IN FULL COLOUR - Dark Fantasy

Axel

Over the hours which followed, since the strange appearance of the dark king, things just got more and more bizarre.

King Gaute had led him back to Dire Mountain, where he had been given a hearty meal and a warm shower before meeting up with us in the conference room. His creatures remained in the forest off course, all except for the three Regmus beasts who seemed to follow him around wherever he went.

Everyone stayed well clear of them and Locke with a few of his high fae warriors were given strict orders from their king to remain with Coyne at all times. Or at least until we knew exactly what his business was in coming here.

Apparently, King Gaute knew Coyne’s family and considered them allies for many years. The two great kings had been close friends once. That was until a little more than four decades ago, when rumours reached Lighthaven that the Kingdom of Shadows and Whispers had been ambushed during the night and the entire royal family slaughtered, along with all the high fae and any creatures taking a physical form. A massacre it had been.

King Gaute didn’t want to believe it at first. He had sent out numerous spies to retrieve any information on whether it was true or not, clinging to any thread of hope that his dear old friend might have survived the ordeal. All of the spies came back pale and terrified. Telling horrific stories of cruelty and bloodshed that reached far beyond any act depicted in history books.

When King Gaute finally arrived with a regiment of his men two weeks later, thousands of bodies lay battered and broken in a mass grave the size of a soccer field. Women, children, livestock and warriors alike, all butchered and the city burned to the ground.

Something broke in the mighty king that day as he beheld the rotting corpses of fae he had once loved. The crows tore at their flesh and pecked out their lifeless eyes. Blood, now dried and flaky covered almost every surface. He had fallen to his knees and wept. Wept for the kingdom that had fallen. For his friend. For the wife and five children that had gone down with him and for every life that had been stolen.

After the king had mourned for an entire day, he gave the order to burn the bodies. They had prayed, sang songs of sorrow and bid their loved one’s goodbye as the smoke reached the heavens, taking the souls of the slain victims with it.

No one ever learned what had happened that night. Who had slaughtered them and why. It remained a mystery, but somehow, King Gaute knew that whoever it was would be coming for him and his family next. So, he hid. He moved his entire kingdom down into the depts of the mountains, wiped their scents away and warded the entrance with magic.

His sons were still young, his beings not nearly as fierce as those who dwelled in Shadows and Whispers.

~

It was utterly quiet in the conference room when Coyne and Locke finally entered, the Regmus beasts and Lighthaven’s guards in tow. Everyone was still mulling over King Gaute’s recollection of the events from long ago, no matter how vague it had been.

Locke pulled out a chair for the young handsome king who didn’t look a day older than thirty, although fae aged much slower than other beings, making it almost impossible to tell his real age.

Even after the shower, meal and a clean set of clothes, the king appeared tired. Drained. His eyes almost seemed lifeless and dull, but not in the same way Lily’s was. No. His eyes reflected pain and emptiness. Years and years of torment.

It was quite strange to see a king with such chest-tightening power clothed in a casual black t-shirt, dark blue jeans and a black hoody which he kept zipped open in front. The long sleeves covered most of his muscled arms and the swirls of black which lived underneath his skin. Only a few tendrils of the blackness swirled around the thick column of his neck and up the back, disappearing into his hairline.

Coyne sat down in the chair and rolled his shoulders. A pregnant silence crowded the room as everyone waited for him to tell us what had happened and what was currently brewing in the east as he claimed.

The story which came from his mouth was harrowing to say the least.

In ancient times, before technology or even the invention of the calendar, there were seven great fae kingdoms, each ruled by a High King or Queen of exceptional power. The beginning of the royal bloodlines.

And all supernatural beings used to belong to one of these kingdoms, werewolves included. Each kingdom had a royal family, a hand-selected few high fae blessed with special abilities and powerful magic. Then there were other high fae underneath them, who also had magic, but it was watered down, mere whispers of magic and lastly came all the other creatures in the realm, the lower fae or nether fae as Coyne called them.

The same term he had used to greet us earlier. Nether fae.

In short, all supernatural creatures had a home, a territory and a ruler to call their own. But because empires were brought to their knees, kingdoms crumbled and wars were fought for power and land, many creatures had died and gone extinct. Bloodlines had been lost and with them, great power.

The royal bloodlines worked in a strange way to protect the magic gifted to the original king or queen of the realm.

According to him, the original king or queen received the gift of magic but wasn’t able to share that magic with any other than a sired heir. A child born of the same blood. And even that came with a price. Magic could not be made, but it could be divided, shared, so once a child was born, a bit of the parent’s magic cleaved off and was gifted to the sire. In other words, the more children one sired, the less powerful the king or queen became.

“You, your kind, used to belong to such a kingdom. Did you know that?” Coyne asked, leaning back into his chair.

“The Moon Goddess, I believe is what you call her, even though she had perished many decades ago. She was no goddess, but a High Fae Queen, ruler of the Kingdom of Midnight and Moons.”

Gasps and murmuring could be heard all around the table.

“Her true name, by which we knew her, was Queen Celene. She was beautiful. The most beautiful and delicate of all fae queens and princesses. But because she was so delicate, her heart so kind, other fae thought they could prey on her. Win her affection and along with it her kingdom. And unfortunately, it worked too. She was seduced and betrayed by her lover, a cunning handsome high fae warrior born outside of the royal bloodline. He had betrayed her on the eve of their marriage, believing that her magic would be passed on to him, along with her entire kingdom. Fortunately, it didn’t work that way. And since she did not have any heirs for her magic to pass to, her magic was divided among the creatures in her kingdom, werewolves being one of them.” Coyne looked up, grinning.

If this was true; we were considered nether fae. Lower fae without a kingdom and without a ruler.

“Her magic still runs in your blood, and it gets passed on from one generation to the next. It includes your abilities to shift into a wolf, fast healing, super-sensitive sense of smell and hearing. Also, the ability to mind-link and reside within a pack. Over the years, the bloodlines have mixed with others, creating weaker wolves. Alphas, however, were known to be mated to other Alpha’s or Luna’s ensuring that the bloodlines stayed pure, strong and that the strength of the true wolf stayed for generations to come. It is also why there is such a significant difference between an Alpha wolf and a normal werewolf.”

Alpha Blake swore under his breath and exchanged a concerned look with me. I didn’t know what he was thinking, but when he looked away, his eyes rested on John and his jaw tightened.

The Kingdom of Midnight and Moons had been the first to fall of the mighty kingdoms and yet this was only still the beginning of his story.

Dear reader, I didn’t want to make the chapter too long, so tomorrow I will post the rest of the history on the fallen kingdoms and why it is relevant to the story.

xoxo