Bonus Chapter 78 - King Ben Blackbone's POV

The nature around us was beautiful this time of year and hiking always took me away from my duties. But it was nothing compared to the sight of Angelica walking next to me, her hand laced into mine, a thrum of promise pulsing through it. She had spoken so tenderly about her cottage and the memories made when she had spent her summers there. I desperately wanted to be a part of that memory bank and make good of my promises. I recalled the taste of her on my tongue and felt my cock harden. A three-day hike and then I’d have her to myself…I hoped. I’d make sure of it even if I had to tie the captain and camp leader to a tree.

Demon snarls broke off my thoughts. “What the fuck!” They should not be in this area.

My hopes of a relaxed hike shattered all at once, fearing I wouldn’t even be able to protect her from the incoming danger. I freed my hand from hers and ripped her dagger from her leg strap. A dagger that would do nothing to protect us from demons.

I snapped my head round to look at the captain. But the captain’s head snapped toward the sound, seeming as surprised that they were this far south as I was. His eyes darkened with recognition, his grip tightening around the hilts of his daggers as he ripped them free from the straps on his orange combat leathers. He rushed to Angelica’s side, his stance low, and braced for a fight.

Mazdon stepped in front of Kate, his sword unsheathed in one fluid motion. He had served in the Air Force, and his family was close to the Coraly family, so did he know about the demons, too? Zayd pulled his twin swords from his baldric, his expression stone-cold. He clearly knew about the demons.

The branches snapped, the sound getting closer, the guttural, choking snarls sounding louder.

“What are they doing so far south?” the captain barked as if he was blaming me.

I wanted to snort at him, but the situation was to dire to argue the point, so I only stared at him, as if he had himself to blame. “Do you have any black blades with you?”

The captain scoffed, his frustration causing cracks in his composure in a way I had never seen him falter before. In a way suitable for the grave situation in which we found ourselves now. “Of course not. We send all the black iron north, unless it’s stolen!” The captain turned towards me, his glare sharp enough to cut as thoroughly as a black blade. A glare that instinctively made me want to push Angelica behind me.

There was no time for a battle between us now. I twisted to monitor the tree line, knowing we had to move far away from the demons, letting my back herd everyone backwards and out into a clearing. “So, what’s your plan, Captain?”

“You’re the king. What do you propose?”

He had captured me, and I had protected his sister in enemy territory risking my life and now he wanted to push the responsibility on me. Fucking coward. A humourless laugh escaped me. “Oh, so now I can be the king?”

“Guys! What’s going on?” Angelica shouted, the fear in her voice scorching my heart.

I found her blue eyes, and they were begging me not to keep another secret. That fucking killed me.

The white-wing leadership had prohibited me from informing her about the demons, threatening both our lives, so my options were few. Hopefully, she’d have committed the small hints I had given her throughout the year to memory. “Do you remember anything I taught you about demons?”

Her entire body seemed to be twisting. “Demons?”

So, no one had filled her in, not the captain and none of the camp leaders calling themselves her friends. Not having much to protect her with now, my anxiety levels were dangerously elevated but the only ones I’d kill if my magic slipped were friends. “The most important fact is that you can’t kill them without black iron, and if they kill you, your soul is dragged straight to the Underworld.”

The fact made her buckle to the ground…no she was crouching, pulling out a black blade knife from my boot. The small knife the general had given her to murder me with. How wonderfully ironic that now she’d use it to save us.

Kate moved, flicking her one thick, red braid over her shoulder. “Demons? Come on, guys. Is this a prank?”

So, this was new intel and shocking to the women while the men had been preparing for years to fight them. Kate’s question was lost on me either way since three demons in dark-grey robes wandered aimlessly near the tree line, emitting that eerie sound that could come from nothing living.

“Let’s move, guys,” Zayd hissed. “They haven’t seen us.”

We started walking backwards, going faster and faster as we entered the clearing. I focused all my energy on being ready to defend Angelica, hardly stomaching to watch the fear flickering across her face.

“I think you’re still messing with us,” Kate snorted, but her hands trembled over the hilts to her daggers.

“You might as well tell her about the rift, Harvey,” Zayd said, also moving as if he’d give his life to save the women.

“Quiet, Zayd,” Harvey hissed under his breath and took Kate’s hand as if that somehow justified his protection and she wouldn’t need to know more.

“Tell her the truth, or I’ll do it. Angie and Kate deserve to know if we’re about to fight them.” Zayd insisted.

Jealousy gripped me by the throat. Jealousy and possessiveness. Angelica’s life wasn’t his to risk.  

“No, you’ll put her in danger when she’s near the generals,” I growled, glaring at the captain in warning.

I had expected a stubborn retaliation from Angelica, but she backed closer to me. Good. My possessive streak had not put her off. I couldn’t have that in this moment. A split focus could be the difference between life and death.

“The generals know everything, anyway. They both assessed me during the ball,” she voiced, and a part of me wanted to smile at her character. The stubbornness had not been snuffed out after all, not even when facing demons. I wanted to kiss her, but it’d have to wait until we were safe.

“Damn,” the captain cursed.

I had no time to consider what the captain was thinking as the shadows were stretching, becoming a bigger threat to us by the minute. Demons lived in the shadows, and Angelica seemed to have realised it to, guiding us towards the end of the clearing where the grass field was still bathed in sunlight. 

She moved around me, and my anxiety grew, not being in control of knowing exactly where she was. I took her free hand, so I could keep my eyes on the demons. The way her hand twitched in me, it was clear that her mind was looking for answers, for logic. She wasn’t the logical one of us and it’d ruin her concentration. I had to give her this one truth and deal with the consequences later, or there might not be a later. “There is a rift in the north in my lands. It’s a portal opened from the Underworld to Skyberg and demons are crawling out of it, claiming the living as they kill them. The Demon King is building an army to take over all three realms.”

“Spirits! And you don’t think that is information I should know?” She glanced at her brother.

Relieved that she didn’t seem to be blaming me for keeping this secret, I watched as no one returned her gazes, clearly more focused on the deadly enemy only a short distance away.

“In the capacity of being king of the black-wings, I’ve asked for aid from the white-wings, but they refuse to give it, saying that the problem isn’t on their territory. The leaders of the white-wings believe that if you knew, you’d join our side rather than be loyal to theirs.”

Angelica blinked, taking in the information. “Winged people are bickering about who does what when demons run amok through the world of the living?”

“Men!” Kate scoffed. “Women should rule the world, I’ve always said.”

The three demons sniffed at the air. Simultaneously, their heads snapped in our direction. 

I tightened my grip on Angelica’s hand and pulled her forward. I wasn’t sure we could outrun them, but we’d bloody try. 

Angelica stumbled behind me, her steps not steady and her mind not clear. I had to get her out of here.

“So, you never ordered your soldiers to attack the white-wings?”

Again, her lack of trust felt like real blows. How could she still think that of me? I grunted. “Of course not. My black-wing soldiers were never in the White Wing Territory. It was the demons crossing over and attacking those villages in Pharanir. King Emille ordered leadership to blame it on me.”

I felt her hand twist in mine, and over my shoulder, I saw her looking backwards. “Harvey! How could you!”

Her fire was back. Good. Spirits, please let it last. She’d need it in the fight that would happen at any moment when the demons caught up with us. They were fast creatures and strong, not the battle I’d ever want a woman to have to fight.

“Angie, we can discuss this later. The priority right now is to survive.” Her brother answered oh-so-diplomatically, still not accepting accountability for the suffering of my people.

The wet gurgling sound the demons produced amplified. They pulled daggers from their belts that sparkled with a blue charge that could cut through flesh like paper, and all the demons I have encountered were great swordsmen.

Suddenly, they charged at us. I pushed Angelica forwards. “Run!” Shit! I shoved her too hard and she was struggling not to fall. “Steady steps along the path! Run!

“Run? Where?”

She halted and I ended up way past her. Why had she stopped? She crouched to the ground. Maybe she was fainting. I turned on my heels, stirring up a cloud of gravel before I raced back. My hand quickly found her waist, clamping down to haul her forwards. “Let’s go!”

Damn it, she wasn’t focused on running, and too transfixed on their unnatural appearance.

“What happens if you stab them with a white blade?” Kate asked.

“Nothing,” Mazdon answered. “They don’t feel it and just keep going.”

Kate was falling behind too because of the same bafflement as Angelica. This was what I had to work with when no one told the white-wings the truth. “Surely, if you sever their heads, they must be incapacitated?”

“No, their head sort of stays attached to their shoulders by magic and settles back on their bodies. I’ve tried,” Mazdon explained.

“You’ve fought these creatures before?” Kate gasped at her brother.

“I served in the in the Air Force for a year before going back to the academy, Kate. I fought in the north. Remember?”

“Maybe Kate can flash them her rude finger,” I whispered to Angelica, but not unsurprisingly, she didn’t smile.

“A little less talking and a bit more running,” the captain shouted, and I kept glancing at Angelica to check she was okay as we were crossing over the clearing.

“I have a stitch, okay?” Kate spat at him but kept running.

“We can’t turn up to the Pharoon City and lead the demons there. We can’t keep running forever, either,” Angelica bellowed to her brother, having found some air. “There must be a way of scaring them off.”

“They’re persistent bastards,” he replied. “Can you fly? They can’t reach us in the air.”

Fly? How could he even contemplate that when Angelica had just returned from Gaithorp. He should never have dragged her out here today. One bloody night’s sleep was all she had asked for. She’d never even get her wings out before we were attacked, and it’d make her feel responsible for everyone’s death – should she survive.

If she wasn’t going to push back on her brother’s suggestion, I bloody would.

“I’ve got her readiness down to seven seconds. But she can’t bring her wings out whilst running, and if we stop for that long, the demons will be upon us. Bringing them out only gives the demons a chance to hack them off.”

I locked eyes with Angelica, and I wished I had insisted on training her harder. She didn’t look ready to face the inevitable. They’d catch up to us and we’d have to fight.

“Even if we could hold off the demons to get her airborne,” Mazdon added. “After this morning’s long flight, I doubt she and Kate could be in the air for very long before their wings cramp. The demons will just find us further down the road. As you said, they’re persistent bastards.”

I had Pere’s backup. Good. He had been to the ball and flown the journey, so he knew the hardship Angelica had gone through.

“Stop squabbling and keep fucking running!” Zayd shouted.

She turned towards me, then. Oh shit! Now I was the next target for her rage. “Were all the things you told me about demons true then?”

“Yes. General Denor forbade me to tell you about them. If I did, King Emille would come for you and send you to the war, so I tried to teach you about them without telling you they existed.”

“I could have kept it secret.”

“From General Denor?”

Her gaze hit the floor and it looked like she wanted to spit out colourful words as she realised the truth of the shit she was in. But there was no time for that now, either.

“Can you run faster, love? The demons are on our heels,” I breathed.

But damned the spirits above, she didn’t follow any of my orders and instead of running faster she skidded to a halt.

“What are you doing?” I shouted, rushing back to her. What did I need to say to her to make her run? I wished I had a fucking manual on how to communicate with her.

Her delicate fingers found my chest to steady herself. “Does your death magic work on them?”

“No!” I pushed at the small of her back, willing her to abandon what crazy idea she had thought up, and run. “Because they are already dead.”

She nodded in a solemn way my senses didn’t want to read the truth of before she voiced it out loud. “Then I suggest you run! I’ll fight them off.”

“I’m not leaving you.” I tugged hard at her arm, noticing she was trembling with fear, but she snatched it free.

Then she brought out the crystal I had given her for her birthday from her bra and squeezed it in her hand like it was the one thing that might save us all. But that was bullshit. It wasn’t charged and could do nothing to repel them. “I have a light crystal and I have a black blade. I’m our best bet.”

I was sure I’d say the wrong words and I didn’t have that damned manual, but I had to try.

“Then give the items to me, and I’ll fight them off while you run.”

She frowned angrily. “No! Run!”

Yep, not the right thing to say.

“Miss Stone, you’re being unreasonable.”

“And you make up your own rules. But in this situation, you can’t make up your own rules as king. Law always dictates that the king needs to be protected from harm by his soldiers, and that is not going to change today.”

“Law also dictates that you must protect your wife and your family at all costs. You just negotiated with me from a standpoint of being my queen.”

The gurgling sound from the demons’ throats grew louder.

“Stop arguing. I can’t lose you. Your kingdom can’t lose you. The demons are getting too close. Please! Run!” 

Her plea broke my heart, but her request was unacceptable.

“No!”

She was clearly panicking and not thinking straight.

“You told me I could be the boss. The boss says run!”

“Your boss privileges have just been revoked.”

The captain joined our side. “What are you guys doing?”

“Apparently, we’re all staying and fighting,” Angelica spat. 

We all discarded our packs and got ready to fight. 

Kate held her hands up and a blast of fire ejected from her palms towards the first demon.

“No!” I screamed, but it was too late. The robe and the fabric-looking skin disintegrated from the flames until the demon looked like walking blue bones and veins of black death that slithered around them to fade at the edges as they moved forward. “They’re not affected by the fire and they’ll only become more angered.”

Angelica held up her black blade knife, and as the first demon charged at us, I lost sight of her as one of the demons targeted me as if I had stolen his whole world. 

Having kicked my demon at a distance, I threw a quick glance at Angelica who stood over her demon as his form crumbled and I could smell the familiar acrid stench. Pride swelled in my chest. She had held her own, and quicker than me. I was still battling mine, although I had nothing to kill it with and my death magic only slowed it down.

“Move Harvey! Help Ben!” Angelica shouted from somewhere behind my back, and I wasn’t even sure where the rest of the group was. Why was she fucking fighting another demon on her own? Granted that she was the only one with a weapon that could kill them, but the others could still hold it off or distract it. After this, the camp leader would have no right to her whatsoever! “Don’t let his skin touch yours!” I shouted before I had to block an attack and counterattacked.

I kept looking over my shoulder every time I had pushed the demon back, seeing that the demon latched onto Angelica’s legs and yanked so she fell on top of it.

“Harvey!” I bellowed, still locked in my own fight but was ready to abandon it if no one else helped her. “Angelica needs help!”

“Ben!” she cried out, the sound tearing at my heart, and I glanced at her quickly.

She threw the black blade in my direction. “Here!”

No! She needed it! I had to reach it and finish this before the demon would infect her. I rolled over the grass to fetch the knife from where it had landed and was ready to face the demon, but it turned, leaving our fight and darting for Angelica now when she was unarmed.

The force of the impact sent her sprawling onto her back, and I felt like dying as I saw a large drop of saliva splatter onto her cheek.

She screamed a high-pitch sound of pain I had heard too many times before, and she was thrashing beneath the creature, trying to kick him away.

I sprinted with all my might to get to her, but a blinding flash cut through the air and then the demon ran her through with his blue blade, plunging it deep into her abdomen, and as he yanked it free, blood poured out.

I couldn’t breathe.

The demon didn’t stop.

With a guttural growl, it wrenched its blade upward, sawing through her insides. I wanted to wretch as I saw her body spasm violently.

I threw myself over the demon, hacking into it with all I had, the small black knife was enough at this point for me to murder them all. Angelica found her rune-adorned dagger and was quicker to stab into it. Shocked, I saw as the runes glowed and worked to kill the demon. How? What magic had her father bestowed her?

I pushed it off Angelica’s body as it crumbled to ash.

Angelica’s head lolled from side to side, her eyes unresponsive. Blood poured out of her and the infective pus had started to fester. Fuck!

The captain almost pushed me aside as he leaned over her, too. I didn’t let him. He had done nothing to save her. This pain was on him, and if she died, Sprits, if she died, I’d kill every single one of the white-wings.

“Captain. You know who is the only magic healer, powerful enough to have a chance at healing this. It’s not only the blood loss. She’s infected.” I knew the captain would never seek help from his mother, never take Angelica to her, but if that was her only chance at surviving, I’d take her with or without his permission. The problem was that I was bonded to him, so I needed him to come with me unless I wanted to carry them both after knocking him unconscious. Tasks that would take too long to save Angelica’s life.

“No,” he snapped, just as I had expected, but I could tell from his tone that he knew I’d not give up.

“She will die otherwise. I’m not really asking for your permission. Her dying, isn’t an option for me.” I shouldered him away to get space to extract my wings and quickly lift Angelica up.

“I’ll have to come with you as we’re bonded,” he muttered, and I thanked the spirits that he wasn’t putting up more of a fight.

“Since it’s saving your sister’s life, I thought the choice would be easy.”

“Nothing is easy. She will hate us both forever. No matter what happens, we’ll lose her.”

Perhaps true, but I was willing to take that risk over returning to put my trust in Mewer. If she lived and hated me, I’d have a lifetime to earn her forgiveness, if she died… I flexed my wings and sprinted for a take-off. I couldn’t think in terms of her not surviving. That was not an option. But with a three-day flight to get back to Black Castle, I doubted Angelica had that much time.

“Wait!” The captain shouted behind me, but I didn’t want to stop. Didn’t want to hear the truth I knew to my core.

There was no use trying to keep Angelica alive. She could never survive this and even if by miracle she did, she was infected. Death would come for her one way or another.

My whole body and soul faltered, so to keep trying to save her was the only way that I could function.

The captain had ushered the others behind the next mountain base and had caught up with me, throwing his hand out to open a portal in front of us.

What the fuck! That was magic I had never seen him do before, like a distance walker, but I couldn’t care less right now. I could see Black Castle like through a window and hope flared in my chest. The captain folded his wings close to his body in the last second as he dived into the small hole in the air. I followed, cradling my wings around Angelica’s limp body that was draped across my arms. She didn’t move, not even stir. Spirits, please don’t let her die.

My legs pelted across the courtyard well after I had landed, cutting the corners finely to get to the infirmary. “Find the general and drag her to the infirmary!” I shouted at Coraly.

At the same moment I reached the infirmary hall, Harvey and Sonja stumbled out of a portal, their faces pale like they had been drained of all they had and their hands quivered. Harvey had some explaining to do about his magic but right now I feared my general more. Her eyes turned to liquid rage as she saw Angelica lifeless across my arms.

“Harvey, take your sister and put her in that room!” She roared and pointed without taking her eyes off me.

As soon as I had passed Angelica over to the captain, a fist made impact with my nose. It came so fast at me that I had no time to duck. Bloody Spirits, I hadn’t even seen it coming. The centre of my face stung, and I smelled the tang of copper. Cursing under my breath, half knowing I deserved it, I braced myself for the next blow. By the looks of Sonja’s face, she wasn’t near done. Sharply dodging back, I avoided both a right and a left hook, but the next went low right into my abdomen punching the breath out of me. I folded forward with a gasp, leaving myself exposed for another blow in a way I’d do for no other than the Coraly women in my life.

“How dare you bring her to me in that state? I told you to stay away from her! I told you it could only ever end badly.”

“Sonja, we are soulmates.” I had to make sure to keep my voice gentle. She was an angered mother, but I could never accept a fate where Angelica wasn’t by my side.

“Soulmates aren’t real,” she bellowed her lungs out at me, leaving no doubt the entire infirmary wing heard her. Not good for my authority, but if I wanted Angelica in my life, I needed Sonja on my side. “It doesn’t exist. It’s only runes. You’re not meant for her! There is no happily ever after for you two. “Your love would be bleak compared to–”

Before I could protest, she spun on her heel to sprint after her children. I guessed she thought the case was closed, and there was no point in arguing until I knew Angelica survived.

All I could do now was inhale a full, deep breath and fight to hold myself together as I entered the room. My bravery already slipped at the threshold taking in the stench of demon and decay and death. I held onto the doorframe as my knees wanted to buckle. Sonja and the captain were brutally cutting off Angelica’s blood-soaked combat leathers from her body with daggers unsheathed from their belts. There weren’t many places my gaze could fall without wanting to vomit, so I crossed the room to open the window.

Sonja sharply stabbed her dagger back into her sheath and palmed both hands over her chest, whimpering in agony as she healed. She was using all her strength even if it drained her own life.

My body craved to tap a foot on the floor or pace the room, but I was glued to the spot, my eyes locked on Angelica’s face.

She was so pale she seemed translucent, a ghost in death already. The demons had won the war. If I lost Angelica there was nothing else I cared about enough that I could still lose. All was gone. Hopes. Dreams. Life.

Her eyes were closed, and even when Sonja opened to check for any reaction from her pupils, they still looked gone. Dead. An inanimate object without a soul behind them. Her lips were not red, not even pink or apricot but a greyish purple. Her chest was level, not raising with her breaths. Fearing I’d faint at any moment, I backed up and slid down against the wall. It was so fucking hard to breathe. I cupped my forehead in my hands, trying to remember all the Spirits so I could pray to them all personally.

“This is not working,” Sonja cried out as if she had expelled a final burst of her remaining power. “Harvey, get the…” she paused, hesitated, looking at Angelica’s face.

Why? What idea was she contemplating that could be of any use? What idea could be so horrendous that the general wanted to refrain from saving her daughter?

Harvey shook his head like he, the man of steel himself, was panicking. “No. It’s not that bad. You can do this. Focus.”

“No!” I growled. “Whatever it is you’re considering, do it, you have to save her.” I commanded like a king, hoping it would be enough.

The captain had not lost people to the demons like I had. He didn’t know how hopeless it was once your loved-one had been infected. It’d be a miracle if she survived the infection, not to mention the cut the demon had sawed right into her.

Sonja shared a pleasing look with her son that I couldn’t read, her face wrinkling around those sapphire eyes that were so alike Angelica’s.

The stoic captain ignored his mother, snapping his head my way.

“Trust me, King Blackbone, you don’t want her to use the ring.”

My brows shot up. “What ring?”

“Harvey!” Sonja barked a warning. “Get it. It’s your sworn duty.”

My gazes jumped between the two of them as the captain wasn’t backing off. Not to my general, and not to his mother, about this ring.

“I’d choose Angelica’s happiness over that duty any day!”

Sonja glanced around the room as if some invisible beings could be right here in this room and hear him say that. “Do not anger the Spirits!” she finally hissed. “Get it now! It’s in my jewellery box. Top shelf in the wardrobe.”

“Mum?”

“Her body will know how to draw his strength from it. It’s the only way, or she will die.”

The captain’s glance travelled lower on Angelica, probably assessing the wound at her side. Then he sighed heavily before taking a step backwards and opened a portal with his hand circling in the air. One moment, he was here and the next, he had walked through air and vanished. Fuck, the Coraly family was a mystery even to me.

An infirmary maid walked in with a bowl of water and began cleaning blood off Angelica. But she soon left again after having wrung out red water into the bowl a few times, probably having to change the water.

When there was only Sonja and me in the room I muttered, “Tell me she’ll live.” I couldn’t stand the thought of my soulmate dying and prayed Sonja would lie, if need be, and tell me all would be okay. Hope was fickle as it was at this point. I couldn’t sense any flicker of life through our bond. No feelings. No light. No soft caress of her being brushing against mine.

Sonja didn’t answer. She knew me well. Getting no answer, was easier to handle, than hearing the truth or a lie.

“Fuck!” I swore into the silence.

The captain returned, holding out a golden ring towards Sonja, but he didn’t look happy. I stood from the floor, striding closer. “What is that?”

Sonja slid it onto Angelica’s left finger without asking for my permission. Her left… the promise ring’s finger. The one I was going to use for my ring to her one day. It clearly couldn’t stay there.

A high-pitched shriek tore through the air outside the window, snapping me right round. It had been an agonising scream, sounding from far away as if in another realm, but still with enough power to ripple into this world.

My heart pounded against my ribs so hard I thought it would break through its cage.

“What in the damned Underworld was that?”

I looked down at the finger wearing the ring and saw ancient runes curling a dragon head on an oval surface from which a delicate band ran around the back of her finger.

“That,” Captain Coraly spat, looking deep into Sonja’s eyes, as if he told his mother he had been right, “was the angered Spirit. Don’t keep the ring on for long or he will find her.”

I laced my fingers on top of my head and focused on breathing through my panic. “Was that a dragon?”

This was what Counsellor Denor had warned me about. I remembered. He had said that worse things than him would come for her, but I had brushed it off like an empty threat. I should have known. Denor never made empty threats. He didn’t need to. He was too powerful for that.

No one answered me. Didn’t they dare to look me in the eye and tell me the truth?

A faint glow on her right wrist caught my eye and lines began to appear. A rune. What the fuck?

The captain saw it, too, gripping her wrist to hold it up to show his mother. “Take it off!”

Sonja uttered a guttural sound as she poured all her healing magic into Angelica’s chest. Her palms shook as if the magic found it hard to enter that quickly and the infection fought it.

“Only a bit longer,” she drawled, her voice filled with pain and despair.

I trusted she would do anything to save her daughter, but I also feared it meant a steep cost to me. It couldn’t be helped. I knew the stake and the odds. My entire being, heart and soul, was in her hands and I could do nothing but trust her.

The captain’s entire body was ramrod straight, and tense to the brim of his soul. His eyes stayed locked on the unmoving body on the bed, as if the slightest twitch and sign of life would make him dive for the ring.

I hated that the two of them knew secrets they hadn’t shared with me, but I hated even more that it didn’t seem to be working.

Was she truly dead? No miracle would bring her to life? No magic could save her now? No Spirit of Luck watching over her?

I sank down on the chair by the desk, my face in my hands, and I prayed. I prayed to the Spirit of Life and the Spirit of Luck, promising them my life and my love in return for hers. I’d do anything if they let her live.

Please!

I beg you.

At the same time as I looked up from my hands to check if my prayers had worked, Sonja snatched the ring off Angelica’s finger.

Then she returned her hands to the subtly raising and falling chest.

“Thank the Spirits,” she whispered in one long breath.

A tear rolled down my cheek. Wet and warm. I swiped it off my cheek. “Is she… alive?”

“Barely. But yes.”

The captain looked to be collapsing with relief, shoving his fists into the mattress to support his weight from ending up on the floor.

Had my prayers worked? I didn’t dare to think about it for fear they’d take her away from me. If the spirits existed, I’d lose her one way or another… and that was if Sonja didn’t kill me first. She was nowhere near done with me. That I was sure of.

None of us left the room for three days. Maids and other healers helped, and Sonja said Angelica was growing stronger, but the knot of anxiety was still in my chest as Angelica didn’t look to be any better than when I had first brought her here. She was clean, and the wound had stopped, but it never healed completely and puss still oozed out of it.

My patience was stretched to its maximum hours ago, but I knew it had to hold a little while longer as the captain’s stare suddenly locked on me, and he moved towards me as if he had a whole rehearsed speech to throw in my face.

Frankly, with the powers I had seen from him lately, I wasn’t sure I’d win a battle against him without using my death magic. And under no circumstances could I use my magic on the brother of the woman I loved. I’d lose more than my life and her love, I’d lose my soul and her forgiveness, writhing in guilt and grief in the Underworld for eternity.

<><><> 

The captain had kept muttering curses at me for three days and nights. It had become hard to take whilst also being crazy worried about Angelica. General Coraly had been trying to heal her relentlessly without much progress. It was tearing at me. I hadn’t slept or eaten properly, and all I wanted was to see her open her eyes.

“You detest me and will do everything in your power to distance yourself from the black-wings. You’ve made that point very clear,” I roared when my patience finally ran out. “Coraly, you need to understand that my feelings for Angelica are genuine. If she dies–”

“I paired you with my sister at the outpost because you’re the strongest person in the camp and could keep her alive. But there is where your usefulness ends. Cut your fucking emotions off!” he roared back at me with the same force.

He was exhausted, too. He had sat at Angelica’s bedside as long as I had without rest. But I couldn’t feel pity for him. It was his fault she was here in the first place. He should have never sent her to spy on me.

“I’m not you!” I shouted in response, not caring if he was a captain or a strong magician or Angelica’s brother. “I can’t just shut off my love for her. Or I bloody would have done it the day I knew I had fallen for her.”

This wasn’t a fate I wanted for her. Not even if the cost was my own misery.

“If I hear that you get any closer to her, I’ll pair her up with someone else, who won’t be as good as you are at protecting her. Am I making myself clear?”

No matter what had happened in the past, here we were and if she would survive, she was mine. He had no right to take her away from me now. Range came quickly and I shot up from the chair, its legs scraping over the floor. I got closer to Angelica, needing to feel her. I placed my hand over hers as if to declare to Coraly that she was mine. To calm myself, I stroke my thumbs over the back of her hand but kept away enough to not be in the way for Sonja to work her healing magic on her. The general had sat in the same spot at her bedside ever since she had beaten the shit out of me.

At my touch, Angelica’s eyes fluttered. I couldn’t believe it. She was waking up. She was alive.

“Where am I?”

Her voice was the most amazing thing in the world. It felt like I took my first breath in days. I could barely get the words out to answer her. “You’re in the infirmary in Black Castle.”

“Kate…Maz…Zay–”

“Everyone is okay.” Of course, she would worry more about the others than herself. “The others continued to your summer cottage and your brother is here. Only you, my brave warrior, got the brunt of it.”

Sonja poked with her fingers over Angelica’s stomach where the demon blade had cut her open, and Angelica frowned. “How bad is it?”

I swallowed. Not knowing the answer. Not truly. “You’ll live and you’re as beautiful as ever, my love.”

“Stop that bullshit!” her brother bellowed. “She’s infected by a demon’s touch and we still don’t know if she will survive this! She is a soldier. Not a damsel in distress.”

“She is my everything, Captain Coraly!”

“Talk like that, and I’ll leave you here and not allow you into the White Wing Territory again.”

Sonja kept checking on Angelica. “Boys, if you’re going to fight, take it outside. Angelica deserves the rest.”

Angelica had registered Sonja’s voice and used the little strength she possessed to pry her eyes open once again. This was when I’d find out if she’d hate me forever. There was no way of knowing how she would react finding out her mother was alive and that she was my general, a woman I had known and loved like a mother all my life.  

Angelica managed to get her eyes open and I let her fight for it, the motivation of surviving was good for her. But I felt like dying myself when I heard her sob out and grip the sheets.

Tears filled her eyes and I desperately wanted to wipe them off and comfort her, but this was her moment to process on her own no matter how much I wanted to protect her from the shock.

She kept staring at her mother like she was a ghost, her expression not betraying how she felt. Maybe she couldn’t feel anything. There was no knowing how deep the demon infection had rooted. It was good if she felt anything at all, even if it was grief and betrayal.

Her voice cracked as she finally whispered the question, as if she couldn’t trust her eyes.

“Mum?”

Now there was no going back. I’d either welcome a queen to our family, or lose her forever.