Chapter 46: Psycho Academy : Epilogue

Lothaire

Twenty-five years ago

“No,” I snapped, then counted to ten and breathed deeply.

Throughout the centuries, I’d discovered counting was the only thing that worked to calm my anger.

Otherwise, it overwhelmed. Controlled. Consumed.

“You promised fidelity to the High Court, or was that a ruse?” Dick asked with his insufferable calmness as he sat behind his ostentatious glass desk.

“Obviously not. I’d think six centuries of running an academy of brats and training your assassins is proof of that.” I rubbed my hands over my tired eyes to stop myself from lunging across the space and strangling the life out of him.

How dare he question my loyalty after everything I’ve sacrificed?

Dick grunted dismissively. “You weed them out and prep them. At the High Court, we actually train them.”

The angel had his nose perpetually stuck in the air. He thought he was so much better than everyone else because he served the sun god directly.

I debated the consequences of ripping out his throat with my teeth.

Silence stretched.

I didn’t bother to respond to the pompous git. I’d served for centuries, proven myself time and time again, but it was never enough for them.

My past failures always loomed larger than my accomplishments.

Yet again, war was coming.

Yet again, the High Court didn’t need soldiers; it needed sacrifices. Pawns. Spies.

Yet again, I was expected to oblate myself to the cause.

It was exhausting.

Dick sighed heavily, like he was the one being asked yet again to do the unthinkable. “You’re not the only one who has to sacrifice themself for this war.”

“What the fuck does that mean?” I spat with annoyance. “Are you being asked to go into the vicious fae realm and become consort to a psychotic bitch? A bitch that is known widely as the mad queen?”

I snorted as I thought about it. “Really spreading peace throughout the realms. Good job appointing her. You both have the same temperament.”

Dick slammed his fist down on his glass desk, and it cracked.

His pale skin flushed mottled red like it always did when he got angry. “Oh yes, the fae realm, which has been more known for starting wars and genocides, is in such worse hands now that it’s aligned with the High Court and has been at peace for the first time in centuries. Please tell me more about how I failed when a massive war is coming and for the first time, the fae realm is on our side.”

I laughed at his hubris. “You think you can control the mad fae queen? Just because she’s joined some peace treaties doesn’t mean she’ll side with you in war. You’re a fool.”

Dick leaned back in his chair with a smirk.

I didn’t like it, and my suspicion flared. “What have you done?”

“What is necessary for peace.”

“Drop the fucking cryptic bullshit and spell it out, or are you just too cowardly to admit you’ve fucked up?”

The red flush trailed brighter down Dick’s neck. “The mad queen will not be on the throne when war comes. That is where your mission comes in.”

“I don’t understand.” I dug my fangs into my gums and welcomed the sharp jab of pain. Everything about the High Court was a mindfuck. “How does me being her consort put someone else on the throne?”

Dick reached under his desk and pulled out a glowing tube, and he swirled the sparkly liquid back and forth slowly.

“This is a fertility potion for the mad queen.”

The urge to flip the desk and skewer Dick with a table leg was uncontrollable. “You fucking bastard.”

Dick nodded calmly, like he wasn’t asking something so heinous it was mind-blowing.

“She was given options and only agreed to accept you as her paramour. She will take the steps to ensure procreation. All she knows is that she must bear a child.”

His eyes sharpened as he settled the full weight of his stare on me.

The implications of what he wasn’t saying hit me: Dick was willing to sacrifice the woman he knew for a better wartime leader.

In the process, he was willing to have me raped.

Horror grew. “So you’ve gotten tired of using people, and now you’re in the business of creating them.” I swallowed bile. “The perfect pawn.”

He didn’t even blink. “The moon goddess is creating champions for the war. The sun god is not willing to leave peace in her hands. He needs monarchs on his side.”

“So you’re playing surrogate for gods? How noble.”

“I’m playing at survival.” Dick’s face grew colder, and his countenance stiffened like it always did when he was extremely enraged.

He was a block of unfeeling ice. “You’ll breed the queen, and then you’ll have no contact with the offspring. They must experience the full brunt of her mothering.”

I slammed my hand on my thighs. “I will not leave my powerless child at the mercy of that bitch, and I will not have my offspring be a conceited, vapid fae.”

Dick swirled the fertility potion and stared through it like it had all the answers. “This will ensure your child has their mother’s powers. We both know how impressive they are.”

“They’re still just a child. I will not do this.”

Dick continued like I hadn’t spoken, “It’s not a linear plan. The child will be taken from the fae realm when they are sixteen and taught how to survive away from their mother.”

“I don’t give a fuck what you think you’re going to—”

Dick cut me off. “They will be brought back to her when they’ve grown up and made ties to others. When they’re strong enough to see how unfit she is to rule.”

I shook my head.

“You’ll be the catalyst that pushes them over the edge. You’ll threaten those ties. And when the time comes, with the right prodding, your child will destroy the mad queen and ascend to the throne.”

I slammed my fist into my temple in frustration. “You can’t fucking know that’s how it will play out! There are millions of factors you’re not accounting for. How do you even know the child will have the capacity to commit such an atrocity?”

Dick smirked. “Because they will be yours.”

I lunged across the table and wrapped my hands around his thick fucking throat.

He arched his brow at me condescendingly like I wasn’t seconds from snapping his neck and said, “But mostly because they will be hers. The queen’s sense of justice has warped to madness over the years, but any child of hers will know the sun god’s righteousness. They’ll be pure.”

I tightened my hands because his words didn’t make any sense. Fae never had a sense of justice. They were as removed from the sun god’s goodness as vampyres.

Dick should have cowered as I choked him, but he was the only person who refused to be afraid of me.

He was an imbecile.

Said idiot stared unblinking into my eyes. “The child will do what must be done for peace just as I do. They’ll see the correct paths forward even if they don’t want to. They’ll do what must be done because they are his soldier.”

“No child of mine will be a pawn,” I growled into his face and let him see the promise of my fury. My wrath.

“No.” Dick shook his head. “They won’t be.”

“But you just said—”

“After they ascend, your child can lead the fae realm however they see fit. As long as they side with the High Court in the war, we will ask nothing else of them. That is all the sun god wants.”

I removed my fingers from his neck and took a step back.

Let his words wash over me.

“The fae ascension is brutal. Who’s to say they won’t be slaughtered immediately for the throne?”

Dick sat unnaturally still. “They will have their mother’s power and the sun god’s favor.”

“We both know that’s not enough,” I spat with disgust.

“Then you will think of something. You have years to come up with a solution.” Dick shuffled papers on his desk like ruining my life was boring him.

“No.” I shook my head and dug my fangs harder into my gums. “I refuse to let you torture my child like you’ve tortured me.”

Dick looked up, and his eyes were empty and cold like they always were.

I hated angels. They pretended to be more righteous than everyone else, but they did the most fucked-up shit in the name of peace.

The Angel Federation claimed the sun god had granted them all insane analytical abilities so they could serve his will.

They played the long game masterfully.

They used people.

Ruined them.

Then smiled at corpses and said it was for the greater good.

If I hadn’t seen the atrocities that Dick’s scheming had prevented, I would have believed he was the villain. There were still much worse monsters out there.

He was an embodiment of the motto the High Court ingrained into their advanced assassins: You need to be dark to stop the darkness.

They weren’t wrong.

A flush spread across Dick’s neck as he said quietly, “This is not up for debate. Or have you forgotten the city you slaughtered? That the sun god has seen your black soul and marked you for an eternity of suffering?”

My fingernails dug into my palms.

Memories of wading through a river of blood pounded against my temple. Hammered into my consciousness.

The rage overwhelmed me.

The bloodlust guided me.

I let my powers free.

Bodies everywhere.

Hundreds of thousands of bodies.

I couldn’t walk by a fireplace without hearing their screams as they died by fangs. The shame was my constant companion.

Ten. Nine. Eight.

I breathed slowly and counted on the numbers instead of the memories.

“You agreed to a lifetime of service to save your soul.” Dick slammed the hammer into the nail. “Dead men don’t have choices.”

I swallowed harshly and spoke my biggest fear, “What if my child has my rage?”

The unspoken question hung thick between us: What if they’re a monster just like me?

Dick’s lips tightened into a line. “Their mother’s heritage will counter your disposition.”

“And if it doesn’t?” I snapped, tired of the constant games and the promises the High Court couldn’t keep. “She’s called the mad queen for a reason.”

“Then after they ascend, you can teach your child how to control the rage. You can give them what you never had.” He spoke calmly like everything made perfect sense and wasn’t a convoluted mess.

Sun god, I loathed him.

My knuckles cracked as I fisted my hands. “If I do this, my child will never be enrolled in Elite Academy. They will never be forced to be your pawn like I have.”

Dick didn’t so much as blink at my demands.

I kept going. “They will never train to be an assassin at the High Court. They’ll be their own person and can make their own choices.”

My words rang in the space between us.

Silence expanded as I waited.

Dick nodded slowly. “After they ascend to the throne and agree to side with the High Court during the war, we will remove all influence over your child.” The corner of his mouth lifted in the smallest smile.

My rage returned.

I didn’t like the look in Dick’s eyes; it was like the angel knew something I didn’t.

“Promise me on your angel wings,” I demanded.

Dick stared at me for a long moment, then his crystal wings glowed like they were lit from within.

His voice was strong and powerful as he said, “I promise that the High Court will not personally interfere with your child after they ascend the throne. We will not be the ones that force them to attend Elite Academy. We will not force them to serve.”

I swallowed thickly. Something about the way he emphasized “we” made my hair stand up. Like I was missing something.

Dick shuffled his papers. “Is that acceptable to you? Or are you going to keep throwing a tantrum?”

My fangs dug deeper into my gums. “Fuck you.”

“Yes, yes. You’re forced to impregnate the gorgeous fae queen and have an extremely powerful offspring who will ascend to the throne, poor you.” Dick rolled his eyes as he wrote on a piece of paper.

His eyes would look nice with the writing instrument sticking out of them.

“Sign here.”

I stared down at the dotted line and the words above it, which read, Lothaire Vord agrees to this mission.

“I don’t agree.”

“Sign the paper.”

There was no choice to be made, and we both knew it.

My hand cramped as I signed, and the angel across from me let out a long exhale like he’d been holding his breath.

“Your service is not unnoticed, Lothaire,” Dick said quietly. “And you’re not as alone as you think.”

I rolled my eyes at his infinite hubris. “Please, what have you ever had to sacrifice?”

“While you’re in the fae realm, I’ll be in the shifter realm.” His voice was low, but there was an edge to it I hadn’t heard. “The tides of war demand new leaders, and the moon goddess is going to create a champion.”

“It’s not your offspring that will be sacrificed.” I shook with the urge to kill the fucker.

“No,” Dick said softly. “But it will be my job to prepare a child.”

I scoffed. “I’m sure you’ll win them over with your cheery disposition and emphatic nature. Father of the year for sure.”

Dick’s pen creaked in his hand. “I will do what I must for the peace of the realms. Whatever is required. I will do.”

“Oh, everyone knows that,” I snarled. “Pretty soon you won’t be able to differentiate between the evil you fight and your own actions. You won’t be able to stomach the sight of yourself in the mirror.”

I spoke from experience.

Dick didn’t blink when he said, “I already can’t.”

His self-righteousness knew no bounds.

I would have respected him more if he reveled in the fucked-up shit he did instead of acting like he hated it while doing it repeatedly for centuries.

There was nothing to say to him.

I left.

A few weeks later, I RJE’d to the sun-kissed lands of the Fae realm. Prostrated myself before the mad queen’s glittering throne—the seat of death—and promised myself to her.

Seduced her with my power. My body. Impregnated her.

The consequences came swiftly; per the High Court’s request, my daughter wouldn’t know her father.

The mission was a success, but for some reason, it felt like a failure of the worst kind.

A calamity.

Like in all great tragedies, I persisted and bore the pain.

I left to serve at Elite Academy for most of the year, and when I had any time off, I stalked the palace halls and watched Arabella Elis Egan from afar.

My precious daughter.

A mischievous little child who was too smart for her own good. She had a wildness in her turquoise eyes that I recognized in my own—unrestrained anger.

She was perfect.

Time and time again, I stopped myself from going to her. Holding her. Playing with her. Introducing myself as her father. Apologizing for the High Court, the plot, and her role even though she was too young to understand anything.

But every time, I stopped myself because I’d signed on the dotted line. The mission demanded I let her mother raise her, and not interfere.

At least she was unharmed.

Until that fateful day when earth fae made the ground shake beneath the castle and tried to seize the throne.

I RJE’d from Elite Academy to find half the castle on fire and the other half littered with dead fae bodies.

Sprinting down halls, I nearly collapsed with relief when I found my three-year-old daughter cowering on the ground, hiding behind palace guards.

She turned her head, and her little cherub face was covered in blood and tears.

Arabella was harmed.

Someone had gouged out her eye.

Unholy rage blinded me, and I slaughtered every fae who stood between me and my daughter. All the palace guards and all the intruders.

Every.

Last.

One.

I knelt in front of her with blood-soaked arms, but the little princess didn’t cower and scream at the strange monster before her.

Arabella threw her little arms around my neck.

I hugged her tight.

Drawing back, I stared into her missing cavity with sadness because she couldn’t grow back her eye from nothing.

Her little fingers tightened around my long braid. Tiny nails digging into the unrestrained curls that I always plaited to keep off my face.

She smiled at me sweetly, and I knew at that moment that I wouldn’t allow this.

Her body could regenerate her turquoise gaze if she had a mold to work with.

I dug my fingers around my eye and didn’t allow myself to think.

Instead, I pulled.

Wrenched out my eye.

Skull screaming in pain and my vision reduced, I gently pushed my too-large eye into the bleeding cavity of her face and RJE’d to the High Court’s healers.

Hours later, after hundreds of enchantments, Arabella’s eye looked good as new.

Relief overwhelmed me.

Since his life’s purpose was to ruin my peace, Dick stormed into the room and slammed me against the wall with one of his glowing daggers.

“Fae saw the princess lose her eye. People will wonder why she now has one and the prince consort doesn’t. They’ll put it together.”

“I’ll come up with an excuse.” I was too relieved from Arabella’s recovery to care about Dick’s perpetual aneurysms.

“Yes, you will.”

Suddenly, a crystal blade slashed across my still throbbing face.

Pain exploded.

I didn’t flinch.

Refused to look away from the angel who was obsessed with ruining me.

He was strong, but I would always be stronger. Scarier. More fearsome. More respected.

I smirked at him.

Pain didn’t affect me.

Dick’s cheeks flushed brighter at my defiance. “The healers will give her a memory enchantment to make sure she has no recollection of these events. The High Court has slaughtered every last person in the palace. No one will remember.”

“How noble of you.” My upper lips pulled back as I scoffed at him. “If everyone’s dead, then why would you need to scar my face?”

There was a long pause.

“Insurance, just in case we missed someone. Your excuse is that you lost your eye fighting a monster, and that’s how you got the scar.”

I let the blood drip off my face, onto him, and said, “It’s the truth, after all. A monster did give it to me.”

He didn’t have the decency to disagree.

Ripping myself from his grasp, I RJE’d my daughter away from the High Court and returned her whole.

But I was broken.

As she got older, Arabella’s pale skin glowed with health, and her long teal hair was the envy of the elite fae. Two gorgeous blue eyes completed the picture.

I taught at Elite Academy.

My fae daughter lived a good life.

And time marched on.

But when she was sixteen, I learned she’d run away from the fae realm, and I started to worry.

I knew Dick had said he would take her from the realm, but why would she go? She was a princess. Happy. Gorgeous. Loved.

Without Arabella, visiting the fae palace was like going to a prison.

There was no one to distract me from the mad queen. I visited her bed. Dealt with her constant mood swings. Listened to her rantings and vile thoughts. Her long nails caressed me as she whispered sonnets about my dangerous looks.

I’d always preferred men.

But it was my penance, and I served it just like I always had.

When I was informed Arabella had finally returned, I didn’t need an excuse to visit, because the mad queen demanded my presence.

She told me of a plan to test the powers of the competitors and said she got the idea from a distant relative.

The queen didn’t know that I knew she was in the High Court’s pocket and there was only one person who had any sort of power over her.

It was Dick’s plan.

So I walked onto the gladiator sands, ready to play my part.

Until I saw her.

My daughter was covered in bruises.

Horrible black-and-blue welts mottled her fair skin, and from the way the mad queen smirked next to her, she’d done it.

All rational thoughts fled my mind.

I kept my mask in place and gave the grand speeches about testing for power that the queen had had me rehearse beforehand.

But I was far, far away.

No amount of counting, of calm breathing, could stop the overwhelming rage that shook my vision, and I was barely conscious of the shifters dying in my hands.

Barely aware that Dick was standing like a smug fucking bastard next to the queen.

The show would go on, but I wouldn’t be following Dick’s script anymore. Once the competitors were dead I’d slaughter her mother.

My soul didn’t matter.

An eternity of suffering didn’t matter.

What was a monster good for if he couldn’t protect his daughter from harm? Nothing.

I would avenge this wrong.

At least, that was the plan.

I never got the chance to execute it because the useless shifter girl I’d been killing turned out to be much more than I’d realized. But she wasn’t the one who brought me to my knees.

It was my daughter: Arabella.

She ripped out her mother’s heart, ate it, and ascended to the fae throne.

Once again—she was perfect.

Dick smiled with victory as a million fae fell to their knees.

Pride swelled in my chest. Arabella didn’t need anyone to save her, because she had her father’s rage.

It was beautiful.

Then the stadium erupted in chaos as everyone realized the implications of what had just occurred. I ran down the gladiator halls, searching for her, but Dick blocked the way and RJE’d us away.

If it were any less powerful of a man, I’d have succeeded in killing him, but Dick was a fucking angel, and he evaded my vengeance.

And my daughter went missing.

My rage intensified as I continued to research a solution.

Now that Arabella had ascended, she was wanted, but she had yet to come into her full powers.

She was painfully vulnerable.

It tormented my every waking thought.

But I hadn’t taught the most powerful in all the realms at Elite Academy for centuries because I was weak. I hadn’t survived the sun god’s wrath because I gave up.

After years of research, I finally found ancient texts on tying life forces together so both parties were stronger.

It was an extremely powerful enchantment, and I was surprised I hadn’t heard about it before. The ability to prolong lives would have been highly sought after.

I reckoned it was hidden for that reason.

Otherwise, everyone would do it.

The other problem was the books never said how to actually create the bond.

I brought it up to Dick. The fucker was one of the only people with access to the High Court’s historical archives, and he gave me the name of a tattoo artist who could perform it.

It would counter the fae ascension, and my daughter would not die unless all the men tied to her were slaughtered.

That was what I was promised.

I asked about side effects, and Dick said, “The archives speak of nothing else.”

My hair stood on end, and I didn’t like the gleam in his eyes, but I never found anything else as promising in my research.

It was my best bet to save my daughter.

A plan took shape.

Three of my students, the Devil Kings, were extremely powerful, but they couldn’t master their powerful abilities and serve unless they found their fourth mate.

So we made a deal.

In exchange for allowing them to train at the academy while I used my vast spy network to search for their missing mate, they agreed to protect my daughter.

After all, if their life forces were tied together, they’d all be stronger for it.

My daughter would be safe.

The Devil Kings would be whole.

Everyone won.

After they were bonded, they’d all separate and go back to living their own lives with more protection than before. I’d never let them near her. I wasn’t about to allow my precious daughter to be in the presence of the Devil Kings.

The men I trained at the academy were hardened ones who had no business being around innocent girls like my daughter.

I just needed a way to find Arabella so I could complete the plan.

Opportunity presented itself when the half warriors confided in me that they were the reason my daughter was brutalized by the mad queen.

And Dick said I had no self-control?

I didn’t kill them.

The angel wasn’t the only one who could play the long game. No. The half warriors would help me find my daughter, and then they would die.

No one harmed her and lived.

So I taught the recruits at Elite Academy like I always did. Trained them for the war that was looming closer and closer every day.

The rage and fear for my daughter consumed my every thought, and I was even more brutal than usual. Crueler.

But only the strong survived, so I made them strong.

Training with me was nothing compared to what the High Court would force them to do once they became anointed assassins.

My ruthlessness was my mercy.

Living within the haze that was fear for my child, I missed the signs.

Didn’t put it together when the little girl with darkness in her eyes told me she was Aran’s guardian and that they were tied. I didn’t see Aran’s familiar coloring and put together the obvious.

Until the enchantment fell away.

Aran was Arabella.

My little girl.

The smiling child I’d given an eye to so she could see.

In that moment, something good I hadn’t known was left inside me cracked and broke. The waves of shame became a tidal wave of despair.

And I understood.

The oath Dick had given twenty-five years ago put my teeth on edge because he’d emphasized “we.”

As in it would still happen, just by someone else’s hands.

Dick had known that my child would attend Elite Academy, but it wasn’t because of the High Court.

It was all because of me.

I would kidnap her. I would torment her. I would enslave her to the cause. I would make her into everything I hated about myself.

It should have been obvious when Dick said the sun god wanted someone else on the throne. When he’d said the moon goddess was creating a champion.

The entire affair reeked of the sun god’s manipulation; he also wanted a champion, and he’d ensured I’d trained her.

Yet again, I was nothing but a pawn.

Yet again, I was the villain.

My sacrifices were not enough.

They took my child.

And so it began.

“I will take my father’s place in battle.”

—The Ballad of Mulan

To be continued….