Nectar of War: The Song of Verity and Serenity (The Nectar of War Series Book 1)

LAVEN HEPHAESTUS ARVENALDI, II

T he moment her hand moves downward, there is loud knocking on the door of the chamber. Maivena turns toward the door, and a quiet laugh is given from her as the knocking continues. It proceeds to grow louder the longer I attempt to block out the sound.

“Laven,” Morano says from behind the door. “I hate to interrupt, but you have King shit to give your attention to.”

I yank the door open, and there is a smirk on his face. His smile vastly grows, and his eyes touch in the corners as he stifles a laugh.

“Morano, I swear, I will put you through the wall.”

“Oh, I do not doubt it; you have once before. But Your Majesty,” he taunts. “If Lorsius is not going to handle a King’s duties, they are now the Heirs. Carmen and Lorena need you back at the palace, effective immediately.”

I exhale heavily and turn to Maivena; her back is to me as she stands from the bed, and she secures a robe around her waist.

“You all have impeccable fucking timing.” I bite out.

“I am well aware.” He pats my shoulder with a heavy hand. “You can taste her for dessert, duties first.” He mumbles his final words and I shove him down the hall as he hollers with laughter.

Maivena kneels in front of the fireplace, she pokes the wood with an iron rod, causing the fire to spark larger. She looks back at me as I put on a black undershirt and tuck it into my undone trousers. As I grab my vest, she approaches.

“Where are you going?” She ties the strings of my shirt hanging loose around my wrists. I raise an eyebrow as she moves on to tie the laces of my trousers tightly.

“Carmen and Lorena are asking for me,” I answer. “I do not know what for, but I will return soon.”

“Lorena,” Maivena exhales while smiling. “She is lovely.” She says as she unlaces my trousers and then perfectly relaces them together.

“Do not let her trick you,” I watch her fingers as they work on the laces. “She can ruin someone’s day if she chooses.”

Maivena quietly laughs, nodding.

“There, you always have the laces improperly crossed. This is correct.” She tugs at the waistband, and I lean down.

“Someone likes to pay attention,” I lowly speak the words as I move nearer.

Her skin heats at the slightest touch. She pushes up from her toes, edging her lips closer to mine. Her lips chase after my own as I pull away and stand up straighter.

Maivena’s eyes narrow as she looks up at me. I brush her bottom lip as I smile at her anticipation for our lips to finally meet once and for all.

Tensity, the forever builder of want and need.

“Just as you want to savor every bit of me, the feeling is verbatim, darling.”

Maybe it would not be such a bad thing for us to be starved of one another, then when we grow excruciatingly hungry, we will not be able to eat enough of each other.

*  *  *

As I walk into Carmen’s study, the doors shut behind me. On a large table in the middle of the circle room lie two corpses—one of a Wolf and the other of a man. I quickly recognize Carmen’s brother Carsten; he is wearing a white Healers topcoat as he observes two vials of blood sitting in a glass bowl of ice.

If I remember anything about rouges, it is the horrid smell their corpses release.

“I will explain,” Carsten nods. “Come nearer.”

“Thank you for coming on short notice,” Carmen walks toward me clad in his black leather armor. “Lorena and I were on patrol and found these two dead—I am guessing they were from yesterday when Vorian went on his killing spree while here.”

I walk around the table examining the bodies lying in front of me. “What is it that you are doing, Carsten?”

“Taking their blood,” he lifts a vial before gently placing it back into the ice. “I am going to see if there is a way to reverse this disease, so to say.

“Use their blood, but against them. Then, if I can navigate around this and add my knowledge of medicine and herbs, I can develop an inoculation of some kind and give it to the people. But this will take many tests, possible weeks, months, even years. Depending upon the time frame it took for someone to create this infection, it may take just as long for me to develop a reversal.”

If Carsten is forming an inoculation he cannot be the only Healer to have thought of this. The rogues have been trailing our realm for nearly six months now. If there are more Healers, they and Carsten need to work with one another on this.

“Have you contacted anyone else to see if they are trying to do what you are as well?”

The eyes of the corpse sit open, entirely black and drained of life as they lay limp. Even with life this is how some tend to look, the one that came after me when on the ship home from Terseius looked similar.

“I have, there are some, but not many have devoted their time to it. An assignment like this will take undivided attention. I will have to find someone who can truly give their time to help me develop—the more people I have to help me, the quicker I can cure and inoculate.”

Maivena.

“I have someone in mind who can assist you.”

His violet eyes brighten just as Carmen’s do. “If they are willing, I will take any seconds or hours they can give to me.”

I nod. “How far have you gotten with the process?”

“You are looking at it,” he holds his hands out to the blood in the vials.

“I will bring her. I do not know how much knowledge she has of Healing, but anything you teach her, she will grasp quickly.”

“Thank you, I will be here tomorrow, but now I must take these vials to the lab,” Carsten says before leaving the study.

“Laven,” Carmen calls from behind his bureau. “This is for Maivena. Lorena had them made for her,” he holds out a white box tied with blue ribbon.

“All of you are invited to be here in the morning. I am hosting breakfast for us, and Maivena can wear one of these dresses then. Afterward, we will discuss more of the new training for General Vanytha. Vanytha is the main person who needs to know of all the current changes being put into place. Then she can teach the rest of our Mandem.

“Also, I hope I do not take away too much of your night, but there is a lot Lorsius, and I did not talk in-depth about before he suddenly left. It is about Misonva; he never signed the treaty confirming the extension of the border between our seas. We can read through it before you sign.”

That would be because Lorsius is choosing to be stingy with land. I am not taken back by finding this out. We already have hell brewing on our land, us losing our vital connection with the Queens of Misonva is not worth the strain.

Carmen flips through the multiple papers full of information regarding the border between our realms.

As I grab a chair to sit down, I feel a slight tug on the bond between myself and my brothers. They say nothing, but just then, I receive visions of Maivena from three different angles, each angle they see is being sent to me. Her head is thrown back in laughter as she and Esme talk over plates full of supper.

I smile since there is nothing more for me to do but smile.

“Thank you,” I say, searing this sight into my mind.

IT IS PAST MIDNIGHT as I look at the clock hanging on the wall, further than that—almost precisely an hour past twelve.

“Why must I stand like this, Amias?” I hear Morano ask. “I look silly.”

“Because these rogues are fast and unrelenting with their strikes. Every second you need to be prepared for what can come,” Amias says. “There is no structure to their fighting, they are fighting to kill within their first slash, and you need to be prepared.”

I find all three of them in the undecorated drawing-room.

Roaner observes Amias intently as he moves and explains new training tactics. Suddenly, Roaner looks back at me as I enter.

“That took a long time,” Amias says.

“There is quite a lot Lorsius did not do while he was here. And apparently, he is not in Partalos handling whatever he was supposed to. The Duchesses sent a messenger to the palace while I was there, and the messenger asked when the King was to arrive.” Repeatedly, I move my hands across my face, trying to relieve the building of stress.

“When was the last time Lorsius visited one of our Courts and actually helped them when they were in need?” Morano asks, his arms cross as he turns toward me. “You are constantly called upon not even a day later to fix the shit of a mess he creates.

“Do not think we forgot about the week you were eating one meal a day because you barely had time to sleep, let alone feed yourself. You were too busy completing your duties and picking up behind Lorsius—you would think after he colonizes a land, he would do the work to upkeep it.”

I can only laugh at what he says. If I go too far into thinking of everything I have done to save Lorsius’s ass, I will see no end of rage.

“I am starting to think those white streaks in your hair are from stress, and not because you were born with them.” Amias jokingly says.

“Believe me. I wonder that often,” I nod. “We should discuss what I spoke of with Carsten.”

“As intriguing as that sounds,” Roaner raises his hand to stop me from carrying on. “You need to eat, sleep, and then we will talk of it in the morning.” He walks forward, shoving me from the drawing-room and guiding me to the kitchen.

He leaves me to walk the rest of the way to the kitchen, returning to Amias and Morano in the drawing-room. When I enter the kitchen, I see Esme leaning against the wooden countertop with a teacup. There is steam evaporating as she blows on the hot liquid.

“Laven,” she tightly greets.

“Hello.”

I walk to the pot of food sitting on the counter. I almost question if I should skip dinner to avoid conversating with her, but I grab a bowl and carry about.

Scooping out piles of stew into a bowl, Esme speaks. “It is hard for me to entirely hate you.”

I sit down at the table near the window in the kitchen, mostly to place distance between her and me just in case this conversation goes southward.

“Why the change of mind?” I ask, although I do not care.

She stills, her eyes lift from the tea in her vessel and to me.

“Because she looks at you as if you hung the moon, and you watch her as though the sun rises and sets on her shoulders . . . Maivena’s happiness is one of the few things that means most to me. Do not ever let me witness this bit of joy she finally has after years of being subjugated slip by your doing.”

I say nothing.

I say nothing because I do not make promises I cannot keep. I am not perfect, and I will not pretend to be for the sake of others.

Esme looks at me as if hearing my thoughts.

A knowing smile appears on her face before shaking her head and leaving the kitchen to return to her and Roaner’s chamber.

Once I am done eating, I follow suit and go to my own chamber to sleep. Although, I do not know how much sleep I will get tonight.

*  *  *

I stare down at the grave.

LAVEN HEPHAESTUS ARVENALDI, I

‘You mean to tell me,’ I stop speaking as I look at my mother who stares down at the grave in front of us. ‘You mean to tell me, not once did you ever come see me while I was imprisoned–’

‘Laven,’ she attempts to speak over me.

‘No,’ I sternly stop her. ‘You do not prevent me from saying this. You told me your pain and now you get to listen to mine.’ She is at a standstill waiting for me to continue. ‘You came to see me not once, you never allowed my siblings to come see me, only my father came. Then, my father dies, and not even then do you come to see me, and now you bring me to an empty grave?’

‘I wanted to tell you,’ she begins to cry.

‘You did not. Why?’

The sympathy I should feel for her tears is nowhere to be found.

‘How could I tell you while you were already so torn with what was happening while imprisoned?’

‘As my mother,’ I step closer to her. ‘As my mother you come and tell me. You figure it the hell out.’ As much as I do not want to, I shed my own tears with her. ‘How do you just not tell me?’

‘I am so sorry.’ She pleads.

‘Are you?’ I shout.

Just as I raise my voice she begins to speak. Yet, she fades within wisps of darkness that swarms around me like a hurricane. I fight to make my way through as I hear her calling for me.

‘Ma!’ I yell as I force through the gusts of wind that push me back to where I was previously standing. This is not just a push; I am being levitated back.

One step forward takes me another levitation backward.

‘Ma!’ I holler once more as I can no longer see a thing nor hear.

She is gone.

The empty grave with its carved headstone is gone.

There is nothing but darkness.

I am thrown to the ground as I take another step forward and the hard collision makes the area around me clear.

The wet, sharp stone is all too familiar to me, and so is that treacherous view of the dark woods as I look through the unrailed balcony of the prison.

My ankles are grabbed, and I am yanked across the rigid stone beneath me. Two of the guards are pulling me further to the edge of the open balcony.

I turn in their hold and reach out to grasp the ground. My chest rakes across the stone and I see the small lines of blood pulling from my flesh as I am being drug closer to the edge.

A rope is rung around my neck as we near the balcony and I am forced off.

As I fall from the edge I grab a loose end of the rope to stop it from hanging me. I am now swinging from the edge as my bloodied hands merely hold on for dear life. When I look up, the two guards are at the edge, waiting. Their laughter is widely heard.

Purely out of spite to live, I find the strength I still have to pull myself up the rope.

The moment I near the top of the balcony one of their boots connect with my face and I fall without a single hope for reaching the rope to pull up.

I only fall.

I fling as I wrench awake and shove the blanket away. I scurry backward so swiftly my head collides with the headboard in a direct strike.

“Stop! Stop, stop, stop–” I finally shout the words trapped in my throat.

The louder I scream; I begin to stammer.

A gentle hand touches my cheek as I pant.

Maivena is sitting next to me.

“Laven, Laven, shh,” she coos.

She holds my face as she looks at me.

I grip her wrists as she gazes down at me. I hold onto her; a deep fear settles in that she will vanish. I am not ready to be taken back to that dreadful ache of falling so quickly.

“No, no, no,” I plead as her hands loosen. “Do not let go of me, I will fall.”

“Laven,” she stills my head, and her eyes pour into my own.

Reality begins to fall into place the longer she stares down at me. Her hair cascades around us, curtaining me to see only her.

“There is only us.” She whispers and I find security in her as we are bathed in a serene darkness. “You,” she encompasses my face tighter. “And me.”

I let her hold me until all previous thoughts of never having her are gone.

She once was untouchable for me. That tiny star you find in a sky full of black, and as you would reach for it; the clouds would hover, and the storm would begin—hiding the star until the storm would pass, clouds would rest, the star would be gone, just as she would be gone.

But she is here just as I manifested over that same star.

If there is one thing I remember my father saying, nothing meant for me can be taken from me.

Maivena lies down next to me as I turn to look at her.

She rests too far away. “Come closer, please.”

I reach out and wrap my arm around her, tugging her across the bedding. She presses in so closely I can no longer tell if my breath is hers or mine.

As I shut my eyes, she quietly speaks. “Do you wish to talk about it?”

I only shake my head.

“You should, Laven.” Her tone is soft and caressing, yet hesitant to push me too far.

I struggle to respond, but I do, nevertheless. “I cannot,” are the only words I can muster.

She does not say anything back. I know she is not asleep. Her heartbeat is too unsteady. When she falls sleep I noticed she has the steadiest heartbeat, this is not that.

“It is not fair, Laven, for you to know my darkest dreams and I do not know yours.”

I open my eyes, and she is staring at the tattoo on my chest.

“I want to tell you, but I just cannot. Not yet.” I touch her chin and she does not respond to it. Instead, her eyes close as if I never said anything.

But she does not dare to let go of me through the rest of the night.