To Bleed a Crystal Bloom by Sarah A. Parker

Firm knuckles assault the door.

I feel it down my spine, all the way to my toes. I feel it in my bones and in my fucking soul.

“What?” I whisper, knowing who it is. I knew from the moment I heard his heavy feet ascending my stairs slower than normal, as if he were being cautious for a change. “It’s not feeding hour yet.”

Silence stretches so long I picture being tossed through the castle gate like a sack of grain.

There’s the faint clear of a throat, and then, “Funny.”

I thought so.

“I’m here to escort you to the Conclave,” he commands, and every muscle in my body tightens.

Nobody told me I was expected to attend. And the thought of facing all those people after what just happened in the gardens? Fair to say, attending the Conclave is at the bottom of my priority list.

“I think not,” I reply, gaze pinned to the open window. To the blanket of heavy clouds refusing to allow even a shaft of sunlight to split through and warm my skin.

Make me feel less numb.

“You think not?”

“Don’t sound so surprised. I made your effort, and it didn’t turn out so great. Hard pass.”

“Then I guess you’ll be hitching a ride over my shoulder.”

This asshole.

“My door’s locked for a reason.”

“And it wouldn’t be the first time I’ve busted through it. Should I call the carpenter in preparation? It’s his birthday, and he’s spending the day off with his family, but I’ll tell him it’s urgent.”

“Leave the poor man out of this,” I mutter, glancing down at my clothes and realizing that in the time I’ve been sitting here, staring at nothing, they’ve almost entirely dried.

“Is—” I clear my throat, scanning the clouds again. “Is that male going to be there? The one who ...”

I grind my teeth, mind staggering back to the memory of those sounds splitting me apart strike by strike—of the familiar man with azure eyes and a sword hanging at his side.

I feel ... rattled. Not myself. I don’t know if I have it in me to face him most of all. Not after he saw me unravel like that.

And it wasn’t just him. It was an entire crowd of people previously roaming the castle grounds; a crowd Rhordyn no doubt carried me through once he plucked me up and bundled me against his chest like a child.

“Yes, but you’ll be at my side the entire time.”

My heart leaps into my throat and flutters about.

At his side ...

He really shouldn’t use that sort of language around me.

“Won’t Zali be there?” I ask, tone flat, and he puffs out a sigh.

In that sound, I hear exhaustion.

“Orlaith, I need you in that room with me,” he insists, leading me to release my own exasperated sigh.

“I’m not dressed for it ...”

“You look perfect to me.”

I peel off the door and twist around, staring daggers at it. “You can’t even see me.”

“Don’t need to.”

I roll my eyes, then hear him rumble—a deep, throaty sound that ignites every cell in my body. But that fire is swiftly extinguished when I remember where this discussion is leading.

“Do I have to talk?” I ask, eyes squeezed shut.

“You don’t have to do anything you’re not comfortable with.”

“Can I get that in writing?”

No answer.

I blow out a breath, run my fingers through my hair, and shove to a stand, straightening my blouse with a few firm tugs. Sweeping damp hair off my shoulders, I lift my chin and whip the door open, catching a glimpse of his posture; bent forward, head bowed, as if he were leaning with his forehead pressed against the grain.

He arches a midnight brow and moves back until he’s three steps down Stony Stem, his eyeline just below mine.

He’s the picture of savage regality, dressed in a fine garb that contours to the grooves of his chiseled physique—so impeccably tailored, it’s as if Dolcie dipped him in shadow ...

I glance away before my mindset erodes any further. Dolcie and her measuring tape can drop in a ditch.

Rhordyn’s shoulders square and he offers me the crook of his arm.

Ignoring it, I sweep past, careful to breathe through my mouth—the sound of his hearty chuckle grating my nerves as I stomp down the stairs.

He’s giving me his smile again, but it’s tainted now.

That smile belongs to somebody else.

* * *

The distressed-wood door does little to soften the chattering coming from behind it.

People.

My twisted fingers betray my skittish nerves, as does the sweat collecting down my spine.

Rhordyn severs my sight of the door, a galvanized shadow slipping into place. But I don’t want to look into his unnerving eyes right now, so I stare at his chest instead ... only mildly less intimidating.

Reaching for the stone and shell hanging around my neck, he tucks them down the front of my top, pinching buttons through their holes until they’re secured all the way to my throat.

I swallow, painfully aware of his closeness—his paused fingers.

The silence between us seems to draw its own breaths, bearing a full-bodied weight and pressing against me, demanding attention.

He shifts, hands landing on my shoulders like weights, and I dare a peek at his eyes ...

There’s a sincerity there—an openness that binds me with his attention, tending wounds that were beginning to turn septic.

I can’t help but revel in it.

Does he know he sustains me? Gives me everything and nothing all at once?

My next breath is nowhere near as satisfying as the last, as if nothing compares to the sips of him he feeds me.

Tortures me with.

“Orlaith,” he says, voice a little raspy. “Are you ready?”

No.

Beyond those doors, we cease to be alone.

Beyond those doors, what we have in this small, disencumbered moment becomes overburdened with the weight of reality.

Even so, I nod.

His hands fall and he spins, shielding me while he tugs the door open, the rusty hinges releasing a pained groan.

The rush of chilled air hits me.

Gray light spills from the expanding void as Rhordyn steps forward. I follow, leashed to his essence—a puppet to every shift of his booted feet.

Murmurings abate as we move into the room crammed full of restless energy. I glance around, taking in the rocky dome of space that’s much like a tomb, or at least how I picture tombs to be from the books I’ve read; a gloomy void, dull and dramatic.

A blade of muddy light shafts through a single open window cut from the peak of the dome, landing on the round stone table dominating the room. The light penetrates the rusty grate covering a hole in the middle of it, piercing down into the guts of who the hell knows what.

I hate this room—can feel the ghosts of past conversations caught in the crypt of it like they’re tangible things. And it’s cold.

Bone-jarring cold.

When I first cracked open that old wooden door to discover this place tucked into the castle’s heart, I backpedaled like my ass was on fire.

One peek, that’s all I needed to know this is not a happy space. It just ... bothered me. Still does, the feeling slightly overridden by my heart-cinching anxiety at the sheer amount of people seated around the huge, circular table, looking at me with barely veiled curiosity.

My skin pebbles, spine stiffening.

There must be over fifty pairs of eyes on me—one big circle of nope.

Rhordyn grips the back of one of the few spare chairs and lifts, walks it back a step, then places it on the ground again.

My gaze docks in his pewter eyes.

He motions for me to sit with a jerk of his chin, hands still gripping the seat. But my feet are mortared in place.

Chairs scraping across the ground only bother me a little, yet he must have noticed ...

“Milaje.”

His beautiful, carved lips shaping themselves around the nickname has me jerking into action.

The chair shocks me with its chill, threatening to tug all the remaining warmth from my body. I shiver, tucking my hands between my thighs to conserve heat.

Rhordyn takes a seat beside me, and conversations start again.

In an effort to avoid the furrowed brows and stolen glances nipping at me, I look to the hole in the ceiling; to the peek of bulging clouds it allots me.

There’s no glass to prevent the gentle mist of rain from entering.

I let my attention plunge to the halo of smooth stone circumnavigating the rusty gate in the center of the otherwise unrefined table, directly below the hole in the roof ...

I wonder where the water goes.

Shivering again, I feel the cold brush of Rhordyn’s stare and peer sidelong at him.

“What?” I whisper, and he releases me from his scrutiny, stare stabbing out across the table.

“Your lips are blue.”

“That’s because you dragged me into a cellar,” I bite out, and he grunts in response.

The door opens behind me, offering the softest breath of warmth before it shuts again, and heavy footsteps preface the grind of wood against stone.

I grit my teeth, feeling a heat brush over my face, drawing my gaze to the man who just entered.

Twin cerulean orbs assess me in a way that feels far too intimate. Not a sexual sort of intimacy, but one that goes far, far deeper than that ...

The man from the garden.

He reclines in his chair like a cat lazing in the sun, draping a leg over the arm of it. The movement crumples his fine Southern threads—a tunic that accentuates his muscular physique and lends a drop of nonchalance to his already casual façade.

All the while, his stare doesn’t waver.

So, I study him with the same unwavering intensity.

He’s attractive, I’ll give him that, harboring a strong, exotic sort of masculinity I’m not familiar with.

I’ve seen Bahari males before—there are two others currently seated around the table at various intervals—but never one like him.

I’ve not seen skin such a perfect shade of bronze.

I can tell he thinks highly of himself by the way he holds his chin, his shoulders. The way he so boldly examines me, as if he couldn’t care less about the male by my side filling this space with his expanding essence.

A hand nails to my shoulder and I jerk, then relax into my seat as I tune into the calming presence behind me.

Baze.

Something about his touch makes me feel a little less hollow.

His companionship, I realize, is one I take for granted. Even his closeness seems to loosen my knot of anxiety and plant little seeds of fire in my veins, taking away just a smidge of this bone-jarring cold.

He leans in, breath cool on my ear. “You okay?”

I nod, resisting the urge to rest my head against his arm and use it as a comfort pillow. “I’m fine.”

The conversations ease, and the room gradually becomes quiet.

Baze’s hand shifts, but he stays standing behind me and Rhordyn. A sentry at our backs.

“Do we give him another hour?” someone asks, and I seek out the long face of a rusty-haired Eastern male. He’s slight like a thistle weed and just as prickly looking, with a sharp, beady stare the color of pine needles. But there’s power in the way he holds himself.

“No,” Rhordyn answers. “He’s not coming.”

“Who’s not?” I ask Baze, trying to ignore those crystal-blue eyes assessing me from the opposite side of the table.

“The High Master of Fryst,” Baze whispers in my ear, and Zali rises from a seat four spaces away.

The vision of her makes my breath catch, her willowy beauty a stark contrast to a room filled with mostly men.

She’s dressed in tan leather pants and a chestnut top, armor hugging her curves—a breastplate that’s made from what appears to be bronzed scales. It looks impenetrable, yet the way it dips and bulbs enhances her lithe, feminine form.

Her rosy hair is pulled back and secured in a tight bun, cheeks flushed from the chill she’s probably not used to—not with being from the Eastern Territory of Rouste where the sun burns the dunes into rolling hills of desolation.

I barely recognize her; awed by her confident stance in front of this room full of people.

“You all know why we’re here,” she announces, voice clear and lilting. “So I’m just going to cut straight to the point.”

I glance at Rhordyn, who appears comfortable in his chair ...

Perhaps Zali is running this meeting.

“There’s been an alarming number of Vruk attacks across Fryst and Ocruth over the past four years. Not only are their pack numbers swelling, but these beasts are growing in both size and cunning at a discerning rate. Equally disturbing is that entire families have gone missing without a trace, children snatched in other circumstances.”

An icy chill slithers up my spine.

“These possible abductions often leave a scene too clean to be pinned on a pack of rogue, blood-lusting mutts,” Zali continues, spitting the last word with distaste. “Which means the disappearances and frenzied Vruk raids are either entirely unrelated or someone is governing both; weakening our smaller regions, instilling fear, and bleeding our populations.” She plants balled fists to stone while she surveys every person sitting around the table.

Bodies lean forward as if lured by her pause ...

“I know it seems like a stretch after years of relative peace, but we need to prepare for the possibility of a territory war.”

A second of silence beats by before a riot of yelling erupts—Low Masters and Mistresses tossing verbal blows back and forth across the table. The sharp scent of fear makes me want to breathe through my mouth.

As far as I’m aware, the boundary fences have been in place for years. There have been small, regional battles between neighboring Low Masters and Mistresses, but nothing that has threatened the walls that bind us to our overriding territories.

Nothing that has threatened the colors we wear.

Blunt voices bounce off the curved stone walls, assaulting me from all angles. The Bahari male sitting opposite me is picking dirt from under his nails, wearing an expression akin to bone-deep boredom.

He obviously has very little skin in the game.

“What are you suggesting we do?” a man with chocolate hair and piercing green eyes bellows. I recognize him as one of the Low Masters from Rhordyn’s territory who often shows face at the monthly Tribunal.

“Unite,” Zali remarks without hesitation.

“And what about High Master Vadon?” someone yells from my left, and my brow buckles.

“He stopped trading with us four years ago,” Rhordyn states, his low voice rolling through the room like thunder, cauterizing every other spill of sound.

He’s reclined in his seat, arms knotted over his chest, not even looking down the table at the man who just asked that question ...

He’s looking at the Bahari male.

“Neither he nor any of his Regional Masters are here today, and every sprite I’ve sent his way since trading ships stopped traveling down the River Norse has not returned. You do the math.”

“Perhaps he’s simply been affected by the storms!” someone yells, and more chaotic muttering ensues.

Zali stalks to the edge of the room where she heaves a large sack off the ground, cheeks reddening as she hauls it over her shoulder. Once standing in front of her seat again, she lugs it onto the table with a heavy thud.

The noose of bodies seems to tighten as we collectively lean forward, even the Bahari male.

Everyone but Rhordyn.

A smell hits me, but it’s not the chafing odor of partially rotten flesh that has my throat cinching. It’s the underlying waft of wet dog—a scent that casts a line into my memories, hooking on something too big and vicious to pull to the surface.

I’m about to stand and walk out of the room when Rhordyn snatches my hand and pins it against his thigh.

I turn to hiss at him, but Zali grips the corners of the sack and tugs, sending a big, fluffy, frozen head rolling across the table.

My hand flies to my mouth in an effort to catch the garbled sound that rushes out.

People stand and point and gag, screams bouncing off the curved walls. Sour-smelling vomit spills across the table, though the putrid stench is swiftly lost to the cinder scent of pure, undiluted fear.

Rhordyn’s hand tightens, offering me a frosty anchor while I’m caught in the crossfire of that vacant stare ...

Vruk.

I gawk at a wide, flat maw—at blood-stained teeth exposed by its peeled back lips, as though the creature died mid-snarl. The gray, shaggy mane has been hacked through, leaving a slice of exposed meat and bone and dried blood.

A thick neck that used to be attached to a hulking body.

“Breathe, Orlaith.”

I try, but my lungs are made of stone. If I force them to inflate, I’m certain they’ll shatter.

The trembling ground.

That awful screeching sound.

No.

No, no, no ...

Baze’s warm hands land on my shoulders, pinning me to the chair with their comforting weight, but it’s not enough to tamp that pressure bulging inside my skull.

“Look at me.”

I can barely hear Rhordyn’s voice through the ringing in my ears, but I can’t do what he’s asked. I can’t peel my eyes from that devastating maw—worried that if I do, it’ll come back to life and snap at me. Rip me up until I’m nothing but scattered pieces.

Rhordyn drops my hand, and for a second I’m adrift; floating without anchor. But then he grabs my thigh under the table, and a breath strikes the back of my throat.

“Look. At. Me,” he growls against my ear so ardently that it shoves through the haze.

I peel from my nightmare and stare into eyes that are ruthless. Stark, frozen lakes that take no mercy.

“It’s dead, Orlaith. Nothing can hurt you so long as you’re with me. Do you hear?”

I think I nod.

“You’re going to breathe,” he orders, fingers digging in, grip tightening to the point of pain, and I suck a sharp gasp.

The icy wave of oxygen barrels into my lungs, enriched with the scent of him. It’s a balm for my insides, the instant relief tempering me.

The shrill sound in my ears tapers enough for me to hear the ongoing commotion, voices rioting back and forth.

Baze lifts his hands.

Rhordyn’s throat works, and he loosens his grip, though he doesn’t let go. His hand stays wrapped around my thigh as he surveys the room.

“Silence.”

He doesn’t have to yell for his voice to rip through the tumult.

Some sit, others continue to stand, our combined attention on the decapitated head. Swallowing thickly, I notice the stark difference to the Vruks that haunt me in my sleep ...

This one has a long, shaggy coat.

“Why is it so ... fluffy?” someone asks, pointing an unsteady finger.

“Almost all the Vruks I’ve been encountering over the past few years have the same thick winter coat, no matter what time of the year it is,” Zali responds, gaze falling on me. A small line appears between her brows, and then she’s rolling the frozen head back into the sack.

I try to avoid looking at the dark smear on the table as Zali treads to the edge of the room and lets the head thunk to the ground, swiping her hands on her pants. “These days, Fryst is almost entirely frozen all year round. Based on the evidence, it appears these mutts are growing in strength and numbers in the Deep North before venturing over the alps.”

My stomach threatens to turn inside out.

More whispers spill from tight lips and bared teeth.

“What does that mean?” someone asks from the other side of the table.

“One of two things,” Zali states. “Either Fryst is overrun by Vruks, to the point where they’re running out of food and spilling across the mountains in search of fresh game ... or High Master Vadon is purposely breeding and feeding the mutts, then setting them free by the border and letting them do his dirty work.”

The room goes so silent you could hear my needle drop. I can feel the weight of a thousand thoughts settling upon my shoulders; can see it in the many pairs of wide-open eyes—some staring at the High Mistress of Rouste, others at the empty space before them.

“Neither option is ideal,” Zali tacks on, her honey eyes lacking their usual warmth. “If the Vruks keep growing in numbers, strength, and cunning ... then bunkers may no longer be enough.”

“They’re not enough now!” the thistly man yells, spittle flying, and a number of people mutter their agreement. “We’re cowering when we should be fighting!”

“We should be preparing,” Zali corrects with a raised voice that silences the room. “Rhordyn recently sent a scouting ship down the River Norse, and there’s now a gate larger than this castle barring the border entry.”

Eyes widen and gasps spill. I try to look equally shocked, as if I’m not a cloistered hermit who has a limited sense of the world beyond my Safety Line.

“We don’t want to be caught unprepared if those gates crack open and something nefarious spills out,” she continues. “A territory war on anyone’s terms but our own could shrink our borders, decimate our populations, and set us back centuries. Nobody wants that, and nobody wants to continue living in fear of Vruks tearing through our villages and ripping apart our loved ones.”

People nod, eyes turning cold and grim, while I try not to wither under the darting glances that dare to pick at me: the living reminder of just such an attack.

“So, the question is ...” Zali pulls a tawny badge off her lapel and throws it at the table. It comes to a halt next to the rusted grate—only a few inches away from tumbling through one of the holes into the unknown abyss. “Do we sit back while our smaller villages are plucked off one by one? While our people are taken or left mauled in a field, and we’re forced to feed liquid bane to anyone left alive but wounded? Or do we unite, combine our assets, strengthen our walls, and prepare to not only defend what’s ours, but to stake the problem in the heart and ensure the thriving future of our lands?”

The grip on my thigh tightens.

Rhordyn tosses a black badge on the table—one stamped with his lone-sword sigil—and murmurs follow.

A stout man with red hair and a crooked spine stands with the help of two younger males wearing the same rusty-colored garb. Years are etched around eyes that regard the High Mistress of Rouste with tenderness, and he tosses his own tawny badge on the table. “My region is small, and I have limited resources since a pack of mutts tore through my village a month ago, but I’m happy to honor this pledge if it comes to it.”

I glance at Zali, noting her smile that looks more sad than happy.

Badges add to the growing pile, and I find myself avoiding the source of a heated audit branding my face from across the table.

Rhordyn’s like a rock beside me. I’m not even sure he’s breathing as that pile grows and grows ... until there’s nobody left but the Bahari male who wears the sun for skin.

My gaze finally lifts, breath catching when our stares collide, and I swelter from the scorch of his narrowed focus. I can’t breathe under the force of which it’s branding me, but I refuse to let that show.

He clears his throat and slips his leg off the arm of his chair before leaning forward. Seconds drip by, but they feel like minutes before his eyes flick to Rhordyn. “I request a private audience.”

The words are deep, husky bolts that echo through the room suffering in otherwise stark silence, striking me over and over again.

I look sideways, hear Rhordyn grind his teeth, and something heavy lands in my stomach ...

“Fine.”