The Immortal Prince (51 page)

Before she had time to even register that fact, someone barrelled into her from behind and she was knocked to the ground.

Winded, and gasping for air, she was forced onto her back, looking up to find Jaxyn sitting astride her, covered in dust and Cayal's blood.

He smiled maliciously. “Good evening, your grace.”

 

“What have you done to my mine, Jaxyn?” Maralyce demanded of him, hands on her hips.

“Why do you assume I've done anything?” he asked still astride Arkady, looking a little peeved as he tried to brush off the dust and debris the cave-in had coated him in. He could do nothing about the blood, however, and the sight of it made Arkady want to weep. “For all you know, it was Cayal's handiwork.”

“Cayal has too much respect for other people's property.”

“Funny, that's not what you said after he drowned your mine the last time.”

“That wasn't deliberate malice,” Maralyce reminded him grumpily. “This was. You just wrecked
how
many years' work? And for what, you fool? You ain't killed him. All you've done is slow him down for a bit.”

“Maybe that's all I wanted to do.” He shrugged. He studied Arkady for a moment and then climbed off her. “I do, after all, have a rescue to perform and he really was getting in my way.” He offered Arkady his hand.

With a great deal of reluctance, she accepted his help and he pulled her up.

“I see you've fared quite well despite your ordeal, your grace?”

“It's been very…informative,” she replied, forcing herself to stand tall. She wanted to weep for Cayal, she wanted to run away screaming, but even if she'd been able to, there was nowhere to go.

Jaxyn studied her curiously. “Perhaps the damsel isn't in quite as much distress as she'd like her husband to believe?”

“I rather think that's between me and my husband, don't you?”

He seemed amused and in remarkably good spirits. Was this how Jaxyn reacted to death and destruction?
Tides, we're in so much trouble.

“Cayal certainly didn't knock any of the stuffing out of you, did he, your grace? I wonder what he did knock out of you then.”

“You are beyond disgusting, Jaxyn,” she told him, wondering why she was bothering to keep up the fiction that she considered him nothing more than her husband's lover. “And I fully intend to report everything to Stellan when we return to Lebec. Including what you really are. And what you intend to do.”

Jaxyn was singularly unimpressed by the threat. “Good luck getting him. to believe you. He already thinks you've lost your mind, Arkady. By all means, go home and tell him
I'm
a Tide Lord, along with the prisoner you helped escape. That should convince him you haven't been out in the sun too long.” Without waiting for her to reply, he turned on Maralyce. “We'll be gone at first light, Maralyce. I promise.”

“Bah! What's your promise worth?” she spat, turning her back on him. “Just get them abominations off my claim, Jaxyn, and don't you bother comin' back for a good long time, neither.”

“Stupid bitch,” Jaxyn muttered at her retreating back, and then he turned on Arkady. “Enjoy your little adventure, did you?”

She met his eye evenly and said nothing.

Jaxyn wiped away more of the blood-soaked dirt streaking his face, before ordering one of the Crasii to find him something to wash with. One of them hurried off to do as he bid as he turned his attention back to Arkady. “The Tide's turning, you know.”

“So Cayal and Maralyce inform me.”

“If you keep fighting me, you'll be on the wrong side of the line when the Tide Lords return and take their rightful place as the Gods of Amyrantha.”

“And what's the right side of the line, Jaxyn? Standing on the same side as you?”

“I'll be ruling Glaeba before the year is out,” he assured her with a quiet confidence that chilled her to the bone. It wouldn't have once. Once she would have laughed off his boast as the idle dreams of a reckless young man. But now…after all she'd seen and heard…“You don't want me as an enemy, Arkady.”

“I think that might be rather less dangerous than being your friend, Jaxyn.”

He studied her for a moment in the flickering torchlight and then nodded. “So be it,” he said with unsettling finality. “You've chosen which side you're on, Arkady Desean. Don't say I didn't warn you.”

Just as Jaxyn promised Maralyce they would, Arkady left the mine on foot with the Crasii and the Tide Lord at first light the following morning, returning to the camp farther down the trail where the horses were tethered. Once mounted, they headed down the mountain at an almost leisurely pace. The Crasii obeyed Jaxyn unquestioningly, and for the most part he acted no differently than he had before Arkady discovered he was an immortal.

For the first day or so, Jaxyn seemed content to leave her alone with her thoughts, but after a barely adequate meal of cheese and jerky on the evening of the third day, Jaxyn came and sat opposite the fire from her.

“You really don't get who I am, do you?”

“I get it, Jaxyn. I'm just not impressed by it.”

“You will be,” he predicted. “Then you may wish you hadn't been quite so dismissive of me.”

“Jaxyn, I don't care who you are, or who you
think
you are, because it doesn't alter
what
you are. Immortality might give you power, it may even make people afraid of you, but it can't make people like you.”

“You'll live to regret not liking me,” he warned. “So will Stellan.”

Arkady shook her head, refusing to be intimidated by his threats. She'd thought about this a lot over the past two days and was fairly certain she knew the way this would play out. The Tide Lords might be on the rise, but there was time yet, before they were ruling the world again.

Time, perhaps, to find a way to prevent it.

“You won't expose Stellan,” she told him confidently. “Not yet, at least. To expose my husband means exposing yourself as his partner in crime. Until your power has returned fully, you can't afford to lose your position in our household. Even with us going to Torlenia, you still have access to the corridors of power in Glaeba through Kylia. You're not going to risk losing that until you're ready. By then, I suppose it won't matter what you say about Stellan, will it?”

“You really are too clever by half, aren't you, Arkady?”

She shrugged, privately pleased she'd been able to out-think him, at least this once. “That remains to be seen, I suppose.”

“You really don't understand it, though,” he warned. “You think you know what's coming, but you don't realise what it means. You don't appreciate the truly unique relationship between the immortals and the Crasii, and that's a pity.”

“They're your
slaves,
” she replied impatiently. “I get it, Jaxyn, really, I do.”

“No, you don't. Nobody gets it. Not until they've witnessed it for themselves.”

“I've witnessed your power over the Crasii plenty of times, Jaxyn. I'm even moderately impressed by it. Does that make you feel better?”

He smiled. “I think you need a demonstration.”

“You can make them jump through hoops, I get it.”

“Who's your favourite?”

“What?”

“There's a score of Crasii here with us and you know most of them by name. Which one do you like the most?”

She shivered, hoping it was the icy darkness that made her shudder. “That's an absurd question.”

“Very well, which one is the most loyal? Which one would you trust with your life?”

Arkady didn't want to play this game but she was fairly certain there was no way to avoid it. “Chelby, I suppose.”

“The canine? He's your best tracker, isn't he?”

“You know that. It's why you brought him along, isn't it?”

“Be it on your own head then,” Jaxyn said, rather ominously. He turned and called over his shoulder, “Chelby! Come!”

Obedient as ever, the canine hurried across their small camp to the fire. “My lord?”

Jaxyn withdrew the knife he carried from his belt. The knife he'd used to mutilate Cayal—not to kill him, so much, as slow him down, Arkady realised now. He held the knife out to Chelby, who accepted it with a puzzled look.

“Sire?”

“Cut your throat,” Jaxyn ordered calmly.

The canine blinked, but made no objection.

“No!” Arkady cried, leaping to her feet.

Chelby looked at her, his eyes glistening, shaking his head, but he didn't even hesitate before raising the knife. Around them, the felines stopped to watch, every one of them staring at the canine with dark, questioning eyes. Chelby was visibly distressed by Jaxyn's command, yet inexorably, his hand was moving upwards, the knife getting closer and closer to his throat.

“Jaxyn, stop this!”

“You wanted proof, didn't you?”

“You can't do this! Make it stop!”

Jaxyn watched her closely, apparently amused by her distress. The knife Chelby held was pressing against his throat, a bead of blood already forming around the tip.

“Tell you what, I'll stop him, if you'll make a deal with me.”

“Whatever you want! Just stop it! Now!”

Jaxyn studied her for a moment longer and then turned to the canine. “Halt.”

With a great deal of relief, Chelby dropped the knife. He was visibly shaking, his ears flat against his head, his tail hanging limply between his legs, and obviously in a great deal of distress.

“What deal?” she demanded, wishing she could comfort the poor creature, but she suspected any sympathy on her part toward the Crasii would just make it harder on them.

“I'll not tell your husband you were a willing accomplice to Cayal's escape, if you don't say anything about who I am.”

“What would be the point of making a promise like that? As you said, if I tell Stellan you're a Tide Lord, he'll just think I'm crazy.”

“On the off-chance he actually thinks you're not, I'd like to cover myself. As you say, it doesn't suit me to rock the boat just yet.”

“Do you truly have your eye on Glaeba's throne?” she asked. “Is that why you singled Stellan out? What were you planning, Jaxyn, to kill the other heirs ahead of Stellan and rule through him?”

“More or less.” He shrugged. “Of course, things are a little different now. I've realised there are other ways to the throne besides through your husband. They may even prove quicker. I
can
navigate the corridors of power without magical help, you know.”

She glared at him suspiciously across the fire. “What are you up to, Jaxyn?”

He smiled. “As if you didn't already know! Weren't you listening in while Cayal and I were discussing my evil plans for Glaeba?”

“You actually
have
an evil plan, then? How foresighted of you.”

“You can mock me all you want, Arkady,” he told her, scooping the knife Chelby had discarded off the ground. “Sooner or later, you'll be kneeling at my feet, begging for my mercy, remembering there was a time when I was actually willing to give it, and you rejected me.”

He turned his back on her but had only taken two steps before she called him back. “Jaxyn!”

“Your grace?” he enquired, looking over his shoulder.

“I'll do it.”

“Do what?” he demanded as he turned to face her again, making sure he was extracting the promise he wanted.

“Keep your confidence. For now.” He looked so smug Arkady wanted to throw something at him. “I'm not doing this for you, idiot. Stellan loves you, although I can't for the life of me imagine why. It would destroy him to learn you were using him to gain the throne. The idea that by inviting you into his home, by trusting you…he might well have betrayed his king…it would probably kill him faster than the realisation he was conned by an immoral, ruthless killer with no scruples about sleeping his way to power.”

Jaxyn beamed at her as if she'd paid him a huge compliment. “My, you
have
been talking to Cayal, haven't you?”

“Well? Do we have a deal?”

“Indeed we do, your grace.”

“Then let that be the end of it,” she agreed. “For now.”

He eyed her up and down suggestively. “Not interested in sealing our pact with a kiss?”

Arkady squared her shoulders, glaring at him across the fire. “Don't push me, Jaxyn.”

“Push you?” he laughed. “You're threatening
me
? Tides, but you've got balls, Arkady.”

She lifted her chin defiantly. “I believe you were the one who said he didn't want to rock the boat? I may not be able to stop you in the long run, but trust me, I can capsize your cosy little rowboat for you now, Jaxyn, and long before you get a chance to navigate anywhere near the halls of power you seem so fond of.”

He studied her for a moment in the firelight, and then, somewhat to Arkady's surprise, he bowed in acknowledgement of her power—however fleeting—over him.

“Then we have a truce, Arkady. For the time being.”

“For the time being,” she agreed, with a bad feeling that, far from helping her cause, she had just made a pact with the devil.

“Don't even think of crossing me,” he warned.

“I wouldn't dream of it.”

He studied her for a moment and then shook his head ruefully. “Actually, I suspect you'll be dreaming of little else,” he concluded. “Maybe you
do
need reminding about what I can do, after all.”

Before she could stop him, Jaxyn turned on Chelby. He handed the knife back to the canine, hilt first, with a brusque command. “Do it. Now.”

Without hesitating, without a single objection, Chelby accepted the knife and—despite the anguish in the young canine's eyes—with a single sweep of his arm he slashed himself across the throat. Blood sprayed both Jaxyn and Arkady as Chelby fell. Arkady screamed, stumbling backwards, soaked in the blood of the dead Crasii.

Even worse, the felines stood and watched as if frozen in place.

Jaxyn flinched distastefully and stepped back as Chelby lay twitching on the ground, his anguished eyes staring up at them as he silently bled to death at her feet. The immortal turned to Arkady. She had fallen to her knees, sickened by what she'd seen, numb at the thought of what it meant.

“Now,” Jaxyn predicted with satisfaction, “you begin to understand.”