Crown of the Queen (The Wardbreaker Book 3)

  Contents

  TITLE PAGE

  Synopsis

  CHAPTER ONE

  CHAPTER TWO

  CHAPTER THREE

  CHAPTER FOUR

  CHAPTER FIVE

  CHAPTER SIX

  CHAPTER SEVEN

  CHAPTER EIGHT

  CHAPTER NINE

  CHAPTER TEN

  CHAPTER ELEVEN

  CHAPTER TWELVE

  CHAPTER THIRTEEN

  CHAPTER FOURTEEN

  CHAPTER FIFTEEN

  CHAPTER SIXTEEN

  CHAPTER SEVENTEEN

  CHAPTER EIGHTEEN

  CHAPTER NINETEEN

  CHAPTER TWENTY

  CHAPTER TWENTY-ONE

  CHAPTER TWENTY-TWO

  CHAPTER TWENTY-THREE

  CHAPTER TWENTY-FOUR

  CHAPTER TWENTY-FIVE

  CHAPTER TWENTY-SIX

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  Also by Katerina Martinez

  About the Author

  Copyright

  CROWN OF THE QUEEN

  The Wardbreaker

  Book Three

  By Katerina Martinez

  I have a thousand year old scroll, but I can’t read it, and the answer lies in the muck.

  I’m gonna level with you. The situation is less than ideal. We have the drowned Queen’s scroll, sure, but none of us can read it. Whoever wrote it enchanted the scroll to prevent just anyone from knowing what they’d written. That’s not exactly good for me.

  I need to know what’s on it.

  The only problem is, I can’t break the spell. None of us can. The only way to read the scroll is to secure a rare substance known as Aetherglass, and in order to do that, we have to ask Magister Eliphas for help. Remember Eliphas? The person I stole the scroll from in the first place? The only thing I have working for me is the Magister’s insatiable curiosity. He wants to know what’s written on the scroll just as badly as I do. Maybe that’s enough to secure his help, maybe it isn’t, but I have to try.

  Meanwhile, none of us have heard from Asmodius—Axel’s crime-lord father—and that’s making us all nervous. We’re still shacked up with Becket and his demons, and as long as we’re under his care, we’re safe. But that can’t go on forever, and when tragedy strikes, the sands of time truly start falling. If we want the tool we need to read the scroll, we’re going to have to dive into a deep, dark place to get it.

  A place where no one does anything for nothing. A place where no good deed goes unpunished. A place where virtue and decency go to die like wounded animals.

  CHAPTER ONE

  The thing chasing me through the water wouldn’t let up, and I was running out of air to breathe. The water was dark and murky. Long weeds licked against my arms and legs as I moved near the seabed, as if to grab me as I swam past them. The creature behind me was a much better swimmer than I was, but as a native New Yorker with no interest in the ocean, or swimming, this wasn’t surprising.

  Still, I had magic on my side, and that meant I had a shot. With the Tempest’s help, I was zipping across the water like a dart, blasting telekinetic energy with my hands to push me in whatever direction I wanted to move. The air bubble I’d created around my shoulders and head gave me an oxygen supply to breathe; it also gave me no reason to ignore the fire spirit sitting on my shoulder.

  “Could you maybe swim a little better?” Ifrit said.

  “Damn, why the hell hadn’t I thought of that?” I asked, rolling my eyes.

  “It’s right behind us, and I hate to say it, but it’s going to catch us.”

  “You’re not being helpful.”

  “Really? Because relaying the facts seems like a helpful thing for me to be doing right now.”

  I realized only at the last possible second, I was about to swim straight into a ruined, stone column. With a blast of magic, I slowed myself down enough to avoid hitting it dead on. Another blast and a groan, and I was on my way around it like a dart.

  “You wanna be helpful?” I asked, “Tell me what it is and how I can get away from it.”

  “I don’t know what it is, but I can tell you we aren’t gonna out-swim it. It has many tentacles; you only have two little legs.”

  “Who’re you calling little? You’re, like, three inches big!”

  Something wrapped itself around my leg; something slimy and strong. My breath caught in my lungs. Up ahead, I saw a chunk of stone I thought I could grab hold of. I reached for it, fingers desperately stretched, but the tentacle yanked hard, dragging me deeper into the darkness.

  My heart thundered against my chest, the bubble around my head growing smaller, and smaller the harder I breathed. Fighting to turn around, I caught a glimpse of the creature pulling me through the weedy underwater ruins. Its deep green skin was the color of seaweed, and it’s body was human like with the exception of its long, thick tentacles.

  It was like some kind of octopus-man, and it was disgusting.

  I tried to grab the tentacle with my hands, to pull it off my leg, but that thing had me in a vice grip.

  “What are you waiting for?” Ifrit asked.

  “It’s got me!” I yelled.

  “I can see that! Blast it!”

  I wound my arm back like a pitcher and drew the power of the Tempest into myself. My fingertips crackled with electric might; my whole body hummed like I’d become the instrument of a force far more powerful than myself. Then, with another groan, I hurled a bolt of sizzling lightning into the octopus-man dragging me through the water.

  The magic tore through the water, sending bubbles and sparks in all directions. When the tip of the bolt struck the creature, its grip on me tightened so hard I thought my leg was going to snap off from the pressure. The thing convulsed, shook, and thrashed violently enough that I got rocked left and right.

  Then it suddenly stopped thrashing, its grip on my leg loosened, and it started to sink to the bottom of the ocean.

  “Why didn’t I think of doing that before?” I asked, once the excitement had died down.

  “Because you were too busy running from the weird octopus thing to think?”

  “I’ve really gotta learn to blast things more often. I could probably solve a lot of problems like that.”

  “I hate to tell you, but that’s not going to solve this problem.”

  I turned my head to the side and watched the little flame burning on my shoulder. He didn’t have to tell me the bubble around my head was looking way smaller than it had a minute ago. He also didn’t have to tell me it was shrinking fast. Too fast.

  “Oh, shit,” I said.

  “Oh-shit is right.”

  I gazed upward, toward the glittering surface. It was going to be a long swim up, but if I didn’t try, I’d die down here. Going back up empty handed, though, meant I’d have to do this whole thing all over again—and that was if I reached the surface without suffocating first.

  Groaning, I sent a blast of magic into the seabed beneath me, using the force to send my body shooting upwards. I could just about see the light playing on the surface, little more than twinkles of sunlight against an otherwise dark ocean, but it was enough to give me hope that I could make it even as the bubble of air around me collapsed to almost nothing.

  It was like breathing into a cellophane bag, every breath I took causing it to shrink further, and further. Worse than that, the more the air let out of the bag, the quicker it crumbled against the pressure around it. I had seconds. Nope, not even seconds. With one final gasp, I sucked what was left of the air in the magic bubble around me.


  Water rushed against my face as the bubble disappeared, my last veil of protection against the elements now entirely gone. Ifrit clung to my shoulder, a hand-sized fireball burning bright and hot despite being encased in water.

  I fought my instincts for as long as I could, but that was a battle I would never be able to win. My mouth opened, and water spilled into my lungs. My vision started darkening, the strength ebbing from my muscles. I wasn’t going to make it. The dazzling light dancing on the surface of the water was so close, now, I thought I could reach it with my fingertips if only I had the strength to stretch them out.

  The world darkened to almost nothing. I was only barely aware of my arms and feet limply moving, slowly pushing me closer and closer to the surface. I could hear my heart beating against my ears, each thump harder than the last, but also further apart. And then I broke the surface, air touched my face, my skin cooling. I spat out the water I’d swallowed before taking a clean, fresh breath. As soon as I did, everything came back into focus.

  Danvers made a slow, hissing noise. Brushing my wet, blue hair out of my face, I turned around to look at her. She was sitting at the edge of the pool, the water lapping against her bare shins. In her hand she had a stopwatch, and she was shaking her head.

  “Seven minutes… that was pretty poor,” she said. “RJ lasted way longer than you did down there.”

  “RJ can grow gills,” I snapped, still coughing up water, “I can’t.”

  “Hey, I offered to give you gills,” RJ said. He stood behind her wearing a pair of black swim shorts, his muscular, tattooed body on display. “You didn’t want them.”

  “What was it you said to me?” I said, “You could give me gills, but you didn’t know how long they’d take to go away, and I wouldn’t be able to breathe air while I had them so I’d be stuck underwater until the spell wore off. No thanks. I don’t wanna be a fish.”

  “You probably would’ve lasted a little longer if you had them,” Danvers put in.

  “Is any of this constructive at all?” Karim asked, peering at me from behind a nose covered in sunscreen. “I mean, it’s not like berating her is going to change her shitty time.”

  “You be quiet,” I barked, “And why the hell are you wearing sunscreen? This is an indoor pool.”

  “I’m British. The bloody florescent light is capable of giving me a third degree burn if I stand under it long enough.”

  I jabbed a finger over at Axel, who had only just released the magic he’d been throwing at me. “And you. That was all too realistic.”

  Axel cocked an eyebrow. “I’m pretty sure the realism factor was your idea,” he said. “We don’t know what we’re going to find down there. It’s important to be prepared.”

  “Octopus-men? Really? That’s what you think we’re gonna find?”

  “It’s called the drowned city… who the hell knows what’s down there?”

  “I think you’re just pissed you didn’t do as well as you thought you would,” Karim said, grinning at me. “I suppose you can’t be faulted for that… but next time, try not to talk so much shite?”

  I swam closer to the edge in silence. He was right, of course. Karim was always bloody right. I had been the one to suggest we prepare ourselves for a possible underwater excursion, I’d insisted we make it as realistic as possible, and I’d been a little too confident in my own abilities. Mental note; next time, make the air bubble bigger.

  “Alright, look,” RJ said, “Seven minutes is good.”

  “Yeah, but it’s not enough,” I said as I hoisted myself out of the water. Looking around at the calm, Olympic sized swimming pool, it still amazed me that this whole thing belonged to Becket. My idea had been to go out into the bay on a boat and throw ourselves into the Atlantic, but Becket had suggested we try a more sensible approach.

  All we had to do then was turn the pool into a testing environment, something Axel was able to do with his Psionic magic. The whole test was one big hallucination. We could’ve probably gone without a pool, considering how developed Axel’s powers were. But having a real place to swim around in made the magic easier for him to maintain.

  “This won’t work if only one of us can survive underwater for longer than seven minutes,” I said.

  “I can probably turn RJ’s gill spell into weak potions you can drink,” Danvers said, “But there’s no way of knowing exactly how long the spells would last on you because you’re all different. It could be too much, or it could also be too little.”

  “It’s magic, not exactly science,” Ifrit, who’d been strangely quiet this whole time, said.

  “Again, not helpful,” I snapped.

  I walked over to Axel, who looked good today in his black swimming shorts. I rarely got to see him without his shirt on, but when I did, it was a real treat. He was strong, and toned, his shoulders broad, his abs well defined. He kept a lot of muscle hidden under the suits he enjoyed wearing.

  “Could we go somewhere to talk?” I asked.

  “I know what that means,” Karim said, rolling his eyes.

  “You don’t know shit.” I glanced over at Axel. “It won’t take long…”

  Axel nodded, gestured toward the door leading out of the swimming hall, and stepped aside for me to go through. That Axel and I had something wasn’t exactly a very guarded secret, even if whatever that something was remained largely undefined.

  Karim would’ve had everyone believe I was stealing Axel off somewhere quiet where I could have my wicked way with him, but we hadn’t gotten there yet; and anyway, he was wrong. I wanted to talk to Axel because those few moments I’d spent teetering on the edge of consciousness had woken me up to a harsh truth.

  I wasn’t ready for what was coming.

  CHAPTER TWO

  Axel and I headed out of the pool area and went back into the main house. On the way out, I’d grabbed a towel to run through my hair, and a gown to wrap around my wet body. Becket’s place was always cold, and that cold made itself known as soon as we left the steamy pool hall, but I had real magic at my disposal, now; not that K-Mart magic I’d been peddling most of my adult life.

  All it took was a thought, and a delightful, cozy kind of warmth flooded my body; and then fireworks happened.

  Being an Elemancer was incredible.

  We made our way to my room where I could get changed. I didn’t want to sit around on Becket’s furniture fresh out of the pool, so Axel waited for me by my bed while I slid out of my swimming gear, dried off, and put some real clothes on. I had to admit, the idea he was on the other side of the door while I changed had me a little excited, but I kept myself in check.

  “Feeling better?” Axel asked as I stepped out of the bathroom.

  “Much,” I said, “There’s only one thing worse than the cold in this house, and that’s being wet and cold.”

  Axel nodded, and smiled at himself. “I got changed so fast last night I stubbed my toe on my bed.”

  “Ouch.”

  It wasn’t like me to get awkward all of a sudden, to feel like I’d lost the ability to form coherent thoughts and then speak them aloud. That’s exactly what happened, though. I kind of just… stared at him, then down at the floor, a knot growing in my stomach.

  “Everything alright?” Axel asked.

  I turned my eyes up and met his. “As a matter of fact, no.”

  He frowned. “What’s wrong?”

  “This… all of this. Don’t you sometimes just get the feeling that nothing’s going as it should be?”

  “I don’t know what you mean.”

  I walked over to the bed and sat down. “I like to think you’ve gotten to know me pretty well over the past… how many months has it been?”

  “Forever, it feels like.”

  “Right. So, you’ve gotten to know me pretty well.”

  “I feel like there’s a trick question coming.”

  “Look, I’m having doubts about all this, okay?”

  Axel cocked his head to the sid
e. “Doubts?”

  “Down there in the water,” I said, running my fingers through my damp hair. “I don’t know, we really have no idea what we’re getting ourselves into. An octopus-man wasn’t even the wildest thing you could’ve thrown at me, and even that made me start questioning everything.”

  “What are you questioning?”

  I stared at him. “Don’t take this the wrong way but dealing with your dad was easy. I don’t mean easy, like, we didn’t even break a sweat. What I mean is, we kind of knew what we were up against. People. People with magic, and guns, but people. We have no idea what’s on the other side of that map.”

  “I know.”

  “The worst part is, we can’t even read the damn thing. What the hell use is having this scroll if we have no idea what it says?”

  I had tried reading what was on the scroll, but every attempt so far had come up short. Sometimes I’d see what looked like landmasses, arrows, and often a little lettering. Other times I would see just words, words I couldn’t possibly understand; words not even Becket could decipher. The scroll had a strange, shifting, mercurial quality to it—like it didn’t want to be read.

  “You can’t blame yourself for that,” Axel said, “These ancient Mages clearly didn’t want just anyone reading their scrolls. We just need to figure out a way to read it, one problem at a time.”

  “Trust me, what you’re saying sounds rational enough, but I still feel… inadequate.”

  Sighing, Axel moved over to the window and looked over New York City off in the distance. It was dull today, and grey; the lack of sun having sucked all the sparkle out. “We’ve been here before,” he said, “The only difference is, we didn’t know then what we know now.”

  “What do we know now? Because I feel like we’re a little lacking in the knowledge department.”

  “We know the city exists. It’s out there, somewhere, waiting to be found. Before you came along, the whole thing was just a myth. The Queen, her city, her treasures. Just something whispered between collectors in bazaars; the ephemeral golden ticket any Mage lusting after material wealth dreams about finding… and we’re about to.”