Page 68 of What Lies Beyond the Veil

“It really isn’t normal how much you enjoy it when I hit you,” I said, taking a step backward when he came toward me slowly. I forced myself to hold my ground, tightening my grip on the hilt of my sword and readying myself for the attack I knew had to be coming.

“If you can hit me, you can hit anyone,” he said, stabbing toward me with a quick jab. I bent backward to avoid it striking me in the chest. “And I will very much enjoy watching you cut down our enemies at my side one day.”

His second stab came toward me to accentuate those words, and I raised my sword in a quick arc to shove his to the side. Caelum went on the offensive, stabbing and swiping at me so rapidly that all I could do was deflect his blows. There was no time for me to go on the offensive myself when I could barely defend myself against his attack.

“Come on, Estrella,” he pushed, aggravation tinting his voice as he urged me be faster. To be stronger than I was. “Sink into it andburn.”

I fought to regain my composure, searching for that place inside me where the flame of a star blazed, and for the ability to defend myself when I was too worried about death to fear a potential injury.

What I found inside me wasn’t a light. It didn’t burn with the brightness of a thousand stars in the night sky. What I found at the center of my body was a place so cold it burned as icy waters in the depths of winter burned, so far from the surface that nothing but inky darkness surrounded me.

I sank into that cold hollow inside of me, letting it wrap me into a familiar embrace. My fingers burned on the hilt of my sword as I shoved Caelum’s sword to the side, stepping toward him quickly and lifting my leg to press into his chest between his attacks.

I pushed him with all the strength in that leg, watching as he stumbled backward. He caught me by the ankle as a grin claimed his face, holding it so the bottom of my boot pressed to his chest. I bent my leg at the knee, leaning my weight into him and using it to drive him further away. Just enough that I could get my ankle loose from his grip and stand on my own two feet once more.

I hurried to strike while he was off balance, landing a sharp smack against the flesh of his belly as a woman’s laughter echoed through the room. Caelum paused, turning his attention to where Melian strode up to face us.

“It’s funny; this doesn’t look like my library,” she said, lifting her chin toward me in challenge. Her lips curved up into the hint of a dare to defy the challenge, as if she found me amusing in her own way.

“I can fight. It would be foolish for me to lose that ability while studying books that will still be there in an hour,” I said. My breath came in deep pants, the exertion of our sparring making me feel heavy as I pulled out of the space inside of me and returned to reality.

“I’ve no issue with you getting physical activity down here, Estrella. All that matters to me is that you continue your work with the texts. Your value is not as a body to be cut down by our enemies, but in the mind that holds information most of us lack.” Though her voice soft and soothing, there was the gentle thrum of a command in it, as if she couldn’t quite turn off the leader, but it wasn’t harsh or cruel.

“That’s funny. I thought my worth was in spreading my legs and letting your men fuck me. According to Jensen anyway,” I said, the words carrying through the room. The first judgment of my usefulness would never go away. Her assessment would never erase that someone had thought to use me in the same way men had tried all my life.

“Jensen is being dealt with for his inappropriate behavior toward you. That I can promise you, Estrella. You will not be pressured to become something you do not want to be. Not here,” she said, the sadness in her voice bringing a pang inside me. To exist somewhere that I could be more than just a body to fuck or breed was still unfathomable to me, when that was all I’d been raised to believe was my future.

I had no smart reply in the face of knowing the man who’d made me uncomfortable would be dealt with, nothing else I could say to make my stance known.

“Come. You’ll train with me,” she said, nodding her head over to one of the other unclaimed spaces. I glanced back to Caelum, wincing when I found his glare on her.

“I think I’m perfectly capable of training her,” he said, sneering at the woman. He left me with no doubt that the two of them would remain at odds, even with the misunderstanding with Jensen behind us and being addressed. I wanted to like her, even admired her for the fact that she’d come to be in power in a movement that was filled with men and women alike.

“You’re holding back,” she said, cocking her hip to the side and crossing her arms over her chest as she met Caelum’s glare. “I have seen you cut through four of my men at a time. Estrella can fight, and she has the potential to be a great warrior one day if we teach her appropriately, but you will do her no favors by babying her. HerViniculumwill protect her against the Mist Guard unless they manage to trap her in irons. It is the Fae she needs to train for, and they are far greater fighters than you,” she said, stretching out a hand and catching me by my free one. She braved Caelum’s wrath to pull me away from him, taking me over to the space she’d gestured to before. A dummy sewn from cloth and stuffed with straw sat there waiting, the pointed ears on each side of its head leaving no doubt as to what it was meant to be.

“He won’t be happy with you,” I mumbled the moment we were out of earshot from Caelum. I pursed my lips together tightly to try to suppress the grin and chuckle that threatened to surface at the look she gave me.

“It’s cute that you think I care, but I promise you I am very much used to people not being happy with me. Such is the life of a leader who has to make the hard decisions when the consequences can mean life or death,” she said, her thin lips tipping up as she smiled down at me. “There are two ways to kill a Fae.”

She stepped up behind me, raising my practice sword to tap the dull edge of the blade against the neck of the dummy. “Cut off their head or stab them through the heart with iron. Anything else they can and will heal from in time,” she explained, pressing the tip of the sword to the spot where the dummy was marked with a bullseye.

“But iron weakens us, too,” I said, thinking back to the shackle that had been placed around my neck. I couldn’t imagine carrying something like that around all the time, dealing with the heavy feeling as it sank into my bones.

“Iron makes it so that ourViniculumcannot protect us,” she said, nodding in agreement. “Some of the Fae have spelled swords that do not weaken them, but they are few and far between, even among the Fae themselves. We have no such luxury, but you can render them immobile long enough to sever their head from their shoulders if you stab them in the heart with a silver sword. That is your goal, and the easiest way for you to deal with them.”

“Have you ever killed one of them?” I asked, turning a stare at her over my shoulder. I hadn’t seen one, had never laid eyes on them aside from the Wild Hunt.

“One,” she said, a shadow passing over her face, as if the memory was too much for her. “It took three of us to take him down when we went on a raid to a nearby village just after the Veil fell. Trisha cut down his legs. Jensen stabbed him in the heart. I took his head. He was Trisha’s mate, tracking her through the Kingdom when we were out for too long.”

“Do they all look like the Wild Hunt?” I asked, even though I felt fairly certain they didn’t, from the likenesses I’d seen in the texts and the statues at the hot springs. I needed the confirmation that the male coming for me would be different than the ghostly beings I’d seen, even if I didn’t want to know my mate, and never wanted even the misfortune of encountering him.

“When did you see the Wild Hunt?” she asked, going still.

“After the Veil fell. They almost found my brother and me, and then again a few nights later,” I explained. Her eyes drifted closed as she undoubtedly put together the pieces.

I’d had a brother with me. I didn’t anymore.

“Caelum saved me,” I said, giving her a soft smile and knowing it would partially explain my attachment to him. I’d have been taken by the Fae if he hadn’t intervened; already in the arms of the mate I didn’t want.

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