Prisoner of Chaos (Redemption Book #4)

Chapter 22

Rift

"Blood Queen, I wish to introduce to you to the most powerful being in Axus. I give you Rift, the Dark Lord," the servant, who led me from my tent, bows to a woman wearing a black cloak hooding her face. She stands at the center of a group of guards. There is an aura of dark magic surrounding her. Similar to the aura that surrounded my mother.

"So this is the Dark Lord I've heard so much about it?" this Blood Queen speaks and she doesn't sound impressed either. "I expected more death in your aura, young mage. Yet it appears you're practically a virgin on the topic."

"Do not speak of death to me," I hiss at her, causing my eyes to blaze with magic. "I've no patience for threats. Are you willing to do business with me as my mother's successor or not?"

"Ah, let's get right to the point then? Speaking of your mother," the Blood Queen says, "she was predictably bound by the darkness, but you, Rift... you don't seem held by her code." The Blood Queen waves her guard to step aside and boldly approaches me until I can make out the shape of her pale, smooth face under the hood. "I confess, I'm surprised by you. So little death. I'm an expert in it you know..."

"Aye, death only stops the suffering, and if you can see an aura on that I'm sure you'd find I'm quite the expert on the topic," I say, not at all intimidated, even though the longer I'm around her the more I sense dark magic pressing in. "Why do you have need of the tainted arlite?" I ask, changing the subject to her strange fascination of my past's limited kills. "Who do you give it to?"

"Why do you want to know?" the Blood Queen says with a disdainful snort, "You're nosier than the Red Lady was. She never asked questions, she just obeyed her Master like a good bitch," the Dark Queen says, her eyes narrow to slits under the shadow of her hood. She's studying me, trying to figure out what I'm about.

"What Master are you talking about, witch?" I ask, tensing in her scrutiny.

"You and I both know what Master we serve," the Blood Queen says, her lips twitch in a smile. "I'd like to speak with you alone, Dark Lord." She laughs after saying my title, as if finding merriment in it.

I'm intrigued. Who is this person and why hadn't my mother ever introduced us? This Blood Queen is obviously a dark magic user like my mother, and she's also self aware of the Dark Lord. "As you wish," I tell her, "my tent is right here. We can speak privately in there." I gesture toward it.

The Blood Queen nods beneath her hood and follows me inside the tent.

Once inside the Blood Queen throws back her hood. Her hair is blonde, her lips are stained a deep crimson, her eyes are light brown, and her skin is deathly pale. I'm unsure of her age, which is always hard to tell with Sorceresses, but she appears thirty years at the most. On her forehead is a bright red tattoo the same color as her lips, three dots over each eyebrow and an upside-down drakon at the center.

"Wine?" I offer, striding over to the cabinet and dispatching a bottle of Ferardian Blanc from the rack.

"I smelled it the second we entered... there is blood on the wood of that cabinet," the Blood Queen says, paying tribute to her name at the notice.

"My own," I say nonchalantly, "I had someone shoot me with a dart."

"How peculiar. Why would you do that?" she asks, raising her brows at me and sitting down at the table within the tent.

"Because I don't need an explanation?" I say with a dry chuckle. "Does my blood smell too delicious, or would you like some wine?"

"You're quite a gentleman," the Blood Queen says with a smirk, she likes my sarcasm. "I don't eat or drink anything for fun, Rift. I have no ability to experience that pleasure as I traded it in for more power. If you weren't born the way you were, you'd know all the sacrifices one has to make to become as I, but you are born with dark magic innate to your essence and luckier than the rest of us."

"I didn't take you in here to complain about your path to dark power," I retort, "Tell me who is buying the tainted arlite and Cursed blood here. Who are you getting the Cursed blood from?"

"Sit down, boy. I'll answer your questions if you do something for me first," the Blood Queen says, sitting back with an amused expression.

Hate her. "And what is that?" I ask.

"Sleep with me?" she says, leaning forward and giving me a very obvious up-down gaze. She bites her lip seductively. "I've never been with a man capable of magic... Not only are you a man capable of manipulating magic, but you're damn sexy."

And you don't have a beautiful pair of wings, black hair, a curvaceous body, blue eyes, and an ounce of inner good to attract me to you.

Damn, I'm actually attracted to the light in Kyla now?

My eyes ignite and I set down the bottle, glaring at the Blood Queen coldly. "Out of the question. I'm not used to having people ask me to whore myself out either, so watch your tongue, witch."

"Pity. But I have another favor then, I desire the death of someone," the Blood Queen answers. "And I shall not say a peep unless they are killed under your own mental power."

"Who do you want me to kill then?" I ask, pouring myself a glass anyway. Clearly the Blood Queen knows the Dark Lord is taking control of me. Damn, if she views me as a mere vessel it's possible that's why she has a lack of respect and fear for me.

"I'd ask you to kill Queen Lucy, but since she isn't here anymore, I have another person whom you're much more likely to want dead anyway," the Blood Queen says, a micro-expression of anger and bitterness appears for a fleeting moment. She raises her chin up. "Yes, kill Prince Wes of Erlund for us and I shall tell you everything about your mother's operation here from Underlund to Erlund."

Kill the man who wants to marry my woman and claim my baby as his.

When can I get started?

"Why?" I ask, not wishing to betray to her my affinity for Kyla.

"He's a nuisance to our plans, he wants peace," the Blood Queen mutters. "As you know, the Master, the true Dark Lord, can't have peace if he's to take Axus for his own."

"Where do you come from?" I ask her. "Why was I unaware of you, another being of dark magic?"

"I was your mother's apprentice, but am not from this world," the Blood Queen says. "I am from Earth. I came here, during the time of Queen Lucy's arrival."

"How did you gain the acceptance and powers of dark magic?" I ask her. "It took my mother years."

"It took me years as well," the Blood Queen says with a chuckle. "I came to Axus a shattered human of Earth. I knew nothing about magic. It didn't take me long to realize where the real power in the world comes from."