Kingdom of Ash

He was in Erawan’s room, and yet not.

Maeve purred to him, “The key, if you will.”

Dorian’s hand slid into his pocket. To the sliver inside.

“And then we shall retrieve the others,” she continued, and beckoned to the portal through which they had both come. He followed her, pulling the shard from his pocket. “Such things I have planned for us, Majesty. For our union. With the keys, I could keep you eternally young. And with your power, second to none, not even Aelin Galathynius, you will shield us from any who might try to return to this world again.”

They emerged into their room, and a swipe of Maeve’s hand had the portal fading. “Quickly now,” she ordered him. “We depart. The wyvern awaits.”

Dorian halted in the middle of the chamber. “Don’t you think it’s rude to leave without a note?”

Maeve twisted toward him, but too late.

Too damn late, as the claws she’d hooked into his mind became mired in it. As flame, white-hot and sizzling, closed upon the piece of her she’d unwittingly laid bare in trying to trap him.

A trap within a trap. One he had formed from the moment he’d seen her. It had been a simple trick. To shift his mind, as if he were shifting his body. To make her see one thing when she glimpsed inside it.

To make her see what she wished to believe: his jealousy and resentment of Aelin; his desperation; his naive foolishness. He had let his mind become such things, let it lure her in. And every time she had come close, falling for those slips in his power, his magic had studied her own. Just as it had studied Cyrene’s stolen kernel of shape-shifting, so had it learned Maeve’s ability to creep into the mind, seize it.

It had only been a matter of waiting for her to make her move, to let her lay the trap she’d close to seal him to her forever.

“You—” A smile from him, and Maeve stopped being able to speak.

Dorian said into the dark chasm of her mind, I was a slave once. You didn’t really think I’d allow myself to be so once again, did you?

She thrashed, but he held her firm. You will free me, she hissed, and the voice was not that of a beautiful queen, but something vicious and cold. Starved and hateful.

You’re old as the earth, and yet you thought I would truly fall for your offer. He chuckled, letting a wisp of his fire burn her. Maeve shrieked, silent and endless in their minds. I’m surprised you fell for my trap.

I will kill you for this.

Not if I kill you first. His fire became a living thing, wrapping around her pale throat. In the real world, in the place where their bodies existed.

You hurt my friend, he said with lethal calm. It will not be so very difficult to end you for it.

Is this the king you wish to be? Torturing a helpless female?

He laughed again. You are not helpless. And if I could, I would seal you in an iron box for eternity. Dorian glanced to the windows. To the night beyond. He had to go—quickly. But he still said, The king I wish to be is the opposite of what you are. He gave Maeve a smile. And there is only one witch who will be my queen.

A groan rumbled through the mountain beneath them. Morath shuddered.

Maeve’s eyes widened further.

A crack louder than thunder echoed through the stones. The tower swayed.

Dorian’s mouth curved upward. You didn’t think I spent all those hours merely searching, did you?

He wouldn’t allow it to exist another day—that chamber with the collars. Not one more day.

So he’d bring down the entire damn keep atop it.

It had not been hard. Little bits of magic, of coldest ice, that wormed through the cracks of Morath’s foundation. That ate away at the ancient stone. Bit by bit, a web of instability growing with each hall and room he searched. Until the entire eastern half of the keep was balanced upon his will alone.

Until now. Until half a thought had his magic expanding through those cracks, bearing down upon them.

And so Morath began to crumble.

Smiling at Maeve, Dorian pulled out. Pulled away, even as he held her mind.

The tower shuddered again. Maeve’s breath hitched. You can’t leave me like this. He’ll find me, he’ll take me—

As you would have taken me? Dorian shifted into a crow, flapping in the air of the chamber.

Morath groaned again, and above it rose a screech of rage, so piercing and unearthly that his bones quailed.

Tell Erawan, Dorian said, halting on the windowsill, that I did it for Adarlan.

For Sorscha and Kaltain and all those destroyed by it. As Adarlan itself had been destroyed.

But from utter ruin, it might be built again. If not by him, then by others.

Perhaps that would be his first and only gift to Adarlan as its king: a clean slate, should they survive this war.

Screaming filled the halls. He’d marked where the human servants worked, where they dwelled. They would find, as they fled, that their passageways remained stable. Until every last one of them was out.

Please, Maeve begged, staggering to her knees as the tower swayed again. Please.

He should let Erawan find her. Doom her to the life she’d intended for him. For Aelin.

Maeve curled over her knees, her mind and power contained. Waiting in despair for the dark king whom she’d tried so hard to escape. Or for the shuddering fortress to collapse around her.

He knew he would regret it. Knew he should kill her. But to condemn her to what he’d endured …

He would not wish it upon anyone. Even if it cost them this war.

He did not think it made him weak. Not at all.

Beyond the window, Ironteeth shot to the skies, wyverns shrieking as Morath’s stones began to give way. In the valley below, the army halted to peer at the mountain looming high above them. The shaking tower built atop it.

Please, Maeve said again. Levels beneath them, another bellow of rage thundered from Erawan—closer now.

So Dorian soared into the chaotic night.

Maeve’s silent cry of despair followed on his heels. All the way to the peaks overlooking Morath and that rocky outcropping—to the two Wyrdkeys buried under the shale.

He could barely remember his own name as he slid them into his other pocket. As all three of the Wyrdkeys now lay upon him.

Then he reached back into the mind still tethered to his.

It was simple as an incision. To sever the link between their minds—and to sever another part of her.

To tie off the gift that allowed her to jump between places. To open those portals.

World-walker no longer, he said as his raw magic shifted her own. Changed its very essence. I suggest you invest in a good pair of shoes.

Then he let go of Maeve’s mind.

A hateful, unending scream was the only response.

Dorian shifted again, becoming large and vicious, no more than a pack wyvern flying northward to bring supplies to the aerial legion.

A king—he could be a king to Adarlan in these last days that remained for him. Wipe away the stain and rot of what it had become. So it might start anew. Become who it wished to be.

Dorian caught a swift wind, sailing hard and fast.

And when he looked behind him, at the mountain and valley that reeked of death, at the place where so many terrible things had begun, Dorian smiled and brought Morath’s towers crashing down.