Page 140 of Kingdom of the Two Moons

Caryan says, “I made it very clear that the rules changed for the time being. I promised an execution to anyone who stepped out of line, so you will have it.”

Caryan turns away from me, from us. I can feel his deadly magic rise, forming like a spear aimed at the chef.

I tear free from Riven’s grip and throw myself over the faun, my eyes closed, my whole body locked up, bracing myself for imminent death.

For a moment, timeitself seems to stop.

Then… nothing. Just the ragged breathing of the faun under me, matching my own.

I blink as a black wind of magic brushes around me, no longer carrying the promise of death.

When I dare to look at Caryan, I find his eyes wide and blazing, but… horrified.

The sentiment is replaced by a mask of Arctic ire. His voice is dead-cold when he orders, “Step away, Melody.”

I glance at Riven, only to find him staring at me wide-eyed, his aura a storm of shock and terror before I look back at Caryan. “No. Please. Please, spare them. It was a mistake. I’m unharmed. He… he’s my friend.” Tears well in my eyes, my hands still curled around the horns of the faun under me, his head at an awkward angle, pressing into my belly. I dare not move. I dare not let go of him either.

Caryan’s eyes are damning. Promising that I’m going to regret this.

I venture, “I offer you a bargain. Please, spare them, and I’ll do whatever thing you want me to do.” I say it without looking at Riven. I can’t. I know what I’d see in his face. Horror. Grief. Destruction. But I know I won’t regret it, not when it saves their lives.

I’m not sure Riven would—could—understand.

Caryan looks at me for a long while before he agrees, “Very well, a bargain it is. A thing called in anytime from now.”

I hiss as something hot and sharp seeps into the skin of my left wrist. When I glance down at it, I find a black tattoo there. Two wings, folded around two crescent moons, burned into my flesh. It thrums. Thrums with a part of my soul that has been forged into it and caged there.

I force myself to not let my terror show on my face when I eventually let go of the chef and straighten.

“Do not ever court my ire again,” Caryan says to the fauns.

The shackles around their hands loosen, but they stay kneeling, their heads bowed so low their horns touch the soft grass.

“You are dismissed. All of you,” Caryansays with a last, long glance at me before he spreads his wings, their span easily twice my size, and shoots up into the air.

***

“What have you done, my little one?” Riven asks once we are back in the enclosure of his chambers. A warm black and lilac fire jumps alive in the huge fireplace as soon as we enter, and I sink before it, my legs pulled up tight against my body.

Riven hasn’t spoken to me until now. We walked back in silence. I was numb, stealing glances at the strange tattoo.

I make myself meet his face at last, surprised to find only softness there. He holds out a tumbler to me, a liquid as black as elderberry sap in it. I take it, swallow and shudder against its taste, the way it fragrantly burns down my throat. A kind of distinct pain coming along with it, one that distracts from everything else.

I take another sip. “I know you’re disappointed,” I say finally, looking back at the beautiful flames, the black dancing with the violet.

“How could I be if you offered a bargain for such a noble reason?”

I frown up at him. “I’ll admit that you surprise me,” I say, quoting his words from a night that feels years back rather than mere weeks.

He gives me the gentlest hint of a smile. “Is that a good or a bad thing?”

I shrug before I get up. “A dangerous one, I guess.” My eyes come to rest on his. My voice falls quiet. “Caryan has never done that before, has he—execute people for tiny mistakes? I saw your aura. The surprise there. The horror,” I continue before he can answer me. I’d glimpsed it on that lawn, the moment Riven had been too distracted to keep up the veil.

Riven turns his head away, staring into the flames. “No, he has not.”

“It is me, right?”

His jaw tenses but he doesn’t answer.

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