Black Crown (Darkest Drae, #3)

“This is my home. Wild animals have lairs. My empire is all of Draeconia, from the front of the cliffs, extending out to the water on all sides, all the way down to your precious Verald. And yes, that door will lead you to the rest of my abode. Behind you is your private washroom, through the smaller doorway there.”

I didn’t even need to speak anymore to be answered. How convenient. I offered Daddy Draedyn a tight smile.

A foreboding darkness billowed out from him, the only response to my flippant thought. The creeping dark-green power crawled through the room toward me, and I had a minor freak out. He didn’t expect me to watch my thoughts, did he? That was probably impossible for anyone.

The ominous pressure retracted like a knife pulled from a wound. I was drawn forward as though dragged by an invisible force.

“Very true, daughter,” the emperor murmured, walking around the bed away from the door. “Our thoughts are the essence of what we are. As you think, you will become. Do you know what guides me?”

Ugh. Was he giving parental advice? Or trying to bond? When would he just go— Oops.

He turned to the black wall, hands clasped behind his back. He was huge although his choice of apparel made him seem smaller. As he drew closer, I better appreciated his height, maybe five or six inches taller than Tyrrik although thinner than my mate. To the outside observer, only years might’ve separated us, but in truth, Draedyn was hundreds or thousands of years old.

He’d killed my mother. Not directly, but he’d led her to a life of secrecy and fear. What life could my mother have had if not for being rounded up and carted off to him to be a brooding mare?

What the hay was he looking at the wall for? The meaning of life?

“Betrayal,” the emperor said.

Maybe he was touched in the head—more than his utter ruthlessness and greediness for power suggested. I took a deep breath and, humoring him, repeated, “Betrayal?”

His shoulders tensed.

His mind-reading-thing was reducing the likelihood of my escape.

“Hundreds upon hundreds of years have gone by,” he said, still speaking to the graphite wall. “And yet the strongest memories I have are those of betrayal. What it felt like: the twist in my stomach, the wrench in my heart, the fire in my belly. I used to get angry and frustrated with the inconvenience. I had to create plans to exact my revenge. I deserved recompense from those who dared to defy me, or worse, rise against me. I vowed never to forget a betrayal, and I didn’t. Each time someone significant broke my trust, I pulled a scale from my Drae body. That way I had merely to look upon my true form and be taken back to the exact moment, the exact feeling I had.”

That. Was. Messed. Up. Seriously.

That, right there, that was why he was crazy, with a capital K. Revenge? Recompense owed? Burn someone’s pancakes, chop down a tree, or get a hammer and go bang some nails into a stump like a normal person. Better yet, go blow fire at the stars.

I cringed as the oily green power began to creep back. What a time to learn my mind liked to rattle one insult off after another. Actually, I might’ve known. Tyrrik hearing my thoughts and Draedyn hearing them weren’t the same thing.

The emperor turned, hands still at his back, his facial features fixed in an impassive mask I was certain male Drae were born with. “I have spent my entire life serving this realm. I came from the Draekon desert with the goal to leave a legacy the Drae could be proud of. But the Drae began to rise against me. My own people denied the aid necessary to obliterate our mutual enemies. I was forced to look for a different route to success. I sent Irdelron and my Druman to give them a choice. There is no way to straddle a line when it comes to war. If you aren’t for, then by default you are against, and the Drae refused to join me,” Draedyn said, his neck tightening as he reigned in his emotions.

Ouch. They mustn’t have liked him at all. No surprises there.

Draedyn’s hands curled into fists.

He continued his history lesson. “Irdelron and the Druman were forced to slaughter them and bring me the female Drae. I took every precaution I could with those of my kind. I collected the Phaetyn, knowing the healers could help the females with child, but we lost so many. And then there was Draehl. I remember the reports of your mother’s progressing pregnancy.” His eyes flicked to mine and I stilled. “I visited her, felt you kick her belly. I watched over her. She was not my mate, but I felt the same protective draw to what she carried in her womb—to you. I was desperate for you. I forced Phaetyn after Phaetyn to heal you and her, but she continued to decline. I remember when the Phaeytn queen poured her vitality into your mother.”

The creeping darkness, the color of rotting garbage, reached me, sucking the air from my lungs as it clawed up my body to my mind. I reached hands to my throat, but there was nothing there I could pull against, no way to free myself.

“I was told she died, just like the others, by the midwife. But I remember, weeks later, being informed of Draehl’s betrayal.” He straightened and inhaled through his nose, tipping his chin slightly. “Yes,” he said, drawing out the word. “Years go by, but memories of betrayal remain, and recompense will be paid.”

My eyes watered, and I whimpered from the lack of air.

He glanced at me, his eyes widened, and the creeping power fell away like water down a sluice on irrigation day.

I coughed, wheezing to fill my lungs.

He clicked his fingers, and the door swung open. “But I do not blame you. Which is why I would welcome you into my empire, heir-daughter, with a gift.”

I drew my hand across my watering eyes to clear them. The dark power still lingered around the edges of the room, and I focused on it, forcing myself to stare until I was able to distinguish the dark-green power hovering over the floor like wet soot. Curious. I turned my thoughts inward and searched for my Drae tendrils of energy. The lapis lazuli threads were there, locked outside my mind by a shield of Draedyn’s emerald powers. His shield looked just like a thick-cut gem wrapped around my head, separating my mind from the entirety of my Drae side. I tried to think about shifting, but there was no way to access, let alone wield my power.

A light tread outside the doorway announced someone’s arrival.





29





I turned and scowled, my heart twisting with dislike and distrust as another piece of my missing memory came back.

“Kamoi,” I greeted coolly. A tiny sliver of doubt, the thought that Kamoi might have been forced to do what he’d done, was all that kept me from launching off the bed and strangling the Phaetyn prince.

He’d been sitting on Draedyn’s back when they captured me. And it was the reason he’d been there that had my fists curling into tight, white-knuckled balls. Phaetyn could see through my veil. When I’d been searching for Lani, I’d let my Drae shield lax in order to glimpse the gold of her veil around the army.

But I’d had the Phaetyn veil up.

Kamoi had been Draedyn’s eyes. The Phaetyn guided the Drae straight to me. I was here because of the prince’s failure. He either hadn’t been able to lie well enough or worse. His only decent decision in their capture of me was he’d had the guts not to give up the entire army.

“Ryn,” he said, his voice quivering as he shifted his violet gaze to the floor.

“Is Kamini al’right?” I asked, jaw clenched.

He dipped his head.

Barely. I deserved a mite more attention than that considering he freakin’ gave me up! A growl slipped through my teeth, and my body trembled with rage.

“Yes, heir-daughter. This Phaetyn has proved most helpful. But you don’t know the half of it,” the emperor said, amusement lacing his voice. “Would you like to know all that he’s done?”

Kamoi flinched horribly, his pale skin blanching beyond what could be normal, even for a Phaetyn.

Kelly St. Clare & Raye Wagner's books