Page 4 of The Crimson Walls Of Algorath

Nikolai allowed a slow and wicked smirk. His brown eyes glinted in the moonlight as he turned his attention to Azriel. “You have been summoned to the Princeps.”

Heat flooded Ariadne’s veins. She launched from the carriage. “We dined with my father just yestermorn. He gave us his blessing.”

“Circumstances have changed.” Nikolai nodded once to his soldiers, and they pushed Azriel forward. He resisted, the shackles’ clang grated against her ears, summoning images of Azriel’s back splitting open and the sharp pain of her own lessons at the hands of Ehrun.

“He is a Lord Governor,” she rasped. “Treat him as such.”

Nikolai’s smirk broadened. “He is an enemy of Valenul until proven otherwise.”

Azriel grunted as they pushed again, and this time, he continued onward. “So much for the laws. I’ll be fine, my love.”

The soldiers marched him away, and Ariadne grabbed her old Elit’s arm. The same arm she had once drank from under the careful supervision of her father. She searched his pale face, webbed with blue lines that mirrored her own as a symbol of their place amongst the elite Caersan vampires. “Please. I know this is from Loren. Let him go.”

“Now, now, my Lady,” Nikolai said and swept his short brown hair back from his forehead. “What are you going to do? Kill me and hide my body in a basement?”

Ariadne’s stomach curled. He knew what she did. He knew it had been her blade that cut through the guard’s throat and she who dumped the bodies down the steps into that vile cellar. A torture chamber, more like it, from which she had rescued her secret half-brother, Madan.

When she did not respond right away, Nikolai pushed past her and followed the soldiers to the prison wagon they pulled out from a side road. Despite the darkness of the night, Ariadne saw everything as clear as day thanks to her pure-blooded Caersan eyes—even if the colors were a bit muddled. It was the same wagon that brought Azriel back to the Harlow Estate after his lashings. The door opened, and this time, when her husband stepped in, he wore the finery of the Society, not the bloodied remains of his bare skin.

“Are you taking him to the prison?” Ariadne croaked, unable to focus on anything but Azriel’s green eyes glowing from behind the iron bars.

Nikolai did not so much as look back at her as he mounted his stallion and turned to face down the highway. “The Harlow Estate.”

Then, as fast as they had appeared, the soldiers vanished into the night.

Ariadne stared at where their crimson cloaks faded into the distant shadows. She heard nothing but the roaring of her blood in her ears. Despite the summer night’s warmth, an icy chill crept into her bones.

If Loren still controlled the military despite his revoked status as General, they were in more trouble than Ariadne could begin to comprehend. The soldiers continued to listen to his commands and, worse, looked to him for orders. He had stooped to torture and murder to acquire information about Azriel. Though Madan would never reveal the truth of his half-brother’s fae heritage, she could not be certain Loren had not pieced it together himself.

Of what she knew of the ex-General, it was that he would never give up, and Azriel had humiliated him not once but twice. While he may have let the duel go, the embarrassment at the Teaglow’s ball would be too much. Vengeance remained all he had left.

“Astra,” Ariadne breathed and when no one moved, she took a light-headed stumble toward her gray-speckled mare behind the carriage. Louder, she said, “I need Astra.”

The Rusan backstepper shot into action, face wan and shoulders tense. He untied the lead and exchanged the rope for reins with shaking hands. The straps of the saddle, already buckled for use, were tightened and set to the correct adjustments in a matter of moments, thanks to his practiced fingers.

“Meet me back at the Harlow Estate,” she said as she swung up and into the saddle. “I will fix this.”

How? By the gods, how would she be able to keep Loren from exposing Azriel? She could only pray no one listened to him. After all, no one would listen to a word she said, and even if they did, they would not heed her. But she would never forgive herself if she did not try.

Ariadne turned Astra back the way they came and shot off down the highway. All semblance of tranquility brought on by their tumble in the carriage had waned. They had not made it far from the capital, but the time it would take to turn the carriage around and lumber back to the Harlow Estate would be too long.

What she would do once she arrived, Ariadne had no idea. Perhaps her father would see reason before her arrival and demand Azriel be released immediately. He had no reason to believe her husband to be anything but the upstanding Lord Governor of Eastwood Province that he had been the last several weeks. Loren had no proof of anything, be it the slaughtered guards or Azriel’s hidden dhemon parentage.

By the time she rode up the drive to the Harlow Estate, the prison wagon stood empty. She leapt from Astra and collected her travel skirts to dash up the front steps where the front doors were left wide.

Azriel knelt in the foyer, Loren standing over him and facing her father, the single most powerful vampire in Valenul. The former’s silver hair, tied back by a crimson ribbon in solidarity with the soldiers around the perimeter, glinted in the light of the chandelier. The latter stood across from him in stark contrast, his dark brows pulled low over golden, hawk-like eyes that snapped in her direction.

Ariadne shoved past the soldiers nearest her husband and sank to her knees beside him. His shackles had been removed, likely by her father’s command. “Did they hurt you?”

A quiet grunt in response, and Azriel turned over his arm to expose the small cut on his wrist. Blood trickled from the opening—the lack of healing from his impure bloodline—yet her breath did not catch at that. Small black webbing stretched out from the wound, pulsing in and out of sight in time with his quickening heartbeat.

She had seen that once before on Madan’s arm when she half-carried him from the cellar. Liquid sunshine had been cut into his hand, and though it had not killed him the same as true sun exposure’s aegrisolis, his flesh had slowly decayed. But Madan was a Caersan, not a half-blood vampire like Azriel. By all accounts, it should not harm him in the same way.

“My Lord Princeps,” Loren said, his voice rich as molasses. “It is with a heavy heart that I come to you with grave news.”

Was he trying to kill Azriel? That would be treason. What, then, could the liquid sunshine do to Azriel?

Ariadne stared at the webbing. He had to survive, even if she had to cut his hand off, same as their shared brother. She searched her memories for something—anything—that would give her the answer. Every conversation, every interaction, every detail could be a clue.

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