THE EMBERWITCH

CHAPTER THREE

LIRA

If dawn was meant to be hopeful, no one told the Iron Kingdom.

A gray light smeared over the walls like soot, doing nothing to soften the Iron Palace’s silhouette—spires and battlements jutting up like swords ready to strike the sky.

I hurried across the courtyard praying to the gods that I wouldn’t get caught.

One day, Maeve would actually be the death of me.

As I scurried towards the connecting towers where Maeve currently stood at a balcony waiting for me and looking around for guards as though we were thieves running away with precious gold, I wondered again for the hundredth time this morning, just why I said yes to Maeve’s proposition.

I made my way up the narrow staircase the servants used, seeing the crowd already thickened along the main road and pressing against iron barricades from afar. I could hear shouts from here, I didn’t even want to imagine the chaos of being right in the middle of it. Children perched high on shoulders, eager to see the Prince.

I finally joined Maeve where she stood.

“Wow, it really is a whole event.” To say I was shocked would be an understatement. I knew it would be highly attended but this…

Maeve nodded and smiled brightly.

“gods, I wish you could see it up close. The men are mostly dressed in makeshift armor pieces in mock imitation of the guards and the women have blue ribbons all over them, in their hair and stitched into their clothes. Blue like the flags on the Iron crest.” She sighed.

“One day, we’ll get to attend events like these Lira, and it won’t be as servants only watching from the sidelines.” She finished.

A glint of hope in her eyes.

I really did hope she would get all she wanted, but I, wanted no part of that life.

Standing here now, looking at the people from this high up, I realized that I didn’t want to hide forever. The breeze in my hair felt nice. Staring down empty corridors felt wonderful.

I wanted Maeve to be the high lady she was born to be.

And I wanted— I wanted my freedom.

“Are you crying?” Maeve asked me, concern on her face.

“Lira, what’s wrong?” She wiped the tears that had fallen from my eyes.

I hadn’t even realized I’d been crying.

“I’m just realizing how good it feels to be up here.” I answered honestly.

And a small smile came over her face.

“Just wait till you see the Prince, then you’ll really be amazed.” Of course she thought I was talking about something else but that was okay. Of all truths, mine was one she couldn’t know.

I let her drag me down the corridor to where I would finally watch the procession.

————

I was finally tucked into a corner of the corridor Maeve had promised would be unguarded. True to her word, the journey here had been safe and easy.

Sadly, she had to leave quickly before Lady Morgana’s lady in waiting noticed her disappearance.

From where I was, I would only be able to see what happened inside the palace, not outside but that was fine. Less straying eyes.

A loud horn blared, echoing into the palace and a crush of cheers exploded, so loud I had to cover my ears.

The prince had returned.

First marched in the soldiers—rows of them, their armor scarred and dented. The crowd roared with names and praises. They tossed flowers onto the men and cried blessings for them.

Behind them, supply wagons carrying crates bound in chains that rattled ominously. I didn’t want to imagine what—or who—those might be.

Then standard bearers marched in with the iron sigil: a sword through a circle, meant to represent protection. And two blue flags on either side of the sword crossed in a X behind it, meant to represent loyalty above all, to the crown.

And finally—the prince.

The ember inside men simmered restlessly, as a cat before a storm, as I found myself drawn to look at him.

His warhorse entered before him. He rode the black steed, taller than any normal mount. His armor gleamed in the sunlight.

And his face… oh gods. His face was impossible.

How could anyone look like that?

His skin was perfectly sun-kissed making his brooding light blue steel colored eyes appear as though they were piercing through your soul. His nose was slightly crooked but narrow. His lips were deliciously full on the bottom and slight on the top and his jaw, gods, his square jaw looked sharp enough to cut through steel, like his sword.

His hair looked damp and it clung to his face beautifully, the slightly longer front of his hair hung just short of the end of his eyes.

Was this truly the Prince?

He was… he was perfect.

More resounding screams filled the palace, taking me out of my trance just enough to notice only one hand of his held onto his steed, the other, was full of a fistful of red hair.

I swallowed a scream as I watched what he flung to the ground before him. My hands flying to my mouth as I watched in horror.

The head of an Emberborn.

I felt myself hyperventilating as I fixated on the head, not a drop of blood on the floor, whoever it was had been killed long before they made it back.

An innocent life had been taken.

A head lay on the floor of their precious palace.

But the intensity of the screams only increased.

The kingdom praised him.

Prince. Savior. Monster slayer.

My chest tightened in horror and pain.

I thought the heat inside me would burn and beg for a release, I thought it would want to turn this castle to cinder and ashes.

But I felt it travel through my body to my fingertips where it tested and prodded.

'What are you doing?'

'Him.'

'What? We can’t kill him.'

'No kill. Want.'

'What?'

In my confusion, I hadn’t noticed it, but now I felt it.

I looked up from where my eyes had faced my fingers to lock eyes with—Him.

SHIT!

I moved back, trying to hide myself further into the corner.

He had seen me. But I prayed to the gods that he hadn’t noticed my ember or my head would sooner join my kin on the ground.

I looked again to see whether he had moved along only to see he was still looking at me.

I should've run. But that would make me look guilty of something. And if he hadn’t yet noticed my ember, maybe he would then.

So I stayed in place, unable to look away. Frozen by his cold blue, steel eyes.

Look away. Please look away.

I silently begged him. And he did.

I let out a breath I didn’t know I was holding and watched as he turned to face the crowd.

What just f*****g happened? I asked myself.

He was a monster, a slayer, an ember killer! So what the hell just happened?!

As I wracked my brain for an answer, he rose his hand to silence the crowd.

Then he began.

“People of the Iron Kingdom, the crown has worked tirelessly to protect you and in our efforts, we found an ember sanctuary for refugees of their dead kingdom.”

My stomach plunged to my feet.

My people were alive? No—

“It is with great pride that I say that those monsters have been purged from this world.”

Shouts and screams vibrated through the palace walls in celebration and my heart sunk.

No— no please.

“And many of the outside rifts have been pushed back. Soon we will find a way to destroy the rifts for good.”

“This can’t be happening,” I whispered—but oh, it was and it did.

Was there truly no one left? But there had to be… there had to—

And just like that, my newly born dream of freedom was shattered.

What freedom lay beyond these walls? Another life of hiding, running and living on survival mode, only to be hunted down like cattle and slaughtered.

My legs trembled and gave way.

I fell to my knees, tears rimming my eyes.

Prince Kael sat his horse, ever the mighty warrior. His declaration of death, an ode to his fore fathers.

I hated it.

I wanted to wipe the indifference from his face.

His disgusting, inhuman face.

HOW DARE HE?

While I was hyper focused on him, I didn’t realize, I didn’t see it—

Till I heard the multiple gasps resound in the hall.

My eyes slowly looked down where my body did not move.

A man stood apart from the crowd, his body turned as though he was about to run, his blood… quickly pooling beneath him.

As I looked up at his body, I saw his eyes, and the fear inside them as blood ran through him. The blood that spilled from where the prince had swung his sword right into his head.

He was so fast that I didn’t see it, I couldn’t even react to it, even when I was so focused on him.

I couldn’t fathom why he would just take a life, till I saw it, the thinnest strands of hair, so thin, you wouldn’t notice it if you didn’t know what you were looking for. But I came face to face with that hair so often, I would know it by a single strand.

A gasp racked through my body.

Emberborn. And he didn’t even know he had been killed.

The man crumpled like cloth to the floor. One of the returned soldiers went to his dead body and ripped off the hat and hood from his head.

Tears practically poured from my eyes as I struggled to keep my cries within me.

I couldn’t let them hear.

Silence held for one terrible heartbeat.

Then cheers thundered, rolling over his still body like a tide of iron.

My vision blurred and my ears rang.

Because I had seen my fate.

There was another one like me living within the palace walls and I did not know. And yet—

And yet, it took him a split second to find and kill him.

My ember surged, a sudden burst so strong heat seared up my throat. I choked, staggered, and nearly dropped completely to lying on the floor.

It wanted out—wanted to flare like a bonfire, wanted to avenge the dead man, wanted to burn this place to cinders.

I clamped a hand over my mouth and forced it down, every muscle in my body shaking with the effort.

A spark fled my skin and danced in the air in front of me—I slapped my hand closed around it before it got too far. I crushed it—smothered it—and prayed no one saw—

But when I looked up, across the platform, through a sea of people cheering like demons–

Prince Kael Ironhart was staring directly at me.

His eyes narrowed—only a fraction, but enough to make my veins turn to ice.

He hadn’t imagined it.

He’d sensed it.

That tiny ember-flare I’d smothered was enough to ping across.

But I was still alive and that meant he wasn’t sure of what he sensed.

But he knew something.

And that was too much.

I forced myself to look away—down, down, down—until there was nothing in my line of sight.

Move, i hissed to my mind.

Disappear.

But my knees refused, rooted to the floor as if Prince Kael’s stare pinned them like nails.

The officer barked for the crowds to make way and the guards stepped forward to remove the body. The cheering swelled again—the ugliest sight I’d ever seen.

My stomach twisted so violently I thought I’d retch. My throat burned from nausea.

There was no reason for that man’s death. He committed no crime. But he was killed.

The prince brought along with him, a souvenir from killing my people, people who wanted nothing more than to exist peacefully, but he killed them.

Proof to people like me that there were remains of us—no longer.

This man was a living, breathing, personification of the doom that befell all those born with red or blonde hair.

I felt the nausea slowly subside, and replace it self with anger.

He wasn’t better than Emberborn.

None of them were.

The same rift creatures that killed them, killed us too.

Emberborn were destroyed for simply existing.

HOW WAS IT OUR FAULT?!

His head should’ve rolled on the ground.

The sword should’ve been thrown into HIS head.

Why did he get to live?

No, he didn’t. I won’t allow it. He had to die!

'Him?'

'Yes, him. The prince must die.'

'No.'

'Excuse me?'

'Special. Him.'

'There’s nothing special about the man who made killing us a sport.'

'NO. Can’t.'

'Yes, we can.'

'Won’t allow.'

'Then I’ll do it myself.'

I shut down the ember before it had the chance to say something else that would be incredibly stupid.

I wanted freedom. And it was now obvious what I needed to do to get it.

The Prince needed to die.

I didn’t know how I would do it. I was disadvantaged in every way, but his life was mine.

He could not go free for all the blood he had shed.

In defiance, I rose my head and looked at him, only to find him still staring at me.

I returned his stare, ire and hatred in my eyes.

His eyes narrowed once again, probably trying to make out why the scared servant was suddenly meeting his gaze with anger, before finally moving his eyes away and focusing on the event before him.

The procession rolled onward.

But I left quickly, vanishing into the maze of hallways, not wanting to bare witness to the celebration of the death of my people.

I would gain my freedom.

I would get my retribution.

I would burn down the Iron Kingdom.

I would kill Prince Kael.