Crown of Fire (The Forbidden Fae Book 1) Read online

  On the surface, I looked like any other girl in her twenties. Nice. Pretty. Normal.

  But there was a hardness to me that people didn’t see. That I didn’t let them see. The normal was a shell that I’d built over the determined killer I’d become.

  But it was starting to creep in, right at the edges of my eyes. The look of an animal who would chew off its own leg before it allowed itself to be caught.

  And I would. I’d sever a limb before I’d let him take me.

  Five minutes later, I met Connor back in Potions & Pastilles. The warm, cozy space had become my home more than my apartment had. My brother was a potions expert, which made owning a magical bar and coffee shop a logical extension. I occasionally helped out, but in truth, I spent most of my time hunting monsters for the Order of the Magica, the supernatural government that oversaw magic users.

  Connor’s jaw was tight—no doubt at the idea of leaving P & P, his baby, behind—but when he spotted me, he smiled.

  “You don’t have to fake it, bro,” I said. “This sucks.”

  He nodded sharply. “Worth it, though. Let’s get out of here.”

  I joined him, and we stepped out onto the sidewalk. He turned to lock the door behind him—just in case we could ever come back—and I turned to look down the street toward where my friends lived.

  Fate decided to stab me in the heart with a dagger right then, because Cass stepped out of her shop. Her red hair glinted under the light of the street lamps as she shut the door to Ancient Magic behind her. She and her two best friends owned a shop that specialized in old magic.

  Her gaze caught on me and she grinned. “Off somewhere?”

  My brain stutter-stopped.

  I needed to tell her something, but what?

  Connor and I had lied all our lives about what we really were—not because we’d wanted to, but because we’d taken a magical vow of silence about our origins that couldn’t be broken. He’d said he was a hearth witch, and I’d said I was a fire mage.

  Neither was true.

  Neither was what I said next, even though it was hard to force the words out of my throat. “Got a job for the Order that Connor is going to help me with.”

  “Cool.” Cass sounded like she believed me. Of course she did. We were friends. I had a bit of Fae ability to read a person’s soul, and she had a good one. It had allowed me to trust her from the first moment. Probably the only reason we’d become friends.

  Cass smiled. “I’ve got somewhere important I need to be, but if you need help, I’ll be back by tomorrow night.”

  “Thanks, but I think we’ve got it.”

  She nodded. “See you later.”

  She waved and headed off down the street. My heart twisted at the sight of her going. It might be the last time I ever saw her.

  I turned back to Connor, who was anointing the door with a potion that he’d drawn from a bag he stashed in the ether. It was an expensive spell that allowed him to store objects in the ephemeral ether that surrounded every living thing, but it was useful.

  When he was done, he turned to me. “That should do it. All magical signatures scrubbed. He won’t be able to sense that we were here.”

  My lips tightened as I nodded, and we headed into the alley to get our car. We could use our precious transport charm to get out of there, but we only had one. Better to save it for an emergency.

  The old truck was Connor’s, and I climbed in as he got behind the wheel. Quickly, I typed a message into my phone to tell my boss at the Order that I was going on vacation. She’d think it was a load of crap since I never took a vacation, but it didn’t matter.

  “Where to?” Connor asked.

  We had a few bail-out places planned, but I hadn’t decided on which.

  “The desert.” I stared out the windshield, eyes blind with the memory of the man who hunted me. Since he was king of the Court of Ice—once known as the Court of the Sea—we needed to stay the hell away from water. He’d have an advantage there.

  Connor peeled out of the alley, turning right. We passed by Potions & Pastilles, which no longer glowed with golden light but tugged at my heart all the same. Ancient Magic wasn't empty as I’d hoped—two women moved within, both dark-haired. Del and Nix, Cass’s best friends and business partners.

  I touched the glass, as if I could reach out to them, then scowled at myself.

  I was acting like I was in a damned movie, for fate’s sake. I shook my head and turned back to the windshield.

  “We’ll be back,” Connor said.

  “Do we want to be back?” I asked. “Because this might be it. It all might be starting. And then…”

  “We’ll have to make a decision.” His voice was grim.

  I nodded. “We’ll have to make a decision.”

  If my fated mate was hunting me, a chain of events was about to start, one that could end with war or tragedy. At the end of it, if my Court survived, Connor and I would have to choose—did we go back to Dartmoor, a starkly beautiful windswept place that called to my soul, or did we return to Magic’s Bend, where we’d created a life full of friends?

  I squeezed my eyes shut and leaned my head against the window. I wasn’t going to worry about that now. I couldn’t.

  Running.

  That was all I could worry about.

  The dream came hard and fast, as it always did. Every night of my life, filling my mind and strengthening my resolve.

  Burning, screaming. My people dying.

  The Apocalypse would come with a bang—quick, sudden, unexpected. One day things would be normal, and then…

  Fire.

  We were the Fire Fae, magical beings with the power of flame and heat, but when our control was stolen from us, it would all be over. The fire that made us who we were would consume us.

  The seers didn’t know how it would happen, or when exactly, but I could see the results in the flames. A future that would happen if I didn’t stop it.

  My beautiful homeland on Dartmoor, a place of windswept hills that crested to form rocky points called tors would be devastated by the flame that we possessed.

  I watched it in my dream—the fire racing over the hillside, devouring the colorful gorse and heather, yellow and purple going up in a blaze of red. Ancient stone monuments blackened under the tongues of flame.

  Then it reached the people.

  My friends and family, burning. Our homes trapping them inside. Screaming.

  It was said that this had happened long ago, thousands of years before I’d been born. And it was meant to come again.

  In the dream, panic roared through me. I ran for them, but my legs barely moved. I was so slow, bound by the dream and my own cluelessness about how I was supposed to save them.

  The prophecy showed me what would happen; it even told me that I was the one who could stop it. I could feel it deep in my heart.

  I just had no idea how I was supposed to manage it.

  Iron bands tightened around my heart, burning, cutting off my breathing. I clawed at the air, trying to reach them, to get to them.

  But nothing.

  “What is this?”

  The masculine voice snapped me away from my terror. My heart still raced, but I couldn’t help but search for the voice. It was low and smooth, so perfect that it rushed over my nerve endings in a horribly delicious way. I was terrified for my people, and yet this voice could make me feel things even when I didn’t want to.

  I turned, confusion racing through me.

  This dream was always the same. Just me and the flames, watching my home burn.

  Yet he was here.

  The King of the Ice Fae stood behind me, his dark cloak whipping in the wind. He stood with an elegant, deadly grace, his gaze moving dispassionately over the scene of my home burning.

  “What the hell are you doing here?” I demanded.

  “In your dream?” His impossibly blue gaze moved to me, flicking up and down.

  Heat flickered within the icy depths of h
is eyes, followed by mild surprise. As if he were shocked to find me attractive.

  I had a preternatural gift for reading people, and this man wanted me.

  “In my dream,” I confirmed. He felt real. Like he was here. The burning houses were an image of the future, but he was flesh and blood.

  I stepped back, heart thundering.

  Could he get me here?

  He prowled toward me, his stride graceful.

  My gaze raced over his shoulders and down his arms, to the sword sheathed at his side. I’d spent my life training to recognize deadly opponents. This guy topped the list.

  I swallowed hard, breathing shallowly through my mouth to avoid the delicious scent of his magic. “You didn’t answer my question. Why are you here?”

  “To know more about my mate.”

  I didn’t argue with his statement. We’d never met, but we’d both been raised on the same prophecy. I could sense that he was my fated mate as easily as he could. A knowledge deep in my chest, a thudding awareness that followed the cadence of my heart.

  It felt as if mine beat in tandem with his.

  I loathed it.

  His gaze flicked back to the burning scene behind me. “What is this?”

  I looked behind, my heart twisting in my chest. “It’s my homeland burning.” I turned back to him, glaring. “I’m meant to stop it. Somehow. Yet the prophecy states that you will kill me and leave my people to burn.”

  His jaw hardened and he shrugged. The heat that had filled his eyes banked, and the ice that seemed to flow through his veins filled the space it left behind.

  “What must be done, must be done.” His voice was devoid of emotion, but within it, I heard the truth of what he would bring me—death. “One prophecy outweighs the others.”

  It was so strange, his willingness to kill me. It was said that one Fae mate couldn’t live without the other once they found them. They would wither away and die. So what would happen to him when he killed me?

  Was he truly made of ice, so cold and hard that he wouldn’t care?

  I didn’t bother to ask.

  I reached for my bronze ax, calling my favorite weapon from the ether. The weight was heavy in my hand. Welcome.

  The king arched a brow.

  “Claire!” My brother’s voice cut through my consciousness, dragging me from the dream.

  The image of the king wavered in front of me, disappearing. The flames that flickered out of the corner of my vision disappeared as well, and I jerked upright, opening my eyes.

  3

  I woke quickly, blinking to find myself still in the car with Connor, the headlights cutting through the darkness of the desert.

  I turned to him. “What happened?”

  “You were dreaming.” His eyes darkened with concern. “It didn’t look good.”

  Images of the king flickered in front of my mind’s eye. “It wasn’t.” I looked out the window, seeing nothing but flat, barren land. I could feel that the sun was approaching the horizon, a Fae talent I hadn’t missed out on. “Where are we?”

  “Nearly to the desert.”

  “Good. We need to find a place to rest.” I hated sleeping on the run, but despite my short nap, exhaustion still dragged at me. Connor didn’t look much better.

  “We’ll find one.”

  I nodded and leaned against the window, staring out.

  We drove the rest of the night, across the plains and over the mountains. Toward the rising sun that bled red and gold all over the horizon.

  Behind the wheel, Connor never flagged. I couldn’t have asked for a better brother. When we’d learned of the prophecy and I was forced to leave home and go into hiding, he’d come with me. It was a huge deal for a Fae to leave their Court behind. We’d lost out on so much—including our wings.

  He’d given that up for me. Our parents hadn’t been alive any longer, and he was the only family I had left. I’d tried to get him to stay in our homeland, the place where the land called to our blood, but he’d refused. He’d come with me instead, and we’d created a new home together. Now we were running again.

  By the time we reached the part of desert we sought, I was exhausted.

  “Nearly there,” Connor said.

  He was right. I could feel the prickle in the air. Magic lurked here, heavy in the desert. The sun, which had recently risen, began to dim.

  I eyed it warily. “It’ll be full dark soon.”

  “Better to hide us.”

  I nodded. There were several places like this in the world—locations that were perfect for lying low. Magic in the air made them perpetually dark, and there were loads of crazy magical signatures bouncing across the landscape. Hiding our signatures. Hiding us.

  Connor turned off the road, and we bounced across the dirt and rocks. I leaned forward and peered into the distance, then pointed two o’clock. “Maybe there. I see a rock outcropping that we could defend if we’re found before we can move on.”

  “Good eye.” Connor drove us toward the collection of rocks, which turned out to be massive boulders rising twenty feet in the air. There were dozens of them, forming a camp about a hundred feet in diameter.

  He drove the truck between two of them, entering a hidden area where little caves had been carved out of the rock. An abandoned fire circle sat in the middle of the rocks.

  “Looks like we aren’t the first people to use this place,” I said.

  “Nor will we be the last.” He stopped the truck, and we climbed out.

  “I’ll do recon from above.” I looked up at the top of the boulders, searching for the best place to climb up.

  “I’ll get the potions.” He walked around to the truck bed and opened the cover, then began rustling inside.

  While he got to work, I scaled one of the boulders. Cold wind whipped at my face, and I peered into the distance. There was nothing for miles around except a few more rock outcroppings. The unnatural darkness made it hard to see, but their shadows were obvious.

  The collection of rocks we’d chosen provided great cover, with only a few passageways into the middle. I strode toward the edge of my boulder and leaned down to look at Connor. “There’s only three entrances. At two, six, and ten from where you’re standing.”

  “On it.” He strode toward the first one, a bag of potions slung over his shoulder.

  While he got started with anointing the passages with a repellent potion, I climbed down and strode to the fire circle. It was getting cold, and we’d need to cook some food.

  I crouched at the edge of the charred remains of the last fire and held my hand over it, conjuring a flame that wouldn’t glow past a perimeter of about four feet. No way for someone to use its light to find us.

  Once it was burning, I collected a kettle, some water, and some miserable MREs from the truck bed. They had not yet expired, but it was close. We’d been planning this for a long time.

  I’d just finished making dinner when Connor joined me. “Smells good.”

  “You have low standards.” I handed him a packet of re-hydrated jambalaya. “We should have grabbed some pasties from the shop.”

  He shoved a bit in his mouth. “Too much of a hurry, but you’re right.”

  I chewed on my fettuccine Alfredo—which had more in common with plaster than it did with pasta—and thought longingly of the meat and pastry delicacies our cafe specialized in. We’d brought the recipe over from England when we’d left years ago, and it was one of our few reminders of home. It was a testament to how scared I’d been that I’d forgotten my beloved cheese and onion pasty.

  “Next time we run for our lives, I’m remembering the pasties,” I said.

  “You and me both, sis.” He stared into the flames. “What are we going to do?”

  Heaviness descended on my shoulders. For most of our lives, the threat of the future had been a distant one.

  But time had been an inconsiderate jerk and had decided to roll on by like it always did, and the future was here.

 
“We can’t go back to Magic’s Bend.” The idea tugged at my heart.

  “And we shouldn’t go home. Not yet.”

  I thought of the windswept hills and craggy tors that called to me whenever I closed my eyes. “No, not yet.”

  “So we keep running?” he asked.

  Anger prickled my skin and made my heart beat slow and steady. “No. I can’t run anymore.”

  Even this little bit of running made me queasy. It wasn’t me. Sure, when I’d been a teenager and the Court had forced us out for my safety, I’d run. It’d been our only option.

  But I’d grown up since then. “I won’t be forced away from two homes.”

  “So what are you thinking?”

  I looked around our little hideout, inspecting the high sides of the boulders and valleys in between and the clearing in the middle where we sat. “We invite him here and take him out.”

  “Like a kill box?”

  “Just like a kill box.”

  “Alone?”

  I pursed my lips and sighed heavily through my nose. “As much as I’d like to say yes… No. It’s too risky.”

  “You still believe the prophecy. That you have to save them all.”

  I turned to him, brows raised. “You don’t?”

  He shrugged. “It’s been so long since we left. And I don’t have the dreams like you.”

  “Yeah, you’re not reminded of it every time you fall asleep.” I turned back to the flames and stared into them, flinching at their similarity to the fire that tore through my dreams and devoured my home and friends. “I still believe it. The prophecy was delivered by the most powerful seer in the world, and it stays alive in my head every damned day. That future is coming if I don’t stop it.”

  “Maybe you can change the future.”

  “Maybe. But first we need to stop the Ice King.”

  Connor nodded. “Let’s do it here, then.”

  “We’ll need help.”