The next day continued on the same way. We walked and I collected creatures—I had to be near the back now so the army could spread out behind me. Shadow and Ixana stayed close to me, which was frustrating, since I had been trying to avoid the pair of them since Shadow had fucked me within an inch of my life.
Today I was “lucky” enough to hear their conversation.
“Remember when we were kids?” Ixana said with a laugh, warm to him when she iced everyone else out. “Your sister used to torment us both and we’d hide in that massive maze near your family’s home.”
Shadow’s rumbling laugh had a familiarity in it, as he too got caught up in past memories. “I should have known Cristell was an evil bitch even back then. She would take any opportunity to hurt me. Or get me into trouble. Her favorite pastime was calling me the ‘little maggot heir.’”
Ixana didn’t laugh. “Yes, she was always horrible. Jealous and spiteful about the fact you were born to inherit the ultimate power, while she’d always exist under her younger sibling in power. It was what drove her crazy in the end.”
I couldn’t see Shadow’s face, but I knew that tense set to his muscles. “My mother was the only one I could trust,” he said. “It’s been the hardest part of being locked from the realm. Not so much the loss of my destined power, but the loss of her.”
Ixana placed her hand on his shoulder, and I forced myself to look at my feet, watching the small splatters of dust kick up under my boots. Shadow had been procuring me new clothes throughout the days, but the boots were a staple.
“Your mother was the one who helped me escape,” she said softly. “Because she knew one day you’d return and with me at your side, we would take Cristell down.”
And that, ladies and gentlemen, was how a soul shattered.
I mean, not mine, of course, because I was made of tougher stuff than that. But all the ladies who thought they could tame the beast god were currently sobbing into their pillows.
“How long since you’ve seen her?” Shadow asked.
Ixana finally removed her hand, shaking her head at the same time. “Not since that day, so thousands of cycles ago. I heard rumors that she went missing, and I wondered if maybe your sister managed to get rid of the rest of your family who felt any sort of connection to you.”
Shadow’s flames burst to life, a fierce burn that sent heat shooting out around us. Ixana leapt away, clearly not enjoying his fiery side. Meanwhile, I just wanted to climb that damn flame-filled giant and absorb every last iota of his power.
“Cristell will suffer.” He growled. “That’s a given. But if she hurt my mother, then I will make it so much worse.”
“We’ll have enough power to best them very soon,” Ixana said, and she sounded far too pleased. “Between the stone and your creature army, there is no chance for any of the royals.”
I’d be using this army to defeat them only so we could free the creatures and restore their land. And yeah, it was a bonus if Shadow could take his place as his family’s rightful leader, but it was also a double-edged sword. After he took on the mantle of Supreme Being, he’d be gone from my reach forever.
“Excuse me,” I said, interrupting, and for some reason, the moment I spoke, Shadow’s flames died off. Our eyes met, and just like always, the buzz of awareness between us was enough to have me stumble on the completely flat ground. “How far until we reach the Nexus?”
Ixana scowled. Did she not like me interrupting her little bonding time with Shadow? Tough shit, cupcake.
“One more day of walking, I estimate,” she said stiffly. “If you can keep up the pace, of course.”
“You mean, the pace I’ve been maintaining while carting along hundreds of shadow creatures who are protecting us?”
No need for her to forget who was doing all the heavy lifting here. There was a cacophony of noise behind me as the creatures screeched and bellowed and called to the sky, and I felt a small sense of satisfaction as her gaze darted about, her expression drawn in fear.
“Of course. You’ve been doing amazing.” She actually reached out to touch me. She’d been doing that a lot over the last few days, trying to be reassuring, but it was mostly creepy. Fighting the urge to shake her icy touch off, I was thankful when she removed her hand. “We’re grateful for your assistance in reestablishing us on the throne, right, lover?”
She turned to Shadow, missing the fucked-off expression descending over my face. I had no idea what the literal word she’d used was, but the translation had clearly gone with lover, and that made me want to use my creatures for evil. I didn’t, because they were not actually my personal army to destroy my enemies, but it was certainly tempting.
“It’s my throne,” Shadow said gruffly, and he had my attention now. “My power and stone that you’ve been withholding from me.”
She shook her head. “No, I told you I needed to keep it to maintain my land. Without the stone, every being there would fall victim to the rogue creatures of The Grey Lands. You wouldn’t want that on your conscience, right?”
Shadow spun on her, one of those rapid, scary moves that I recognized from my early days with him. “I cannot accept my birthright without the stone. I’ve been patient; we’ve done it your way. But I refuse to leave The Grey Lands without the bloodstone. Understood?”
She swallowed hard. “Yes, and it will be okay by then with the creatures under the rule of Mera. The stone’s protection will no longer be required, and my people will make their way to the royal compound when we do.”
She had it all worked out. Oh, boy, did she have it worked out. I could tell that Ixana had been planning this for many years. Dreaming about being the “princess” in the Shadow Beast fairytale. What she didn’t realize, though, was that this was not that sort of tale.
This was one streaked in darkness, with a broken beast both feared and revered by beings that lived in worlds far from here. Shadow, who had powerful friends and two libraries. He was so much more than just being the Supreme Being of the realm.
When they’d kicked him from his home, they’d changed the course of his destiny, and now they had no idea what they were dealing with. He was super independent, and I was almost positive—I’d have bet my favorite dragon shifter series on it—that he didn’t want to share the crown with anyone. He’d waited centuries to claim his throne… his destiny.
She’s his destiny too.
I couldn’t really argue with true mates, but these two were the oddest I’d ever seen. Did it work the exact same way here as it did with shifters? I assumed the reason we had true mates was because the royals of this land did.
Shadow had created what he’d known.
Right?
“How does someone find their true mate?” I asked later that night when we were getting ready to go to sleep. I couldn’t take the unanswered questions any longer. “In Shadow Realm?”
Ixana’s icy gaze warmed up. “It’s a promise at birth. Usually between two royal families. Mine is from Holister, to the northwest of Trinity. I was completely honored to have such a strong and powerful mate.”
Wait a freaking minute…
“Are you telling me there’s no magical connection” I confirmed? “It’s just an arranged marriage?”
Okay, now everything made a lot more sense, especially Shadow’s general lack of interest in her. It gave strength to his assurance that he was only sticking around for reasons that had nothing to do with their bond.
And fuck if I wasn’t secretly doing a little happy dance about that.
“The initial connection is formed by our parents,” Shadow said, and the blaze simmering in his eyes told me this was not his favourite topic of conversation. “Then there’s a bonding between the two children. Like a promise ceremony. Which holds until we come of power-age, and the final bond is cemented at twenty-two.”
“We were robbed,” Ixana said bitterly. “It was supposed to happen the night of Shadow’s ascension to his destiny. We were so close to our final bond.”
“It’s different for shifters,” I said softly. “We find ours at first shift if they’re in close proximity. Our wolves know each other straight away, and you feel this… like shock of lightning in your chest. An awareness of the other. They’re supposed to be your match in all ways: power, strength, soul.”
Shadow’s hands flexed on the piece of rock he’d been tossing from palm to palm, and it was now dust.
Ixana didn’t seem to notice as she leaned forward. “And do you have a true mate?”
I snorted. “A selfish fuck of an alpha. I don’t know what that says about me, but I really haven’t spent much time with him since we recognized our bond.” I jerked my head toward a silently glowering Shadow. “Beast over here kidnapped me just after that, and my life has been in his hands ever since.”
His expression was reminding me that it hadn’t just been my life in his hands. He had all but owned every fucking part of me, and I was a prisoner to the desire he sparked to life within me.
“Why did you take her?” Ixana asked Shadow, and as he finally, finally, tore his gaze from me, I shivered, feeling naked after that penetrating stare.
“She touched the Shadow Realm. I’d been trying to find a way around Cristell’s spell for most of my time on the outside, and finally there was this small hope of another way.”
“He pretended he needed my help to round up the shadow creatures that had escaped,” I said, cutting in. “When really he just needed me to open the doorway between our worlds.”
And I had done that when no one else could. I could claim that as a victory, even if I still wasn’t sure if it was good news or not that we were here. With his damn mate.
Shadow’s lips curled up. “Turned out you could have been an even bigger help, had I known everything you were capable of.”
I shrugged. “Surprised us both. But in the end you got what you wanted from me.”
His shoulder’s lifted as he chuckled. A dark, smoky sound. “So much more than I ever expected.”
Only a moron would miss that innuendo, but apparently Ixana did not want to hear the truth in what he was saying. “I’m very happy Shadow had your help. That in the end, you figured out how to bypass the power of Cristell’s spell. She used a never-ending rotation of creatures, one of the greatest losses in our history of their energy. It near bankrupted our lands, and it contributed to the drought-like conditions across the realm.”
“The spell itself was the issue,” Shadow said. “It was so clever and adaptive. No matter what I did to try to best it, the power would anticipate my next attack. Cristell was good with spell work, but the illusions it created never felt like her work.”
Ixana jumped in quickly. “Cristell is a royal of many hidden strengths. Truthfully, her skill in spell weaving is second to none; it’s been the one thing that has kept her on the throne all these years. The royals and freilds in your area didn’t want to accept an interloper, at least not at first, but she eventually silenced any who stood against her.”
“This spell weaving,” Angel interjected, and as always, everyone paid attention when she spoke, “is going to be the biggest issue we face in taking her out. No doubt she has woven some intense and complex securities over the years.”
“Inky told me you learned a little from Kristoff about what we’re up against?” Shadow said to her. It had been some time since he’d mentioned his friend who was possibly missing… and had possibly betrayed us.
Angel shook her head. “He didn’t have a lot to offer, since it’s been a long time since he visited her compound. His one warning was to expect the unexpected. Cristell has an ever-changing security around her, and you never know what you’ll come up against. His best advice was to interrupt her power source; cut her off from the creatures she controls.”
Well, if there was one thing I was good at, it was stealing creatures from megalomaniac royals. Speaking of…
I turned to Ixana. “What happened to Kristoff after your goons snatched us up?”
She cleared her throat, but Shadow answered instead. “She assures me that he’s still safe where we left him.” He’d clearly already asked her that question, in one of their private chats, but he wasn’t satisfied with her answer. My clever beast knew she was full of shit, and it was only a matter of time before he uncovered all of her secrets.
I couldn’t wait.
