Gleam: The dark fantasy romance TikTok sensation that’s sold over a million copies (Plated Prisoner Book 3)
Gleam: Epilogue

I’m not a male prone to feeling panic.

But when Midas grabs Auren and holds a blade to her throat, panic becomes me.

My power rears up so fiercely that I nearly stagger with it, my feet grinding into a rumbling floor.

“Use your magic, and I’ll slice her open!” Midas spits, and his shout arrests me in place.

I react instantly, yanking onto my power as I lock it down and signal for my Wrath to halt. Ranhold and Highbell guards stop too, while Queen Kaila’s men back her away, pressing her toward the far wall, trying to protect her from the exchange.

The entire ballroom goes still. Or maybe that’s just me, but time has paused, my damn heartbeat paused with it.

Auren’s body is crushed, held roughly against Midas’s chest. Her throat bobs beneath the glinting blade held there, her golden eyes wide with shock and fear. That look makes me lose my fucking mind.

I can feel my power reacting to her terror, can feel the remnants of its reach trying to leap right off my skin and strangle Midas where he stands.

My voice punches out between clenched teeth. “Let her go. Now.”

Midas only holds her tighter, eyes skimming the room.

“Hold back your rot and your soldiers, Ravinger.”

My Wrath are five steps away in their own stare-off with the guards, but they stay where they are, not moving an inch. None of them will give Midas a reason to hurt her. Digby too has frozen in place, his gaze locked on the threat.

Midas shifts his stance and digs the blade in, causing a dribble of gold blood to leak from Auren’s sensitive throat. And just the sight of that—of a single drip tracing down her skin—makes something feral open up in me.

My teeth ache with the need to sharpen, spikes threatening to puncture through my back and arms, my vision tunneling as the push for violence rattles my skull.

The tiny noise Auren lets out makes my warring soul splinter, my entire body shaking. She tries to claw his hands away from her, but the bastard has a solid hold.

Furious magic bites at my skin and arches into my feet, but I dig in, holding it back. “You are a fucking dead man,” I vow darkly.

Midas has the good sense to look worried. It was only for a blink before he shuttered the expression, but the savage fae in me relishes in it.

Good. He should be worried.

“Leave now, or I’ll slit her throat,” he grits out, steps backing away, dragging her with him.

If he thinks I’d ever leave her, he’s not nearly as intelligent as he thinks he is.

“You won’t kill her.”

It’s a fucking promise.

Midas knows it, too. He can see it in my face.

His jaw tightens, a different kind of resolve settling there. “If I can’t have her, no one can.”

Unease rushes through my veins, diluting my festering ire. I glance from him to her, my body tense, fists clenched at my sides. All I want to do is let my magic lash out, to bleed up through his legs and corrode him from cock to crown.

But I can’t.

I fucking can’t.

Because I can see in the crazed resolve in his eyes that the threat he’s laid out isn’t a ploy. If he feels even a hint of it, if my magic doesn’t react fast enough to kill him first, he will open her throat and I will watch her die right in front of me.

Midas will never let her go, and I will never risk her. He can see the truth of that in every second of my hesitation. The line of blood shimmering on her neck is the only blood I’ll allow to be spilled.

“Go now, Ravinger. You have thirty seconds, or I will kill her.”

I can feel my Wrath look at me, waiting for an order one way or another, but I’m stuck in this dilemma.

“Use your ribbons,” I urge her. They’re strong. She’s strong. She only needs to trust herself and—

A lamenting sob pours out of her mouth, eyes filling as she looks at me with something like regret. “I can’t.”

I frown, not understanding the look on her face, but Midas’s laugh heckles me.

“Oh, she didn’t tell you?” he asks smugly, mouth curved up. “She lost that privilege.”

My body goes still. Even the roots clawing at my neck seem to pause.

Midas motions down to her hand, and for the first time in all of this madness, I realize what’s tied around her wrist.

A single gold ribbon. One I know very well. One I expect to lift up and move.

Except…it doesn’t. It’s not trying to weave closer to me or shove Midas away in a protective furor. It just hangs there limply, and I know instantly that something is wrong. It’s in the lackluster color, the drooping ends. Even at rest, Auren’s ribbons are always…alive. As vibrant as she is.

And that’s when I see the severed end, the curdled drips of blood left behind.

No. No.

Something roars in my ears, and my eyes flash up to her misery-laced face, as the realization of what he’s taken from her sinks into me like a boulder. “Auren…” I rasp, my voice sounding as gutted as I feel.

As tears drip down her cheeks, my heart feels like it breaks in half.

“She’s helpless and completely at my mercy, and she will die at my hand if you force it,” Midas says, but I barely even hear it. “Ten seconds, Ravinger.”

Wretched, furious grief knocks the breath from my lungs at the reality that I’ve failed her so thoroughly. I fucking can’t leave her…but I can’t risk Midas killing her either.

But then…something changes in Auren’s eyes.

If I weren’t so attuned to her, I might’ve missed it—the flicker of light that crackles in her golden irises. I definitely wouldn’t have missed the flare of her aura, though. It pulses so brightly for a moment that it stings my eyes.

That’s all the warning I get before the entire room seems to erupt with power all at once.

Everywhere around me, the gold that Auren has created seems to come to life. All I have time to do is suck in a breath as the floor, the walls, the fucking table, every inch of metal, melts like magma. It starts to attack like it’s taken on a mind of its own, like it heard the call of its mistress, and it’s come to do her bidding.

Where there was stillness before, there’s now a rupture of movement all throughout the ballroom.

Queen Kaila screams, her people trying to get her out through the back, only to stop short as an unlucky Highbell guard runs through the doorway and is immediately swallowed by a waterfall of gold that drips from the wall, consuming him in a metallic splash.

Guards start fleeing, but my own Wrath come directly to me, tightening around me in a protective circle. Osrik, Judd, and Lu have their swords ready, but what can that do against this? My eyes cut over to my brother Ryatt as he comes to stand beside me too. He’s careful to keep Digby propped up at his side, though it’s an awkward hold with the spikes attached to his armor.

“What the fuck?” Ryatt says, as we all watch the gold strike. In both liquid and solid forms, it plunges people beneath its glossy depths, piercing others through, attacking left and right, while we’re left to watch the melee.

“Rip…” Lu cautions, her hold tightening on her hilt.

Through the panic of the room, I watch Auren. Watch her aura flare brightly again and burn my eyes like I’m looking directly at the sun.

“She snapped,” Judd murmurs, flinching when the damn ground comes up twenty feet away from us, opening like the mouth of a bird, beak swallowing a Highbell guard whole.

My attention is intent on Auren, on the way she’s moving, on her expression. Her power is killing everyone in the ballroom, and now she has Midas pinned to the wall.

The gold isn’t attacking us, but the hysteria of her flashing aura worries me.

“Go,” I order the others.

Lu gapes at me. “Rip—”

“Auren isn’t fully in control right now, and I don’t want any of you getting hurt.”

“What about you?” she volleys.

I shake my head. “She won’t hurt me.”

The gold takes that moment to kill a Highbell guard right in front of us, his armor crushing his chest in with an audible crack.

“You sure about that?” Judd asks dubiously.

Osrik curses, drawing my eye back to Auren, and we all go still as we watch her place a kiss on Midas’s cheek. I might’ve gotten jealous if it weren’t for the fear in his eyes.

When she pulls back, the press of her lips leaves a mark behind, and my own power surges up. I watch in rapt fascination as Auren’s gold slithers and moves, and then, it starts to devour him. It’s a reveling fiend, shoving in his mouth, binding his limbs, holding him hostage until his struggles go still, his body adhered to the wall.

Shock courses through me at how fast it happened.

Midas is dead, trapped in the metal he coveted.

My breath hisses between my teeth as a barrage of emotions crashes over my head like thunder. Surprise, pride, guilt, it all rushes over me, soaking me through.

I’ve wanted that fucker dead since I found out he kept her in a cage. I’ve imagined rotting his spine and leaving him paralyzed on the ground for the birds to peck. The moment he laid hands on her, I wanted to lay hands on him.

But I didn’t need to.

I’m so fucking proud of her. She destroyed him so spectacularly that my chest swells, even as I feel guilt that she was put in this position in the first place.

You did it, Goldfinch.

I knew she could burn brighter than the sun if she only stepped out of his shade. But fuck. Even my faith in her strength didn’t match up to just how magnificent she really is.

That’s my girl.

“Shit, she killed him,” Osrik exclaims, doing nothing to hide the glee in his voice. “She actually killed him. Fucking amazing.”

“Good,” Digby spits, the colors of his bruised face darker with his fierce expression.

Lu snorts. “Alright, how about we make sure she doesn’t kill us before we start celebrating?”

“Go,” I tell them. “Move slowly.”

This time, they don’t argue. The five of them make a beeline for the archway, their steps cautious as they walk over the rippling floor, Ry and Osrik pulling along Digby between them.

When the gold doesn’t immediately attack them, they start going faster, tentative steps gliding across the space. Only when they slip out of the ballroom do I let out a breath of relief.

I turn back toward Auren just as she looks around the now empty room, her expression ecstatic…though not quite her own.

The gold has overtaken the space, moving like a tumultuous sea, churning and lifting, the walls weeping down like rain on a windowpane.

Auren’s attention snags onto the archway, and something nefarious warps her face, making her eyes gleam with light.

My chest tightens at the look of Auren’s waning aura, at the gold that starts to flicker. The magic is riding her hard—too hard. It’s draining her faster than I can blink. Though based on the volatile look on her face, I don’t think she even realizes the toll this is taking.

The gold room lives and breathes by her hand, and she’s controlling so very much of it—too much of it.

She starts striding toward the exit, so I make my way across the room, the soles of my shoes sticking to the floor like I’m walking on syrup. Gold laps at my ankles, the subtle waves of a tide washing up on the shore.

I don’t break my pace until I slide in front of her, blocking the archway.

Auren jerks to a stop, a massive crest of gold at her back casting her in a shadow, the wave of a tsunami ready to hit.

She watches me, but it’s not just her looking out of her eyes. Something else lurks there too.

I can feel her hunger, her need for revenge, and I have no qualms with her meting it out. I would gladly step aside and let her cast her reckoning on this whole damn kingdom. I’m not blocking her for them.

It’s her sapping strength that roots me in place. It’s fear that has me gently coaxing her, because I can feel the power feeding on her, draining her, killing her.

“Goldfinch, can you hear me?” I say softly.

Her head tilts, like she’s trying to place me, and my own expression turns grim, my chest going tight.

The magic has taken over.

“Auren,” I coax, taking a step forward. “You can let go now.”

A frown mars her beautiful face, resistance tightening in the gold behind her. The magic is sparking, making her skin gleam like beams of light reflecting off her skin even as sweat drips from her brow and her breathing grows labored.

Too much. It’s taking too fucking much.

I eat up the distance between us, ignoring the floor that pricks through my boots, my sole focus on her, on keeping the panic from my eyes so I can try to calm her down. “You need to let go, baby. You’re draining yourself.”

“Draining?” she asks, though her voice sounds strangely hollow.

I nod. “Yes. You need to drop the magic before you hurt yourself.”

The room seems to pulse.

“My gold won’t hurt me,” she hisses, something almost animalistic bearing down on me through her eyes.

“It already is. Your aura is fading. You can’t see it, but I can. I need you to breathe and let go of your power.” There’s a plea in my voice.

“No.” The floor shifts in an angry wave.

My teeth grit when her aura dims, and I know I have to fucking stop this. “You’re alright now. You don’t need it,” I say, trying to assuage her magic.

But then she goes and breaks my damned heart.

“I want everyone to hurt like I hurt.”

My lips press together in a hard line, fingers itching to reach out and touch her. “You punished the one who mattered,” I promise her.

You punished him.

Giving in to the need riding me, I take another step forward and reach out to caress her cheek. “Come back, Goldfinch,” I murmur, her bright eyes making mine burn, though I don’t look away.

Something shudders through her at my touch, her waning aura trembling, and then she blinks, the strange glow of her eyes receding.

“Slade?”

Hope leaps in my chest. “That’s right, baby. Let the magic go.”

Just when I think I have my Goldfinch back, Auren’s eyes flare with panic as she curses the gods. “I can’t. I don’t know how to let it go!”

Fuck.

I grab her trembling arms, trying to steady her while my own power beats at me, reacting to her terror. “Breathe, Auren.”

The room quakes, gold jumping and jerking in an erratic fit. “I can’t control it, I can’t—”

“You can,” I tell her, because I won’t accept anything else. She didn’t defeat Midas just for her own power to turn on her. “Try, Auren. It’s your power, it answers to you.”

She winces, her skin gone hot to the touch as she tries, but when the floor ripples again, her anxiety surges back full force.

“It’s going to hurt you!” she cries, shoving at me. “Go, Slade, I can’t…I can’t hold it back much longer, and I don’t know how to stop it!”

Refusing to let her push me away, I grab both of her cheeks and say, “Look at me.”

Her fearful eyes well up with tears. “You have to leave.”

And let her drain herself to death? Never.

“I already told you. If you think I’m leaving without you, you’re out of your damned mind,” I growl.

The gilded ceiling begins to drip like rain, the walls warping, the floor roiling, and Auren trembles with all of it, her aura so muted that it’s nearly snuffed out.

“Auren, your aura is fading fast, you have to let go!” I shout, voice rising to be heard above the groaning gold.

There’s a plea in her streaming eyes. “Leave. Please,” she says, slumping in my arms, her legs failing her.

I barely duck as a stream of gold falls just to the left of me, crashing to the ground. “Dammit, Auren, you don’t have time. Let go!”

But she either can’t anymore, or she won’t. My power is going fucking crazy, magic leaking from my feet, cracking the gold beneath me. When her aura nearly winks out, the roots around my chest claw inward like they’re trying to burrow straight through my damn heart.

Terror grapples my entire body, severs right down to my soul. She can’t die. She fucking can’t.

I won’t let her.

So I do the only thing I can think of before it’s too late and she lets the power drain her completely.

Leaning forward, I breathe her scent in, relish in the heat emanating from her skin. “Forgive me,” I whisper, because I loathe myself for what I’m about to do—for taking the choice away from her. But when it comes to her life, I can’t just sit back and let her sacrifice herself. Not for me.

My lips press against hers, even now, the supple warmth of them enough to take me to my knees. The moment she parts her mouth for me, I breathe out the rotted power within me. I let it sink in past her lips, feel it slip down her throat and root beneath her skin.

Her power wavers at the sudden intrusion, but the look of fear in her eyes nearly kills me.

“Forgive me,” I say again, because she’s scared of me. But she’s weak, so fucking weak, and I’m out of time.

With another push of power, I force her body to languish, even as my instincts scream that this is wrong. My own magic wars with me as I force her in a stasis between life and decay, as I make my power rot her from within. But I’m scared, so fucking scared that I could hurt her, that I could somehow do something wrong, push too hard.

“Forgive me,” I whisper for a third time, but I know she can no longer hear me. Please let this work, I implore silently. Please let her be okay.

When her aura is nothing but a wisp, she finally slumps, letting out a single, dusty breath as I catch her in my arms.

Without her consciousness to direct it, the wave of gold comes crashing to the floor. Taking a limp Auren in my arms, I run out of the archway just as a loud smash sounds. But even in the hall, more insipid gold is dropping from the ceiling and solidifying against the floor in uneven waves, nearly making me trip.

I dodge and duck, my spikes digging beneath my skin in a protective surge, wanting to come breaking out, but I grit my teeth and suppress it.

Gold floods the floor, splashing against the stairs, an unsuspecting servant crying out from somewhere behind me.

“Over here!”

I replace Osrik waving me forward, and I skid to the right, trying to keep from jostling Auren too much as he leads me out.

The entire castle seems to groan, and I realize that more gold than just what was in the ballroom is rioting without Auren conscious to direct it.

No wonder she fucking drained herself. It’s like she brought every piece of gold in the castle to life.

“Out here,” Osrik grunts, just before he takes a sharp right, where a doorway is being propped open by Ryatt.

The moment we make it out, Ry lets the door slam shut, and not three seconds later, something hard slams against the door, splintering the wood. We all back up on instinct, watching as gold curls through the break. But much to my relief, it gives one last shake before it solidifies, its movement stiffening to a stop.

The crashing and crackling of the rest of Ranhold Castle dies down too, until bleak, unnatural silence bleeds through the air.

“Shit,” Lu says, letting out a low whistle.

Osrik looks down at Auren. “Is she okay?”

My stomach churns, a tic jumping in my jaw. “I don’t know.”

Shockwaves go through my Wrath, and then a hobbling Digby comes pushing past them to check on Auren. When he sees the state of her, he brings a pair of glaring eyes up to me. “You’d better fix her. You hear me, boy? Fix. Her.”

I blink at the fierceness in his tone. I don’t think anyone has ever dared to call me boy, even when I was one. Yet I’m too damn terrified to even be bothered. I have no idea if I did more harm than good by using my power to keep her in this paused state, but I need to get her out of here. Far away, where there is no gold to grip her.

I turn and start stalking off, the others hurrying to match my step as I head for my army’s camp.

“What do you want to do, Slade?” Ry asks at my side.

My eyes harden with my resolve, only softening when they drop down to Auren’s face.

I’m going to fix her. She’s going to be alright.

I won’t accept anything else. I won’t even consider it.

Shouting voices from the front of the castle carry across the night air, making my steps quicken.

“We need to leave. Right fucking now,” I reply grimly. “Get the army back to Fourth.”

As soon as the panic abates, the survivors and witnesses are going to be talking. Accusing. Pointing fingers. They’re going to want answers and demand atonement. Because the dead can’t say what transpired in that ballroom.

But Queen Kaila can.

She and her group were in there. They saw what happened, and they saw that it was Auren who made it so.

It’s just a matter of time before they come for her.

But I’ll be fucking ready.