Page 16 of Light Up the Night

She paused and swallowed hard before forcing her smile to return. I understood her emotion. It wasn’t just her mother; it was all of it. In our world, everything had changed. It had all evolved, taking us with it, like it or not.

“If you set here and allowed them to take your king you wouldn’t be Fallen Gods. You wouldn’t even be men… you’d just be Fallen. Disgraced stains on the legacy of your ancestors.” Her eyes scanned and sliced the crowd in a way that I had only seen Generals do, before she spat and smoothed her hair. “I’m not the Queen of the Fallen...so get your fucking asses up and get ready.”

Several heads abruptly lifted, and more than a few eyes threw daggers at her. It didn’t slow her any. She marched toward a soldier with a thick mustache who had finally decided to put his helmet on. His shield was lazing between his hands.

Chalice charged him. She flew into his shield with a thud and began to shove and pummel it.

“Get up!” she barked.

The woman was on a rampage. She brought her hands up and clapped them against either side of his helmet, no doubt ringing his ears and boxing them all at once.

“Get her!” Ender called.

“Don’t tell me those slaves I freed have more fight than you lot… Don’t you dare!”

The crowd bristled and thickened around her. “They marched across her kingdom. The Lost People of the Forest Wilds helped me take one of the Savage Queen’s men. A King of Tauran. Will you make them save your king on their own?”

She was breathless and heaving, but she had said her piece. Ender and I started shoving our way through, but it wasn’t necessary. Chalice turned around and they parted for her, until we were the only thing left in her path.

Ender

Fuck she was beautiful. And oh, so much like Messiah. He was the only other person I’d ever seen unleash that kind of temper on a Fallen God. They were different, those born of the Inlet. No, I wasn’t a child, I knew they weren’t gods. The physician in me reasoned that the answer was likely in their adrenaline. Something narcotic like that made them oblivious to injury and dead set on destruction when they felt threatened.

She was, undeniably, the Queen of the Fallen Gods, nose to nose with the largest amongst them and walking away with her back bared in the boldest of dares.

“What... the... fuck?” Messiah hissed, falling in line beside her.

“Have my bath drawn and take me to her Pretty Prince,” Chalice commanded, ignoring his question completely.

Their eyes locked for a second too long, and she stopped walking and raised a brow. He jerked his head back in what might as well have been a nonverbal repeat of his previous question. She gave a half turn that had more attitude than effort behind it, and he stormed off, quietly cursing on his way toward the kitchen.

“Your room is this way…” I reminded her.

“I’ll see to that after I get what I want. I didn’t trek my ass across three countries and a fucking sea to sip tea with this bastard,” she quipped.

My dick hardened like she had whispered the darkest of lovers’ promises. I reached out and buried my fingers in that silky hair of hers. It was sun lightened in places and gritty from the sea, but I didn’t care; it was her mouth I was after. I hadn’t tasted her in the better part of a month.

I saw the flash of instinct in her eyes, but there was nothing I could do besides brace my mouth against hers and clench my eyes shut. The caress of her tongue made up for the explosion of needles that she sent against the side of my face. I laced my hand around her throat and led her back to the wall.

“We don’t have time for this…” she whispered, but she still slid her hand behind my head. Her lips nibbled and demanded at mine while her hands pressed me away.

“Oh… but when we do…” I groaned before taking her by the hand and leading her toward Lazarus’ office.

“I’ve never been in there before,” she admitted.

“I hadn’t either, until a few weeks ago. You have to see it,” I encouraged, only to feel resistance in my arm. She was planted at the door and staring past me. Someone had left the door open, likely when they dragged the hostage down. The bookcase was aside, and the large heavy door wide. Brick tunnels stretched from beneath the keep to the houses beyond the walls. “It’s an emergency system and a jail all in one.”

I cocked my head and she hesitantly began to follow me. Every now and again, we passed a door. Each contained a room with a ladder leading to the adjoining house. Most were designed as cellars, perfectly concealing their true purpose.

Half-way down, we found the open door of the jail. This room had no cellar ladder going up. It had a cell on either side and enough space to place an extraction chair between them. Tools of all interest and variety hung along the wall. Most of them still wore the evidence of their last victim’s bravery, or lack thereof.

“That one has a mouth full of filth. Apologies, my Queen, you may not want to hear the foulness this one spews,” a soldier in a tidy uniform said. He was young and honestly appeared to believe that the prisoner held the power to offend Chalice.

“Indeed?” Chalice mused, stepping around him. The prisoner’s eyes followed her. She had his full attention once the guard had foolishly betrayed her status. She grabbed a crate and pulled it near his cell, giving him the same cool amused smile he was leveling on her.

The difference was, Chalices’ smile met her eyes.

“Welcome to the Iron Inlet.’ She waved her hand in front of her face when she spoke and cringed, no doubt tasting the mold that clung to the air. “They tell me you are Ryver. That you belong to the Savage Queen.”

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