The Goblin King (12 page)

“Are you speaking from experience, Roman?” Evie asked softly. The way her husband’s voice had drifted into a lilt of quiet desperation had awakened a
deep note of worry inside of her. This was not just Roman telling a story. This was Roman empathizing with a woman he had apparently killed. There had to be a very good reason for such a thing.

Roman looked up at her. “I have a cave to hide in,” he told her, his tone now
slightly teasing. But then it became serious. “And now I have you.”

Evie
saw both pain and salvation in her husband’s eyes. She tore her gaze from his and peered back into the electric fire.

“Iliandra was both lovely and intelligent – full of potential,” Roman continued. “But she lived her life under the chokehold of a
harsh monarchy. To make matters worse, she did not meet Rafael, nor was she made vampire, until she was in her mid-forties, at which point she had already suffered the uncaring attentions of an obtuse, philandering husband for nearly twenty years. And she was already beginning to show the signs of mental duress.

“
She was still incredibly striking, and being an Offspring did not diminish her charisma, but enhanced and preserved it. However, she needed help, she needed reassurance, and though Rafael loved her very dearly, his head was in the past and he had never been a good listener to anything that did not directly pertain to history. As a result, Iliandra continued to diminish.

“Meanwhile, y
oung Rose of Kisilova was but nineteen. And to Iliandra, she represented every future hope and dream that she herself had lost. Iliandra was naturally, and
insidiously
, jealous.

“One night, Iliandra
left Rafael, who had been sharing stories with one of the village elders. She approached Peter Plogojowitz in the fields, where he was working late, and she entered his mind. The next day, Rafael decided to move on to the next town, and Iliandra asked to remain in Kisilova, claiming she enjoyed the people and atmosphere. Rafael could never deny her anything she asked for. So completely oblivious, he readily agreed and left on his own.

“Over the next few weeks, young Peter’s
attitude toward Rose deteriorated. He became sullen and preoccupied. Rose began to question the upcoming wedding. Not satisfied with the rift she’d caused between the would-be couple, Iliandra played with the minds of others, forcing a town official to betray his wife’s trust and inflict his attentions upon Rose, even as the young mortal feared the impending loss of her betrothed’s love.

“It became a disastrous affair. Finally, Iliandra brought it all to an end by luring Peter Plogojowitz into the forest and draining him of every last drop of his blood. She did so slowly and painfully, allowing him to feel it as a punishment.
When she was finished, she gave him just enough of her own blood to ensure the spell would work, and she spoke the three words of transformation. With this spell, Iliandra D’Angelo lost what little remained of her sanity. She then placed a protection spell over Peter to shield her new toy from the sun’s rays.

“The townsfolk found
an apparently dead Peter early the next morning, and because of an already tumultuous view of the supernatural due to the Black Plague, they looked upon the multitude of bite marks on his body and hurriedly buried him along with piles of religious mementos that supposedly kept vampires at bay.

“
Rose entered a time of deep mourning and depression, during which time the aforementioned official forced himself upon her, nearly causing her to end her life in despair. But Iliandra, now completely mad, was not yet finished.

“
Peter awoke as one of us, just as Iliandra had intended. Unfortunately, he was six feet under when he did, and being new to the powers of the Offspring, he did not know how to transport himself out. He clawed his way to the top, ripping skin and eventually breaking off fingers as he did so. Iliandra was waiting for him in the moonlight. She looked at his bleeding, broken body and smiled. Then, taking a negligible amount of pity on her slave, she kissed him, told him that it would all heal in short moments so long as he fed, and then directed him toward his first kill.”

Evie felt a rush of cold run through her.
The tale had been mountingly horrible, but
this
was what she’d known was coming.

“His first victim was a child of five years. A little girl with long black ringlets and blue eyes. The girl’s mother would have been his second but for Iliandra’s cruel instruction. She told him to leave the woman alive… to suffer the loss of her child. Peter’s second victim was a loving husband and father to four.”

Roman stopped and ran his hand over his face. “Over the course of days and under Iliandra’s relentless tutelage, Peter Plogojowitz killed nine people. All innocent. All young – all loved.”

Evie closed her eyes. Her chest ached. She saw a little girl and thought of a parent’s ultimate loss. Nothing worse could happen to a person.
Nothing
.

“As king, I caught wind of the situation even before Rafael did. I hastened to Kisilova, saw what had become of the townspeople, now wrapped in a full vampire hysteria, and I confronted Iliandra. However, as I looked into her eyes, I saw all that had happened. I read everything
, and I understood. The woman she had once been and the woman she might have become were no longer present and were no longer a possibility. She was a monster now, more hatred than anything. And she needed to be stopped.

“I ended it quickly and mercifully. But in her madness, Iliandra laid one last curse upon my family. She used the last of her magic in a dying spell. As I took her head, that spell was released.

“When Rafael found her, he found her wrapped in the intricate and insipid illusion she had so carefully weaved. He found her ashes upon a makeshift altar of stone covered in wards of trapping. And just as she’d intended, he assumed his wife had been tied there to be found by the sun and slowly burn to death by its merciless rays.”

His voice grew quieter. “
I tried to explain to Rafael that this was not the case, that she had died a quick and merciful death. But there is no stronger magic than a dying wish, Evie. And to this day, he does not believe me.” He paused, and the sound of the fire crackling filled the silence. “He is not the same man that he once was, my brother. If I had known that killing Iliandra would destroy him as well, I would have found another way to put a stop to her evil. But it is too late now. And Rafael will do anything to exact revenge.”

Chapter Fourteen

“This seer of theirs will be a problem.”

Ophelia watched her master move from the table where he’d served himself a drink to the windows, which displayed a star-studded night beyond. “She’s interfered once,
hence we can assume she will attempt to interfere again. She’ll have to be eliminated, as will the old woman. The high witch is too powerful to leave alive.”

He took a drink of whatever alcohol he’d poured for himself –
from what Ophelia could see and smell, it was scotch – and then lowered the crystal glass. “It was a disappointment, and Kamon won’t be happy to hear another of his plans failed. However, not all is lost.”

He turned to face her now, and Ophelia stepped back.
The red had returned to his eyes. It meant he was hungry.

“While they were so busy trying to fin
d my sister-in-law, we were at work searching for the next queen.” He smiled, flashing fangs. “And we’ve located her.”

Ophelia tried to
think fast. She needed words, something to distract him, to stall him from using those teeth.

“Securing her and killing her king will
be our first order of business,” he said. “We’ll have to act fast and take her before she has absorbed the power of one of the thirteen. The queens are far too strong once they’ve stepped up onto the playing board.” He returned to the small table from which he’d first poured his drink, and set back down his glass. “I believe we can expect some very lovely company again very shortly.”

Ophelia felt a squirming in her stomach. Not that she had anything against killing any of the queens. The fact that the fates had seen fit to make these women as important as they were and yet leave her
to suffer in the dust didn’t sit well with Ophelia. In fact, it filled her with a bitterness she could barely contain. Her anger was a physical embodiment within her, sitting like a ball of molten lead somewhere just above her stomach and just below her heart.

It made her less than willing to feel much sympathy toward the women for any trouble they might encounter along their benighted journeys.

But something about Rafael D’Angelo sinking his fangs into one more person –
any
person – made Ophelia feel nauseated. He was not gentle.

He was
never
gentle.

“If you kill Lily Kane,
” she interjected now, turning their conversation back to its previous topic, “you will have the entire werewolf nation to contend with.”

He shrugged
, slipping his hands casually into his suit pant pockets. “We have as much already.”

Ophelia
shook her head, taking another unconscious step back. “No. You have wolves sniffing at your door and standing beside the supernatural factions that have supported them in the past. You have not yet won them as direct enemies. But this would do it. Lily Kane not only has the affection of her husband and the werewolf nation in general due to her Seer abilities, she has a powerful guardian. And a kind of bond with Malcolm Cole.”

Ra
fael frowned. “The author?”

“Yes.
He is one of the most dangerous men known to the supernatural world. And Lily Kane’s best friends are all very powerful werewolves in their own rights. One of them is the Curse Breaker. Another is the former Overseer’s granddaughter.”

This seemed to give Rafael a small amount of pause.
At least it appeared he was now more carefully considering his plans.

Good
, she thought as she simultaneously hoped he wasn’t privately reading her mind. She doubted it. He was incredibly preoccupied by this latest disaster, no matter how well he hid it.
Perfect.

Just stay on that side of the room
.

An
d then something occurred to Ophelia. It blossomed inside, its unfurling leaves coming into the light like an un-shrinking violet. She saw the idea shimmering in the possibilities of her subconscious, and she kept it there, hoping that it was safely hidden from the prying mental fingers of her cruel master.

“
I wouldn’t worry, Pet” said Rafael calmly as he again shrugged and started once more toward her. The sound of his leather-soled shoes on the cavern floor sent a cold chill through Ophelia. The fact that she was forced to wear so little in his private company did not help. She would have thought vampires immune to cold. But Rafael’s attentions felt like being stripped naked and tossed into an arctic sea.

“Werewolves are only
glorified dogs.” He smiled again. His fangs gleamed in the torch light. She watched him draw nearer and found herself distractedly thinking of his endless tailor-cut suits and the way he was so much like his brother in so many ways. Just not in any of the ways that counted.

“
And I suppose that’s why we bothered to bring the Hunters into our fold, isn’t it?” he asked, posing the question in such a manner that it was clear he wasn’t expecting an answer. “Let them deal the K-9 rabble.”

Rafael D’Angelo wasn’t
even thinking of the wolves any longer, Ophelia knew. Or of Lily Kane or the Overseer or even the Hunters.

He was thinking of lunch.

Ophelia braced herself and dared not wonder what she would endure this time. It was best not to dwell on it.

*****

Diana was painfully aware of the man’s presence beside her. The smell of rain and leather and a barely-there faintness of wood smoke teased and taunted her senses. Even that scar that ran down one cheek and into his upper lip had some sort of devastatingly masculine effect upon his charisma.

He was confusing her.

He kept pace very closely. So close, she would have brushed against him if she’d changed her gait just a tiny bit.

He was
magic
. She was coming to grips with that. She was actually quite proud of how effectively she was digesting it. But he was not only magic, he was a
king
. His eyes burned with fire. He carried a sword – when he wasn’t casting it magically away somewhere. He ruled over
monsters
. And he was… well, he was perfect.

She couldn’t imagine a man capable of holding
a candle to Damon Chroi’s magnetism. She could so easily believe he was a king. He had presence in spades. He smelled good, looked better, and his deep voice was subtly, beautifully accented.

She glanced at him and then quickly looked away. He
could not have been any older than she was. There were no wrinkles. He had only the slightest laugh lines at the corners of his intense eyes.

God, those eyes,
she waywardly thought. She shook herself mentally.