Skirting around the corpse to stay as far away from it as possible, she slipped out of her room and pulled the door shut. She did not want to see the thing anymore, knowing she had let her friend down by not being able to protect her.
She found four guards in the hall. They were all watching her curiously, given a redhead had gone into the room the night before and now a brunette was leaving it. Oh, the rumours were going to be glorious.
"Get rid of it," she said flatly.
The guard looked confused at first before starting forward with a curious expression.
Shaking her head, she tried to orientate herself. She started down the hall, her mind on the gardens but she did not make it past the door to the lich's room. He pulled the door open and swept out, looking remarkably like a vulture in his sweeping black robes.
"What is that stench of Faerie magi—" he broke off as he caught sight of her, blinking hard for a moment, and then clenched his jaw. He was not angry; he was trying to control his sadistic glee. She could feel it radiating off him in waves.
"Your Highness," she said after a moment. Her voice low and husky, belonging to a lover who whispered in your ear as you lay in bed, hungry for more sinful pleasures. It was a voice that promised all of the darkest, most depraved pleasures a person could offer. It was not intentional. She could not control that purring sexuality that seemed to ooze out whenever she spoke. It was annoying because people thought she was flirting when she was not.
"Princess, how delightful it is to finally see you," he said slowly. He knew something in her had changed, and now he had to be wary of her. At least when she had felt fear, he was mostly safe. Now she would kill him simply because she could, her own life be damned.
"Join me for a stroll in the gardens?" she asked, polite as you please.
The man seemed to be contemplating the question as though it were some great philosophical dilemma. Why would she have invited him out into the gardens? What was her plan? Was she going to kill him? No, she did not really intend to do anything to him, but he did not need to know that.
"I would be delighted," he said finally, deciding on something she could only guess at.
Accepting his arm, she linked hers with his and allowed him to guide their way.
People stared openly; they couldn't not stare. The lich was arm in arm with this strange, riveting creature that many of them would never have seen before. The other half would know immediately what she was.
"Is it still snowing?" she asked politely. The curtains in that corridor had not been opened yet.
"I believe it is, yes."
While their questions seemed calm and relaxed, internally they both seethed. She was seriously contemplating the deal she had made with him and the curse he had placed on her, weighing it against her own immortality. Would the curse keep her from being able to be reborn, or would it vanish with the death of this current life? Was she willing to risk it?
For the time being, the answer was no, and that was enough for her to let the thought of killing him in the gardens pass.
Apparently, the lich had other plans for their little stroll, for instead of leading her outside, he tugged her in the direction of the hall.
"This is not the path we agreed upon," she said as he pulled her unresisting towards the archway.
"We will go for that walk, but for right now I want to see his face." The lich sounded horribly gleeful and their appearance caused the stir she knew he had been hoping for. Thankfully for them, the court was a lot emptier than usual. Most courtiers did not wake until noon. Those that saw her fell silent, causing their companions to do the same. The group nearby looked around at the abrupt change in noise. The wave of silence started at the back near the doors and reached the throne after two breaths.
The king had been occupied, finally looking up only once the room had fallen completely still.
She had to admit, his reaction was rather enjoyable.
First, she felt his gaze on her. She knew his pupils would shrink to the size of a pinhead. He sucked in a deep breath to fill his lungs as though he might get a hint of her perfume or the scent of her hair. His face reddened and his jaw fell slack. His eyes raked down her form, retreating from her hips and up to her arm, curled snugly around the arm of his brother. His jaw clenched and lightning flashed in his eyes. He knew who she was. He knew she had tricked him in his rooms. He was livid.
To make matters worse, Epharis extended his free hand and turned her jaw. Cupping the curve of her jaw with his fingers, he lifted her head just enough and leant down, planting a firm, cold kiss upon her forehead.
An odd crunching sound came from the hall, making everyone in the room jump. The king had crushed the wooden arms of his throne beneath his enormous hands.
Finally, the lich took his grand finale and stepped forward. He bowed low to the king, his hand still possessively on Etani's arm as he drew her forward two steps.
"Your Majesty, might I introduce the Princess Etani of the Winter Court."
Her heart stopped beating and her mind went blank while the room exploded with voices, cries of shock and alarm. No one could remember ever seeing a fae, let alone a Princess of Faerie.
This was bad… This was so incredibly, ludicrously bad. The son of a bitch had outed her in front of at least twenty people, and to the one person she did not want to know.
And the lich was loving it. It was a game to him, playing with them all like some great chess set, moving her around and waiting to see what would happen. Then he would laugh and laugh like it was all nothing.
She would not make a scene; rather she gave her very best curtsy to the throne where the king sat visibly shaken, his expression one of abject horror.
"I have graciously agreed to introduce the princess to our beautiful gardens and humbly ask that you please pardon our rapid departure." Without waiting for a response, Epharis pulled her from the doorway and out into the gardens.
She was patient enough to wait until the guards were well out of earshot before she turned on him. In an instant she grabbed him and slammed him up against a wall, her nails at his throat. Feeling the slight pressure at her waist, she glanced down to see he had a knife against her, one made out of a dark grey metal that sang with the promise of pain. At a stalemate, she pressed herself against him, pinning him to the wall.
"What are you playing at, lich? Why would you tell him?" Her voice was a low hiss, her anger showing through her calm facade. "Every fae within a hundred miles looking to make a name for himself will go running to the court with this information."
"You will be hard-pressed to find a fae in that range, my dear girl. And I cannot fully keep you safe on my own. Now you have the undivided attention of the king, there isn't so much as a bug that would dare bite your pretty skin for fear of what he would do to it. I have given you the best protection in either world. I do not do things on a whim."
Staring into his dead eyes, she pondered his words, unable to deny he had some points.
"You have taken an enormous risk, and for what? To keep your pet alive?"
"Think, Etani. The king is obligated to protect you, to treat you well. He can do nothing to you for fear of retaliation from the court. He cannot pursue you, cannot hurt you, and he will see to it that you are given everything you could possibly need." His voice was low, threatening. The knife had cut through the fabric of her dress, a small stream of smoke coming from its feather light contact with her bare skin.
"What I need is my freedom. I cannot evade these people when I am forced to remain in one place," she said finally, her grip on him loosening him just enough that he withdrew the knife a fraction of an inch.
"You do not need to evade them when you are under the protection of the most dangerous man in this world."
"The most dangerous man in your world is a child when compared to the most dangerous men of my world, lich. You have signed my death warrant." Shoving him hard into the wall, she backed away from him. Still, she was not stupid enough to take her eyes off him when he had that iron blade.
"I have ensured that no one will ever find you again," he said after a moment. He dabbed at blood that streaked his skin, the result of her nails.
"And how is that?" she snapped, wiping her bloodied fingertips on her dress.
"The city is bound. If the king demands an order of silence, no one will be able to speak a single word of your existence outside of it." Cleaning his own fingers off on his robe, his eyes lingered on her fingers for a moment in contemplation.
"And of course, he will want something in order to give that order."
The lich looked up into her face and blinked, momentarily blinded by her.
"Of course, but we will get it."
"We wouldn't have needed it if you had kept your damned mouth shut," she snapped, turning away from him.
"Lovers quarrel?" A voice called from the distance and both Etani and the lich turned to see who had spoken. It was the grey man; he was stalking towards them in the snow. She could not help but notice that the man walked on top of the snow, leaving not a single footprint.
"Mind your own, Ghost," the lich barked, irritated at the interruption.
"Now, now. I haven't been formally introduced to the princess." There was a definite sneer in his voice and once he had closed the distance to the pair, his hand thrust out for hers.
"How's the face?" she asked dryly, accepting his hand and allowing her own to be touched only briefly by what she realised was fabric, not lips.
"Healed fine, you have quite the kick," he said in an equally dry tone.
Even in the brightness of the snow reflection, his hood hid his face, but she pieced it together. He used fabric and illusion to keep the hood dark regardless of the light.
"And you have quite the right hook."
The lich seemed to be stumped by the conversation, his teeth clenched in anger. Reaching for her, he snatched her hand from the gloved grip of the grey man and wrapped it protectively around his own arm, possessive.
"Now that you have been introduced, please kindly excuse us." He gave her a tug in the direction of the path, and she followed, her eyes lingering on the compact man.
"That's no way to treat a lady, Your Highness," the man called out, clearly laughing without uttering a sound.
The lich made no response; instead he tugged her along the path until they had rounded the corner.
The last she saw of the man, he had turned to the wall of the castle and was staring at the spot she had pinned the lich, his chest expanding as he inhaled.
"Who is that?" she finally asked after a time.
"Aelen, given the name of The Ghost. He is Alaric's pet assassin," he said finally, deciding not to ignore her question. The implied 'just as you are mine' hung between them.
"Interesting, he is not human," she said after a moment of thought.
"No, he is an elf of some sort. He keeps his hood up at all times, but was forced to reveal his face during my brother's method of control. He requires your face to be visible as well as a lock of hair. With those, he can ensure you obey him."
Blinking once, she compared that to the far more effective method the lich had used. But perhaps the king was not so skilled in magical manipulation.
"The Ghost. Who came up with that?" she asked.
"Lady Catherine, the werewolf bitch my brother keeps. She said he swooped around the castle like a ghost in that grey outfit of his. It stuck."
Letting out a low breath, she nodded. She could see why that would be the case, given his knowledge of the castle's hidden inner layer and his ability to pop up at any moment.
"Why is he so interested in me?" she asked after several moments of thoughtful silence.
"Those my brother has him hunt are never human. He is scoping you, looking for a weakness for when Alaric decides you are no longer useful. It wouldn't be the first time my brother has had one of our kind assassinated because they no longer mattered to him and they knew too much."
Coming to a slow stop at a bench, she withdrew her arm and crossed to a small, frozen rose bush. She had spotted something. Feeling the lich watching her as he sat down, she bent down to part the leaves and found a small, perfectly blue flower.
Carefully, she pinched it from the base and turned. Without a word, she approached the lich as he sat down, tucking the flower behind his ear.
She did not know why she did it, only that the cold, frozen thing seemed to match him so perfectly. Brushing back his long, lank silver hair, she found that his ears were pointed, very similar to those of an elf. Taking note of that, she stood calmly between his knees and tucked the flower in place, pressing it down gently to catch the stem in his hair. His eyes had been locked on her face the entire time. Neither of them spoke.
Smoothing down his hair, she cocked her head to the side to examine her handiwork. Adjusting a lock of hair on his shoulder, she gave one nod and moved away from him, only to be stopped by his hand catching her wrist.
Glancing back at him, she met his burning gaze with her own. Silent words passed between them, ones of hatred and want, of distrust and yet total, complete trust.
She could not help but wonder if the man had ever had someone like her in his world. She doubted it, and yet she did not feel sorry for him. He had brought it on himself, he had earned his title.
With his hand light on her wrist, he lifted her arm. To her shock, he pressed the palm of her hand against his cheek, feeling the slow beat of her heart against his jaw.
Neither of them moved for several minutes, the lich listening, while she stood frozen before she finally relaxed. Her thumb ever so gently caressed his cheekbone.
She understood him, they were one and the same. Yet she knew his feelings for her were generated by control and dominance. She did not try to pull away from him, but rather granted him that small shred of comfort that she doubted he had felt for centuries.
Sometime later the protesting screech of a gate made them jerk apart, his fingers releasing hers as though stung. Without a word, the two moved apart and headed back in the direction of the main doors.
***
It was several days later when she finally heard from the king. She had half expected him to demand a meeting with her on that first day of her introduction, but it was nearly a week before he came.
He did not come quietly either. The boom of his knock on the front door of her suite made her jump.
She had been sitting comfortably on a little day bed beside the open door to the balcony, her eyes lowered to a book on reptilian anatomy. She had noticed a marked increase in the reptilian species heading through the city, making their way north in order to escape the cold, and she had been curious about them.
Naga, lizard creatures she had never seen before, dragons, and it was even rumoured that an enormous turtle had been seen in the ocean. All heading for warmer weather and stopping in only to collect more supplies or offer news from further south.
From what she knew of the continent, there was not a whole lot further south, only swampland and a small city that no one wanted to go near. Ayathian was as far south as most people would ever venture.
The boom came again, the door quivering under the strain of the blows that came in threes, mere seconds apart.
When she did not open it fast enough, she got an odd sense of warning. She threw herself into the bathroom, just in time for the door to be summarily kicked down, taking part of the wall with it.
Rubble rained down, the door slammed into the wall that she had just hidden behind, and dust filled the air.
"Where are you?" the king bellowed into the room.
Peeking around the door, she saw the man was glowing with anger, lightning crackled around him, and his eyes found her in an instant.
He moved in a flash, lunging across the room, and making a grab for her head.
Scrambling backwards, deeper into the bathroom, she managed to escape his grip though only barely. Had the man grown bigger? His head nearly scraped the ceiling, and she was certain it was around ten feet high.
Hitting the counter with her back, she found herself unable to move any further back as the man leaned down to peer at her from under the doorway.
What on earth could she have possibly done to earn this level of fury? She did not know. She had been so quiet and patient, not making a stir and remaining in her rooms.
The man's face vanished as he stood, his fingers appearing a moment later on the top frame of the door. He was going to rip it off.
"Your Majesty, stop!" she yelled, watching as cracks appeared in the wood and plaster, the wall screaming its pain. "Please stop!"
Slowly, the man's head came into view and he glared at her, reaching in with reflexes no one his size should have. Grabbing her leg, he yanked her from the room and into the main room of the suite.
Her voice rang out in a scream as she felt the bones break under his grip, but he did not loosen it.
He lifted her up, and she hung from one leg before him, her entire world suddenly upside down.
Inwardly glad she had decided to wear pants and not a dress, she tried to right her thoughts even as she dangled there. Her foot brushed the ceiling as he lifted her higher, yet her long hair still touched the floor below her.
"Who do you think you are?" he bellowed.
Normally the raised voice wouldn't have bothered her that much, but the man had semi-transformed. The voice made her eardrums vibrate and caused her face to screw up in pain. There was no denying the man was, indeed, half titan.
Reaching up behind her with both hands, she gripped the handle of two long blades she had stashed in sheaths that ran crossed against her lower back. Holding them tight, she heaved herself up and used the knives to cut the tendons in his arm.
His fingers released her instantly, and she hit the ground hard on her back. Breath gone from her, she rolled and flung herself back up onto her feet.
He roared at her, but they both knew full well the git would heal in a matter of seconds.
His blood was hot and smelled strongly of copper, filling the room with a heady scent that made her mouth water.
Backing away from him, she slid her right foot back, her arms moving into a defensive posture as she leant forward, ready for another attack. It came, and the man was blinded by fury as he tried to grab her torso.
Her blades flashed; silvery metal turned red as she quite simply lopped off his middle finger from the first knuckle.
Again, he bellowed and swiped. Her body was airborne, flung sideways and crashing into a wall.
Plaster crumbled down around her as she attempted to catch her breath, looking up in time to see his hand.