Allegiance (12 page)

He picked up his drink and grabbed a bottle of water from the ice-filled tub, passing it to me before taking my hand. Then, he led me across the pavers towards the backyard, snagging a rug from the back of a chair and shaking the grass from it as we walked.

It was dark up the back—the only light shining on a bunch of ex-students splashing and shrieking in the pool. We passed them by, and others locked into pairs in the shadows. Still more sat around a fire, drinking and laughing and singing along to the music as they fed the flames with sticks and bits of rubbish. Jack chose a dark corner and spread the rug on the ground before pulling me into his arms and nuzzling his face into my hair. Unable to resist, I wove my arms around him and lay my head on his shoulder. He was shower fresh and warm, his white shirt crisp under my cheek. Quietly he said, ‘You’re leaving tomorrow?’

I nodded.

‘You love me still?’

‘You know I do.’

Running a hand slowly down the length of my hair, he said, ‘I’m going to miss you so much, Marla. This week has been hell.’

‘I’m
so
sorry, Jack.’

‘Will you miss me?’

I looked up and into his eyes. ‘If I had one wish it would be that there was another me to stay here with you.’

His arms tightened around me. ‘Do you think he’d resent us a few more kisses?’

I leaned my forehead against his shoulder. I belonged with Leif, I knew that. But right now he was in another world. And it wasn’t even about that. It was about me and Jack, alone in the dark, the firelight flickering across the yard, the sounds of
laughter floating around us and the stars twinkling in the sky above. I didn’t have the strength to resist him and I didn’t want to. It all felt so unfinished. I looked up at him. ‘I don’t know, Jack.’

He bent to kiss me—my hair, my ear, my neck. Shivers ran up and down my skin. I closed my eyes, tipped my head back and let the sensation of his soft lips smother my guilt.

‘There’ll never be another you,’ he murmured. ‘I thought I could forget you but…’

‘I’m sorry,’ I said again, letting him press his lips to mine. I knew I shouldn’t but I couldn’t help it—this was my Jack. And regardless of my bond with Leif, I couldn’t just stop feeling this way.

Jack pulled me down on the blanket and we held each other and later, when he walked me to my front door, he kissed me one more time—slowly. Then, touching my lips with his fingertips, he told me that was our last kiss.

I agreed and watched him disappear down the stairwell.

Life sure was complicated.

There was a knock just after seven the next morning. Leif wasn’t due until ten, but, excited to see him, I raced to let him in.

The smile slid from my face the moment I opened the door. It wasn’t Leif, it was his father. The mighty King of Telophy loomed above me—powerful, majestic and terrifying. Ice spiked through my veins, freezing me in place.

‘Marla,’ he said, without a trace of warmth.

The sound of his voice dragged me back to the last time I’d seen him and my mind became a cacophony of terrible memories—his rage, the threats, the wildness in his dark eyes and, oh, that kiss! I was overcome with a strange fogginess and had to concentrate hard to stop myself from sinking to my knees.

He smiled then—or sneered, it was hard to tell—before striding right past me.

I followed him into the living room, my heart crashing against my ribs. My father looked up from his newspaper and quickly stood when he saw the king. ‘Who are you?’ Dad demanded, eyebrows furrowed.

King Telophy glanced in his direction before turning back to me. ‘If there is anything you need, Marla, get it now.’

Dad took a step closer to the king. ‘Now wait just a minute,’ he said. In that same instant Ashleigh appeared in the hallway—all drowsy eyes and bed hair. She stopped, her eyes flicking between us. I had a moment to be grateful that Mum liked to sleep in on the weekends.

‘This is Leif’s father,’ I managed to choke out, ‘King Telophy.’ I attempted to pull my dad away from him.

‘What do you want?’ Dad asked, shooting daggers at the king and staying right where he was. Fear for my father took hold of me. For my whole life—even in his weakest moments—I’d thought of him as tall and strong. But at sixty-two he appeared a fragile old man next to the fearsome king.

Thankfully, King Telophy ignored both Dad and my gawking sister. ‘Make yourself ready immediately, Marla, unless you wish me to pick you up and take you as you are.’

Dad pulled me behind him. ‘You can’t speak to my daughter like that!’

The look King Telophy shot my father pierced my soul with terror. I wriggled from behind my father, moved between the two men and caught the king’s eyes. ‘Please, don’t hurt my dad,’ I whispered.

‘I have no interest in this human,’ he replied scornfully then told me yet again to make haste.

Dad moved to stand in front of me again. ‘You’re not taking my daughter anywhere!’

King Telophy captured my father’s eyes. Immediately Dad turned a deathly shade of pale before collapsing to the floor.

I cried out and dropped to his side, shaking him, crying for him to wake up. Ashleigh was right there with me. ‘What have you done to him?’ she shrieked at the king.

‘I am losing my patience, Marla,’ he said, ignoring her.

‘I don’t need anything! Just make him wake up!
Please!
’ The sight of my father crumpled on the floor, pale and still, twisted my heart. I crawled to the king’s feet, folding my hands together as I turned my face up to him. ‘Please, Majesty,’ I begged. From my knees, he looked a million miles away. He watched me for a
moment then turned his eyes to my father. Instantly, the colour began to return to his face.

When she saw Dad recovering, Ashleigh turned on the king. Using every four-letter word in her vocabulary, she told him exactly what she thought of him. He silenced her with a cold stare and probably some of his power. I crawled to where my father lay and put my arm across his chest. ‘Dad, I have to go. Please don’t get up till I’m gone.’

But my father was already struggling to rise, turning to King Telophy, his expression furious. Before he could even utter a sound he was falling again. The king picked me up. I screamed and struggled in his arms as he carried me through the balcony door and released his glittering white wings. But when he looked in Dad’s direction again, I fell silent. As we flew off the balcony I looked back to see my father sitting on the floor by my sister, rubbing his forehead.

I was completely at King Telophy’s mercy. If he wanted to make good on his threat to kill the offspring of the woman who’d rejected him, there would be no better opportunity. He could carry me far out to sea and hold my head under water until I drowned. He could force me to drink poison. It would be nothing for him to dispose of my body and be home in time for breakfast.

He lifted me under one arm and took me high into the sky. Without the movement of my wings to warm me, I was soon shivering and attempting to curl myself around him. Leif would have gathered me into his arms and released his sun to me, but King Telophy just let me freeze. By the time he alighted at Mount Kosciuszko and set me on my feet, I was like a block of ice. Teeth chattering, I glanced around. We were alone. There was nothing but rocks, grass and the sound of the wind.

King Telophy’s eyes narrowed as he watched me. ‘You fear me, Marla, but don’t you realise if I intended you harmed it would be
done? I could end you now if it were my pleasure. Nobody would ever know.’ He came close and placed a powerful hand around my neck. I could feel his breath, warm in my hair as he said, ‘Just the smallest amount of pressure would be enough.’

Somehow I found the courage to stay absolutely still as I cried out to Leif in my mind. There was no answer. A silent tear slipped from the corner of my eye. Then the king did something I would never have predicted: he removed his hand and, with his thumb, wiped the tear away. I began to shake. It started as a tremor inside and grew until my whole body vibrated. Softly, King Telophy continued, ‘I have no intention of harming you, Marla. Though it pains me to have you near, I have made a vow to my son that he may keep you for a promise. But know this—the moment you defy me, my side of the bargain is void.’ He hesitated before finishing. ‘If you are anything like your mother, that time will come soon enough.’

‘Why are you doing this?’ I whispered.

‘I have a task for you. But before we go further, you need to understand this.
Nobody
dictates the affairs of my kingdom to me. I do not care for the judgement of ten assemblies, nor do I care who you are betrothed to.
I
have decided that Leif may have you—if you can manage to behave yourself. But your mother still does not win. Has she not a son lost in the human world?’

A lump came to my throat. My brother—the twin I hadn’t even had a chance to know—would languish on Earth somewhere, sick and suffering and aging, while I would be allowed to make a life in Faera. And who knew what fate had befallen my birth parents? Tears began to leak from my eyes.

‘When you arrive at the castle,’ the king said, ignoring them, ‘Stay away from me. You are a constant reminder of all I wish to forget. And take care you
never
mention the names of your parents in my presence.’

Somehow I managed to remain standing when all I wanted to do was crumble.

‘Release your wings now, Marla, we need to be in Faera.’

I turned my back to him and removed my pyjama top, clutching it to my chest as I opened my wings and gave myself to the sun.

I thought the king would take me directly to the castle. Instead we arrived in a small courtyard outside a set of silver gates. While the guards standing on either side of them busied themselves bowing to their king, I pulled my top back on and glanced around. We seemed to be close to the peak of a mountain, smaller than the one King Telophy lived in, but formed from the same smooth white stone called willa. The mountain remained in its natural state, but the courtyard glittered with trapped rainbows where the rock had been cut.

I walked to the edge and peered over the side. Scattered down the mountainside all the way to the sparkling river below was a sea of flowers—shades of yellow and pink and white. Their nectar-sweet perfume rose into the air like mist, tickling my nose. I drew a deep breath, filling my lungs. As the fragrance came into me, the strangest thing happened—my anxiety slipped away, my muscles becoming loose and my mind, light. The sensation lingered before easing into a kind of vague feeling of wellbeing.

Drawing a few more deep breaths, I followed the dazzling blue ribbon of the river as it wove around the mountains before vanishing amongst the trees. I wondered if it met the lake at the base of King Telophy’s castle. I looked up and around, soon finding the king’s home rising above the forest, glorious and majestic, its multiple spires gleaming as white as snow. Even from this distance
I imagined I could see the multi-coloured prisms buried inside, sparking into the lavender sky. Wondering if Leif was there, I called to him once more. Again, there was no answer. King Telophy called out to me and the guards heaved the gates open.

I went to the king and peered inside the gates. The cave-like space darkened a little towards the back, before narrowing into a passage. My blood rushed. ‘Where’s Leif?’ I whispered.

‘Doing my bidding,’ the king replied as he caught my wrist and took me inside. Fighting the urge to struggle, I went with him to the back of the cave where he released me with an instruction to follow. We entered the passage, which immediately began curving down into the mountain. Occasional sunstones lit the gathering dark, their reflected light turning the hewn walls around them to rainbow glitter. King Telophy explained we were within his kingdom’s prison, that he’d brought me here to speak with one of the prisoners—a woman called Arelle. The name was familiar, and when he informed me that sixteen years ago she’d made a changeling of a newborn baby, I recalled why. Leif had told me her story not long after we’d met—she’d left her toddler son in the care of a teenage girl called Maia. Tragically, the boy had fallen to his death from his home in the treetops. Several years later when Maia gave birth to a daughter, Arelle had made a changeling of the baby to avenge the death of her son.

As we made our way deep into the mountain, King Telophy told me that one of his guard had informed him Arelle seemed somewhat softened to the idea of revealing what had become of the changeling. ‘But until she informs my guard absolutely,’ he explained, ‘I will not reward her with my attention. She knows this. At present she is merely rambling.’

‘So why do you think she’ll tell me?’

‘You are experienced with the human world, are you not? You know first-hand the life Arelle condemned that child to.’

The same life he’d condemned me to. Something like nausea mixed with venom crept up my throat. How on Earth was I going to live under the same roof as this vile man? But I didn’t have time to think about it because he was explaining what I was to do—use whatever means I could to get Arelle to speak, and when I had the information, inform the guard who would notify him.