Imperial ((Imperial) Web of Hearts and Souls) (10 page)

Though I had never witnessed the creation of a Fated Escort, I believed they were indeed possible.

Fated Escorts, by all accounts, are regal. Old souls that knew that anger was a gift and used it for change. They understood the balance of the emotion. How it could equally create and destroy. These beings would have an instant pull to them. Masses would find an undeniable attraction in their magnetic stare, in the essence of their energy. They would serve as ambassadors for our kind. One of them, in a carefully chosen dimension, could sway the entire mood of the world, and in turn the universe.

Their cravings to relieve or express emotion would haunt them, but they would not feel the need to feed for lifetimes, that is, unless they accidently tasted the power of raw energy. They wouldn’t, though. Vade was too fierce a leader to let anything happen to those he led.

“Could you sense if they were Fated? Did I take that from you?” I asked in a meek whisper.

He let out a sigh as he rolled to his side to face me. I let my arm fall and pulled my pillow closer to my neck so I would be level with that diamond stare of his.

There was something in his stare that told me they were more than that. I had a horrible feeling that I had taken more than Fated souls from him.

I cringed as I recalled another dream of Vade’s. One that he had only shared with me. To create an Escort with both light and dark energy. To create metallic energy.

Vade wished this for a very simple reason: he wanted peace. He wanted mortal souls to be powerful enough to rise above the emotions that chain them. He never came out and said it, but I think he intended for his Fated to rise with unheard of metallic energy. In Vade’s mind, if that were to occur then the other kings could invoke dark emotions all they wanted, but the souls would rise. In effect, we would return to our given charge without war, without the loss of life.

Even though I believed metallic energy to be impossible, the thought that I had hindered him from, at the very least, disproving himself was overwhelming.

“They
are
Fated,” he said as he reached to caress my lips.

“Are,” I repeated with wide eyes.

He leaned in and let his humming lips caress mine. “Are,” he breathed against my skin.

I smiled, thinking that maybe that was why I was freed today: his ambassadors were restoring our race, and any threat to me had vanished. “Congratulations, your majesty.”

I felt him tense and questioned him with my eyes. When he offered no answer, I pressed him for one. “What?”

“They were stolen,” he said as his pristine eyes became drowned with anger.

“By whom?” I asked as I rose fiercely from the bed. With little effort, he pulled me back to his embrace.

“By several,” he responded as his fingertips traced across my brow in an attempt to wipe away my anger.

“Why are you calm? Why are you not out destroying every single line that has crossed you!”

The hum within his skin intensified as he eased his hand down my shoulders and along my waist before pulling me against him.

“Glory, it is a very complex problem.”

“No, it’s not. They stole what belonged to you, and they
will
return them.”

“My adored, they have taken so much more from you…they have declared war, they have signed their death warrant.”

Chapter Seven

I had never heard words so fiercely spoken in that classic seductive tone of his. They were so powerful that I felt myself quiver. Not understanding the response of my vessel, Vade pulled me closer to his humming skin.

“You will be avenged. I swear to you.”

“I don’t understand what they could have taken from me. You are in my arms, Mazing is within this mansion, and I released my line.”

His brow furrowed for an instant, then he gained control over the emotions he was clearly fighting.

“You cannot release a line completely, not in the way you assumed. They were freed from you, they were blinded from your existence, but their cravings and desires remained. They ached to be claimed by anyone that would explain their purpose to them.”

My breath stopped. The very pulse of my soul stopped. “Are you telling me that my line exists still? That another sovereign is ruling them now?” Before I could rise with well-deserved fury, his powerful arms flexed around me.

“Yes. And that sovereign will release them to you the moment we decide that we no longer want to be in this room which, for me, is not this one or the one after.”

“Who?” I breathed, feeling agony. I’d always imagined my line living out lives of peace. I admit in the back of my mind I searched for them in the procession of death, for I knew their souls would not understand why death had come for them, that they would seek a stay from the Reaper. I never saw a single one of them. Never even came close to sensing the essence that I would know as well as my own breath.

Knowing that they were harmed while I was imprisoned was more than I could handle. It also meant that I had every right to go after Xavier–two wrongs do not create a right. He’d breached our agreement, or rather allowed me to make an agreement that had no merit.

A smile reflected in that diamond stare of Vade’s. “I found them all, claimed each by name. Rasp called them home the moment you stepped foot within these walls.” A slow, sweet smile infused with an amber blush enveloped  his visage. “Do you feel them, Glory?” he whispered.

Every lean muscle in my body relaxed as I breathed in. I felt them. I’d felt them long before this moment, but I assumed it was their ghostly memories. “You did that for me.” That young girl deep inside was speaking now. It was as if he had arrived at my doorstep with endless roses.

“Would you have expected any less from your rush?” he questioned as he gently tensed his brow, so much so that his luscious eyelashes nearly masked his eyes.

Those words made me smile, like the girl I was deep down in my soul.

All exaltation is short-lived, as this exaltation I was feeling surely was. “So are you avenging the kings for taking my line from me?” I asked in a disbelieving tone. That wasn’t Vade’s style. If the matter were resolved, then he would cause no further turmoil.

“No,” he said in a near whisper. “I’m avenging your mist…as well as mine.”

“What else are you avenging, Vade?” I asked nervously, not recognizing the cold look in his eyes.

“In time, I will tell you,” he murmured.

“Tell me now,” I demanded.

“I cannot and I will not right now. You have a line to claim…we have a web of misted souls to untangle.”

“A web? I did not call my mist. They were not accepted into this life—how could anyone claim my mist or yours? Tell me what I do not understand.”

His jaw tightened as a rage-filled emotion rippled across his image. “They planned your downfall for eons. Every move was precisely calculated and meticulously orchestrated and carried out.”

Wrath was swarming through my being. “How was my First’s betrayal planned?”

Slowly, his eyes appraised my image. “Tell me this: if Colton were a true First, would Xavier have executed him?”

“He did what!” I couldn’t have heard him right.

Vade cocked one eyebrow to push his point. “Xavier ripped Colton’s energy into shreds moments before you appeared at his throne.”

“Who would do that to their First?” That was foolish. Anyone with any sense would have claimed that energy, at least part of it, as their own to grow their line. And the king who did it would be so weak that he would not be able to stop it from occurring.

“No one.”

“So why did he?”

“I doubt Colton was Xavier’s First. I think Colton was a ploy.”

“Were you not there when his First was claimed?”

The reserved look in his eyes told me that he did not wish to speak of the king’s beginning, and that was fine by me. I knew the past between him and the others had been troubled for a while. I just needed to understand what the hell he was trying to tell me.

“No. That surprised none of us. He is the king of shock. Hiding his true First is not an ostentatious idea. I fear his real First will never be clearly seen by any of us.”

“So he had us all believe that Colton was his First, declared that he would be coupled with a petal—from another line, mind you—and then he felt validated to execute my First, along with me?”

“What?” Vade hissed as he rose up on his powerful arm and every part of him tensed.

“Cadence. Or whatever her name was or is now—she was from Fielder’s reign. Mazing told me that she reeks of lilies. That she taunted her. Mazing also stated that the scent of that Creator-forsaken petal was on the first level of The Realm when we returned today.”

Vade’s anger rippled through the room, and you could feel the electric charge vibrate around us. The candles responded, flaring up for an instant, but like always he found his control and the flames settled.

“You didn’t know that?” I asked in pure bewilderment.

“No, but it makes sense.”

“How does this make any sense? Why would they cross their lines? Do they not realize that an act like that will produce Escorts with a hunger for both emotions, and that hunger will send us further down this twisted path that is nothing like the charge we were given?”

“They were not trying to cross their lines. They were trying to end ours,” he stated disdainfully.

“I—what?” Who would dare to counter Vade? I doubted all of them combined had the courage to do that. That is, unless those low-lying, soulless kings were clever enough to make the assault seem self-inflected. The fact that I was the one that disbursed my line, not them, was pointing to that course of thought.

“I have no idea when this began. For all I know, it was the moment the Creator took me to your human deathbed. All I know is this: Colton was not Xavier’s First. His true First remains hidden from each of us. You released your line, set your energy free along with not only your mist, but also mine. Our lines drifted, and the kings we served with had every right to reach out to them, to pull them under their reign.”

“How would taking them from us bring you down?”

It didn’t make sense to me. If you wanted to hurt Vade or me, the most efficient way would be to take out our Firsts, Mazing and Rasp.

His eyes narrowed slightly. “The mist, from each of us, created Fated Escorts.”

“Both?” I gasped.

He nodded once. “Both. The Creator came to me. He told me under what alignment to send our energy out.”

“And you decided not to tell me this?” Fated Escorts. I had
Fated
Escorts. That was like having a First all over again. Unbelievable!

“I did in my own way,” he said as he lay down and stared at the glow around us.

“Exactly how did you tell me?” I bit out as I rose and wrapped the sheet around me.

“I told you that you needed to be nourished, that your energy had no choice but to be strong.”

“You told me that because we were not invoking emotions, because we were finding energy in nature or any other natural source, not because the Creator had spoken to you,” I argued.

“You heard what you wanted to,” he said under his breath.

That was his classic line. The King of Anger knew all too well that you cannot listen or see the manifestations of life when you are enraged.

“You know what? Sometimes it’s better to just be blunt. Would it have killed you to tell me that before our fight became laced with fury?”

“I cannot tell you what to hear or what to see. It was clearly explained to me that you see life the way you are meant to. That you are not me. That you are under no one’s control. You heard what you wanted to—and in that fight, you declared that you did not need me to tell you how to care for your line.”

“Do you really want to relive that fight? Right now? We can. I’m sure I have it memorized.”

“No,” he stated flatly as he reached for my arm and let his fingertips send a powerful hum straight to my core, causing my toes to curl. Thankfully, I was strong enough to hold in the sigh that wanted out, the urge to seize his rush once more and let these revelations come to light in a delayed fashion.

“I assumed that you knew something that I did not, that the Creator had spoken to you as well. That you were seeking a new source of energy for your mist. I was overprotective. I’ll give you that.” He glanced at my dark auburn hair which was resting against my ivory skin. His eyes grew distant as a thought took him far from this room for an instant. “Still am.”

I reached into his essence, searching for that thought, what would cause that fierce protectiveness wrapped in tenderness to come to light, but he was valiantly shielding it from me.

All I could do was stare at him as I heard that last fight in my mind. During that fight, he was viciously overprotective. You would have thought that my essence was his. In the past, he had guided me, let me find my own way. Not that day. He was demanding for the first time ever with me. Even now I didn’t understand his actions, and clearly he was not ready to explain them to me, which wasn’t odd; our Creator works mysteriously. He will tell you of your course but strip your words from you. Even when asked, you cannot clearly explain what you are doing or why. Until now, I’d always seen that as a precious gift. If you did not speak your path aloud, then there was no one to talk you out of it. No one to put damning thoughts into your mind.

“Who has our mist? Can we still claim them? Is that why you delayed coming for me? Were you trying to right all the wrongs first?” He offered no quick answer. “Can you at least tell me how the kings taking our mist would hurt you?”

“Us,” he stated contemptuously.

“Okay, us. You’re guarding your intentions and thoughts from me, Vade. You are going to have to use words.”

He stretched his shoulders wide as he took in a deep breath, finally allowing his eyes to meet mine again. “Our energy is entangled. I would dare say it was from the moment I first laid eyes on you.”

“I knew that,” I murmured, failing to hide a crimson blush.

The scent of roses left his skin at that moment. For some reason, it always amazed him that I adored him as he did me. Which was foolish, he was the king, the favored king at that. Even though I never saw him that way. I always saw a boy that had claimed my soul. It was still humbling to think that he would find my emotions for him hard to believe.

“The only way for a line to be properly disbursed is for it to die from the ground up. It can only perish if the sovereign ends each by their own hand.”

“In hindsight, that makes sense,” I said, clenching my jaw.

“Everything is clear in hindsight,” he said. “The only other way for a line to be destroyed is if the line is at war, civil war, if marked petals or Fated Escorts fight to the death.”

“And neither of our lines would do such a thing,” I offered, knowing that we were seen as the kindest sovereigns, ones that had never forsaken one soul under our watch.

“At first glance, no, but if our Fated Escorts were taken as mists, raised by another sovereign, blind to their regal essence, then set on a course where they had no choice but to end each other, it could occur…it
will
occur.”

“Our mists are at war?” I gasped.

“A war of hearts, it seems.”

The only way to stop any war of hearts was for the sovereign to end those who were raging against each other. These wars rarely occurred because our lines knew we had such a power, that without notice or reason they would perish with a thought from us. That is why they never occurred. Yet, if Vade’s mist and mine were blind to us, they would not know of such a risk.

Vade had the same weakness I had; he could not strike anyone in my line without seeing my image. He knew I would feel the pain, and pain was something he would never volunteer to let me feel which meant if my mist were at war with his, there was only one way to end it: each of us would have to end the ones in our own line in order to save the others, to save our kingdoms.

Being torn into shreds and cast into the life of The Realm would be far less painful than ending one of the precious souls under our watch. The pain would be eternal, felt in our essences forevermore. Whether it was necessary or not, no one could get over ending something that was created from the core of our being.

“They are ours, though. I have been absent. If I go to them, claim them, and explain how they were played against each other, they will see. They will stop.”

I needed him to tell me that my words were true. It didn’t matter that I never knew the Fated. They were mine. They never should have known the evil they are surely fighting now.

Vade’s fingertips caressed my arm as he spoke. “I fear that the one that I am struggling with now will throw down his own life if he is made aware of his true heritage…” He wrapped his hand around my arm tightly, ensuring his hum was present before he continued. “He was claimed by no line, but as a Witness…at least that is how he has lived out his recent existence.”

A Witness. I was spellbound. I could not comprehend that one of mine could be claimed in such a manner.

The admiration that I saw in Vade’s eyes was terrifying right now. Did he see this as a promise that one day my energy could create the metallic energy he was searching for?

Witnesses were in a sense archangels. They lived like warriors for eons at a time. At their human death, they were offered a charge to protect darkness from invading pure light. And honestly right now, souls of pure light were the only ones that could lead us back to balance. The only ones that could open The Fall naturally.

The only issue was that Witnesses were established to fight the course that Donalt and Xavier were on. So, my dear mist, the one that was chosen to become a Witness, would surely despise what he sincerely was…in his mind, I was the same as Donalt and Xavier. I was sure of it.

“Why are you struggling with him?” I asked in a whisper, hoping against all hope that this mist of mine’s actions were not ones that couldn’t be forgiven.

“Well,” Vade breathed, “he is plotting to kill one of my Fated Escorts, actually more than one.”

“His reason?”

“Beyond that he thinks he is a Witness?”

“Your Fated Escorts would not be evil. They would be fighting the same as he.”

“Glory…life has changed in the corporeal realm.”

I swallowed nervously. “How so?”

His jaw clenched before he answered. “Donalt and Xavier have succeeded in not only extending their lines to a massive level, but in invoking harmful emotions…their mist are found early, given a taste of power, and told to seek out potential lights. The pair of them, Xavier and Donalt, are fools, though. Their lines have grown so massive that only half the mist even know what they truly are. Some even have a foolish idea that if they gain enough power, find a blinding light to subdue, that they can rule The Realm.”

“You’re not serious.” Had those kings lost their minds? The idea of all those lost mists, blind to the splendor of what they were meant to be, sickened my soul.

“Sadly, I am.”

“The war—the humans I sensed in The Realm—they are fighting us, assuming that we are all the same.”

He narrowed his eyes. “They are fighting against our fellow kings.” Clearly, he took ‘us’ out of my summary.

“Then we shall fight with them.”

That brought a ghost of a smile to his face. My fearlessness often left him breathless. “When Xavier and Donalt assumed Earthly vessels, they assumed the consequences of such actions. Pure lights have fought the obvious misery they produce, in turn the kings retaliated. A web of intent, and blind deals were cast. And unfortunately, our lines are at the center of this battle.”

“I still do not understand how.”

“If they belong to us, you know their intentions were born pure, so pure that wholesome lights were attracted to them, claimed them. And in that claim there lies an unrest.”