15 | ACT I, SCENE XV

P R E V I O U S L Y

I was going to live in a new Castle tomorrow. A new home. A new family. A new enemy.

HARTINGTON CASTLE, ALNWICK, STORMHOLT.

EDWINA

THE CRISP AIR OF THE cool afternoon of Stormholt greeted my tired limbs. Frustrated after a whole morning of ceremonies for the conclusion of Cosmo and Titania's funeral, we could finally leave Steffith only at midday.

As I felt the exhilarating rush of teleportation leave my blood, I opened my eyes and the rich aroma of woody forests hit me.

Stormholt, the seat of House Valmont, and Ellesmere, the seat of Eric's House LeVane, both bordered the Ocemond Sea, the largest sea of Endollon. After all, Eric and Amphitrite were the gods who ruled over the sea and rain. Tristan nearly ruled over the entire domain of sky like Uranus before him, so being closer to the coastline did serve him too.

Emerick's family, House Rotavelle, held their Kingdom called Allington. Further west, lay Vertgate. Vertgate was home to House Emmerson.

Cosmo's youngest children, Atherton and Cymbeline Emmerson, were the original founders of their House. Yet with both of them missing after their trip to Vezort - their only son, Vivian Emmerson, the god of healing and medicine, held Vertgate.

Steffith, the capital, and Normount, home to the Everlys, were both near the polar caps. It was almost always winter there, as the conceited Drusilla, goddess of ice and ever constant winter, never allowed any season to come to pass there. Just below Normount, bordering the river Derwentwater, lay my Kingdom and the home of the Tremaynes. The kingdom of Dracnesse.

And now all six Kingdoms and the Capital were under my rule.

The afternoon was dark, honeyed and sulky, yet the sky was dotted with light billows of white clouds and the blue sea shimmering warmly nearby. Around me, everything was green, and the deep, dark greenery with smoky pines and conifers rose everywhere as far as the eye could reach. The delicious smell of the Ocemond sea nearby awakened a bubble of happiness inside my chest, until, of course, my eyes actually fell on the Valmont Castle, Hartington Castle.

"In a foul mood again, aren't we?" Tristan quipped from beside me with a cocky smile, and I looked at him, my face burning with annoyance.

"Look who's talking, Valmont," I bristled impatiently, carefully trying to hide my reaction.

"Ah. I see. What is the weather like today? Cranky with a touch of psycho like last night?" he asked, looking innocently incredulous.

"I wasn't lying!" I snapped viciously, balling my fists. "The woman was there!"

"Hmm..." Tristan mused, scratching his chin, completely oblivious to my outburst. "I'm guessing the weather is too damp for your much anticipated beach party?"

"I'm pretty sure I'll find a couple of idiots to barbecue. Don't worry about boring me."

"As a matter of fact, I did intend to bore you... to death," he barked darkly, his voice turning strained again as we both glared at each other.

Without waiting for me, he turned and began a leisurely walk to his tall castle. Damn it, his strides were impossibly long. His shoulders were rigid, his eyes hard. I cursed under my breath and ran to catch up beside him.

Just from between the Cheviot Mountains of Stormholt, rose the tall, dark spires of Hartington Castle. It was made of black marble, and I could see the way it gleamed in the afternoon light. Long glass windows scattered symmetrically across the walls of the handsome structure, which was linked with smaller bridges and lined with crenelations.

When I noticed the tall towers at the top reaching the sky and disappearing into the clouds, it took all I had not to start reeling then and there at the anticipatory thrill of living at such heights.

I hated that devilish rogue, but damn it. Why the heck did he have to have such excellent taste?

On one of the highest turreted towers, I spotted the navy blue flag bearing the golden lion of House Valmont. On it, were emblazoned the words of their House.

'Live by the sword, die by the sword.'

The Valmonts had a prickly sense of pride, and their words were the most threatening of all others, powerful and strong. They refused to bend, ever. Valmonts never yielded.

"Well?" Tristan asked as I stopped beside him at the front gate. It was carved of black marble gilded with golden lions, frozen in a deadly roar with sapphires for eyes. The watchers on towers had already begun to open the large doors and I could hear locks clicking and chains rolling.

"What?" I asked him irritably, trying to hide my awe at the sight of the majestic entrance and succeeding.

Tristan looked at me with an annoyed frown, and his jet black hair blew about as he spread out his arms wide and indicated the castle to me with the most pleased smile on his face.

"Don't you like it?" he demanded.

"Oh, was I supposed to? Sorry to hurt your feelings, Valmont," I rolled my eyes convincingly, and a satisfied smirk pulled up my lips as I saw his expression turn dark.

"It's my Castle," Tristan said sullenly, voice grim. "Everyone likes my Castle," he raised his voice a notch higher, as if stating a heinous crime, and his smile dropped to a pout.

"Did you dig out the marble with your bare goddamn hands and shape it by gnawing on it like a beaver?" I asked dryly, taking special pride in watching his smile fall even further.

I watched Tristan's ears droop to the ground as his face flushed.

"...damn you and your thick hide," he swore under his breath, then strolled ahead of me as his cloak blew behind him.

The people of Stormholt had all gathered at the massive gates, as they all waved at us both cheerfully. He waved back, and I gave an acknowledging nod of my head.

"Conceited bastard," I muttered from a corner of my mouth, as the doors opened for us.

Inside, Hartington Castle was even more majestic than its exterior. The foyer was an extravagant corridor with sky high ceilings painted in the hues of the deep galaxy, and diamond studded chandeliers danced from them like shooting stars. Gilded tapestries hung from the walls, and yet, this was just the foyer.

The Valmonts had been on the losing side for the battle over the deadly valuable Derwentwater!

All the staff and the family had gathered in the main hall, garbed in their traditional blue and gold. Everyone went to their knees as we entered, even the rest of the Valmont family, bending their head respectfully to accept fealty to the new sovereigns.

Get used to this, my brain whispered to me. This is how you will be greeted every time you walk into a room.

A moment passed in silence as Tristan quickly beckoned them up, and the crowd rose slowly, muttering whispers of admiration.

"Welcome to Stormholt, Queen Regnant," a man with clear grey eyes and a sharp nose stepped out from the crowd, smiling broadly at me. "And welcome back, King Tristan!" he smiled.

I saw an unexpected moment of camaraderie pass between the two men as Tristan clasped his back before turning to me, looking rather pleased with himself.

"This is Daniel," he nodded to the man. "One of my closest advisors and one of the very few people I trust with my life."

"Pleased to make your acquaintance, my Lord," I offered my other hand to him.

"No, your Grace, the pleasure is all mine," he said with a wry smile, kissing my hand.

"Thank you," I said graciously. "It is by your grace that the crown sits on our heads, and I hope we can live up to your confidence in us."

"Long live the King and Queen!" someone shouted.

"Nay," Tristan raised his hand, hushing the crowd. "Long live Endollon," he corrected, as the smiles went higher and brighter.

"Long live Endollon," I said, "in the hopes and prayers that King Cosmo's memories never fade from his people. We wish that his luck greets all of us equally. I wish it all on you, my people," my voice softened.

I saw lips turning up in smiles, people begin excitedly whispering into each other's ears. Tristan shot me the sourest look I had ever seen and I returned it with one of my own.

"Long live Endollon!" the crowd took up the cry, echoing through the hall, as they repeated it over and over.

"This is Cressida," Tristan coolly nodded over a smartly dressed woman with golden hair pinned back. "My efficient secretary," he continued, as she walked briskly to us.

Cressida gave me a warm smile, squeezing my hand as she swept her hair back.

"The castle is made brighter by your presence, Queen Regnant," she said softly.

"Thank you, Cressida."

"I've decided I'm going to have you make a new rule," Llewellyn interrupted smugly, puffing his chest importantly like a red robin.

"Which is?"

"It's now illegal to be cuter than me!" the younger Valmont continued proudly, basking in the attention.

"Well, we're all going to jail then," Tristan smirked with a roll of his eyes, trying to hide his grin before whacking his brother on the head. Llewellyn was quick to dodge, returning it with a box on the ear.

"Also," Daniel added, "would you like to see the rooms?"

"I'll show her myself," Tristan said impatiently, then looked at me, his nose scrunched up in annoyance. How did he manage to look so gorgeous even when he was so cold? "Have you cleared the west wing as I ordered?"

"Yes, King Tristan. Perhaps you'd also like to know that your sword has come back from the capital," said a new voice. I turned to find a tall, lean, olive skinned youth with black eyes and a grin on his face.

Tristan greeted him with an acknowledging nod, putting a hand on his shoulder.

"This is Philip. The commander of my army."

"Ah, come on, son. Surely you won't forget your poor mother?" I heard a silky voice near my ear, and a woman's arms wrapped around me, pulling me into a hug to my utter surprise.

I returned the warm embrace and looked into the dark blue eyes of Celinette Valmont.

Both mother and son had the same sharp nose, sharing it with the same silky voice. The goddess of the moon had wonderful silver hair that cascaded down her shoulders in a glorious waterfall, and her shining silver eyes were full of glee and mirth.

She was Celinette Valmont, wife to Apollo Valmont and my mother's younger sister.

My mother in law was also my aunt.

"Niece! It's been too long!" she laughed, tucking a stray end of my hair behind my ear in a motherly fashion.

"I know, aunt Celinette," I said in a softer tone, hugging her tight.

"Is Tristan behaving? Or do you want me to put him in place?" she giggled into my ear, making me laugh.

"Are you coming or not?" I heard him snap from behind, his voice both vexing and testing me at once. "Mother, you can catch up later!"

"I know, I know. Now don't go about getting all worked up about it," Celinette chided, skipping, taking my hand and interlocking it in Tristan's with a mischievous smile. "Now go, both of you!"

• • • • •

"Here," Tristan grumbled. "This is our room," he said, flinging open the door with a triumphant flourish of his hand.

"Our - our room?" I spluttered, taken aback.

"Obviously, Tremayne," he hissed, "as far as Endollon is concerned, we both have spent the night together and are... officially - man and wife."

"I didn't sign up for days and nights of eternal damnation in your room, Valmont."

"Well, guess what? Neither did I. And we're going to circle back to eternal damnation."

"Our marriage was an arrangement. This," I gestured to the bedroom, "this was not a part of the arrangement," I glared, and that bitter smirk on his lips made me ball up my fists.

He merely crossed his arms over his chest, making his muscles look even more mouth watering and tighter and now the only thought on my mind was to rip those robes off his body.

Gods, gods, give me strength to get those thoughts out!

"You're drooling, woman," he muttered with a bare smile, and I hastily whipped my head up and checked.

"I'm not. Now show me the bloody room or I will drool all over it. For real."

Tristan grimly nodded, muttering something to himself about smacking sense into idiots, then pushed open the door and let me enter first.

The floor was black veined liquid silver, the walls were a tasteful ultramarine blue. The ceiling stretched high above, a midnight black, dotted with chandeliers floating with diamonds and candles.

Against the wall there was a huge four poster bed, piled with tasseled cushions and silk duvets. The steps down from it led to the other part of the room, where gilded rosewood mirrors surrounded an expensive looking vanity. Across it were cupboards of gleaming ebony.

Further across, marble steps led to the balcony at the window. The sea was visible from there, the warm blue sparkling against the gray sky.

But most of all, in a revered corner of the room, sat a huge piano. The lid was studded with rings of sapphires, and sheets upon sheets of music piled on the top, all in the same beautiful, cold hand. The piano had no dust on it. It looked well cared for.

It was the room of an artist.

"You play?" I asked quietly, gesturing to the piano.

He shrugged hesitantly, and for a moment, his eyes lost their gleam and his shoulders slumped.

"Occasionally," Tristan said. "I trust the accommodations are... sufficient?" he asked, voice frigid.

I nodded, rolling my eyes. Shouting wasn't going to help and besides the desire boiling in my veins was this close to making me fling at Tristan, who was watching me with that devilish smile of his. What would those alluring lips feel like against my own? Or that hot body pressed against mine the way it had been that night?

"We need to establish some rules, woman," his voice broke through my reverie.

"Rules?" I echoed morbidly, and he said nothing, uncrossing his arms and looking at me expectantly.

"First, no one touches my piano. Second, no one touches my sword. Third, you inform the staff when you to go Dracnesse for work. I'm not going to roam all around Endollon looking for you at night-"

"It's not like you gave a damn about me anyway, is it?"

"Right," he said, satisfied. "Fourth-"

"There are more?" I gasped. What the bloody hell?

"No one, absolutely no one, enters the second room at the end of the third corridor," Tristan finished quietly, his voice strong and powerful and searing. "And-"

"Oh wait, even more?" I shot him a sweltering glare. "Perhaps you forget that I am a Queen, not a prisoner! What next? Tying me to a post with manacles?"

A deadly silence descended between us, and my cheeks began to burn red as I furiously looked at him, breathing heavily. Tristan came two steps closer to me, our noses almost touching - his masculine scent invading my senses and driving me mad.

Slowly, he put his fingers under my chin, leaving burning imprints on my senses, and he tilted my head up to face his predatory gaze, licking his lips sinfully.

"I could tie you up... if you like," he whispered huskily, his smoky voice sending blood rushing to my groin.

My breath hitched as his long fingers traced a loop on my cheek, but I didn't pull away - how could I? I so badly wanted him, deep down, and I knew that. I wanted him to extinguish the fire he'd started, I so badly wanted him to take me and put that pretty silk bed sitting there to good use. And we were man and wife now, would it really be wrong?

"That's not happening," I hissed, breaking free of his grasp, and his face turned cold again, the humor and amusement draining away in an instant.

"As you wish," Tristan snapped murderously, his eyes darkening and he stepped away abrupt from me, relieving himself of my touch. "You can take your time getting comfortable. And leave me the fuck out of it," he barked, gritting his teeth and making his way to the door, flinging it open.

"Valmont-" I began.

"-and one more thing, wife," he minced his words mockingly, looking at me with a steely glint in his eyes. "I may be a god, but that does not make me immune to pain."

"Listen-"

"-good day, Queen Regnant," he finished abruptly, slamming the door behind him as he turned on his heel and strolled away.

"Goddammit," I mumbled to myself, putting my head in my hands. Of course, we just had to do that. Lord, sometimes I wished I could cut my tongue out myself so that I didn't regret what I said later.

But last night.

I was not lying. I had seen the woman. I would prove it to Tristan, I swore to myself. I didn't know if he was lying about not seeing her, or he really didn't. Either way, I was dead set on proving him wrong.

Hmm... she was gliding through the air at night when the eerie piano was playing in the Citadel in Steffith. The malicious look in her pitch black eyes had unnerved me, and I knew that whoever she was, whatever she was, she meant harm to me and my family. Or possibly to the whole of Endollon.

There was just one tiny problem.

No one in the Citadel actually owned a piano.

I clenched my fingers around the ruby studded hilt of my sword, Seraphine, preparing to go to Steffith at once to investigate. I needed answers and I needed the truth.

"Leave," said a voice from behind me, coming from the doorway. "I wish to greet our guest in private."

"But, Lord-" I heard one of the guards at the door protest.

"-leave," the voice said again in a deep baritone, full of harsh meaning. I tensed immediately, and my hand went to reach for the hilt of my sword buckled at my waist. I watched the guards ruefully file out in a single line, their heads bowed in sentience, a silent as mice. I didn't turn around, instead concentrating on the grip in my fist.

I knew who had come to see me.

The corridor emptied out completely, until I heard the click of the visitor's boots as he went and locked the door shut, and that was when I finally turned around.

The wicked sun god had a black aura of anger around him, reeling off him in waves. The stone black eyes observed me keenly, glimmering with their sinister reputation. The dark hair slicked back did not stray one inch, and I heard the rustle of his cloak on the floor, settled on his heavy shoulders.

I drew my sword. I would drink his blood as revenge if not for the oath binding me.

"I will not wait one moment before driving this sword into your heart if you come any closer, murderer," I spat at his feet without remorse.

The god tutted wickedly.

"Now, now, now, niece. It's bad manners to turn away your father in law. Especially when he comes to welcome you home... privately," leered Apollo Valmont.

• • • • •

"What do you want?" I asked, standing up tall and facing him.

Rage seethed in my blood, hate boiled in my veins. It must have been centuries since I last saw him, but the day Apollo Valmont killed Asteria Tremayne, my mother, over the Derwentwater, was the day he erased any hope of us reconciling with his House. I felt disgusted knowing that this killer was related to me. He was my uncle. He was Tristan's father. And he was my mother's brother.

The children of Helios and Nyx, these four had been.

Lucius, the god of earth. Asteria, the goddess of rain. Celinette, the moon, and Apollo, the sun.

The founders of Houses Tremayne and Valmont.

Harbingers of dust and ruin over a river.

"Put that down, niece," he said brusquely, and I defiantly looked into his dead eyes, which glowed eerily gold with the brightness of the sun he was master of.

I stalked a few steps to Apollo Valmont and leveled Seraphine's tip to his heart as he watched me with a dark smile.

"Give me one reason I shouldn't gut your heart out and feed it to the dogs," I spat viciously, my voice dripping acid.

Apollo's hands gripped the blade and wrenched themselves around it, making his blood drip to the floor as his fingers inched closer to my side of the hilt.

"I can," he whispered voraciously. "Because you're not a Tremayne anymore. You're a Valmont now, just like us," Apollo said gleefully, his sharp nose glinting harshly.

"To hell with your fucking House," I hissed.

"And speaking of Valmonts," he continued feverishly, "I expect you to bear a living child by the end of this year. A living male child. A Valmont child."

My blood began to twitch and sing with immeasurable anger.

"Excuse me?"

"Oh, looks like you didn't hear me right the first time, niece," he said with a smart smirk, leaning closer to whisper in my ear as every nerve of my body screamed to get away from him.

"Oh, I heard you perfectly all right, you filthy murderer," I snapped, glaring into his strong eyes which bored holes into the back of my skull. "I am much more than a royal womb on legs. And I do not have any, absolutely any intention of bearing a child of your kin!"

Apollo drew himself up, tugging at the sword in my hand to throw it down. Instead, I held it tightly and inched the tip closer to him, my eyes a clear warning of the danger he would be in if he didn't stop his atrocity.

I stepped past him to make my way to the door. Surprisingly, he didn't block my path, instead stepped aside to let me pass as I marched past him. I had to go to Steffith.

He suddenly disappeared from behind me in a hissing whoosh, and the next thing I knew, Apollo had materialized just in front of me, nose a bare two inches from mine, concealed in hatred.

My father in law's eyes grew steely, cold and unfeeling as his gaze traveled over my body, making me feel exposed even when covered in all my silks.

"Oh dear," he whispered softly, his eyes taunting me to danger. "You will bear a Valmont child. Though it doesn't matter which Valmont puts it in you, does it?" A slow smile crept across his face. "Perhaps I'll pay you a visit tonight when my son is done scorning you, you little bitch," Apollo grinned.

• • • • •

Next chapter is a really important one since a new character is gonna make an appearance soon! Why do you think Tristan asked Edwina to stay away from a particular room? By this time, obvious he's hiding something, isn't it? And what do you think Edwina will find out in the Citadel the next week?