Chapter 4 - Let the Blood Rain
His body slammed against the iron bars above, and he fell right back, the floor of the dungeon crashing at the force just as the bricks floors above sealed up.
Silence stretched across the hall.
Then laughter wreaked it.
Loud. Full of mockery.
Ismena released a breath, the feeling still present in her veins.
"Fool," the King laughed ever louder and turned to Ismena.
She blinked, forcing herself to smile.
"Weak and pathetic. Don't you think, darling—"
"AHHHHHH!"
A scream pierced through the air. The floor trembled, the walls too.
Then she saw him, leaping through the air towards them.
By the Sun!
No!
NO!
He was going to kill her.
This was the end!
The night creature crashed in front of her, and hovering horror as her back crashed against the cushion. She waited for the pain of his claws in her bones, but it never came.
Instead the chaos blurred into silence.
All she could see were his canines, his rageful, bleeding face that was something between beast and man.
All she could feel was the dread consuming her more and more, the hatred that spilled out of him as he looked right at her.
Death. Was. Certain.
A growl tore through him… and she might have just died right there.
"Die, Bastard!" The King's voice pushed through her mind and broke the haze she had been caught in.
Of course! He was the reason she wasn't dead yet.
Everything else happened quickly.
The King pushed her away from behind him as he wrestled the creature to the ground and shoved his sword right into his belly.
"No! No!" She screamed, trembling.
For what?
She didn't even know.
A Knight grabbed her arm, shoving her into the passage way, escaping like many others were doing. More knights rushed in with their swords, many others with arrows.
One would die tonight.
Or maybe both.
The passage door slammed shut.
"No!" She turned to Egor, the King's Second. "He'll die. He'll die!"
"The King cannot be killed by any creature, your Majesty."
She said nothing else but tears kept running down her cheeks. Her feelings confusing and overwhelming her.
He will die! He will die!
Her mind kept screaming, till Egor finally hurried her into the King's chamber and shut the door firmly behind her.
"Your Majesty!" Both her handmaidens called her her, the moment she stepped. She crashed into their arms.
"He'll die." She mumbled, crying. "He'll die."
They consoled her.
But she did not stop crying.
What was this madness?
"Leave us!" The King's voice thundered across the room as the door slammed shut.
Ismena rushed to her feet, as her handmaidens hurried out of the room, closing the door firmly behind them.
Her eyes raked over him quickly. There was blood everywhere. On his shirt. On his sword. Dripping down the tip to the rug.
Purple blood.
Her hands reached up to her face and wiped her tears, shock going through her.
"You are alive."
He should be dead. That thought went through her immediately.
No.
NO!
If he should be dead then whose potential death was she crying about? The night creature? Her husband's captive?
By the Sun, she didn't even know him!
Their type… his type was the enemy.
Also what wife in her right sense would pick the death of her husband over that of a stranger - an enemy to her people, a monster!
"He is dead." She smiled, ignoring the painful twist in the pit of her belly.
It was over.
The King frowned, rage blazed in his eyes and just as swiftly pointed his sword at her.
Ismena's heart skipped a beat.
She moved back, fear spiraling in her veins. He knew. By the Sun, he had caught her. He had seen those moments of distraction in the hall, and now he wound punish her for it.
Her insides twisted.
She didn't want to die.
Not now.
Not yet.
But she couldn't run, that would anger him. She couldn't beg too much, or he would be furious. He would ask her if she thought him a monster with no control that would bring harm to her.
A monster like the night creatures.
"Your Majesty—-" she forced her voice to sound leveled. "I have done nothing—-"
"What. Happened?!" He asked between gritted teeth.
Bells rang in Ismema's ears.
"Your Majesty?"
"You heard me."
There was murderous darkness in his eyes. The blade was awfully close. She couldn't dare to move.
"I—-I—- I do not—-"
The blade moved close, she could almost feel it against her neck. "Tell me the truth, Ismena. Do not force my hand."
It was at that moment she saw it in his eyes.
He would do it.
"Nothing! Nothing happened," she was panting, her fear making her lose her breath. She forced herself to sound calmer. "That monster wanted to kill us all, wanted to kill you for revenge. And because he saw that you love me, he wanted to kill me to hurt you. It wasn't me. It was you. All you, your Majesty."
Something shifted in his eyes.
He was watching her.
Assessing.
Then he turned and swung his sword against the wall. The blade clanked heavily to the floor and Ismena loosed a breath of relief
"Damn that bastard!" He did not look at her.
Instead he stormed off to the bathing chamber.
Click.
Ismena heard the lock turn. Her legs almost gave way beneath her, but she forced herself to get busy with something else while she planed for what she would do when the King would appeared from the bathing chamber.
The war wasn't over yet.
She knew that.
She had sensed it in how tense his back was when he had turned it to her.
Besides, strange things were happening tonight.
The King had raised his sword to her.
He had never done that before.
Never!
Something about tonight was just dangerously terrible?
Could it be that the black smoke from the metal balls could affect humans too.
Or…
She balled her hands into fists by her side to the point that they almost went numb.
Could it be… the night creature?
Was he doing something to them?
Her nails dug into her palm.
Was his type capable of that?