A Soul for Vengeance

Chapter 7



The brown-haired elf who answered the door last night met Arden at the bottom of the stairs, regarding her with the same narrow-eyed suspicion as before. “Lord Varrik is in the drawing room.”

“If I find myself in need of him, I’ll know where to find him,” she replied, stepping around him with Cinder close on her heels. She’d elected to stay in her room last night instead of joining her father for dinner, but the rumblings in her stomach forced her to emerge this morning.

The elf cut her off with both speed and grace, ignoring the growl of warning from the fire wolf. “It is rude to ignore your host, Soulbearer.”

“It’s also rude to order around my Soulbearer,” Loku whispered. Images of green lightning snaking down her arms filled her mind, even though she saw none when she looked down. “Why don’t you show him how to respectfully address a goddess?”

Arden cast a mental net around Loku’s magic and pulled it back deep inside her where it belonged. The last thing she needed was for him to cause another earthquake to add to snow already clogging the pass. “Will you behave?”

He laughed, and an invisible hand brushed against her cheek. “Come now, my little Soulbearer, you like it when I misbehave.”

“Not lately.” Because of Loku, she was trapped here with a man she loathed. A man she was being forced to interact with by the elf in front of her. She released a heavy sigh, letting the elf know what a pain in the ass he was being. “Very well, show me the way.”

The elf’s gaze flickered over her, and his lips thinned before he turned to lead her down a hallway.

“If anyone’s being a pain in the ass, it’s you,” Loku hissed. “You’re not being any fun.”

“I’m not here for fun. I’m here for my mother’s necklace.” Reaffirming her purpose dashed away any second thoughts she might have had about sneaking away so she wouldn’t have to deal with the man who’d sired her. She lifted her chin and strode into the drawing room with her goal firmly in place.

Varrik looked up from the book he was reading, his mouth parting, and stood. “I’m honored that you decided to join me, Arden.”

The elf closed the door to the room, trapping her inside the drawing room with her father. “I’m only here because you have my mother’s necklace, and I want it back.”

“So you’ve told me.” He laid his book aside and approached her in the same cautious manner as before, his steps long and slow, his eyes never leaving her face. “Might I offer you some tea?”

Her stomach growled loud enough for anyone inside the palace to hear. Arden gritted her teeth. “Yes, tea would be fine.”

While he went to the tray in the corner to pour her cup, she inspected the room. Two tall bookcases lined either side of the large window overlooking the snowy valley, each overflowing with books. “This looks more like a library than a drawing room.”

“No, the library is down the hall,” he replied, offering her the cup. “I’ll gladly show it to you, if you’d like.”

“Maybe later.” She took a sip of the tea, her breath catching as she tasted the warm brew. He’d known exactly how she liked it without asking. She reinforced her mental shields, an art she’d perfected while in the company of the Empress. “If you have a library, why do you keep all these books here?”

He ran his finger down one of the leather spines, his expression brightening. “These are my favorite books, the ones I’ve read over and over again. They’ve become old friends over the years, and I like to keep them close.”

Arden scanned the shelves, slowly sounding out the titles in her mind. The Transfiguration of Debron’s Empire. The Legacy of Zolar. The Dark Hovel. “I don’t recognize any of these books.”

“I doubt you would. These are all tales about Gravaria. You are welcome to read any of them, though.” He paused, stretching his neck as though his collar was too tight. “That is, if you do read.”

Fire shot down her spine. “Yes, I know how to read, if that’s what you’re implying.”

“Although not very well, eh? I bet you can’t pronounce the title of that book.”

“Shut up, Loku.”

Varrik’s brows rose. “I wasn’t expecting you to be so accomplished.”

“And what is that supposed to mean?” She dug her nails into her palm, the constant simmer of Loku’s magic taunting her, begging her to draw upon it and teach Varrik a lesson or two.

He took a step back as though he seemed to know how close to the brink she was, how dangerous she could become if she dipped into the chaos god’s power. “Nothing at all. I’m just surprised since your mother didn’t know how to read.”

The mention of her mother doused her anger. How could he remember such a personal detail about a woman he cast aside? “She never learned—she was too busy working to support me.”

To his credit, a hint of remorse filled his blue eyes before he looked away. “Then how did you learn to read?”

“Dev taught me.”

She continued to run her finger along the shelf until she came to a book whose spine was so creased, she couldn’t read the title. She pulled it from the shelf and flipped through the pages. She’d only seen writing like this once before, when Dev scribbled something in Elvish for her to try to read. The memory pierced her heart and made her eyes burn. She doubted she’d ever have another reading lesson with him again.

“Stop boo-hooing over that stupid elf and get on with your life. You’re much better off without him trying to restrain us.”

Am I? She’d gotten so used to having Dev by her side in times of trouble that she missed him more than ever in situations like this.

“Remember, you wouldn’t be here if Dev hadn’t meddled in your life and informed Varrik that he’d sired a child with the Ranellian maid he’d had a fling with.”

She lifted her eyes from the book to her father. His face was pale and drawn as he stared at her. “Is something wrong?”

He shook his head, but his expression said otherwise. “I just found it odd you’d choose that book over all the others on the shelf.”

“Why?”

“Well, to start with, it’s in Elvish, which is much more difficult to learn than some of the human languages.”

“He’s lying,” Loku whispered in the back of her mind. “Look at him—he’s terrified you’ll learn the truth.”

Varrik’s eyes moved from side to side, lingering at the door for several seconds like he wanted to flee the room. His hands trembled. And when he caught her looking at them, his eyes widened, and he balled them up into fists. But it was too late. “No, there’s something else about this book that you don’t want me to know about.”

“Perhaps.” An odd mixture of emotions washed across his face. Fear. Anguish. And lastly, hope, as though he wanted her to pursue this conversation even though he didn’t want to answer her question.

She flipped through the vellum pages and tried to decipher the jumbled scribbles of lines, swirls and dots, failing miserably. “Can you read this, Loku?”

“Of course I can, you foolish child.”

“Then tell me what it says, you disembodied jerk.”

But instead of the chaos god answering her, it was Varrik who said with the same hesitancy he always bore around her, “That is The Epic of Engellik.”

A rush of memories slammed into her. Arden heard her mother’s voice reciting her favorite bedtime story about a knight sent on a series of quests to eventually find his true love and win her heart. Every evening, her mother would tell her just a piece of the story, enough to set her imagination flying and leave her anxious to hear the next installment. She’d lost count how many times she’d heard the entire tale before her mother died, but it was enough for her to recall specific quotes. “And Engellik looked at the goddess and asked, ‘Why did you choose me out of all the men in this realm?’”

“‘Because you have the bravest heart,’ the goddess replied,” Varrik continued, finishing the line from the story.

Arden’s eyes swam with irksome moisture she refused to let fall. She closed the book and held it to her chest. She’d come for her mother’s necklace and had discovered instead another mystery. “How did my mother come to know a Gravarian legend?”

“Because I read it to her every night.” His voice, so soft and solemn, spoke of gentler times, of moments shared by two people in love, and of longing for a time in his life he wished he could recapture.

“Was that before or after he had his way with her?”

Arden suppressed her scream of frustration. “Shut up, Loku!”

But even his lewd comment couldn’t shake the turmoil brewing inside her heart. Sweat prickled her skin, and her heart raced. Her breath couldn’t come fast enough. Everything she thought she knew was being challenged once again. The man she’d always pictured as being cruel and uncaring, of casting her mother aside once he’d finished using her, suddenly became more complicated. How could her mother continue to recite the same story told to her by a man who’d wronged her unless…?

She raised her eyes to Varrik and saw the answer she feared.

The only way her mother could continue to recite the same story told to her by a man who’d wronged her was because perhaps he never did wrong her.

Her heart, so full of bitterness for so many years, squeezed and thudded against her chest. She tightened her hold on the book, pressing it against her ribs as though it could dull the painful truth she wasn’t ready to acknowledge.

Varrik ran his finger along the top of the book. “I brought this with me to Ranello years ago. It’s the very same book I read to Alisa night after night.” He withdrew his finger, letting it hover inches above the spine before adding, “I find it strange that you would be drawn to it without even knowing what it contained unless a shared memory can weave magic that neither of us comprehends.”

A lump lodged in her throat, choking her anger back and letting a new emotion take root. Whatever twisted game Loku had envisioned when he’d trapped her here, she never imagined it would leave with this hunger to know her father better. What kind of man was he? What was it about him that made her mother fall so in love with him? And what was the real reason why they were torn apart?

“You are as disgustingly naïve as your mother.” Loku’s insult squashed any seedlings of curiosity and let the longstanding weeds of bitterness take over. “Be wary of him, Arden. He fooled your mother, just like he’s trying to fool you now. He knows you want that necklace, but he refuses to give it to you. Why?”

Her pulse stuttered for several beats before resuming the long, solid strokes she’d started the morning with. The dam she’d built to hold back Loku’s power cracked, and magic seeped into her veins. “Is this another one of your lies, Varrik?”

He balked, the softness fleeing from his eyes and revealing an unexpected side to the man who’d sired her. This man stood firm like a formidable opponent who was more than capable of taking her on. A wall of unfamiliar magic encased her. “You’re letting him have too much influence over you, Arden.”

Loku fought back, his reach extending to the surface of her skin and adding a deep echo to her voice. “You do not want to anger us, you silly mortal. We are far more powerful than you can ever imagine.”

The door handle jiggled, but Loku sent a bolt of magic toward it, melting the metal lock. He seized more and more control of her body, pushing her back to the deepest recesses of her consciousness.

Cinder whimpered and nudged her hand with his cold nose, but she couldn’t even ruffle his fur and let him know she was alright. Loku now dictated when and how she moved.

“Arden, remember who you are,” Varrik said, his voice calm and steady. “You are the Soulbearer, the one chosen to contain him, not to be his slave.”

She struggled to fight back, but it was like trying to swim in the waves of a stormy sea. She’d already let him grab too much control, and now she was drowning.

Loku laughed, his voice coming from her mouth. “See, Varrik? I have complete control of her. She’s mine. Now give us what we want.”

“You’ve grown arrogant, Loku.” Varrik stood tall, his unyielding stance acting like a rope thrown from a boat that she could grab onto. “You’ve forgotten how you ended up like this.”

“No, I’ve never forgotten. But you underestimate her hatred, her desire to have vengeance for what you did to her mother. She’s willingly relinquished control to me to carry out your punishment.”

“No, I haven’t,” she yelled back, but her words remained buried deep within her mind where only Loku could hear her. She clawed her way back to the surface, fueled by her fury. Loku was putting words in her mouth. Loku was betraying her. And Loku would pay once she regained control.

For a brief second, she managed to overtake him. The book fell from her hands as she reached for the one person offering to help her. Then a cloud of green lightning swallowed her, shoving her back into the black abyss. She was falling deeper into Loku’s spell—so deep, she feared she’d never come back.

A low chant halted her freefall, leaving her suspended in the void.

“Stop it!” Loku growled, but the chant grew louder and clearer with each repetition. Although she didn’t understand the words, they beckoned her to trust them. A beam of light sliced through the darkness. She grabbed it.

What happened next, she couldn’t describe. It was like flying faster than a peregrine’s dive, only instead of going down, she was being pulled up. The speed pressed the air from her lungs, blurred her vision, and made her jaw ache from clenching it so tightly. She ripped through the veil of helplessness Loku had tried to smother her with and emerged from the other side with a bone-jarring landing that left her with a pounding headache. She squinted in the bright light that flooded her eyes and tried to bring the world around her back into focus.

And when she did, she found Varrik standing in front of her with his finger pressed against her forehead.

Her legs crumpled as though the bones had been pulled from them. A pair of arms caught her as she fell and led her gently to the floor where Cinder sat waiting for her to lean against him. “Arden, are you back?” a concerned voice asked.

She didn’t trust her voice, didn’t want to open her mouth and have Loku’s words spill forth, so she merely nodded and wrapped her arms around Cinder’s neck.

The doors rattled twice before splintering off the hinges. The brown-haired elf burst into the room. A rope of magic coiled around her hands, her feet, her neck. “Are you safe, Lord Varrik?”

“Quite safe, Callix,” he replied, dissipating the imprisoning spell with a wave of his hand. “There’s no need for that.”

Callix remained tense and aloof, another spell sparking along his fingertips. “I sensed great chaos in here.”

Arden laughed in spite of the fact her pulse still hammered from the ordeal. Great chaos was an understatement. Loku had managed to slip through her restraints once again, this time to the point of scaring the wits out of her. She held on to Varrik’s arms, savoring the bedrock steadiness they offered. For the first time since she’d left the Conclave, she wished she could go back and complete her training, if only to prevent this from ever happening again. Next time, she doubted she’d be able to lock Loku away.

“You did, but we have this under control, Callix. Loku is contained.”

A thread of unease squirmed through her gut. She’d only contained the chaos god once, and with dire consequences. She called out to him, but got no reply. “You know how to do that?” she asked.

Varrik helped her to a nearby chair and offered her another cup of tea before answering. “Who do you think taught Dev?”

She took the cup, but didn’t drink. Her nerves were too frazzled for anything less than a strong drink. She shifted her attention between the two elves in the room, wondering what kind of danger lurked here now that she was without the power of the god at her command. “I’d like to release him from his confinement, please.”

Callix lunged toward her as though she threatened to assassinate the Empress. Cinder jumped to his feet, his fangs bared, but Varrik stepped between the elf and the growling fire wolf and asked her, “Why?”

“Because despite what you just witnessed, I think he would protect me if needed.”

“Don’t do it, Lord Varrik.” Callix’s nostrils flared as he glared at her. “The Soulbearer has obviously been seduced by Loku.”

“Seduced?” She shoved the cup back into Varrik’s hands and crossed the room to stand in front of the brown-haired elf. “What kind of sick world do you live in where that is considered seduction?”

“Then why do you defend him?”

She blinked several times, searching her mind for a reason. Despite all of his plotting and scheming, she still actually believed Loku cared for her. After all, he’d saved her life more times than she’d cared to admit. He’d helped her free her homeland from a necromancer and shown her how to heal Dev after he’d been mortally wounded. He’d bolstered her confidence when she doubted her place in the world and provided a sympathetic ear when her heart was troubled. But how could she keep that side of Loku without tipping over into the nightmare she’d just experienced?

“It’s complicated,” she said at last.

“Undoubtedly.” Varrik came beside her and placed his hand on her elbow. “You can leave, Callix. I have everything under control.”

The brown-haired elf left with a snort of displeasure, restoring the doors to their former condition with a snap of fingers before closing them.

Varrik led her back to the chair. “Sit,” he said in a tone that allowed no argument. “We need to talk.”

“I’m listening.”

Varrik crossed his arms and paced for a minute, his brow wrinkled while he seemed to choose his words. “What has Sazi taught you about controlling Loku?”

“Not nearly enough.” Especially if today was any indication.

“Indeed.” He stopped short and turned sharply on his heel to face her. “I think we need to strike some sort of bargain while you’re here. I’ll return your mother’s necklace to you, but only after you’ve proven to me that you can successfully contain Loku should he get out of control like that again.”

She dug her fingers into the arms of the chair. “How can I prove it to you when you have him contained?”

“I’ll help you release him, but only after you’ve recovered from this and mastered a few helpful spells.” He tilted her chin up so she couldn’t help but notice the seriousness in his eyes when he added, “This is a dangerous game you’re playing with him, one where you do not understand the rules, nor the consequences, Arden. But I intend to help you level out the playing field.”

He released her and pulled a slip of paper out from between the pages of the book he’d been reading when she’d first entered. “There is another matter to address, though, before we start your lessons. The Mage Primus and your Protector are quite worried about you.”

“You didn’t tell them I’m here, did you?” She jumped from her chair and calculated the number of steps between here and the door.

“No, I haven’t. This letter just arrived this morning to inform me that they regretfully had lost my daughter.” He set the letter down on his book. “The question is, why do you want to hide from them?”

The ache in her chest returned with throat-swelling vengeance. “Because I can’t bear to be around Dev anymore.”

“What did he do to you?”

The dangerous note in Varrik’s voice startled her at first, as did the murderous gleam in his eyes. For a man who’d only learned he had a daughter a few months ago, he’d already mastered the role of an overprotective father.

“Nothing, Varrik,” she replied, hoping her words would appease him. “He’s done nothing other than remain steadfast in his duty above all else.”

Varrik was no fool. His eyes searched her face for any clue of what really happened between her and Dev, but she kept her expression blank and the secrets of her heart closely guarded.

“Very well,” he said, his attention falling back to the book that held the letter. “I promise I will not tell them you are here so long as I feel your safety is not compromised. But that means I’m keeping Loku contained until I feel you are ready to control him.”

She looked to Cinder to see if he sensed any danger from Varrik or this arrangement. The wolf sat with his tongue hanging out of his mouth, completely at ease now that Callix had left the room. “I’ll agree to my end of the bargain so long as you agree to keep yours.”

“Agreed.” He paused before adding a word that sent an icy shiver down her spine, “Daughter.”