Beauty (A Faery Story 3)

Torin’s stomach turned. Fuck, he wished his brother would go away. Thirteen years and his brother was still here, still a shade who managed to whisper in Torin’s ear.

“Shut up, Seamus. Why didn’t you leave with your brethren?” The sluagh were gone. He’d had his guards check the caves near the palace. Torin knew it was most likely a bad sign. They had heard of his plans to destroy them, but the one thing he had been happy about was the fact that his fucking dead brother would be gone, too. No such luck.

“I didn’t become sluagh to join the happy little family. When I died, I sent my wife on, but tied myself to this place until such time as you no longer breathe air.” Seamus’s form shimmered, a sure sign that he was emotional. Even then, his voice remained a hoarse whisper. “I chose to stay here because I owe my children.”

Torin sighed. He’d heard this all before. Roughly three years after his successful coup, Seamus had shown up, having stored enough energy to make himself known. Torin had thought he was going insane. Those around him still believed he was. Seamus was excellent at hiding from all others.

Seamus liked to show up at the worst times. When Torin was giving a speech, he’d catch visions of his brother’s form. When he made love to his wife, Seamus stood and watched, those flint-gray eyes filled with judgment.

Torin hated his brother. Just like when he was alive, Seamus ruined everything simply by being around.

“My hags are going to make sure you never come back. They’re working on it now. The blood of traitors will banish you to the underworld, and then I won’t have to see you or listen to you prattle on ever again.”

Seamus laughed. “I’ll believe it when I see it. Even if you found a way to get rid of me, you can’t get rid of the me who lives inside you, Torin. That piece of me will never fade until you join me in death.”

Torin feared Seamus was right. Guilt weighed heavily on him, but he couldn’t go back. He was too close to finishing off those annoying boys. The Vampire Council had declared them criminals. The word was that Beck and Cian had fled the Vampire plane and were seeking asylum. Once they were caught and their bodies and that of the bitch they’d bonded to were hanged in the city square, the rebels would know all hope was gone.

Then he would take out all non-sidhe one by one if he had to. Including those disgusting, blood-drinking vampires.

All he had to do was kill two men.

“As long as they’re out there, you aren’t safe.” Seamus seemed to be able to read his mind. His brother leaned against the marbled wall of the palace balcony, his ghostly eyes going out over the city. Beyond, Seamus could surely see the fires that had been set in the country in an attempt to quell the current rebellion. “These are small rebellions run by peasants. What would you do if one of the nobles gave the rebels someone real to rally behind? You didn’t kill all those with royal blood. The rebellions will almost surely continue since you don’t know the first thing about running a country. Peasants don’t like it when you steal all the food and leave them with nothing.”

Torin’s fists clenched. “Traitors. They’re lucky I leave them alive.”

Seamus’s head shook. “Oh, brother, you’ve put them in the position where they have to choose between the king and their own lives—and the lives of their children. A king’s worth is in protection and shelter, and you offer neither. You’re a tyrant, Torin. It’s why father chose me over you.”

Their father had chosen Seamus over the eldest, rightful heir. Torin had been forced to bite his tongue and plot revenge for twenty fucking years. “Our father was an idiot who would have had us make friends with the monsters. As you would. You were seriously thinking about a marriage between the Unseelie and your daughter. It’s a good thing I did what I did or she would have been tortured beyond anything a girl should have to survive.”

Seamus snorted. “You call all non-sidhe creatures Unseelie, brother. It’s ridiculous. There are plenty of sidhe who are considered Unseelie. And many helpful races who are as Seelie as me.”

“The Unseelie are all half-breeds. Impure. Unworthy. I have plans for them.” As soon as he’d dealt with the royal vampires, he would handle the Unseelie. Within mere months, he would rule three planes. Ambition burned bright inside him. He wouldn’t stop until every sidhe bowed to him and his name was glorified for ridding the world of monsters.

A low wail pierced the night. Would the hags never be done?

“You allow a single incident to color your life, Torin. It was one group of goblins and trolls who nearly killed you,” Seamus pointed out.

Torin turned away. He didn’t think about the day. He didn’t think about how the small band of monsters had delighted in beating him and making him bleed. “Well, I think they would all pause before attempting to harm me again.”

“You’re a big man, oh yes. King Torin kills brownies and gnomes.” Disdain dripped from his brother’s voice.

“Yes, and you embraced them all.” Torin turned back to the ghost of his brother. “You were so fucking kind. You beat your own child.”

If a sluagh could pale, Seamus did it. His form faded a bit. “I thought I was helping him. I thought I was correcting his bad behavior as our father corrected mine. I see th

ings differently now. This side allows for a full accounting of all that is true if one is open to it. I hate you for killing my wife, but one good thing came from it. Beck was freed from my rigid morality. He can become the man he always should have been, and Cian can get over my ignorance. And they’re both definitely better off without your bride.”

Maris. Lovely, blonde, frigid as an iceberg. And seemingly as fertile. She’d been promised to the symbiotic twins, the bondmate who would have bridged them, but she’d hated the idea. She’d been more than willing to help Torin in an effort to get out of a hated marriage.

At the time, she’d seemed a perfect bride. Thirteen years in, he’d given up going to her bed, but she still had her value. She was a bondmate, but suspicious of psychic powers. She’d managed to make the other bondmates somewhat comfortable, until they had figured out he wanted to use their powers to enhance his own. “You didn’t vet your pick properly, brother, or you would have known she hates non-sidhe as much as I do.”

“Your Highness?” A throaty voice broke through the quiet. Una. One of his hags burst into the room.

And just like that, Seamus was gone. Torin had no doubt in his mind that his brother was still hanging about, listening in and gathering information to torture him with later.

“What is it? Do you have the spell?” They were working on a spell to kill the sluagh. He needed to be rid of his troublesome brother.

Una was one of the singularly least attractive women he’d ever seen. Even in her human form, there was an air of decay that hung about her no glamor could ever mask. On the surface she was in her middle years, a plain woman with fair skin that no one should really notice, but once Torin stared at her for too long, the wrongness couldn’t be denied. Her sister Liadan had been the most skilled at glamour, but she was dead and the hags suspected the renegade royals had done her in.