The Adani Chronicles: Birthright

Evin was angrier than he could ever remember being. The night air was cool on his face, but still he felt warm, and he knew if the light were better, his ears would be visibly red. His heart pounded in his chest and his breath felt short, but very little of it was because of the grueling pace he and Ryn had silently agreed upon. Pine needles crunched under his feet, the stars shone brightly overhead, and the air smelled sweet and fresh, but none of it held any appeal for him, not now.

His giant oaf of an idiotic, chivalrous, stupid brother had left to take on the worst of the quest alone. The Beast was no trifle; Evin had fallen asleep reviewing everything known about the creature in an attempt to manage some sort of attack plan—an entire army had once tried to kill the thing and failed, but sometimes numbers would lose where cunning could win out. He’d drifted off with the seedlings of a plan dancing around his skull, the very beginning of an idea that could have caught the thing off guard and seen them all home safely, Crest in hand.

But Brandt had other ideas, apparently. Ideas he felt no need to share, and battle lust he felt no need to temper with wisdom.

No, Evin thought, that was not like his brother. Brandt was the eldest in every way; far more steady and intense than Evin himself, more like to think a decision to death than make it too quickly. Brandt wasn’t being rash. He had a good reason and a strategy for what he was doing.

Really, that hurt Evin worse than if Brandt had just rushed off half-cocked. The man wasn’t being hotheaded; he was deliberately excluding Evin, probably because of some motherly, misplaced desire to protect him, and in the process he was going to get himself killed. Evin wondered if his noble, hard-nosed simpleton of a brother had considered where that would leave him. Evin without Brandt was…was…

Well, it was not an idea to be borne, for one thing.

“You’re quiet,” Ryn remarked, falling back to walk beside him. Kota moved silently ahead, barely a whisper in the still night, a dark shadow moving amongst pine and asley—and his mistress was nearly as invisible. Evin couldn’t even hear her breathing right next to him. Not for the first time, he understood how she’d survived all these years in the wilderness. He scowled, not that she could see it.

“Brandt is an idiot,” he answered. A dead idiot, if we can’t reach him in time. He ignored how his chest constricted at the thought.

“Your brother wishes only to keep you safe,” Ryn said quietly. He almost retorted to that, but she didn’t give him time before continuing. “Though I happen to agree this is a foolish way to do it. His place is at your side, as yours is at his.”

“We are stronger together,” Evin insisted, echoing the mantra their war masters had pounded into their skulls since they were but lads. “Fire and ice, they call us at home. He’s the steady lion, I the unpredictable fox.”

Ryn chuckled. “I can see it,” she agreed. “But a lion may take on many beasts alone.”

Evin’s eyes narrowed and his face felt hotter. “Not as many as he can with the fox by his side.”

Ryn stopped so quietly he wasn’t even aware of her absence until her hand closed round his arm. He turned to face her, a wraith in the dark, moonlight dappling her dark hair as she lowered her hood. Now he could see her face, sort of. She looked immeasurably sad.

“I am only saying don’t be too angry with him,” Ryn said. “Brandt loves you and wants to keep you from harm.”

Evin clenched his jaw. “I’m no child, Ryn. That’s not his call to make. There is a reason a prince is assigned a companion for his jofurr aetla! Brandt needs me as I need him—we’re safest at one another’s sides!” His breath came out in a great shaky rush. “And he knows it too. Something else is going on, something not right. He’s been acting strangely since the fight with the Val’gren.”

Ryn reached for him, squeezed his good shoulder. “Evin, we almost lost you that night. It shook him.”

A feline growl interrupted them, and Evin turned to see Kota’s yellow eyes glowing nearby. The lynx pawed at the ground impatiently. Ryn smiled.

“Let’s go get him,” she said quietly, bumping Evin’s shoulder with her own as she passed.

He followed, still annoyed but at least heartened by her camaraderie. The lynx turned and bounded ahead, clearly in a hurry, stopping often to sniff this or that. Evin and Ryn followed, Evin’s resolve renewed. He would save Brandt from whatever mess the man had gotten himself into, take his rightful place at his brother’s back.

And then, when this was over, he intended to punch him square in the face.

It didn’t take long for it to become clear that this was more a stupid decision than a brave one. Brandt had snuck in as quietly as he could, but there was only one way in or out that he’d been able to scout. The cavern was huge, with a long winding entrance that was as dangerous as it was dark. It opened into a cave so massive he could not see the borders of it. He stuck to the edge wherever possible, a hand on the walls to help navigate. Sickly-blue orbs provided weak light in the long, rough-hewn corridor, but Brandt stayed in the shadows.

Idiot he may be, but he had no intention of offering himself up on a platter for the Beast.

Still, intentions are often for naught, and entering the Beast’s manse—what would have been, he supposed, a great room or parlor—he was greeted by the sight of the Crest of the Vaeärne, displayed upon a pedestal in the very center of the room. He’d never seen it before, but he knew immediately what it was from artists’ renderings, though the likenesses had been rather...embellished, it seemed.

The amulet was a rough-hewn stone, about the size and shape of Brandt’s thumb, deep cobalt shot through with leaf green and set in a delicate gold wire that wrapped around the bottom and top in a graceful arc. At the top of the setting was a phoenix wrought in fiery gold, beak wide open in a cry, about to take flight—the family crest. The entire thing was mounted on a slender gold chain. All in all, it was small enough to fit in the palm of his hand. Brandt could just hear Evin’s reaction to it.

We came all this way for that?

But he knew better. The house of Vaeärne, for all their royal status, had never stood too much on ceremony or gaudy rings and heavy furs and luxurious silks. He knew other royals did, and the Blackblade clan that had reigned for much of Laendor’s rocky history did; but Brandt’s ancestors had risen from poverty a mere five generations ago, and they never forgot it. Not even Evin, though he could be youthfully oblivious at times. Brandt thought the amulet—for all its simplicity that belied its value—perfectly symbolized their family and the understated potential within it.

Brandt wondered for a mere second why the amulet would be sitting out in the open like it was, but then nearly laughed at himself. Who would be stupid enough to walk in and take it?

Other than him, of course.

Not wasting a moment, he snatched the heirloom, stuffed it in a pocket, and turned to go.

“Rather too easy, do you not think?” came a mocking, raspy voice from the shadows to his left. Brandt spun, raising his sword, but there was nothing there. Instead, a laugh came next; a languid, lazy sound that seemed to come from everywhere rather than any one particular direction. He turned in a slow circle, straining his eyes against the shadows in an attempt to see something, anything.

One of the blue orbs went out.

Brandt moved fast, rolling to the edge of the room and placing the wall at his back, sword held before him in a defensive position, but still he could see nothing threatening. Another light blinked out of existence, dimming the room further and making it impossible to see much of anything anyway, but Brandt still tried.

“I’ve been expecting you, eldest Son of Signy,” the voice came again, right next to his ear. Brandt flinched away in spite of himself, swinging his sword blindly and meeting nothing but air. The laugh sounded again, raising gooseflesh on the prince’s arms. He said nothing.

“You followed our trail perfectly,” the voice continued, this time right beside his other ear. “And you brought your dear little brother with you. How...splendid,” the word sent chills down Brandt’s spine. “Especially since he’s the one we wanted all along.”

With a roar of impotent rage, Brandt slashed in the direction he thought he heard the Voice, prompting another of those languorous laughs. The sound set his teeth on edge.

“How unfortunate for you that I left my brother behind,” he growled, holding his sword in one hand and feeling along the wall for the exit with the other. He needed to get out of here, get Evin as far away from here as humanly possible. Intelligence on the Beast had been spotty at best, with only a few stories of the creature’s horrors, but little useful information about its actual abilities or how to kill it; and Brandt wasn’t very keen on Evin trying to find out.

“Ahh,” the Voice tutted. “So you did. How unfortunate for you that he is coming anyway. My spies see all. But fear not.” A laugh. “Young Evin is in no danger. Râza wants him not only alive, but well. You, on the other hand…”

Before Brandt could respond to that, the dimmed orbs came back on, and brighter than before, lighting up the entire room in an instant. Brandt squinted and blinked at the stabbing light, struggling to adjust. When he did, he felt all the blood leave his face.

The Beast had assumed a form.

They came upon the Beast’s Lair at last, shortly after the sun had risen. Ryn sucked sweet morning air into her starving lungs—they had run the last few miles, some horrible sense of dread driving Evin on. He’d given her nothing by way of explanation, simply begun running and expected her to follow.

She had.

The air around the place smelled rotted, decayed. The darkness was so complete, Ryn felt the first stirrings of actual fear. Kota trilled, a gentle sound intended to comfort, and pressed his nose into her palm. Ryn smiled and stroked his furry ears.

“You have done so well, my kisa,” she whispered to him. “I am proud of you.” The lynx pushed up into her caress, bunting her with his head, and she laughed despite her budding terror. “Now comes the hard part.”

Evin had not taken his eyes off the entrance to the cave since they arrived. Now he looked to her, his eyes hard and cold as amber, his face set.

“Are you ready?” he asked.

Ryn would have followed him to any one of the seven hells at that moment.

“I am.”

They plunged into the dark together.

The corridor was long and serpentine, with plenty of uneven knots to trip upon, but they made it through with no incident. When they reached the end of it, Ryn sucked in a quiet, surprised breath at the vista that opened up before her, burying her fingers in Kota’s fur and twisting just hard enough to stop the lynx in his tracks. He didn’t take much convincing, baring his teeth silently as he stood beside her. She sensed rather than saw Evin halt on her other side, a short chuff of air his only sound.

“By the Astra,” she whispered.

The Beast clearly wasn’t a simple animal; the stalagmites in the cavern had been filed to a smooth black shine with deadly sharp points, eerie blue light shone from floating orbs placed strategically throughout the main cavern, and crowning it all was a well-built stone home almost large enough to be called a castle. The blue light created shadows in strange places, shifting as they floated, giving the entire scene a surreal, flat quality.

A shout of distress reached them from inside the manse, and Evin started forward with a growl of his brother’s name. Ryn caught the crook of his elbow, but he twisted away.

“Don’t ask me to wait outside,” he warned.

Ryn shook her head. “I would never. But if you storm in there without thinking, you’ll get yourself killed.” Evin did not argue the point, so she continued. “Let Kota and I sneak in first, get the lay of the land. Give us sixty seconds and then come.”

Evin didn’t look happy about it, but he nodded. “Just do it quickly.”

Ryn hugged him tightly then motioned to Kota, who melted into the shadows at her left, while she moved to the right and crept inside.

A massive arched foyer met them just the other side of the entrance, and at least one of the Astra was smiling upon them: they had to go no further to find Brandt. The Beast, Ryn could not yet see, but Brandt was on his knees in the very center of the room, face bloodied. Strange runes were etched into the stone surrounding him, and they glowed black and purple, sending tendrils of wicked-looking light through the man in their midst. Ignoring the way rage bloomed in her chest at the sight, Ryn snuck behind one of the mighty mineral pillars that decorated the place, trying to stay hidden but get a better look.

She could learn nothing here, so she ducked forward a few pillars and tried again.

What she saw froze the blood in her veins to ice.

Brandt was standing over the kneeling figure, a look on his face she never thought she’d see; it was cruel triumph, all arrogance and brutality. Confused, Ryn looked back to the man on his knees and had to bite back a full-on gasp.

Her eyes had not deceived her. It was Brandt, golden head bowed and shoulders bent.

Brandt was standing over.... Brandt?...gloating. Laughing, now.

“You are forsaken, as you always knew you would be. It was our intention to draw your brother here, but I think my Master will not mind destroying what of the Royal House I manage to get my hands on—”

“You’ll not touch him!” Evin stepped into the weak light. His face was washed white as a ghost, and it contrasted frighteningly with his dark hair and eyes that looked black in the flat light. Ryn felt her heart skip a beat in fear at the look on his face.

It was nothing short of deadly.

But the impostor Brandt merely smiled blandly. “Oh, I’ll definitely touch him, and you will more than allow it once you hear what I have to say.”