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  Legends of Fire

  (A Dark Faerie Tale #7)

  Copyright © June 2016 Alexia Purdy

  All rights reserved

  Published by

  Lyrical Lit. Publishing

  Photography and cover design - Cathleen Tarawhiti

  Digital art - Maria Jose Hidalgo Barranco

  Model - Kingsley Comins

  www.alexiapurdybooks.com

  This book is sold subject to the condition that it shall not, by way of trade or otherwise, be lent, re-sold, duplicated, hired out, or otherwise circulated without the publisher’s prior written consent in any form of binding or cover other than that in which it is published and without similar condition including this condition being imposed on the subsequent purchaser.

  This is a work of fiction. All characters and events portrayed in this novel are fictitious and are products of the author’s imagination and any resemblance to actual events, or locales or persons, living or dead, are entirely coincidental.

  Keep these words,

  In your heart,

  Never forget,

  Who you are.

  For I am here,

  Never far,

  Close enough,

  To watch you fall.

  Chapter One

  Rylan (Soap)

  There was nothing like the wind rushing through my senses and springing them alive unlike anything ever had before. This soaring, high above the clouds with their soft, wet kisses spraying across my skin, revitalized my innermost soul when total darkness wanted to suffocate it and gave me life. I’d flown with the Raven faery clan before, back when Shade was mine and we’d been surrounded by thousands of Unseelie warriors during Aveta’s dark stranglehold over the land, but I would never have my fill of flying.

  The bright blue of the sunlit sky was blinding against the stark white of the puff of clouds surrounding us. I was being escorted by Taos. Benton, Shade’s brother, a fire elemental, was being carried by Bibette. Taos and Bibette were two of the Raven Queen’s flying servants. They’d been sent to bring us to Aluse, their queen. Memories of the Raven royal rushed back as I thought of her alabaster skin and obsidian hair that matched the feathers of her shiny wings. She was an ally to be counted on. Good thing Shade’s grandmother, Lana, had been good friends with her or we would have died in the forest when the Unseelie set it ablaze. Lana had died in that fire, exiled and imprisoned in a magical bubble in the middle of the forest. Her friendship with Queen Aluse had saved us from the inferno.

  I closed my eyes. Memories of Shade still made my heart twist. I loved her. She was the most unusual woman, being half faery, half human and of royal descent. But she’d chosen to marry Dylan, a Teleen warrior who was bound to her by blood. It had shattered my heart and drowned my hope of ever finding love.

  That didn’t mean I didn’t hold out for a miracle.

  “How much longer?” I called out to Taos. He tightened his grip on my arms, causing me to yelp as his sharp talons dug into my shoulders. He wasn’t pleased, and I decided to not bother him any further during the flight.

  “Look!” Benton pointed downward toward a large charred scar in the forest below. Saplings and underbrush were growing back in droves, but the damage was apparent and would take decades to fix. A fire had destroyed the ancient trees around a hill where had once stood a quaint farmhouse. Lana’s house. I remembered Shade’s anguish as she watched the hillside light up under the burnt orange fires set by Aveta’s Unseelie army, consuming the one relative who could show her how to rein in her newfound magic. My heart lurched at the thought of Shade’s horror as she watched it all burn.

  The only good thing about the landmark was that it marked the proximity to Queen Aluse’s territory high in the rugged, sandstone mountaintops surrounding the valley.

  “Brace yourselves!” Bibette called out as we descended from the clouds, dropping rapidly toward the red-orange rocks below.

  The fall made my stomach knot, and I swallowed down my breakfast as Taos snapped his wings and hovered slightly before dropping me unceremoniously to the flat ledges of the Raven caverns.

  Dusting my clothes off, I snapped my eyes toward Taos, throwing him a dirty look that he ignored or didn’t even notice. The guy was on my shit list for now. His flight skills were less than admirable as was his customer service. Aluse would be hearing about his less-than-welcoming presentation if I had anything to say about that. Darting my eyes toward Benton, I found him and Bibette landing softly, laughing together as they immediately began chatting about the flight. Bibette’s face lit up as Benton fed her compliment after compliment, elated after the short jaunt.

  I rolled my eyes. At least his heartbreak about Sary, the pretty Vyn princess of the south, appeared all but forgotten. He didn’t waste any time moving on. Just as well. I preferred the happy-go-lucky Benton over his broody, the-world-sucks-and-can-bite-me attitude.

  “So what now?” Benton approached me as Bibette headed into the caverns below, leaving us to fend for ourselves. “Where’s this brother of Aluse?”

  “Come on.” I motioned for him to follow me to the entrance Bibette had disappeared into. Inside, the caverns seemed larger than they appeared from the outside. Long snaking corridors led deep into the mountain and to dozens of carved-out rooms occupied by a multitude of Raven faeries, chatting, eating, preening, dancing… just enjoying life, I guess. They were far more relaxed than the Teleen faeries, and I looked forward to hanging out with them for a short time again.

  One thing about the land of Faerie, there were numerous clans of magicals who could be counted on for a darn good time. The Ravens were one of them.

  “This place is amazing!” Benton ran his fingers along the rough sandstone walls, and I could see the gears moving around in his head. “How does it not just crumble to bits? The rock is soft here.” His fingers caused the wall to crumble just a bit under his nails, but it immediately patched itself up as though the stone had never been touched.

  “Magic, perhaps.”

  He nodded more to himself than anything. I was happy to see him more cheerful, after his sister Anna had unwittingly betrothed herself to that Unseelie maniac, Oran. I was sure he was none too happy to get away from the Scren Palace and dive into whatever work he did back at his home and Pyren. Pulling him out of his gloom had actually been Shade’s idea, and the mission presented to her by Queen Aluse’s soldiers had been perfect for us. But I hadn’t told him that. He would sour about any intervention from his sister, though he respected her more than anyone in this world.

  “Make sure he eats and gets some sun. He’s in dire need of it,” she’d told me. I aimed to please. Anything for Shade. It would always be so.

  “Where are Queen Aluse’s chambers?”

  “We’re close. Just a few more floors down.”

  “Why isn’t she in the highest room of the highest tower of the highest et cetera and so forth?” Benton snickered, more jovial as he skipped along the hall and whistled a tune to himself. Maybe this version of Benton was absolutely, undeniably more irritating than the other two faces he could present. I shook my head and bit my tongue to keep words I’d regret from slippin
g out.

  “I don’t know.”

  We passed even more corridors near the outer wall of the mountain where small windows were carved to let the light of the world into the darkness within. Occasionally, a ledge popped out where a winged faery could take off if he or she needed to leave the stronghold. Most faeries didn’t fly. Not the human-sized ones, at least, so there was little worry that an attack would come from the sky. No, the ones to fear were always on the ground and could do significant damage in great enough numbers.

  Like Aveta’s army had. They had done enough damage without being able to fly. This place, Queen Aluse’s aerie, was probably the safest place in the world. It was high enough to be left alone by most wars and isolated enough to disappear into if one wished. Only the clouds could be seen on the horizon. Right now, a wispy fog hung low enough I could barely see the tips of trees peeking out from under them, like arrows darting out of a fluff of cotton.

  There were two places in Faerie I admired the most: The Scren Castle and the Aerie Catacombs of the Raven Queen. Maybe one day, one or the other would become my permanent home.

  “Here.” I pointed toward one last opening heading toward another set of rooms. This area was brighter than most others, lit by skylights. It was at the top of a cliff, still part of the catacombs but more private and harder to get to since its sides were vertical, impossible to climb from the outside, making it the safest spot to huddle down in the aerie.

  I knocked on the carved wooden door. It was smooth and worn, like it’d sat there for centuries, but heavy enough that nothing would get through without a good amount of force behind it.

  “Who is it?” Aluse’s voice rose from behind the heavy door, muffled by the thickness of the wood.

  “Rylan of the Teleen and Benton, Shade’s brother, Your Majesty.”

  “Ah, yes.” Locks clicked as she turned them open, rotating their tiny gears until the door was released and she slowly pulled it open, peering out with her glassy, obsidian eyes. Her ebony hair flowed freely about her shoulders, surrounding her in a dark halo.

  “Soap, Benton.” She gave us a curt nod, relieved to see us before opening the door wider. “Please come in. I’ve been waiting for you.”

  Chapter Two

  Benton

  Nothing could have prepared me for what I saw in the royal chambers. Trey, Aluse’s brother, was withering in a way I’d never seen before. He reminded me of the ruined faeries who hung around the Siphon Lord Ferdinand, back in Chicago. His wings were but skeletal remains of their former glory, with shafts of stripped feathers still embedded into the wings, barely hanging on.

  He was a ghost, a faint glimmer of what he had once been.

  It made me shudder, but I fought to keep it to myself lest I offend the royals. I tried not to focus on the ruined faery and took in the darkness of the room. It was lined with overflowing bookshelves. More tomes were stacked along the walls. In one corner, candles sat grouped on a table with two chairs while another bunch sat upon a small reading table next to a recliner. The bed was a tousled mess, blankets twisted and the mattress stained even though the sheets looked fresh on the corners. A small amount of sunlight came through at the edges of thick curtains hanging over the windows, and the entire room stank of urine and remained stale and musty, even with the windows open and a breeze gently wafting the curtains.

  Trey was staring off into oblivion; his stark, sunken eyes were reddened, darker than his sister’s. He looked like a dying cancer patient, with bones protruding from every edge of him and thinning ebony hair that hung in patches across his shoulders. I worried we were already too late to save him.

  “Trey? Please, talk to me.” Aluse’s royal demeanor was dropped completely the moment she touched her brother. The worry and sorrow strained her features while her nervous fingers slipped over her brother’s arm as he failed to react to her presence. “Trey? I know you can hear me. Rylan has brought Benton, a human elemental warlock, to help us. Do you understand?”

  I swore her eyes were fighting back tears as she begged her brother to respond. I feared it was futile; he was fragilely close to death. After a few minutes of her pleading, he slowly turned his empty eyes toward her, focusing his sluggish gaze onto her face.

  “Aluse?” His voice was a rough whisper.

  “Trey! Yes, that’s it. Did you hear me? Benton is here to help. You have to tell him what happened, you hear? Tell him everything. He can help you, but you have to say the words.”

  Trey looked away and back toward the gaping hole in the wall serving as a window to the outside world. It was the only window without curtains. Blown glass was wedged into the carved eyelet to the world, held snugly to the wood frame that kept it secured to the stone. Ripples in the glass distorted the scenery of a million evergreens crossing the horizon beyond the mountain.

  There, in a far corner of the landscape, was the wide scar marring the emerald field, the charred area where the fire had burned the trees away. From what Shade and Soap had told me, it had happened recently when Shade’s grandmother from Faerie had died. It felt like it’d just happened, but it’d been months ago.

  “She died there. The woman who could help me. She hid the key I needed. There’s no hope without her now.” Trey sucked in an agonizing breath of despair before pacing the floor, muttering under his breath and growing increasingly agitated. “She said she would help me, but she died before she told me what it would do. She lied!” He slammed a fist into the wall, and I winced as blood oozed from his split knuckles.

  “Who lied, Trey? Trey… please!” Aluse stepped closer to window and peered out at the view beyond the window. Her eyes widened before she turned back toward Trey, who’d already lost his focus. He was now staring at something in the fingers of his uninjured hand. The other lay to his side, drizzling droplets of crimson onto the ground. He didn’t seem affected at all. There was no acknowledgment of pain in his sallow features.

  I stepped closer to see what he was studying so intently. It was a pure white feather, looking a bit rough from being handled. Its down was twisted in little locks of soft white. The long shaft was smooth and slightly grey, as if it’d once been a pure white and was now dingy. It was a large feather, but it wasn’t from any bird I’d seen in these parts of Faerie.

  “Trey, no, no, no. Don’t… please, come back to me.” Aluse was back on her knees before her brother, her large obsidian wings dragging across the floor. She couldn’t care less they were being scuffed up.

  “What’s he mean about a woman?”

  Aluse sighed, realizing Trey was lost to us again. She rubbed her forehead and stood up. “He speaks of my friend, Lana. She died in fire set by the Unseelie out there.” She pointed toward the scorched patch outside the window. “She was also Shade’s grandmother. She was like a sister, and a very dear, lifelong friend of mine.”

  She sniffled, like another memory had tickled her nose and threatened to send the dam overflowing with unwanted tears.

  “What…?” Confusion hit me as I thought of what Shade had told me about her grandmother. Since we had different fathers, hers faery and mine human, I had never gotten to hang with Lana like she had, but I’d met her once. The faery was beautiful, like most of the fey I’d met, but she died withering from being in exile for far too long. It’d been just a coincidence that day had brought the massive Unseelie army, sent to burn the forest around her house and drive Shade out. It’d been a dark day, and Shade rarely spoke of it. I knew better than to ask her to tell me more when her eyes shined with regret. I’d left her to her memories of her grandmother, but now I wished I’d bothered her more about it.

  I turned toward Rylan. He’d been with my sister when it had all gone down.

  “Lana was a wonderful soul,” Aluse said, staring hard out the window. “I was devastated when she died. We grew up together. Hunted together, found our partners and married about the same time. Even… had children at the same time. When she died, I lost part of my own soul.”

&n
bsp; “Why would Trey mention her?” I asked.

  Aluse shrugged, shaking her head and frowning. “I have no idea. Lana never told me about any curses such as this or the key he might be speaking of.” She wrung her hands, causing them to flare up a dark pink. “Can you help him?”

  I tilted my head toward Trey, who was now asleep and leaning back on his fragile, skeletal wings, snoring softly. His black hair partially covered his face, but he was almost perfectly still, with only his chest moving in a soft rhythm. His hand was healing slowly but was now being carefully wrapped by a servant raven girl who knew better than to wake him up.

  “I’m not sure,” I said. “I could try and scan him for any memories he might not have mentioned.” Aluse nodded. I fixated on the item in his hand again. “What’s the feather for?”

  “I don’t know. I assume it’s from a type of winged faery with white feathers. Trey must have met one before his illness.” Aluse looked wearily up at me. “Some believe they’re what you call angels, but they’re really just faeries who call themselves the Nephilim. They’re a unique and rare type of fey who should, from what we know, be extinct.”

  The word “extinct” made me jerk my head up, for it stirred something in me, and I racked my memory for its importance but came up with nothing. I swore my recall was shot, and I wasn’t even nineteen yet. Maybe my human mind just wasn’t meant to handle the land of Faerie. I needed to ask Braelynn, a powerful sorceress I’d met through my sister, for a memory charm.

  “If they’re extinct, who would have such a feather? Maybe someone kept souvenirs?”

  “I don’t know. But if you think looking into Trey’s memories will help, by all means, go ahead.”

  I sighed, checking my pack for any items I’d need for the spell. Rylan was waiting patiently by the window now, his arms crossed as he peered out across the forest. I could only guess what he was thinking about those days and the fire. Back then, he’d been with Shade. Back then, he had loved her. He still did, that much I could tell. I’d never seen him happier since. Now I was sure it pained him to think of her. I felt bad for him, even if Shade was my sister.