Page 3 of Her Royal Blood

I hugged Gabrielle and told her in earnest. “I am so lucky to have you, and you are, and have always been, my best friend.”

Chapter 2

Lex

I woke up to the rocking in a jail cell with a barred window high above my head that was moving violently back and forth. I laid on a wooden bench with other prisoners in their own cells lying or sitting on rickety benches that were the same as the ones in mine. I heard the faint splashing of water in the distance and knew instantly that I was on a water vessel. We must have been on a boat bound for Vitoria Island.

I wasn’t shackled, which I found surprising, but where would I go? I was locked in a cell. We were all prisoners. Some of them I recognized as Royal Guards from Onyx Rah, but there were others as well, too many were innocents. I saw the confusion and fear in their eyes. Men and women Aria had appointed to be teachers, writers, scholars, law enforcement, Royal Guards, the Minister of Administration. All were locked in cells similar to mine.

Sharing my space was a tall man with scars marring most of his body. Deep red gashes and faint strap lines crossed over the skin on his arms and torso. He had evidently been through something very painful. The two other men in our cell were bronzed by days working in the sun. One had a black eye and a fat lip, the other was unblemished but wore a menacing scowl.

“Does anyone know where we are?” I asked to confirm my suspicions.

“Prisoner boat to Vitoria,” the scowling man answered.

“How long have we been at sea?” Suddenly, I panicked worrying that a significant amount of time might have passed.

How many days had I been unconscious and how far was I away from Aria? Had she already married Polonius? My heart sank at the thought of her getting married. I was going to kill the tyrant. There was no mistaking that fact, but the idea of Polonius touching her or even breathing the same air as she breathed lit me up with rage.

“Set sail last night from Navarrah City,” he said without any emotion.

“Navarrah City?” Hearing the words leave my mouth stabbed me with more pain. “What of the king and queen?” I asked, trying not to let on that I was inquiring about my own parents.

“Gone,” he grunted out.

“Dead?” Panic exploded through every nerve.

“I heard they are in hiding” the scarred man said, as he sat half naked on a hard wooden bench. “Lord Polonius of Brahman’s Peak has declared himself ruler of Tobran. Everyone is fighting in the streets,” he said without much care. “Fucking chaos,” he laughed. “I’d like to be in his bedchamber when he fucks that pretty queen though. What a waste,” he laughed as the others joined in. “I’d bed her better, I bet.”

“He’s probably got a nobby little cock,” the guy with the black eye added and I was ready to rampage.

I could hardly contain the mayhem I was ready to unleash, but I had to hold myself together.

“When are they getting married?” I asked, breathing through my violent thoughts.

“Tomorrow at sunset. Onyx Rah will unite with Brahman’s Peak. They have Halo something or other from the ObsidianValley and the Royal Mage Sire Vanoire, they’ve already attacked Angeline Falls, Navarrah City, and last I heard were outside of the Obsidian Valley, gonna be a real exciting wedding night for the mother fucker.” If the man with scars continued to speak of Aria and Polonius’ wedding, I’d have to kill him for the way he was fantasizing about Aria.

“Had to tie her down, I heard,” the man with the black eye added. “My brother said she was dragged away.”

“She’s probably into that kind of rough play, no other reason to marry someone like him,” the scarred man said and I couldn’t hold my temper anymore.

I rushed for the scarred guy and clamped my hands around his throat lifting him up from the bench as I pinned him against the wall.

“Don’t you dare speak that way about my queen.” He had no way of knowing that Aria was mine. MINE!

I was ready to explode. I punched the guy in the face and the other two men in the cell grabbed me, but I got another punch in then turned on them and attacked them both. I gut punched one while I kicked the other in the mouth. I figured a broken jaw would go nicely with his black eye. I was about to return to the scarred man slumped against the wall when guards filed into the cell.

I shifted into my wolf, ready to kill every guard on the ship, but they hit me with something sharp and I instantly fell to the floor in a thudding mass of bones and flesh. My wolf retreated back and as I laid out shivering and twitching from whatever they’d given me.

“I knew this one was going to be a problem,” I heard one of the guards say. “Put him in a cell with the women. Let’s see him rip their heads off,” they laughed as I was dragged out of my cell.

For the second time in two days, I blacked out. Being drugged and coming off of an unknown substance versusrecovering from magic were two vastly different recoveries, magic disappeared, drugs messed a body up. My head ached and I needed water more than air at that point.

“Water,” I was able to choke out.

I realized that I was laying on the floor. The room looked hazy through my blurred vision, but I was in a cell with women. They were dirty and disheveled from traveling, but none of them were injured. One of the women, who looked to be in her mid fifties, came up to me and held my head off of the ground.

Like the cell I was in with the men, there were only wooden benches to sit on and no bedding or beds. The floor was the only place to sleep.

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