Page 22 of The Horned King

With a shrug, I tell him as little as possible, "The sooner they are to their death when I get them, the closer they remain to their living form. He might not even know that he's dead."

"Who's dead?" the man then asks from his chair in front of us.

I cross one leg over the other, feigning nonchalance even though my entire body feels like the moment just before lightning strikes, my skin breaking out in goosebumps. There's no need to let Shan know just how much seeing Elva in danger today affected me. I'm not ready to have that conversation with myself, much less him. "You are. And I have some questions for you."

"What are you talking about?" The man stares me down as if waiting for a joke or an explanation. But I do not have time for either of those.

"You are dead," I reiterate. "And I brought you back because I need to ask you a few questions."

"How did I die?"

Rolling my shoulders to ease the tension, I give him this one answer, "Gerald snapped your neck. Now, who sent you?"

"Who the fuck is Gerald?" he nearly shouts, and I don't fucking have time for this.

Not willing to keep playing this back and forth, I take complete control of his mind, searching for his last few memories. I don't like doing this because in order to do so, I have to look at the exact moment they died and trace backward from there. The pain, the fear, the resignation, or lack thereof in this case, in those last moments, are something I do not enjoy living through. But he's not going to give these answers willingly, and I need them right now.

I watch in his head as the memory of his neck snapping and everything going dark clears, going back further to his complete focus on Elva, the determination that he was going to put a bullet in her skull if it was the last thing he ever did. I live through his terror at the idea of failure, the fear that something terrible is going to happen to his family if he does.

In the recent past, swirling through his head, there's a note on his workbench. A carpenter with a penchant for hunting caught the eye of a mystery donor, who threatened to kill him and his family if he did not kill our visiting dignitary. And there, beneath the note, crumpled and smeared, a crude drawing of Miss Elva Aistin. Even in shades of charcoal gray and parchment yellow, there's no mistaking her large eyes, brilliant grin, and flowing hair. There's even a little dimple on one side, and I wonder if that's what it looks like when she truly smiles. The falsified ones I've received have been far less vibrant than the one in this drawing.

This is from someone who knows Elva. Truly knows her well enough to see who she is behind the niceties she wears as armor. Which is helpful, yet decidedly not. Whoever wants her neutralized has gone through the effort of obtaining a drawing from someone who is close enough to see the truth about her. Who could possibly have that kind of power and influence and want her dead? And why?

"I've seen enough," I tell Shan and the man before me, whose name I don't even care to retrieve. "You can go dump yourself into a grave now."

Telling him to do so is redundant, but I love the way Shan shudders whenever I give the corpses orders.

I'll simply watch through the man's eyes, guiding him until he finds a small place he can dig himself a hole to lie in forever. Once he climbs inside, I'll let go of my hold on his soul, let it travel into the next world, and give him the peace he requires. But for now, he is mine to control. And should I need him again, he will be then, too—just… without the messy soul attached.

"That is unnerving," Shan whispers once he's gone. "How quickly after death do you need to get to them to keep them whole like that?"

Three minutes.

But I don't tell him that. "Not sure. Can't say I've ever experimented on them that way. Once they've been dead too long, whatever makes them themselves is gone, leaving behind a perfectly empty vessel for me to control. All the memories, but none of the personality or emotions attached to them."

He pushes for more answers, curiosity getting the best of my right-hand man. "How long could he have gone on like that? Not knowing he's dead? If you hadn't told him, I mean."

"Indefinitely, I suppose." I shrug. "If I hadn't been controlling him, he might have tried to go home to his family, only to drop dead as soon as he left the castle grounds."

My powers only stretch so far, and from the tests I've done, it seems that the castle grounds are roughly the extent of my reach.

"Wow."

I mhmm, not wanting to continue this conversation any longer than necessary.

Clearing my throat, I change the subject, needing to get to the solution of this fucking conundrum of a day. "Okay, let's talk about what this means."

Hours later, Shan and my other living guards were given new assignments, new rounds, and new rules to follow.

The most important change we're making is also going to be the most difficult by far. Elva can't be permitted to leave the castle grounds, nor can she be without a chaperone at any given time. She's going to hate it, but for the sake of my entire fucking country, she can't be harmed.

Attempting to rub the tension from my temples, I wait patiently as Shan explains again the consequences should Elva be killed whilst she is here.

Allowing them that provision was a mistake. Allowing her here at all was a mistake. According to Shan, there are so many reasons people would want her dead and take this opportunity to make it happen. Half of our surrounding countries still have extremist groups that believe only Zalig are worthy of leadership and will stop at nothing to eliminate non-Zaligs from power.

A handful of our neighbors also still believe women shouldn't be in power, while others feel that letting just anyone have a say in their leaders will have disastrous consequences. Any one of them would take this time to send a message and send our nations into war in the process. Do any of them know that her safety has been guaranteed for these peace talks? Certainly not. How could they?

So now, not only will I be surrounded by pompous politicians and their outdated ideals, but I'll have to solve the mystery of which of them sent an assassin to kill my guest while I'm enduring their endless drivel.

---