Black Storm - Red Queen Fan Fiction

Chapter 18 - The Mirror part VII

The next chapters will jump back and forth in time a little. I'll try include dates whenever it's possible.

Brand new quote material! Watch out for the King's Cage book trailer~

Mare POV

The empty eyes of the mask stared back at me. I saw myself in their abyss. How would it be when I put it on? Would I no longer be Mare Barrow, the traitor and the Lightning Girl? Would I Mareena Titanos again? Or would I finally succumb to become Maven's doll?

I traced the swirling patterns with my fingers, lines both red and silver, and no hint where Red ended and where Silver began.

Red and Silver, stronger than both.

A dry laugh escaped my throat. After the success with the Winter Gala, Maven had declared the whole of December to a month of festivites, to parade me around in a new fancy dress on each event. And today, a masked ball was on the schedule.

The sentinels had dressed me up already, a red muslin gown wrapping and billowing my legs as I crouched on the bed, contemplating the mask that was to complete my attire. Finally, I let it drop and my hand wandered up to my earrings. I felt a tiny gladness to still have them with me.

But. That piece wasn't a mask for a powerful Newblood who had threatened to kill a king. It made a mockery out of me, turning all my effords, all I had been, into a party costume.

That was why I wasn't wearing it yet. Maven wanted me to look at it to realize its meaning. And because he would come to put it on my face himself.

He was ready for the ball when he came for me, though his face was covered by his own mask already. The two sentinels waiting on me bowed upon his arrival. He wore his favourite uniform, decorated with even more silver and gold. His mask, black with stylized blue flames, could hardly be called such; it disguised only his left eye and cheek. Of course, the king would arrange a masked ball, but he wasn't going to pretend he was anyone else. Not anymore.

He greeted me, kneeing down to meet my eye level. "Do you think I enjoy seeing you like this?" Maven said. "Do you think I want to keep you a prisoner?" His long and pale fingers took the mask and turned it to give it a look of approval. He lifted it in front of my face.

"You are a weapon I intend to wield."

I entered the throne room ten paces behind him, surrounded by sentinels and Arvens as usual. I wondered if Maven felt embarrassed or proud, having to escort his state prisoner by so many security personnel. Wasn't I a most dangerous beast on a leash?

But I didn't watch the courtiers gawking at me, I looked at my hands, dressed in lacy gloves tonight. The Silent Stone manacles were still there, chained to the collar on my neck. The gloves served one purpose: to hide how chafed and swollen my wrists had become by now, rubbed raw by the constant physical and supernatural strain of the dreadful handcuffs.

The event was as dull as ever. Apart from my grand entry, I had to sit down next to the dais for the whole occasion. Maven was too occupied with the High Houses to spend much time near me, and when he did, he had only side eyes and wry smiles for me, to my great relief.

"It's as if he doesn't know what to do with you," I heard a woman say to me out of a sudden. I had dared to let my attention sway, and now the lady and her stunning black-haired attendant stood in front of me.

The lady came even closer to me, sitting down on the armrest of the throne. She didn't wear a dress, but a shiny black suit. I looked up into her face with a frown. Her mask was made up of raven feathers, as dark as her black eyes, contrasting with her yellow hair and tanned golden skin.