Page 116 of Ruby Red Sky

I wasn’t sure what to do. Not that I was scared, but I was eager to get settled. Laying down and trying to acclimate the new surroundings was also appealing. Lukas had sent my art supplies ahead of us, and they were somewhere inside the building. I wanted to make sure they were all there and in good condition. God help whoever messed up my portrait. I’d send my man after them.

Nobody wanted that.

“Stand right here,” Lukas instructed me. “Do not move.”

He walked up to the open doors and curled his fingers. A wave of what looked like heat rippled the atmosphere and soon, a group of men appeared in the opening.

“Leave. Now,” Lukas snarled at them, baring his teeth.

One of the men opened his mouth and began to protest, raising and pumping a fist in the air. Then he fell to the ground. The others saw reason and ran away. I turned and watched while at least forty men ran past me. I lost count after twenty-one.

“You moved,” Lukas rightly accused me. He was directly in front of me when I faced the castle again.

My eyes shuttered. “I did.”

His shoulders lowered a fraction. “You won’t stay in place if I leave you here, will you.”

It wasn’t a true question, so I didn’t answer. He grabbed me and transitioned us a second time, and I found myself in a building that reminded me of a train station, or maybe an airport.

An electronic buzzing permeated the air along with other electronic beeping sounds. Throngs of people wandered around and a man with a device similar to an iPad walked up to us.

“Identification,” he stated, his tone bored.

Lukas pulled me past the man and strode across the floor. I heard a commotion behind us but didn’t look back. I didn’t need to see what was going on.

My heart hammered in my chest. “What are you doing?”

He didn’t look at me. “We won’t have peace as long as they are still alive. No one will. I can’t run this Realm with them. They are disordered and messy. A blight.”

“Who?” I asked.

Massive doors swung open in front of us, reminiscent of the ones I’d seen in the First Realm’s palace. The room was covered in black marble, and long, glimmering tables dotted the space. A throne with smaller chairs alongside it sat on a raised platform on the far end, and an elegant bar at the other.

The most interesting thing was the water feature behind the throne. Or, rather, blood feature. Red liquid poured from the edge of the ceiling in a sheet, pooling somewhere beyond what I could see. The red haze lingered above our heads, wafting around rafters and bowers. It was concentrated above the waterfall.

Lukas took my shoulders in his hands and stared me in the eye as he smoothed his palms downward. His emerald eyes sparkled at me, and the edge of his mouth curved into the barest of smiles.

Then he strolled away, glancing at me over his shoulder, leaving me unable to move. I was furious until he crouched one leg, placing both palms on the floor in a single, smooth motion.

A bright white spread across the floor, starting from where he laid his palms. The color was vivid against the ebony, spearing in huge arcs that almost looked like snowflakes.

I froze him. That was what he said he did to Wyvon.

The wintery infection climbed the legs of everybody it came across, and cries of horror and pain filled the air. People turned into anatomically correct snowmen before they crumbled into piles of sleet and ice.

My eyes watered and I couldn’t breathe, the scene being too much for me to take. I hadn’t seen this level of destruction since Bryan and his girlfriends. This was an entirely new level of terrifying.

Silence filled the room as I hiccupped and the man I loved was back in front of me. “Cassia,” he stroked my cheek.

I couldn’t meet his eyes. “Remind me not to get on your bad side,” I said, attempting and failing to give him a smile.

He pulled my chin up, leaving me with no choice. “Every last soul in this room, in this building, would have hurt us given the chance. It was the right thing to do.” He sighed. “If it makes you feel any better, the pain was minimal.”

A laugh escaped me and I didn’t know if I should have been ashamed of myself or not. The man did have a point. Friends were hard to find, and foes made up most of the populations I’d come across.

My fingers gripped his arm. “I think I’d like to stay home, next time.”

He took my hands in his own, preparing to send us to the castle. “I’ll try to keep that in mind.”