The Dark Queen (The Dark Queens Book 5) (26 page)

And all around her, the world burned...

Gasping, Owiot clutched at his chest, heart thundering with fear at the future revealed for her. What had happened to her? Why had she chosen to return to the black arts and surrender her soul in the process?

But the moment he looked into Coyote’s right eye, he had his answer.

Fable held Owiot tight to her breast. His eyes were closed and his skin ashen. Standing over them was the monstrous vision of a beast that salivated poison. Owiot’s flesh was riddled with it. Blood stained his front and back. And he knew without asking that the beast had dealt him a killing blow.

His darkness screamed, clutching at his chest and begging the fates to alter what had been done, but none would.

And as he opened pain filled eyes, he smiled softly at her and whispered brokenly... “it was always you, my darkness. Always...”

Then he exploded in a shower of starlight, and Fable—with a tear stained face—and mad, glowing eyes stood, turned toward the fairy still flitting around the beast and with a snarl of pure, unadulterated rage, stretched out her arm and smote the little blue fairy dead, howling as the madness of the blackness finally consumed her soul.

Sucking in a sharp breath, Owiot clutched at his chest, shaking his head and trying to tell himself that this couldn’t be real. This couldn’t be their fate. But Coyote had shown all he was willing to show tonight; he was now snoring on Owiot’s thighs and lost to his dreams. 

The only way for them to escape this fate would be for Fable to choose love over revenge.

For her to choose to walk away with him now, and not wait.

He could just walk back there, tell her their future, tell her what she would lose if she didn’t decide to let go of her need to hate, but then he’d always wonder what choice she’d have really made on her own. And not only that, he’d always wonder if she’d have rather chosen revenge over him, even knowing the outcome.

What if, like Aiyana, she grew to despise the very sight of him down the long road of their existence? What if someday she woke up to the realization that she’d have far rather ended Galeta’s life than to be permanently tied down to the man lying beside her on the bed?

Owiot settled his hand deep into Coyote’s reddish-gray fur and closed his eyes, trembling because he knew the answer.

He did not care about his own death. Death was a natural part of life. He’d lived long enough if death came now for him he would embrace it like his brother and move on to the next phase of his journey.

No, what mattered most to him was that Fable not turn into the creature of destruction and chaos as he’d witnessed. But the only person who could make her not choose that path was herself alone.

Fable had to choose either life or death.

Bowing his head, he prayed to the Great Spirit, begging not simply as a man in love, but as the son of the Great God himself, to hear his plea to save the life and soul of the woman who meant more to him than even his own.

Coyote snored.

Fable

I
nstantly she grew aware that she was no longer alone. Sniffing, she wiped at her eyes with the back of her wrist and stared into the face of one who’d always loved her more than his own life.

Her grandfather, Hades. Dressed in his usual colors of deep black and gray, with his penetrating and soulful blue eyes and ebony colored locks, she had always thought him the handsomest male in the world—until now.

Now her thoughts were consumed by Owiot.

“Little flower,” he said in his deep, bassy baritone.

With a cry of anguish and pain, she raced into his outstretched arms, wrapping her arms tight around his neck and sobbing uncontrollably as all the hurt and pain finally exploded from out of her.

And he let her, holding on tight and squeezing almost to the point of pain, but letting her know in no uncertain terms that she was not alone.

Finally, when she got her turbulent emotions under control, she pulled back a little, but stayed within the safe confines of his embrace and shook her head. “Are you even supposed to be here?”

He snorted. “Your aunt and grandmother probably won’t like it, but I couldn’t stay away, little one.”

She snorted, wiping up the mess of tears on her face. “Only you could see me and still think of me in that way. I’ve done awful things, grandfather. Unforgivable things.”

“As have I,” he murmured. Then snapping his wrists, he created a bench of ebony colored skulls for them to sit upon.

She’d always loved her grandfather’s macabre sense of style. Grinning softly, she joined him on the bench.

“Talk to me, sweetling, tell me what is the matter,” he finally asked when he’d gotten them situated.

She shrugged, glancing down at the now wilted flower still gripped in her hand. “I love him.”

His smile caused a rainbow to suddenly appear in the sky. Grandfather might deal in death, but ever since his joining with grandmother, he created life too.

Hades had been built for sorrow and sadness, but the power of love had transformed him into so much more. Fable wanted what he had.

“That is good to hear. Then why haven’t you told him this already and left? You know he loves you too.”

Even though she suspected it, her heart still beat like a drum in her chest at her grandfather’s words. She swallowed painfully.

“I suspected that might be the case.”

Flexing his powerful shoulders, he stared down at her with keen, intelligent eyes, before finally sighing deeply.

“I sense a but in there somewhere, Fable.”

She cringed. Anytime grandfather used her given name she knew she was in trouble.

She shrugged, and he groused under his breath.

Grandfather was a very good grouser. He made the trees themselves shake almost as violently as Button could when he got grumpy. She’d always hated when grandfather got grumpy with her.

“Fable,” he drawled. “I already know what it is, so why don’t you just spit it out already?”

Frustrated with her stupid emotions, she squared her shoulders and glowered down at the silly flower she still couldn’t seem to let go of.

“Galeta, that’s what. I wanted out of here, grandfather, I did. I do. I was ready to tell him everything, ready to turn over a new life. But I’ve been given an opportunity to exact my revenge against the bitch who turned my life upside down and...and...” she trailed off pitifully because saying it aloud made her feel heartily ashamed of herself.

“Fable,” Hades said soft, “I’m going to tell you something, granddaughter, something you already know, but that you’ve probably forgotten.”

Looking up at him miserably, she waited for him to continue.

“I know the dark pull of vengeance. The need for revenge. I understand what it is to feel justifiably homicidal.”

She couldn’t help but chuckle at his turn of phrase. Grandmother had found grandfather strung out like a stuck pig when she’d first encountered him way, way back in the day.

Hades had been accused of murdering Persephone, and all the gods of the pantheon save for Auntie Themis, and Auntie Aphrodite had wanted to see him burn for it.

Only grandmother’s quick thinking had gotten him out of the mess.

“How did you let it go? How were you able to just move on with your life? How?” she asked softly.

His lips twisted. “It would be a lie to say it was easy, I chose love, and la-dee-da, we skipped our way into eternal happiness. Your grandmother is many things, and life with her has been an adventure in many ways, but my love for her was not what finally caused me to release my hate.”

She frowned, confused by his statement. Because she’d been so sure that love had fixed him. That that was the basis and foundation of true love, an immediate cure-all that would fix all of life’s woes and make her forever happy.

Rolling her wrist, she waited silently for him to continue.

He sighed deeply. “I simply came to the realization that it was too exhausting to continue to hang on to it. That no one cared about my hurt or pain as much as I did. No one lost sleep over it. Not a one of them realized the heavy strain I’d been under and suddenly wanted to apologize. For them, life had simply moved on, and that was an end of it. I was little more than a passing fancy in the framework of their thoughts.”

“That seems wholly unfair.”

“Yes, but that’s life, my girl.” He gripped her hands. “Since when is it ever fair? Is it fair that humans have such short lives as to be pitied? Is it fair that love can be found and lost all in the same day? Is it fair that a couple that strived for years to have a child should have one only to then lose it a few days later? No. None of that is fair. But it is what it is. It’s called life, dear. And life is full of glorious wonders and unimaginable pain, but you live it, and you move on because that’s the only thing you can truly control. Even in Kingdom, where death doesn’t come as easy as it does to those that are Earthbound, there is very little in this life or the next that you can control, the only thing you can change is your heart. How you choose to live your life. You can let the hurt and pain twist you into a monster, or you can let that same pain make you stronger and mature.”

Tears were falling again, but this time, they were tears of relief. Because she knew what she had to do.

“I want to kill her, grandfather. I want to hurt her as she hurt me...”

She admitted the innermost weakness of her heart to him. But the strangest thing happened when she did.

Rather than being overburdened by the pain of the past as she’d always been, instead confessing that truth had made her feel lighter somehow.

Hades smiled softly. “I know you do. And trust me when I say, Galeta the Blue will not have an easy road of it in these games. Did you really think that your grandmother wanted to see that awful fairy gain her own happily ever after?”

She frowned. “I did wonder why that bitch was here to begin with.”

He snorted. “Your grandmother and I have matured in many ways in our long lives shared together. We’ve learned that the best way of letting go of hate is to sometimes take the opposite road. But that doesn’t mean that we can’t have a little fun while doing it.”

Laughing, thinking of all the dastardly ways that grandmother was likely to punish The Blue for all her years of treachery seemed suddenly more than good enough to Fable.

And with one final
click
the last of her need for revenge faded away within her. Just as grandfather said, she didn’t suddenly feel love for the fairy or even wish her well...but what she did feel was freedom from carrying around the heavy burden of hate.

Let fate take care of the damned fairy. Fable was ready to begin her life anew with the man she loved with all her heart.

Smiling wide, she threw herself into her grandfather’s arms. He expelled a little
oomph
of surprise, but she heard his smile in his words as he said, “Now, little flower, will you please relieve my worries and go find your mate, tell him you love him and get the hell out of this twisted game your grandmother and Aphrodite have wrought?”

Chuckling deeply, feeling as though she could fly, and so impossibly happy that she wondered if it was actually possible to die from it, she popped a quick kiss on his cheek.

“Yes, grandfather, I will. And when you see mother and father next, please tell them that I’ll be returning for a visit this winter, with my mate in tow.”

He grunted deeply. “I will. And I love you, Fable, my beautiful dark one.”

Her smile took up her entire face; she practically burned with it. Her cheeks would ache tonight, no doubt, but she no longer cared.

“I love you too, grandfather.” Jumping to her feet, and ready to go find her man, she was stopped by a light touch on her hand. “Oh, and Fable, one last thing. Just so you know, we’ll be keeping Mirror in these games just a wee bit longer, if you don’t mind.”

She cocked her head, wondering why in the world Mirror needed to stay, but trusting that her grandfather had a very good reason for it.

“Oh, okay, I guess.”

“Good. Now, I think it’s time be reunited with your lover, don’t you?”

And so saying, he winked, waved and vanished right along with the bench built of skulls. And standing in its place stood Owiot, looking dazed and confused.

“What is—”

With a cry of utter joy and longing, she flung herself into his beautiful body, tackling him to the ground as she peppered his face with kisses.

He laughed heartily. “Fable...my darkness, what—”

“I choose you, you beautiful, beautiful man,” she said in between ardent kisses. “Always you. Forever you. I love you, starlight. I love you.”

He paused in his laughter, and his eyes grew intensely serious as he whispered, “And I love you too, Fable of Seren, with all my heart and soul and the very flame of life that burns within my chest.”

No sooner had they spoken the words the coiling magick of grandmother’s power washed over them, lifting them high into the sky and through a shifting tunnel full of starlight.

She clutched onto his shoulders, nuzzling her nose with his. “So it’s probably going to take us a while to get back to the Enchanted Forest.”

“
Mmhhm
,” he agreed with a gravelly voice, “and just what did you have in mind, my love?”

Chuckling, she dug her toes into his shins and shoved up just enough so that their mouths aligned. “Well, I was thinking that maybe we could do what we did the other night when you went all the way down on me, except maybe this time, we could both do it to each other at the same time.”

He growled, and the wild beast that dwelt in his soul came suddenly roaring to life. Owiot wasn’t a passive lover, he took her violently, almost aggressively, and she loved every bloody minute of it.

And that’s how they returned home, through a shifting tunnel of stars, and making happy, happy music together.

Fable

W
alking back through her castle was the hardest thing Fable had had to do in a long time, coming face to face with all the bodies laying haphazardly in her halls—but especially with Snow’s, who Owiot now carried. They’d stopped quickly in the forest to retrieve her body and brought her back to the castle so that Fable would only need to murmur the awakening spell once.