Fabled Kingdoms Read online

  Book 7

  C. R. Jane

  Fabled Kingdoms by C. R. Jane

  Copyright © 2020 by C. R. Jane

  All rights reserved.

  No portion of this book may be reproduced in any form or by any electronic or mechanical means, including information storage and retrieval systems, without written permission from the author, except for the use of brief quotations in a book review, and except as permitted by U.S. copyright law.

  For permissions contact:

  [email protected]

  This book is a work of fiction. Names, characters, businesses, places, events, locales, and incidents are either the products of the author’s imagination or used in a fictitious manner. Any resemblance to actual persons, living or dead, or actual events is purely coincidental.

  For everyone who’s loved Eva from the beginning.

  Join C.R. Jane’s Readers’ Group

  Stay up to date with C.R. Jane by joining her Facebook readers’ group, C.R.’s Fated Realm. Ask questions, get first looks at new books/series, and have fun with other book lovers!

  Join C.R.’s Fated Realm

  Fabled Kingdoms

  I would never leave you. It just may take me a second to find you.

  No matter what life Eva has lived, she's always done whatever it takes to save them.

  Her soulmates.

  Damon, the fallen angel who would burn the world for her.

  Beckham, her golden fae, the first boy she ever loved.

  Mason, the incubus with a dark past and a voice that makes the heavens cry.

  Time and time again, Eva has put herself in the flames to save them.

  But what if a day comes that she can't?

  Eva might not know what the future holds,

  But she'll fight for who she loves until her very last breath.

  Contents

  Prologue

  Chapter 1

  Chapter 2

  Chapter 3

  Chapter 4

  Chapter 5

  Chapter 6

  Chapter 7

  Chapter 8

  Chapter 9

  Chapter 10

  Chapter 11

  Chapter 12

  Chapter 13

  Chapter 14

  Chapter 15

  Chapter 16

  Chapter 17

  Chapter 18

  Epilogue

  Author’s Note

  Sneak Preview

  Copyright

  Remember Us This Way

  Epigraph

  Remember Us This Way Soundtrack

  Prologue

  Chapter 1

  Join C.R.’s Fated Realm

  About C.R. Jane

  Other Books by C.R. Jane

  “If all else perished, and he remained, I should still continue to be; and if all else remained, and he were annihilated, the universe would turn to a mighty stranger.”

  ― Emily Jane Brontë , Wuthering Heights

  Prologue

  I exist.

  And that is all.

  I no longer feel emotions. And I wonder, was this Aiden's intent? Because surely he must have some kind of feelings for us to have ended up at this place.

  He's frustrated.

  I see it in his eyes as he watches me hungrily...and angrily.

  He wanted me to be like him, but all I am now is a void, empty of everything.

  I go through the emotions of what he wants, but everything that made me Eva...it's all gone.

  And he hates it.

  It turns out that one of the things he hated about me, was also one of the reasons he loved me.

  I would think that was funny if I was capable of it.

  "Eva," he calls for me roughly. I subserviently approach him and kneel before him on the mattress that he has his servants lay out for me at his feet.

  He stares at me, his gaze searching mine. I stare at him obediently, waiting...always waiting.

  "Tell me you love me," he orders.

  "I love you," I immediately reply, in a calm, even voice.

  Love, I think I used to remember what that felt like. Now, it seems like a fairy tale told to children before bed.

  "Again. But mean it," he seethes, his hand reaching out to grab my chin. His fingers dig into my skin, and I know there will be a bruise, but I just can't find it in me to care.

  "I love you," I repeat dutifully.

  He growls in frustration and throws me to the hard marble floor. My head hits the ground with a loud crack, but I don't even cry.

  I'm incapable of it.

  "Chandra!" he calls out suddenly, summoning the head servant of his domain. She appears silently at the entrance to the room where she'd been patiently waiting to please him. Her head bowed in submission and her hands clasped timidly in front of her.

  "Get her here now," he seethes. Chandra immediately leaves the room to get the Goddess. Aiden doesn't even have to specify, she's the only her that bears mentioning.

  The Goddess appears within minutes, almost like she'd been waiting for his call. She spares me a pitying glance as she glides up to Aiden's throne. I'm still lying on the ground, my head aching too much to move.

  "You called?" she announces wryly, staring at her fingernails like she's bored even though her entire body is tensed like Aiden....or the snake wrapped around his legs, is about to strike.

  "Something's wrong with her," he spits out, gesturing to my prone form.

  The Goddess's gaze flicks to me for a moment.

  "You've been injecting her with the venom?"

  "Of course, I have. You didn't do your job!"

  She scoffs. "She's perfect. Just like you requested."

  "She doesn't love me!" he yells out suddenly.

  The room goes deathly silent in shock.

  Love him? How could I really love him when I'm not even capable of real feelings anymore?

  The Goddess laughs then, the sound coming out like the chime of a bell, delicate and sweet, even though it should sound mocking.

  "What did you think would happen? You would inject her with poison from that creature and she wouldn't be affected?"

  She shakes her head in disgust, glaring at the snake. She turns and walks away dismissively.

  "There's nothing I can do, Aiden. But the terms of our deal are still in place."

  With that parting remark, she floats out of the room.

  The silence is terrible after she leaves. Aiden sits there on his throne in a haze of anger.

  After a long stretch that feels like hours but is probably only minutes, he turns his attention back to where I lay.

  "I guess we'll have to start over again," he says before standing up and striding towards me.

  He kneels beside me and strokes my hair as he stares down at me and shakes his head in disappointment.

  "Such a shame," he whispers before he pulls a long, familiar-looking knife out of his belt.

  I know that knife. It's so powerful it has its own name, Scrios...gailic for "destruction." It's a word that perfectly describes the knife that can kill any immortal. The knife that can assuredly kill me.

  "Goodnight sweetheart," Aiden says calmly before stabbing me suddenly right in my heart.

  I gasp in surprise and in pain as blood starts to flow out of the wound. He watches me, fascinated, and I know I'm dying.

  Cold spreads through my veins, but I also feel lighter, like the venom that's poisoned my entire being is slowly being leaked out of me.

  Tristan's face appears in my mind and this time I recognize him for what he is. I recognize the face I love the most in the world.

  While the expulsion of the poison releases me from the numbness that's been my constant companion, when you're dying is not the time you all of a sudden want to feel.
/>
  With feeling comes the terror of knowing I'm dying.

  I reach for the knife to pull on it, but I find I'm unable to move any of my limbs. Aiden's put some kind of spell on me rendering my entire body useless.

  I stare at him, somehow feeling betrayed as he continues to gaze at me impassively.

  Tears slip down my face, but they fail to move him.

  "Till we meet again, sweetheart," he soothes before he stands up and walks away.

  I listen as his footsteps fade.

  And then I fade away too.

  Chapter 1

  Scars. I'm full of them.

  At least on the inside.

  Looking at me, you'd never know. Every hurt I've ever experienced disappeared thanks to the magical blood that flows through my veins.

  But it doesn't mean they aren't there.

  Staring down at Mason's face as he sleeps peacefully, I feel every single one of them.

  And it's painful. Agonizing actually.

  "Why don't you come and get something to eat?" Beckham asks from the doorway. I turn and look at him, losing my breath momentarily at the beautiful golden god leaning against the doorway, staring at me worriedly.

  "Maybe in a few minutes," I tell him tiredly, thinking that it would probably be healthy for Mason and me to switch places.

  Mason's been sleeping for three days. After saying my name and giving me hope, he promptly fell back asleep.

  Evidently days of drinking and drugs isn’t good for you. Even for a supernatural.

  Who knew?

  During that time, I'd managed to catch a few hours of sleep, but not more than that. It's all catching up to me. The fact that Damon and Beckham don't know who I am, that Aiden's out there planning something, that Lexi betrayed me in the past and most likely the present, that Mason's still asleep.

  That my past is still a mystery lying just out of my reach.

  I'm tired. Down to my bones. Down to my soul actually.

  For someone who only remembers bits and pieces of her past, I feel immeasurably old at the moment. Every one of those years sitting on my shoulders.

  Beckham hasn't moved from his spot, so I sigh and finally get up and walk towards him. He reaches out his hand to grab mine as I get close and I give him a weak smile, my gaze searching, always searching to see if he remembers me.

  I never see what I’m looking for.

  There's affection there. Attraction definitely. Maybe even love.

  But the way he looks at me isn't the way the Beckham who knew Eva used to look.

  Like he knew all the good things and the bad things about me and still somehow thought I was perfect.

  Like we shared a history older than just the past year.

  Like we were once everything to each other.

  "You need to start taking care of yourself," he tells me as he guides me down the hall, his hand on my lower back sending tingles all over my body.

  I hum noncommittedly. I'm not overly worried that Mason won't wake up or anything like that. I think it's just having something to concentrate on beyond the crap that is my life at the moment that has me focusing single-mindedly on paying vigil at Mason's bedside instead of doing necessary things like eating or drinking.

  Or maybe it's because I'm holding desperately on to the lifeline that was Mason's words.

  He remembers me. He seems to be the only person who does.

  It's all that's getting me through at the moment.

  We make our way out into the kitchen where Damon's cooking something over the stove.

  "Eggs sound good?" he asks, shooting me the same concerned look that Beckham was still giving me.

  I force another smile and nod even though I know anything I eat will taste like sandpaper now.

  Damon's phone buzzes on the counter and I wince when I happen to look down and see Selena's name on the Caller ID. Damon groans and ignores the call.

  "Why don't you just block her number?" Beckham suggests, saying what I'm desperate to say if not for the fact that this thing between us is brand new to Damon and I don't want to come off as the jealous crazy who can't stand to think about the ex-girlfriend of the guy I'm dating.

  A pang runs through my gut that I can't even call Damon my boyfriend at the moment.

  "I would, but I have a feeling she would just call me from other phone numbers that I didn't recognize then. At least now she holds out hope and I can ignore her call instead of accidentally answering."

  It's a reasonable thought but my heart takes a moment to burn at the memory of Selena's hands all over him when I'd walked into the kitchen that day. It's not something I'm going to forget any time soon.

  Yet another reason why I can't seem to sleep.

  Damon takes the skillet off the stove, spoons some eggs onto a plate, and then slides the eggs towards me while Beckham sets down a glass of orange juice.

  It smells delicious but I can only pick at it under their watchful stares. After forcing a few bites down my throat, I get up and carry my plate to the sink.

  Damon comes up behind me, crowding in until there isn't an inch of me not covered by his body. I try and suppress the shiver spiraling across my skin, but I've never been good at playing pretend with them.

  "When are we going to talk?" he questions me, his breath hot on my neck.

  "Talk about what?" I ask, my mind blanking with the feel of him.

  "About the fact that we obviously know you somehow and seem to have lost all our memories."

  Oh right, that.

  "I guess now's as good a time as ever," I tell him. He steps back at my words and I immediately miss the feel of him against me.

  I walk over to the living room couch and Beckham and Damon sit across from me. I notice that there is a distinct chill between the two of them. The poison that comes from falling for me is already apparently getting to work.

  I recognize the fact that I'm being depressing, but I should be allowed a little grace at the moment. Or at least that's what I'm telling myself.

  They're both looking at me expectantly so I take a deep breath and launch into the full story that is us, determined not to make the mistakes of the past where I keep everything from them and just try and do things on my own.

  I have a feeling that our story will require me to be on my own in the end to save them, just like all the other times, but I try not to think about that.

  There's a heavy silence after I finish an hour later.

  They don't believe me.

  It's written across their faces.

  But then again, who could blame them. The story that I've just told is insane.

  It's right at that moment...that my wings pop out. They bang against the back of the couch slicing me with pain.

  But it gets their attention.

  "An angel," Beckham whispers.

  "A fae, a half goddess, and who knows what else. I don't even know if I'm an angel. There's just these wings..."

  My murmurs are caught up by Damon standing up, his own stunning, black wings shooting out until he looks like every bit of the avenging fallen angel that I know him to be.

  He whispers something to me in another language, one that I don't recognize but that I feel deep in my heart.

  He flies towards me then, pulling me up against him. Without preamble, he pushes his mouth against mine, prying my lips apart. My hands fly from my sides to his hair and tugged. I kiss him like I haven’t seen him in years, haven't felt him in ages, and I've missed every second we’ve been apart.

  We only pull apart when we hear Beckham coughing loudly to get our attention, and even then, it takes me a second to recover because my legs seem to have stopped working momentarily.

  "What was that for?" I ask, when I've figured out how to stand again.

  "I remember," Damon whispers to me. Tears fill my vision until he looks like a watercolor version of himself with no definite edges or features.

  Hiccupped sobs erupt out of me and he pulls me against his chest gently, burying h
is face into my hair and breathing deeply. I hear Beckham curse from where he's perched on a couch, but I don't have the energy to lift my head up to look at him. The relief I feel is so profound that it can't be measured.

  "It was your wings," Damon tells me in a gravel-filled voice threaded with his own tears and what I assume is relief. “As soon as I saw them it all started to come back."

  He sighs, tremors scattering throughout his body as he holds me tightly.

  "Eva, I'm so fucking sorry."

  "Thank you for remembering me," I whisper, grasping his shirt tightly as the tears continue to come.

  "Can I have some time with her?" Damon asks desperately. Looking up I realize that he's talking to Beckham who's entire demeanor spells devastation.

  "Why can't I remember anything?" Beckham responds, ignoring Damon's question as his gaze stays locked on mine. "Why are you still the stranger that I met on the movie set?"

  "I'm not sure. The key seems to be unlocking something that connects us like a song, or wings."

  "Well, what's our connection?"

  I open my mouth and then close it, unsure what to say. My history with Beckham is so long and complicated that it could be a million things.

  "We have one, don't we? I can feel it, right here," he tells me as he beats a fist on his chest...right over his heart.