Keystone (Gatewalkers) by Amanda Frederickson Read Free Book Online

found.”
    She still glared at him. The princess’s mind was being thrown to her like a treat to a dog, and the Prince was certain she disliked being treated so.  
    The Mara wrenched her hands from his suddenly pliant grip and glided to the door. As she brushed past, he felt her rip one last time into his mental shields. They buckled, giving him a small taste of her fury, but didn’t break.
    The Prince did not retaliate. This time. She was useful, and he had no intentions of angering her husband. After all, the seal over his Gate had cracked.
    The Prince disliked leaving matters as they stood, but there was no help for it. He waited until the Mara had time to leave the hallway, and then stripped off his mask, the faint buzzing along his skin created by its illusion fading away. He spun the mask between his hands.  
    He looked up to examine his real face in the mirror hanging on the wall. Pale hair, pale skin, aristocratic features. He lifted the mask to pass it across his face and back, watching his hair change colors with the illusion embedded in the mask. Dark with the mask, light without. Light. Dark. Light. Dark. Which one was the true mask? Which was his true aspect?  
    He hung the mask in its case along with his armor, closing and sealing it with his key.
    The Blood Prince activated the runes surrounding the doorway, creating a minor gate to his personal quarters. It was time to prepare for his appearance at court, to offer the High King condolences on the loss of his sister.
    ***
    The Mara poured into the chair at Princess Maelyn’s bedside. One of the castle’s few servants had tended to the comatose girl’s needs since the shattering of the Keystone. Maelyn looked like a proper sleeping damsel waiting for her prince to rescue her.
    The Mara wanted to carve her eyes out and dig slashes across her perfect, pale cheeks.  
    She traced a nail down the girl’s slender nose, wondering what the Blood Prince would say if she broke it. Or perhaps it would be more satisfying to hand Maelyn over to the terradi officers and let them fight over that delicate little skull with its long, silky black hair.
    Maybe the terradi would let the Mara keep Maelyn’s eyes. Their vivid green reminded her of Gwalchmai’s. She’d only managed to get one of his. She felt a visceral thrill deep in her gut remembering it. She hoped his pretty little traitor wife loathed the sight of him after that.
    The Mara drew her nail across the underside of Maelyn’s eyelid. “Wakey, wakey,” she crooned. Once upon a time, her voice alone had commanded the power of life and death.
    Maelyn’s eyelids twitched, but she refused to wake, her mind shattered and trapped on the bridge between worlds. No matter. The Mara was even stronger there.
    She allowed her essence to leave her physical form, letting her body slump back in the chair. Insubstantial as a cloud, the Mara crossed over the barrier separating the worlds, stepping onto the bridge.
    Gates allowed one to cross the bridge in less than a breath, but occasionally a Gate went wrong. In the ever shifting, in-between “world” of the bridge, most sentient beings lost what sanity they possessed, trying to make sense of the pure, unmitigated chaos. The mind would attempt to create form where there was no form, producing a maze of corridors and stairs, archways and doors, all twisted and shifting around each other. Such unfortunate beings would wander until they perished, or until they stumbled through another Gate that spat them out into a “real” world, their minds so torn that they could no longer understand what became of them.
    The Mara, formless as the world surrounding her, deftly slithered through the bridge’s twisted “terrain.” She could see the evidence of Maelyn’s wandering efforts: Gates between the worlds that were closed once more. She considered trying to rip a few open again, but decided not to waste the time. It made little difference to her. She only cared about one