitate their desires were not only refused, they were remonstrated for even suggesting them and warned if they should do anything further, even discuss this with other priests, they would be cast out. Regrettably, this only served to make them even more zealous in their cause.”

  “And you know of this, so the Go’Doan know of this, so you must know the next question I will ask is why King Ares is dead, Sofia is dead, and Melisse is hovering on death and this was not stopped before it grew out of control.”

  He shook his head. “They were far from open about their recruitment, Your Grace. They were careful. They were also smart. Fervent, even fanatical, but not aggressive. They further took time to get organized. By the time they were large enough in number that there were whispers amongst the other priests, they had some hold and their aggression came in other ways. There truly are those priests of Go’Doan who have no idea they even exist. There are others who do who fear them mightily and for reason. And there are still others, like myself, who do something about it.”

  “And what do you do?”

  “I’m afraid the number who is like me is small. So, I do what I can with what I can discover without getting discovered myself and I, or more importantly, my chosen one and the women I work closely with, finding ourselves targeted which could mean dire things, including the end of our lives.”

  Damn it all.

  She could understand this was a deterrent.

  It wasn’t an excuse.

  But it was an understandable deterrent, especially with this man and the way he looked at his Saira.

  His hazel eyes intensified. “And the things I do are such as sending anonymous birds to Nadirii queens to warn them their realm is about to be attacked.”

  She would credit him for that.

  But not much, because of what she asked next.

  “And why didn’t you save Melisse?” she snapped.

  “I knew they had her, but I couldn’t even begin to imagine that was part of their plan,” he answered. “Not until too late. And then, I could only react, which,” he gestured to the tent he had set up to care for Melisse, “Saira, myself and our group did.”

  It remained to be seen if that was enough.<
br />
  “I cannot offer excuses,” he went on. “And it is with grave remorse I share the fullness of our responsibility, for we were aware that things were well out of hand when King Ares was assassinated by G’Dor, who was one of the priests who had come forward with these desires for the future of our faith. He then left it, presumably at the time, because the others did not see things as he did. When he murdered Ares, we became very aware of just how far this had gone and those higher up who understood the situation was spiraling tried to handle things…” his pause was weighty before he continued, “internally. Clearly, they failed.”

  “Clearly, they did,” she agreed crossly.

  “And sadly,” he kept on, “we do not know the extent of their operations.”

  This did not bode well.

  “Are the Go’Doan prepared to condemn this faction and cast them out so they no longer enjoy the resources of the Dome City?”

  He shook his head again. “I’m afraid I am not yet a priest of a level that is privy to the discussions of those who speak for our faith and make those kinds of decisions, much less am I invited to be in those discussions. But my understanding is, no. They simply deny it has anything to do with the true Go’Doan faith, condemn any acts made by the extremists and continue to try to stem the tide internally.”

  “I lost not a sister in battle to these men, who are not warriors,” Ophelia stated, throwing a hand in the direction of the battlefield, such as it was. “However, if I did, I would be even more infuriated than I already am with my sister lying abed, her future survival unlikely, not twenty feet away. Not to mention having to ask my sisters to ride under the threat of any battle, this being that they may be harmed or killed. And I can share with you that a condemnation of the event without any teeth in it coming from the Dome City would not appease me in the slightest.”

  “I understand.”

  “Do you?” she asked.

  He nodded. “I truly do. However, I am but one man. And the enormity of this issue is paralyzing those who might have some power to do something about it.”

  “This is not good enough. For we took prisoners. We will interrogate those—”