Join me in night painted with crimson and black.

His eyes steal the light from mortal souls
His eyes like deep night and his depths like coals
Mortal flesh is trembling, flames devour it
She disappears – tiny bit by tiny bit

Leira couldn’t unhear this song. The fae were celebrating the month of Lorian’s coming of power. The promising youth of winter faeries, with snow in their souls and sharp-taloned hearts, seemed to enjoy this celebration more than Lunar New Year. Youg fairies – free, unbound and wild – loved Lorian’s reign. Maybe because  they rarely stepped the boundaries which he set. For Leira, it was obvious, that they do not want to – not do not dare. The winter reign was cruel, primal and passionate.

The song… a rare jest on the reign, which was more a keen approval than a true jester’s mock. The voices were accompanied by the sound of sitar, soft, atonal and typically fairy-like. Singing fairies enjoyed the beauty of the wintry night, bathing in midnight – the hour of the lost souls. Which fairy court believed to be haunted by something very similar to ghosts. Not fae ones – these were feeding trees and overgrowth of Ain’asel. The humans, who gaining power of cold touch, returned to torment the ones who once destroyed them. Leira heard that only way to stop the cold soul, is to spill own blood.

How peculiar to believe that a fae blood can quench human soul’s hunger.

Trapped between the iron bars
Her body wears the failure’s scars
Join us in a feast, feed us with your smiles
Show us the garden which under moonlight blooms
and in his endless void dies

His soul darker than the night
His shadow feeding on every budding light
She drowns in black lake, her hands are cold
Her soul suffocating, to the lost one sold…

Why this song made her anxious?

Her slave dress fluttered on the wind, warm and changed by the magical barrier set on windows. The stained glass reflected her face as she passed them – now blood engraved in her reflection, which she was taking with reluctance once, fear even, looked like a crowning of her position here. A ghost of Dal’coler. Maybe he was right. Maybe she at once made it. Fit like an unpaired puzzle into whole image – by force, breaking other elements, only to stay in a place she craved for. An element taken from a different set, put into an art that showed different colors, different life. A lonely one, the only one who sees how grotesque it looks.

Her steps led her further into overgrown depths of Dal’coler. Up, the Stairs of Eternal Longing, the only ones which she knew better than the passages to her own chamber. The black railing was carved in raven wings, a craftsmanship of a higher level, which didn’t leave anything to an accident. The master who did them, possibly already passed away, the artists never were hired from the Higher Fae kind, it had to be a lower fey, who usually lived much shorter. But Lorian always hired the creators of ultimate beauty. How much it was attributed to his own needs and how much to mainating decorum of his position, Leira couldn’t guess. Lorian liked pretty things. But he was far from being vain or superficial. Too much pain changes perception, beauty becomes a trivial thing.

She found Lorian in royal library. He didn’t read – he just stared at the book shelf under a high arches, entangled with old birch. His face – Leira was observant, and with their mental bond, it was even easier to catch that – was lost in some old pain, which he never rugged and torn from his soul.

Leira preferred to not  show she saw it. But of corse the same mental bond was selling her like an old human peddler on the busy marketplace.

His face lost the tension and wore the smile so similar with beauty to stars behind the vast window, that Leira could see the cracks in it, the crevices through starlight allowed the night sky.

“I allowed him to think that he can win” another crack, so beautiful. It could sip her soul, if he wanted. “Now, he is just a shell, empty, dry and left to rot.”

“I thought you enjoyed his fall?” Leira felt almost assaulted by his aura. It was deeper than lowest bottom of the ocean. With his bells still sounding in her being, she could almost touch it – thick like mud, an ink writing the prophecy of death.

“Oh, I did” he laughed. “Most filling experience, a dish served cold and bleeding. No, Leira. It was not only anticipated. It was a crowning of all games we led, all pleasant lies we shared in the court. All fake smiles, all dark dreams we had of each other.’

“But you do not enjoy it fully” it was more of a statement. His thoughts were closed from her, but… his feelings he allowed into her. So intense. Calm as a dead black desert.

His long fingers lay on one of the books. Caressed its cover.

“I remember how it all started. A young soul, who looked at me like into a painting reflecting his dreams. He was flame incarnate, which was destined to be dulled by my shadow. Perhaps he would – his rebellious, young heart would rot between the walls of this fortress, to my joy. He would become not what he would come for. He would become who he never wanted to be. But he would become more. He would be no longer a guest to Dal’coler.”

He withdrew the hand. Shadows imprinted for a small moment on the cover and withered, dispersed by non existent wind.

“And I started to like more not what would bloom under my touch. I started to like what he already was. He maybe never reminded me of myself in his age… but some innocent awe that we all should had, when our years are young. Awe of life, of beauty, of joy from simply being alive. I lost it, Leira. So long ago, that I don’t know if it ever was there. My needs were different. Not joyful. Not beautiful. Not full of awe.”

He turned again to her. His long eyelashes look almost dream-like in his supple face, touched by shadow that always bubbled under his pallid skin.

“I killed all he would want to be. All he was and all who he would become, if he stayed with me, on the path to decay. And perhaps that’s why I find this victory both fulfilling and bitter. A bed made of soft moss and nettle leaves.”

He had to talk about his son.

Leira never asked Lorian about him. Maybe because she felt regrets of her own, which she wanted to hush. Her betrayal which she would repeat, yes, but it wouldn’t sting less. She was calling herself ruthless, but that didn’t come without a price and particles of souls she sacrificed on the way to earn her shadowed crown.

Alnam was a victim of them both. Created by Lorian, drilled by his relentless shadows and pushed into his claws by her.

She wanted him dead. Because he reminded her of the woman she once was.

And that alone was something that made her soul creep and crawl.

“I create my enemies with joy with which others create friends – restlessly, hungrily. Maybe because they flatter me more. Am I vain creature, in the end?”

No. But you like to be admired, Leira thought and she heard the soft laughter in her head.

No one admires as strong as an enemy, she heard inside her mind, a pleasant tug of his power over her being.

That’s why he took her to Dal’coler. To be feared. To be admired. To be hated. To be a Shadow in her eyes, who makes her love him, even if he hurts her.

“Lady Nymre… examined me…” she knew he will see through her words faster than a storm sends lighting to part the tree bark. His smiled carried even more of the cruel starlight. He left the book behind, approaching soft like a cat. His shadows traveling behind him, a thick veil of black mist.

His thumb brushed through her light tangles, and pulled one, curling it around his finger, his hand digging into her thick hair. A caress and a possessive gesture, yet not demeaning. His respect for her was true, his nature unchanged, though.

“I feel you get closer. Mentally, you shed your fear, she – her jealousy. Maybe if it all falls apart, it will be the only way to stop the decay.”

“If… it falls apart?”

He leaned forth, his lips touched hers, she gasped, when they sent a string of shadow into her. A caress. And possessive gesture. His kiss tasted of frozen fruits, even more than usual. A delicious, calm and strong kiss, which made her relax in his arms.

“It can fall apart into so many tiny shards. Scattered across whole Dal’coler. It can fall apart so easily.”

The lonely shadow touched her cheek. Lonely – just like them.

“And end like many fairytales, which always go wrong. Aren’t we a fairytale creatures? Destined to feed the stars? Falling like them into the mouth of hungry void beast.”

“This was… oh, this was so stupid.”

Her fingers ran through his arm. Wound still ruled his flesh, but Nymre was a powerful – and most of all experienced – healer. She gleamed with translucent light, caressing the sharp edges. She knew he feels pain, but for her it was obvious, that normal suffering is not stopping him anymore. Too long he was taking the much worse torment, forced to smile and pretend nothing ever happened.

She still couldn’t embrace it. He was so stubborn, always. He was always threading the path to his goal like it was an enemy, who needs to be subdued. But this…

It was probably the only way, the inner voice was trying to tell her, a touch of common sense. But it wasn’t making the whole thing less horrid. She loved him, all these years, she lived next to him, touching him, discussing realm matters. She stood by his side. And he– was taking the gods in and with them… the pain, which she couldn’t even imagine.

Her magic slowly healed him, allowing him to not add additional pain to already felt anguish.

Her voice was annoyed when she spoke, but only because so many things could go wrong. Alnam had many supporters, some of them helped him to free Tiyan Markon. Nymre almost suspected pain took common sense from Lord of Devlonmere. He never acted so reckless, ever. Freeing this human man had to be an idea born in the most decayed place of his soul. He couldn’t know what Lorian planned for Tiyan – yet not knowing anything and still acting was not similar to anything he would do.

Lord Alnam eventually reached the bottom.

Which was shocking for Nymre – but seemingly not for Lorian.

“He wanted so much to bury talons deep into my flesh, that he touched the chaos” Lorian was allowing her power to penetrate his skin, edges of the wound closing slowly, but inevitably. “His mind opened for me not long ago, surprisingly, fully. Something cracked in him, Nymre. Something that spread over his soul like a parasite. Allowed me to bite into his core. It flooded me with so many sensations. A treat of most delicious kind.”

Nymre’s hand closed over Lorian’s wound, tighter. Not because she wanted to inflict pain in him. She felt helpless next to things going faster and faster. Now, time leading to gods’ awakening was a maddened maze full of small horrors and tiny scares. Each of them reaching with their hands to them, forcing into view, to present their grotesques shapes.

Lorian’s eyes pinned her to the her seat, a wild joy in them.

She didn’t withdrew.

The window was letting the daylight in, dimmed in the overwhelming darkness of Dal’coler. This place hated the sun. Light fought each tiny second for survival in their palace. But the light… the one that fought hardest and was most resilient, was most beautiful creature that could happen here. Threaded through eternal night, it was becoming something else. A magic of its own.

“I saw his plans” Lorian’s smile bloomed even if Nymre’s talons still were in his wound, and dripped with healing power. “I knew his every step. How he takes Leira’s form. How he drops last plates of his inner armor, to reveal the delicious mental meat. I myself didn’t expect so much pus. So much rot.”

“You wanted him to make this mistake” Nymre shook her head. Since the visit in the gods’ chamber, she realized that fae are by no means all-powerful. Even her. Lorian too, even if his power was growing every day. Why if…

… gods helped Alnam? Their minds still drilled Dal’coler, deeper, harder. What if, they slipped into him and caused more anguish, to eventually push him to do this deluded move?

But of course Lorian told her only now, what he planned. A selfish bastard.

But it worked. It worked, for Sacred Forest’s sake.

Luck… or brilliance of her lover’s mind? Maybe both. And she was fool enough to not ask.

The small bottles filled with herbs were standing by her side, ready to be used. A touch of reality, which was so distant when Lorian was near. Did he make a mistake or allowed Alnam to wound him? Some twisted game, which would later make Lord of Devlonmere suffer more?

“What will happen with him, now?”

The question hanged between them. Nymre heard many times that Lorian respected his most devoted enemy. Death was the most sensible choice now – but she also knew how his mind worked. He longed for suffering. He longed for prolonged torment. And even her couldn’t imagine what he planned for Alnam Devlon.

“Do you like it?”

A sudden question, which pulled her from her thoughts.

“Like…?”

He got closer, his healthy hand reached to her hair, burying deep into the pale tangles.

“Healing me… touching my open flesh.”

She shivered. Why  she was sure that he reached her mind and now reads in her like in a book? He wanted in some way to disturb her… or to instill want in her. Both worked.

She wanted to remove her hand, but she couldn’t. His shadows plastered it hard to his skin. Her light power pumped into his flesh, making it hotter…. but closing faster.

“Isn’t it tempting…” he laughed silently, a pleasant sound, like murmur of the rain after harsh drought. “… to think we could delve into each other… become one in literal way… feast on blood, pain… and pleasure. Purest than any other. A clear path to realm of beautiful torment.”

Her eyes met his black void. She was now sure he reads her mind.

“What will you do with Alnam Devlon?”

His laughter was only a tone louder now. Soft though and content, like his skin wasn’t torn with teeth not long ago, and his path didn’t involve causing the collapse of the hungry gods. She could sense twisted energy beaming off him, like the thought of having Alnam sentenced for treason is a pleasure purer than what he just painted before her.

“Something that will honor my admiration for his hatred. Something that will fill him deeper than his despise and scorn resided in my mind, feeding me with its spores…”

Nymre couldn’t stop looking at him. She could feel the almost fevered need in him. The world started to slowly collapse, revealing a whole realm in his eyes, only she could truly understand. The same light that danced between shadows in chambers of Dal’coler, was negated by his aura. Not because he was more cruel that other fairies. But… because he was darker. His needs were not shallow, he didn’t choose violence for the thrill, for amusement. He was choosing it, because his being needed it to live.

Because he pulsed under fingers of darkness, like a most eager lover.

And she loved it. And she could relate to it.

And she despised it, because it was making her weak.

A beautiful torment he mentioned, already caressed their naked limbs.

*

The candle light licked the walls like alive creatures, sharpening the shadows and creating eerie shapes, which resided in and ruled every nook and every corner of the chamber. It was like daylight, entering Dal’coler, was becoming as vile as its darkness – dull, enshadowed and dangerous. The flames knew that not all what is bright can become a day in the end.

Lorian stood on the balcony of his room, when they dragged Mina in. He seemed to be completely lost in his thoughts… his shadows swirled around his arms, reaching through his fingers into the night. The lesser fae didn’t dare to distburb him, so they just stood waiting until he turns his attention on them.

Mina at once registered his clothes – made of shining leather, tightly pressed to his supple limbs. His ears were adorned with golden earrings, covering the tips with delicate ornaments and his eyes… She couldn’t take hers off them – they were touched with golden dust, which made his black holes look even deeper.

He looked just as old fairytales were depicting fairies – otherworldly and dangerous, with a gleam of something evading comprehension.

She decided to not meet him in fear, even when her body still felt the last collapse. And Lorian was first with whom she met after that. No one brought her food or water, like they used to before. Whole day without meeting anyone, just macerating in panic which was growing stronger with every breath.

When they separated her from Tiyan, she still remembered his pained eyes, even through her malign state.

What will they do with him?

What will they do with her?

“Sit her down.”

His voice was filled with strange content, the air snapped when the shadows returned to him – like whole night shifted and breathed out the air it held. The lesser fae pushed her on a crimson couch, so soft, that Mina almost drowned in its silky texture and pillows.

“If you ever could taste Ain’asel…” he mused, not even looking at her. The shadows solidified behind him, and now, they looked like enormous black wings, made of smoke and black mist. “It has scent of old, thick woods… tastes like fresh snow… combined, it’s like god’s blood” he laughed silently, like amused by his own words. “But that could be said only by someone, who doesn’t know how godly blood tastes like.”

He turned to her, the shadowed wings dispersed in a second, a mist escaping from the gust of storm wind.

“And you, Mina Markon… you showed me, that your blood is stronger than any other I have seen in this palace” his steps was silent and cat-like. Mina drowned further into the pillows. “What child would still lie, still listened to my orders, seeing her brother bound and hurt? You truly impressed me. How your little heart had to ache, witnessing his state. Yet… you didn’t falter.”

“I made a deal. You promised not to kill us” murmured Mina. Now she could really sense the snow around them. His violets were frozen. Not sweet anymore. F r o z e n.

“You brought something intriguing to my court” continue Lorian, like he didn’t hear her. The tight leather clothes stretched on his body with perfect rhythm with his muscles. His eyes, surrounded with golden dust, were empty in the darkness and Mina couldn’t see if he is angry, joyful or pleased. His tone indicated nothing. All fae were peculiar unsolved riddles. “Boldness of someone who saw only few winters. How such creature can be so courageous, especially if surrounded by dangers. That is impressing.

“What… what happened when me and Tiyan… ?”

“What was bound to happen” Lorian grinned with all shadows; they drifted to Mina and clasped around her hands, swiftly binding them. Mina threw in her seat, but only drowned further in soft couch. “You ate the apple with such joy – a real treat for whole court. You ate it so eagerly, that you tethered yourself to Dal’coler, not only whole realm. Your hunger was also impressive. How such young soul can possess so many promising traits…”

Shadows slid over her arm and tangled with her now untruly locks. Mina didn’t move this time. She petrified, changed into stone statue.

Lorian bent over her, she could see up close the adornments on his ears, which reflected each flicker of light in the chamber. His eyes were so close to hers now, that she for the first time could look deeply in them.

They were reflecting her own face, her own frantic eyes, she saw herself in them.

And then, her reflection started to drown.

Reflection’s hands closed over its throat. And squeezed.

Mina felt that she lost breath. She wanted to stop looking into the void, but his gaze held her captive, unable to move. She made a gurgling sound, when reflection’s nails dug into its neck’s flesh, blood trickling from puncture wounds.

“… but I have better future to paint before you, brave Mina.”

She fell, catching for air, with her back straight into the soft cushions. Her body shiver from the intensity of the vision.

“We have made a deal…” she gasped, still not being able to take a full breath.

“I promised to not kill you. Mina, you clever child” Lorian straightened up. The night brought suddenly from afar the notes of atonal but beautiful music. Dal’coler lived its life, joyful, pleasurable… a dark maze of lies and half-truths.

He won’t be true to his word.

He won’t. But how? Fae can’t break the deal. They can maneuver around it, but somehow, the deal is binding for them, for better and for worse.

“Why you can kill me” her voice was stern and strong. Her stubborn nature rejecting his threats and his lies. She wanted the truth. Even if most horrid.

“You did your part in this game” he shrugged, his smile so perfect, that Mina wanted to throw up. “You showed your brother few things he won’t forget. But… your real purpose is coming now” he laughed. His laughter was sweet, causing her to shivered. “You will help breaking him.”

“Why. can. you. kill. me” she didn’t know from where these words came from. They were sharp, and strong, like not created by her child throat. She wanted to know. She needed to know.

“Because you made a mistake that every mortal before you did. You made me promise not to kill you. I won’t” his shadows coiled around her waist and lifted her suddenly up, making her stand on her toes, just before him.

“Someone else will.”

He turned again to the landscape that spread before the balcony; an endless woods, touched with moonlight, the distant mountains covered with snow. Mina tossed in the clasp of his shadows, her heavy breath laced with panic.

He moved a finger at the lesser fairies.

“Order the kitchens to prepare her. She must be whole. And crisp as the winter morn.”

Mina started to scream, loud, when she realized what that means.

She screamed all the way down.

They said that when Feirne angered Lorian Ain’Dal, he traveled there himself, with Nymre by his side and a small group of nobles, who wanted to see this peculiar, unusual sight – humans who dared to raise heads. Nymre parted with main group and galloped forth on her horse, to see the heart of the opposition quicker. The walls of Feirne were covered with iron plates, under them – a rowan wood which created a tall palisade. The city looked like a heavy turtle, prepared for any blow, with a flesh made of many desperate and tough people. Nymre demanded to talk with the leader of this place – an older woman appeared on the battlements. She was not tired though or afraid. Nymre asked to open the gates, because it’s rude to keep guests outside. That she demands giving her bread and salt, like human rendition says. The woman replied that she should come and get it herself, if she can.

And Nymre did.

Her light aura spread around the city walls like a thick mist. The iron, which the humans of Feirne were sure is the ultimate weapon against fairies, started to slowly corrode and rust.  Nymre just stood there – the lesser faeries possibly would be long ago wounded by the touch of it. But she was old, powerful and even if the iron aura stung her skin, she was here to show these humans, they can’t kill even one fairy, without the punishment.

The wide lobes of red and copper iron were falling from the walls, like blood. Nymre’s power slipped on the battlements, coiling around the guards’ necks.

“Stop!” the woman said, a real fear in her eyes. “Do not kill them. It’s me who lead them. You can take me, but allow my people to live.”

“This is such a foolish request” Nymre narrowed her brows.

The group of faeries arrived in the same moment, clad in black, green and crimson. Lorian with his cruel shadows, and Sadin with his sand and earth. And Volaria, with wind and storm. Lorian’s silver crown, shaped as spine, shone in the late noon sun. His gloved fingers held the reins nonchalantly. The horse under him stood with its red eyes turned just at the human leader. Empty like wells filled with autumnal colors.

Lorian bent in his saddle, looking at the woman with a stunning smile, which was kind enough to make the humans shiver. It never promised well, when a fairy was in good mood.

“You didn’t greet my lover with bread and salt. Maybe you do not have enough of worthy food. Would you want me to offer the goods, which you could taste for years?”

The woman looked at him with surprised expression. The panic slowly was seeping in, even if she tried to silence it. Feirne now was exposed, at the mercy of the conqueror.

“We do not greet invaders like ones of us.”

Nymre laughed. Volaria scoffed. Sadin looked amused.

Lorian only slid his hand over his sholi horse mane; sholi didn’t move, still with red empty eyes just on the woman. The Fae king’s expression brightened even more. The strings of shadows danced around him, brushing his hear so they moved like underwater.

“Salt” he mused casually.

The guards standing near her, ready to defend her, if the situation needed it, the men who fought with lesser folk for months… the woman saw how they petrify in place with wide open pupils. They limbs sagged, like drained, fast, like pierced by the needle which made them lose the water and air. Their bodies began to tremble uncontrollably, their veins slowly becoming visible, red lines of suffering. The woman didn’t know how to help them, didn’t know what is even happening. Until the cry of pain didn’t reach her ears. It was so loud, and so sudden. A wail torn from the reality with cruel magic.

She could hear Lorian’s voice though, even through the howling of her people.

“Maybe bread too… after all, I am generous today.”

The guards’ mouth started to salivate, foaming with blood and parts of flesh, their throats and stomachs bulged like pushed from within. Something seemed to grow in them, their faces unnaturally wet and bloated.

“I do not like the scent of rotting meat, Lorian” Nymre looked at him with faked reproach.

“Oh, they are not rotting, my cruel raven” laughed Lorian charmingly. “They are prepared for a good feast.”

The walls, now not protected by the iron were nothing for Lorian’s power. A tiny shadow slid from his foot and traveled to the gate, going up and up, and wherever it went, the wood started to molder, fell off. Door touched with decay needed only one push of Volaria’s gust of wind, to fall under the Fae’s feet.

The battlements slowly started to collapse; the guards, now crimson red and swollen, alongside with the leader woman, were trapped by Lorian’s shadows and when Feirne was collapsing under own weight – carried under his feet.

The woman feared him, but didn’t show humility. She raised on her hands and with an utter scorn on her face, she spat before the group of Unseelie.

“You are nothing” she uttered, through throat clenched by anger. “You came here, thinking you are gods. But you are not ones.”

“We aren’t” Lorian cocked his head and leaned over the woman. The gargling sound of guards “being prepared” didn’t suppress his soft chuckle. “Because even gods will bend their backs.”

Volaria looked at Lorian with pure joy.

“You Majesty, this one is very unique. She is not fearing. Maybe we could keep her. Just to enhance the next celebration.”

Lorian’s tone darkened.

“Do not be childish, Volaria. This woman would definitely not like it. And we still want to be guested with bread and salt” he turned to the woman again. “Will you invite us, so we could enjoy your city, fully?”

“Be gone” her teeth gritted. “You will never be welcomed by Feirne soil.”

“Ah, but even the sacred soil has weaknesses and even strongest wind has to cease. Will you offer me Feirne, Talara?”

“NEVER.”

His smile for a moment became predatory, so much that women’s heart skipped a beat.

“Let us in… Foyere.”

It was like a blow of a strongest wind, taking breath away. Like a mountain avalanche, claiming the travelers and burying them under a colony of stones. A hope that she still had, a tiny, small and very insistent, drowned in this one word.

He knew her true name.

“We still would adore being invited by the real hosts of this place” Lorian continued with a sadistic precision. “After all, the soil subdues only to those who have right to step on its flesh.”

The guards next to her looked like sacks of meat, moaning scraps of what they were before.

The people in the city held a breath.

He knew her real name.

“Will you guest us, Foyere?”

She panted, a painful groan escaped her throat. They of course could enter. But if the witch allows someone to her place, the ground welcomes them too. And embraces all they bring, because the soil trusts the witch.

An old rule.

But it will allow him to destroy this place for eons.

She would stab him in that beautiful face.

She would tear his guts out, with her bare teeth.

She would…

“Yes,” she uttered. Nowhere to hide. Nowhere to escape.

At least they fought. At least they killed hundreds of lesser fairies through the months they were given to by the goddess. At least… they bought time to other villages.

Lorian went through Feirne, the walls, rusty and decayed, opened before him like lover’s legs. Then the decay followed and wherever his foot touched the ground, the rot was inflicted, deep, endless and merciless. The humans were finding out that ground under them starts to swallow them with a bubbling sound, mud and dirt, decayed like old meat.

It spread, taking in possession not only the houses, farm animals and humans. It instilled deep into the roots of the land of Feirne, poisoning whole area, traveling to nearby cities and villages, and doing the same with them.

Lorian’s steps were supple and graceful, he was passing humans, who slowly drowned in rust, his shadows caressed their faces and trashing limbs. His feet were like a sentence and the shadows – executioner.

Until he stood. Breathed in, taking the scent of decay and blood into his lungs.

And turned to Nymre, his nobles, the swelling guards and the woman, who didn’t even cry.

His face became a epitome of beauty, a purity that sends darkness on its feet.

He cocked his head again and spoke, his voice a sensual  caress.

“Now… we can start the feast.”

*

Alnam’s eyes fluttered open, his limbs immediately responded for him waking up with a groan of pain. His whole body was pain, like someone instilled in his flesh millions of glass shards and ordered him to crawl.

The words of tale about the horror of Feirne rang in his head, a long forgotten dream he didn’t even witnessed. The bards were singing it at almost every celebration, laughing from humans who dared to stand against the Unseelie kind. That was the moment when, after their arrived back and Lorian’s most trusted nobles shared what happened, he started to suspect Nymre holds much more danger than he thought at the beginning.

Nymre, when arrived to Dal’coler for the first time, was a fresh breeze, a sunlit silky creature in love. Crisp like winter, but hot like summer. Then, she changed, as whole court, aside of few. The frozen season made them all like winter.

Three times more ruthless than winter fairies of the past.

Lorian instills rot in everything.

Why you think of her? Why her? Where are you?

The chain clang when he tried to stretch his arms. Like through mist he remembered how he tried to save that human. How he shapeshifted. How he was blinded by pain.

How he attacked Lorian frontally.

A laughter, bitter one, broke from him. You are truly a desperate man. Desperation can so easily change into death wish. He thought he still have more coldness in him, macerated in ages of grief. But in the end… he ended as all living beings – closing his fingers on a dagger blade, to not to sink.

He was a prisoner then. He gave him a perfect excuse; not that he needed one. He just allowed him to slip into his soul and place there burning coals, pressing that hard, aching spot that hurt for too long.

He didn’t even hoped he will even be free again. Nor that he dies soon. He lunged with claws and fangs at the king of Ain’asel, stole his prisoners and used other fairies, urged them to break a vow to the crown. Even Marnsul would punish that, mercilessly. Lorian…

He was a traitor now, in the eyes of whole court. Someone who advised their king, supported him, feasted with him… and turned against him. Only fae still loyal to him will know the truth. And no matter to what he would be subjected, he won’t allow Lorian to know their names.

How… joyful.

His long life will end here, in prison cell. Sentenced for treason, which he would commit again. And again.

He wanted Corvel to see his actions. Fae souls do not have afterlife. They grow in trees, replenishing the leaves and making their life hundred times longer. If he was a human, he would believe the earth swallowed his soul and prepared it for another cycle. That way, he would meet Corvel and Narlia again, in next life. Lorian too. Nymre. Leira.

Maybe it would be repetition of his well known mistakes and faults.

But he would not be alone.

Now, the only thing he hoped for was…

… death.