Cast in Faefire: An Urban Fantasy Romance (The Mage Craft Series Book 3) (19 page)

“I’ve been AWOL,” Seth said.

“What would motivate a guy to pretend to be a god, hypothetically speaking?” Deirdre asked.

Seth dropped her hand first, and he could tell she thought that was a victory. “You’d have to ask a guy pretending to be god.”

She leaned in to whisper to him, “Did you have a nice time alone with Marion last night?”

He jerked back. “What do you want?”

“I’ve heard you’re giving a speech to endorse the marriage today,” Deirdre said. “Because the words of gods should calm the nerves of a lot of voters. Right? As long as you’re a god, that is.”

The mere mention of the endorsement he was meant to give flooded him with hot anger all over again.

Seth had been trying not to visualize Marion’s bruising because it had a way of overwhelming him. But even when he wasn’t thinking about what Konig had done to her, he was still thinking about her crying in his arms, and the wet spots that had remained on his chest when he walked away.

“Nothing to say to defend yourself?” Deirdre asked.

“You haven’t made any accusations.” He brushed her off and walked to the edge of the central fire pit. Flame glimmered across the surface of crystals, generating just enough heat to offset the chill of the waterfall.

It shocked him that Deirdre went to sit by Rylie. Even more shocking when the Alpha didn’t move away.

Seth might have interceded if Prince ErlKonig of the Autumn Court hadn’t swaggered into the room at that moment, attended by another handful of Raven Knights.

It was sickening that Konig could be drenched in charismatic confidence when Seth had left Marion crying in her room.

The man was dressed for his wedding. White suit. Some leather things. Snowy patterns. He’d match Marion perfectly.

Seth wanted to kill him.

The intensity of the emotion was shocking. Seth’s brother used to tease him for how easily he backed down from fights, and now he was contemplating murder.

Abel had never hit Rylie. Not once. And Abel was the biggest douchebag to saunter across the face of the Earth.

“I haven’t missed anything, have I?” Konig asked, flopping on an empty couch and throwing his leg over the back of it.

Seth was feeling so very vengeful at the moment.

“Not yet,” Rylie said. Like always, she didn’t have to speak up in order to be heard. As soon as she started talking, people fell quiet in order to listen. “Everyone knows why we’re here, so I’ll spare us any speeches. I want to remind you all that we aren’t dealing with mere politics here. Our vote will shape the life of a pair of kids—young adults—who are very much in love.”

She looked at Seth when she said that part.

Who was she reminding? The council, or him?

“I’d like to say something too.” This came from Deirdre Tombs. “The lives of a pair who are ‘very much in love’ are nothing compared to what’s at stake. This could impact the entire world.”

“Possibly,” said Adàn Pedregon. Seth recognized him from the news. “It’ll only impact the whole world if their union stirs the gods to revenge.”

And everyone looked at Seth again.

This was where he was supposed to endorse Marion and Konig’s marriage.

Seth had made a promise to Marion. He’d said he would do anything she wanted.

Everyone was still looking at him, and he wasn’t talking, and he didn’t even know what he wanted to say.

Seth took a folded piece of paper out of his back pocket. He’d made a few notes on things he could say. Like Rylie, he didn’t come from a background involving leadership; unlike Rylie, he hadn’t spent the last twenty years developing those skills. His brain had a habit of going blank when the pressure was on. Werewolf hunter instincts couldn’t make him a man of words.

At the moment, he couldn’t even read what he’d written down.

When he looked at the page, all he saw was Marion’s bruised back and her tearful face.

He crumpled the paper and tossed it in the fire.

“You all know who I am,” Seth said. “And—”

“Do we?” Deirdre interrupted.

“He doesn’t look like much of a god.” That came from the man representing the Office of Preternatural Affairs. He was a tall, broad-shouldered human wearing a suit without a tie. The open collar gapped around the hollow of his throat. Blood flowed strong underneath his skin.

Someone else whispered something like, “Avatar.”

But people didn’t look more convinced.

“Yes, I’m the avatar of the third god of the triad,” Seth said reluctantly. “The demon god who’s meant to rule death.”

“You’re not Arawn,” said Ruelle Myön of the Allied Covens. Another face that Seth knew from the news. The last time that he’d seen her, she had been receiving oral favors from an unseelie waiter.

“Arawn’s not the god of death. He’s just pretending to make himself look cool.” Konig yawned into his fist. “I beat the guy one-on-one. We don’t need to worry about him.”

Arawn wasn’t the only one that had been beaten by Konig one-on-one.

Seth ripped the glamour off, snapping the cord that held it around his neck.

“I
am
Death,” he said.

He tore his shirt from neck to hem and dropped it.

With the glamour gone, there was nothing to keep the illusion of skin from vanishing, exposing his innards.

The tearing had gotten worse. His breastbone was exposed now, as well as the pounding heart behind it. Every single squeeze of the muscle made foggy, electric energy bloom from the wound.

Seth didn’t fight it for once. He embraced the godly energy, letting it fill him, flow from his fingertips, burn in his veins. “I am Death,” he said again, turning to take in the whole room, fists clenched at his sides. “As a human avatar, I speak for myself and all the gods.”

Nobody was arguing with him now.

There was silence in the room, as though everyone held their breaths.

Konig was smirking at Seth. His chin rested on his hand, legs crossed at the ankles. He was waiting for Seth to drop the bomb: the endorsement that would ensure Konig controlled Marion, the Winter Court, and the darknet for decades to come.

“Our Voice said it at the summit, and I’ll say it again.” Seth towered over Konig, and he put to words what he couldn’t do with fists. “There will be no angels in the Winter Court and we’ll enforce it with blood. Vote to remove ErlKonig from the Autumn Court. Vote against the wedding.” He glared at Konig as the prince’s face drained of blood. “You will
never
touch Marion again.”

K
onig had thought
he’d known anger when Marion had been mouthing off at him the night before. It had felt as though the wine had been a dark spirit possessing him. Everything his parents had ever told him about how to treat a woman—all those words about consent, respect, love—had been gone.

And he’d been strong.

Konig knew how to make Marion respect him. He’d seen the change in her face when he’d lashed out with magic. He’d been angry, and it had been so
righteous
.

There was nothing righteous about the anger he felt now.

Seth Wilder towered over him looking every inch the god—so much more than Arawn had as an impotent demon king in Sheol.

“You will
never
touch Marion again.”

Konig had walked into the room with such confidence, sure he was on the brink of his wedding, and his coronation. The ascension from prince to king.

Seth stole that from him with a handful of ugly words.

Worse, Seth was telling Konig what he was allowed to do with Marion.
His
Marion. His woman, his bride, his princess.

Konig sat up slowly. It required pushing against the full force of Seth’s energy to do it.

Avatar of god or not, Seth was still a man for the time being.

“What did you say?” Konig’s words were chased by all the sidhe power that he normally held back for the benefit of mortals. It oozed from him. It twisted the hall.

Seth didn’t repeat himself. “On your feet.”

“Traitor,” he hissed under his breath.

“We should vote now.” That was Rylie speaking from the other couch. Konig could barely hear her under the throb of sidhe energy whining like a badly tuned cello. “Raise your hands if you are in favor of stripping Prince ErlKonig of his title.”

Konig didn’t look to see who raised their hands. He couldn’t tear his eyes from the endless, inky pits of Seth’s. Konig could see right through Seth’s skull into whirling infinity. Endless stars. Distant suns.

A thousand-million deaths.

“Four,” Rylie said. “Four votes.”

Only four people voted in my favor?
Konig’s heart sank, but still he couldn’t look away.

He heard Deirdre Tombs’s shout of dismay, though. “That’s not possible! The votes—”

“We can’t vote again,” Rylie said. “It’s settled. ErlKonig will remain Prince of the Autumn Court, and the wedding’s on.”

Seth turned, shocked. “What?”

Konig hadn’t lost the vote.

He’d won.

* * *

T
o say
that chaos erupted when the verdict was announced would have been an understatement.

Deirdre Tombs drew a gun.

Several people began to shapeshift.

The Raven Knights swarmed.

Seth rounded on Konig, and whatever shreds of humanity had remained in him were gone, utterly gone, stripped away to bare raw vengeance.

Konig’s survival instinct kicked in at the sight of Seth’s wrath. He’d seen death in those black eyes—a willingness to kill. He reached his mind into the ley lines, extended his body through them, and teleported away.

He phased into the throne room. That alone was adequate verification that Konig had kept his title. It was a protected area separate from the rest of Myrkheimr, and cocooned in so many wards that a wayward sidhe would have been shredded. None but the royal family and their closest servants could leap in there.

He landed safely, stumbling between his parents’ thrones. His heart was pounding wildly.

Konig spun on the spot, looking around the shadowy throne room. The curtains had been drawn to conceal it from the rest of the kingdom, permitting not even the thinnest sliver of sunlight to touch the floor. It was also empty. There was nobody there to see his cowardly flight from Seth.

That was fine. Seth had lost the vote and Konig had won the war. He was still prince.

Amazing how quickly anger and fear turned into victory.

He thrust his fist into the air. “Yes!”

“It was Adàn Pedregon.” Nori appeared moments after he did, breathless and flushed. She had been given authority to access the throne room when she was serving as diplomat for the angels, and it didn’t seem to have been revoked. “I couldn’t tell you before—I’ve been busy—but
Los Cambiaformas Internacional
has been pulling strings. Plus Deirdre did such a good job convincing everyone that Seth isn’t a god because she thought he’d vouch for you—”

“You saw the vote?” Konig whirled her into his arms, planting a hard kiss on her mouth. He laughed wildly. “You saw the vote! You saw my victory!”

“
Our
victory.”

“Yes, that’s what I meant.” Semantics. He was still prince, and he was about to become king.

“It’s going to be a short win if we don’t do something about Marion. That’s why I came looking for you. Marion wants me to find Ymir before she walks down the aisle.”

As high as he’d gone with the excitement, it took him a moment to crash back down again as the implications set in. Konig’s shoulders tightened so hard that they shook. “What did you tell her?”

“I said I’d try. What was I supposed to say?”

“You should have put her off,” he said. “You should have made her realize she needs to trust me.”

“But how? It’s not like she
can
. We’re lying. She knows it. How can she trust that?” Each word made her voice rise in pitch until she was all but shrieking, loudly enough that people would be able to hear outside.

Konig wanted to slap her hard enough to shut her mouth, but Nori wasn’t the same kind of beast as Marion, to be urged forward by spurs. She needed coaxing.

“Marion won’t marry me if she knows what I’ve done to Ymir. Niflheimr will fall and you and I will lose our path to power. She absolutely cannot see him.” Konig watched her face, waiting to see if she’d come to the right conclusion on her own. She kept looking charmingly befuddled. He had to fill her in. “Kill the kid. Tell Marion that Arawn did it because she left the Winter Court unprotected. She’ll be too busy beating herself up to question it.”

“I’m not going to kill a child!”

“Do you want to lose everything we’ve been working for, now that we’re on the brink of victory?” His thumb skimmed over her bottom lip. “I’m so close.
We’re
so close. I can taste it.”

She opened her mouth to respond, but no words came out.

Her body jerked. She grunted. Her eyes widened.

A blade thrust through her belly.

Another jerk, and it cut upwards through her body, shredding her dress.

Nori fell.

Arawn stood behind her, yanking the sword free of her body. His hand was drenched in shiny half-angel blood.

* * *

T
he stylists were retouching
Marion’s makeup when news of the vote arrived. “We won!” Heather cried, bursting into the room. She was grinning with the triumph of it. Marion had never seen her smile like that before. “Only four people voted against us! Four!”

Seth must have advocated for Konig. Marion’s plan had worked, and Konig was still prince.

“Those are great results,” she said, moving her lips as little as possible. A makeup artist was brushing powder along her jawline.

Why was she so dead on the inside?

Heather slid onto the stool beside Marion’s. “Not to be a pessimist, but I really hadn’t expected that.”

“I had a secret weapon on my side.” Marion’s tone was as empty as she felt. “Seth’s a god. I asked him to stand up for us.”

“You did? That’s weird, because the doctor didn’t ‘stand up’ for you at all. He practically threatened to rain hellfire if people voted in your favor, and the vote
still
didn’t go that way. Everyone’s talking about it.”

The feelings that blossomed inside of Marion were so strange.

Despair. Horror. Anger.

Delight.

Seth hadn’t done as she asked. In fact, he’d openly defied Marion’s wishes. And he’d done it because in his heroic, Marion-first brain, he’d wanted to take care of her.

Heather was still talking. Her voice faded in and out of Marion’s awareness. “We’ll have to find Konig quickly…only a few minutes until the wedding, but he had to flee the vote… It sounds like the Raven Knights had to arrest half of the council. I think your doctor friend attacked Konig, so he’s probably been arrested too…”

Marion seriously doubted that anyone would have managed to seize Seth. She was surprised he hadn’t already materialized to abduct her before she could marry Konig.

The idea wasn’t as unappealing as it should have been.

Stupid, selfish Marion
.

“You’re being called, Your Highness.” Her hairstylist grabbed something off of the vanity and offered it to Marion. The white soapstone statuette that Marion and Nori used to communicate with one another was glowing.

“Thank you.” Marion gripped it in one hand.

The line of communication activated as soon as her fingers closed around it.

Flashes of words and images cascaded over her. They would have made no sense to anyone who didn’t have angel blood—not exactly like a phone call, but more like sharing a moment of perfect unity.

Nori was on the floor of Myrkheimr’s throne room.

She was bleeding.

Rearing over Nori was Konig—with an arm locked around his throat and a demon sword near his ribs. Arawn was holding him. And that meant Arawn had done the impossible. Despite relocating the wedding to somewhere sunnier, Arawn was at their wedding.

The sensations ended abruptly.

Marion leaped to her feet with a shriek of shock. “Nori!” Her sudden motion upset the stylists, the stool she’d been sitting on, the table.

Heather had her bow drawn in an instant. “What is it?”

“I need to get to the throne room,” Marion said. “Right now!”

But before she could grab the archer, screaming erupted from outside the windows.

Marion bolted to the window. She already knew what she would see, but infernal power rippling in the shadows between columns was chilling nonetheless. It coursed over the crowd of humans who had been taking their seats for the wedding. Anyone who wasn’t sitting in daylight.

“Impossible,” Marion whispered, even though she’d already seen Arawn, so she knew it was tragically possible.

That was the only word that she could get out before the entire wing of Myrkheimr collapsed.

It folded like a house of cards, the columns bowing in among themselves, the roof sinking, the floor rising to meet it.

Heather swore loudly and launched out the window, nocking an arrow so quickly that Marion hadn’t even seen it come from the quiver.

The archer disappeared into the crowd of fleeing attendees.

“Heather!” Marion shouted, to no response. “Damnation above and below…”

The crowd surged, turning against itself. She tasted the copper tang of blood on the air. Crimson runes raced across the courtyard, crawled up the walls, and ringed the collapsed area.

With a discordant
crash
, hellish energy struck Myrkheimr like a bolt of lightning. Smoke and sulfur poured from dozens of people.

They’d been possessed by demons.

“They collapsed the building so Arawn could invade,” Marion breathed.

But how? They shouldn’t have been capable of getting a foothold in the Autumn Court at all. That was why they’d moved the wedding from the Winter Court, after all. It was meant to be safer, dammit.

The Raven Knights were closing in on the collapsed wing. It was the most obvious threat, and it would keep everyone occupied while Arawn murdered the soon-to-be King of the Winter Court.

“I’m coming, Nori,” Marion said.

Wedding dresses weren’t meant for running in. She was cursedly slow, dragging that train behind her, but incapable of getting out of the dress without help. She hitched the skirts as high as she could and pretended not to hear threads popping and diamonds scattering across the floor.

The hallways were flooded with people running—some haloed in auras of infernal power, others bloody from the attack. They were all going the wrong way. Marion had to fight against the tide to head for the throne room.

Marion was three steps from the corner to the next hallway when she tasted that copper tang again and the walls shivered around her.