Dark Harmony by Laura Thalassa

Chapter 12

I don’t think I breathe. Around me, the room darkens.

“A shadow,” I repeat.

Back to this insidious shadow. I’d almost forgotten about this aspect of the Thief of Souls. The Night Kingdom’s wet nurses had seen a shadow watching over the casket children, and in the Flora Kingdom I had heard about a shadow visiting the sleeping women.

I glance over my shoulder at Des, the two of us sharing a look.

“What did the shadow look like?” I ask, facing Typhus once more. My voice lilts as the glamour drips off my tongue.

Typhus glares at me, his fury still apparent. “It looked like a shadow. I don’t know, I wasn’t there. This is just what was reported to me. Godsdamn idiot slave.” This last part he says under his breath, just loud enough for me to hear.

The room darkens anyway. I don’t need to look behind me to know Des is all but primed for an attack. I don’t let him get the chance.

I click my tongue and grab Typhus’s chin, squeezing his jaw the way annoying relatives love to squeeze kids’ faces. I lower my voice to match his. “This idiot slave has your willpower by—the—balls. Now, apologize to me.”

“I’m sorry.”

It’s the least sincere apology I’ve ever heard.

I shift my weight, the reaction pulling a groan from him.

Definitely in hate-bang territory with this one.

“What are you sorry for?”

He glowers at me. “Absolutely nothing, you cock-sucking whore.”

My claws sharpen, and my back pricks were my wings want to manifest.

Why do men like this always revert to the insults? It’s embarrassingly predictable.

“You’ll pay for that,” I say quietly. “After you give me what I want, you’ll pay for that.” I lean in to his ear. “Perhaps I will make you suck someone’s cock.”

Over my dead body would I make someone do that. But a little empty threatening does wonders for cooperation.

I pull back. “I could you know,” I say, my voice low like a lover’s. “I could make you get down on your knees for every single man in this room, and you’d be powerless to stop me.”

Typhus’s borrowed magic seeps into the air around us, the most obvious indicator that behind his frozen exterior is a firestorm of anger.

Someone is really unused to being at the bottom of a power dynamic.

I pat his cheek patronizingly. “Now, be a good boy and let’s cooperate for a change.” My hand drops to one of his necklaces, and I finger a small bone. “You said that the shadow retrieved Galleghar. What was Galleghar doing while this was happening?”

“Walking.” He says this so derisively, like there is no other way a previously dead body could leave a tomb. After a brief pause, he adds, “My reports said he walked out of the tomb alongside a shadow.”

So Galleghar lay undying in his tomb until one night a shadow came and presumably awakened him. Then the two skipped off into the night, and the rest of us were none the wiser.

“Good,” I say absently, patting his cheek once more. “Good.”

I begin to climb off of Typhus’s lap, my thoughts racing ahead to sleeping bodies and shadows, when I pause. “Oh, I almost forgot. There was one more thing.” I sit back down on the king’s lap, cocking my head to the side. He doesn’t know it yet, but this is how a bird sizes up a particularly juicy worm.

“How is it you are so strong?” I ask, my skin still glowing, my voice still harmonizing. I’m burning through magic like I’m a sorority girl throwing back tequila in Cabo.

“I already told you,” he says between gritted teeth, “I am cobound to my subjects.”

“How does one … cobind themselves to another?” I glance over at Des, who’s beginning to pose frozen fairies like they’re Christmas reindeer, each position a little more compromising than the last.

I face forward again, just as Typhus replies, “Say a short oath, exchange a little bodily fluid, and briefly embrace—that’s all it takes.”

“All it takes for fairies to what, give you their power?”

“If that’s the oath they’ve sworn.”

“And all these fairies just happily gave you their magic?” It’s hard even voicing such a ridiculous question.

“They don’t just give me it.”

It sounds like I’ve come close to ruffling this king’s feathers. Poor little Typhus, getting accused is just the worst.

“That’s right,” I say slowly, “you offer them protection in return—and I’m guessing a place to stay in your underground city. How magnanimous of you.”

The air thickens with Typhus’s magic.

Definitely hit on a sore spot. His eyes no longer look just angry; they seem wild with panic.

Right now, he can only answer my questions, and I’m curious to see what’s going on behind those eyes.

“What is it, Typhus?”

“Fairies die out here all the time.”

“And I bet you have nothing to do with that.”

Again, he looks desperate to explain himself. Too bad we’re not playing this game by his rules.

We’re playing it by mine.

“Do you or the fae who work for you have anything to do with the deaths of the fairies who ‘die out here all the time’?” I ask, throwing his words back at him.

Again, that panic is in his eyes.

You made your shitty-ass bed, buddy. Now you have to lie in it.

Typhus holds out responding for a whopping three seconds.

“Sometimes,” he finally hisses out.

We’re not talking loudly, but his words still echo throughout the room.

I swear the silence somehow just got claws and teeth to it.

I lean a little closer and drop my voice. “Remember when I told you you’d pay for your words?”

He glares at me. The fucker remembers.

I swivel around. “Every fae in this room can now move their necks.”

As soon as the words are spoken, the crowd of fairies focus their attention on us.

I rotate to Typhus once more. He still can’t move, but he’s beginning to sweat, little beads of perspiration giving his skin a sheen.

He knows what’s coming. How delightful! I do savor how they squirm in the end.

I step off of him and face the room, raising my voice so everyone can hear. “You, Typhus Henbane, are going to confess to this entire room every single thing you don’t want them to hear, starting with your true intentions for taking their power,” I order.

His face is turning red, and he’s grinding his teeth together in a hopeless attempt to stop the inevitable.

“I … I …” Typhus tries to stall, until the confession is yanked from his lips. “I spent the last century and a half coming up with ways to manipulate fairies out of their powers, using whatever means I could think of. I—I did this so that I could stay healthy and strong in this place. I trade magic for my protection even though I’m the worst thing fairies have to fear out here.”

He takes a breath. “I’ve killed hundreds, maybe thousands of fairies—some outright, and some indirectly after I drained them of too much magic. I have a hidden room filled with countless fairies who are all but dead.”

An unbidden shiver moves through me.

Sounds like the Thief of Souls.

He continues, “I try to keep them alive for as long as possible—”

“Why?” I interject.

“Once a fairy dies, the bond is broken, and Typhus loses their power,” Des says from where he stands. “Dead men can’t uphold oaths.”

Typhus begins explaining the same thing, forced by my glamour to answer my question. Once he finishes, he pauses, ever hopeful that he can skirt around my other order—the one where he confesses his crimes.

I raise my eyebrows, bemused.

Around me, fairies flash him venomous glares. Poor little Typhus.

With a shudder, he continues on. “I have blackmailed men and women into having sex with me. I’ve lied about how strong I really am—I cannot singlehandedly stop an uprising, should one happen …”

On and on it goes.

It takes twenty minutes—twenty incriminating minutes—for Typhus to get through the impressively long list of shitty things he’s done. By the end of those twenty minutes, you can feel the room baying for his blood.

Hell, after hearing his laundry list of dirty deeds, I want to rip his throat out.

This king knows it too. He’s now openly sweating; it drips into his eyes and down his chin. Gone is his cockiness. I wonder how long it’s been since he’s felt this kind of fear.

“Apologize to all these fairies,” I command Typhus. “Apologize and mean it.”

His eyes move to the crowd. “I’m sorry for everything I’ve done.” His voice is low and hollow with something like guilt. It’s definitely not regret, but whatever. Some people never do regret their choices, only where their choices landed them.

I walk around the throne, my skin still glowing, high as fuck off my power. I still wear his crown on my head, and I’ll admit, the weight of it gives me a little rush.

When my gaze meets Typhus’s, the devil is in his eyes.

“Alright,” I say, “enough of this.” I use my sweet, cajoling voice, and the king seems to relax at the sound of it.

I can practically hear his thoughts—almost over.

“Oh,” I say, mock surprised, “did you think I was through with you? Oh, Typhus, no, no, no.” I’m shaking my head, my voice pitying.

Through my connection I can feel a whisper of Des. The sensation is so faint that it’s hard to place what emotion of his slipped across our bond, but if I had to guess, I’d say it was awe. And I realize, this is the first time he’s truly seen me use my magic. Stopping the sleeping soldiers was one thing, but playing with a man’s free will? Toying with him and drawing it out as I savor the kill?

This is new territory for him. And judging by his reaction, my twisted king approves.

“No one in this room is leaving without their powers,” I say.

In response, Typhus’s face goes red, and another wave of his power fills the air. He’s still bound by my glamour, however, to only answer my questions.

I watch him for several seconds, letting his mighty magic fight mine. It’s useless. I have absolute control over him right now.

But I will indulge him.

“Go ahead,” I say, “tell me what’s on your mind.”

“What you’re asking for is impossible!” he gasps out. “I would have to break every single oath; some fairies aren’t even conscious enough to agree to that.”

My voice goes ice cold. “Or they could just simply kill you. Dead men, after all, can’t uphold oaths.” I stare down Typhus, every bit the heartless creature our lore has made me out to be. “I’m sure the lot of you will figure something out.”

I back up from him, a nefarious smile spreading across my face. “Typhus Henbane,” I say, my skin lit, my glamour thickening the air, “I command you to return every single bit of magic you’ve stolen within two days’ time.” Much longer than that, and my glamour might wear off.

Typhus gives me a look like I’ve brought the axe down upon his neck.

I’m not even done.

“You will never again exchange power for your betterment.” My eyes flick around us. “May your people have mercy upon you.”

I walk away from him towards Des, my footsteps echoing throughout the throne room. I touch the crown that still perches on my head and pause. I swivel one last time to face Typhus.

“Oh, and I’m keeping this.”