Seconds to Midnight: A Maiden of Midnight Prequel

Destiny- Day Thirty

It took time, but I finally got around to doing some of the paperwork that had been waiting for me since my return to life.

The candles, lit by a servant earlier in the evening, when I had commandeered a random office to complete said paperwork, were barely clinging to their solemn lives on my desk when the door swung open, a large file being slammed atop my work, smearing the ink there, and one of the three candles passed on, its smoke rising to the ceiling like a departing spirit. I didn’t let my mind pretend it was Cain’s, just in case I caused myself more heartbreak.

Today had been a long day, followed by an even longer night.

“Shall I ask what it is, or are you about to tell me?” I asked tiredly, bored already of the handful of work I needed to catch up on in the hundred years I’d been missing from the Manor, its people’s lives continuing despite my own having been gone. Because of it, it took significant effort on my part not to sound too interested by whatever Nym was about to show me. It had to be leagues better than whatever rubbish I was currently reading. I glanced down at the page, grimacing at the now-unreadable ink. I would have to start whatever that letter had been again.

Well, it had waited the depths of Hell knew how long for an answer. A couple more nights wouldn’t hurt, and how would they complain? I was their Princess!

Nym braced one hand on my desk, her breath smelling sweetly of spiced drinks as she declared, “Three targets!”

“Pardon?” I grabbed a new pen from its holder, sighing as Nym quickly snatched it from my hand and toyed with it, flipping the huge file open to the front page, where a blurred image of a blond-haired, blue-eyed male sat, several lines of writing beneath it. It was the exact same file Zeella had given me in his office a month ago. I’d shelved them, refusing to look at Operation Eden until I sorted my own affairs out. There was no time-frame on this mission. I could take my sweet time, and let the Sins and Lilith stew in anticipation. They believed I was carefully planning it.

I might as well have been chewing gum and twiddling my thumbs for how much ‘planning’ was going on. I could run rings around everyone in Ordeallan with my eyes closed and my feet wearing cement shoes, so I wasn’t exactly concerned about being caught off-guard. Unless Seth was an Archangel in disguise, I was confident I could deceive him with no complications. My strength was back now, although I was still training nightly.

“Three targets for you to hunt, the first being the lovely, the handsome, and the too-friendly Seth Smith of Ordeallan.” Lovely? Handsome? Not words I would have picked for Seth Smith. Taking a second glance at the image, I raised a cynical eyebrow. I supposed, looking at him in the right light, he could be decent. His eyes were… I scoured for a word to describe them… Nice?

‘Nice’ worked perfectly well. They reminded me of the ocean, with how blue they were. I imagined the photo, which was blurred and taken at an awkward angle to hide the presence of a camera in Ordeallan, did not do him justice.

Nym winked playfully at me, murmuring, “I picked the ones with the prettiest faces for you to hunt.” She spread the files out for me, opening them.

“I very much doubt you did. You took all the ones that looked good so you could hunt them, didn’t you?” I smiled, and my faithful Guardian flushed, shaking her head as she clasped a hand to her chest dramatically.

“I would do no such thing to you, my Princess!”

I laughed, the sound surprising me, and then asked, “Next target?”

Nym flipped through several pages on the Nephilim boy, and stopped at one photo of a dark-haired, dark-eyed man in his twenties, several scars covering his arms.

“Reece O’Connor, the leader of the Ordeallan Night-Hunters, which are-”

“I know what the Night-Hunters are.” Cain’s notes, made thanks to my Guardians accounts, made sure of that, “What of him?”

“He has an alias that is kept with Lady Merantala, and is highly protected. He has a brother, Darcie O’Connor, and a deceased sister.” Lady Merantala… Her name was met with scorn in my mind, and set a sneer on my face. She was a Demonic-being from the Manor, sent to The Borderlands ahead of me with help from a mirage, helping us gain more information on Reece. She was meant to be helping, but she was probably going to get in the way.

I knew about Reece’s brother- Darcie, and their deceased sister, Allabelle.

“Very well. Third target?”

“Best for last, Princess… Best for last.” Nym stopped at the final person, a blonde-haired, green-eyed woman with the face of a Faery and the eyes of a warrior, her name scrawled beneath.

“Tatiana Sevenna,” I murmured, “a Fae Royal? That’s daring. What does Zeella want with her?” I hadn’t actually bothered to read any of the files beyond Seth’s, in all honesty. I was genuinely surprised to find Tatiana Sevenna to be one of the targets. Whatever. It wasn’t my place to question the Manor, and I didn’t care for the Sun Palace Princess, so taking her life would be easy enough.

Or… I read the file with a frown. Not taking her life, but tormenting it. They needed her ‘emotionally broken’, as the file so delicately put. Sure, I could do that. I read along a little further. Maybe I could kill Lucifer, her future fiance. That could be easy.

Nym shrugged at my question, and then heaved another file from her cloak, thumping it atop the first one, and further ruining the letter I had been writing to Raymondo Senior, declining his son’s offer of marriage. I had no appetite for ruining my life at such a young age with such a boring, tasteless idiot. Perhaps in another thirty-thousand-years, when I was bored.

Grabbing the files, I shoved them into my desk drawer and thanked Nym, who only dumped a bag atop my desk, the same dull-blue coloured satchel I had carried with me since birth, the fabric mended a thousand times over in my lifetime, and bearing the weight of my weapons and knowledge.

“I brought all your favourite things. There’ll be a bath running in your room when you’re done working, passionfruit soap included, and I’ve picked a movie for us to watch.” Was Nym trying to coddle me? I eyed her up and down, debating her motives, and finally sighed, “Us?” Nym had a tendency to… over pick the crowds that joined us for celebrations quite often, and after a night of working, I wasn’t particularly in the mood for a large gathering.

I was never in the mood for a large gathering, unless they were there to watch me succeed.

Despite my tone, Nym only tapped my nose with her finger, thrust the bag forward onto my lap, and crowed, “You’ll see! It’s a surprise!” Had she not been a loyal Guardian, I would have bitten her hand clean off for touching me. I still scowled. I hated surprises. Gifts were fine, but surprises left me off-guard. There was nothing I hated more than being off-guard.

“So I bathe with people in the room next door?” I called to her retreating form, her body already halfway out the door, and blotted out by the light in the hallway. I preferred to work in darkness, much to my father’s delight.

“Never bothered you before!” She waved goodbye, disappearing, and I sighed, sliding a hate-filled eye toward Ray Senior’s letter. I could deal with it tomorrow… It would be better to get it over with.

Grabbing a second sheet of paper, and my pen from where Nym had left it on the floor, I quickly penned out a short, but firm, ‘no’, detailing every. Exact. Reason. as to why I had no intentions of marrying Ray Junior, starting with the fact that he had no skill as a tracker, fighter or even thief. He was utterly useless to me in terms of power or wealth, since I was a Princess of Hell, and had nearly two million to my name, and he couldn’t provide any sense of love or commitment, unless he planned to drop his numerous lovers. Hours passed, various drafts finding their way to the bin beside me, while others were merely tossed into the corner for the servants to deal with the next time they cleaned. Being diplomatic while maintaining my image as a take-no-prisoners Assassin was a fine line. I practically needed a magnifying glass to see where the line was, and avoid crossing it.

The handle on the door turned, and before I could even try to hide the letter I had been writing, Zeella poked his head around the dark onyx door, his eyes widening at the pen in my hand. He was wearing nothing but a thick robe, which was the usual choice of outfit for the Sin of Lust, and a keen look of lust in his eyes, leftover from whoever he’d just been ravaging. He was probably surprised to find me working.

“What are you still doing awake?” He demanded, no doubt having intended to use the desk- I doubted to write letters, judging by the lust in his eyes- and I lifted my burning eyes to the clock on the wall, my shoulders nearly slumped over with exhaustion. I’d been awake this whole month, having only spent one day sleeping, and it was beginning to catch up to me, as Zeella could obviously tell.

“It hasn’t been that long since I’ve slept.” I was one of the only people in the Caliem Manor who could go days, sometimes months, without sleeping, a useful skill for an Assassin and Princess.

“A month, Desterium,” he repeated the words blandly, tempting me to spit, ‘Yes, a month! That’s thirty days, you idiot!’. I would have said it, if I wanted to die. I chose to keep silent instead. With Zeella, I needed to choose my battles wisely.

“Go the Hell to bed before I have to personally tie you to it!” I only raised my eyes to the ceiling, and he took a threatening step forward, before spotting the letter on my desk, and its drafts scattered around me, finally realising why I’d stayed up so late.

“Planning a final goodbye?” He asked dully, and I snarled low in my throat, scrunching the final letter up and balling it to him, muttering, “You deal with it, then. I’m going to bed.” His taunt reminded me too much of a previous argument with me; arguably one of the worst ones we’d had- when he had told me to kill myself.

“What is it?” I was already out the door, satchel in hand, before he could unroll the letter, and his hiss echoed in my ears as I stumbled down the hallway, half-asleep and deluded with hallucinations that flashed in the corners of my vision, courtesy of my month of no sleep. Asking for my hand in marriage was the same as begging for an execution. Zeella only sold my hand if he wanted someone very dead.

I only accepted an engagement if I agreed they should be dead.

‘A little…’ My inner voice slurred off before it could ask for help, and the Septem Peccatis sighed heavily, half-steering my body up the stairs; a dangerous task.

‘Could you NOT exhaust yourself? You move like the undeeead,’ he drawled, groaning, and I said, “I mean, technically I am the undead, so…”

‘Shut up before you attract some Heaven-awful predator in this nasty place.’

I closed my mouth, nearly running into the door of the chambers I shared with my deceased cousin, Cain Maladur. Tears sprung to my eyes at the thought of Cain, whom I’d last seen holding together whatever pieces were left of me as the Korathian building around us came crashing down, crushing us. He hadn’t been to see me in the past month, which meant he had to be dead, since he’d ALWAYS come to see me the second I’d awoken. Shoving the door open and wiping tears from my eyes, I stumbled into the pitch-black living room, the expanse of cavernous space empty of light, not even a fire burning in the fireplace. Reaching for where one of the lanterns hung, I clicked my fingers, and shrieked at the figures that appeared in front of me.

Nym, Lydiav, Bal’gag and- and-

“Cain!” My mind moved quicker than my feet possibly could, urging me to run to him, and I almost immediately tripped over, my dearest cousin and friend rushing forward to catch me, his arms warm and covered in scars that hadn’t been there the last time I’d seen him. Nym only fist bumped Bal’gag in the background, their eyes locking for a moment of shared triumph. Lydiav remained at their side, watching with surprisingly quiet happiness. They had all loved Cain as much as I had.

“You… you were dead!” I gasped, pulling away to study my cousin, the scars on his body, his face, and I gulped down a surprised sob when he shook his head, pulling me to him in another hug, my cheek pressed firmly against his chest, where I could hear his heart beating.

“Zeella had me training your soldiers on the outskirt of Caliem. I was ordered to remain at my post, but Nym managed to get a bit of leniency on my work, and I’m here for the next month.”

“A month. That’s how long I’m here for before I have to go.” Damn sleep to Hell, I would be spending every possible second with Cain! I thought I lost him! I was never letting him go again!

He nodded, and I squeezed him tighter, murmuring, “Are you coming with me?”

He shook his head, and my heart immediately sank. While I usually enjoyed being alone, Cain was a welcome presence constantly, no matter where we were or what I was doing.

“Not at first. You need to complete the first part of your mission first. I’ll come later, when you’re done.” A sense of calm washed over me. He would follow me anywhere, making me feel that much more sure in my own plans.

I gripped the files in my satchel, vowing to read the rest of them before I slept. Cain frowned, studying my face, the bags beneath my eyes, the look of exhaustion, and sighed.

“You haven’t been sleeping.” He should have known that after spending millenia with me. I rarely slept.

I shook my head, again patting the files in my bag and grinning, “Too much work to do.” Cain’s presence had made me excited to work on the mission again, eager to show him how hard I was planning. I wanted to succeed, and have him congratulate him! I valued his opinion more than the Manor’s.

He turned to look at my Guardians, and Bal’gag stepped forward, muttering, “We’ve told her to get the Hell to bed, but she won’t listen.” No, I wouldn’t. They were my Guardians. I was their Princess! They didn’t get to order me around!

My cousin looked over to my bedroom doors, flung open to let the warmth seep out into the large space, and grabbed my hand, pulling me toward it. I shook my head, muttering, “I’ve got to finish reading these files, and then I’ll-”

“No. Sleep.”

“Cain! I want to spend time with you!” I argued when he took my satchel, hanging it on the cloak-rack by my door.

“And you will,” he countered, shoving me toward my bed, covered in black silk and cotton sheets, pillows piled high. They had been cleaned, the sheets recently bought to replace the old, fraying ones I’d had for three-hundred-years, and I could feel a yawn building up in my body just looking at the warm bed.

“Besides, you won’t be able to spend time with me if you’re constantly napping, will you?”

“That’s precisely my point! I can’t spend time with you if I’m SLEEPING!” I hadn’t seen my cousin in a hundred years, had thought him dead until this point, and I wasn’t going to waste this first encounter sleeping while he went out partying or whatever.

He faked a convincing yawn, a humorous glint of evil in his eyes, and I fought back the yawn that continued to build in me. He wouldn’t win this one. Crossing my arms, I stubbornly planted my feet into the soft carpet, and my Guardians dispersed, still grinning like cats, while promising to keep watch. Cain nodded, thanking them, before clicking his fingers. It took his powers a moment to flicker to life, the door closing slowly, and I blinked. What was he doing? He marched over to the fireplace, which was barely more than embers now, and tossed another log into it, the warmth spreading across the room, and I fought to keep my balance through exhaustion. I couldn’t sleep yet. There were things that needed doing. He turned to look back at me, and I shook my head.

“Nope. Not sleeping. Take me out somewhere.”

“No. Do you want to spend time with me?” He sighed, and I nodded eagerly. Cain and I were close, and I enjoyed his company, and the company of his numerous friends, most of them soldiers from the army he trained as General. Like my cousin, I hadn’t seen any of his friends in the month I’d been back.

Peeling his shirt off and muttering profanities, he shoved my covers back, and extended his arm toward me. I remained where I was, confused. We had often shared a bed as children back on Earth, and occasionally on missions when we needed the warmth, but we hadn’t done it in… four-hundred-years. Laying side-by-side while we watched a movie or scrolled on our phones was different to sleeping next to each other.

“Well? I can sleep on the couch, if you’d like. There, now you’re spending time with me, AND sleeping.” I hated the fact he’d found a loophole so easily.

Pressing my lips together, I slid into bed beside him, smiling at his familiar warmth and scent, his arm wrapping around me, close, but not uncomfortable, even when I stupidly said, “Someone will suspect something is happening between the two of us.” I grimaced at my own words afterwards. Who cared? We knew the truth, and a relationship between the two of us wouldn’t surprise anyone in the Manor. Our own betrothal, my first, was broken off by Lilith and the Sins when we were still children. We were too friendly with each other, apparently. The Sins wanted me paired with someone who would put me at their throat every night, and vice versa. They wanted drama, pain and possibly a death or two.

“We’ve always shared sleeping quarters. I don’t think it’s going to change much, Des. If you’re worried-”

I shook my head, pulling the covers over me, and leaning my head back against one of the dozen pillows I had, fighting to keep my eyes open. Cain clicked his tongue, and shoved his hand over my eyes, forcing them shut.

“I know you have this whole, ‘I’ll sleep when I’m dead’ complex, Des, but you need sleep, alright? You’re not being lazy if you sleep, you’re not slacking off, you’re not abandoning your court, so get some rest. I’ll be here.” His words rumbled against my back, and I smiled slightly, my mind slowly drifting into oblivion, a small piece of it hovering protectively.

My mind never fully shut down while I slept, a by-product of having a Demon Lord possessing me, but it meant that not only was I protected while I slept, but I never actually slept properly, much to Cain’s horror. I could sleep for a week, and still know most of what had happened, aside from the rare occasions that I was knocked out, or my Demon Lord decided to get some rest. Because of it, sleep felt unnatural to me, something that I despised. I enjoyed being awake, working and fighting and living, compared to just lying there, practising being dead. I spent enough time being dead without damned practicing for it, too!

“Maybe…” I slurred, and Cain only replied, “Hm?”

“Maybe if I wasn’t possessed… I would… enjoy sleeping more.”

‘That’s just uncalled for. I don’t recall ever shitting on your presence, sweetheart.’

‘I might as well be sleeping next to a radio station for all the bullshit you’re spitting.’

Dark claws dragged themselves lightly, warningly, across my mind, and I muttered, ‘I hate this.’

‘Speak for yourself. I’m trapped with you.’

‘You trapped yourself!’

“Stop arguing with him, and go to bed,” Cain ordered, and I groaned, shoving his hand from my face and sitting up.

“I can’t sleep. I’m too pumped up.” I wanted to find a way to thank him for his notes on The Borderlands without actually having to say the words, and then I wanted to tell him about the mission I was working on, “How did you know I was talking to him?”

“Your eyelashes kept fluttering against my hand. You only flutter your eyelashes when you’re talking to him.” Cain was the only person who would ever notice a detail like that about me. He saw every part of me, no matter how trivial, and loved it. I cherished him for loving me, even if I would never say it.

It was always ‘him’ with Cain, never ‘Septem’, or even ‘Adam’, as my Demon Lord’s actual name was. Cain, while he never despised the Septem Peccatis, always seemed to dislike speaking of him, perhaps because of haunted memories, or maybe because he knew Zeella had sold me like cattle. Rolling over, I stared at my bedside table, Inferos laid out lovingly on it, and reached for the blade. One of the symbols, the one for Cain, was glowing softly, and I pressed my thumb against it gently, stifling the light out before it could flare any brighter. Outside, the snow turned into something harder, the rain becoming more persistent with every passing minute, and Cain rose from the bed, a huge, jagged cut covering his entire chest, and most of his shoulder. I sat up, watching the way the scar tissue shifted when he shut the window, and quietly asked, “How did that happen?”

“Ah… This?” He prodded at the wound with a finger, a slight smile on his face, before taking a seat beside me.

“It was a training session with one of your soldiers, a girl with surprising strength, but little courage, until I began coaxing her with various insults. She wields a knife better than most of those in her division.” For someone to have made such a scar with a mere knife, the wound must have taken weeks to heal over, even with Demonic blood.

“Useful in a war, then?” I questioned, and Cain asked, “Are you going to start a war?”

I pressed a finger to my lips, thinking, and then sighed, “If Zeella requests it, yes. Will you stand beside me?” I asked more for the reassurance than actually needing his loyalty proclaimed.

My cousin reached forward, his hand encompassing my own, and he said, “Always. What will you do with civilians?”

“Spare most of them. I have no use for Super-Natural prisoners.” I’d dealt with enough insults on Earth, during the last set of prisoners taken. Lillian, the Vampire-Fae I’d rescued, was my one redeeming act of mercy. I had saved her life, brought her to Korath, and given her a job in my quarters as my main servant. She hadn’t seemed to begrudge me for it, since it gave her a pay, a roof over her head, food and clothes.

Cain and I were probably the easiest of the Heirs to serve, since we kept to ourselves. That had to have helped!

“Or the patience, I suppose,” Cain muttered, my mind already wandering back to the last war we’d started, just before Earth had fallen to the Legacy War, and Zeella had fought to keep as many Super-Naturals from the Divider as possible. His plan had worked, with Cain and I keeping most of them from reaching the Divider, but the prisoners we’d taken were Super-Naturals, a majority of them long-lived and cunning, so keeping them in their cells was a task on its own. Eventually, just before we’d been ordered to leave, I’d set them free. The fields had still been stained with blood the last time I’d walked through them with Cain, wrapped in blankets and hurried along by my cousin, who was glancing frantically over his shoulder every few minutes while we stumbled around and over bodies, fallen logs, mines that were yet to explode- and into the Divider.

The world beyond had been strange; familiar and yet entirely foreign. A world where the people weren’t quite human, but still spoke, walked and looked like humans. The only thing different was the scent, and the history behind them. It took both of us ages to accustom to it, and most of that time was spent in the Lenontin Hotel, waiting for the Manor to be built.

I blocked the memory from my mind. It was pretty high on my list for ‘Worst Moments in my Life’.

It was like whoever I’d been, the monster within me, cracked once Earth was destroyed for good. I remembered all the deaths, saw them in a light other than the Manor’s approving eye, and just… cracked. If it weren’t for Cain staying with me during those dark days and nights, I might have thrown myself out of the window to end it all. My death might have made up for the pain and suffering I’d caused millions of others. Hell below, what I did to Hestia Mercuri alone…

Cain walked into my own dining room, returning with a jug and two glass cups, and offered one, already filled with blood. Sniffing, I wrinkled my nose. It smelt off, somehow.

“What is it?” He asked, moving to tip his own cup to his lips, and I grabbed it, hissing, “Don’t drink it.”

“Why?” He sniffed at it, and then frowned, grabbing my own and sniffing that as well.

“Poison?”

I shrugged, dipping a fingernail into the drink, and watched as the liquid turned black, my own poison mingling with whatever was already in the cup. Sniffing again, I shook my head.

“Nothing I recognise.” I knew every poison on Earth, but Earth was gone, and with its replacement, Korath, came a whole new legion of poisons that I hadn’t had the time to finish documenting. Poisoned drinks weren’t something uncommon to Cain and I, despite it being treason to poison an Heir. At this point, reporting them wasn’t worth the trouble. We just tipped it out, and ignored it.

Cain, true to form, dumped the glasses in my bathroom sink, and then the jug, too, striding out of the room with the promise to return with something different. Now alone in my bedroom, I stood from bed, leaning on my windowsill and watching as a sickly mixture of snow and rain pelted against the walls of the Manor, the training grounds already boarded up in preparation of floods. Caliem, like the plains of The Borderlands, were susceptible to flooding, and with most of the Caliem Manor being on the lower floors, with only some of the living spaces being up high, it was likely that- Glass shattered beside my cheek, to the right and just below my eye, the dagger was now jutting out, its tip smeared with a thick white liquid. Turning to stare at the fields of ice below, I spotted the hunched over, cloaked figure of Ray senior, a letter clenched in his fist. Clearly, he hadn’t taken my denial of his offer very well. Wrapping my fingers around the blade, I ripped it from the window, glass falling to my feet in a shower, and pulled the curtains shut.

Warning taken.

Storming for the door, my Guardians beat me to it, appearing in the entryway just before I could storm out, their faces pale. They hadn’t seen him approach. Before they could apologise, I shook my head. Raymondo was cunning, and kept tunnels around the building. Tunnels that I would personally be destroying tomorrow night, when exhaustion wasn’t tearing into my bones. Spotting the blood that dripped from my hand, Bal’gag grabbed it, lifting it to the light. Whatever liquid that had coated the dagger had remained untouched by my fingers, and I frowned. That shouldn’t be possible.

“What happened?” Nym growled, flitting about the room as she locked and secured the rest of the windows, Lydiav watching quietly on. Bal’gag grabbed a bandage from the cupboard, wrapping it around my fingers and securing it with a small pin, just as Cain returned, a tray of food, enough for the both of us and my Guardians, in his hands. He arched an eyebrow at the sight of my bleeding hand in Bal’gag’s, and then asked Nym, “What was going on?”

“That was what I was about to ask,” My Guardian replied, and I sighed, “Ray senior didn’t take my refusal to his son’s proposal very well. He threw a dagger through my window.”

“That little- I’ll kill him. Right now!” Cain handed the tray to Lydiav, and I stopped my cousin with one hand to his chest, muttering, “No, I’ll deal with it in Ordeallan, when I’m away from the law of the Manor. Ray has already signed up to join my team, so I’ll finish him off there.”

“Ray junior is trying to accompany you on a mission? Does the man know what he’s in for?” Bal’gag sneered, and I smiled sinisterly. Ray junior would meet his messy, brutal fate on this mission, either by my hand or another. Either way, he would not be coming back alive, or in one piece. Cain stopped, and nodded, before turning to grab the tray from Lydiav again and motioning for us to follow. Tossing a cloak over my messy clothes, we followed him out into the landing, and down the stairs to the dining hall, where a group of Cain’s men, including his Guardians, had gathered to eat and celebrate the return of their leader. Bowing low at the waist, Cain grandly announced, “Tonight, you’ll be joined by the company of one of your Princesses! I expect everyone to be on your best behaviour!”

By best behaviour, he meant worst, of course. Or I did. I wanted to see debaucherous behaviour tonight; something to take the edge off my mind.

Standing on tip-toe to wink slyly at his men, I added, “Drink to your hearts content! I don’t care how you act, so long as you don’t kill anyone!”

They cheered loudly, saluting us with their cups, and I took a seat beside Cain at one of the tables, Nym, Lydiav and Bal’gag taking surrounding seats and dragging their meals towards them. I had no idea when the last time they’d been able to sit down and relax was, despite my constant urgings to do so, and I smiled at their happiness. I ate heartily, thankful that Cain had grabbed food for us all before his soldiers had come in and devoured the rest of the huge meal, and eventually Cain rose with a large group of men, heading toward the servant kitchens to fetch more food. There was no reason, my cousin had claimed, for us to wake the cooks with our growling stomachs at such an hour. The second my cousin had disappeared, three of his men, friends of mine, grouped together, their self-chosen leader cupping something between their palm and the table, sliding it across to me. I cocked my head at his hand, and he whispered, “A gift. We bought it in Pangorama.”

“You didn’t have to buy me anything,” I protested, and they shrugged in unison, Lydiav asking, “Why did you wait until Prince Cain had left before giving it to her?”

The leader laughed, whispering, “Because we didn’t get anything for him! Can’t buy a gift for one Royal without getting one for another, unless you give it in secret! If he sees you with it, don’t tell him where you got it from!”

Laughing at their expressions, I promised, wondering if Cain already knew about the gift, and the man lifted his hand, revealing a small leather pouch, the mouth tied shut with a thick red cord. I grabbed it, sniffing, and before I could excitedly exclaim what it was, the man said, “Fire Sugars. Your favourite chocolate, right?”

I nodded, and tucked the pouch into my cloak pocket, footsteps echoing in the hallway outside. Thanking them, they all returned to their meals, and I turned to Nym, who was wolfing down a slab of meat. She only watched me in silence, waiting for me to speak, and I shook my head. Now wasn’t the time to ask about work. Even my fragmented mind knew that.

Music began, floating from some high-up speaker that they’d hidden, and several of the soldiers stood to dance, grinning like fools and half-drunk. Looking around the room, I searched for a familiar face. Nym and Bal’gag had moved to speak to Cain’s Guardians, the fifteen of them exchanging valuable information about the border and Manor alike, while Lydiav had gone to dance with some of Cain’s closest friends, her smile bright. With my gut full of food, I laid my head down on the table…

A hand on my shoulder woke me, Cain pulling out a chair and taking a seat, his arms folded on the back of it while he downed a drink, his plate empty in front of him. Behind us, music and cheers still echoed, the midday sun streaming in through one of the far away windows. I turned to look at the window nearest to me, to find it covered with Cain’s cloak, shielding me from the light.

“Hey,” he murmured, his eyes clear, and I rubbed at my sleep-swollen face, peeling my tongue from the roof of my mouth with a grimace. My eyes burnt, and I could feel a sore spot on my cheek where the table had dug into my face.

“So much for sleeping,” I groaned, my forehead thudding against the table, and Cain laughed, sliding a small drink across to me, a straw floating in the bubbling liquid. Taking it, I didn’t bother to sniff it before I drank, confident that Cain would have checked, and slumped my head back into my arms again.

“Will you be alright here?” Cain asked quietly, and I nodded, lifting my thumb up. Rising from his chair, he joined his men in dancing…

I awoke, shivering, on a hilltop, my clothes too thin to stave out the cold, and my skin icy to touch. Around me, water roared down the hill, flooding the plains beneath me, where hundreds of tents had been erected against the storm. The camp appeared empty, the tents abandoned, and supply packs, food roasting over fires, shoes and weapons and clothes left to face the rising water. A war camp, but a quickly abandoned one, the soldiers within having spared not a single moment to stop and collect supplies, and their muddy footprints, having sunk into the mud, led up the hill on the other side, where a great forest rose to greet and shelter them.

Blood dripped from my arm, where a wooden pole had been scraping against it, wedged between the large boulder I laid on, and another nearby stone, where wooden planks, poles, and large strings were being crushed. Catapults. I spared another moment to look around, wondering where I was, and felt water lapping at my feet; even now, in the precious minutes I’d been here, the water was still rising.

With a groan that roared behind me, a lumbering mass of wood and metal came free from its position in the dirt, pulled by the water, and came hurtling toward me, bulky enough that should it hit the stone, it would roll straight over, crushing me with it.

‘Hurry, hurry, hurry,’ a voice clanged over and over in my mind, and I shook my head as I turned toward the water beneath me. Seconds, I had seconds to decide whether I would live or die, but I was already freezing. The cold of the water would be enough to end my immortal life. One by one, I forced my frozen fingers to lift from the stone, my grip weakening, and a second before I plunged into the icy water, I spotted a small ring on my left hand.

I hit the water hard enough that the breath I had forced down was immediately shoved from me, and I beat against the cruel hands of water that lashed against my skin, trying to tear it from my bones. I had been taught to swim at a very young age, younger than most children would have been taught, but while I could outswim a riptide or a whirlpool, even this hulking mass of death was too powerful to contend with. As the sky above faded to a murky black, blotted out by the water, I continued to shove and swim in the current, doing everything I could to avoid the deadly shrapnel, hot coals and swords that were flung around like toys, and eventually, hit the other hill, where the soldiers had retreated earlier, and clung to a branch, its thorns tearing into my fingers. Blood flowing down my arms, I spat water from my lungs, and heaved myself up onto dry land, the water rushing by.

Still shaking, I gulped down air, too exhausted to haul myself any further up the hill, even when I heard people shouting my name above. Teeth chattering too hard to scream, I only weakly mumbled, hoping to catch their attention, and felt the last of my power ebb out beneath me, trying to warm my body. The grass was too wet to warm, and I rubbed at my fingers, curling into a ball. Above me, the shouting grew louder, moving closer to me, and footsteps shook the dirt above me, dozens of hands pressing against me, checking for my pulse, trying to rub warmth into me. Eventually, they managed to drag me higher up the hill, where several people were still making their way through the trees, trudging hopelessly along the dirt paths, where I could see a large oak tree with a single blue cloth tied around it, a silver string extending into the forest and forming a path for them to follow. I rose, and walked behind them.

A hand caressed my cheek, too solid to be anything from a dream, but I kept my eyes closed, not wanting to attack someone who was perhaps merely checking on me while I slept. The stench of thickly-applied perfume doused my senses, and I couldn’t stop myself from wrinkling my nose. Luckily, my face was still buried in my arms, hidden from view, as I recognised the scent of lemon and petunia.

Ray junior.

The hall had been closed off to anyone else, and I could still hear the dancing and bawdy tunes of Cain’s men, but no one had seemed to notice him slipping in, or the fact that he was close to me. A month ago, when Ray junior had attempted to bully a servant into handing over my clothes to him, claiming that I was now his fiancée and I lived with him, I had ordered that he be kept away from me, or face death. Now, with yet another of his proposals denied, it seemed the idiot had gotten cocky. My left hand, luckily, was resting on one of the dinner knives on the table, its silver body warm in my fingers, but I didn’t want to kill Ray. Not yet.

His death was planned for another time. Killing him here would be too anti-climactic; it wouldn’t paint a brutal enough picture to any future followers of his example that I was not to be messed with.

I was a spider, and he was nothing more than a fly who believed himself a dragon.

Despite the slight movement I made wrapping my fingers around the knife, his hand continued to caress my cheek, moving down to brush against my jaw, my throat- I gripped his hand tight enough that I heard his wrist crack, and I stifled his shriek of pain enough with my other hand, still holding the knife, that it wasn’t heard over the music. Once the dancing began, not many people bothered to look over to the tables, since most of the drinks had already been depleted, and the food eaten. His large blue eyes stared back at me, frightened, and I crooned, “Touching things that don’t belong to you, Ray?”

His attitude, willed into something sharper by the tone in my voice, changed completely, and he tried to pull his wrist back, purring, “I will marry you, eventually.”

“You’ll die trying.” I pressed the dagger to his palm, hard enough that he shook, a nervous laugh escaping him. I pulled it away, turning to look for Cain. If he saw Ray here, Ray would be dead before I could give the order.

“My father has already begun preparations, such is the confidence he has in Zeella agreeing to our union.”

I didn’t give him the satisfaction of grimacing, but I pulled the dagger his father had thrown at me from my cloak, brandishing it proudly, and said, “Perhaps I would have considered your offer, had your father not thrown this through my window in an attempt to end my life.” It was a lie, but he wouldn’t recognise that. He was too bloody dim-witted to realise that the Demi-Sin of Deceit might be lying to his face. That, or it was arrogance that made him believe he was too important for me to lie to him.

Ray’s face turned red with fury, but it was directed elsewhere, and I pressed the dagger into his pathetic hands, hissing, “If you ever come near me again, Ray, I’ll kill you. Do you understand? I will chain you up, and feed you to the Demonic-beings of Ordeallan.”

Ray reached arrogantly forward, brushing a finger against my collarbone.

“You’re mine.” Death wish accepted. Ray might as well have signed his death certificate himself.

I snapped his finger with a quick movement, snarling, “And you are dead. Does your puny mind understand that word, Ray? ‘Dead’. If you dare to come on the mission with me in a month, you won’t survive the first week. Take that as an omen.”

Releasing him, I shoved him away, and stalked toward Nym, who was leaning against one of the nearby pillars, looking content. She must have seen what I’d done.

“Hell below, I’d been hoping to do that myself since the moment you died, and he started crowing to everyone that he was your future husband. Why not kill him outright?”

“Grander plans. His life could be a good bait in Ordeallan, or a sacrifice to some ancient god.”

‘I would ask that you refrain from that name.’

’What? ‘God’? We’re ruled by Seraphina. She created you.’

‘But who created Seraphina?’ He marvelled, and I sighed, unable to bring myself to care about who had made the mistake of creating the Archangel Queen. Linking her arm with my own, she handed me a string of diamonds, held together by a silver chain, and I asked, “Have you got a secret admirer now?”

“It’s not for me,” she said, a smirk on her face.

“Who’s it for, then? Lydiav? Will I need to relieve her from being my Guardian so she can marry happily?” Of all the people whose wedding I would be overjoyed to see, my Guardians would top it, along with Cain, and maybe a few of my siblings.

“It’s for you.”

Heaven above.

‘Look who’s gaining the attention of all the attractive men.’

‘Shut up.’ Cheeks flushing, I took the necklace from her hands, looking around the room to see if anyone was watching nervously to see my reaction. When I could find no one, I said, “Who gave it to you?”

“I’m under secrecy not to tell, but only to specify that it isn’t a ‘love’ thing, just a ‘gift for a friend’, thing.”

“So why are you smiling like I’m about to be married?”

Nym shook her head, grabbing the necklace from my hands and securing it around my neck, before clicking her tongue, muttering about not being the best judge of jewellery and whether it looked nice. Calling over her sister, Nym turned away from me.

“Do you think this looks good?”

Lydiav studied it for a moment, before nodding.

“Looks pretty. Very shiny,” My Guardian approved, gripping both our hands, pulling us into the reel of dancers before we could stop her. Nym and I had never been dancers, preferring to hang out on the sidelines and take bets on who would fall over drunk first, but Lydiav was a storm to be reckoned with when it came to partying, and before I knew it, I was being shoved into the arms of one of the soldiers, who bowed their head to me.

“Nice to be back, Princess?” He said effortlessly as he spun me. I blinked, half-dizzy, and begged for someone, preferably Cain, to spare me from this personal Hell. Despite being Royalty, dancing had never been a strong point for me. For Reannatiel, it had been as easy as breathing, but she’d always been the favoured one for ruling. I didn’t mind, preferred it, until…

Casting the thought from my mind, I replied, “It’s nice to be out of the Void. Caliem Manor isn’t a favoured spot, though.”

“Oh? And what would be?”

What I wanted to reply was something akin to treason, now. Where I wanted to be was a small home in Britain, back on Earth, where the rooms were smaller and my family was actually a family, or the school I had attended as a child, where Cain’s friends had been my friends and my twin had bought lunch from the school tuckshop. Any place but here.

Despite the thoughts in my head, my only reply was, “Wherever it’s warm.”

The soldier’s arms tightened around me in agreement, and he said, “The training camps are similar. The only place you want to be is somewhere warm, where there is good food and enough beds for everyone.”

“Is that not the case now?” I asked, concerned, and the soldier hesitated, debating how much complaining he should do to his Princess. I tried to will any harsh looks from my face, anything that revealed that I was nasty, and did my best to look sympathetic. I would not judge those who spent their lives protecting me.

“Well…”

“If it is not, soldier, then I will see to it that your wishes are met. Is there any other improvements that need to be made?”

‘A delicate line,’ I thought as the soldier’s face softened, and he looked surprised at the kindness I’d shown, ‘would need to be drawn between where I would show mercy, and where I was their Princess.’

Zeella would expect no less.

The soldier gave me a tentative smile, and said, “There often isn’t enough food or supplies to go around, and because of it, tensions run high in the camp. Warmth is also rare… There aren’t enough proper buildings with fireplaces, and not many of us will dare light a fire near the tents.”

Food, supplies, warmth. Those three things were fixed easily enough. A short letter to the Lords, and a meeting, and it would be done. I was persuasive enough on my own, but if I could get Cain and some of my other cousins to agree, it would be enough.

As the dance finished, I assured, “I will see what can be done. I will ask that you not give me your name, in case they question me for it.” Having his appearance was bad enough, but nobody could peer into my mind, not even the Sins. Thank the depths of Hell for it. I didn’t want to imagine how much more often I would be dead if they could see my thoughts.

The soldier bowed his head in thanks, nodding in agreement, and I was quickly scooped up once again by Lydiav, who was towing a red-faced and gasping Nym, her eyes wide. Bal’gag, as usual, had disappeared, and before Lydiav could convince us to a second dance, I brought both of my female Guardians toward the tables, murmuring, “I’m going up to bed. Stay down here if you wish. Have some fun. You’ve both earnt it. Or, if you would like, you can go to bed.”

“Want us to tell Cain?” Nym asked, and I shook my head. Let my cousin relax for the night. Hugging them both, I retreated away from the dining hall, taking the quieter, less traversed hallways back to my room, before I came to the stairs. Sitting on them, waiting, was Ray. Still carrying the knife from dinner, I kept a nonchalant hand on it as I walked toward him, some instinct in my mind warning me that something wasn’t right.

‘He’s got some sort of vial hidden in his hands. He’ll throw it at you.’

‘Which way do I go to avoid it?’ I said, continuing to walk, and my Demon Lord replied, ‘Left. Dart to the left once he throws it. If it hits you, it’ll burn. If enough of it gets you, you’ll die in agony.’

‘Thank you.’

The Septem Peccatis bowed his head, and vanished back into the depths of my mind. Now only a few steps away from Ray, I double-checked the knife on my belt. Three steps, and he made no show of moving. Two; Nothing.

One… Ray jolted, as if someone had kicked him up the ass, and I immediately darted to the left, the ‘SLAP!’ of whatever liquid he’d thrown landing on the stairs behind me, and I swore at a sharp pain in my right shoulder, where a few specks of it had hit me, having bounced off the wall. Ray was gone before he could even see if it had fatally wounded me, and still swearing, I tore my cloak off, watching as it continued to burn through my shirt and skin. Gritting my teeth, I walked the rest of the way to my room, and collapsed on my bed, not wanting to move. The pain was akin to being rubbed with a cheese grater, or a mincer.

‘Do I wash it?’

‘No. Water will make it worse. The pain should lessen in about fifteen minutes.’

Fifteen agony-filled minutes. Wonderful. Vowing to kick Ray’s ass so hard he coughed even more bullshit than normal, I peeled off my shirt, dumping its steaming remains on the floor of my room.

‘What is this?’ I demanded, staring at the small, but deep, divots in my skin, where the bone armour was now visible. I’d had worse wounds, but very rarely did they cause so much pain.

‘That’s a shoulder.’

‘I’ll pummel you into oblivion as well!’

Rolling over, I bit down on my fingers to stop myself from sobbing like a child, and snagged Cain’s shirt from where he’d left it, wrapping it as best I could around my shoulder in a makeshift bandage. If things continued the way they were, I was going to end up looking like a crucified body, covered in bandages and hollowed out.

Still imagining all the ways Ray’s life was about to become a living, breathing Hell, I grappled for unconsciousness.

‘Pathetic.’ The Septem Peccatis cracked my mind open like a nutshell, immediately clenching his taloned fists around my mind, and exhaustion hit me once again…