The Stone Queen (The Dark Queens Book 9) Read online

  I hiccupped, covering my mouth with my hands. He’d seen right through me, as I’d known he would. And now there was no more in me. We could never be together, but I couldn’t keep hurting him this way.

  I shook. “Oh, Ares. I can… can never be… be with you. It’s impossible. I could ki—”

  There was a clapping sound, then everything changed when I saw the god Poseidon staring down at us with his haughty, hawklike gaze. The crowd’s noise grew in pitch like the sound of a disturbed bee’s nest.

  “Poseidon!” they whispered. “Why has he come? What is this madness?”

  But he wasn’t the only god there. I recognized the other as a god, I simply couldn’t tell who he was. He was tall and lanky, dressed all in black but a black that swirled with what looked like stardust. His eyes were a hypnotic shade of blue and his hair an inky shade of shadowy black. He stared at me with those haunting eyes of his, never blinking or wavering. I inched closer toward Ares.

  “Uncle,” Ares asked, sounding surprised. “Why have you come? And why have you brought Hypnos with you?”

  Angry at me as I knew he was, Ares backed up against me, pressing his back to my chest, shielding me with his large frame as best he could. I peeked out from behind his back and noted another familiar face was there.

  Perseus stood just behind Poseidon’s left shoulder. His face was a mask of pure venom and rage as he glared in our direction.

  I curled my hands into Ares’s tight, muscular back, suddenly ashamed of myself for lying to him as I had. I hadn’t known what to do, and the longer I’d been with him, the more pain I’d felt, but he knew I loved him. We’d spoken truth last night, and Ares was no one’s fool.

  I rested my cheek against him, squeezing my eyes shut, sensing that things were about to get dark, dangerous, and possibly even life-threatening. Mortals did not survive when gods warred, and Poseidon looked as though he meant to drown us all in his wrath.

  I was tired of pretending I felt nothing, tired of pushing Ares away. I did love him. I always would. Leaning up on tiptoe, I laid a very gentle, tender, and the lightest of kisses upon his shoulder blade. He should not have felt that butterfly’s touch, and yet his skin prickled with gooseflesh, and I heard his rumbling approval.

  “Step away from her, boy,” Poseidon growled. “You do not understand the viper you’ve made your bed with.”

  More shocked gasps came. We’d never slept together, not that it was any of their business, but I would forever be marked a fallen woman for it now. The usual feelings were not aroused in me, though. I felt no embarrassment or even shame that others should know that Ares and I were so close. One thing had become very clear to me just then—I loved him. Deeply. Truly. The type of love that made one feel invincible. Strong. As though they could conquer worlds even if they had but the strength of a mouse. Ares was my rock and my hope for a better life. A better life for us both.

  “Do a thing to harm her, Uncle, and so help me, I will burn your kingdom to the ground,” Ares warned, not a note of quiver in his tone. This was a man who meant exactly what he said. This was a god of war issuing a challenge, and it made my blood sing to hear it.

  Poseidon’s nostrils flared. “I do you a favor, my boy. You do not know who she is. I’ve only just discovered the truth myself. She is a demon sent from the Titans themselves to destroy us all.”

  I gasped, and not because I was afraid but rather because I heard sincerity in the words he spoke to Ares. The great god Poseidon sounded truly worried. And if a god should sound so worried, then maybe… maybe this was nothing to do with the petty ways of the gods at all. Maybe I was tainted. Of bad blood. Maybe Perseus had had cause to hate me. Had Mother kept more from me? Did I really know everything?

  “She is no demon. And I have a plan to help her with her curse. I’ve only just been gifted an apple from Father—“

  “Are you a damned fool? You would turn that monster into one of us! Wake up, Ares.” Poseidon snapped his fingers, and thunder and lightning cracked over his deep waters to punctuate his words.

  A stiff breeze smelling of brine and salt whistled at my back, shoving me even deeper into Ares’s strong, towering frame. I buried my nose in his spine and squeezed my eyes shut. I knew who he was and all that he was capable of doing, and yet… and yet, a terrible sense of dread was rising up in me.

  “I’m telling you that she will be the ruin of us all. Now, we can do this the easy way or the hard way, boy. But you will do as I say. You will leave this thing be! If you love her at all, then leave. Leave now!”

  I chanced a quick peek at the god of water and was stunned to see how round and huge his eyes were. He did not play games. My knees shook, and it was all I could do to remain standing.

  I could almost hear Ares’s smirk as he said, “You think me a fool! I leave and then you will harm her. I know your ways, Uncle. You’re not half as clever as you believe yourself to be!”

  “Damn you, boy!” Poseidon was practically spitting now. His eyes were wild, and his hair had grown longer and turned a shade of what looked like dark ocean blue. The long locks floated like a wave behind him. “She has the power to end us! If you think I jest, I do not. This is one moment where I am trying like hell to show you the truth, son. This bitch will be the ru—”

  Suddenly Poseidon’s neck was jerked back, and he was grunting, gurgling, as his eyes nearly popped free of their sockets from the pressure upon his neck. Ares’s hand was outstretched, and I knew that he was the one doing this thing to his uncle.

  The choking sounds Poseidon made were terrible to hear, and I knew they would haunt the rest of my days.

  “Never speak of her thus again,” Ares said in a low tone but deadly serious. “She is my female, and you will respect her!”

  Poseidon’s skin was a dark shade of red, and grunts grew wilder in sound. I heard him say what sounded like words, but I could make none of them out until he said, “Hypnos, now.”

  And then it was not Poseidon struggling for breath but my beloved Ares pinned fast to the ground. That gaunt giant stood with his arm outstretched, and all around us, lethargy began to spread like creeping death.

  I swayed on my feet, affected by the power of such might even though he was not aiming directly at me. Shaking my head as though to ward off that darkness, I clutched at my breast.

  “Stop. Stop, please,” I whimpered when I dropped to my hands and knees. The sharp sting of rubble biting into my flesh helped me focus better. I crawled over to Ares, grabbed his large shoulders, and gently shook him. “Please, please stop,” I whispered to Hypnos, even as I continued to try to awaken my beloved.

  “You ensnared him! You are Ceto’s seed, you conniving whore!” Poseidon barked, but I paid him no mind, for he did not matter to me. But in one matter, I knew he spoke truth. And if I loved Ares at all, then I had to be willing to be honest with myself. My heart in my throat, I decided to warn Ares one last time. I would make him no threats of leaving or say that I despised him. I would never lie to him again. With all the love I had in my heart for him now resting in my glance, I gently smiled his way even as I felt the heat of tears begin to bathe the backs of my eyes.

  “He does not lie, Ares,” I said softly, and he grunted, shaking his head most violently. “Oh, my darling War. I wish I was something, someone other than what I was created to be. But all my life, I’ve felt a darkness trapped within me, something ancient and terrible. I know he does not lie. What if I am cursed to spell the doom of you all? Would that seem so far-fetched? I am the offspring of primordials, after all.” I gentled my words even over the sounds of his grunting denials. It pained me to see the tears rolling down the strong bridge of his nose. This was a man broken, not a proud and vain god.

  “Surely, you cannot love a monster like me. You must be free of me. I love you too much to hurt you further.”

  He croaked and tried to reach out to me, but the netting of Hypnos’s power was too strong. Ares’s movements were lethargic and slow.

>   “Little bird,” he whispered. The veins in his neck bulged and strained as he fought to work through the dark chains that bound him. “I will never stop loving—”

  “This is bullshit!” Poseidon hissed. “If you won’t believe my words, then maybe seeing is believing!”

  I was flung to the dirt, and my head banged violently against the temple steps, and stars burst in my field of vision. Woozy and unsure of where I was, I tried to shake off the surprise attack, but I was given no time.

  I felt a body upon me, and I screamed when my skirts were roughly shoved aside. “No! Do not do this! You do not understand. Do not do—”

  “So help me, I will end you!” Ares roared. “Release her at once! Or I will never forgive you for this!”

  But Poseidon’s face was wild, and I knew he did not hear his nephew. There was a look about him that told me my fate as clearly as words ever could. The sobs tore through me then. Though I’d not felt shame before, it now came over me like a tidal wave the moment my maidenhood was breached for the very first time.

  And though I knew that at some point I would be wild with grief, all I felt was numb and dazed, like this was naught but a dream, a terrible, horrible nightmare, and soon I would awaken and see that it had never happened. That I was safe in my bed. And that no man who stank of fish and sweat grunted over me.

  My eyes locked with Ares’s as my mind shifted far away from what was being done to me. So long as I had his gaze on mine, I could weather this storm. I could fight to hang onto to me. I could escape this curse that’d haunted me my whole life.

  But as Poseidon continued his brutal attack upon me, a change came over my Ares.

  His eyes grew shuttered at first and then distant, until finally there was no warmth in there at all. Only cold, hard detachment. When it was all over and I lay exposed before everyone, a disgraced and fallen woman, Hypnos released his hold on Ares. He stood, tall and proud, and looked down upon me as though he did not know me at all. As though I was naught but filth in his path.

  “Ares? My love?” I whispered with a voice as broken as my innocence.

  He sneered, and the face staring haughtily down at me was one I did not know. “I do not know you.”

  Poseidon snickered. “Bloody hell, Hypnos, you did a number on him.”

  But I couldn’t make sense of Poseidon’s words. All I knew was that Ares had rejected me in the most humiliating and brutal fashion imaginable. I’d thought myself in love, I’d honestly believed him, but Mother had been right all along. The gods were capricious beings full of arrogance and lust and deceit. And in that pain was birthed that darkness that I’d spent all my life pretending away.

  The darkness spread, and it grew, and it consumed me. It ate me from the inside out. The pain, humiliation, and desolation of Ares’s betrayal was almost worse than what Poseidon had done to me. Poseidon had humiliated my body, but Ares had destroyed my soul.

  I screamed as I felt my hair tugging, heard the first snaps and hisses of serpents coiled upon my head. Every male that my eyes landed upon changed instantly into a pillar of stone. Eyes and mouths were forever frozen open in horror.

  Then the gods were screaming. “Take the shield, Perseus. Do it now!”

  I did not know what he said. All I knew was I had to end them all. I had to make them all pay. But when I looked upon the spot where I’d seen Perseus last, it was not a male I gazed upon but my own twisted and hideous reflection.

  There was no beauty in my face any more. I was a monster, true. My hair was a wild nest of snakes, my skin tinted greenish-blue. I had fangs for teeth and slitted, reptilian pupils. I felt the change first in my toes, then my feet, sliding up my calves, then to my knees.

  I knew what was happening because I’d seen it done to so many others. I was turning to stone myself. The change was slower, and as I glanced around at the field of destruction I’d unwittingly unleashed, I felt nothing but self-loathing and shame.

  I’d become the very thing that I’d hated.

  I hoped Mother could forgive me my weakness some day. The horror twisted upon the faces of the mortals gazing back at me was a nightmare I knew I could never escape again.

  There was a loud snicking sound, and I knew what it was before I even looked.

  Ares’s war blade had just been handed over to Perseus. My one-time best friend advanced slowly upon me. No doubt his eyes were averted, but I was too ashamed to look at him to learn the truth.

  I would not fight this end. It was what a monster like me deserved. Instead, I sat as the stone continued to consume me. I’d done a terrible thing, and a terrible thing had been done to me, but the one thing that hurt worse than any of that was the fact that Ares had utterly abandoned me. He’d forgotten me entirely.

  He’d left me alone. His promises, all his pretty vows, were nothing more than smoke on the wind.

  It was like he’d never known me at all.

  The cold metal pressed against my hot flesh, and I closed my eyes. Then there was an instant, searing burst of fiery pain, then there was nothing at all but blessed, heavenly silence.

  It was done.

  Epilogue

  The Harpy

  I glanced at The Creator, even as tears streamed down my face, wordlessly asking It why that had been allowed. I’d watched so many worlds with my Creator. I’d seen life and I’d seen death, but what I’d witnessed tonight had been unimaginable.

  “Why?” was all I could ask.

  The Creator’s eyes were full of sadness even as all around us, universes bloomed with life and verve. Starlight glowed for us, lighting up the worlds. A haunting vision of beauty was all around us, but I felt cleaved in two by the tragedy of what I’d witnessed.

  The Creator breathed deeply. “Free will means the creation has autonomy, Harpy. They decide.”

  “Even when it’s so wrong? She did nothing. And Ares, to let Hypnos make him forget her. It was cruel. You could have stopped this, but you stood there. You did nothing. You did—”

  “Oh, my dear one, if you think I do not weep for what’s been done, then you do not know me at all.” Its eyes landed back on the terrible scene of tragedy. Medusa was broken.

  Perseus bandied her head about like a treasured prize. He was such an evil creature, and yet the history books would tell a different story. They would call him a hero. They would paint the fair Medusa as the true villain, and Ares’s part would be entirely scrubbed out.

  “It’s not fair,” I whispered. “I hate what’s been done here. There must be a way to change this. There must.”

  I looked up at my Father/Mother/Sister/Brother. It was all things. In Its eyes, I saw even more worlds pop into creation and others still burn out with one last pitiful gasp.

  “Do you really wish it, little one? This change? What if doing so changes more than just one life? What if it changes dozens more? What if the cost is so high that the mere thought of it breaks my own heart? What then?”

  I scrubbed at my tears, feeling hope as I’d not felt it in a long time. “Oh, Creator. Any cost is worth the paying if it means fixing this. Ares loved her. He should know the truth. He should have the ability to make this right. He will forever brood for Aphrodite, little knowing that it was never her heart that he’d truly wished to tame but another’s that he’d been forced to forget. That is not justice.”

  The Creator nodded slowly. “Then… what if I told you there is a way?”

  I gasped and shot to my feet. “Anything, only tell me what must be done.”

  “It will take many lifetimes and much strategizing, and the choices will always be yours to make or not. But if you truly wish to see a change, then listen to me closely, my sweet one. There is a goddess. One of water. She is but a primordial. She’s got no form. But one day she could. She just might. It all starts with her.”

  “What is her name?”

  “Calypso. Her name is Calypso, and she will be a force to be reckoned with.”

  I clapped my hands, and The Creator no
dded.

  “Then this is what you must do.”

  I listened raptly as It detailed all that must be done. And It was right. The work would take many lifetimes, but I would work tirelessly, diligently. I would see Medusa’s happily ever after restored. And I would save Ares too.

  For once, I could be important. For once, I could actually do some good.

  I smiled, then I began to hum. It was time to visit a primordial goddess’s sleep.

  This terrible story had only just begun. I would fix this. I would fix all of this…

  The War King and the last book to this duology is already available for preorder. Make sure to grab your copy now!

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  Love my stories? Want more Kingdom news updates? Then make sure to sign up for my newsletter! I’m also very active on FB and constantly post updates, teasers to upcoming books, and do cover reveals. I also have an online readers group for fans of all my series called The Harem. So there are lots of ways for you to keep up with what I’m doing. Next book in the Kingdom saga will be the continuation of Ares and Medusa’s story, The War King. Already available for preorder and set to release June 1! So make sure to grab your copy now!

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  And if this is your first foray into my world of Kingdom I highly suggest starting at the beginning with my Bad Boys collection I wrote as Marie Hall, the first three books: The Kingdom Collection. The stories include Alice and Hatter, Gerard and Betty (my beauty and the beast spinoff), and Red and His Wolf. So if you love twisted fairy tales, you’ll probably enjoy those.

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  And please, if you enjoyed this book, write a review for it, reviews let me know which books my readers are most interested in reading next and I always adjust my writing schedule based on the series with the most active and engaged readers. On the next page I’ll list all of my works. So make sure to turn the page!