A Kingdom of Flesh and Fire(3)

Casteel moved slightly, his hands sliding off the arms of his chair.

“As I just said, I’m with Casteel.” Elijah lifted his gaze to Landell. “Always, and no matter what he chooses. And if he chooses her, then we all do.”

This was…that was entirely ridiculous, the whole argument. It didn’t matter. And I didn’t care why there was a need to bring the people of Atlantia together because Casteel and I weren’t getting married. I didn’t get a chance to point that out, though.

“I do not choose her. I will never choose her,” Landell swore, the skin of his face thinning and darkening as he scanned those who sat around him. Wolven. He was a wolven, I realized. I adjusted my grip on the knife and tensed. “All of you know this. The wolven will not accept her. It doesn’t matter if she has Atlantian blood or not. Neither will the people of Atlantia welcome her. She’s an outsider raised and cared for by those who forced us back into a land that is quickly growing too small and useless.” He stared down the table, looking at Casteel. “She didn’t even accept you, and we’re supposed to believe that she will bond with you?”

Bond? I glanced at Kieran and then Casteel. I knew that some wolven were bonded to Atlantians of a particular class, and it took no leap of logic to assume that Casteel being a Prince was just that. The two of them seemed the closest out of everyone I’d seen Casteel interact with, but I knew of no other bond.

However, again, it was irrelevant since we were not marrying.

“Are we supposed to believe that she is worthy of being our Princess when she flat-out denies you in front of your people while reeking of the Ascended?” Landell demanded. My nose wrinkled. I didn’t smell like…like the Ascended. Did I? “When she refuses to choose you?”

“What matters is that I choose her,” Casteel spoke, and my stupid, stupid heart skipped a beat, even though I did not choose him. “And that is all that matters.”

The wolven’s lips peeled back, and my eyes widened at the sight of his canines elongating. “You do this, and it will be the downfall of our kingdom,” he snarled. “I will not choose that scarred-face bitch.”

I flinched.

I’d actually flinched, cheeks burning as if I’d been slapped across the face. I lifted my fingers, touching the uneven skin of my cheek before I realized what I was doing.

Landell’s hand dropped to his hip. “I’ll see her dead before I stand by and allow this.”

Seconds, mere heartbeats passed from when those words left Landell’s mouth, and the frenzied stir of air as it lifted wisps of hair at my temples.

Casteel’s chair was empty.

A shout, and then something heavy clanged off a dish. A chair toppled, and Landell…he was no longer standing by the table. His plate was no longer empty. A narrow dagger lay there, one designed for throwing. My wide eyes followed the blur that was Casteel as he pinned Landell to the wall, his forearm pressed into the wolven’s throat.

Good gods, to be able to move that fast, that silently…

“I just want you to know that I’m not even particularly upset about you questioning what I intend to do. How you’ve spoken to me doesn’t bother me. I’m not insecure enough to care about the opinions of little men.” Casteel’s face was inches from the wide-eyed wolven. “If that had been all, I would’ve overlooked it. If you had stopped after the first time you referenced her, I would’ve let you walk out of here with just your overinflated sense of self-worth. But then you insulted her. You made her flinch, and then you threatened her. I will not forget that.”

“I—” Whatever Landell was about to say ended in a gurgle as Casteel’s right arm thrust forward.

“And I will not be able to forgive you.” Casteel jerked his arm back, throwing something to the floor. It landed with a fleshy smack.

My lips slowly parted as I realized what the lumpy, red mass was. Oh, my gods. A heart. It was an actual heart.

Letting go of the wolven, Casteel stepped back, watching Landell slide down the wall, the wolven’s head lolling to the side. He turned to face the table, his right hand stained with blood and gore. “Does anyone else have anything they’d like to share?”





Chapter 2





A chorus of denials echoed through the banquet hall, but none of the men had so much as twitched in their seats. Some of them were even chuckling, and I…I stared at the red coursing down the length of Casteel’s fingers, dripping onto the floor.

Casteel leaned forward, plucking up Landell’s napkin. Strolling back to his chair, he idly wiped his hand clean.

I watched him sit, my heart thumping as he turned to me, his gaze sheltered by a fringe of heavy lashes.

“You probably think that was excessive,” he said, dropping the crumpled, blood-stained napkin onto his plate. “It wasn’t. No one speaks of you or to you like that and lives.”

I stared at him.

He sat back. “At least, I gave him a quick death. There is some dignity in that.”

I had no idea what to say.

I had no clue what to feel. All I could think was, oh my gods, he just ripped a wolven’s heart from his chest with his bare hand.

The men who stood by the doors were picking up Landell when one of the men at the table asked, “So, when is the wedding?”

Laughter greeted the question, and there was a hint of a smile on Casteel’s lips as he leaned toward me. “There is no side of you that is not as beautiful as the other half. Not a single inch isn’t stunning.” His lashes lifted, and the intensity in his stare held me captive. “That was true the first time I said it to you, and it is still the truth today and tomorrow.”

My lips parted on a sharp inhale. I almost reached for my face again but stopped myself. Somehow, in the process of getting used to being seen without the veil of the Maiden, I’d forgotten about my scars—something I’d never thought possible. I wasn’t ashamed of them, hadn’t been for years. They were proof of my strength, of the horrific attack I had survived. But when I was unveiled in front of Casteel for the first time, I’d feared he would agree with what Duke Teerman had always said. What I knew most thought if they saw me unveiled or looked upon me now.

That half of my face was a masterpiece, while the other was a nightmare.

But when Hawke—Casteel—had seen the pale pink, jagged streak of skin that started below my hairline and sliced across the temple, ending at my nose, and the other that was shorter and higher, cutting across my forehead through my eyebrow, he had said that both halves were as beautiful as the whole.

I’d believed him then. And I’d felt beautiful for the first time in my life, something that had also been forbidden to me.

And gods help me, but I still believed him.

“What he said was more than an insult. It was a threat that I will not tolerate,” Casteel finished, sitting back as he picked up his chalice with the same hand that had torn a heart free from its cage moments before.

My gaze fell to where the dagger still lay on Landell’s plate. What the wolven would’ve attempted to do with that dagger shouldn’t have come as a shock. It wasn’t like I didn’t know that many of those at this table would rather see me sliced into pieces. I knew I wasn’t safe here, but all of them had seen the hall outside this room. They had to know what would happen if they disobeyed Casteel.

Some unconscious part of me still underestimated their hatred of anything that reminded them of the Ascended. And that was me, even if I hadn’t done anything to them other than defend myself.

Conversation picked back up around the table. Quiet discussions. Louder ones. Laughter. It was like nothing had happened, and that rattled me. But what left me wholly unsettled was what I couldn’t admit, even to myself.

Kieran cleared his throat. “Would you like to return to your room, Penellaphe?”

Pulled from my thoughts, it took me a moment to respond. “You mean my cell?”

“It’s far more comfortable and not nearly as drafty as the dungeon,” he replied.

“A cell is a cell, no matter how comfortable it is,” I told him.

“I’m fairly certain this is the same conversation we had earlier,” Casteel commented.

My gaze swiveled back to Casteel. “I’m fairly certain I don’t care.”

“I’m also sure that we came to the conclusion that you have never been free, Princess,” Casteel tacked on. The truth of those words was still as brutal as it was when they had first been spoken. “I don’t believe you would even recognize freedom if it were ever offered to you.”

“I know enough to recognize that’s not what you’re offering,” I shot back, fury returning in a hot, welcoming wave, warming my too-cold skin.

A faint smile appeared on Casteel’s mouth, though it wasn’t his tight, calculating one. My anger gave way to confusion. Was he purposely baiting me?

More than a little agitated, I focused on the wolven. “I would like to return to my more comfortable, not-nearly-as-drafty cell. I assume I won’t be allowed to walk there myself?”

Kieran’s lips twitched, but his expression smoothed out pretty quickly, proving that he had the common sense not to smile or laugh. “You would assume correctly.”