The Last Queen Book Five Read online

  She lets go of my hand, turns on her foot, and stares at me.

  Her eyes are wide and bright with knowing.

  Slowly, I tilt my head back, my messy hair bunching around my neck.

  Maybe this is where I should say that she was the one who cast the warp spell. Though that would work on someone idiotic like Spencer, she was connected to me at the time, and Matrexia has never been an idiot.

  “You play a game,” she says as she brings her fingers up and plants her hands lightly on her hips. Though the move is technically graceful, it’s also pregnant with warning. Because, although her touch is light, her muscles are held rigidly, as if they are springs getting ready to snap into action.

  I keep my hand flattened on my chest as I continue to gasp in breath after breath. Finally, I find my nerve, and I stagger to my feet.

  My body, quite rightly, feels like it’s been compressed and stretched and then compressed again.

  Though it takes me a while to find my balance, as soon as I do, I tilt my head up and stare at her. “So what happens now? Spencer is still busy,” I add.

  Is it a threat? Is this me telling her that her king isn’t here, and there’s no one to protect her from me?

  Or is it just an acknowledgment of our current predicament?

  You see, I have absolutely no idea how Matrexia will react.

  Before I’d seen her unmistakable emotion, if you’d asked me, I would’ve said she was nothing more than a shadow. A creature incapable of emotion because, at the end of the day, it wasn’t her brain and personality that were replicated – it was her power. Ultimately, her brain and personality – and all the desires and beliefs they entailed – were irrelevant. For what’s a queen but a tool? And no one needs their tools to feel.

  But now I’ve seen it, on multiple occasions, and I choose to hold onto the fact that Matrexia’s emotions are real as I face her once more. “You loved Senator Rogers, didn’t you? You still feel for him, don’t you?” I ask.

  Maybe this is where I should play innocent and pretend I haven’t seen through this situation, but screw that.

  I’m running out of time.

  Who knows how that fight is going and how John and the rest of his pieces are fairing. One thing’s for sure. I saw the determination in his eyes when he looked at me. He will be coming for me. And this time, there’ll be nothing that will be able to stop him.

  That thought buoys me and yet sinks me at the same time. Because, though it suits my longing heart to believe that John still cares enough to come for me, at the same time, I will not lose sight of my ultimate goal.

  “You play another game,” she says once more, letting her palms sink down onto her hips as she stands even straighter.

  By god does she look threatening. From her glowing form to her stance, she looks like a coiled snake getting ready to strike.

  But even though I can’t see myself, I fancy that I look threatening, too. I may not have the sheer power of magic cascading off my form. I have something else, don’t I? I have pure damn grit and determination. I don’t need to have a lithe, elegant form. I don’t need to have magic-laced hair that wafts around me like wings.

  All I need is the power in my hands and heart.

  It’s got me through so much; it will get me through more.

  So as we stand and face each other, I do not shudder back in fear.

  And maybe she respects that, as she tilts her head to the side, and the truly hard and suspicious, angry quality to her gaze changes. “You will not win. The game does not permit people to play against it,” she says, spitting out the word against.

  My eyes narrow. “So you know what I have planned, then?”

  This is probably where I should shut up, fight her, and get her out of the way before Spencer returns. I cannot risk him finding out what I’m planning. If he does, he’s going to turn me into his piece.

  And if that happens, I will lose my opportunity. Hell, every single person in the world is gonna lose their opportunity to get rid of this horrendous game. I’m the Last Queen. If I’m turned, there’ll be no one else who will be able to destroy the original game board.

  “You wish to play one final match and then destroy the game. Forever,” she adds, her lips twisting hard around the word.

  I watch for several seconds, trying to read her mind, trying to figure out if she’s on my side, or if she’s just stalling for time.

  I know she can practically read my mind. She has the same keen awareness of nature that I do, and it would be able to show her exactly what I’m thinking. From my rigid stance to the determined look in my eyes, I’m not trying to hide the truth, either.

  I’m embracing it.

  I nod. “Yes. Spencer has the original board. I’m going to destroy it. And there’s nothing anyone can do to stop me.”

  “Incorrect. There is much everyone can do to stop you,” she points out plainly.

  I look at her.

  For the first time, I look her up and down, and though I usually search for strength when I’m staring at Matrexia – though I usually allow myself to be drawn in by her sheer power – now I search for something else.

  Weakness.

  Because if she feels for Senator Rogers, if she holds onto his memory, it means somewhere within her powerful form is the ability to feel pain.

  And pain leads to weakness and vulnerability.

  I see it now.

  In the way she’s holding herself and the way she’s staring at me. In the way she cannot let her guard down for a second.

  “I’ll push past all obstacles,” I state equally as plainly. “I’ve seen too many people fall to this game. I’ve seen too many horrors. I’ve seen too much destruction. So it’s time to end it all.”

  “You assume you can destroy the original board,” she says.

  Though I know that we’re posturing here, and if I start to show weakness, she’ll probably snap in, at the same time, I can’t afford to ignore her certainty.

  “What do you know?” I demand simply.

  “The original board has protections that no other game board does. You cannot destroy it as you do others.”

  Just before complete sorrow and fear can twist around in my heart and destroy my hope, I shake my head. “There’ll be a way.”

  “Why are you so sure?”

  “Because I can feel it,” I say as I bring up a hand, clench it into a fist, and tap it twice on my chest. “You know as a queen that we are uniquely able to sense the natural world. So you must know – you must have felt how much of an abomination the game is,” I spit the word abomination as if it’s poison I’ve sucked from a bite wound.

  She looks at me for several seconds, then finally moves. It’s a hesitant one, but she nods. It’s just one little tick of her neck. “That will change nothing,” she says. “The reality of the game is one thing, your ability to destroy it another.”

  “If you’ve felt how much of an abomination the game is, then you’ve also felt nature’s desire to destroy it,” I add. As I do that, I bring my arms up and spread them wide. I feel like a preacher standing at a pulpit, commanding my parishioners to fight some evil. Commanding them to find their hope and hold onto it with all their might.

  And maybe I am. Because if I can’t convince Matrexia this is possible, then why have I sacrificed so much on this chance?

  She continues to look at me, and I can tell that gaze is penetrating. She’s picking up every single micro expression, every change in heat and blood pressure, everything. With her keen magical senses, my body, and most importantly my mind, would be laid bare to her.

  I make no attempt to hide. “You’ve felt it too, haven’t you? Nature’s desire to get rid of this. I don’t know what the game is exactly… but I think it’s a parasite,” I add. “Some kind of twisted creature that’s trying to absorb all our magic, keeping us trapped so it can feed off us. It doesn’t matter how powerful it is, though. I know there’ll be a way.”

  As far as argumen
ts go, it’s pathetic. It’s weak. It has no substance. But can I tell you what it does have? True feeling. And that feeling comes, not from my heart, but from my entire body, and most importantly, its connection to the world.

  I draw up every dark dream I’ve ever had. Every dark image I’ve ever seen. All of the destruction I’ve seen the game perpetrate.

  It isn’t natural. In every way imaginable, it contravenes the natural order.

  And yet, the game must exist within nature – within the world. So there must be some way to destroy it.

  Matrexia continues to stand there and stare at me, her hands now held tightly on her hips. But the exact tension of her body has changed. And if my paranoid mind tried to assume that she’s getting ready to attack, the rest of me points out one thing. The look in her eyes. It’s deeper now. So much deeper than a shadow should ever be able to show.

  It shows an emotional reckoning close to my own.

  Which brings up one question.

  As I let my gaze flick over her, I frown. “What is it that you are, anyway? You’re more than a shadow. I can sense your emotion. You have to be more than a mere image of some previous queen’s power.”

  She doesn’t reply immediately. In fact, her expression is completely impassive, proving that maybe I’m wrong, and she is nothing more than an automaton, after all.

  But then she closes her eyes. And that’s when I see it at the corner of her eyes – the tension, the crinkled skin, the tight muscles, the pale wash to her cheeks.

  It’s the look of somebody holding on with all their mind.

  Her hands tighten around her hips. “I am a shadow,” she says. “But I’m a complete one,” she adds.

  I frown. “What is a complete shadow?”

  “I did not die naturally,” she reveals.

  It’s my turn for my cheeks to become pale as I start to suspect something. “What do you mean you didn’t die freely?”

  “I went through a ceremony.”

  “What kind of ceremony?”

  “In order to become a complete shadow, a queen must tear off her body, ensuring that she will remain as a piece in her king’s arsenal forevermore.”

  I don’t think I could look sicker. I’m sure my cheeks have skipped straight past looking pale and are now green as I get ready to retch. I bring up a hand and press it over my lips. Gone is the time when I wouldn’t show emotion in front of this woman.

  I can’t hold onto it. It’s not just the fact of what she’s saying. Something’s twisting in my heart, and it doesn’t take long to realize what it is. The exact same thing I was talking to her of before. Nature. I get the strongest sense that this ceremony she’s talking about is wrong on every level. Creatures dying and remaining as shadows? Their bodies rotting away but their power remaining?

  It’s against every natural rule. I shiver once more as the fact of what she is settles into me. “You did this for a king? Senator Rogers?”

  She shakes her head. “The king I killed myself for lived many hundreds of years ago. Senator Rogers found me. He… was kind,” she says.

  If you’d asked me when I’d first met Matrexia if she even had a concept of what kind was anymore, let alone valued the trait, I would’ve laughed right in your face.

  Now I see it. She twists her head to the side and stares at the carpet as she gets a far-off, nostalgic look in her eyes. “He reminded me of my king.”

  “I see,” I say. As far as comments go, it’s completely pathetic, but you try figuring out what to say in a situation like this.

  Though she seems taken by her thoughts for several seconds, soon enough, she twists her head back to me, and there’s a sharp look in her eyes. “You do not have much time,” she says plainly.

  This conversation has been far-reaching, but there’s still something critical we have to establish. Exactly what Matrexia will do now she knows what I’m planning.

  The fact remains that she has a new king, and she, just like all pieces, must be loyal to him. Right?

  Slowly, I look up at her. It’s my turn to plant my hands on my hips, but it is not a defensive move. I’m simply resting them as I frown at her with all my might. “Are you going to tell him?”

  “I’m obliged to defend my king,” she says simply.

  My heart skips a beat, and my mouth becomes dry as it warns me of an impending fight.

  “Are you going to tell him?” I ask once more, voice quiet.

  She looks at her feet, then looks up at me. “He will expect the same of you as my king expected of me,” she reveals suddenly.

  It’s such a quick change of subject, I’m forced to shake my head. “What are you…?” I trail off.

  I suddenly get it.

  “If Spencer plans to use the original board to control all other kings in order to become the ultimate leader, he will still expect the same of you as my king expected of me.”

  My lips pale until I feel them practically drop from my face. “You mean he’ll want me to kill myself to become a complete shadow?”

  With a piercing gaze that appears to bore right through my soul, she nods once. “You are the Last Queen, and if you were to die in battle, he would completely lose your power. If, however, you are to freely give up your power like I did, you would live on as a complete shadow. You would have no body, and you would long for one every second of your life,” she says, her voice twisting with pure emotion on the word long, “but your power would remain.”

  “… Why are you telling me this? I thought you had to be loyal to him? I thought that’s what the game dictated?”

  “I became a complete shadow for my king. And my connection to him was the strongest. Though I had… loyalty to Senator Rogers,” she says carefully, and her eyes widen on the word loyalty, “I have nothing for Spencer. Yet, he controls me. As per the rules of the game, I am his.”

  “But your heart is someone else’s?” I comment.

  She looks right at me. “As is yours. You consider that other king to be yours, don’t you?” she spits the word other.

  Though she’d been open until now, I can feel her closing down.

  I can’t forget that just minutes ago, she was trying to kill John.

  I stare at her.

  I could lie. Probably should lie. I need to keep her on-side so she doesn’t go to Spencer and tell him what I’m planning. But I just stare at her. “I don’t want a king,” I answer honestly. “I never have.”

  “That is not my question. I do not ask if the game has decided you will be loyal to him. I do not ask if the abomination,” she says that word through white lips, “is forcing you to play on his side. What I ask is this: do you have loyalty for that man? Is he the king of your heart?”

  Though I could chuckle at the term king of my heart and point out it’s pretty damn sappy, I don’t. Because I can appreciate it’s got a deeper meaning.

  Matrexia isn’t engaging in some light conversation.

  This is as deep as it will ever get.

  She’s forcing me to come up with one final answer about my feelings for John.

  It doesn’t take long.

  From the moment I met John, to every single time I tried to save him and he tried to save me, there’s been one thread connecting us.

  It’s not the imprinting process. It’s something far, far deeper. It’s not my power, either. It’s not his wealth and privilege.

  It’s the fact that, together, we have more of a chance than we do apart. I don’t mean that our relationship is logical. I mean that in his presence, I feel like he lifts me up. Like, alongside him, I can find the only path out of this mess.

  Matrexia doesn’t take her eyes off me, and she suddenly nods. “He is your king,” she says. “But I will kill him,” she adds.

  I look at her sharply.

  I don’t make any attempt whatsoever to hide my expression – my anger and fear. They wash over me. They fill me like an ocean draining into cupped hands.

  “He killed my king,” she expands.
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  “No he didn’t. You already said it – Senator Rogers wasn’t your king. He simply reminded you of your king.”

  “That does not matter. I pledged my allegiance to Senator Rogers. So I will avenge him.”

  “Why? So the game can continue? I saw it in your eyes, Matrexia. You want this to end as much as I do. And the only way to do that is….” This is not where I should trail off. This is where I should take the argument by the horns and convince her that she needs to trust me and she can’t lay a finger on John.

  And yet, I trail off.

  All of the doubts I’ve been dealing with over the past several days slam into me.

  Yes, I’ve changed. I’ve had to change. But at the same time, haven’t I always harbored the suspicion that deep in my soul is still the same confused woman who was dragged into this game and who has been stumbling through it ever since?

  I spend all my time criticizing John for his decisions, but at least they’re intelligent.

  Mine?

  Are assumptions. Often dangerous assumptions.

  Rather than try to fill in the gaps of my knowledge, I act. I force my way forward, and that can create just as much trouble as it solves.

  Now all those fears flood back into me.

  The fear of what Matrexia promised – that Spencer will turn me into a complete shadow like her. The fear that she’s right, and there’s no way to destroy the original board. The fear that this will never end, and every single time I feel hope, all I do is feed the damn game once more.

  I bring up a hand and clamp it on my brow. I know my cheeks are white and slick with sweat. I know I’m practically shaking on the spot.

  And Matrexia? Watches me. She does not miss anything. Her gaze darts up and down my body, locking on the sweat glistening over my brow then on my shaking limbs. She sees it all.

  Just before she can turn away from me and conclude that I’m a pathetic queen, I let my hand drop.

  I stare at her. “I can’t stop you from warning Spencer. I can’t… stop you from trying to kill John. But I can promise you this. I will find a way. Even if it takes my death, I will still find a way.” My words are slow and halting, quiet and careful. It’s not the punching speech of someone attempting to convince an army to go to war. In fact, it lacks confidence, full stop. But what it has is simple. And pure.